Episode Transcript
[00:00:12] Speaker A: Welcome to the Blessed Sacrament Homilies podcast, where our mission is to help everyone recognize and experience the presence of God. We hope you are nourished and encouraged by the Word. Thank you for joining us.
[00:00:25] Speaker B: The Lord be with you and with your spirit. A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Luke. Glory to you. Lord Jesus said to his disciples, I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing.
There is a baptism with which I must be baptized, and how great is my anguish until it is accomplished.
Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth?
No, I tell you, but rather division.
From now on, a household of five will be divided three against two and two against three.
A father will be divided against his son and a son against his father.
A mother against her daughter and a daughter against her mother.
A mother in law against her daughter in law.
A daughter in law against her mother in law.
The Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Well, that's two weeks in a row that Luke has definitely shared with us the good news, don't you think?
But in reality, that's exactly what this gospel is about.
But we have to break it open and look at the depth of what it's trying to tell us in order to understand how it's good news.
But I want to share with you a little story from my own life.
One of the best ways any of us can process grief at the loss of someone we love is to not shy away from talking about them, to share stories and memories.
And if we allow ourselves to do that, we'll notice, though, we'll get to a point of transition where tears become less and smiles and sometimes even laughter become more.
And once we get to that point where we can laugh and think about those memories, we are well on our way to healing.
Well, after my dad died, my mother and I did a lot of talking and we shared a lot of memories and stories.
Now, to fully understand that, you have to understand that my sense of humor comes from my mother. Everybody thinks it was my dad, but it was my mom.
She was by far the sarcastic one, the one with the acid tongue.
And as we were sharing remembrances of dad, one funny thing happened.
We both had noticed a tell in his behavior. And if you ever played cards, you know what a tell is. It's a way of interpreting what somebody's doing to see if they're actually telling you the truth.
You can tell if a card player is bluffing.
Well, we both noticed this tell in my father, but had never talked about it. While he was alive.
And that tell was, if something were happening and you were a little nervous, how is this going to work out? Is this going to be okay? If he ever said, trust me, run for the hills.
Because whenever he said, trust me, you could almost guarantee something was going to be amiss and it might end up even being a disaster.
Well, Jesus says, trust me, but his tell is one that is worth believing in.
His tell is based on our reality.
And all of our scripture readings today kind of filter into that understanding that no matter how hard things get, no matter how much we struggle, the one thing we can trust is that Christ's presence will be there when no one else will be.
And this gospel, while on the surface seems kind of awful when we recognize that the early audiences that would have heard these stories were already going through this stuff.
By being a follower of Jesus, they put their livelihood at risk. They put their relationships with family and friends at risk.
They might have even put their own life at risk.
And this gospel was meant to remind them that, yeah, this was all going to happen. Jesus knew about it. He understood it. He never promised that everything was going to be perfect.
In fact, he actually promised it might bring some difficulty.
But the one thing we have to remember is that in that difficulty, we will never be alone.
His presence will be with us.
And that truth actually still exists today. Anytime you're the lone voice crying for mercy and peace when everybody around you wants vengeance, you know what that's like.
Or perhaps you're the one standing up for people who cannot stand up for themselves when the mob mentality wants to dismiss them as unimportant and unworthy, you know what that's like.
Anytime you speak for generosity and the rest of the world guides you towards greed, you know what that's like.
Jesus never said being his follower, being his disciple, would be even remotely easy, but he did promise we'd never be alone.
