Category: homilies

The gospel today amounts to a summons to faith by Jesus. In particular, He is summoning us to faith in Him and in the truth He proclaims about His presence in the Holy Eucharist. Last week’s gospel ended with Jesus declaring that He is the bread that has come down from Heaven. Today’s gospel opens with the Jewish listeners grumbling about Jesus’ claim to have come from Heaven. Throughout the gospel, Jesus stands firm in His call to faith. He teaches them about the necessity of faith, its origins, and its fruits. Let’s learn of what the Lord teaches us in four stages.

I. The Focus of Faith – The gospel opens with the grumbling of the crowds, since Jesus claims to have come from Heaven: The Jews murmured about Jesus because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven,” and they said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph? Do we not know his father and mother? Then how can he say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

Their lack of faith is a scandal. It also shifts our focus to the need for faith and yet how difficult it is to have faith. Both the scandal and the difficulty are illustrated in the background to the crowd’s lack of faith.

First, recall that Jesus had just fed over 20,000 people with five loaves and two fishes, and there were still 12 baskets full of leftovers. It was this very miracle that caused many of them to follow Him when He went to the other side of the lake. All the miracles Jesus worked were meant to summon people to faith and to provide evidence for the truth of His words. Jesus said elsewhere, … for the works which the Father has granted me to accomplish, these very works which I am doing, bear me witness that the Father has sent me (John 5:36).

Thus their lack of faith, their grumbling and murmuring, was scandalous. The multiplication of the loaves and fishes was not the first miracle he had worked, nor would it be the last. Recall that he had also

changed water into wine, healed lepers, healed the centurion’s servant, cast out numerous demons, healed the lame, healed the woman with the hemorrhage, raised Jairus’ daughter, cast out blindness in numerous individuals (one of them blind since birth), cured the man with a withered hand, walked on the water, calmed storms at sea, fed 4000, fed 5000, healed the deaf and mute, caused miraculous catches of fish, raised the widow’s son, and raised Lazarus.

So the question is, what are they (we) going to focus on? What Jesus does, or where he’s from? It seems clear that they are more focused on His human origins: where He is from and who His human kin are.

Similarly, many today seem focused on the human dimensions of the Church, or the foibles of believers, or even on their own personal struggles. How many put their focus on what God is doing, or on the many daily miracles of simple existence, or on the many ways that even defeats become victories?

Where your focus? On mere human things? But what if the focus is on God, and that God is worthy? Is faith your focus? We can see why Jesus focuses on faith, because, frankly, we are a hard case and our faith needs to grow.

II. The Font of Faith – Noting their lack of faith, Jesus rebukes them in these words: Stop murmuring among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him on the last day. It is written in the prophets: They shall all be taught by God. Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me.

Jesus here teaches two things: that our faith in Him comes from the Father, and that we are a hard case.

First, Jesus teaches that His Father is the source of our faith in Him. Scripture elsewhere teaches this truth.

1. For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God (Eph 2:8).
2. This is my beloved son, listen to him (Matt 3:17).
3. But the testimony which I have is greater than that of John; for the works which the Father has granted me to accomplish, these very works which I am doing, bear me witness that the Father has sent me. 37 And the Father who sent me has himself borne witness to me (John 5:36).
4. I bear witness to myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness to me (John 8:18).

Here, then, is the central work of the Father: to save us by drawing us to faith in His Son, whom He sent to redeem the world.

But Jesus also teaches that this work of God generally involves dealing with considerable resistance on our part. And this fact is evident in the wording that Jesus uses, namely, that the Father must “draw” us to the Son. The Greek word here is ἑλκύσῃ (helkuse), which means to drag, draw, pull, or persuade; it always implies some kind of resistance from what is being drawn or dragged. For example, this is also the word used in John 21:6 when describing drawing a heavily laden net to shore.

Thus Jesus points to their (our) stubbornness in coming to faith. We are stubborn and stiff-necked, so the Father has to exert effort in order to draw—yes, even drag—us to Jesus.

Yes, we’re a hard case and we have to be “drug.”  Someone once said,

I had a drug problem when I was young: I was drug to church on Sunday morning. I was drug to church for weddings and funerals. I was drug to family reunions and community socials no matter the weather. I was drug by my ears when I was disrespectful to adults. I was also drug to the woodshed when I disobeyed my parents, told a lie, brought home a bad report card, did not speak with respect, or spoke ill of the teacher or the preacher. Or if I didn’t put forth my best effort in everything that was asked of me. I was drug to the kitchen sink to have my mouth washed out with soap if I uttered a profane four-letter word. I was drug out to pull weeds in mom’s garden and flower beds and to do my chores. I was drug to the homes of family, friends, and neighbors to help out some poor soul who had no one to mow the yard, repair the clothesline, or chop some firewood. And if my mother had ever known that I took a single dime as a tip for this kindness, she would have drug me back to the wood shed. Those drugs are still in my veins and they affect my behavior in everything I do, say, and think. They are stronger than cocaine, crack, or heroin, and if today’s children had this kind of drug problem, America might be a better place today.

III. The Functioning and Fruit of Faith – Jesus goes on to teach about how faith functions and what its fruit is: Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life.

First, as regards the functioning of faith, the Greek text is more clear than our English translation. The Greek word here for “believes” is πιστεύων (pisteuon), a present, active participle. This construction signifies an ongoing action and is better translated as “He who goes on believing …” or “He who is believing …”

The danger is that we reduce faith to an event or to an act. Thus, some say that they answered an altar call, others point to their baptism. Good. But what is going on now, today? What is prescribed here by the Lord is lasting, ongoing faith. It is a lasting faith because faith is more than an event; it is an ongoing reality. It is more than something you have; it is something you do, daily. It involves leaning on and trusting in God. It is basing our whole life on His Word, the daily obedience of faith.

Scripture says elsewhere of this ongoing necessity for faith,

1. But you must hold fast to faith, be firmly grounded and steadfast in it. Unshaken in the hope promised you by the gospel you have heard (Col 1:21ff).
2. Brethren I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and in which you stand firm. You are being saved by it at this very moment provided you hold fast to it as I preached it to you. Otherwise you have believed in vain (1 Cor 15:1).
3. He who perseveres to the end will be saved (Matt 24:13).

Jesus, having taught of the ongoing quality of faith, also speaks of its fruit, which is “eternal life.” Here, too, we have to move beyond reductionist notions of what is meant by eternal life.

The Christian use of the word “eternal” does not refer only to the length of life but also to its fullness. The Greek word here that is translated as “eternal” is αἰώνιος (aionios–where we get the English word Aeon). And aiṓnios, according the Greek lexicon of Scripture, does not focus on the future per se, but rather on the quality of the age. 

Note, too, that the Greek word translated here as “has” is ἔχει (echei) and is a present, indicative, active verb. Thus, it does not refer only to something that we will have, but something that we now have. So believers live in “eternal life” right now, experiencing this quality of God’s life now, as a present possession. And while we do not now enjoy it fully, as we will in Heaven, we do have it now and it is growing within us.

Thus, Jesus teaches that the believer enjoys the fullness of life, even now, in a growing way, day by day. One day we, too, will enjoy the fullness of life, to the top, in Heaven.

Here then is Jesus’ teaching on the functioning of faith (its ongoing quality) and the fruit of faith (eternal life, i.e., the fullness of life).

IV. The Food of Faith – Having set forth the necessity of faith, Jesus now prepares to turn up the heat a bit and test their faith. Not only has he come from Heaven, but He is Bread that they must eat; and the bread is His flesh. He says to them, Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died, but this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.

Now this final verse points to next week’s Gospel, in which this concept will be developed more fully and graphically. But in effect, having warned them of the necessity of faith, Jesus now points to one of His most essential teachings: the Holy Eucharist, the Sacrament of His Body and Blood.

Without faith, they (we) can neither grasp nor accept this teaching. And, as we shall see next week, most of them turned away from Him and would no longer follow Him, because they could not accept what He was saying. They did not have the faith to trust Him in this matter; they scoffed and left Him. We will discuss this more fully next week as John 6 continues to unfold for us.

But for now let the Lord ask you, “Do you have faith to believe what I teach you on this?” Perhaps we can say, with the centurion, “I do believe; help my unbelief.” Or we can join with the Apostles, who said, “Increase our faith!” Or we can say with St. Thomas Aquinas,

Visus, tactus, gustus in te fallitur (sight, touch, and taste, in thee fail)
Sed auditu solo tuto creditur. (But only the hearing is safely believed.)
Credo quidquid dixit Dei Filius; (I believe whatever the Son of God says.)
Nil hoc verbo veritátis verius. (Nothing is more true than this word of truth.)

But in the end, either we will have faith or we will be famished. Either we will have the faith to approach the Lord’s table or we will go unfed. Jesus says later, Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood, you have no life in you (John 6:53). In other words, we starve spiritually without the faith that brings us to God’s table.

Behold how few come to the Lord’s table in these times, in these days which so lack in faith. It is estimated that only 27% of American Catholics today go to Mass. If we have faith in the Eucharist, how can we stay away? We cannot. To the degree that we believe, we will not miss a Sunday Mass; our devotion to the Lord will increase daily and our experience of the fullness of life (eternal life) will grow.

It’s either faith or famine. Do you believe?

All of the readings in today’s Mass speak of human desire. The Israelites in the desert are hungry, so are the people by the lakeside with Jesus. And in the Epistle, St. Paul warns of corrupted desires. In all of the readings, God teaches us that our desires are ultimately directed to Him, who alone can truly satisfy us. Why is this? Because our desires are infinite, and no finite world can satisfy them.

Let’s look at what the Lord teaches by focusing especially on the Gospel, but also including insights from the other readings. There are three basic parts to the teaching on desire. The notes that follow are more extensive than I could preach in a Mass. They are really more in the form of an extended Bible Study on this passage.

I. THE HUNGER OF DESIRE – Today’s gospel begins where last week’s left off. To refresh your memory, Jesus had multiplied the loaves and fishes and satisfied the crowd with abundant food, but then slipped away and headed across the lake to Capernaum. Today’s text begins, When the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they themselves got into boats and came to Capernaum looking for Jesus.

Thus we begin by simply noting the hunger of the people. Allow hunger here to represent all of our desires. Desires, of themselves, are good and God-given. It is the people’s hunger, their desire, that makes them seek Jesus. Further, their desire is very deep and strong; they are willing to journey a significant distance to find Jesus.

As such, desire has something important to teach us. It is easy to see that our desired motivate us. But we should also recognize that they are infinite, unlimited. For no matter how much we get, we always want more. We may experience some momentary satisfaction with certain things like food, but it doesn’t last long. Taken together, our desires are limitless.

This limitless, infinite quality demonstrates God’s existence, for a finite world cannot give what it doesn’t have, namely, infinite longing. Thus, our infinite longings point to God and must come from Him. Our hearts, with all their infinite longings, teach us that we were made for God and will not find rest apart from Him.

Purification is needed. The journey of the people around the lake to find Jesus is good in itself, but as we shall see, their hunger needs purification and a more proper focus. They do not seek Jesus as God, but rather as the “bread king.” They seek mere bread, mere food for their stomachs. But the Lord wants to teach them that all their desires really point higher. And that leads us to the second movement of today’s gospel.

II. THE HEALING OF DESIRE – As we have already noted, desire is good and God-given. But, in our fallen condition, our desires are often unruly, and our darkened minds often misinterpret what our desire is really telling us.

Desires are unruly because we desire many things out of proportion to what we need, and to what is right and good.

Our minds are darkened in that we consistently turn to the finite world in a futile attempt for satisfaction, and, when it fails, we keep thinking that more and more of the finite world will satisfy our infinite longing. This is futile and is the sign of a confused and darkened mind, because the world cannot possibly satisfy us.  More on this in a moment.

For now, Jesus must work with these bread-seekers (us) and help them to realize that their desire for bread is about much more than mere food; it is about God. He is the Lord whom they really seek. Let’s observe how He works to heal their desires.

A. The Doctor is in – The text says, And when they found him across the sea they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” Their question is somewhat gratuitous, since they know exactly when He got there; they are simply trying to strike up a conversation in order to get more bread. As we shall see, Jesus calls them on it. But note this much: they are looking for Jesus and they do call him “Rabbi.” Both these facts are good. Their desire, though imperfectly experienced, has brought them to Jesus, who, as Lord, can now teach them (and us) about what their longing is really telling them. The doctor is in.

B. The Diagnosis – The text says, Jesus answered them and said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled.” In other words, “You are not looking for me because you saw signs and want to believe in me, but because you want your bellies filled.”

And this is our essential problem: we focus on our lower desires, our bodily needs, neglecting our higher, spiritual desires. We have a deep, infinite longing for God, for His love, goodness, beauty, and truth. But instead of seeking these things, we think another hamburger will do the trick. Or if not that, a new car, a new house, a new job, more money, more sex, more power, or more popularity. We think that if we just get enough of all this “stuff” we’ll finally be happy. But we will not; it’s a lie. A finite world cannot possibly satisfy our infinite longing.

In the second reading from today’s Mass, St. Paul warns, I declare and testify in the Lord that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds … that you should put away the old self of your former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires, and be renewed in the spirit of your minds (Eph. 4:17, 20-23).

Note St. Paul’s use of the word “futility.” The Greek word is ματαιότης (mataiotes), here meaning unreality, purposelessness, ineffectiveness, a kind of aimlessness due to a lack of purpose or any meaningful end, nonsense because it is transitory and not enduring.

In other words, it is exactly what the Lord is getting at in telling them that their desires are messed up. It is the sign of a darkened mind to pile up finite, earthly goods in a futile attempt to satisfy infinite desires.

St. Paul goes on to say that some of our desires are deceitful. They are so because they bewitch us into thinking that our life is about them, and that if we attend to them only, we will be happy. We will not; this is a deception. Simply getting more food, sex, drink, houses, money, power, etc. will not cut it. These are finite things, while our desires are ultimately infinite.

Thus the doctor, along with his assistant, St. Paul, has made the diagnosis: You and I are seeking bread (not evil in itself) when we should also be seeking Him who is the True Bread of Life. They say to us, in effect, “You seek the consolations of God, but not the God of all consolation. You want good things, but do not seek the giver of every good and perfect gift.”

So we have our diagnosis. Our desires are our out of whack and/or our darkened minds misinterpret the message that our lower desires are really giving us. Next come the directives.

C. The Directives – The Lord gives three essential directives:

1. Fix your focus – Jesus says, Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. The point is that we should attend more to things that endure unto life eternal than to the passing things of this world.

Most of us do just the opposite. The passing world and its demands get all our attention and things like prayer, scripture, sacraments, building our relationship with the Lord, learning His will, and obeying His will, all get short shrift. We attend to “the man” and tell God to “take a number.” It’s kind of dumb, really.

The passing world, a sinking ship, gets all our attention. Calling on the one who can rescue us and learning His saving directives and following them gets little attention. Instead we “rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic,” indulge ourselves on the “lido deck,” and get angry that we don’t have a first class cabin.

The Lord says, “Hey! Fix your focus! That ship is going down. What will you do then? Why obsess about that stuff? Turn to me and listen carefully; I alone can save you.” Fix your focus: worry less about things that perish and focus more on the things that last and can save.

2. Firm Up your Faith – Jesus goes on to say, For on him the Father, God, has set his seal.” So they said to him, “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?” Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.”

Okay, so the ship is going down; the world is perishing. So how do we get saved from it? The answer is faith.

But faith here must be understood as more than just answering a mere altar call or the recitation of a creed. And surely it is more than “lip service.” Faith here is understood as being in a life-giving, transformative relationship with Jesus Christ.

Real faith puts us into a relationship with the Lord that changes the way we walk, that gives us a new mind and heart, new priorities, indeed, a whole new self. To be in a relationship with Christ, through faith, is to be changed by Him. And it is this change, this obedience of faith, this transformation that saves us and gets us ready to meet God.

So the Lord says, “Come to me and firm up your faith.”

3. Find your Food – But as the discussion with them continues, they show themselves to be a stubborn lot.  They say, “What sign can you do, that we may see and believe in you? What can you do? Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, as it is written: He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”

In effect they are still back to demanding bread. It’s as if to say, “Sure, fine, all that higher stuff is fine, but I want bread for my belly. So give me that and then we’ll talk about all that higher stuff and that bread that endures and does not perish. If you want me to have faith, first give me bread for my belly.”

They’re still more interested in the stuff of a sinking ship.

 So Jesus says to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” And in saying this, Jesus is saying, in effect, “Don’t you see that the ancient bread in the wilderness was about GOD? It was not merely food to fill their bellies; it was food to draw them to deeper and saving faith. It was food to strengthen them for the journey to the Promised Land. And so it must be for you: that you understand that even your lower desires are ultimately about God. If mere grain is your food, you are doomed, for food perishes and you along with it. But if God himself is your food, now you can be saved, for I, the Lord and the Bread that endures, will draw you with me to eternal life.”

And in these ways the Lord seeks to heal their desires. But now comes the main point.

III. THE HEART OF DESIRE – So they said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.“

And thus we see that the Lord now makes it plain: I AM your food. I AM the fulfillment of all your desires. I AM the only one who can really fulfill your infinite longings, for I AM the Lord and I AM infinite. Yes, I AM your true bread.

So what does the Lord mean in saying we will never again hunger or thirst? To some extent we must see that Jesus is employing an ancient “Jewish way of speaking,” which looks to the end of things and adopts them as now fully present. There is no time to fully develop this here and describe how it is used elsewhere, but in short, it is the capacity to see things as “already but not yet,” and to begin to live out of the “already” in the here and now.

Thus Jesus is saying, in more modern terms, “To the degree that you enter into a life- changing and transformative life with me, and to the degree that I become your bread, that I become that which satisfies you, your desires will come more and more into line and you will find them being satisfied more and more with each passing day. You will find in your life a satisfaction that a new iWatch could never give, that money, power, sex, possessions, and all other passing goods could never give. And one day, this satisfaction will be full and never pass away when you are with me in heaven.”

Of this I am a witness, for with each passing day in my life of faith with the Lord, I can truly say that I am more and more satisfied. The things of this passing world are of less interest to me and the things of God and Heaven are increasingly the apple of my eye. I have a ways to go, but the Lord has been good to me and His promises are true, for I have tested them in the laboratory of my own life.

The old song is increasingly mine, which says, “I heard my mother say, Give me Jesus. You may have all this world, just give me Jesus.”

In the gospel in the weeks ahead, the Lord Jesus will develop how He is bread for us in more than a metaphorical way. Rather, He is our True Bread in the Eucharist and the Bread He will give is His flesh for the life of the world. Yes, His Body and Blood are our saving food for the journey to the Promised Land.

I am mindful of an old gospel hymn that I’d like to give a Catholic spin. For I have it on the best of authority that when Jesus was speaking to the crowd in today’s gospel, He started to tap his toe and sing this song:

The gospel today speaks to us of the priority of personal prayer. You may recall that in last week’s gospel, Jesus sent them out two by two to proclaim the Kingdom. Now they return, eager to report the progress and the graces they encountered.

But as Jesus listens, he urges them (perhaps because they are overjoyed) to come aside and rest awhile, for they have labored long. In so doing, Jesus also teaches us about prayer. Let’s consider four teachings on prayer that are evident in today’s gospel.

I. The Practice of Praise-filled Prayer – The text opens with the disciples gathering with Jesus and joyfully recounting all they experienced on their missionary journey. In a similar text in Luke (10:17), the disciples return filled with joy and rejoice that demons are subject to them (in the power of Jesus).

Thus, the first instinct of the disciples is joyful gratitude before the Lord.

Is your prayer filled with praise and thanksgiving? Are you grateful to God for all He has done? Do you tell God what is happening in your life and give Him thanks for all He has enabled you to do?

Too many people think of prayer only in relation to petition. But praise is also an essential component of prayer. When Jesus began his instruction on prayer, He said, When you pray, say, ‘Our Father, who art in heaven hallowed be thy name’ (Mat 6:9). In other words, “Father your name is holy; you are a great God, a wonderful God; you can do all things and I praise you! Thank you Father; your name is holy and you are holy.”

So praise the Lord. Thank Him for what He is doing and tell Him everything you are experiencing. Scripture says that we were made for the praise of his glory (Eph. 1:16). So praise the Lord in your prayer. Don’t know how? Take a psalm of praise; pray or sing the Gloria from Mass; sing or recite a hymn, but praise Him!

II. The Peace of Personal Prayer – Jesus invites the disciples to come away by themselves to a quiet place and rest for a while. Most people don’t think of their personal prayer as a privileged invitation from the Lord, nor do they think of it as rest.

Yet, consider that the Lord invites us to come aside and spend personal and private time with Him. Most people would relish personal attention from a celebrity or famous person. Why not from the Lord? An old song says, “What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer.”

Note the description of this time as “rest.” Most people think of prayer more as a task than as a time of rest. Yet to pray is to rest, to withdraw from this world for a brief time and enjoy the presence of the Lord. Scripture says, For thus the Lord GOD, the Holy One of Israel, has said, “In repentance and rest you will be saved. In quietness and trust is your strength” (Is 30:15).

And old hymn says,

Sweet hour of prayer! Sweet hour of prayer!
That calls me from a world of care,
And bids me at my Father’s throne
Make all my wants and wishes known.
In seasons of distress and grief,
My soul has often found relief,
And oft escaped the tempter’s snare,
By thy return, sweet hour of prayer!

Learn to think of prayer as quiet time, as rest with the Lord, when He soothes, strengthens, refreshes, and blesses us.

III. The Primacy of Prioritized Prayer – The text tells us that people were coming and going in great numbers seeking the attention of the Lord and the Apostles; they could not even get a moment to eat!

Now there is no doubt that the people had critical needs. They needed to be taught, healed, fed, and cared for in many ways. And yet even in the face of this, Jesus said, in effect, “We have to get away from all this for a while.” He directed the disciples to go off in the boat to a deserted place.

Indeed, one of the few places they could “get away” was out on the water. So out they went, where the crowds could not follow them. They were alone and quiet for just a brief while.

Jesus made prayer a priority. Scripture says of Him, But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed (Luke 5:16). Scripture also speaks of Him rising early to pray (Mk 1:35), praying late into the night (Mt 14:23), praying all night long (Lk 6:12), and praying in the mountains (Matt 14:23) and other deserted places. Yes, Jesus made prayer a priority.

Understanding prayer as rest helps us to understand why prayer must be a priority in our lives. If we are going to engage in the work to which God has called us, we need to be replenished and refreshed daily by spending time with the Lord.

If we were to engage in physical work without ever stopping to rest, we would collapse. The spiritual life has a similar law. Resting with God in prayer fills us with His presence, grace, and strength so that we can be equipped, empowered, and enabled unto the tasks that He has given us.

No one can give or share what he does not have. And if we aren’t praying and experiencing God’s presence, how can we share it? To share grace, we must first receive it. To speak the Word, we must first receive it. To witness to the Lord, we have to know Him.

Jesus often had to hide in order to pray. Sometimes the only quiet place He could find was out on the lake. But Jesus did make time for prayer, and He invites the Apostles and us to do the same, not only despite the busyness of life, but because of it.

A Story: A priest friend of mine said that he once gave spiritual direction to a religious sister back in the 70s. At that time, it was common for people to say “my work is my prayer.” When this priest inquired of the good sister’s prayer life she answered, “Oh, I’m too busy to pray, but that’s OK, my work is my prayer; that’s my spirituality.” And he replied, “Sister, if you’re not praying, you don’t have a spirituality.” He got her to start praying for one hour a day. Some years later, he ran into her at the airport. By now, she had moved on to become a major superior in her order. “How are you doing, Mother,” he asked. “Oh,” she replied, “I am very busy!” He cringed, but then she added, “I’m so busy these days that I have to spend two hours a day praying!”

Now there’s a smart woman! When we’re being foolish we say, “I’m too busy to pray.” When we’re being smart we say, “I’m so busy that I need to pray more.”

Jesus made prayer a priority. Prayer is the rest that strengthens us for the task; it is the refreshment that gives us new vigor and zeal.

IV. The Power of Pious Prayer – The text says that after Jesus spent this time alone with the Apostles on the boat, they reached the other shore. And sure enough, the crowd was there waiting for them. But Jesus and the Apostles had been refreshed and were now well-rested. Jesus, refreshed and renewed, saw the vast crowd and began to teach them at great length.

Prayer has that effect. In drawing close to God, who is love, we are better equipped to love others. Jesus, though He never lacked love for them, models this renewal for us. The text says that upon seeing the crowd, His heart was moved with pity for them.

An aside – The Greek word used is σπλαγχνίζομαι (splagchnizomai), which means “to be moved with compassion.” The English word “pity” often carries with it a condescending tone. But what happens here is that Jesus sees them, loves them, and has compassion for their state. The religious leaders in Jerusalem have largely abandoned them, considering them “the great unwashed.” But Jesus loves them and teaches them at great length.

For us, it often takes many years and lots of prayer to equip our hearts in this way. One of the signs that grace and prayer are having their effect is that our love for others, even for the multitudes, grows deeper, more compassionate, more patient, and more merciful. This takes great prayer and long hours of sitting at the Lord’s feet and learning from Him.

But here is the power that prayer bestows: we should be more fully equipped for our mission, more zealous, and more loving. The rest afforded by prayer rejuvenates our better nature and helps it to grow.

So here are four teachings on prayer. Jesus found time to pray; He made prayer a priority. How about you?

One of the great obstacles to effectively evangelizing is that most Christians lack the requisite freedom and simplicity of life to carry forth the task consistently and coherently. In today’s gospel, the Lord offers some counsel on what is required to evangelize effectively.

As we read a gospel like this, it is tempting to think that it speaks only of specialists such as missionaries, religious, priests, or deacons. But such a presumption forgets that everyone is called to evangelize: clergy to people, parents to children, elders to youngsters, siblings to siblings, friends to friends, neighbors to neighbors.

Thus this gospel is for all of us, and it summons us to a greater freedom that will equip, empower, and enable us to evangelize more effectively. Let’s look at the Lord’s counsels.

I. The Freedom of SUMMONS – The text says Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits.

It may not be immediately obvious how a summons is freeing, but consider that, to the extent that we know we are called to do something by someone in authority, we are often more courageous and diligent in doing it, even if it is hard. A commanding officer may have to ask his troops to engage in a difficult battle, but because he knows that his own commanders have ordered it and that it is part of a wider strategy, he tries to rally his troops. He speaks not only with his own authority but that of others, and thus he is courageous and his words have weight. And even if his troops protest or seem unenthusiastic, he remains strong because he knows his duty and that he is doing what is right.

Yes, being under a summons is freeing and empowering. And so for us, if we know that the Lord has summoned us and sent us to evangelize (and he surely has (cf Matt 28:19)) we can go forth with courage to rally God’s people and summon them to the Lord’s team. And even when people react poorly we need not be discouraged, for we know we are under the orders of God Himself and that what we speak is right.

As a priest, I am often called upon to speak on topics that some do not want to hear. And yet, to the degree that I know I have called to speak it, I do so with courage, knowing that when the Lord and His Church bid me to address something, I speak not only with my own authority but with that of God. Some may grumble that they don’t want to hear me talk about money, abortion, religious liberty, or homosexual or heterosexual sin. Yet to the degree that I know I AM called to speak on these things, I still do so and do so with courage. Yes, I am summoned. I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! … for God has given me this sacred trust (1 Cor 9:17).

Do you know that you have been summoned? Have you experienced this call? Do you see it as a mandate, as something you have been summoned to do? Priests and deacons need to recognize our call to preach the Word of God unambiguously. We are under orders from the Lord. As Scripture says, In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, I give you this charge: Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage–with great patience and careful instruction (2 Tim 4:1-2). But honestly, can any of you who are parents and grandparents not see that you are called to the same for your children? And who of us here can say that any but perhaps the youngest are exempt from the summons to preach, to declare the Word of God?

Knowing and experiencing that you have been summoned is freeing! 

II. The Freedom of SIMPLICITY – The text says, He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick— no food, no sack, no money in their belts. They were, however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic.

One the most fundamental reasons that people do not evangelize is that we have way too much baggage. What kind of baggage? Consider that our lives are

1. CLUTTERED – We have too much stuff. And stuff needs attention, maintenance, and money; it takes up space and ties us down. We also have the baggage and clutter of too many commitments. We’re overscheduled and overbooked. We have many wrongful priorities such that we spend too much time worrying about things that don’t matter all that much in the end. And what does matter gets put on hold. Reading Bible stories to your kids? No time for that; we’ve got to get to soccer practice!  Yes, our lives are cluttered with the excess baggage of too many distractions. And what is a “dis-traction?” It is something that gets you off track and makes you lose traction in what really matters.
2. COMPLEX – Most of our lives are so cluttered and choked with excess baggage we don’t even know where to begin to simply it. We don’t know how to break the cycle, how to say no. So we end up carrying all this stuff and are quite enslaved to its demands.
3. COMPROMISED – All this extra baggage weighs us down and entangles us with the world. Thus, our values are not the values of the gospel. Instead, we are tied down to the world, loyal to it, and invested in its thinking and its ways.

We need to be free to preach the Gospel and to evangelize. So the Lord says, simplify! Too much obsession with money, food, clothes, boxes of stuff, popularity, and fitting in will hinder you.

Think of a runner in a race. He does one thing only and carries nothing extra that would weigh him down. Travelers, too, do not take their whole house with them, only what is necessary. And, in terms of this world, we are just traveling through.

Most of us just have too much stuff. Because of this, we are tied to this world and lack the kind of freedom necessary to witness prophetically to what is beyond this passing world. Ask the Lord to help you gently but persistently simplify your life so that it increasingly becomes about the one thing necessary.

III. The Freedom of STABILITY – The text says, He said to them, “Wherever you enter a house, stay there until you leave.”

Stability is the freedom to accept what is and to work with it rather than to be constantly looking for something better. It is the freedom to bloom where you are planted, and to use what God actually gives rather waiting for something better.

There’s a real freedom to staying put and developing the deeper relationships that are usually necessary for evangelization to be effective and lasting.

One of the bigger problems with handing on the faith today is that there is very little stability in families, communities, and parishes. When things and people are passing and ephemeral, how can values rooted in lasting things be inculcated?

Preaching the gospel often depends on well-founded relationships, patience, perseverance, and taking the long view of life. Running here and there and living life only on the surface will not cut it. Shallow soil does not sustain taller growth. Only deep roots can do that.

Ask for the freedom to stay put and to be less anxious about the possibility that there may be a better job, a better community, a better deal out there somewhere. There is value in being grateful for what you have and working with that, in setting down deep roots and lasting relationships. This is the deeper and richer soil in which evangelization can happen.

IV. The Freedom of SURETY – The text says, Whatever place does not welcome you or listen to you, leave there and shake the dust off your feet in testimony against them.

Here is one of the greatest freedoms of all: the gift to be free of our obsession with being liked, approved of, and popular. Too often we are overly concerned with being popular. We care too much about what others think of us, at the expense of the truth of the gospel.

In effect, Jesus implies here that rejection will surely happen and when it does, shake it off, let it pass over you. Speak the truth and don’t worry about rejection, expect it! This is a very great freedom.

Too many parents are desperate to have their children like and accept them. They avoid discipline and difficult teachings. It is necessary to be free of this “need.” The Lord can give that to you.

We are not speaking here of becoming sociopaths, caring not one whit what others think. This is not an invitation to be impolite, or to fail to groom ourselves and be presentable. Rather, it is an invitation to be free of our obsession with popularity so that we can shake off the rejection of the gospel that we will inevitably experience. And again, the Lord can give that to us.

V. The Freedom of SUBSTANCE – The text says, So they went off and preached repentance. The Twelve drove out many demons, and they anointed with oil many who were sick and cured them.

There is freedom in knowing what to say and what to do. And this freedom flows from the SUBSTANCE. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Crucified. This is freeing, for we cannot be compelled to change or adapt the message that has already been set for us. There is a freedom in sticking to the message proclaimed once and for all. The world demands compromise, that certain passages of Scripture be modified. But we, who in no way can do this, are free of such compulsion.

Only those who are enslaved to the times and the mentality of this world can be so compelled. But to the degree that we know we are summoned, sent, and given the substance of what to preach, we are free to announce, and free from coercion to compromise.

And substance was “repentance.” As we have noted before, the Greek word μετανοῶσιν (metanoosin) means more than simply to clean up one’s behavior. It means “to come to a new mind,” or “to change one’s thinking.” Hence the evangelizer seeks to appeal to the whole person. It is not only a person’s behavior that is important; it is also how he thinks and what is taking place in the deepest part of his soul.

The Lord seeks to heal the whole person from the inside out. Thus the Apostles and those of us free enough to be true evangelizers are not seeking merely to inform but to transform.

And note how the text describes them as driving out demons and curing the sick. Is this merely some exotic ability of the early Apostles? No. We, too, by this proclamation, drive out the demons of sadness, meaninglessness, ignorance, misplaced priorities, atheism, agnosticism, worldliness, materialism, and so forth. We also bring healing and peace for those accept the power of the Word of God into their lives. These healings are very real. I know them in my own life and have seen them in the lives of others.

Are you free enough to evangelize, to preach the gospel, and to bring healing and peace to others? Are you free enough to be a means of God’s transformative Word?