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Homilies | Friday, March 24, 2017

A picture speaks a thousand words

Homily by Archbishop Wenski at Mass at Catholic Relief Services board meeting in Baltimore

Homily by Archbishop Thomas Wenski at Mass at Catholic Relief Services, CRS, board meeting in Baltimore, MD. Thursday, March 23, 2017. 

A picture speaks a thousand words - which is why, today, we are most effective when we can accompany words with images. That's why we use power points - and incorporate photos, grafts, maps and other visuals into our presentations. Last night, at dinner, weren't Charlene's words about her trip to Guatemala enhanced by the visuals? Homilies might be more effective - and certainly more interesting - if we could figure out how to incorporate effectively audio-visual resources into them.

Some liturgical purists might object - but in today's gospel, Jesus does just that. He didn't have laptop to project a PowerPoint but he did have "miracles" -they were powerful "visuals" that illustrated what he was preaching about. He talked about the Kingdom - well, in the miracle, there was the Kingdom breaking into the world.

Well, those miracles still do happen every day in many different ways because of Catholic Relief Services- and while I don't say CRS makes them happen - for the glory belongs to God! - CRS is in the miracle business. Even a goat given to family - a goat that might eventually pay for a child's schooling - is a miracle that gives glory to God.

This is why we care about "Catholic identity" - because what CRS does is Jesus' work - it might not be "churchy" work but it is nonetheless God's work. Remember Jesus was not only about "soul salvation", he was about "whole salvation". As Saint Iraeneus said, the glory of God is man fully alive. And CRS in promoting the life and the dignity of the human person - helps man, in the generic sense including both male and female - to be "fully alive".

Of course, Jesus performs this miracle on the way to Jerusalem - and we know what awaits him there. He is involved in a cosmic struggle: this is the struggle of life versus death; sin versus grace; God versus the devil. He expels a demon who has made a man deaf and dumb. Jesus heals him - as Jesus healed us when at Baptism the priest or deacon also performed an exorcism on us touching our ears and our lips so that we might one day hear the Word of God and proclaim it.

Today, of course, people are more skeptical: we have a harder time believing in miracles or in exorcisms. But in the gospel, today even those opposed to Jesus didn't question the fact of the miracle. It was obvious: the dumb man speaks. The Pharisees don't question the miracle but they question the source of Jesus' power. He casts out devils, they say, by the power of Beelzebub.

And so, the Pharisees here are engaging in a tactic - still quite common today in politics - It is called "poisoning the well". They try to put down Jesus by associating him with something commonly repulsive - Beelzebulb, for the Jews, is the Lord of the flies - that is, the Lord of the dung heap. Here in the conduct of the Pharisees we see something of the mystery of iniquity. There is something demonic about their opposition - for if Satan had rendered that man literally deaf and dumb, they are figuratively deaf, dumb and blind! Isaiah says, "Woe to those who call good evil and evil good." And isn't the crisis of our age when evil is called good; and good evil?

So, if the opponents of Jesus say that he cast out demons in the name of Beelzebulb, we should not be surprised that our opponents say something similar about the Church and about CRS and the miracles we help bring about every day. Despite those that would try to "poison the well", the Kingdom is breaking into the world.

In this miracle and in all of Jesus' miracles including the miracle of his Passover we can see that there is that cosmic battle being waged between good and evil; but Satan is being defeated. "If I drive out demons by the figure of God, then the Kingdom of God has come to you."

We have to see ourselves as part of this cosmic battle - and we have to make sure we're on the right side; in any case, there is no room for neutrality. Lent calls us to walk with Jesus along his way, the way to Jerusalem. We are either on the way with him or we are in the way.

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