The Assumption - Lifting Up the Lowly

    Reflections on the Feast of the Assumption - August 15, 2022        

        Can you imagine what the world was like in 1950? Very few of us were alive then, and even fewer would be old enough to remember. This was five years after the Second World War with its terrible destruction of human life, property and virtue. Millions had died, and many more millions were displaced from their homes, seeking refuge and a new beginning. It was 5 years after the unleashing of not one but two atomic bombs that killed and maimed hundreds of thousands of civilians. In 1950 the malevolent grip of soviet-style communism was tightening over various countries, removing the rights of millions to lead dignified lives. Against this background of violence, oppression and dehumanization, Pope Pius XII, after asking the question of ALL the world’s bishops, infallibly asserted our Christian hope: Mary our Mother is in heaven.

        On November 1 of 1950 – the feast of All Saints – he issued his Apostolic Constitution that declared the Assumption of Mary into heaven body and soul to be Catholic dogma and was called Munificentissimus Deus – “Our Most Incredibly Generous God” - and right at the beginning he laid out the underlying reason for the timing of this declaration:

o   Now, just like the present age, our pontificate is weighed down by ever so many cares, anxieties, and troubles, by reason of very severe calamities that have taken place and by reason of the fact that many have strayed away from truth and virtue. (2)

                 Further on in the document, Pope Pius says this about his own wish for how this declaration would have an effect on Catholics:

o   And so we may hope that those who meditate upon the glorious example Mary offers us may be more and more convinced of the value of a human life entirely devoted to carrying out the heavenly Father's will and to bringing good to others. (42)

                 “Bringing good to others”. After all of the destruction, pain, and deprivation of the previous years, Pope Pius wanted to encourage Catholics – then and now – that because Mary has been assumed into heaven – not just her soul, but her human body – because of that, not only do we have hope of the same fate at the end of time, but that we would see the value of all human life today, in the here and now.

        And isn’t that a message that we so desperately need to hear today?

        As if the lasting effects of a worldwide pandemic weren’t bad enough, we’re also experiencing a global increase in racism, nationalism and an almost worldwide sense of selfishness or corruption which so many people hoped would decrease as a result of Covid 19, but appears to have had the opposite effect. Humility and tenderness seem sometimes to be in short supply – wealthier nations were sinfully slow in sharing their vaccine resources with poorer countries, and now the current economic struggles are reinforcing the "me first" and certainly the "America first" attitude.

                We know that this suffering is not a new phenomenon. War, violence, famine, and sickness have constantly ravaged the bodies of God’s people. In 1950 these effects were all too present and the memories were raw for so many people. In the declaration of the Assumption, the Church affirmed - then, and now - the importance of not just human souls, but human bodies. Caring for the sick, feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, sheltering the homeless were a big part of life then. These corporal acts of mercy toward the marginalized should distinguish us now as Christian people just as it has in past ages.

        How we regard people on the margins was brought home to me again just this past Wednesday, on August 10, when we celebrated the feast of St Lawrence – one of the early deacons of the Church in Rome. During a persecution of Christians, after Pope Sixtus and the 6 other deacons had been taken away and martyred, the Roman Prefect insisted that Lawrence bring him the treasures of the Church since Lawrence was responsible for administering them. Lawrence quickly gave away any and all of the material wealth of the Church, and then appeared before the Prefect of Rome together with the diseased and malnourished poor, the orphans, cripples, and widows, those socially excluded by the powerful hierarchies of the time– everyone on the fringes of society and declared, “these are the treasures of the Church”.

                 This feast of the Assumption is not just Mary’s story, but it’s our story as well. It’s a story of hope – based in the hope that we, too, like Mary, will someday - after our earthly journey - be reunited body and soul. But it is also, as Pope Pius said, an occasion for us to meditate on the value of human life and seize the opportunity to bring good to others. Mary had hope in a God that would

"...cast down the mighty from their thrones,
        and lift up the lowly.
    Who would fill the hungry with good things,
        and send the rich away empty..."         (Luke 1:52-53)

             The Good News is that as we do the will of our Most Incredibly Generous God, ministering to the least, the last and the lost, we can sing that Magnificat along with Mary, and proclaim the greatness of the Lord. 

Racism Is a Sin - Homily for 6th Sunday of Easter 2022

 

 “Racism is a sin: a sin that divides the human family, blots out the image of God among specific members of that family, and violates the fundamental human dignity of those called to be children of the same Father. Racism is the sin that says that some human beings are inherently superior and others essentially inferior because of race. It is a sin that makes racial characteristics the determining factor for the exercise of human rights.”

Those are the words of the U.S. bishops from a document titled “Brothers and Sisters to Us” written in 1979 – 43 years ago. They wrote that document about 15 years after the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act because they believed that although the legislation was in place for a more racially just society, the reality had not yet caught up. It's a document that every U.S. Catholic should read.

The Church has been very clear about its teaching on racism. “Brothers and Sisters to Us” identified racism as not just one sin among many, but as “a radical evil that divides the human family and denies the new creation of a redeemed world”.

Faithful Citizenship, the Bishops’ document on political responsibility, reminds us that racism is an intrinsic evil - like abortion and torture.

And most recently the Bishops issued still another Pastoral Letter against racism called “Open Wide Our Hearts” just 3 ½ years ago in 2018.

The unfortunate truth is that racism is not a thing of the past – and actually, it’s all too real, especially when we have a brutal reminder like we did last Saturday. But it seems like incidents of racism come at us in disconnected stories – like the murder of George Floyd two years ago this Wednesday, and the number of other incidents of the killings of black men, and the “racially-motivated killing spree” as Bishop Fisher called last Saturday’s shooting – and you can read his statement in today’s bulletin. All of this can sometimes lead us to believe that they are just isolated incidents, and not part of a larger pattern.

But racism is not just individual, it’s also institutional, and is embedded in many of our country’s structures and laws. Part of the problem is that in the post-civil rights era, we have been taught that racists are mean people who intentionally dislike others because of their race. And if we define racism that way, it’s easy for us to say, “I’m not mean, I don’t wish harm on anyone. So, I don’t have any racism in me.”

But I’m not sure we’re looking at racism honestly if that’s how we define it. Especially since the Church calls us to conversion to help eradicate this plague of racism from our country. The Bishops remind us that "Each of us as Catholics must acknowledge a share in the mistakes and sins of the past. Many of us have been prisoners of fear and prejudice. We have preached the Gospel while closing our eyes to the racism it condemns. We have allowed conformity to social pressures to replace compliance with social justice."

Some might object to thinking that we have a “share in the mistakes and sins of the past” since we didn’t own slaves, or personally keep Blacks from moving into the neighborhood. But we weren’t in the Garden of Eden, but share in the human character that story teaches – and just the same, being born in this society we are affected by the “original sin” of racism in America.

They say we have been “prisoners of fear and prejudice”. Have we allowed ourselves to be prisoners to fear and prejudice? Do we permit talk from our family or co-workers that demeans black people, or how white people are being replaced by minorities, or other negative stereotypes without objecting?

The Bishops also say that “We have preached the Gospel while closing our eyes to the racism it condemns.” They are saying that we don’t see the racism around us because we’re not looking hard enough.

Maybe a good analogy is to remember those “Magic Eye” pictures. Do you remember those? They were a combination of colors and patterns but there was another picture that was in there if you looked at it the right way. And then, once you saw it, you could see it every time.

Racism is a lot like that - Those who have been the object of racism are able to see it immediately and recognize it easily. Those of us who have not been the victims of racism can still train ourselves to see it – but it requires us to look honestly at events and situations in a different way and be willing to have a conversion of heart.

The Bishops point out that “We have allowed conformity to social pressures to replace compliance with social justice." Pope Benedict has said that the Church “cannot and must not sit on the sidelines in the struggle for justice” and that we must hunger for justice as we hunger for the Eucharist. But do we? What is keeping us from feeling that hunger for racial justice?

In just a short time we will approach the altar to receive “Communion”. But maybe part of the conversion that the Church is calling us to is to realize that until we are in full “communion” with all of our brothers and sisters – regardless of their color, race, or country they come from – that our communion will somehow be at least somewhat diminished.

Jesus tells us today that whoever loves him will keep his word, keep his commandment, the commandment that we heard him give us last week – love one another. That command to love one another has to extend not just to those next to us in the pew, or next to us on the street, but to everyone in the human family. Because as the Bishops remind us, “the brother and sister of our Brother Jesus Christ are brother and sister to us.”

The Urgent Call for Catholics to Address Gun Violence

 

(A note upfront: This is an updated version of an article that I wrote in July 2021 after a shooting across the street from St. Columba-Brigid Parish. In the wake of the racist attack on the East Side earlier this month, and now the mass murder of schoolchildren in Uvalde, Texas, we need to address the issue of gun violence once again.)

This past Monday I attended “Let Not Your Hearts Be Troubled”, the interfaith prayer service remembering and grieving for the ten Black sisters and brothers who were slain by a young racist using an assault-style weapon. Then just a few days ago nineteen children and two teachers were gunned down by a young man using an assault-style weapon. The two attacks are not outliers. Mass shootings happen in the U.S. with depressing regularity.

The truth is that unless there are high-profile events like those two, gun violence and mass shootings have become so much a part of our culture that they almost don’t even make headlines anymore. In the US this year there have been over 215 mass shootings, and this is only the 145^th day of the year.

In the wake of this increase in gun violence, there are groups that are working to help victims and their families with counseling and support. Many organizations have gathered food to deliver to those who can no longer shop at Tops on the East Side. There is an outpouring of “thoughts and prayers” for the families who lost children in Uvalde, Texas. But there still does not seem to be enough effort at the root of the problem: the preponderance and easy availability of guns.

This level of gun violence does not appear in other developed countries – and the one factor that sets the US apart is the number of guns and the lack of any regulation or registration. Current estimates are that there are over 400 million guns in the US – more than two times as many per person as any other country. And only one quarter of one percent of those guns are registered.

It is perplexing to see that there is no organized effort on the part of Catholics to oppose the continued deaths and assaults on human dignity that guns have perpetrated on our country and our Diocese. There is no Catholic parish that has an organized effort to advocate for gun control, and it is rare to hear any priest or deacon preach about gun control or the scourge of guns in our society.

Our US Bishops have repeatedly – at least since 1975 – called for reasonable regulations and controls for guns, especially handguns, and for a ban on assault weapons. Just a few years ago, after another tragic shooting, the Bishops sent testimony to the US Congress to push for better gun controls with a specific goal to build a culture of life and confront the culture of violence. Congress took no action for tighter controls.

After another mass shooting two years ago, the Bishops said that these shootings “…are an epidemic against life that we must, in justice, face.” We need action and advocacy from the parish level to push Congress for much tighter gun regulations, banning of assault weapons, and serious reduction in the number of guns in our society.

As I was driving past our parish school yesterday, I was reminded of Martin Luther King’s comment about the parable of the Good Samaritan. The priest and the Levite, King said, wondered, “If I help that man in the road, what will happen to me?”. The Good Samaritan, on the other hand, thought, “If I don’t help that man in the road, what will happen to him?” I watched those kids leaving school and I wondered, “If we don’t do something to control guns, what will happen to them?”

Deacon Don Weigel can be contacted at deacondon@gmail.com.