{"id":312,"date":"2009-08-22T11:53:00","date_gmt":"2009-08-22T11:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2009\/08\/homily-for-august-23-2009-21st-sunday-in-ordinary-time.html"},"modified":"2009-08-22T11:53:00","modified_gmt":"2009-08-22T11:53:00","slug":"homily-for-august-23-2009-21st-sunday-in-ordinary-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2009\/08\/homily-for-august-23-2009-21st-sunday-in-ordinary-time.html","title":{"rendered":"Homily for August 23, 2009: 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

When you\u2019re on vacation, sometimes, you can\u2019t completely get away from the world. <\/p>\n

Last week, I watched the news down in Florida, and saw the tragic pictures of that plane crashing into a helicopter over the Hudson. It was truly horrific. <\/p>\n

In the Wall Street Journal this past week, a priest who ministered to the family of the helicopter pilot wrote powerfully about their faith, in the middle of that nightmare. <\/p>\n

<\/a>But what was particularly impressive to me was the faith of the young helicopter pilot himself, Captain Jeremy Clarke. <\/p>\n

He had been born and baptized a Catholic, but was never confirmed. As a lot of us do, he drifted from the faith. But his mother prayed for years that he would come back to the Church. And a few months ago, he did. He decided to complete his sacraments of initiation, and was confirmed. His fianc\u00e9 kept a letter that Jeremy had written to God, at the time of his confirmation. He expressed his joy at that moment:<\/p>\n

Dear God,
None of this could have happened without your intervention. The timing could not have been more perfect. The improbable has become a reality. I pray to keep improving myself and getting better with your help. Thank you for all that I have in my life, I am blessed.
With love,
Jeremy Clarke<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a beautiful letter \u2013 heartfelt and hope-filled. And it\u2019s all the more poignant in light of the event that we all saw on television \u2013 the terrible crash that cost Jeremy Clarke his young life.<\/p>\n

But when you think about Captain Clarke\u2019s choice to complete his journey in the church, you realize that at some point in his life, Captain Clarke probably heard the same question that Peter heard in today\u2019s gospel.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you also want to leave?\u201d<\/p>\n

And \u2013 like Peter \u2013 Captain Clarke had only one answer. <\/p>\n

\u201cMaster,\u201d the reply comes back, \u201cto whom shall we go?\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking at this episode in John\u2019s gospel, you can\u2019t help but realize how deeply it resonates with all of us.<\/p>\n

This is a question that wasn\u2019t just asked two thousand years ago on the shores of the Sea of Galilee to a group of restless fishermen. <\/p>\n

This is the great question of our time.<\/p>\n

It is the great question of our lives \u2013 yours and mine. <\/p>\n

It is the question Christ asks today — his challenge to a broken and sinful world that strains against the gospel again and again. A world that questions and even defies it. A world that keeps saying:<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is too hard. Who can accept it?\u201d<\/p>\n

All you have to do is scan the headlines and you know what I\u2019m talking about. It\u2019s there in a host of social issues \u2013 from health care to abortion to marriage. We live in a time when so much of what the Church teaches \u2013 much of what we have held true for two millennia \u2013 is greeted with hostility, scorn or, at times, even derision. The world so often takes the gospel as being too hard. G.K. Chesterton put it so well: it\u2019s not that Christianity has been tried and found wanting. It\u2019s that it has been tried and found to be difficult. And so people walk away.<\/p>\n

And every day, God asks us:<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you also want to leave?\u201d<\/p>\n

And every day, we answer Him. With our lives. With our choices. With the way we go into the world. <\/p>\n

Every day is a choice between what is right\u2026and what feels right at the time.<\/p>\n

Between our will\u2026and God\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Between timeless truth\u2026and attractive illusion.<\/p>\n

The choice is ours. <\/p>\n

I\u2019m sure all of us here can tell stories of people we know who have left. They\u2019ve quit the Church or — for one reason or another — just drifted away from God. In fact, some who are here this morning might prefer to be somewhere else. Maybe your husband or wife or parent or child twisted your arm to get you to mass. <\/p>\n

Well, I feel your pain: I used to be one of you. See what a little arm-twisting can do? I am blessed with a wife who is very prayerful and persistent \u2013 and patient!<\/p>\n

But I\u2019ve also been blessed with a God who never gave up on me. <\/p>\n

He never gives up, in fact, on any of us. <\/p>\n

The gospel today doesn\u2019t tell us if any of the people who drifted away from Christ eventually returned \u2013 if they had second thoughts. <\/p>\n

I imagine a few of them probably did \u2013 and some probably did return.<\/p>\n

As the Prodigal Son discovered, the road that leads away from the Father\u2026also leads back. <\/p>\n

And leaving, after all, is only one pivot step from returning. <\/p>\n

Maybe you or someone you love has been away from the faith. Maybe you\u2019re coming back for another look. <\/p>\n

Come. Look. Stay. The door is always open. <\/p>\n

Be assured, and hold onto this truth: even though we may walk away from God, He never walks away from us. <\/p>\n

He is here, waiting. <\/p>\n

Captain Jeremy Clarke understood that. <\/p>\n

And, of course, so did Peter. Peter himself turned away from Christ during his darkest hour \u2013 out of fear, or confusion, or simple human cowardice.<\/p>\n

And look at what happened.<\/p>\n

Peter remembered Christ\u2019s own prediction of that hour.<\/p>\n

Maybe he also recalled his own words to his teacher on that afternoon in Galilee — his great answer to the great question facing each of us here and now, in this time of choosing. <\/p>\n

\u201cDo you also want to leave?\u201d<\/p>\n

We can only reply, as Peter did, with wonder and humility and hope:<\/p>\n

\u201cTo whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When you\u2019re on vacation, sometimes, you can\u2019t completely get away from the world. Last week, I watched the news down in Florida, and saw the tragic pictures of that plane crashing into a helicopter over the Hudson. It was truly horrific. 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