Sunday, April 21, 2019

Comeback / Rebuilding (2019-04-21, Easter)

April 21, 2019   [ Easter Sunday 2019]   

Easter Vigil Readings:  ● Genesis 1:1-2:2 ● Genesis 22:1-18 ●
●  Exodus 14:15-5:1 ● EPISTLE: Romans 6:3-11  ● + Luke 24:1-12●


Title:        Rebuilding

[_01_]    ►” Saturday, August 11, 2018” ►  That Saturday, we had very severe thunderstorms, tropical rain. You may recall Caldwell had 5 inches of rain that afternoon. A Little Falls car dealership lost many vehicles which were carried away by the flood water.
            Here in our Lourdes neighborhood, the water rose quickly on the very aptly named Mississippi Avenue – to your right
            And, only the doors of the church basement and well-built structure kept the water back. We even got water on the basement floor.  And, several of you sprang into action to check doors, un-clog drains, address the water …and … to calm me down. Thank you!
 [_02_]    At the time, it was hard to imagine how we would clean up, respond, and bounce back and we needed the church basement (Connor Hall) for an important family social event.  We needed a comeback…
            Coincidentally, it was for Liam Cunningham, our Eagle Scout who had who rebuilt 275 feet of fence on our property, to honor him for this infrastructure “comeback”  … but would our infrastructure come back in time ?
            We did get it cleaned up in time.           I personally believe that so much fresh water had flowed into our “Temple” (cf. Book of Ezekiel, ch. ___) that the church basement appeared in better shape after the flood than before.
            There was so much water.
[_02_]   Easter & the Easter Vigil are times to remember the celebration of water and the baptismal water in our lives.
And, also to renew our baptismal promises.
          What does baptism, or ‘to baptize’ mean?  St. Paul wrote about this to in ‘Romans’:
          “Brothers and sisters, are you unaware that all of us who were baptized baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death.  We were indeed buried with him through death so that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life” (cf. Romans 6:3 --__)
          So, baptism is about death and new life.  About a comeback. 
About the renewal of our promises, continually.  Father Ronald Knox writes – in this very simple example – that we do not re-baptize – or baptize more than once – just because it is about the forgiveness of sins.
For example…let’s say your mom tells you to wash your hands..you don’t say … oh, I washed them last week or or I used hand sanitizer in the car.  Rather, you wash them, repeatedly. Your mother knows!
          So, baptism happens only once but we renew our baptismal vows or promises.
[*** Pause ***]
[_03_]   And, renewal is good. Comeback stories are good. We love comeback come-from-behind victories.
The University of Virginia men’s basketball team lost in 1st round of their playoffs/tournament last year despite being heavily favored to win the whole tournament.
It was the most embarrassing lost in the history of the tournament. Then, this year, they “came back” and won the whole tournament in 2019 to be national champions.
Comeback.
Serena Williams, she is a perpetual comeback story, trouncing teenagers and players 15 or more years younger on the tennis court.
And, who could forget Tiger Woods of last Sunday, golf, the Masters?
Everyone loves a comeback story.
In our baptismal promises, we are making a comeback, spiritually …
          But, we are not always doing so publicly for all to see…
          For example…
► 1-on-1 in confession, we renew and come back to love God and love our neighbor according to the Commandments.
► in turning away from selfishness and self-centeredness, we reject Satan and all his works and all his empty promises. That’s a baptismal promise. A comeback.
► speaking and listening to God in quiet prayer – rather than all the competing voices around us, we renew our belief in the Holy Spirit. A comeback.
► walking into church, blessing ourselves with holy water, that’;s a comeback. we say…Lord, I am trying to live my life in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, according to your will, though it is sometimes difficult.

[*** PAUSE ***]

[_06_]     ►” Monday, April 15, 2019” ► 
This was the day after Tiger won the Masters. Monday.
Will there be a comeback achievement? Another? Paris?
A few days ago, it was certainly more than a thunderstorm and several inches of rain that affected the church of Our Lady, Notre Dame, Notre Dame Cathedral, ile de la cite, on an island in the River Seine, Paris. Monday.
          What were you and I watching, feeling to this heat, smoke, not to mention high volume and pressure of water?
          One journalist (E.J. Dickson Rolling Stone) wrote that the fact that the building did not collapse – a concern in the hours immediately following the blaze - serves as a powerful testimony to the skill of the medieval builders who – 850 years ago, circa 1200 – who had neither cameras nor computers nor calculators nor communication devices, except handwriting and the spoken word. They did not even have clocks, digital or analog.
          “It’s worth remembering why [the Paris church community] went to the trouble of building [Notre Dame] this way.  They built it so it would endure, last. The vaulted ceilings and & flying buttresses was not only for aesthetic [visually artistic] reasons – but it was also for fire proofing. And, they were surely worried about fire in 1200, 1300, all they had were buckets of water as their extinguishers.”
          They built to survive a fire.
          Jesus dies for us so that will survive a fire also.
          Survive the fire of persecution… and many difficulties, so that we will survive the fire of feeling unloved, rejected …
          Not only the fires of hell and Purgatory..but that we will survive the fires of today, to know that we are loved and worth dying for.
          And – like the builders in 1200 of the church, the firefighters on Monday had only 1 chance. You only get 1 chance to fight a fire.
          And, those firefighters were being celebrated today in another cathedral in Paris.
[_07_]      The artwork of Notre Dame can be reproduced..human life cannot.
          For this reason, hundreds of firefighters rushed into Notre Dame.
          They rushed in to get people out… and just like the firefighters on 9/11 rushed in to get people out. And,they saved tens of thousands of people in New York in 2001.
          Jesus laid down his life for our sins not only so that we might not fear death but that we might touch a little bit of death and yet rise to new life.
          And, to live a mature complete Christian life, we are called to forgive others. This can be a burden, a cross.
          We are called to die to ourselves. For to forgive another person, we imitate Christ and while none is the savior of the world, we participate in his saving mission and we give life by forgiveness.
          To do this, we may have to die to our own agendas ..to die to ourselves.
          Jesus shows us that you
are worth dying for, I am worth dying for.
          Jesus shows us we are worth dying for, to give us new life, given to us originally in baptism.
          This is the life we re-claim when we confess our sins, the life we re-claim when we forgive another’s faults.
In this comeback, we don’t build a new structure but we build from the inside out, similar to Notre Dame Cathedral will be rebuilt from the inside out.
Jesus is the way and truth to our new life. His resurrection reminds us that he is the stone rejected by the builders and has become the cornerstone. This the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad.
[_fin_

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