Body of Christ

The Coming Tsunami

This Sunday Jesus has some bad news. He speaks about a coming disaster, a disaster that has implications for us today: the destruction of the Temple.

In his Catholicism video series, Fr. Bob Barron tries bring home what the Temple meant to people of that time. “In an American context,” Fr. Barron says, “we’d have to imagine a violation of some combination of the National Cathedral, the Lincoln Center and the White House.” But it was even more personal than that. For a first century Jew, the Temple was his beloved. To destroy the Temple would be to destroy him.

But the destruction of the Temple did take place, as Jesus predicted. In 70 A.D. the Roman army surrounded Jerusalem and eventually the people inside ran out of food. The historian Josephus describes the horror as people even resorted to cannibalism.¹ Eventually, the army breached the walls, set fire to the city and – what was most terrible – entered the inner sanctuary of the Temple and looted the Holy of Holies.

Could something so terrible happen today? Please God, no, but we do see signs things are getting worse in our world, in our American society – and perhaps even in some of our families. We have come to accept evils that we could barely imagine a few decades ago. And let’s be honest – some who are listening to me, may be caught in a downward spiral. G.K. Chesterton said, “Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil. That road goes down and down.”

We fool ourselves thinking we can bracket evil. No, it seeps through everything. At first it may not seem so. People say things like, “Well, the sky hasn’t fallen. Everything will continue like before.” But – as was the case with the destruction of the Temple – there comes the moment of no return. It is like the tectonic plates under the ocean bed slowing reaching the breaking point. As Jesus tells us today, it would be naive to think that no disaster could come upon us. Unless we radically repent, a tsunami will overwhelm us.

The question is: what can we do to prepare for a possible tsunami? Let me draw a lesson from one of the ship captains when that huge tsunami struck the Pacific rim. His boat, filled with passengers, was in a harbor. The warning came that a moving wall of water was on its way. The radio told people to seek high ground. But this ship captain took a different course. He put out to see. The deep waters absorbed most of the shock. His ship and passengers survived. The great destruction took place in the shallow waters.²

There is a lesson here. With a tsunami coming, we need to put out to the deep waters. If we stay in the shallows, we will be washed away. I would now like to tell you where to find the deep waters.

At the beginning of the homily, I mentioned that the Gospel contains bad news – the imminent destruction of the Temple. It represents all the inconceivable disasters of human history – perhaps one looming for us. That is the bad news. Besides this bad news, the Gospel contains good news. Jesus speaks about the rebuilding of the temple – in three days. He means his body, his Risen Body. There we find the deep waters – a relationship with Jesus through his Church, his body. Don’t be deceived. You cannot have a disembodied Jesus – a relationship with Jesus must include his body, the Church. St. Joan of Arc expressed it this way: “About Jesus Christ and the Church, I simply know they’re just one thing, and we shouldn’t complicate the matter.”³

So come to the deep waters. Come to Jesus. Come to his Church. In a few moments we will have the First Scrutiny. It reminds us that the power of Jesus is greater than any spiritual or earthly power.

With a tsunami coming, we must put out to the deep waters. Come to Jesus and his Body, the Church.

¹- Jewish Wars

²- Credit for this illustration goes to Fr. William Joenson, writing in The Magnificat Lenten Companion.

³- 795 Christ and his Church thus together make up the “whole Christ” (Christus totus). The Church is one with Christ. The saints are acutely aware of this unity: Let us rejoice then and give thanks that we have become not only Christians, but Christ himself. Do you understand and grasp, brethren, God’s grace toward us? Marvel and rejoice: we have become Christ. For if he is the head, we are the members; he and we together are the whole man. . . . The fullness of Christ then is the head and the members. But what does “head and members” mean? Christ and the Church.230 Our redeemer has shown himself to be one person with the holy Church whom he has taken to himself.231 Head and members form as it were one and the same mystical person.232 A reply of St. Joan of Arc to her judges sums up the faith of the holy doctors and the good sense of the believer: “About Jesus Christ and the Church, I simply know they’re just one thing, and we shouldn’t complicate the matter.”233 Continue reading »

I Do So Willingly

We do not give time and money grudgingly; we are building the Body of Christ. With St. Paul we say, “I do so willingly…I have been entrusted with a stewardship.”

Many years ago, in England, three men were pouring into a trough a mixture of water, sand, lime and other ingredients. A passer-by asked them what they were doing. The first said, “I am making mortar.” The second: “I am laying bricks.” But the third said, “I am building a cathedral.” They were doing the same thing, but each looked at it differently. And what a difference that made! … Continue reading »

“We are the Church.”

Misleading Slogan #9. “We are the Church.” I admit I have called on this slogan a few times myself. When people talk about how the church let them down or failed to respond to someone in time of need, I want to say, “But all of us, we are the church. Not just the priest.” … Continue reading »