Bishop Robert Barron

Between the Old and the New – A Meditation on Transitions

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Luke 21:5 19

Next week is the Last Sunday after Pentecost, sometimes referred to as Christ the King Sunday. The following Sunday will begin the Christian new year, and the season of Advent. As another liturgical season ends and one begins the church, through her readings, invites us to meditate on endings. How do we read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the transition from one way of being to another? Another question might be, “What does Jesus teach his disciples about these end times?” The Bible is full of this “end times” literature called apocalyptic literature, and in today’s Gospel Jesus is teaching in the tradition of that school of thought. Apokaluptikos (from the Greek) means an unveiling or the uncovering of something new. This type of literature calls to mind how different things that are being brought forth, or showing forth, will bring about a newness to our worlds – both subjectively and corporately. Today’s Gospel, coupled with the 1st reading and even with today’s Psalm could be an invitation for us all to reflect on how well (or not so well) we transition from one thing to another. If we can meditate on how we already transition, then this can prepare us for either the ultimate transition from this life to the next, or prepare us for the unveiling of God’s Advent, the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. In order to do this, I’ll be using the five aspects of natural ending experiences as taught by William Bridges. Bridges teaches that by naming and understanding these five ways of transitioning can help us practice them. Jesus takes a different way, and asks his followers to trust, obey, and rely on him through specific transitions as he and only he can be named and crowned King of Kings and Lord of Lords. I want to pick apart today’s Gospel by first naming what these 5 ways of transitioning are. According to Bridges, they are as follows:  When we transition, we all have the potential to disengage, dismantle, disidentify, and be disoriented and disenchanted. After we look at the Gospel with a psychological lens, it’s my hope to remember Jesus’ teaching, as well as the Church’s theological response to it.

Today’s Gospel begins with Jesus and a few of his followers marveling about the sights and sounds of the Temple, the ultimate holy place for Jews in the 1st century. I can imagine them walking around the place like tourists on vacation with Jesus being the tour guide. But I’m not so sure Jesus made a very good one for as soon as the disciples point out the building’s majesty, and ooh and awe over the splendor of its complexity, Jesus (the tour guide) says, “Ya know, all the Temple’s beauty and splendor will one day be no more. One day it will crumble and be destroyed. (Here ends the tour. Don’t forget to tip your guide.”) His prediction certainly took all the air out of the room. It was an alarming and dismantling statement. In shock, the disciples asked, “When will this be?”

When something is dismantled, it is torn down, taken apart, or broken. Often times we can try to pick up the pieces and reassemble them, but like all the king’s horses and all the king’s men tried to reassemble the great egg, Humpty Dumpty, we too finally must surrender to the fact that what once was will never be again. Being dismantled by something is living east of Eden our eyes no longer shut, but wide awake, adjusting themselves to a new light. It’s the difference between the great city of Berlin prior to November 1989, and after. In our own country, old ways of living were gone with the wind after the collapse of the World Trade Center in September of 2001. On the positive end, a dismantling occurs when two persons throw off the single life and put on the vocation of marriage, or when you finally reach the age of retirement. Having built a career, you finally have the chance to say ‘goodbye’ to it.

“When will this be,” the disciples asked? Jesus answered them saying, “Beware that you are not led astray; for many will come in my name and say, `I am he!’ and, `The time is near!’ Do not go after them.

Another form of transition occurs other than a dismantling. With Jesus warning his disciples not to be led astray by false teachers and charlatans, today we might say that Jesus is asking them to remember disidentification. Disidentification has to do with changing one’s identity, and occurs naturally from one transition to another. For example, we all begin as infants and have the potential to be babies, children, young adults all the way to senior adults. We disidentify as students when we graduate. We are no longer unemployed when we have a job. In today’s Eucharistic Prayer we are reminded that “in Jesus” we put on a new identity. At the Lord’s Supper liturgy we pray, “To the poor he proclaimed the good news of salvation; to prisoners, freedom; to the sorrowful, joy.” Put differently, as Christians we identify with Christ as our Savior and in doing this we are no longer slaves to sin, but freed up to love in Him.

Another way we naturally end something is through the process of disorientation. Listen to the Gospel again:

“When you hear of wars and insurrections, do not be terrified; for these things must take place first, but the end will not follow immediately.” Then Jesus said to them, “Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom; there will be great earthquakes, and in various places famines and plagues; and there will be dreadful portents and great signs from heaven.

Being disoriented can be scary. You can have feelings of being lost or anxious. You’re on a boat and haven’t yet discovered your sea legs, or you’ve reached the shore and you feel as if you’re still floating. But Jesus has good news for his listeners. Like the angels that comforted the shepherds with their announcement of Jesus’ birth, he too councils his disciples, “Do not be terrified.” (Easier said than done). Many of you are currently caretakers for your spouse, or an aging parent or loved one. Disorientation occurs almost daily for both caretaker and caregiver as old ways are dismantled and new identities tried on. In my own family, I’ve watched both my wife and her mother agonize over decisions to take away the keys to the car for my father-in-law, who was diagnosed with ALS last year. Piece by piece the fabric of what used to be now unravels as keys are taken away, the loss of mobility, speech, basic communication, dignity. In these situations, disorientation occurs for all parties involved as some days are lived in a dizzying fog somewhere between numbness and exasperation. To top it off, “nations will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.” What does this mean other than a great battle of wills. “Don’t take away my keys,” is really the loved one saying, “Don’t take away my control.” “Don’t take way my abilities,” is really the loved one saying, “Don’t take away my freedom.”

In St. Benedict’s chapter on “The Sick” in his Rule for his monastery, he wrote, “Let the sick on their part bear in mind that they are served out of honor for God, and let them not by their excessive demands distress anyone who serves them.” For those of you who are caregivers, or who have been caregivers this statement may come across as highly ideological on Benedict’s part. Again, easier said than done, but I wonder what it would look like if both caregiver and care receiver took seriously Benedict’s teaching here, and truly honored one another in their ministry to each other? I sometimes advise persons who are terminally ill that it is their job and/or their final act of ministry to show their family and loved ones how to die a holy death. Sometimes they take me up on it. Sometimes not.

The last section of Jesus’ teaching has to do with all the resistance to change and transition that will occur, and what he councils is to not resist the change, but to disengage from the way things have always been. Put differently, there is a solemn disenchantment that must occur.

“But before all this occurs, they will arrest you and persecute you; they will hand you over to synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors because of my name.”

This is the old world starting to pass away, isn’t it? Being arrested implies the law of the land. Kings and governors rule the land with the law, but Jesus is predicting that both law and land will be no more. There will be a new world order, a new song, a new way of being. If one knows this, then one can be at once engaged in the culture as well as disengaged with the way things have always been living into the kingdom of God and its virtues which Jesus is bringing about.

Thinking again about caregiving and care receiving, an illness or diagnosis is not intentional, and oftentimes comes as a surprise. Jesus is calling his disciples to not be surprised, and to start practicing now how to disengage from the ways of the world that constantly seeks out power, privilege, wealth, and pleasure. “Disenchant yourselves from these ways of being; instead, be intimately involved with me,” he might of said.

Jesus ends with this statement, “By your endurance you will gain your souls.” By the endurance of living into your vocation for 30 years, by the endurance of being married 40 years, by the endurance of showing the world compassion, grace, and mercy, you will gain your souls. Put theologically, “By your relationship with me as the way, the truth and the life,” says Jesus, “you will gain your souls.” “Well, if he is the life,” Bishop Robert Barron teaches, then “that life which is opposed to him has to give way; and if he’s the truth, then false claimants to truth must cede to him; and if he’s the way, then false ways have to be abandoned.” “So,” the bishop concludes, “as we await the Lord’s second coming, we must give our lives to him and renounce everything that opposes him.”[1]

This, finally, is the good news in today’s reading. Like we pray in The Lord’s supper liturgy, “In him, you [O God] have delivered us from evil, and made us worthy to stand before you. In him, you have brought us out of error into truth, out of sin into righteousness, out of death into life.”

In him. In Jesus. In the Christ…is finally where we live, move, and have our being through old ways and new ways and transitions in between. In him is our invitation to walk in love as Christ loves us, to sing new songs, to rejoice and be glad. So as we say goodbye to this liturgical year, do not be terrified; practice life’s natural transitions; and finally, live fully, so that you may die empty handed letting yourself be held by nothing but his love.

[1]                Daily Gospel Reflections from Bishop Robert Barron. Word on Fire Ministries, accessed on 11/14/19.

Give Out of Your Abundance…Out of your Poverty

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The below sermon was preached on the 25th Sunday after Pentecost – 2018 at St. Julian’s Episcopal Church. An outline and interpretation of today’s Biblical readings relied heavily upon the sermon, “A Tale of Two Widows” by Bishop Robert Barron. Here’s a link to his sermon for further reference.

When I was going through the formal discernment process for the priesthood, my fellow discernment candidates and I were asked to spend one night out on the streets of Atlanta. We spent the day walking the streets, talking to our homeless brothers, sisters, and siblings. We had Holy Eucharist at a local shelter, then we gathered up sleeping bags found an abandoned parking lot in downtown Atlanta and slept – or at least tried to sleep. I wish I could say it was a humbling experience in that I learned an important lesson in humility and poverty and charity. Perhaps I can lift up those virtuous things in hindsight to a certain degree, but in that moment, it simply was not pleasant to say the least. The parking lot that was chosen for us was beside a MARTA station whose trains came in and out of the terminal at all hours of the night. Sounds of sirens from nearby Grady Hospital would interrupt any chances of sleep. Trash, drug paraphernalia, and smells so rank littered the parking lot as well as our senses. Late night drug deals and possible prostitution were openly witnessed. Even though our bodies were worn out and our feet aching from walking all day, sleep simply did not come. Two weeks later I would find myself becoming extremely ill from a deadly bacterium strand I picked up that night. I was hospitalized twice, lost 10 pounds, and it took me one whole year to regain the weight back. I remember being frustrated and angry with the Diocese of Atlanta for my illness. I wrote a hostile letter to one of the Canons in the Bishop’s Office expressing my anxiety, hostility, and anger towards the ordination process, and blamed them for my illness that was still inflicting my body. More on that later…

Today’s first reading from the Book of Kings sets up a similar tone in power dynamics. The context is this:  We’re in Sidon in the 9th century BCE. The notorious Ahab and Jezebel sit on the thrones. Famine and draught are in the land, which the prophet Elijah attributes to the sins of the King and Queen. There is a lowly widow, and she (as well as her son) are down to their last meal. She has no future. She sees no hope. Then Elijah comes to her and says, “Bring me a little water in a vessel, so that I may drink.” As she walks away in order to fill his request, he further orders her to bring him something to eat as well. He is asking for something she cannot give. Upon first glance the beginning of this story strikes me as cold. It was Elijah himself who ordered others to take care of the widow and the orphan. Why, then, would he kick this widow while she was down not following his own advice? I find no comfort in his words; and yet, the story continues with a miracle. She acquiesces, gets him his water as well as makes the cake, and her family is fed (and continues to be fed) from the abundance it produces even as the land remains stricken with famine.

Perhaps the lesson is this: When we are down to our last meal, and have hit rock bottom, God (like Elijah) comes in. But did you notice what happened? Elijah did not comfort the widow; instead he asked her for something. She’s in dire straits, has nothing to give, and yet is still asked to do so. Why give something when in reality she needs to receive? And yet: Reality isn’t all what we see is it? The further lesson is this: Elijah asks her to give, and in doing so she receives Divine grace. Abundance comes from the willing gift.

Turning to today’s Gospel we discover the scribes and the Pharisees milling around the Temple. Bishop Robert Barron describes them as being in a hording mode. They are hording and garnering for attention, honor, privilege, titles, etc. Mark’s Gospel contrasts the professional religious with the widow. She gives the last thing she has for the gift and glory of God. Unlike the widow in Elijah’s story, however, we do not know what happened to her. We do know that in the very next chapter, Jesus predicted the Temple’s destruction. This was telling in that the widow gave all she had for a building that (historically) would not be there in a few decades. Put differently, she gave out of her poverty to what would one day be an impoverished place; and yet, we know God received her gift with pleasure for he knew her heart, and would give her grace in His Son whose Body became a grace-filled temple for all.

The great spiritual truth from both of these stories is one of paradox; that is, we have and obtain love by giving love away. Want more love, give it away? Want more faith, share it? Want more joy in your life, make other people joyful. It’s not about clinging to power, but contributing out of our abundance as well as our poverty. It’s not about holding on, but letting go. It’s not about hoarding but sharing.

It was these hard lessons that I personally learned in another street encounter in downtown Atlanta. Discernment candidates were at a local homeless shelter celebrating Holy Eucharist again. After the service, a homeless man came up to one of the deacons, shared a bit of his story with him, then asked the deacon to pray over him and bless him. The deacon laid hands on him, prayed, then pronounced a blessing upon him. Just as the man was turning to walk away, the deacon grabs him by the shoulders and orders the man, “Now it’s your turn. Give me a blessing.” The man (as well as myself) was shocked. Worlds collided. Heaven was awakened. I was humbled. Here was a man who spent his days walking the streets. He got to experience Holy Eucharist that day, but where I was able to go home, he (later that evening would have to) gather up a sleeping bag (if he had one) find an abandoned parking lot in downtown Atlanta and sleep – or at least, try to sleep. It would not be pleasant to say the least. The parking lot would be beside a MARTA station whose trains come in and out of the terminal at all hours of the night. Sounds of sirens from nearby Grady Hospital would interrupt any chances of sleep. Trash, drug paraphernalia, and smells so rank would litter the parking lot as well as his senses. Late night drug deals and possible prostitution would be openly witnessed by him. Even though his body would be worn out and his feet aching from walking all day-everyday, sleep simply would not come. He had no status in society to write hostile letters to his representatives, expressing his anxiety, hostility, and anger towards his situation. He had hit rock bottom; and yet, the deacon (like Jesus) asked him to give. “Give me a blessing.” And he did.

At that moment, all my anger towards the diocese left me. I understood that I was hording title, power, privilege and prestige. In that man’s blessing I was broken and in my newfound brokenness I was asked to give. Later, my gift would be to humbly apologize to my elders, not complain about my illness, and pray that one day I would become the priest that God (not myself) had in mind. This morning, I wonder what your rock bottom is? I wonder where you find yourself impoverished. Perhaps Elijah and Jesus get to experience your weakness, and yet ask you for something you think you can’t give, but hope to discover that you can. Give away a blessing today, perhaps out of your abundance, perhaps out of your poverty.

The Priority of Christ

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Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away”.
~Mark 13:31

A Theology of Advent
Things that are eternal – by definition – cannot pass away. Everything else does and will as Jesus reminds us today. In the opening lines of John’s Gospel, we are reminded that “In the beginning was the Word…and the Word was made flesh”. The Word Made Flesh is none other than Christ, the eternal one. All things that were created were created through the Word. Put differently, all things were created through Christ. Heaven and earth were created through Christ; yet, they too will pass away. Why? Because God’s crea-tion can never be God – the Crea-tor. If we believe otherwise – that the created order is the same as God – we would be considered pagans. Instead, we are Christians, and the priority of Christ is front and center because Christ (the Word of God) will not pass away. With this beautiful theology and divine truth, we begin our journey through another season of Advent. Without this truth, we are lost in the dark – left to our faltering senses.

The Cycle of Darkness is a Cycle of Change
Darkness. This time of year there is more darkness than light. The days are short. The night is long. This too shall pass.

Change. This time of year deciduous trees shed their leaves while in the fir tree we recognize changelessness. Although these created things (i.e. light/dark; trees and their leaves) are indeed, normal; they are not eternal – so “keep awake”, says Jesus, “for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly.” Isn’t that just like God; that is, to come at us suddenly? It’s been said that life happens when we are making plans. Christ coming into the world was sudden, and there were only a few who were awake enough to receive him. Christ coming into the world in the future will be similar; yet the difference is that all will see him but not all will be gathered up; therefore keep awake.

How do we keep awake? How do we acknowledge the humbling truth that heaven and earth will pass away? The appropriate response is to focus, to practice, and to live into the eternal – those eternal things that will not pass away. When we practice these eternal virtues, we awaken more and more each day. We prepare our bodies, minds, and spirits to receive the love, life, and light found in the eternal Word of God, Jesus Christ Our Lord.

So let’s stay focused on Christ today. To help us, listen to this: For centuries the Church has traditionally found the symbols of “priest”, “prophet” and “king” as appropriate archetypes for describing Christ and his priority. Bishop Robert Barron in his new book, To Light a Fire on the Earth: Proclaiming the Gospel in a Secular Age describes the various archetypes attributed to Christ like this:[1]

Christ as Priest
“The priest is the one who gives right praise. That’s the Biblical way of naming who we are. What goes wrong is that we praise the wrong things. Augustine said that too, that we end up worshipping creatures rather than the Creator. We become priests of the wrong god. From bad worship flows everything else, meaning the disintegration of the self, sin, violence, and so on.

Getting us back on track means we’re like Adam before the Fall…[Adam]’s a priest because he’s in the attitude of right worship. [One of the paintings] on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel [has] Eve [coming] forth from the side of Adam…she has her hands folded in an attitude of prayer. That’s humanity before the Fall; it knew how to worship right”.

Christ as Prophet
“Before the Fall, Adam names the animals, that is to say he catalogs them. He names them according to the Logos [Word] that God has placed in them. [Adam]’s not making up their meaning, he’s recognizing (re-cognizing, to use the term of Joseph Ratzinger). He’s thinking again what’s already been thought into them [by God], so he’s a prophet. From that prophecy, correct speech flows, the whole range of literature and science, philosophy, everything.”

Christ as King
“The idea of king is that Adam…is made to expand out. Now that Eden’s okay, let’s move out and turn the whole world into a place of right praise. What it gives you is the whole vocation of Israel. [Israel] is a priestly people, a prophetic people that knows the divine truth, and then, finally, a kingly people that will go on the march.

These vocations of priest, prophet, and king were not fully achieved until Christ, Barron argues. Barron says, [Christ], in his own person, is the place of right praise. It’s humanity turned to divinity. He’s not just the speaker of truth, he is the [Word] incarnate, so he’s prophet in the full sense. Then he’s king, because he’s going on the march to ‘Edenize’ the world, to ‘Christify’ the world. What goes wrong with us…is that we get all three of those things wrong. We worship the wrong things, we start making up our own meaning, and then we also privatize the faith. A restored focus on Christ…is the only exit strategy from those temptations.”

Re-Order Your Life around the Priority of Christ 
Advent is the season to re-order our lives – not around ourselves – but around the eternal Word of God, that is, Jesus Christ. Doing anything else in this season deprives us of re-cognizing, or thinking again on the things that are eternal. Doing anything else puts to sleep those eternal longings that are tangibly felt and experienced during the mystery of Advent. Sure, it’s dark – but the light of Christ is eternal. Sure, things are changing – but what about the changelessness of God? Sure things are scary – but fear not, for Christ is with us. These are the teachings of Advent. These are the teachings of the Church that pour forth from the Divine Word of God – Jesus Christ.

This Advent, challenge yourself to re-organize your life around the priority of Christ coming into the world, then think on the things that are eternal. Think on, and then practice love, forgiveness, humility, patience, hope, joy, gratefulness, and compassion. Practicing these virtues of the Spirit helps prepare your hearts to keep awake, even as the rest of the world has fallen asleep dreaming of the wrong gods.

[1]          This section describing Christ as Priest, Prophet, and King is a full quotation from the book, To Light a Fire on the Earth: Proclaiming the Gospel in a Secular Age, Robert Barron with John L. Allen, Jr., Image Publishing, New York, 2017, pgs. 101-102.