Christ the King

By The Rev. Martha Frances+
Year C, Last Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 29
25 November 2007

Text: Luke 23: 33-43; Other Readings: Jeremiah 23: 1-6; Colossians 1: 11-20; Canticle 16


     Christ the King Sunday.  The last Sunday in Pentecost before Advent begins next week.  What on earth does Christ the King Sunday mean to those of us who live in a nation where we don't have, nor have ever had, kings?  In fact, even if we Americans are fascinated with the goings-on of the British royal family, we're pretty suspicious of anything as undemocratic as kings & queens, aren't we?  Yet right here at the end of a church year, we celebrate Christ the King.  In fact, some politically-correct folk call this Sunday the Reign of Christ—perhaps much more helpful.

     Next Sunday is New Years' in the Christian liturgical calendar, & we will spend the month of December in the Advent season, preparing for Christmas, celebrating the extraordinary generosity of God in sending the Son Jesus Christ into the world to be a human being alongside us other human beings.  Furthermore, in the past weeks of Pentecost, throughout the summer & fall, we have been hearing of the life & teachings, the parables & healings of Jesus who walked on earth.

     Today we turn to emphasize the other aspect of Jesus, his supernatural nature.  One of the beauties of the Church year is that we are urged to keep life in balance, to look first at the humanness of Jesus & then at another time at Jesus as God's son, Jesus as King, Jesus as Savior.  Today, the Sunday before Advent, we have an echo of Passion or Palm Sunday, the Sunday before Easter, as we are reminded what kind of King this Jesus was & is for us today.  

     So our Gospel reading takes us to the cross where 3 times Jesus is challenged to be his own Savior.  The leaders scoff at him:  "He saved others; let him save himself," they say.  Then the soldiers mock him, "If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself!"  Finally, one of the criminals hanging beside him derides him, "Save yourself & us!"  Probably all of us have been made fun of at one time or another in our lives.  Here, it must feel to Jesus like the whole world has turned against him.  Here again, as in other passages we've read recently, Jesus must surely be tempted to do exactly that:  to save himself.  Here we have echoes of Jesus' time of temptation in the desert:  "If you are the Son of God, save yourself."  If this were a Hollywood movie, now would be the time the superhero would miraculously whip out his McGiver knife or, with the help of the fair maiden who is really a secret agent, overthrow the whole bunch of Romans & Jews & ride off into the sunset happily ever after.  

     However, such is not Jesus' role in God's plan.  In addition to the 3 verbal taunts which Luke records, the inscription hanging over him says, "This is the King of the Jews."  What irony that even the leaders call him "the Messiah of God, his chosen one."  And it is bittersweet that it's not the folks who society calls "good" but the other criminal on the cross who recognizes that this man has done nothing wrong & begs, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."  I hope this is your prayer today also:  "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."  Indeed, what we know today yet perhaps forget because the story is so familiar is that because Jesus was King of the Jews, he could only save others by being crucified.  How this turn of events reverses the usual way we see the world!  It is only by Jesus' death—not by his being a superhero—that any of us can be saved.  It is by the criminal's recognition of Jesus' kingliness that Jesus is able to invite him to join him in Paradise.

     Today we focus on the King who is King in death but also in life.  We recognize what Jesus has been telling us all along, that only by losing our lives for his sake may we find our selves, our God-given selves.  The resentful criminal who derided Jesus missed his opportunity because he was not able to recognize his own wrongdoing, confess it, & turn to Jesus as his savior.  It is the criminal who confesses his sin & pleads to Jesus for salvation to whom Jesus promises a place in Paradise.

     Salvation is focused on Jesus as King in our passage today & not on our deserving of salvation.  It is not by the actions which the criminals have done which save or condemn them but rather the one criminal's acknowledgement of Jesus' kingliness that provides him a place beside Jesus in Paradise.  Salvation is about Jesus overcoming death through his own death & ultimately his resurrection.  Isn't it interesting that it is the criminal to whom Jesus ministers on the cross?  As he is dying, he is able to reach out to a person similar to those open to his message during his teaching ministry.  The poor & outcast who had nothing to lose responded to him even when he was on the cross.  In fact, Jesus' death is saving to all of us not because of how much he suffered but because of who he was, God's chosen one, the King of the Jews, the Son of God who had acted redemptively throughout the history of Israel.  

     As is often the case, we turn to the epistle reading as we ask how this relates to us today.  The writer of Colossians wants his readers to be made strong by the strength which comes from Jesus' glorious power, even when we must endure many earthly hardships with patience, always giving thanks to God who makes it possible to share in what he calls the "inheritance of the Saints."  Through Christ, God has rescued us from the power of darkness & transferred us to Christ's kingdom where we have redemption & forgiveness.

     I don't know about you, but to live faithfully as a redeemed & forgiven Christian, I need the assurances of Christ in charge which I receive from scriptures such as the ones read today.  In Colossians, we hear one of the earliest hymns of the Church.  Here we are reminded that we see God through Christ—the image of the invisible God.  Christ was present in creation, was embodied as God in the flesh here on earth, & continues as head of the Church—Christ's body in the world today.  When terrible things happen to us, & we are tempted to scoff at Jesus, challenging him to save us from whatever present difficulty we've gotten into, the criminal on the cross beside Jesus reminds us we must confess & turn to Christ who has already saved us.  We are reminded that Christ is always ready & able to welcome us into his Paradise when we reach out to say, "Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom."  This past Monday I stood at Jean Howren's bedside with her family &, as her children & grandchildren told her they love her & said goodbye, she let go of her hold on this life & gracefully & peacefully slipped into the next one.  This loving, gentle & strong woman was able to move into the nearer presence of God assured that Christ was present to welcome her & make her his own.  What more can any one of us desire to get out of life?  May we all give thanks that our loving God cares for us in this life & will do so in eternity.  Thanks be to God who truly reigns over this earth as well as the next.

Pentecost XXV

By The Rev. Martha Frances+
Year C, Twenty-Fifth Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 28
18 November 2007

Text: Luke 21: 5-19; Other Readings: Isaiah 65: 17-25; 2 Thessalonians 3: 6-13; Canticle 9



Today's collect is one of my favorites & reminds us of the foundational place our Sacred Scriptures play in our Christian life. Each week the Collect for the Day calls us together to worship as a community, & in this one, we ask God to help us hear, read, mark, learn, & inwardly digest all holy Scriptures so we may grab onto & trust the blessed hope of everlasting life. Every Sunday we read 4 scriptures in church: we Episcopalians take Bible reading & study quite seriously. Both in my sermons & in our weekly noonday Bible study, I pray that we may hear, read, mark, learn & inwardly digest God's guidebook for the daily living of our Christian lives.

Here at the end of the Pentecost season, the lessons are focused upon the end times. Sunday after next, we begin a new Christian year with the 4 weeks of Advent in preparation for Christmas. Here at the end of our church year, scriptures emphasize "eschatology," a fancy Greek word fulfilling the end of the world as we know it. After Jesus' death, resurrection, & ascension, Christians believed he would return very soon in glory & this world would be over. People sometimes just quit their jobs & waited for that time to come. Today we see evidence of this belief on bumper stickers which say, "In case of rapture, this car will be unmanned."

As years wore on, & especially after the Jerusalem temple was destroyed in 70 A.D., it became evident that the 2nd coming of Jesus wasn't to be as soon as the 1st Christians had believed. Therefore, new believers had to learn to live in the long run, in the in-between time, to which our two New Testament passages refer today.

We live in the in-between time now, don't we? Life has been different for many of us, in many ways "new," as we have allowed Jesus Christ to progressively become Lord of our lives. For some of us, that conversion was very sudden & spectacular, yet for many, transformation has come over a period of time as we fell in love with Jesus & turned our will & lives over to the care of a loving God. Little by little, our lives are being made new as we let Christ work through our hearts & minds & souls. Let's see what our Scriptures today have to say about living in these in-between times.

First, Jesus predicts the destruction of the temple, not because of a vengeful God but because the Romans thought that by desecrating the holiest symbol of Judaism, they could destroy the spirits of the people. Jesus warns the Jews that nothing earthly is permanent, not even the beautiful temple, but that God's love & God's power will endure even the destruction of this most sacred shrine. The crowd clamors to know when all this will happen & how they'll know ahead of time the destruction is going to happen. Jesus explains that such things are not for them to know. They aren't supposed to spend their time & energy trying to guess the future. How much of our time do we waste trying to guess what will happen to us in the future? Occasionally, we hear of groups of people who have figured out when the end of the world will come, & they hold up with supplies & protection on the top of some mountain, I suppose to make the trip to heaven a bit shorter. Jesus says, "Give it up. Trust the future to God. God will take care of you." Can you & I really trust our future to God?

Jesus names many catastrophes which sound much like our own day—false prophets, wars & insurrections, nation rising against nation, earthquakes, famine, & plagues, even families going against one another. Do you know people who point to terrible events & swear that any one of those events signals the end of the world? Well, Jesus is pretty clear here that, "the end will not follow immediately" & further, we're not to know the day or the time.

So what should we be doing in the in-between time? Both our Gospel & our Epistle for today address this question. Jesus doesn't promise a bed of roses, does he? He tells the crowd they will experience all kinds of nasty things happening to them. None of us would be thrilled to be arrested or persecuted, handed over to authorities & placed in prison, all because we are Christian. Nor does this happen very often in our country, but we hear about people being persecuted for their faith beliefs in other parts of the world even today, don't we? So this isn't just about New Testament times.

Look what Jesus tells the new Christian community: these hardships will give them an opportunity to testify. Now I might just say, "Thanks but no thanks, Jesus. I know what can become of me if I testify." Jesus tells them not to worry; he assures them he will give them words to say & wisdom to act. Of course, he recognizes that they may die, but he says their endurance will gain them their souls. So it sounds like we're to keep on keeping on in sharing the Gospel, no matter what.

Now we come to the 2nd letter to the Thessalonians which was probably written by one of Paul's disciples using Paul's name so the people would pay more attention. The writer admonishes this community from afar. Yes, the end is promised by God, but no one can predict when it will happen. Some believers have given up & quit working because they think the end times are almost here. In the Thessalonikan community, some people expect the others to take care of them.

What does this mean? Does this mean that someone who really gets out there & tries to find a job but hasn't been able to do so shouldn't have breakfast? Absolutely not! What about someone who is disabled & cannot work? Should we turn that person away from our feast today? No! This is a call for us to examine our hearts & ask ourselves how & what we can do to provide for ourselves & contribute to the larger community. This invitation is for us middle-classed Christians to explore how we can be better stewards of what God has given us. How can we live our lives more simply so we can share more with others? In case you would like to make contributions to Episcopal Relief & Development or the Heifer Project in someone's name for a Christmas present, we have catalogs in the parish hall.

Today, we anticipate this time of Thanksgiving in our country by taking up an extra offering in baskets for the United Thank Offering. UTO grants have provided both in this country & abroad grants to improve the quality of life for those who are often underserved. When you place your UTO box or envelope in the basket today, pause to offer thanks once again for all those blessings that you sometimes take for granted. Not only does such an offering begin a habit of thankful giving, but your coins join others to provide those grants. For those who have forgotten your blue boxes, we'll take them next Sunday.

In addition, although our pledge campaign for 2008 has garnered over 40 pledges for over $110,000, many have still not pledged, & we are still about $70,000 from a balanced budget. Hope is not yet able to sit back & relax. We still have a long way to go. The endings of both New Testament scriptures give us nourishment & hope for the in-between times ahead. Paul's disciple tells the new Christian community & tells us, "Brothers & sisters, do not be weary in doing what is right." And Jesus assures us, "By your endurance you will gain your souls."

Pentecost XIV

By The Rev. Martha Frances+
Year C, Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Pentecost; Proper 27
11 November 2007

Text: Luke 20: 27-38; Others: Haggai 1:15b-2:9; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5,13-17; Psalm 145:1-5, 18-22

      Jesus is approached by the Sadducees with what sounds like a pretty far-fetched situation they have concocted from the law of Moses.  They ask about the levirate law which was designed to protect & make provision for a widow in a society with no social security, but more important, to preserve the family name & keep the land in the late brother's family.  In that society, the man's brother was to marry her & help her produce children who could care for her & the land.  Sounds pretty bizarre to us, but it provided responsibility for the well-being of those whose options in society were limited.  Now the Sadducees have cooked up this question to test Jesus, the 3^rd of a series of questions they have presented to him.

      Jesus knows, however, this is not an honest question from open-minded people desiring to learn from Jesus.  Rather, the Sadducees, the wealthy conservative party of aristocratic religious leaders, only believe in the Torah, the first 5 books of the Hebrew Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, & Deuteronomy.  The Sadducees don't believe in the resurrection, so their question is an attempt to bait Jesus, making fun of both him & of those Jews who expect resurrection & an after-life.  The Sadducees set up a no-win situation & hope to see Jesus squirm, discrediting him in front of his followers.  However, Jesus turns the tables on them by reframing their question & answers them with a quote from their own Scriptures, the Torah.  There, Moses said God is God not of the dead but of the living.

      Besides stopping the Sadducees from their riddles, Jesus has several things to tell us in the passage today.  What can we learn from this story?  In effect, Jesus tells us all the second-guessing we might do concerning the after-life is sort of pointless because resurrection life is not going to just prolong our present earthly life but will be totally new.  Jesus says there will be no need for marriage in the next life because then, there will be no death; even the patriarchs—Abraham, Isaac, & Jacob—are still alive to God.

      I always get nervous when I hear a preacher, usually at a funeral, suggest that the deceased will find an eternal golf game or whatever was her or his favorite earthly activity in heaven.  Now, an eternal golf game would be more like hell than heaven to me!  But that's not the point.  No matter whether what is described is a heavenly fantasy island or streets paved with gold, our human version of the next life is always limited by human imagination.

      Jesus' admonition to the Sadducees—& to us—is very much in line with Moses'—& most of Judaism's—belief in life after this one.  Jesus tells us we don't have to worry about life after death; the resurrection life is not dependent on our wishful thinking but on the very nature of a loving God on whom we depend.  Jesus reveals the Sadducees' question as irrelevant in the first place, reminding us as well as his first listeners that we need not major in minors.  Would that more of the members of the Anglican Communion could remember this today!  I'm really pleased that this parish &, to a large extent, this Diocese, has kept our focus on the mission of the Church to continue to reach beyond ourselves to baptize & teach the Gospel & equip the saints for ministry & not gotten hung up on ideological controversies.

      Another thing Jesus tells us is to focus not on our nature but on God's nature.  The psalmist describes God's close relation to humans when he says "The Lord is near to those who call upon him, to all who call upon him faithfully.  He fulfills the desire of those who fear him; he hears their cry & helps them.  The Lord preserves all those who love him. . ."  If it is God's nature to care for us now & in eternity, then surely we can leave the details of that life to such a loving, all-encompassing God.  Letting God take care of the details is part of what having faith is all about.  Jesus invites us to a new level of faith—our letting go of our illusions about the next life & trusting that the God to whom we turn our will & our lives is a loving God, one who cares for us enough that this totally new existence will be more than we can ask or imagine.

      So, if we're not going to sit around drawing architect's sketches for dwellings in heaven, what on earth are we to do with our lives here on earth?  Jesus says pretty consistently:  live it!  Live it to the fullest; share it with others; don't give up the faith! 

      In today's 2^nd lesson from the epistle to the church at Thessalonika, a disciple of Paul's assures the Christians there that Jesus' return (what they called "the day of the Lord") had not yet come but that they were chosen by God to be the first fruits for salvation.  Although their sanctification (which means their being made holy) is the work of the Holy Spirit & not their own doing, they are called to stand firm & hold fast to the Gospel they had received, day by day living into them & sharing them with others.  Those who had expected Christ's immediate return were getting discouraged, & the epistle writer wanted to encourage them to continue their work in building up their Church for Christ's glory.

      Certainly we at Hope can take comfort in & gain strength from all the gifts which we have received from the Spirit which we often neglect to acknowledge.  We do not have the persecutions & tribulations which faced the early Christians, so we aren't challenged as radically to be ever-vigilant in tending our own faith journey & sharing it with others.  That's one of the blessings of the United Thank Offering about which we have a page in our pew bulletin today & for which we will have a semi-annual ingathering next Sunday.  If we keep our blue boxes close to us & drop a few coins in as we give thanks for daily blessings from God throughout each 6 months, our coins accumulate.  Joined with those of others here, throughout the diocese & eventually the whole Church, our offerings can make a marked difference to outreach ministries throughout the Church.  Please give generously next Sunday & then start over with an empty Blue Box giving thanks daily.  Before long, you'll have established an attitude of gratitude which will spill out into the rest of your life.

      At this time of making a commitment to the budget of Hope for 2008, it is important to ask ourselves what the gifts which God has given us are really for.  If they're just to transfer money from you to the church, it's a transaction, but it's not necessarily a gift.  When we share a gift, it's an investment in another's personhood, &, in this case, in the personal integrity of Hope Episcopal Church.  When we give of our gifts to Hope—whether they be gifts of our treasure or of our time & talents—we are really connecting ourselves to our community, making Hope's future matter in our own lives & our lives matter in Hope's life.  In so doing, we invest in the future.

      Similarly, when we stand up with Jessica & Jennifer as we will do in a few minutes, affirming our support of their baptism, we commit to allowing God's Spirit to be active in our lives, not just individually but also as part of the larger community we call Hope.  Once again this week, I ask you to pledge to fulfill these baptismal promises along with those being baptized & their family, so that we as a parish community can do infinitely more than we could ask or imagine.  Hallelujah!  Amen!

Sunday after All Saints’ Day

By the Reverend Martha Frances+
The Sunday after All Saints'
4 November 2007

Text:  Luke 6: 20-31; Other Readings: Daniel 7: 1-3, 15-18; Psalm 149; Ephesians 1: 11-23

      Welcome, home, family!  It's wonderful to be back in our nave, our worship space, this morning, & to be celebrating several interwoven themes today.  Last Thursday was not just the day after Halloween but also the day from which All Hallow's Eve receives its significance—All Saints' Day—& we are exercising the option to celebrate this major Christian feast on the Sunday following.

      Some of you have worshipped down at Christ Church Cathedral & seen the huge wood carvings on the wall behind the altar there.  On the lower level are carved the 4 evangelists—Matthew, Mark, Luke & John—who gave us the life & teachings of Jesus in their Gospels.  Above them, as if standing on the evangelists' shoulders, are 4 bishops: St. Peter, the first bishop of Rome; St. Augustine of Canterbury, first English archbishop; Bp. Samuel Seabury, first American bishop; & Bp. Leonidas Polk, first missionary bishop to Texas (which was the American church's first mission field).  These men—all bishops were men in those days—blazed the trail of the Episcopal Church to Texas so in mid-20^th Century St. Michael's & Incarnation, & early this century Hope, could be founded.  In a way, my ministry & that of all the priests of this diocese stand on the shoulders of those bishops & evangelists.  But clergy represent only the ordained order of ministry. 

      In addition to saints who are recognized in the Church calendar & who have churches & hospitals named after them, we all have special people in our personal lives who have taught us how to live as faithful people & showed us by the way they lived their lives what a Godly life looks like.  Think how many more little statues we would have to have if each of your ancestors were included.

      As we move to the baptismal font in a few minutes to baptize a child in our midst, let's sense the communion of saints surrounding us to enfold Caleb & indeed all of us in what is often called the Church triumphant.  We'll name many of them at our altar this morning, joining our prayers for them with their prayers for & care for us which have continued beyond the grave into that everlasting life we so often sing about.

      How do we enter into the community of the Church?  Through baptism, of course.  We sang a moment ago "Wade in the water," but our baptismal font is too small for us to wade in, isn't it?  We're fortunate, however, that it is placed right in our midst in the middle of the nave, & as we enter & exit, we can touch our fingers into the holy water & bless ourselves, reminding ourselves of our own baptisms & the vows we made or were made for us.  As we prepare to baptize Caleb this morning, let's review baptism as initiation & ongoing renewal of our faith.  Through baptism, we join countless other Christians in receiving the blessing & anointing of God whose action is always effective even when we backslide or otherwise don't live up to our baptismal promises.  When we baptize little ones as we do today, parents & godparents & the rest of the gathered community promise to rear him as a Christian within a family of faith.  It really does take a village to raise a child to be a fully-functioning disciple growing in faith throughout his lifetime.  The blood family & the church family commit to providing the child—in this case Caleb—with the basics of the faith & turning to the larger community to support them in his upbringing.  When we baptize Caleb in a few minutes, we'll all have opportunity to voice our support of Caleb.

      Surrounding Caleb & the family, we will join in renewing our baptismal vows.  First, we state our profession of faith with the Apostles' Creed, the early personal Trinitarian creed.  Next, I will ask 5 questions & hope you listen to them as never before & take them to heart, responding truthfully when you say, "I will, with God's help."  What are those promises we all make over & over?

      First, we promise to study what we've learned from the apostles, most of which we find in the Bible; & to fellowship with other Christians (sort of like sticking with the winners), those who commit their lives to living as much like Jesus as they can.  We promise to break bread together—coming to this altar table week after week for nourishment from the body & blood of Christ in Holy Communion.  And we promise to pray, not only privately but also in the gathered worship service just as we are doing now.  The first baptismal vow comes from Acts 1 which describes how the first Christian communities grew & flourished.

      Next, we promise to hang in there in trying to resist evil.  The vow itself recognizes we all fail from time to time because it says when we fall into sin, not if we sin.  What happens then?  We repent, say we're sorry, & return to God.  That means we'll try not to sin any more, but when we do, we'll make amends & try to avoid that sin after that.

      The 3^rd promise is we'll proclaim by word & example the Gospel—the good news that we learn from Jesus about life in the kingdom of God.  We'll share the story of how Jesus is changing our lives, but we'll also act out of that transformation—letting the Holy Spirit into our hearts to guide us to behave differently.

      Now, we look beyond ourselves in the 4^th promise.  We try to see Christ in all people we meet & actually choose to serve Christ in that person.  Now I know some people have Christ pretty well hidden, but perhaps if we learn to love those difficult people we encounter, we can see them as neighbor just as the Samaritan saw the wounded man on the road to Jericho.  That's a tough job sometimes, & that's another reason we need each other to help us learn to love folks we usually think are unlovable.

      Finally, when we work together in community, we can work for justice & peace among all people, respecting the dignity of others even when they seem very different from us.  It takes a village—in fact, a whole bunch of villages—to work for justice & peace.  Together, we need to turn our energies on waging peace in the world, much more difficult than fighting wars.  One specific way we can choose to lend our voice to the public sector is to go vote this Tuesday, & vote intelligently.  How we mock the independence we Americans are so proud of when we don't even bother to be part of the democratic process!

      What would the world look like if we were all able to live out our own baptismal promises & support one another in doing the same?  Jesus gave us a vision in the section from the Sermon on the Plain I read this morning.  Because the Beatitudes are so familiar to us, we sometimes let them go in one ear & out the other, missing what they have to say to us about how to live our lives.  So today, I'm using the paraphrase by Eugene Peterson in The Message so we might hear these guidelines for good living with fresh ears.

      "You're blessed when you've lost it all.  God's kingdom is there for the finding."  We all have to mourn our losses.  We wouldn't be healthy if we ignored the empty place in the pit of our stomachs when we lose a job or a wallet or a spouse who divorces us or a loved one who dies.  The 2 things we need to remember are, as St. Paul tells us, NOTHING can separate us from God's love in Christ Jesus unless we shut God out, & that God WANTS to walk with us even through the valley of the shadow of death & come out with us even beyond that valley.  Since God gave his only Son that WE might have abundant life, can't we trust that God really knows how we feel & can be our companion through the grieving to the other side?  Some of us are experiencing this process as we go through the Growing Gracefully through Grief class we're having on Tuesday nights right now.

      "You're blessed when you're ravenously hungry.  Then you're ready for the Messianic meal."  You can all see I enjoy good eating, & anyone who has heard me more than 2 weeks in a row knows how much I depend on the body & blood of Christ in the Eucharist.  We're all invited to this altar for strength for our journey with nourishment which is Jesus Christ himself, & when we share this meal with our brothers & sisters in Christ, we are indeed blessed.

      "You're blessed when the tears flow freely.  Joy comes with the morning."  Tears are truly underrated gifts.  Tears are one of the outward manifestations of deep feelings, & as we get in touch with those emotions God gave us, a whole kaleidoscope of life opportunities open to us, partially because we are no longer blocked from feelings.  Tears require courage, do they not?  Getting through to the other side allows us to face untold difficulties, grateful that Christ stands with us in the gap.  An attitude of gratitude leads us to the joy which is available to us when we move beyond our tears.

      "Count yourself blessed every time someone cuts you down or throws you out, every time someone smears or blackens your name to discredit me.  What it means is that the truth is too close when that happens—skip like a lamb, if you like!—for even though they don't like it, I do. . . & all heaven applauds.  And know that you are in good company; my preachers & witnesses have always been treated like this."  None of us likes it when others put us down because of our faith.  We're hurt when people don't like us or make fun of us, especially when we're witnessing to God's love for us & others also.  However, remember when we're being criticized, it's because we hit too close for comfort.  Remember we aren't called to be successful, only faithful.  And we're certainly in good company with the prophets, witnesses & saints whom we celebrate today. 

      As we celebrate both our famous & ordinary saints & as we initiate a new child into the faith family, it's important to explore once again God's call for us to be saintly.  Welcome, saints of Hope!  Welcome home!