final judgment – Tony Lusvardi, S.J.

Apocalypse when? Homily for the 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily for the 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time (C). November 2019.

Reflecting on this Sunday’s readings, I turned to that great source of theological wisdom, Amazon Video. In November, at the end of the liturgical year, the liturgy speaks of the Apocalypse. Well, I discovered that there are also many films on this theme. I found earthquakes, hurricanes, volcanoes–even alien invasions. And lots and lots of zombies.

The name of one film–at a discounted price–was “Apocalypse 2012.” This film provoked the question: has the Apocalypse already happened? Was I distracted and didn’t notice? As I thought about it, I remember hearing in 1999, “The end is near. At midnight, our computers will no longer work, there will be a total collapse of civilization. Buy canned food.”

From the Church of Santa Maria dell’Orazione e Morte, Rome

Then in 2012, I did an interview for an American Catholic radio program, and they asked me about the Mayan calendar. It was about to end on December 21, 2012, they said, and asked, “Is it true that the world will end? Should we buy canned food?”

Even today, when we talk about the environment—an important issue—there is often an apocalyptic element. And this element, in my opinion, probably does not help us deal with this complex problem in a sober manner.

Perhaps you are now thinking, “But, Father, are you saying that there will be no Apocalypse?” Absolutely not. The Apocalypse is a recurring theme in Jesus’ preaching, and since time of the apostles, the Church has never ceased to proclaim the urgency of being prepared for this event. There have been many false prophets who have proclaimed “the time is near,” but that does not mean we should not be prepared. Even if the Mayan astrologers were wrong about the date, our life is short.

However, with these recent examples of false prophecies, I would like to point out that in today’s culture, the idea of the Apocalypse continues to exist but has become secularized. Earthquakes, hurricanes, aliens, computers, astrologers, pollution, zombies—in all this apocalyptic talk, the one thing missing is the most important thing: Jesus Christ.

Heaven without God? Homily for the 21st Sunday of Ordinary Time

Luca Signorelli, *The Last Judgment* (1499-1504), Orvieto Cathedral

Homily for the twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time (C)

Attention: this homily contains spoilers. A few years ago, Ted Danson and Kristen Bell stared in a comedy on NBC called “The Good Place.” The premise was that Kristen Bell’s character, Eleanor Shellstrop, had died and in the afterlife ended up in the “Good Place.” The only problem was that Eleanor was a shallow and selfish person. There had apparently been a mix-up in the calculations—points were awarded for good actions and subtracted for bad ones—and she had been confused with a much better woman also named Eleanor who happened to die at exactly the same moment. After not too long, Eleanor realizes that there had been an error and that she needs to hide her true identity to avoid being sent to the Bad Place, where she belongs. Since she had spent her whole life being petty, mean, and vulgar, she has no idea how to act and keeps slipping up and almost blowing her cover.

The show presents a picture of a very common understanding of heaven. It is a pleasant place, a never-ending vacation, tailored to the preferences—dietary, decorating, recreational—of its inhabitants. It is more or less religiously neutral; it’s a reward for good behavior, that’s it. In fact, though there are angels in the show—including Michael, played by Ted Danson—God is not mentioned at all. If you watch the show in light of Christian revelation—the way the Gospel talks about heaven—you figure out pretty quickly that the Good Place is most certainly not heaven. Understanding where the show goes wrong can help us to understand a bit better what makes the Christian offer of heaven so unique and surprising, and it can also help us to understand Jesus’ admonitory words in the Gospel today.

No surprises on judgment day: homily for the thirty-second Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time (A)

Many years ago, before I became a Jesuit, my parents celebrated their 25^th wedding anniversary with a trip to Italy. I had just finished two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Kazakhstan, and I decided to meet them in Italy—but I wanted it to be a surprise. So I made up an elaborate story about where I was going—a complete fake itinerary—and I pulled it off. I have never seen my mom’s mouth open so wide as when I showed up and said, “Happy anniversary!”

If you’ve ever pulled off a surprise party—and it’s not easy—you know that both the anticipation and the surprise itself are fun. There’s something about knowing what is going to happen when others don’t, the cleverness it requires, and then the shock, which in the end turns out to be joyful.

Let me be clear about today’s reading. Jesus is NOT trying to surprise us. The arrival of the bridegroom surprises all of the virgins—they all doze off and are awakened by shouting in the night—but for the wise virgins it is a joyful surprise, which brings a wedding feast, and for the foolish virgins, it means darkness. It means remaining outside in the darkness of the night because they did not care for the light that was their responsibility. In the Gospel parable, the foolish virgins are surprised, but Jesus is telling us the parable precisely so that we will not be surprised.

Judgments and Judgmentalism: homily for the sixteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time

Homily for the 16th Sunday of Ordinary Time (A)

At the end of one of the great 20^th century Catholic novels Brideshead Revisited there’s a dramatic deathbed scene. The novel is about a British Catholic aristocratic family. Early on in the story the patriarch of the family, Lord Marchmain, abandons his wife and goes off to live with an Italian mistress who is younger than his children. Needless to say, he becomes very hostile toward the Church and its teachings. At the end of the novel, sick and dying, he comes back to the family estate in England, and all of his children—and even his Italian mistress—beg him to see a priest and be reconciled before he dies. He refuses. They call the local priest to visit the house several times, and each time Lord Marchmain angrily chases him away.

The story is narrated by a friend of the family, Charles, who is an atheist. Charles, the narrator, gets angry at the family for continuing to call the priest even though Lord Marchmain has chased him away again and again. Finally, when Lord Marchmain really is dying, when he’s still conscious but no longer able to speak, the priest comes again and begins the last rites. And Charles, the narrator, is indignant. The dying man starts to move his hand, and Charles thinks, “Look, he’s trying to swat the priest away one last time.” And the shaking old hand moves up to his forehead, and then down to his stomach and then across his chest. The Sign of the Cross.

Now deathbed conversions are probably more common in literature than in real life, though they happen in real life too. But there’s a reason deathbed conversions, though small in number, are important in our Catholic worldview. This is because the fact that deathbed conversions are even possible tells us something important about God: that his mercy is infinite, that his mercy is patient, that his mercy is more powerful than a lifetime of sin, that his mercy directs us toward a life that only begins in this world.

The parables that Jesus tells today about the wheat and the weeds, about the mustard seed and the yeast, reflect this understanding of God. God’s power is capable of bringing forth a good harvest even from a field that seems choked with weeds, of bringing forth a flowering tree from a tiny mustard seed, of bringing forth nourishing bread from what looks like a handful of dust.