Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 01/23/22 Know Why

Episode Date: January 24, 2022

Homily from the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time. Imagine living your entire life and not knowing why. The return of the exiled Jews from Babylon was a great gift. But it also highlighted the reality that many of them did not know why they were Jewish. Do Catholics know why they are Catholic? Or do we lose our way precisely because we have lost our why? Mass Readings from January 23, 2022 Nehemiah 8:2-6, 8-10 Psalms 19:8-10, 151 Corinthians 12:12-30 Luke 1:1-4, 4:14-21

So it's one of those things about this time of year where it's the beginning, but it's also not the beginning, right? So the beginning was fall. Now it's January. It's one of those situations where the memory of, I think this, I think it's, let me back up. I think it's really easy to start things when it's easy to start things. I know.

It's profound, but that's what I'm here for. Profound things. Because, I mean, it's really easy to say yes to things. I mean, that's how they get you, isn't it? you show up the first day of class. Is this class hard? I don't know. Syllabus Day.

Piece of cake. You fall in love with someone and get married to them. Is this going to be difficult? I don't know. We're so googly at each other. Like, it's piece of cake. It's so easy. I'm going to start running a marathon.

How difficult is it? Well, the plan says run one mile today. Easy. It's all easy. Basically, a lot of times when you start something, it's like, that's how they suckery you into the whole thing. They get you when it's easy to do it. And then what happens?

Then they start pulling out the hard. things. And that's the moment, right? And I think sometimes you might be in your major. You might be in your occupation. You might actually be in marriage where it's like, man, it was not this hard at first. And have you ever had that situation where things got difficult, whether they got difficult at school or in a sport or in a relationship or whatever it was you were doing? At some point, you have to ask the question, wait, why did I say yes to this? You have to go back and say, like, why did I think I could do med school? Like, why did I think this would be a good idea? Why did I think, that I could, whatever that thing was, why did I think I could run a marathon? Because this is hard,

and that's actually a really good question. Because I can't remember why I said yes to this. And look back at myself, and I just, and it's really easy in those moments to just want to quit. It's really easy in those moments to lose your way. There's an author, his name is Michael Hyatt. And he said this before, he has actually said it many times, there's a lot of ways to lose your way. He says, but most of us, we lose our way when we lose our why. Why did you start this end in the first place? I have no idea. That's why we're lost.

So many of us, we lose our way. We stop doing the thing that even we know we want to do. We stop doing that thing when we can't remember why we started in the first place. I think a lot of times we lose our way when we lose our why. And if someone asks the question, why are you doing this? A lot of us would probably answer. I'm not sure. In fact, the reason I'm thinking about this is because of the first reading.

The first reading is from the book of Nehemiah. And the context for this whole reading is you have to go back a little bit. So you have the people of Israel, right? 12 tribes of Israel united under King David. And then under King Solomon, his son. And then after Solomon, there's another king who showed up. He was not a good king.

And the kingdom divided into 10 tribes in the north and two tribes in the south. A lot of stuff happened. One of those things that happened is the Assyrians came in from the north and they basically destroyed those 10 tribes in the north. So all that was left, of all Israel were two tribes, Judah and Benjamin. And they rallied. They did okay. But then it came

the Babylonians. The Babylonians came in and they basically conquered Jerusalem. They conquered Israel. And they brought them all, almost every single Jew they brought into exile in Babylon, hundreds and hundreds of miles away. So here are these Jews that for generations, for 70 years, they grew up in Babylon. I mean, they were told that, you know, your forefathers, they grew up in Jerusalem, that your actual land that God promised to your people is in Jerusalem, but they'd never seen Jerusalem. In fact, in Babylon, they had never even heard the Bible. All they knew was that they were Jews, but they didn't know why. But one of those writers in the Bible, his name is Isaiah. When this all was going down, Isaiah prophesied, he said,

in 70 years from now, there's going to be another king, and his name is going to be Cyrus, and he's going to send the Jewish people back to Israel. So what happens? Well, 70 years later, there's this, the Persian king named Cyrus, conquers the Babylonian king, and, and, and, and, And they're like, the Jewish leaders are like, hey, King Cyrus, check it out. Your name's in our special book here. And it says here that you're going to send us back to Jerusalem. And so King Cyrus says, well, I guess if that's what the book says, go ahead. So he sends all these Jews back to Jerusalem.

But here's the crazy thing. Most of them didn't go. Most of them just stayed in Babylon because all they've ever known is Babylon. They've been living there for seven years. I mean, their grandparents had seen Jerusalem, but some of their parents had never even seen Jerusalem. they had for sure never seen Jerusalem, why go back? But there's a number of Jews who went back to Jerusalem, and why did they go back? Well, I guess because we're Jews.

So they came back, there were three waves. The first wave was a guy named Zerubabel. And they'll show up and they live in Jerusalem. Why are you living here? I don't know, because we're Jews. Second wave, the guy named Nehemiah, that's the name of the book today. And he said, we need to build a wall around Jerusalem because we need to defend it. And this is one of those difficult moments because it wasn't just, hey, build a wall.

It was, they had opposition. There were people who wanted to kill them, because they were building a wall. And so actually the book of Nehemiah describes that as they're building the wall, they would have a sword in one hand and a trowel or like a shovel in the other hand. So it wasn't just difficult. It was dangerous. Why are you building this wall? I don't know. Nehemiah tells us to because we're Jews. And then along comes Ezra. And Ezra comes in the third wave and he realizes, okay, you're living here in the city of Jerusalem. You're built a wall around Jerusalem, but you haven't built the temple here in Jerusalem. And they're like, why would we build a temple?

And that's where we have this reading today. In Mehemiah chapter 8, it says Ezra gets up and he reads from the first five books of Moses called the Torah, right? Exodus, Genesis, Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and Numbers. We have to understand. These are people who have never heard the Bible. They never heard this story. They didn't know why they were Jews. All they knew was that they were Jews.

They didn't know why they were living in Jerusalem. All they knew was that were Jews. They didn't know why they built a wall. All they knew is that they were Jews. They didn't know why they needed to build a temple. all they knew that there were Jews, and then all of a sudden, here's Ezra, he stands up and he starts reading their story. You can imagine these people hearts that, after a lifetime spent not realizing,

not knowing why, they were Jews. All of a sudden, they're cut to the heart. And it says here, they begin weeping. Why? They begin weeping because they're like, wait, wait, that's us? They hear this story and they realize, oh my gosh, that's what it means to be Jewish. means that God knows our name? To be Jewish, it means that God actually has a plan for us. To be Jewish means he's actually chosen us. These are people who have lived their entire lives,

knowing they were Jews, but not knowing why? I think a lot of us are like them. I think a lot of us are like them. It's like, why are you here tonight? I don't know, because I'm Catholic. Why are a Catholic? I don't know. I'm Irish. That's actually a thing. I know a guy. Actually, two guys. one guy I talked to him last week and he said that he was baptized his mom was agnostic, his dad was atheist but he was baptized and he had first reconciliation, first holy community

he was confirmed in high school because his grandparents were Catholic that was it why you go to Mass? He doesn't go to Mass. Why are you baptized? Because my grandparents are Catholic. That's the only reason. Another guy, he's a good friend of mine his name is Bill. Bill left home around

17, 18 years old. made his way in the world. But he's kind of rough around the edges. He's a gregarious guy, like to live life, like to party a little bit. But he went to Mass every single Sunday. He told me this. He said, I went to Mass every Sunday

because I didn't want to go to hell when I died. But if you would ask me, he literally said this. But if you asked me, I wouldn't be able to tell you the difference between Jesus and Buddha. Here's a man who's been going to Mass every Sunday into his 30s. No idea why.

Actually, he said, because my last name is Irish, I'm Irish. I'm Catholic. I go to Mass. I think it's a lot of us. And that's why it's so easy to lose our way. Because if someone wanted to ask you, why are you here? Like, I don't, I don't know. I don't know why. I'm just here. Why back in Jerusalem? I don't know. Just here. I've lost my way because I actually don't even know my why. Is there a difference between Jesus and Buddha? I don't know. Actually, you know, in the first reading of this gospel today, Luke wants to make a big point

and saying, yep, Jesus is different than Buddha. He doesn't mention Buddha, but basically Luke says, the very beginning of his gospel, he says, I sat down to write all these things, and I examined eyewitnesses, because here's the thing we need to understand. One of the things that makes Christianity different than every other religion in the world is Christianity is an historical religion.

It happened at a certain point in a certain time, at a certain place, with certain people. It's not an idea. It is historical. And so what Luke is saying is that this isn't a myth. Basically, he even says, I've examined everything accurately and new. Why?

So that you can be certain of the teachings you've received. We have to understand this. There's only one reason to believe anything. Not because it makes you happy, not because it makes you good, but because it's true. There's only one reason to believe anything. And it's not because it makes you happy, not because it makes you good, it's because it's true. And what Luke is saying in the beginning of his gospel is, everything I'm about to share with you, it's 100% true.

Eyewitnesses, it actually happened so that you can be certain of everything I'm going to tell you about Jesus, because here's the thing about Jesus. Jesus is not like every other world teacher, religious founder. In fact, when I was in college, I took a class on comparative religions, in which we took our time to compare religions, as one does in that class. And so in this class, it was great. It's really important, I think, to learn about the world and learn about other religions in the world.

It's really helpful. But in this class, we had a book, and the textbook was basically divided up into chapters, as books are, but each chapter was a different religion. So you have a chapter on Buddhism, chapter on Christianity, chapter on Taoism, chapter on Judaism, and Islam, and Zoroastrianism, and all the different isms. And basically, you just compare them. And that's not a bad thing. I think it's a good thing to learn about other religions. It's really good to be able to affirm the good things that are found in other religions. That's not a bad thing. But one of the things I hear people say is like what I need to do. If I'm going to commit to Christianity, I need to examine all of the other religions and I need to figure out where they're wrong

and see if Christianity's right. And I think that's not a bad project, but I want to make it easier. There's an easier way to go about it. And the easier way is you don't have to ask every question. You just have to ask one. Now one question is, is Jesus who he said he is. Is Jesus who he said he is? Because if he's not, don't pay attention to Christianity. If Jesus isn't who he said he is, then there's no reason for us to be here. We should just shut it down and turn this into like a disco or something like that. Like, if Jesus, you don't have to investigate every other world religion. We just have to investigate this one question.

Is Jesus who he said he is? No, there are people who all the time will say things like, my pal C.S. Lewis, he pointed this out. He said, there are people you'll find every day who will say, I don't believe Jesus is God, but I believe he is a holy person. or I don't believe Jesus was God, but I believe he was a good man. C.S. Lewis says, that's the one thing about Jesus you can't say about Jesus. You can't say he wasn't God, but a good person. Because Jesus actually claimed to be God.

So either, there's a, he's called the Trilemma, either Jesus wasn't God and he knew he wasn't God, in which case he was lying, or Jesus wasn't God and he didn't know he wasn't God, in which case he was deluded. or there's a third option. And so we have to look at this. In fact, C.S. Lewis, in the book, mere Christianity, he examines this.

And if you haven't read that book, I just, 100%, I cannot recommend it more strongly. But he talks about this trilemma. Maybe he's a liar. Maybe he wasn't God, and he knew he wasn't God. Pathological Liar. Now, he's the interesting thing. If you ever do any, like, psychological reading

about, like, the personality profile of pathological liars, they almost all fit the same pattern. They're all narcissistic. They're all self-involved. They're all egotistical. very few of them are creative, almost all of them are so narrow. And yet when you read the Gospels, what's the picture we get of Jesus? It's the opposite of a narcissist.

Jesus is always interested in other people. It's the opposite of someone who is self-involved. He is always giving of himself. I mean, how many times in the Gospels does it describe? Here is Jesus, who's been working hard all day. He's exhausted, and he sees one more person or another group of people who just need him and he pours himself out. Jesus doesn't fit, and you read all the stories, Jesus does not fit, even to his enemies,

Jesus does not fit the personality profile of someone who's a pathological liar. So maybe there's another alternative. Maybe he's not a liar, but maybe he wasn't God and he didn't know he wasn't God. Maybe he was actually what C.S. Lewis says, not a liar, but maybe a lunatic. Here's an interesting thing. If you ever want to know how sane you are, your sanity is, probably, hopefully you do, your sanity is based on how closely your perception of yourself corresponds with reality.

So if I were to say, I believe that I'm a Catholic priest, that perception of myself pretty closely corresponds with reality. If I were to say, you guys, I think that I'm the best priest in the world. Now, if I really thought that, by the way, that doesn't correspond with reality. But if I actually believe,

Sometimes you meet people like that. They think they're God's gift. They think they're like, no, they're self-deceived, right? They think they're better than they are. You can pick that up after about like five minutes. You realize, oh, okay, they're not really quite connected to reality. Now, go even further. What if I thought, I'm not, I don't just think I'm the best priest in the world.

I think that I'm Pope Francis. Like, what if I honestly, you talk to me and I'm like, hola, yo so you, your papa, come what estaz? If I genuinely believed I was Pope Francis, but, shh, don't tell anyone I'm in Minnesota. Minnesota today. You know, it wouldn't take five minutes for you to realize, okay, you're, this guy is not connected to reality. But what if I, what if I was so far gone that I, I didn't just think I was Pope Francis. I thought it was the first Pope. I'm like, you guys,

I'm Peter. Come back from the dead. Don't worry. Call me Rocky. Just no one will know. Like, what if I, and I genuinely thought that I was Peter resurrected from the dead, after a minute, you'd be, okay, this guy is not connected to reality. But if I went even further and said, actually, I don't want anyone, don't let anyone in anyone in on my secret, but I'm actually a butterfly. And I genuinely believe that I was a butterfly. Like, let me tell you my story. First, I was a caterpillar.

Then I wove this cocoon around me. Then I was a pupa. Let me tell you about pupa life. Now, it would take five seconds to realize I am not connected to reality. Here's Jesus. And he comes on the scene. And he doesn't just say, I'm the greatest prophet.

He doesn't just say, I'm Elijah, come back from the dead. Or I'm Jeremiah come back from the dead. Jesus doesn't even say I'm a jelly donut. Jesus says, Do you see that the yellow thing in the sky? I did that. Jesus says, guess who formed you in your mother's womb?

Me. Like, Jesus doesn't just claim to be important or impressive. He claimed to actually be the foundation of all being. If there was someone who was not God, but really truly believed that they were God, you would catch on to this in five words. And yet when you see Jesus, he sees someone who's so compelling.

You see someone who's so connected to reality that he's not a lunatic and he's not lying, which means there's only one remaining option that Jesus is who he says he is. He's actually the Lord. And that's why St. Luke, in this gospel, in today's reading, he says, I want you to know with certainty the truth about Jesus. And then we jump to chapter four today,

where Jesus goes into the synagogue, and he says, the prophecy of Isaiah has been fulfilled in your hearing. Now, this is really, it just blows my mind. Did you know in the Old Testament, there are over 300 prophecies about the Messiah in the Old Testament? So no one in history of the world has ever been pre-announced. There's no one in the history of the world who's ever actually their life, their details of their life,

the fact of their existence was ever pre-announced. Except in the Old Testament, there are 300 prophecies that the Old Testament said the Messiah would fulfill. Question, what do you think the odds are that one person would fulfill all 300? It's astronomical, so let's reduce it. What do you think the odds are that one person would fulfill like 50 of them?

Still be big. Actually, some scientists, some mathematicians got together. And they just wanted to ask the question, what are the odds one person would fulfill eight of these prophecies in their lifetime? So they were conservative about this. and they set out, they did a mathematical thing. So basically, if you took 10 silver dollars, put those silver dollars in a hat,

you know, put a cross on one of them, put them in a hat, blindfolded someone, the chances that they'll pull out that one silver dollar with a cross on it is one in ten. So that's what we're dealing with. The chances of one person fulfilling eight of these Old Testament prophecies is one in ten to the 17th power. I know you're impressed. What is that? I don't know what that means.

Okay, y'all have heard of Texas before? Great, so Texas, it's this big state down in the south. So, Texas is roughly 270,000 square miles. If you were to drive across the state of Texas from east to west, without stopping, it would take you at least 12 hours. The same thing is true if you went from west to east. But, so 12 hours from east to west and the other way too, if you were to drive from the border in Oklahoma all the way down to the border of Mexico,

north or south, it would take you, without stopping, it would take you eight and a half hours. So 12 hours across, 8.5 hours, top to bottom, 270,000 square miles. If you took silver dollars, if you took 10 to the 17th power number of silver dollars, you'd be able to cover every inch of the state of Texas in silver dollars stacked two feet deep. Like, that's how many silver dollars we're talking about. That's what 10 to the 17th power looks like. So imagine, you have silver dollars covering the entire state of Texas, 270,000 square miles, two feet deep, full of silver dollars, and you've drawn a cross on one of them,

and you put it somewhere in that state, and someone put a blindfold on you and said, just go as far as you want. You can even fly there if you want, whatever. At any given moment, stop, bend over, and pick up one silver dollar. The odds of you being able to pick up the silver dollar with the cross on it is one in ten to the 17th power. That's if one person fulfills eight, of these prophecies. Jesus, in his life, fulfilled 300 of these prophecies. So when Luke is saying, I want you to know with certainty, one of the things he's saying is, I want you to know. You believe in Jesus. You showed up today at mass because you're Catholic. Why? Do you know why? You know that you can believe this with certainty that Jesus is not a liar. He is not a lunatic,

that he is the Lord. And you can know this, that Jesus actually is who he says he is. and my prayer is that today, you know why. This guy who said that he was a Catholic because his grandparents were Catholic, he had no idea why. So he lost his way. When he was a senior in high school or freshman in college, he was invited to a Bible study. And as he was going through this Bible study,

one of the Bible study leaders was going through and telling the story. And he realized, oh my gosh, that's what it means to be Catholic. He was just like those Jews in Nehemiah. He actually broke down in tears as he heard the story. He realized, wait a second, I've spent 18 years of my life not going to Mass, except for those Wednesday night religious ed glasses. Not caring because I didn't know this was true. Well, my friend Bill was in his 30s.

He went away for a retreat because his parish priest conned him into it. And while he was at that retreat, he realized that he wasn't Catholic because he was Irish. He's Catholic because it's true. He wasn't Catholic because his mom and dad were Catholic. He was not just to avoid going to hell. He was Catholic because he's like, wait a second, there is a God who actually did live and suffer and die and rise from the dead for me, and it changed everything in his life.

And he rediscovered his way because he finally knew why. And this could be you tonight. Like this literally could be us tonight. Or maybe you've been going to Mass. And you've been doing a good job your whole life. Or maybe just recently. But tonight you're like, oh my gosh, this is true?

Is this possible that Jesus actually is who he says he is? That Jesus actually is God. Imagine what that would be. be like. To realize this for the first time tonight is the last thing. But 10 years ago or so, it came across the story of these two sisters in Hong Kong. They were raised Buddhist, and as Buddhists, you know, it's kind of an atheistic worldview or a philosophy, you don't have to believe in God to be a Buddhist.

So they were raised with the idea that, you know, you're kind of an accident. And in China, they're also kind of raised with the idea that, listen, You're not that special. If you don't live, there's a couple million just like you, just as talented as you, just as capable as you, with as much potential as you. You don't really matter. You don't only mean anything. And at one point in their mid-20s, these two sisters, they met a Catholic Christian

who told them about the God who made them, revealed to them that they weren't an accident, revealed to them that actually they were made on purpose and that this one God not only knew them, not only cared about them, but this God was willing to come to this earth and become one of us in order to love them to the point where he spent his whole life for them. These sisters were so moved, they became Catholics 10 years ago this Easter. And I saw a picture of one of them. They're both very outgoing. They're both very exuberant in life.

And at one point, the one sister was getting baptized. And they were baptized. It wasn't a little trickle of water. It was like dunk tank, the dunk tank baptism. And so she'd been fully immersed. And she had come out of the water, and she was standing, surrounded by all these people in this Catholic church in Hong Kong with this priest standing in the water with her. She just got baptized. She's dripping. She's soaked this water and soaked in the Holy Spirit. And her arms are straight up over her head. And she's just crying out the word, Alleluia, because not just because she's excited, not just because she's happy, but because she knows there is a God who knows my name.

And I know why I'm alive. In that moment, she knew that Jesus is who he says he is. She knew that Jesus is God. She knew that Jesus is the truth and the life and the way. And that moment she was saying, she knew why. Tonight, you and I are in the same place. We know. You know that Jesus is who he says he is.

You know that Jesus is God. You know that Jesus is the way. And now you know why.