Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 02/04/24 Holy Moments: Shared Moments

Episode Date: February 3, 2024

Homily from the Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time. You can only share what you have. Holy moments are shared moments. We share like Jesus (and make moments holy) when we are generous and honest. Mass Readings from February 4, 2024:: Job 7:1-4, 6-7 Psalms 147:1-61 Corinthians 9:16-19, 22-23 Mark 1:29-39

Welcome to Sunday homilies with me, Father Mike Schmitz. I hope today's homily inspires and motivates you, and I also hope that it leaves you hungry for the one who gave everything to feed you. If you want to get this in other Sunday Mass resources sent straight to your inbox, sign up at ascensionpress.com slash Sunday, or by texting Sunday to 33777. You can also follow or subscribe on your podcast app for weekly notifications. God bless. The Lord be with you.

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Mark. Chapter 1, verse 29 through 39. On leading the synagogue, Jesus entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John. Simon's mother-in-law lay sick with a fever. They immediately told him about her. He approached, grasped her hand, and helped her up. Then the fever left her and she waited on them.

When it was evening after sunset, they brought to him all who were ill or possessed by demons. The whole crowd was gathered at the door. He cured many who were sick with very, various diseases, and he drove out many demons, not permitting them to speak because they knew him. Rising very early before dawn, he left and went off to a deserted place where he prayed. Simon and those who were with him pursued him, and on finding him said, Everyone is looking for you.

He told them, let us go on to the nearby villages that I may preach there also, for this purpose have I come. So he went into their synagogues, preaching, and driving out demons throughout the whole of Galilee. The gospel of the Lord. Right, you to have a seat. So I was thinking about that, I was noticing that my parents, when I was growing up, my parents seemed to have a, my parents seemed very preoccupied with teaching us certain things.

I don't know if you had this experience where your parents are just like, it seems like some things that they, it was like really, really, really important for them that we learned these things, among other things. Like, yes, it was very important that we learned our prayers like when it came before every meal. Every time we went to bed, every time we did something.

If there was a prayer involved, my parents were like, okay, you're going to learn your prayers. That was one big thing. Another big thing was manners was very big for my mom and dad. It was one of those situations where my mom had a bone-crushing handshake and so that was like, that's a proper handshake. Is this one that's very firm?

Look people in the eye. Always say yes, no, or please thank you. Basic stuff, but it was, you couldn't get away with even kind of deviating from that even a little bit. So prayers were important, manners were important. Another one, it's actually maybe, this might have been the cardinal rule of my family, I guess working a lot is a thing. So there was no greater insult that my parents could say, or even we could say about each other,

or anyone could say about another person. But that was worse than you're lazy. Like that would be the worst thing. The worst thing our parents could say about any of us is, oh, so-and-so is being really lazy right now. Or you're just being lazy right now? That was like the worst. It was horrible.

So it was very important in my family, my parents, that we learned our prayers, we learned manners, that we weren't lazy. But the thing that it seemed like they were just really, really, really, obsessed with was that we needed to learn how to share. I don't know if you guys had the same kind of thing, but it's just one of the situations where I was like, oh my gosh, everything. If there's food, okay, share the food. Like, that was the thing. If there's clothes and your sibling could fit into the clothes, you share the clothes. If there were toys, 100%. You don't have any toys of your own. If you do, they also belong to everyone else. Friends, even my parents were very big.

And now grateful for this because my older brother had all the friends. And so they were, they were always telling my older brother, basically, your little brother tag along because you're kind of kind of share your friends. Sharing was really, really important for my family. It was very, they were, as I said, preoccupied, maybe borderline obsessed with us learning to share. But I've noticed something. I noticed actually two things about sharing. If someone doesn't want to share, this is not just my family, but this is everybody. If someone doesn't want to share, you can take something from them and give it to someone else, but you can't make them share. I think this is really important.

If someone doesn't want to share, you can take the thing from them. and give it to someone else, but you can't make a person share. And secondly, is you can't share what you don't have. Positively spoken speaking, you can say, you can only share what you have. So these two things stuck with me, and I'm thinking about that in relation. You know, we're in the middle of this series called Holy Moments. And it's based off of Matthew Kelly's book, Holy Moments, which is based off of another book called The Biggest Lie in History of Christianity,

which the biggest lie in the history of Christianity is that holiness is for other people, that sanctity is for someone else, not for us. And so we've been talking about this. We've been talking about the truth that actually what we've learned over the last few weeks

is that holiness is possible. Not only is holiness possible, holiness is possible for you, not for someone else, and holiness is possible for you right here, right now. Not some other life, not some other time,

not some other environment or circumstance, but holiness is actually attainable. So, why? Because a holy moment is simply an ordinary moment that's reconsidered. A holy moment is an ordinary moment where we realize God is present, God is active, and this moment is his. We also found out last week and we talked about the fact that a holy moment is the present moment, that we can only actually find God.

If God is here, he's only here with us right now. If he's active, he's only active right now. And if this moment is going to be his, it's going to be right now and right here. So what do we need to do? We need to realize, to make every moment a holy moment. Again, holiness is attainable and also holiness is desirable. That kind of life where we're living through life fully alive, filled with wonder, filled with astonishment, that's possible. So it's attainable and it's desirable.

But we have to start, and this is the key. Sometimes I think we have to start by simply noticing. Because how does Matthew Kelly define a holy moment? He says, a holy moment is a single moment in which you open yourself to God. You make yourself available to him and setting aside personal preference and self-interest. For one moment, you do what you prayerfully believe God is calling you to do. So I'm thinking, I realize that a holy moment is a moment where you make yourself available. A holy moment is a shared moment.

This is the reality. A holy moment is, yes, it's an ordinary moment. Yes, it is the present moment. But a holy moment is a shared moment. What I mean by that is every time we live a holy moment, experience a holy moment. It means it's a generous moment and it's an honest moment. That's what a shared moment is. A shared moment is a generous moment and an honest moment.

I'm thinking about this, especially when it comes to Jesus. If we look at the life of Jesus, we realize everything he did, he caused every ordinary moment to become a holy moment. Every moment, Jesus was in the present. And every moment, there was a holy moment that Jesus created, it was a shared moment. He was just willing to be generous, willing to be honest. Look at the gospel today.

This is remarkable. Here's Jesus. Comes to Copernum. And here, what happens? Well, they bring to him Simon's mother-in-law. She's sick. What does Jesus do? He shares his healing.

They bring all the sick, all the people who are plagued by diseases, people who are plagued by demons. What does he do? It says, he healed them all. He drove out all the demons. So the one thing we recognize about Jesus, all this activity, the Jesus made every moment holy simply because he was willing to share. Now in this moment, I understand people like, well, yeah, he could share, he's God,

you can walk around this, of course every moment Jesus touches is going to become a holy moment. Well, yes and no, yes because he has God, but no because what made it a holy moment. Jesus was willing to share. Now before you and I get to the place where we disqualify our ourselves and say, I can't do what Jesus can do. You're right. But realize that sharing generosity is really actually more simple than that. Don't think I can't do that because you're right, you can't. I can't heal people or drive out demons. Jesus simply shared what he had. And if you and I are going to make a moment holy, you have to realize, okay, I can't share what I don't have,

but generosity is so simple. Generosity is simply share what you have. No one, including God, is expecting you to give what you don't have. No one, including God, is expecting you to share what you don't have. So the question, why do we complicate this? Why do we complicate and say, well, I don't have X, Y, and Z, therefore I can't share X, Y, and Z. Yes, but you might have A, B, and C. So share that. Again, a holy moment is a shared moment because it's just, generous and honest. We get to honest in the sack. But it's generous in that sense. You simply are willing to share what you have. So what do we have? Well, every one of us has the ability, as you mentioned before, everyone has the ability to be present. What I mean by that is everyone

of us has the ability to notice the people around us. Every one of us has the ability to notice God around us. Remember, the holy moment is the moment we realize God is here. God is active. in this moment is his. So how about this? How about a holy moment, being a shared moment, is a moment where we're not only present, but we also look. We're not only present, we also notice. So here at University of Minnesota, Duluth, at the Newman Center,

one of the things we say, I'll get in again, is these three words. And these three words kind of repeat, they're kind of like a sub-motto of what it is to be part of the Catholic campus ministry here. And those three words are seen, known, and loved. And those words that, you know, I don't know if you've ever heard them before. You've heard the words before, I'm sure you know what they mean. But like, we put them together because we realize that a lot of times this campus is filled with 12 to 14,000 people who every day walk through the hallways unseen.

There's thousands of people across the street here from where we are right now. With this very moment, I feel like nobody knows them. And there's thousands of people across the street right now on this campus who feel that nobody loves them. And so we keep repeating these words, seen, known, and loved to remind us not only that, okay, you're seen and you're known and you're loved, but also we, someone has to be the one to see. Like someone has to be the one who's willing to get to know and someone has to be the one who's willing to love. And so if that's going to be the case, the first step is what? The first step is look, right? The first step is look up.

The first step is, how about this? Make eye contact. And this is one of the things. You might seem so small. But the holy moment is a shared moment. And it's one thing I can just walk in my hallway. I can walk in my lane. I can only pay attention to my stuff. Or I can look up and look someone in the eye.

How about this? How about I can look up, look someone in the eye and smile. Now, I understand that that seems so small. It seems way too small. But that's where we have to start. Because if we're going to start with Jesus healed them all, the drop out demons, and you're like, I can't do that. Okay.

If I say, I think invitation for us to make every holy moment, a shared moment, look to people in the eye and smile, am I going to disqualify it? That's too small? This one's too big. Is this one too small? You know, I actually know people who have gone days, maybe even weeks, without anyone really looking them in the eye, without anyone actually saying their name, without anyone actually genuinely smiling at them.

So maybe looking at someone in the eye and smiling at them, maybe that's small for you. That's not small for everyone. You can make an ordinary moment, the present moment, a holy moment, if we're willing to simply, again, share what you have to smile. I mean, this is what St. Paul even talks about. St. Paul is saying, I share what I have. He says, I offer the gospel free of charge.

You know, Jesus in Matthews' Gospel, Chapter 10, Jesus says, freely you have received, freely you are to give. So some of you know my friend Nick Davidson, Nick Davidson, actually his nonprofit is called Freely Given Inc. Inc.com. So if you go to website freelygivenink.com, Nick, he lives his life like this. He lives his life. If there's anything that makes Nick's life a holy life, his moments, a holy moment,

is because he is the definition of what it is to live a shared life, like a generous life. So right now he and his wife and their wife, and their five children are with the team of a bunch of other people from Minnesota who are living in Cambodia, and they're simply there, and they move there. They have completely transplanted themselves into the country of Cambodia simply because Nick and his wife, Jaiselin, and his family, believe that they have freely been given the grace of Jesus Christ.

The truth of the gospel, like Paul is saying today, where he says, I offer the gospel free of charge because he's been given God's grace free of charge. He's like, yeah, it's worth it now for us to leave everything. everything, everyone who knows us, everyone who supports us and loves us, to go to Cambodia, because those people there, they also need to know about the grace of Jesus Christ. Because why? Because they live holy moments. And holy moments are shared moments. And shared moments are generous moments. And so what a next like principles, even before he left to go to Cambodia, one of his principles that he would talk to everyone about is he says, okay, here's what the thing.

If you find yourself in front of someone who's in need and you reach into your pocket and you realize you have maybe like two, three bills. And there's like the $1 bill, the $5 bill, the $20 bill, maybe even, who knows, $100 bill. Nick's perspective, and this is from someone who doesn't have any money, Nick's perspective is always this. He says, always. Just, this is the policy.

Always give the big bill. Here's someone, and you're going to help them out. Got a $20 and a $5, always give the big bill. Here's someone you're going to help them out. You have $100 bill. He says, always give the big bill. And now, what's fascinating, I think, is the number of people who come up to and say, oh, Nick is your friend.

I'm like, of course he is. And they said, the thing, the big bill thing has changed my life. I mean, I don't know. Honestly, last week someone came up to me and I've never met them before. And they said, Nick David said, tell me about the big bill thing and it's changed my life. Because they say, I find myself in these places where I want to help and I want to help in a small way. But I hear Nick's voice saying, give the big bill. And that's transformed their lives.

It's like what St. Paul says in the second reading. where St. Paul says, he says, I offer the gospel free of charge. I do this so that I might have a share in it. Remember, a holy moment is a shared moment. Paul says, I do this so that I might have a share in the gospel. What he means is so that I might have a part in this. Because every time you and I live a holy moment, that holy moment being a shared moment, remember, what is it?

God is here. God is active in this moment is his. When you actually get to participate in what God is doing, by being generous, that's a holy moment. We're being a part of it. We're being a part of his work on this earth. Imagine an ordinary moment in your day and my day that was simply a shared moment

can bring us and let us be a part of what God is trying to do on this planet. Because we realize that if we do that, we start doing that in just ordinary moments, small moments, become holy moments. It doesn't stop with us. They're moments, but they gain momentum. And there's one, there's actually a holy moment that I was, I was, my mom told me about a couple years before she died. She, she shared that when she, my dad got married, she was a nurse and they moved to Chicago

because my dad was in the middle of medical school. And so he had just started rotations. And so no more just classes, but it was kind of like this chaotic schedule. And he had to drive every morning. Pause. They got married in December. The next December, they had a little baby in their arms who was a couple weeks old. And so it was one of the situations where here's my mom and dad.

and they had moved to Chicago because my dad had to finish up as residency or rotations and ended residency later on. And my mom was supporting them both because my dad, my parents didn't come from a lot. And so my dad got to go to medical school because he was in the Air Force and the Air Force as kind of a payback. They're all a story there. But they would talk about how four nights a week that had spam and rice and breakfast as well. That was the meal, very, very simple living. My mom was the one supporting them because while my dad had to drive to go to rotations at some other hospital. They lived right across the street from the hospital and my mom was a nurse at. So they're there for a year. Now they have a baby. And so when I stay care of the baby.

So my mom had said that she shared with the nurses on her floor, she said, I don't know my schedule because I don't know when my husband will get home from his rotations. Because we have this little baby, I can't leave her there. I have to wait until he gets home and then we do the handoff. And these nurses, this is a holy moment. These nurses, they said, Goody, my mom's name is Goody, said, Goody, whenever your husband gets home, that's when your shift will start. It's just, just, this willingness to be generous, like this willingness to simply give, this willingness to do what, to willingness to simply share what they had. Because why? Because Holy moments are shared moments, and we can only share what we have. But here's the crazy thing. It's not just,

holy moments are not just about activity. They're not just about service. They're also about sharing the heart. That's why holy moments are not only shared moments when it comes to being generous, but holy moments are also shared moments when it comes to being honest. Jesus is in the gospel today. He's busy, right? He's giving. He's giving what he has. He's giving healing. He's giving hope.

He's giving joy. But at one point, he does something very peculiar. At one point, he leaves and he goes to pray. Now, you might not think that's weird because you'd probably grow up hearing that Jesus always goes off to pray, and he did. But what I find is interesting is how did Jesus pray? I don't know if you've ever asked that question. Like, why did Jesus have to pray? Because I know how I have to pray.

I know how we typically pray. We pray because we need Google or we need Google Maps or we need the ATM. Like that's right, right? So we need Google? Like, God, I need an answer. Are we need Google Maps? Like, God, what's my direction to help me get this place? Or we need the ATM.

God, come and help me. Right? These are our kind of our typical ways that we pray. But Jesus didn't need that, right? He didn't need God as Google or Google Maps. he knew he was God, so he already knew stuff. He already knew where he was going. He knew what he was about.

He didn't need necessarily help. Why would Jesus pray? He took time to do it. And we realized that Jesus prayed because he wanted to spend time with his father. So what did that prayer look like? It could look at many, many different ways. But one thing for sure

is we know that that prayer of Jesus was honest. even go to the garden of Githemeny, where Jesus goes into prayer with his father. And he doesn't say, God, Father, I love this. This is the best ever. While internally he's saying, like, I wish this cup would pass from me, not my will be, your will be done.

Jesus, his prayer to the Father was completely honest, which is so different than our prayer half the time. I think too many of us, maybe when you start your prayer, your prayer life, Maybe your prayer life at the beginning was marked by like ease. Maybe your prayer at the beginning was marked by these constellations. Maybe your prayer at the beginning was marked by all these graces. And so you're just thinking like, God, this is great.

Your prayer is flowing. And then what happens a lot of times in people's lives is then we encounter some kind of pain. We encounter some kind of suffering. We encounter something that we don't like and we stop talking to God about it. So we talk to God about everything except the thing that's most heavily on our heart. We find ourselves doing this, especially if you want to be a good person. Right? If you want to be someone who gets close to the Lord, sometimes we think, like, well, this thing is agonizing.

This thing's breaking my heart, but I can't talk to God about it because he probably doesn't want to hear about this. Now, this might never have been you, but this is a temptation for so many people. When something's happening, we have some kind of pain, we have some kind of heartbreak, we have some kind of thing that's distressing us, and we think, it's big for my heart, but it's too small for Jesus. So again, we end up talking to God about everything but,

You say, oh, God, this is great. Things are great. God, you are great. Instead of actually being honest. Because meanwhile, our hearts are breaking. Meanwhile, our life is breaking. It's one of the reasons why I love, I love the first reading today from the book of Job. Job's life has fallen apart.

Job is being crushed. And what does Job say? It doesn't say, God, it's all good. I get it. Job says, I've forgotten what happiness is. God, it would have been better for me if I'd never been born. God, this is actually where my heart is. So there's my invitation for all of us.

To let those dark moments be holy moments. Let those light moments be holy moments. Let every moment be a holy moment by what? By letting those moments be shared moments. And what I mean by that is, let those moments be moments where we share what we have by being honest. This is the last thing. When it comes to our lives,

holiness is possible for you right now and right here. Ordinary moments can be holy moments when we know that God is here. God is active and this moment is His. Holy moments, ordinary moments can be holy moments when we realize that not only has God here, but I'm truly present as well. And at the same time, holy moments are ordinary moments. and we're simply willing to share. God will not take something from us and give it to someone else.

So you can't make us share. It's not waiting us to share what we don't have. But holy moments are generous moments where you share what you have. And holy moments are honest moments where you share what you have. And that's it. And that's all.

And a life of ordinary moments, of shared moments, is all it takes to make a saint.