Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 02/17/19 The Fighting Virtue

Episode Date: February 18, 2019

Homily from the Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time. Willing to engage and embrace the realities of life. Hope is not a “soft” virtue. It is a fighting virtue. Hope is what enables us to live in the present with strength and conviction. It takes hope to take action. Mass Readings from February 17, 2019: Jeremiah 17:5-8 Psalms 1:1-4, 61 Corinthians 15:12, 16-20 Luke 6:17, 20-26 Download the Homily Study

So that question at the beginning of mass, what's the maximum age you would want to live until? I heard a couple of guesses that were like, oh, 21 is good. I'm good. I'm fine. I'm done. Others, you know, it's funny because people are like, I don't know, maybe 70, 100. You know, 100's a good round number kind of a thing. But I wonder, like, what makes us say this is the cap? Like what makes I say, like, you know, maybe 103 because, you know, I broke the barrier and three years past that.

Like, what, why not 170? Like, honestly, why not, like, I don't know, why stop at 100s? Why not, like, 350? When it comes to that, answering that question, I imagine that a big part of the limiting factor was the idea of, like, well, I mean, I guess, you know, as long as I still have my health, I guess I'll keep going on living. It's like, if I can keep traveling, maybe I'll go on living. If I still have, you know, money and means and stuff, I might as well,

keep on living. As long as I have people in my life, you know, I imagine you get to a certain age. I mean, I know this. You get to a certain age and everyone you knew is dead. That's just what, that's what happens. So kind of the idea of like, well, if I don't still have my health and I don't still have finances, if I don't have people around me, then what's the point of living? You might as well die. I mean, that sounds harsh, right, when I say that, but those are the words. That's kind of the idea. Like, at that point, the reason why any of us, if we gave a number, It would be probably because at some point the stuff we counted on ran out. And we would say something like, well, I might as well die.

At that point, if I don't have my health anymore, I don't know, it's painful. I might as well die. At that point, if I don't have the people that I love in my life, I might as well die. At that point, if I can't still travel, I can't still be mobile, then I might as well die. See, this is the thing. We look forward to all those things, right, people in our lives that are really meaningful and significant. We look for health, we look for success, we look for something else. And if those things run out, we might as well die.

You know, it's so funny when we get to that point, when we say it might as well die, I think that's because something happens. One of two things happen. One is our hope has run out, or our hope has finally kicked in. We get to that point in our lives, because hopefully every one of us will get to this point. lives. We say we might as well die. Hopefully, well, it's going to be one of two ways. One is because hope was right now, or hopefully it's because hope is finally kicked in. I'm going to talk about hope tonight a little bit, actually a lot. And I wanted to say

something about hope, because hope at some level, I think hope for us sounds like a soft virtue. Like hope it kind of sounds like kind of like wishing, right? We hope for this. I hope the weather's good. I hope that's going to my way. Hope is not a soft virtue. Hope is actually what they call a fighting virtue. I don't know if you ever heard hope referred to like that, but it is, hope is a fighting virtue. It's a virtue that moves. It's a virtue that acts. And it's a virtue that gets, I mean, honestly, you have hope. I can tell you have hope. Why? Because you're sitting where you're sitting right now. It takes hope to get out of bed in the morning. It takes hope to show up to church when you could be a thousand other places.

It takes hope to do anything. Hope is a fighting, it's, let me clarify, clarify one more time. hope is not wishing. It's a fighting virtue that is willing to engage and embrace reality. Life as it comes at you. I'm going to say that again. Life or hope is willing to engage and embrace reality, the realities of life as they come at you. It's not wishing.

It's not avoiding reality. It's being willing to engage and embrace reality. So, you know, your car breaks down on the side of the road to sit there like, oh, I hope, I'm just going to sit here and just hope something happens. No, that's wishing. That's dumb. hope is a fighting virtue it's willing to engage in embrace reality

as it comes to you hope gets you out of the car even in the cold weather and gets you underneath that car gets that tire off even in the mud and get you back on the road and get you where I need to go because hope moves

it takes hope to take action and if you don't have hope you won't take action again I'm going to say this all again that hope is a fighting virtue that is willing to engage

in embrace reality as it comes at us why because the person who has hope has a belief that there will be a future and that the future will be worth it. Sometimes we think that hope is all about living in the future, it's not. It believes that the future in the future and it believes the future will be worth it, but it's then willing to act now because it believes that there will be a future. It's willing to fight now because it believes that there's something worth fighting for.

Hope moves. Again, you have it because you do it all the time. I mean, the reason you're here in Duluth, most likely, the reason most of you are here in Duluth is because you have a belief in the future and you believe the future will be worth it. The reason why you show up for class every stinking day is because you think, like, no, this will be worth. The work I'm putting in right now will be worth it someday. I will get that job that I want to get. The reason sometimes that you, like, I know some of you are so good, just like lonely hearts club.

I'm sorry, last week might have been a tough week for you. But you keep putting your heart back out there. keep making an effort again like, okay, I'll ask someone else out if I'm going to shot down my heartbroken again. That's a person who has hope. That's a fight. To get back out there again and again

after your heart's been broken, you're a person of hope. It truly does take hope to get out of bed to say, I'm willing to move, I'm willing to fight, I'm willing to engage and embrace reality as it comes to me

because I have a belief in the future and that the future will be worth it. And so we have all these things that we may call them like lesser hopes, right? Pope Benedict points out. He says that our lives are filled with lesser hopes and greater hopes. They're not bad. They're good. I have hope for a lasting and fulfilling relationship.

I have hope that I have this kind of accomplishment in my work that will set me on a path for like success. I have hoped that, again, what you're doing here at university will be worth it in the future. And he says those lesser hopes are good. good. But there is something that can happen. Maybe the worst thing I'd say, the worst thing that can happen for those lesser hopes? The worst thing that can happen to any of our lives, when it comes to those lesser hopes is you get some of them. One of the worst things that can happen to any one of us, when it comes to the lesser hopes in our lives, the worst thing is that you get some of them. Is that some of them actually come true? Because when some of them come true, but they

don't all come true, then we keep on living for lesser hopes. If I just got more of these last are hopes, then I would be happy, then I'd be satisfied, then I'd be fine, because that's the problem. Most of us are fine. When I say fine, just please listen to the air quotes around my word. Most of us are fine. Most of us are okay, which is to say most of us are trapped. We're trapped in being okay. We're trapped in being fine. We're trapped by saying, okay, I got some of these lesser hopes, but if I only had more, then I'd really be happy. You know, that's why Jeremiah, the prophet in the first reading today, he says, cursed is the one who trusts in human beings.

He's not saying that, like, man, if you trust another human being, you're in deep trouble. What he says is, if you think that another human being, which is a lesser hope, will actually ever fully make you happy, you're trapped. Why? Because it's an illusion. You know, the author of the book Ecclesiastes.

Ecclesiastes is a really remarkable book in the Old Testament. It's one of the only books in the Old Testament, one of two, where God doesn't ever show up. God's not really a protagonist in the Old Testament. the book of Ecclesiastes. And so the author of Ecclesiastes is Solomon, right? He talks about how all of life is like vapor. Because Solomon had it all, right? He was like, we had power because he's the king. And he had authority because he's the king. And he had success. He's the king. He had wine and food and women because he's the king. And he says, it's all just a trap.

It's all vapor. It's a mirage. We all know what a mirage is. You see what looks like something in the distance and when you get close, you realize it's just nothing. It looked like something and you get it finally and I'm got nothing. That's a mirage. And I think it's so interesting. You know there's a casino in Las Vegas called The Mirage. And I wonder why they named it, because it's in the desert. I'm guessing that's why they named the Mirage.

But I think it's very, very fitting that this place is named Mirage. The Casino is named the Mirage. Because what happens when you, what happens are you going to go in the casino? You go in there thinking you're going to get something and what do you walk out with? Usually less than nothing. But they give you just enough to keep you, have you come back and keep on playing with the thought that, well, maybe next time it'll be enough. Maybe next time I'll win.

Maybe next time I'll score big. You know, is it so fascinating how casinos work, they don't have any clocks on the walls, that they don't have windows to the outside so you lose all track of time and you think, well, I'll just pull this one arm band one more time, maybe next time. You'll think there'll be something and there's nothing. I'll put down these cards one more time. there'll be something and there's nothing and it's a trap. And Jeremiah, cursed are those, trapped are those who trust in those lesser hopes because

they're trapped. The worst thing that can happen to any of us is we get some of those lesser hopes. And the best thing that happened to us, the best thing that happened is one of two things. One is that we actually get everything you get everything you hope for. That's actually one of the best things that could ever happen to a human being in this life is that you get everything, every one of those lesser hopes that you hoped for, and you realize I am still not happy. The last couple of weeks, I've been able to mention a guy by name of Thomas Brady.

And every time I mentioned Tom Brady, it's so funny. Half the people are like, yeah, Tom Brady, awesome quarterback. The other half are like, I hate that guy, want to kill him. And then the other half are like, who? That's three halves. I just want to let you know that I understand mathematics. But the reason I bring up Tom Brady is for two reasons. One is because there's a number of priests to listen to this podcast, the homily podcast,

and they get mad at me every time I mention Tom Brady. So this is for them. The other reason is because it's a great example of someone who gets everything. So a decade, a little over a decade ago, Tom Brady had an interview. And in this interview, he had roughly half the number of Super Bowl wins as he has now. So he had three. Now he has six, just to rub it in one more time for those people who don't like Tom Brady. Tom Brady, he had three Super Bowl rings.

He is married to a supermodel. Tom Brady, I remember someone describing it like this. Tom Brady has more success than you will ever have. More people adore and love Tom Brady than will ever even know your name. Tom Brady is better looking than you will ever be. He is more fitter than you will ever become. Tom Brady is more adored and adulated than you will ever. And I was like, when I was reading that, I was like, well, that hurts a little bit, I guess.

But it hurts because it's true. So Tom Brady in this interview, here's what he said. He asked the question. He says, why do I have three Super Bowl rings? Now it's six. Why do I have three Super Bowl rings? And I still think there is something greater out there for me. I mean, he says, I mean, maybe a lot of people would say, hey, man, this is what it is.

I reach my goal, my dream, my life. For me, I think, God, it's got to be more than this. I mean, this can't be what it's all cracked up to be. Here is the moment of a guy. Every one of his lesser hopes he got. And so the interviewer says, well, you know what the meaning is? You know, what's it all about? And Tom looks back at the guy and says,

God, I wish I knew. You know, it's so crazy too because Tom Brady was raised Catholic. Like, you actually should know. He should know. And Jim Carrey, he said this too, he said, he said, my wish for is that everyone at some point in the life becomes rich and famous. So that everyone will realize that that does not make you happy. One of the best things that can happen to you is that you get everything, every one of your lesser hopes that you wanted. And you realize, it's still not enough.

The other best thing that can happen is that you get none of them. The other best thing that can happen to any one of us. us is that we get none of them. That's why Jesus comes in with these weird beatitudes tonight. Because Matthew's beatitudes, I like Matthew's beatitudes. They're like, you know, blessed are you who are merciful, blessed are you who are. Jesus in Luke's gospel tonight, he like comes on with some like, just hard beatitudes. They do not sound, blessed are you?

In fact, the actual Greek word is, happy are you when? Happy are you when you mourn? Happy are you when you're hungry? Happy are you when people hate you and exclude you and under every kind of evil. against you on account of me. And then he goes on to the woes. Woe to you who are happy. What do you who laugh? What do you who are rich now? What do you when people speak well of you? What's Jesus trying to do? He's trying to wake us up. He's trying to wake us up and let us know like actually

here's the deal. You might be living for these lesser hopes. But my hope for you is that you don't get them. Because if you get them, you'll stay asleep. And Jesus wants you to wake up. You know, it's really funny. I wonder what our goal of life is. Like, oftentimes I wonder, like, when it comes down to it, like, what do I think is the main goal of life? Is it actually getting these lesser hopes? Is it getting those successes? Is it living as long as possible? What's the actual goal of life? Because we should be getting the goal of our life from the Lord himself. We should get it from him. But I think a lot of times we put our goal of life on God. I find it really fascinating that our image of God highly influences what we expect him to do

in any given situation. What I mean by that is we often get our image of God from our mom and dad. That's just kind of how it is. And I don't know if you, I might have been to this before, but there's this phenomenon that we're living in right now, the phenomena of, you've heard of the term helicopter parents? Right. So this is the whole thing. It's never happened in the history of humanity.

helicopter parent reality that we're living in right now. And so what helicopter parents basically, for those of you who don't know, is that kid gets in trouble, of any age, by the way, kid gets in trouble. And what helicopter parents is, mom and dad jump in the helicopter and they swoop in to save you and get you out of trouble. So here's what a good parent does. A good parent who loves you is the kind of parent who, when you get in trouble, when you're in some kind of problem, when you experience suffering, what a good parent does is a good

parent comes to you and takes you out of the trouble. A good parent takes you out of the suffering. A good parent makes it all better again. That's what we think when it comes to helicopter parenting. I mean, that's what we all of us assume that that's what a good parent does. In fact, we've actually entered into a new iteration of parenting right now that not just that helicopter parenting. It's what I call Zamboni parenting. You know what Zamboni parents?

You know what Zambonis do, obviously, right? So the ice gets all roughed up and everything. And so rather than have used, no, your skates are too delicate. Your skates are too precious. I don't want you tripping, so I'm going to go ahead of you and make everything smooth. Any kind of obstacle you might encounter, any kind of dilemma you might face, I'm going to take it. Before you even experience it, I'm going to make your life smooth, and I'm going to make your life pain-free. Now, I understand that.

If I was a parent, like, that would be, I would not send my children out of the door without, like, elbow pads, wrist pads, you know, helmets, crash suit. You know, I get the impulse there. But if that's how we think what a loving parent does, what happens when we're experiencing suffering and God doesn't swoop in? If that's what we think a loving parent does and goes ahead and removes all suffering, but then here I am, and here's God who's my dad, and he doesn't remove suffering from my life. Does he just not love me? And we can start doubting that God actually loves us because he doesn't swoop in and doesn't take the suffering away.

That's an option. Maybe God doesn't love me. But here's the truer thing. The truer thing is that God is actually a really good dad. There's a psychologist out of Canada who says, you know, a lot of times we, the helicopter or Zamboani parenting, what we think is, we think the goal of a parent is, the main primary role of a parent is to protect their child. And he says that's not actually the primary role of a parent. Now, of course, it's not like, mom and dad, you know, just talking to the kid, touch that hot stove, tell me that you find out.

That's obviously part of being a parent is protecting your child. That's part of it. But he maintains that the primary function of a parent is not to protect you. their child, it's to make their child courageous. The primary function of a parent is not to protect their child, but to make them courageous, to make them strong. Because here's the deal. The world will not get weaker. You have to become stronger. And the parent's main job is to help their child

become strong. Another way to say it is, a parent's primary job is to help their child become like them. Now here's God your father. Who says, okay, my vision for your life is not that you're always well fed. my vision for your life is not that you're always laughing. My vision for your life is not that everyone loves you. Because I don't want to raise a brat. I want to raise someone who's strong.

I want to raise someone who's courageous. I want to raise someone who's like me. Who can be rejected and still love. Who can be scorned and still have joy. Who can be hungry and still rejoice and leap for joy. So why does God allow us to go through this pain? Because he's saying, because here's a deal, because there's more to life than getting every one of your lesser hopes.

And that more to life is, I want you to be like me and like my son. Think of, was there anyone who lived on this earth who experienced a deeper hunger than Christ? A more profound rejection than Jesus. So every time you mourn, you get to say, okay, God, this is where you're making my heart look like your heart. Every time you experience that loneliness, and I know that you experience that exclusion, it's so hard. But that's a chance where you get to say, okay, Lord, what you're doing right? now is you're letting my heart become like your heart. You're actually making me look like you. That's why it gives us the beatitudes tonight. To say, listen, don't put your trust in these lesser

hopes. Put your trust in me. I'm going to do something, even if in the midst of your suffering, I'm going to do something so powerful. I'm going to make you do something even greater than take you out of your pain. I'm in the midst of your pain. I'm going to make you like me if you trust me. But that's the key, right? Trust is the worst. It's so hard to trust. But every relationship is based off trust, isn't it? That's why it's so hard.

It's because trust is completely relational. Trust is all about the relationship. And if I don't trust the person, the relationship is down the toilet. And if I do trust them, the relationship can, there's no limit to how far the relationship can go. But it's so hard to trust. I saw this screenshot of a text thread that was on the internet a while back. It made me laugh.

It was so funny. It was between a boyfriend and a girlfriend, and the girl was like, hey, what are you up to? And he responds, nothing just hanging out at home. She says, prove it. She did not trust her boyfriend. He's like, what? What do you mean? She says, send me a photo.

And he responds, are you serious? She said, send me a photo of yourself in your kitchen with a spoon on your head. So the next thing on the text thread is a picture of him standing. in his kitchen, the spoon on his head going, her response, how do I know you didn't take that picture yesterday? It's so hard to trust. And it's the thing is, when you don't trust someone, no amount of proof will ever be enough. When you do trust someone, no amount of proof is needed. I say that again. When you trust no amount of proof is necessary. And when you don't trust, no amount of proof is sufficient. So when it comes to hope, the heart of hope is,

do I really trust him? That's why that first reading says, the one whose trust is the Lord, the one who hopes in the Lord. It's all about relationship. It's all about I trust you, God. Now, just for my lesser hopes, but even for the massive, massive hopes. Remember last week I was talking about St. G. Tianchang? Remember that? The martyr. And on his way to martyrdom, He wasn't martyred alone. He's martyred with his family. So we talked about he was walking there with his son, with his two daughters-in-law, and he was from grandchildren.

Over the course of this last week, some people came up and they were like, so with his grandchildren, like that's just awful, and it is awful. But he was old man. He had lived a full life, but these kids, they died just as children. And again, it is terrible. It's not a good thing. But if we think that living a long life is better than eternal life, then we are fools.

And that's just not me. The Bible says that. St. Paul says that in the reading today. He says, if for this life only we trust in Jesus, we were the most pitiable of all people. If for this life, we thought, like, oh, I'm following Jesus. He's going to give me all my lesser hopes. No, no, no, no.

We follow Jesus not just for this life, but for eternal life. And that's why, yes, I could die today and say, that's fine. God, you gave me a bunch of free life. I did nothing to deserve. and life is not about living forever, unless it's about living forever with him. And we have to fight for that.

So here's my invitation this week. My invitation this week is for you to fight. Because what's going to happen is this, you guys know this is going to happen. Life is going to punch you this week. You actually might be sitting here and it's already taking swings at you. Life is going to punch you,

which is no problem for you. Why? Because you have hope. What's hope? It is a fighting virtue. My invitation, this week, when life punches you to engage and embrace reality, to engage and embrace life as it comes to you with the belief that there is a future and the future is worth fighting for.

So when you mourn this week, then I also trust this week. What I mean by that is your grief hits your heart and I invite you to say, Jesus, I trust you. Every time you experience a hunger this week, then blessed are you hungry. Because you get to say what? When you have your hunger, you can say, Jesus, I trust you in this hunger.

When you experience all this stress of like, gosh, my life is collapsing around me, like this is not going right and this is not going right. That's life punching in the face. You get to say in the middle of those punches, Jesus, I trust you. Hope is a fighting virtue. You guys, you've got to hope and you've got to fight. And this is the last thing.

The last thing. You might be, I don't want to fight, Father. I get it. I don't know if I'm ready to fight. I understand. I don't know if I want to in the midst of mourning, in the midst of longing, in the midst of broken. I don't know if I want to say Jesus, I trust in you.

I totally understand. That's why one of my favorite saints, St. Ignatius of Loyola, he was the founder of the Jesuits. He had this prayer that he invited all of the other Jesuits to pray every day. And it went something, I'm going to paraphrase. It went something like this. God, I don't ask for wealth or poverty.

God, I don't ask for health or sickness. God, I don't ask for a long life or a short one. I don't ask for a good deputation or a bad one. I just want you. And I'm like, that's a great prayer. But it's a hard prayer. And so what happened was people would come to Ignatius and say, hey, Ignatius, I don't think I can pray that prayer. He said, no problem.

Don't worry about it. Pray to be able to pray the prayer. Okay, so they went off, tried it. He came back. I was trying to pray to be able to pray the prayer, and I realized, I don't want to be able to pray the prayer. Ignatius is like, no problem. Go and pray to want to be able to pray the prayer.

They go up and come back, Ignatius, I don't even want to be able to. And they said, no problem. Just pray to want, to want to be able to pray the prayer. If in the middle of this week, when life keeps punching you in the face, and you're like, I don't even know if I want to say Jesus, I trust in you, just say, Jesus, help me to want, to want, to be able to say, Jesus, I trust in you.

Because life keeps punching. And life keeps fashioning our hearts. And when we might as well die, we could say, well, that's because hope has run out. Or we can say, I might as well die. Why? Because hope is finally kicked in. You know, this world needs fighters. This church needs fighters.

You were born to fight. you were born to be the kind of person who when you got punched you were able to say I'm not alone there is someone in whom I trust and I'm going to keep moving forward you were born to fight which means you were born to hope