Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 02/20/22 Nothing to Fear: Vulnerability

Episode Date: February 21, 2022

Homily from the Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time. Vulnerability is having enough courage and self-possession to let life in. All of our fears stem from the fact that we are woundable. We care about rejection, inadequacy, and the future because we know that all of those things have the potential to hurt us, But the fear of being vulnerable does not have to define our lives. Mass Readings from February 20, 2022: 1 Samuel 26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23 Psalms 103:1-4, 8, 10, 12-131 Corinthians 15:45-49 Luke 6:27-38

So I'm sure that many of you have heard of a woman named Bray Brown. You know, Bray Brown. She is a researcher and an author and a speaker. She has like a gazillion views on her TED talks. She's like pretty remarkable woman. But in one of her talks, she did this thing. I'm going to totally steal it from her. Where she said, I'm going to paint you a picture.

So I'm going to paint you the picture. She says, imagine the scene. It's a movie. You're watching a movie. And here's a young family of four. Mom and dad in the front, two kids in the back. And it's Christmas Eve. It's dark out.

They're all in the way to Grandma's house. and the snow gently starts falling, you know, as they're driving through this, you know, dark road, the light beams up ahead, catching all the snowflakes as they're falling, and jingle bells comes on the radio, and the family just bursts into song, they're all laughing, having a great time as they're singing along on the way to Grandma's House. Now, cut, you're the director. What's the next scene? Car crash. Right? Like, probably most people think, so Bray Brown says, 60% of people, when she asks this, 60% say car crash, next scene. She said the other 10 to 15% have something equally as tragic.

Like, you know, the oncologist's office who says, I have bad news to deliver to you. She said, one guy even said, cut next scene, Grandma's House. Everyone's been killed. A serial killer is on the loose. Like, it's one of those things where we're trained, we're conditioned for this, right?

When things are good, just wait. When we're happy, like, okay, wait a second. Because something bad, when it comes to, like, things that are on the, they're looking up, it's just like, yeah, sure. for now, because at some point you're going to love something and it'll be lost. At some point, you're going to have something

and it's going to be taken. At some point, you're going to care and it's going to be gone. And we all have this fear in our heart, right? We all have this fear of like, that's what's going to happen. And so I think one of the things we do then, I think one of the things we do is we just pretend. We pretend that we don't care.

Not like to other people. We might do that to other people, but I think a lot of times we pretend for ourselves. Like, okay, if I just tell myself that I don't really care about this, that it doesn't matter to me, that I don't love it, then I'm not going to be so disappointed when it's taken away. I won't be so hurt when it's lost.

Because what could be worse than losing something? What could be worse than being hurt? What could be worse than something being taken? Well, when that thing that's taken matters. When that thing that's lost is something we love. When that thing that's good, gone is something we actually care about. So we pretend not to care. You know, we've been doing this series for the last four weeks called Nothing to Fear. We're trying to name some of the things

that we are afraid of. And so the first week we talked about the fear of rejection. And the second week was the fear of being inadequate. And the third week, last week, we talked about the fear of the future, that sense of foreboding we have when it comes to what's next. But all of those three fears, I think you're united by this one that I want to talk about tonight. And you might just say it really simply. It's the fear of being vulnerable. The fear of vulnerability.

So let me put this in context. So the etymology, right? The origin, what the word vulnerable actually means. It's really simple. To be vulnerable simply means to be woundable. If something is vulnerable, it's able to be wounded. And so no wonder we have this fear of rejection. Why?

Because it matters to me whether or not people accept me. And so when they do, don't. I'm wounded. No wonder we have a fear of being inadequate. Why? Because it matters to me that I'm competent. And so when I'm not, I'm broken. And every one of us, when it comes to the future, every one of us knows the future is going to be dangerous. The future is going to, this world is going to kill us. And so if I actually want to keep living, if I care about it, if it matters to me, then I'm woundable. So our response, I think our response to that is to become invulnerable. which is impossible. Therefore, our backup response, we can't become invulnerable. So our backup response

is, how about I just tell myself I don't care? How about I just numb the fear? How about I just numb the anxiety? How about I just numb myself from whatever possible pain I could go through, from whatever fear of the future I could possibly experience? Because if I care, it'll be taken. Now, so Brne Brown, one of the things she says about this, she says, because of that, we have become the most addicted, medicated, obese, and in-debt adult cohort in human history. Because of this, because of this fear of being vulnerable, of being actually woundable, we become the most addicted, medicated, obese, and in-debt adult cohort in human history. Why? Because all of those things attempts to numb ourselves.

The problem is it works. Actually, the problem is being addicted to stuff and medicine. became yourself in all these ways, they all work. The problem is we can't selectively numb ourselves. So if we numb ourselves from fear, we're also numbing joy. And we can numb ourselves from anxiety, but we're also numbing ourselves from peace. And we can numb ourselves from the fear that we experience, a fear of losing. We also numb ourselves from the desire to live. But we're like, but if, but if I care, I'll be hurt. But if I don't numb myself, it'll be taken. Yes, that's true. but I would cost.

I mean, here's the thing. What's the price of not caring? Because if I care, I will lose. But if I don't care, I can't live. So my boy, C.S. Lewis, this is where I pull him out of my back pocket. C.S. Lewis wrote about this. Like in the 50s, the 40s.

People were already numbing themselves way back then. And he said, yes, you either can love and lose, or you can just numb yourself. but he points us out. He says, there's no safe investment. This is his quote. It's kind of longer. He says, to love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully around with hobbies and little luxuries. Avoid all entanglements. Lock it up. safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness.

But he says, but in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken. It will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. This is the alternative we have. This is the price we have. He goes on to say, he says,

the alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. Because the only place outside of heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and risks of love is hell. Let's say that again. The only place outside of heaven where you can be safe from all of the dangers and all the risks of love is hell. It takes courage to be vulnerable. Like truly, let's just be honest.

It takes courage to love through the fear of being woundable. And we need to clarify right now, vulnerability is not weakness. Vulnerability is not foolishness. So let's go to the first reading. First Samuel. You have David. Right, David's the anointed, the next king of Israel. And we also have King Saul, who's trying to actively kill King David.

David is vulnerable, but he is not weak and he is not foolish. What's he do? He realizes, okay, I'm the next king, but Saul is the current king, so I can't stretch on my hand to slaughter the Lord's anointed. But that doesn't mean I can't act. You know, again, again, vulnerability is not weakness. What does David do? He acts in the context that he's been given.

So he sneaks, is this so cool too? David, man, he's my man. So David sneaks into Saul's camp while everyone else is sleeping. And what does he do? He doesn't kill him, even though his buddy is like, hey, just kill him right now. It's like, no, no, I can't do that. I have to act, but I act in the context that I've been given. In every single one of us, when we're vulnerable, we have to act.

Vulnerability is not weakness. But we have to act in the context we've been given. David's also not foolish. This is important to note. David's also not foolish. He doesn't like sneak up to King Saul while he's sleeping and like, King Saul, wiki, wakey, like, you know, it's your buddy David. Can I be your paligan?

No, what's he do? He takes the jug, takes the spear, goes to the other hill while he's at a safe distance and says, okay, Saul, here's the deal. David is not weak. David is not foolish. David is vulnerable. He's able to be wounded. I think sometimes we have this image in our heads

or the person who's vulnerable is the person who's like the classic over-sharer right, the one who always posts on Facebook hey guys, another rough day there's what my heart's, I mean, maybe there's a place for that, I don't know, or the person in the meeting, like in the boardroom, like, how are you guys doing? Well, to be honest, like, no, no, no, we don't want you to be honest.

We want you to just say, you're fine and move on, next person. To be vulnerable is also not to, like, crumble at the drop of a hat. I'll say this, vulnerability. is having the courage and the self-possession to let life in. Vulnerability is having enough courage and having enough self-possession to actually let life in.

When I pretend not to care, when I don't let anyone in, that's not being courageous. Vulnerability is having enough courage and self-possession to let life in. So a bunch of years ago, we had a student, and she was really diving deeply into vulnerability,

And one of the things she did was she came up with an image of what it is to be, what's the difference between transparency and vulnerability. And she had this image, I keep repeating it. She said, to be transparent is like being in a fishbowl. And you let people see what's in the fishbowl. Like this is who I am, this is my life, this is me, being transparent. She said, but being vulnerable is letting someone in the fishbowl. transparency can be good

vulnerability takes courage vulnerability takes enough self-possession to let someone in the fishbowl because we have this fear of being woundable if I let life in it'll all be taken if I let someone in it will all be broken if I let myself be woundable I'll be wounded

yeah maybe that it's 100% possible. And that's why I think I just turn to, that's one of the many reasons why Jesus is the master rabbi. Because in today's gospel, he basically says that. He says, okay, you're going to go out into this world, and people are going to take from you,

and people are going to hurt you, and people are going to hate you. But the world offers us only two options. In response to that, when people take from us and hurt us and hate us, the world only offers two options. The first option is, and you're a dormant, so just let them take. And you have no say, and so just let them hurt you, just let them hate you. And I know there's so many people who just, they have been so hurt, they've been so beaten, they've been so used and abused that they've begun to believe this lie, that they do not have any dignity. So many people

who have been treated in such a way that they actually believe the lie that they don't deserve any better. And I just want to say, too many people believe that lie. Good people, who have been hurt too much without someone to remind them that, no, you are still worth fighting for, you are still worth loving, you still have a strength in you. But the first option is to collapse. I'm just a dormant. Because people are going to take,

people are going to hurt, people are going to hate. So just let them. That's one option the world gives. The second option the world gives is to become callous. To become callous to the world, to become callous to the pain, to become numb. and I think that's the rest of us.

Not only will I pretend I don't care, I'm actually going to get to the point where I'm so numb, I actually don't care. Not only am I going to pretend, it doesn't matter. I'm going to get to the point I'll be so numb and so calloused that actually, you know what, it doesn't matter. I think the world offers us those two options. Either I collapse or I become callous.

But Jesus actually gives us another option. He gives us a third option. and that third option is okay you're going to things are going to be taken you're going to be hurt you're going to be hated in response

instead of collapsing instead of becoming callous I need you to do this I need you to pray I need you to bless and I need you to love in a world where you will be taken where you will be hurt where you'll be hated

this is not the weaker option to pray to bless to love that's not the weaker option it's the woundable option because we realize It doesn't take any strength to collapse. It just means things are heavier than we can carry them. It doesn't take any strength to become callous.

It just means we've been beaten up by life so much that I become numb. But it takes strength to live in this world that hates and not be callous. It takes strength to live in this world that hurts and not collapse. It takes strength to live in this world that hates and still be vulnerable, which is to say, that it takes Jesus. Because we can't do it on our own. We can't do this on our own.

It takes Jesus. So many of you know this woman. Her name is Corey Ten Boom. Corey Ten Boom, she was a Dutch Christian living during the time of World War II. At one point, she and her family were Christians, and this Jewish friend came to their door and said, could you please hide me out in your house?

And so the Tembooms, they basically took all their Jewish brothers and sisters and they hid them from the Nazis. But at one point, what happened was the Nazis found out about this, they raided their house, and they took Corey and her sister Betsy and their father, Casper, took him into prison, send him to a concentration camp in Ravensbrook. Their father, Casper, died almost immediately. But Betsy and Corey lived for quite a long time in Ravensbrook. Corey described later on what it was like to be in that concentration camp. She described what it was like to be with her sister and be stripped naked in front of these guards

who would use and abuse them. To be treated, treated like they were less than dirt. Ultimately, they were so abused that on December 16, 1944, Corey's sister Betsy died. Almost miraculously, a couple days later, there was a clerical error, and they released Corey. Someone just made a mistake, and they said, Corey, you're free to leave.

And so here she is, an orphan, sisterless, and sent out back into the world. Now again, Corey was a Christian when she went in Travensbrook, but after that, while she was there, she encountered Jesus' mercy in a way that went even deeper. She encountered Christ's strength that went even deeper in her life. And so after the war, Corey traveled all throughout Europe, in fact, all throughout the world talking about mercy and love and forgiveness in Jesus because she realized here in Europe is a place that's been divided. They've been under, they've lived through two wars, World War I and World War II. And the place is just, it needs mercy. And they needed Jesus. So she

went all over the place talking about love and forgiveness. And Jesus, at one point she was in Munich. Years after this, she gave a talk on God's love. She gave a talk on mercy and the need for forgiveness. And at the end of her talk, this young man walked up the center aisle. And she recognized him right away as one of the guards at Ravensbrook, one of the guards who treated her and her sister so horribly. And this man walked up to her and said, Fraulein, I was a guard at Ravensbrook. but I become a Christian now he walked up to her and says I become a Christian after the war

and he looks this woman that he had treated with such contempt and stripped so much from her he said your message about forgiveness touched me very much you told about Camp Ravensbrook well I was a camp guard there see she recognized him but he didn't recognize her

I've always wanted to ask forgiveness of somebody personally so I ask of you will you forgive me and Corey says she said I stood there it feels like my blood is freezing. There suddenly stands a man before me co-responsible for the slow, horrible death of my sister Betsy. And he dares ask me for forgiveness.

And she says, she says all those beautiful sermons about forgiveness, but now I have to forgive and I can't. The man stood there and he held out his hand and she said, I can't. I can't take it. And in that moment, here's what Corey says. she says, I pray softly to Jesus. I don't want this.

You have to help me. And then I realize, forgiveness is not an emotion. It's an act of the will. The feeling is not there. But I can move my hand. And so she said, almost mechanically, I place my hand in his. And then something extraordinary happens.

I suddenly feel a warm wave through my body from my shoulder through my arm to our hands. And I have to cry. I forgive you, brother, with my whole heart. And there we stood, the camp guard and the prisoner. For a long time we held hands,

and never before have I experienced the love of God so deeply. She allowed herself to be woundable. She overcame that fear of being vulnerable. I mean, to have enough courage and self-possession to let life in, to have enough courage and self-possession to be able to let this person in, not being foolish, but being vulnerable,

not being weak, but being courageous. And I think, I think, I think, I think that's what Jesus is calling us to today. I think that's what Jesus is asking of every one of us this Sunday. That we numb ourselves so thoroughly, not because we're afraid of feeling, I think we numb ourselves because we're afraid of hurting. And we pretend not to care, not because we don't care, but because we care so much that we don't want to lose what matters. But Jesus gives us another option.

And the option is to be willing to be woundable. to be willing, essentially, to be willing to be like him. Because from the cross, what did Jesus do? From the cross, as he's being crucified, Jesus prayed for his enemies. When Jesus was being rejected, he blessed those who rejected him. When Jesus was being spat upon and mocked and hated, he loved them. And we know this. To love at all is to be vulnerable, but not to love.

not to be vulnerable is not to live we live in a world that will hurt us we live among people who will take from us and we live among people who will hate us

and we have to be vulnerable we have to be willing to be woundable because with Jesus we have nothing to fear Thank you.