Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 04/24/22 Be Mercy

Episode Date: April 25, 2022

Homily from the Sunday of Divine Mercy. Mercy is the love that we deserve the least when we need it the most. The fact of the Resurrection of Jesus has introduced something new into this world of misery. The Cross and Resurrection introduced the possibility of mercy. Not only have we encountered the mercy of God, but we have been commissioned to be mercy in the midst of a world filled with misery. Mass Readings from April 4, 2022: Acts 5:12-16 Psalms 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24Revelation 1:9-13, 17-19 John 20:19-31

So I don't know if you have like a favorite YouTube channel, So It Presents. No, like, like a, like, one of my favorite YouTube channels is a channel called Pitch Meeting. Have you ever heard of pitch meeting? So basically, it's going to change your life. Don't worry about it. But basically, there's a comedian, his name is Ryan George, and he plays two characters in every video.

One is the writer who's like pitching the idea for a movie or for a TV show, and the other is the producer who's like hearing it just wants to make money off the thing. So he pitches all these things, like famous movies, famous TV shows. It's really funny. starts out, so you have a new movie idea for me. Yes, sir, I do. And he launches into this whole thing. Now, I understand right now, after having tried to do this at mass a bunch of times that what's going to, this is going to be as funny as when someone reads you a comic strip, but it's funny for me, so I'm going to do it anyways. So, so one of the movies that he pitches

is the 300, you know, it's the Zach Snyder movie. I don't recommend the movie. There's a lot of inappropriacy in it, but the pitch meeting is relatively entertaining. So he says, so we have a movie idea for me. Yes, sir, I do. It's about a Persian invasion and the 2400 abs that stood up against it. He says, what? He says, well, it's about 300 Spartans, and they all have eight packs. And so, basically, that's the focus of the movie, is the abs. But he says, the movie starts out like this, where there's this, we're going to have this guy examining a baby, right? And the narrator is going to explain that these people, when they see a baby that's, you know, puny and small or sickly or misshapen, that they discard that bad boy. And the producer's like, oh, my gosh,

that's a great way to introduce the bad guys. Like, oh, no, no, no, these are the heroes. Like, really? He says, yeah, he goes on to say, so the Spartans, they put their kids through like all these crazy, this crazy abuse. They make them fight each other to the death. They make him kill each other. They make them live in the wild. And he says, that's horrible.

He's no, no, no. That's what makes them so great. Why? Because these people are the strongest because they have this system where if you're not, you die. Again, it's funny when you watch it. Just trust me. Type it in, pitch meeting the 300, it's hilarious. But that's, you know, a pretty accurate description.

of the Greco-Roman world. That's a pretty accurate description of the ancient life. In fact, I was reading this author, talked about what life was like in Rome back before Jesus and then shortly after the time of Jesus. And he said this, he pointed out

that Roman cities, including Rome itself, had misery in those cities, in that time, misery in that city almost beyond our capacity to imagine. The misery was so great. He says, one saw it everywhere. And the beggar covered with boils sitting on the side of the street,

the man with one leg hobbling down the road, the mother wailing for her dead child. He goes on to say, he says, disease was everywhere, and this is completely true. Disease was rampant. In even times of peace, catastrophe was common. He described how there are numerous times with these apartment buildings, entire apartment buildings would completely collapse, literally killing everyone inside. And every so often a plague would happen.

And then everyone got to be miserable together. Unless you were wealthy, in which case you got to flee the city and go to your home on the coast, your home in the country. but life was marked by misery. In fact, one of the things that made the misery even worse is not just the sickness, not just the suffering, not just the pain, but the fact that people would be abandoned in the midst of their sickness. What you would do is abandon the people you loved in the midst of their suffering

and abandon them in the midst of their misery. And that was just life. And then something happened. And all that changed. I mean, yes, there's still sickness and they're still suffering. There's still death and there absolutely is still misery. but into that misery, something new was introduced. That there was this small group of individuals

who had basically no power and they had no influence, they had no wealth. But they saw the misery and they stepped in. Like they saw the misery and they did something. And things didn't change in a year. It didn't change even in a generation. But it changed everything. If we think about this, in that world,

a beggar was a failure. if you're a beggar, that meant you probably deserved it. In that world, if you were a slave, that meant that by nature you were inferior. And then something changed. And again, it wasn't, if we just kind of evolved, it wasn't just we gradually grew out of that kind of thing or became enlightened. There was a new truth that had come into the world. There was a new, literally a new kind of love that came into the world.

And it changed everything. We know this, because why? because we spent the last, I don't know, eight weeks talking about the story of this new love that's coming to the world. We talked about the seven last words of Jesus for the last two months. Every single Sunday, we've been reflecting on the love of God from the cross and for us. All last week, right? Holy Week. We talked about the story of this love, the reality of the life and the death

and the resurrection of Jesus. And I'm going to, the reality of this, not because it wasn't a myth. It wasn't just a story. It's an historical fact. when we think about even the first reading today, the Acts of the Apostles, where the author Luke is writing and he says, no, here's what happened.

There were so many signs and wonders that being done by the Apostles that people came to believe, 5,000 people coming to believe in just a couple days. Why? Not because they believed a story, but because they saw the power, they saw the signs. In fact, the gospel today is, I love the story in John's Gospel today.

For many reasons, but one of the reasons is because one would expect that after Jesus has been telling them all along the lines of, hey, here's what's going to happen. We're going to go to Jerusalem, and I'm going to be betrayed. Then I'll be handed over to the elders. Then I'll be killed. But don't worry, I'm going to rise again on the third day.

You'd think that when that happened, they'd be like, he said this is going to happen. Let's see what goes down. But they don't. They all run away. They all abandoned him. In fact, when he rises from the dead in the gospel today, they don't believe it. If I was Jesus, I'd be a little upset. You guys, I told you about this so many times.

Even, in fact, Thomas, right? they all say your best friends say we saw Jesus nope nope nope nope I don't believe it until he sees with his own eyes why because this isn't just a story this isn't a myth this is an actual historical fact that is indisputable and it's unarguable and that's why I love how John ends this section today he says no Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples they saw it that are not written in this book but these have been written so that you that us right now could come to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. Into this world with so much misery,

God has done something new. Because of the cross and resurrection, God has done something new. Question, what does the cross resurrection do? Well, one, it gets us salvation, which is great. It reconciles us to the Father, which is incredible. But even more, the cross and the resurrection introduce something new into this world of misery. It introduces the reality that God is love.

There's a historian from the 1800s, and he wrote this. He said, the world before Christ came was a world without love. I don't know if you ever say that again. The world before Christ came was a world without love. That didn't mean that moms didn't love their kids. It didn't mean that spouses didn't love each other. It didn't mean that soldiers didn't love their country. But Jesus introduced a new kind of love.

In fact, it's a love we celebrate today. Because I don't know if you know this, but today is a day dedicated to the most powerful, the most unique, the most life-changing kind of love possible. Because we know this from all time. Why are people loved? Like, why are we loved? We're loved because we're beautiful. Or you're love because you're powerful. Or you're love because you're powerful. Or you're love because you're graceful or because you're useful. We know that's just why people get loved. And if you're not those things, if you're not beautiful or powerful,

if you're not graceful or useful, then I'm not lovable. But into this world, filled with so much misery, Jesus introduces a new kind of love. It's simply one word, and that word is mercy. I don't know if you know what mercy is. Mercy is pretty easily defined. What kind of love mercy is? Mercy is the most powerful love God could ever offer us. It's the most intimate love God could ever offer us.

Mercy is the love that we deserve the least, and the love that we need the most. In fact, a precondition for experiencing the most powerful love God has to offer. The precondition is failure. like the necessity for to be able to receive God's mercy is brokenness. To be able to receive the most powerful love God has to offer is we have to have sinned. Because mercy is love when we need it the most and deserve it the least. And I think about the gospel again today.

You have the apostles, they're hiding out. Why? Because they've failed and they're afraid and they're in misery. And into that misery, what does Jesus do? He shows up and he says, peace be with you. into their failure, their misery, Jesus brings his love, his mercy. But then what does he do?

He immediately says, as the Father sent me, so now I send you. The Father sent me to be mercy. I'm going to go now send you to be mercy. And one of the things that we can never forget is Christians, from the very first day, they took this seriously.

From the very first day, Christians, mercy was as real as the cross. That for Christians, mercy was as real as the resurrection. Because why? because they lived a mercy that had to be experienced, that had to be lived, had to make a difference. I mean, you think about this, a lot of times we find Christians who like to have Jesus without the cross or Jesus without the resurrection. Like, so you have people who will say, I like Jesus, because he loves me and he's kind and he's nice

and he is very gentle and he understands me. I don't really like the cross. But Jesus without the cross is to be ignorant of the reality of misery. Jesus is on the cross demonstrates that God's entered into the misery. Other people say, like, I like Jesus because like his teaching. I like the fact that he's holy, and then he has a lot of good things to say, but I don't accept the resurrection. He's just a holy person, like he was a prophet, but maybe not God.

But we realize that Jesus without the resurrection is to be impotent in the face of misery. So again, Jesus without the cross is to be ignorant of misery, and Jesus without the resurrection is to be impotent in the face of misery. but we have Jesus with his cross and with his resurrection. What does that do? That impels us not only to experience his mercy, but to be mercy.

So when the plagues broke out in Rome, and everyone left, Christians would stay behind. Like when parents were abandon their sick children to go to the coast, go to the country, Christians would take these children into their homes. When kids would abandon their parents and flee, Christians would go out into the streets

and take these people with the plague and bring them into their own beds and care for them. This happened. That happened again and again and again. And it was not seen as being heroic. It was just what Christians did, and that changed the world. Why? Because they had been loved when they didn't deserve it. And so when they saw someone in need, they didn't ask the question, does this person deserve it?

All they asked the question was, the only question they asked was, does this person need it? Because mercy is love that is given, and we deserve it the least, and need it the most. Well, I find it's really interesting. When we try to do this now, we do this. When we try to live mercy now, I think a lot of times I'll hear people say things like, you know, Elon Musk,

he has too much money. So what we need to do is we need to take Elon Musk's money and then do good with it. Or Jeff Bezos, like he has so much money. We need to take Jeffrey Bezos's money and do some good with it. Or Bill Gates or any of something that we think they have too much money. we need to take their money and do something good with it. You know, that's funny.

Christians have never, ever had that attitude. Christians have never had the attitude of I'm going to take someone else's money and do good with it. The attitude of Christians has always been simply and consistently in the face of someone's need to ask the question, how can I help?

It's never been how can I take someone else's stuff and do good with it? The question that Christians simply and consistently ask in the face of someone's need is how can I help? can I do? How can I give sacrificially? And that's what they did. Again and again and again, and again, and it changed the world not in a year and not in a generation.

But it costs them something to love their neighbor who didn't deserve it. And I see this all the time. I see this like now, our day and age, there's a couple, they live in town. They've been married about 10 years. I have about four kids, I think. And ever since the beginning of their marriage, they wanted to be, they had encountered God's mercy. They wanted to be mercy. And so what they would do, they weren't wealthy, and they aren't wealthy. But they built in to the budget every month. They built into their budget a way they could sacrificeually give.

In fact, when making a budget, they have a column for sacrificial giving. And if they get to the end of the month and they don't have enough to sacrificially give, they would ask, where can we go without this month? So we do have something to sacrificially give. Because they said, we want to be a family of mercy. We've been loved and we didn't deserve it. We need to be able to love others when they don't have. deserve it. It's so fascinating because you would never know it. You would never know by looking at

them, you would never know that every single month this family goes without something just for the fact that they can sacrificially give. It's just a normal part of their lives because they belong to Jesus. You know, they received recently someone counseled them that maybe they shouldn't give so sacrificially that they said, well, you have four kids and, you know, that minivan's going to, it's going to bust at some point and you need to get new appliances soon. And maybe you should just like, not You can give, but not sacrificially give. And now this couple, they are wise. Like, they're not dumb.

They are good stewards. But that invitation, like, hurt them. Because it's one thing to be compassionate. It's one thing to be generous. It's one thing to be large-hearted. It is another thing to be merciful. I would say compassion is this. Compassion is when I'm willing to give up my wants

for someone else's need. That's good. When I'm willing to give up my wants for someone else's need, that is compassion, that's generosity, that's large-heartedness. that is so good. But to be mercy, to be mercy is to give sacrificially to someone

who has not yet proven that they deserve it. We get to ask that question, am I generous, am I compassionate, or am I mercy? I have a friend named Nick. I've mentioned it before, I'll mention him again next week, but for Nick, he has a standard of how he knows whether he's mercy or not, whether he knows if he's merciful or just merely generous.

And the standard is that when he sees someone, someone in need. Someone on the side of the road, someone on, you know, begging somewhere, someone in need. And we all do this, right, where he might have some cash in his pocket or in his wallet. And sometimes this happens, right, where we have like a couple ones, maybe some fives, 20s, maybe a 50, a $100 bill. Nix, you're like, you have a $100 bill? Like, no, but you might, for the sake of the example. Next question is always, or next, next principle, is in the face of this person's need, always give the big bill. If I have a 50, a 20, a 5, a 10, it's always the 50.

Always give the big bill. Because he says that's a way for him to measure where his heart is. So he's not simply generous, not simply compassionate, but so that he can be mercy. His way he measures whether his heart is aligned with Jesus is there not. So it's funny because that's risky. This is a risky thing to do. So Nick, he tells this story wherever he goes

that he always has this principle. Whenever someone's in need, give the big bill. So he's telling the story to some friends of ours, this young woman named Delaney. Delaney needs to go school at UMD. And so she loved this idea, this concept of give the big bill. And at one point, she was with some friends, and there was a friend of a friend. She never met this guy before, but he was kind of going on and on about how he didn't have enough money to pay his rent.

He didn't have enough money to pay grocery bills. And Delaney happened to actually have a $100 bill on her. And she was like, wow, this is awesome. This is my opportunity. Nick says give the big bill. And she pulled the guy's side and said, hey, you know, I know you're down in your luck. I know you can't pay your rent. I know you can't pay your grocery bill.

But I have this $100 bill. I want you to have it. And she said, the guy was just so ecstatic. He was so excited. He was like, thank you so much. This is so great to have this $100 bill. I can now finally finish the tattoo I've been working on. And she was like, no!

Because it's a risk. Like to be merciful is a risky thing. To give sacrificially is a risky thing because we don't know what someone's going to do with it. But that's Jesus, right? Here's Jesus on the cross, saying this is for you. Not knowing what we're going to do with it. This is Jesus giving his whole self for us, not knowing what we're going to do with it. We've encountered mercy.

We have to be mercy. This is the last thing. We also have to prepare to be mercy. That's one of the reasons why for the last couple weeks we've been collecting all these materials. So a couple weeks ago, we talked about how this is going to be Divine Mercy Sunday. And Divine Mercy Sunday is not just about experiencing God's forgiveness, not just about experiencing God's mercy and confession. It's also about being mercy. and how many of us have been in that situation

where you pull down to the bottom of 21st and there's someone standing on the street corner and they need something. How many of us have been in Canal Park and there's someone out there and they need something where I don't know what to give. And so what we did is over the last couple of weeks we've been assembling all these materials

like socks and gloves and protein bars and little apple juice packets and bars of soap and toothpaste all these things because tonight after Mass what we're going to do is we're going to assemble these blessing bags. I invite every single person even if you didn't bring something we have enough for at least 200 bags to be assembled

so that you can have this in your car ready so when there's the opportunity for mercy, we can actually be mercy. Because this one thing is true about mercy is a lot of us want to be merciful, but we're not ready to be mercy. There's so much misery in the world. There's so many people left alone in their misery.

But we've seen, we've been seen in our loneliness. and therefore our vision has changed. We've been chosen in our brokenness, and therefore our choices have to change. We've been loved in our unloveliness, and therefore our love has to be sacrificial because we've been loved when we deserved it the least and needed it the most.

Therefore, we have to be people who love when others around us deserve it the least, but need it the most. That love has changed us, and that love, that mercy, changed and will change the world.