Sunday Homilies with Fr. Mike Schmitz - 1/22/23 Homeless: Resolution

Episode Date: January 21, 2023

Homily from the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time. Our identity is at the heart of our resolution. One of the greatest things that is lost while in exile is a true sense of identity. Too quickly, we forget who we are and settle for something too small to be enough. But if we keep identity at the heart of our resolutions, we will be able to live homeless and Holy. Mass Readings from January 22, 2023: Isaiah 8:23-9:3 Psalms 27:1, 4, 13-141 Corinthians 1:10-13, 17 Matthew 4:12-23

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.

You're reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew. Chapter 4, verses 12 through 23. When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. He left Nazareth and went to live in Copernum by the sea, in the region of Zebulan and Naftali that what had been said to Isaiah, the prophet might be fulfilled. Land of Zebulan and land of Naftali, the way to the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles,

the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light. on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death, light has arisen. From that time on, Jesus began to preach and say, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. As he was walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon who was called Peter and his brother Andrew, casting their net into the sea.

They were fishermen. He said to them, come after me, and I will make you fishers of men. At once they left their nets and followed him. He walked along from there, and he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets. He called them, and immediately they left their boat and their father and followed him.

He went around all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and curing every disease and illness among the people. The gospel of the Lord. So it is January 22nd, and I was going to ask, as the opening question, I was going to ask, if you had 22 days ago, if you had any New Year's resolutions, but over the course of the week, I asked some of our students, like, hey, what do you think about New Year's resolutions? And there was this overwhelming, like, New Year's resolutions, boo.

Like, they hated them. And I was like, well, I'm not going to, everyone's got a name. At least we can do that. Because I was thinking about, I was looking at New Year's resolutions. And so some stats, you know, 22 days into the New Year. Do you know that roughly across the country, 40% of Americans make New Year's resolutions. So 40%, oh, but, you know, just try. half of Americans make a New Year's resolution.

Only 9% of people actually keep the resolution. Which is just, that's, those stats are bad. In fact, it gets worse. 23% of people who make the New Year's resolution, 23% quit within the first week. In fact, the second Friday of the month, the second Friday of the year, is the single day that most people give up on their news resolution.

It's actually called, it's called quitters day. So, quitters. and 43% of people who have a New Year's resolution, 43 will stop by the end of next week. Like, 43% of people will give up on their New Year's resolution by February, which is kind of good news for the rest of us. Like, you know, in a week, you can go back to the gym and the machines will be open. Like in a week, you know, ice cream sales will go back up, alcohol sales, go back up. In a week, people's dues buttons won't be so lonely anymore.

because in a week, you know, almost half of people who have had this resolution will have given it up. So it's remarkable just to think about how does a person keep a resolution? How is a person like form a habit? There's a man named James Clear. Some of you might know who James Clear is. He's an author. And he wrote a bestseller called Atomic Habits. And he's talking about, he was studying like, what is it?

There are some people. What happens to those 9% of people? There's 9% of people who actually make a resolution and keep the resolution. What is it that they have that the rest of us don't have? and he says, you know, some people think it's they have a clarity. So maybe you have like a goal. Like, I want to get healthier. And someone says, no, no, no, be more specific.

Okay, I want to lose 20 pounds. He says, that's what most people say. Be more specific with your goal. Not bad. I want to, I want to write. No, no, what exactly? I want to write a book. Fine.

James Clear says those resolutions, those goals, they're basically outcome-based goals. So I want to have this result at the end of this whole thing. James Clear offers this idea. He says, rather than simply make a resolution, he says you have to figure out what your identity is. He calls them identity-based habits. And that always involve two things.

First is, you ask the question, what kind of person do I want to be? Not just what do I want to do, but what kind of person I want to be. You have to decide what kind of person I want to be. And the second thing I need to decide is I need to prove it to myself with small wins. So, for example, if I were to say, I want to be the kind of person who moves more,

like I want to be healthy, right? I'm a healthy kind of person. I'm a kind of person who moves more. He's like, that's the kind of person I want to be. How can I prove that to myself on a regular basis with these small wins? Well, I could, I make the decision that since I'm a person who moves, I take the stairs instead of the elevator when I have a choice. I'm the kind of person who moves.

That's the kind of person I am. So when I park in a parking lot, I find the farthest car away from the store and park next to that car and walk in. Maybe I'm the kind of person who moves, so I have a, you know, a fitbed or something that tracks my steps and every day I have 50 more steps than I did the day before. It's this, these, I decide what kind of person I want to be and then what are the small wins I can prove it to myself? That is the kind of person I am. He gives the example of, I want to be the kind of person who's respected at my work. I mean, the kind of person who's respected at my work. That's the kind of person I am. He says, okay, what's a small win that

you can do that would lead you to be respected at your work? He says, I arrive to my meetings on time. That's a small win. People know me as the person who arrives on time. I'm a person who's respected. And I do that by scheduling 15 minutes of downtime or break time between meetings. So I don't run over. If I run over, I'm still on time. Does that make sense? So it's an idea that what he points to is what helps us keep the resolution is keeping our identity at the heart of the resolution. What helps us do this is we keep our identity at the heart of resolution because we all know this, I'm going to fail the resolution. But if I'm the kind of person who moves, well tomorrow, maybe today I failed. Tomorrow I wake up as the kind of person

who moves. And my identity is I'm someone who writes every day. I didn't write today. Well, that's okay. Tomorrow morning, I'm going to wake up as a kind of person who writes every day and I'm going to write tomorrow. So I can, if my identity is something, I can fail in the resolution, but I'm still that person. I'm going to keep our identity at the heart of the resolution. That's why it's so devastating when we don't know our identity. That's why it's so devastating when we lose our identity. You know, last week we started this series called homeless. And we started the series called homeless because all throughout the Bible, there is a couple dominant themes. And one of the dominant themes of the entire Bible is that we live in exile,

that we're not home. That here's a good God who makes this good world, he makes us good, he puts us here. And it was supposed to be home. But then what happens is we rebelled against God, and all of a sudden, what was supposed to be home doesn't feel like home anymore. What's supposed to be home is actually, we don't belong here, but we have to live here. There's something about being homeless. Something about being homeless that makes us forget.

Something about being homeless is just so painful and devastating. You know, I've talked to so many students who, sometimes it happens that they graduate to high school and they leave for college. And that same summer or that same year, their parents move away. Or maybe they graduated and after, graduate college, their parents move away from their hometown and move across the country.

And it's one of those situations where they express like the pain of like, over a break, where do I go? I don't go home. I go to my parents' house. I go to wherever it is my parents live now. And it can be one of those situations of like I actually, I don't have a place to go back to. I actually don't have a home to go back to. that depth of homelessness where it's

not later on like you know the Babylonian exile we talked about last week the Babylonian exile that was the one it only lasted 70 years the long time but it wasn't forever in the first reading today from Isaiah we were from Isaiah talking about land of Zebulin, land of Naftali

that whole thing well that's Isaiah writing to the people in the northern kingdom so little history lesson so here's the kingdom of Israel made up of 12 tribes At one point, after King Solomon, the tribes broke from 12 into two sets. One, ten tribes in the north and two tribes in the south. The tribe, ten tribes in the north, among those were two, Zebulin and Naftali. But a hundred years before the Babylonian exile, the Assyrians came in, and they basically decimated those northern ten tribes.

Whereas the Babylonians came in and they took the Babylonians into exile, but they got to come back seven years later. The Assyrians, when they decimated those top ten tribes, they never came back. In fact, the Assyrians brought in a bunch of like five other nations, five other groups of people, so that those people who were left there would forget, the people who were brought there would forget. And basically everyone who is living in that region would just forget. They would forget who they are. They forget where they are. They forget the whole point of their life because they were homeless.

And they had no home to go back to ever, ever, ever. And I think that's one of the greatest things that gets lost in exile is that here I am homeless, here I am rootless. and I forget, I forget who I am. I don't know if you've had that experience when you left home to come to college. You have to ask the question, well, who am I apart from my family? We have to ask the question like,

well, who am I apart from away from home? Which are really, really good questions. Like, who am I without those people that knew me really well? Who am I without that town that I come from? It's actually, it's a necessary question to ask, and it's a necessary question to answer. Our problem is, sometimes we're too quick

to choose something that's too small to be enough. Like, who am I now? Sometimes we're too quick to choose something that is too small to be in. This family, family isn't even enough. My family isn't even enough to give me my identity. And so what happens? We show up on campus and it's like, okay, what's the group? What's the group I'm part of?

What's my tribe? What's my club? If I'm in a group of people, then that, yeah, that's me. That's my deal. I'm in Rocket Tree Club or I'm in the Star Wars Club. Or I am in the crayon club, whatever. that sense of, or even just this, even I need to find a group of people that I can go to the dining center with. I think about how painful that was the first couple days, first couple weeks of being on campus, like, I am so hungry.

But I don't want to be that weirdos sitting by themselves eating in the cafeteria. You guys, I eat by myself all the time. It's not that hard. But what we typically do is we grab onto whatever group of people is there. This is who I'm with. This is my identity. Or even just, I mean, a lot of student athletes, you guys know this, how often our identity wrapped up in like, I'm the baseball player, or I'm the runner, or I'm the hockey player, or I'm the basketball player, like, that's my identity. And we all know this.

We all know what's going to happen is there's going to be that day that comes where it's the last game, it's the last time I step off the court as an athlete. Last day I step off the track as a runner, it's the last day I step off the field or off the ice, and I'm no one. That's what I used to do. That's who I used to be. so typically we know that so we transfer it to like well no i'm an engineer that's my deal and i'm a nursing student and i'm going to be a nurse or i'm pre-med and i'm going to do all and so what we do

typically again we're too quick to choose something that's too small to be enough that's why there's a downside with james clear's whole identity-based habits because it helps us a lot but too often we choose too small of a thing and we choose too small of an identity which of course is nothing new I don't know if you heard the second reading today from St. Paul's letter to the Corinthians. St. Paul's writing to all these Christians. And even though all these Christians have a high call, they belong to Jesus, but they're like, no, no, no, no,

I'm going to choose someone smaller. I belong to Paul. I'm in Paul's club. I belong to Kefa. I belong to Apollos. I belong to his club. And this is one of the things that we typically do. We've done it so often.

We always do it. We're always tempted towards this, especially when we're homeless. To forget who we are and to forget whose we are. Because that's what being homeless can do. It can make you forget. your true identity. And sometimes that happens really quickly. Sometimes it happens slowly. Sometimes it happens passively. And sometimes it happens really aggressively. So last week I talked about the book

of Daniel. So remember, the Babylonian exile happens in three waves. The first wave, a bunch of people. Among that bunch of people were four guys. Right? Daniel, Hananiah, Azrah, Mishael. So the first chapter of Daniel's, Daniel's book, it has these three lines. Daniel chapter six, chapter seven or verse six verse seven and in those three verses there's there's a whole world

of tension first verse is this because among those who were exiled were Daniel Hananiah Azraa Michele basically gives us their names sets the scene the next verse is verse 7

and then it gives us a detail that if we don't know we might miss it it might seem insignificant on the surface it says this it says the chief Chamberlain changed their names. Daniel to Belta-Shezar, Hennoniah to Shadrach, Mishael to Mishak,

and Azariah to Abednego. Again, we look at that and we're like, okay, I mean, I guess they're in Babylon. They got Babylonian names. What's the big deal? Well, the big deal is their Hebrew names meant something. So Daniel's name means, God is my judge.

But not any God, L, God, the Lord God, the God of the Jews. So every time Daniel introduces himself, he's reminding himself, God is my judge. Hananiah's name means God has been gracious. Michel's name means who is like God. And Azariah, his name means God is my help. So here are these men, they're living in exile, they're homeless.

Everything around them is trying to strip them of who they are and whose they are. But every time they say their names, God is my judge. God has been gracious. Who is like God? God is my help. So this Chief Chamberlain changed their names. Daniel to Bethel Chesar. Michel to Meshach this whole thing.

In Babylon, there were at least three different kinds of gods. There was the god Akku, the god Nego, and the god Bell. Daniel, whose name was God is my judge, Beltashezar, means Bell will protect me. Shadrach, that means inspired by Aku, the god Aku. Mishak means belonging to Aku. And Abed Nego means the servant of Nego. Because think about how devastating this would be.

You are homeless. You are so far from your home. But every time you introduce yourself, my name is Mishael, which means who is like the Lord God? Now someone is stripped even that from you. You say, no, my name is Mishak. I belong to this strange God.

You know, in the Bible, when someone's name is changed by God, typically it means they have a whole new mission. It means that there's, remember we talked with this last week, to be holy, is to be set apart for a purpose. So when God changes someone's name, that means he set them apart for a purpose. So we know the story of Abram and Sarai.

changes to Abraham and Sarah. In the story of Jacob, his name is changed to Israel, set apart for a purpose. Peter, his name was Simon, and then Jesus names him, Peter. He gets set apart for a purpose. Now here is Daniel, Hananiah, Asura, Mishal, they're set apart for a purpose. And all of a sudden, this chief chamberlain comes along and he tries to, you know, if that made them sacred, that consecrated them, it's almost like this chief chamberlain is trying to desecrate them, saying, you now live here. And you're no longer set apart for that purpose of the Lord God. So what does Daniel do? I mean, he can't go home and he can't say, no, my name's Daniel.

He can't do that. So verse 8 says what he does. Verse 8 says, as a result, Daniel resolved not to defile himself with food from the king's table. As a result, you know, here's Daniel, Hanan, I, Azari, Michel, they're all parts of this king's court and they're all getting food right from the king's table. They're getting Babylonian food. and Daniel, as a result of this, he decides, he resolved.

He made a resolution. And what he's going to do, he's going to do something simple. He's going to do something that's completely doable. He's going to do something consistent and he can do something regular. Every time he ate, every time he ate, every time he sat down to eat, he would eat like a Jew. Even they're trying to steal his identity. They're trying to strip him of the fact he's been consecrated, set apart for a purpose. But every time Daniel sat down, he is not home.

He is homeless, but he's going to eat like he's back home. every time Daniel sits down to eat he's going to eat like a Jew why so that he wouldn't forget who he was because it's so easy to forget and there are some places in this world that make it really really hard to remember who you are

some places in this world to make it really really hard to remember whose you are you know we don't live in a culture that makes it easy to remember that you belong to Jesus a number of years ago I've heard this story so many times because it's just so hard. A number of years ago, there was a man,

not too long ago, maybe 15 years ago. He lived and raised a family in the Fujan province of China. And in China, certain parts are worse than others, but it's illegal to be a practicing Catholic. They have the state-run Catholic Church, but the actual Catholic Church has to be underground in many ways.

So this man, he belonged to the Catholic Church, And so what would happen is they would host, he and his fellow Catholics, would host these clandestine masses in their home, in the middle of the night, where the priest would have to sneak to get to their house. They'd have to invite all their friends who were Catholic. And then under the cover of night, they'd have these people who'd be guarding the house, see if there are any authorities, they would have mass. So one of these nights, they had this mass, middle of the night.

As they got them with mass, they're packing everything up. And one of the people who was a century comes running in saying, the authorities are on their way. They know that we had mass here. So everyone scatters. but it was this guy's house, he had nowhere to run to. The authorities come in, they see that, yep, you had just gotten done having mass here, and they arrested this man for the next three weeks.

They stripped him naked. They beat him. They burned him. They tortured him. They took electric cattle prods and would apply it to different parts of his body. Just answer these two questions, who is the priest and where can we find him? That's all.

That's all you have to do. If you just tell us, who is this priest and where can we find him, you get to go home, you get to go back to your family, get to go back to your wife and kids. This man, for three weeks, didn't break. For three weeks, this man suffered, the most incredible torture.

He didn't break, and so they basically said, well, you can go home. I mean, imagine this. This man was tortured for three weeks straight, and he refused to give up the Eucharist, because he knew he knew that if he gave the name of this priest, told them where he was at, he had no idea when the next time they'd be able to have mass.

he had no idea when the next time his family would be able to receive the Eucharist. He had no idea the next time his friends would be able to worship the Lord through the Mass. And so he didn't break. He goes home. And I imagine if that was the end of the story, that's phenomenal. He's incredible. This man, human being, again, 15 years ago, a hero. A hero for the Eucharist.

I cannot imagine the kind of faith, the kind of courage it would take to be that kind of person. But that's who he is, one of our brothers. Shortly after this, he moved his family to the United States. He just realized I need to leave. so they escaped and they came to the United States and they moved to northeastern part of the United States and originally, initially they were just overjoyed by the fact that he was blown away by the fact

that he could walk down the street and walk into a Catholic church any day of the week. They wouldn't have to hide, didn't have to be in secret, didn't have to be at night any time of the day. In fact, he was blown away by the reality that they could go to Mass every single day. So that's what they did. They moved to the Northeast United States

going to Mass every single day. This man also realized what a great country we have. because he got a job, started working, made some money. He realized, and he learned pretty quickly, that if you work harder, you'd make more money. So after a little bit, he started sending his wife, like, you take the kids to Daily Mass. I'm going to get up earlier and get some more hours in.

Over the course of time, he realized you, if you're working on the weekends, you get time and a half, maybe double time. So he started volunteering for shifts over the weekend, occasionally missing Sunday Mass. As time went on, he got to the place where he only went to Mass on Easter and Christmas. I remember when his priest had told me the story,

he said in this last Easter, he didn't even go to Mass. And we need to highlight this reality. And pay attention to this truth. What communist China couldn't do to this man. What torture couldn't do to this man. What burning and beating and cattle prods couldn't do to this man our culture was able to do and it didn't even have to try.

Nothing could have stolen this man's love for the Eucharist. But our culture did it and it didn't even have to try. And he forgot. The reality is we forget. And because of that, here's the truth. That means we have to fight. When I say fight, I mean we have to intentionally choose.

What it means is we have to resolve. We have to be like Daniel. Daniel, homeless. Daniel in exile, realizes everything around me This whole culture is trying to get me to forget who I am. So Daniel resolved. And he kept identity at the heart of his resolution. So this is what we all have to do.

This is my invitation for us this week. Just like James Clear said, I have to do two things. I have to choose what kind of person I want to be. And I have to prove it to myself by small wins. And the person that you and I want to be, I'm guessing, is we want to be homeless but holy, right? We want to be saints.

what's my deepest identity? What's your deepest identity? A child of God, a beloved son, a beloved daughter of the father. Deepest identity, I'm a follower of Jesus. If that's my deepest identity, decide the kind of person I want to be, and then prove it to myself, remind me, remind myself of this by small wins. So here's the invitation. What is something you can do this week like Daniel? Daniel's like, I got to eat. So every time I eat, I'm going to eat like a Jew. Daniel's like, I got to eat, I'm homeless, but every time I eat, I'm going to eat like I'm home. What is something you're going to do already this week, but you can resolve to do it as someone, as the kind of person who belongs to Jesus, so that your identity can't be taken away from you? You know, we don't

belong here, but we have to live here. We're homeless. And sometimes it feels like there's no home to go back to. It's so really amazing. You know, land of Zebulin, land of Naftali, they couldn't go back. They couldn't go back home. Today in the gospel, what does Jesus say? Zebulin and Naftali? You're right. You can't go back home. So know this. Home is coming for you.

And this is true about you. This is true for me. We're homeless. Because of that, we have to fight. Because of that, we have to remember. Because of that, we have to intentionally choose. Because of that, we have to.

We must resolve. What kind of person do I want to be? Remember, while we're homeless, we have to remember who we are. We have to remember whose we are.