YEAR C: HOMILY FOR THE 3RD SUNDAY OF LENT
HOMILY THEME: “Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans? By no means!” (Luke 13:2-3)
BY: Fr. Robert deLeon, CSC
HOMILY: Luke 13:1-9
Today’s Gospel passage addresses one of the deepest questions we’ll struggle with: what is the meaning of human suffering? The conclusion to which many people quickly jump is that suffering is punishment from God. In today’s Gospel, though, Jesus is quick to dismiss this as he asserts that suffering comes to all people, that pain is part of the human condition, and that one should prepare oneself spiritually for the trials to come. While we’re young and healthy, this may seem a scary prospect, a future event we’d rather put out of mind; however, as we age it may seem less threatening to consider the place of pain and suffering in life.
For the Christian, there is yet another dimension to the question of human pain and suffering. In the course of my training as a hospital chaplain, a very wise woman offered the reflection that all of our earthly life is but the laboring to be born anew into eternal life. While some births are quick and easy, others are preceded by seemingly interminable pain. Is it any wonder that the laboring to be born into everlasting life should be different? On a more personal level, it’s been the wisdom of hospital patients who’ve taught me so much about pain and suffering in the laboring to new life.
I was called one day to the room of an elderly woman who had some questions about the Advance Directives form she was considering. Approaching the room, I found a younger woman crouched in a sobbing heap just outside the doorway. Correctly assuming a connection between the patient I was to see and this heartbroken woman, I knelt down beside her to ask if I could help. Through gulps and gushes, she told me her mother wanted to die and had directed her doctor to let it happen as quickly and easily as possible. As tears fell relentlessly, I took her hand to lead her to the bedside of her dying mother. What I found upon entering the room, though, was quite a surprise, not at all a deathbed scene. Fresh application of cosmetics on her face and TV Guide in hand, Mom was channel- surfing looking for, as she stated, “Something decent for an old lady to watch if she had to be stuck in a hospital bed.” As daughter took up a chair by the door to continue her loud sobbing, mom raised her voice above the racket of both daughter and TV to tell me that she’d really had enough of this earthly life. She spoke of how much fun she’d had all her life. As her age progressed (she was now 92, she whispered), all of the friends she had laughed with through life had died. Her punctuating comment was clear enough: “All my friends have gone to heaven, and I just want to be with them again. So I’m filling out this paperwork so I can get there without a lot of fuss.”
I was called one day to the room of an elderly woman who had some questions about the Advance Directives form she was considering. Approaching the room, I found a younger woman crouched in a sobbing heap just outside the doorway. Correctly assuming a connection between the patient I was to see and this heartbroken woman, I knelt down beside her to ask if I could help. Through gulps and gushes, she told me her mother wanted to die and had directed her doctor to let it happen as quickly and easily as possible. As tears fell relentlessly, I took her hand to lead her to the bedside of her dying mother.
What I found upon entering the room, though, was quite a surprise, not at all a deathbed scene. Fresh application of cosmetics on her face and TV Guide in hand, Mom was channel- surfing looking for, as she stated, “Something decent for an old lady to watch if she had to be stuck in a hospital bed.” As daughter took up a chair by the door to continue her loud sobbing, mom raised her voice above the racket of both daughter and TV to tell me that she’d really had enough of this earthly life. She spoke of how much fun she’d had all her life. As her age progressed (she was now 92, she whispered), all of the friends she had laughed with through life had died. Her punctuating comment was clear enough: “All my friends have gone to heaven, and I just want to be with them again. So I’m filling out this paperwork so I can get there without a lot of fuss.”
Feeling a bit caught between her desire to be with old friends in heaven and her daughter’s inconsolable grief, she took my hand and winked, “Just ignore her; I do.” As she signed the document assuring her easy release from this earthly life, I rejoiced to be in the presence of such a wonderful attitude toward the eternal destiny of which she had not a doubt or a hesitation.
What is human suffering all about? It’s about the struggle to be born anew.
If we examine the course of human life only from physical conception to physical death, then suffering makes little sense. However, because as Christians we believe that we have existed in the mind of God long before that conception, and because we believe that we continue to live in the embrace of God after death and into eternity, suffering takes on new meaning. Struggles always involve some measure of suffering. Our souls, once sheltered in bodies strong and young, find themselves all too soon constrained by the limits of the body. Shedding what we’ve grown beyond is a painful struggle, but it’s far more about birth than death.
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