Readings – http://www.usccb.org/nab/111410.shtml
We find ourselves in the middle of November, generally the last month of the Liturgical Year, one week before the Feast of Christ the King which is the last Sunday of Liturgical Year, and so the Readings this Sunday talk to us about the End – which can be the End of the Year, End of our Lives, the End of the Age or the End of Everything.
In Church or when we talk of Religion, we tend to focus on the End of the World. Maybe it’s because we imagine it both so awesome and so distant that it’s actually safer to talk about it than the other “Ends” which we experience in our lives.
I’ve been at Annunciata now for some 7 years.
There are teens here today, who I remember when I was visiting them in their 3rd Grade Class.
There are young adults, in their 2-3 year of College who are remember graduating from 8th Grade the year that I came here.
There are even teens and young adults here now, who have “grown up” or “out” of various rough patches in their lives and are now much better, more upstanding people than when they were when I first came here, when I was looking at them wondering if they are going to get in trouble with the law when they “grew up.” Some did (get in trouble in such ways), went through this, and are now better, more upstanding people for it. People grow, people change, and yes, some of our people have proven here that it is possible to change for the better.
At the other end of life, there are people who were in our Choir, who are no longer with us, who have passed on, and are singing, hopefully, among the choirs of heaven now.
This is November, and November tends to be one of the busiest months for funerals and we’ve had 6 in these past two weeks, or nearly one every two days. We’re going to miss them all, but one I’m going to miss particularly, because she and her husband were among the counters of our Parish Collection, and my Monday (my Week / my Day off) would begin talking with them about the day before and she’d generally give me a review (generally positive) of my Homily the day before. I’m really going to miss her, even though we all know that none of us are here forever.
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My grandmother in the Czech Republic, got a phone only in 1972. Until then, the only way to communicate with her was through letters, that took two weeks to get there. (We found out only after the Communists fell that it only took 1 week, but that the Communists read every letter that was received from the outside – they really did – it was amazing that they had time for that). The first phone, was like in the U.S. decades earlier a “party” phone shared by several families. Then a few years later, she had her own line. Even then, I had a hard time conceiving how one could live without a phone. I would ask my dad, how it would work. Did one have to end every meeting or get together with one’s friends with planning what, when and where everybody is going to get together the next time. He would say that it be something along those lines and that one had to have one’s home more or less in order for visitors, because one wouldn’t necessarily know when one would come. Now we have to remind people to turn off their cell phones when they come to Church. And it’s difficult to imagine life without one.
I remember the first video games – pong. They were slow, played on the TV set – “pong..., pong..., pong...” Then came Asteroids, faster, also playable on the TV set. Then came other games – space invaders, pacman, super mario, already played at an arcade. The xbox brought video games back to the home / TV, games that were now similations “grand theft auto” (not the most edifying of games) or “band of brothers” that you could play sitting on your couch, stealing cars or shooting Nazis or space aliens or what have you. Then a few years ago came the Wii and I was fascinated by that – Guitar Hero, bowling, etc. A parishioner explained to me that the Wii came about as a result of the concern that previous video games were making kids just sit in front of the TV or video screen doing nothing but clicking buttons with their thumbs, Wii allows people to stand play the guitar as if they were in a rock band or to bowl, play baseball, box or even kick box as if they were actually doing all these things. Yesterday, I heard on the Radio Program “Sound Opinions” that a company has come up with a new generation of “Guitar Hero” (I don’t remember the actually name of the new game) in which one could plug in one’s Fender (electric) guitar and the program/game would teach one how to actually play it in the style of David Lee Roth or Pete Townsend, Keith Richards and so forth. How awesome! (There are new Keraoke programs out there that are going to teach people how to sing on key, indicating to them if they are singing off key, and what an improvement that will be as well!). So a few years from now, kids will wonder how it was even possible that we would find so much entertainment in banging a piece of plastic pretending that we were playing a guitar as in Guitar Hero, when it will seem so natural to them to have the real thing plugged in and helping them to play the electric guitar in the style of the great guitarists for real (and yes competing with others as to see who could do it the best!)
I mention all this to give us a better appreciation that we experience all kinds of “Endings” in our lives all the time. And in each Change, or each Revolution or even Apocalypse we are invited to move forward and assured that God is with us.
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But the Readings are also a reminder to us, to be prepared for Change, not necessarily super-prepared -- we’re assured by Jesus that his words will be with us to pass through the trauma – but to have our house more or less in order. If we were to die – in a car accident, for instance – tomorrow, how would we leave this world? Would we leave with our lives in more or less good order, or would we leave a mess for our loved ones to have to clean up. With time, everything does get cleaned-up, but do we want to leave our loved ones a Mess to clean up? This is something as well that we are invited to reflect on this week.
But above all, we are to remember that even as change happens, as we grow, as those around us grow and depart, that none of this Change is really that threatening to us, that God is with us and at our Sides through it all. So let us give thanks for the many things and many changes that we have seen during the course of our lives and let us live in confidence as we look toward the future. Because nothing, nor anyone can separate us from our God who created us, loves us, and will eventually take us home.
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