A homily for the Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Aug. 9, 2020
1 Kgs 19:9A, 11-13A, Rom 9: 1-5, Mt 14:22-33
Like St. Peter’s, our faith is being tested right now.
Now, to be clear, I don’t believe the coronavirus is a punishment from God or an act of the devil. It’s not caused by demonic possession or the wrath of the Almighty for some transgression by our parents or grandparents. We’re long past those notions as a community of believers, or at least we should be.
Yes, COVID is testing our faith right now.
And it’s a hard test.
We don’t know precisely where the virus came from, and that puzzles us.
We don’t know if we will get it, and that paralyzes us.
We don’t know when everything will go back to normal, or what that “normal” will look like, and that frightens us.
We demand – we demand! – answers from God, and we don’t think God is giving us any. God isn’t letting us copy off his paper.
And this tests our faith.
This just doesn’t seem like a good time for “Let go and let God.”
But it’s always a good time for “Let go and let God.”
It’s a good time to remember that Jesus will never let us sink, even if we get really wet attempting to do the impossible. Maybe we can’t walk on the water ourselves; we definitely cannot if we rely totally on our own limited powers and skills. But we can achieve greatness if we reach out, ask for the help of our Triune God, and accept the hand that grasps ours.
Accepting that help is a test in itself sometimes, because we don’t always recognize the hand of God in the hand that reaches to us.
Unlike St. Peter, we won’t get to grasp the callused hand of the Carpenter when our faith is tested. But the hands that lift us will be sent by the man from Galilee.
Our first responders.
Our doctors and nurses and scientists.
Our civic leaders trying to make the best decisions for everyone’s safety.
Our previously ignored – our often scorned – essential workers scrubbing and sanitizing and restocking shelves and hauling trash and showing up on the job every day while many of us had to stay inside.
When Peter cried out, “Lord, save me!” Jesus stretched out his hand. When we cry out, “Lord, save us!” the people in our lives who are Christ to us will stretch out their hands.
That’s the first answer to this test. Jesus will never let us sink. He will stretch out his hand out through people of faith, hope and charity.
And our faith can be restored.
Until, of course, the next question.
We believe, we take as a matter of faith that someone, as Christ to the world, will stretch out their hand to people in need, especially in an unprecedented crisis like this.
What do we see when we look at our own hands?
Because that’s the next question on this test.
What do we see when we look at our own hands?
Are they hands that can wave a sign of love, support, peace and good cheer, even behind a protective shield or from six feet away?
Are they hands that can lift, carry, comfort, defend?
Are they hands that can labor for hours when the need is great?
Are they hands connected directly to our hearts and God-given souls?
Or are they hands that wave off, say No, say Stop, say I can’t do this?
Through faith, through the knowledge that Jesus wants our hands to reach out like his, the correct answer to this question is:
Yes, I will be Christ to the world as best as I can during this crisis, with the help of God.
And God helps those who help … others.
The last big question on this test of faith deals with uncertainty.
We just don’t know when or how this crisis will be over. We just don’t know what is going to change, and people aren’t always thrilled with change.
Almost 50 years ago, during the 1970s oil embargo, drivers could get gasoline only every other day. After a few weeks, someone in the government pointed out that the gas crisis could no longer be called a crisis because rationing was now the everyday normal.
How many of us wonder if masks and six feet and Purell and plexiglass are here to stay? Is this no longer a crisis? Is this the New Normal?
And if so, how do we find God in that? How can we?
The answer, my friends, is blowin’ in the wind.
(Sorry, I couldn’t resist.)
Actually, though, the answer is blowin’ in the breeze.
Elijah didn’t find God in the storm-force wind, or in the earthquake or fire. This Almighty God, who created Heaven and Earth by simply saying “Let there be … everything,” was not where the prophet expected him to be.
No, God was not in the gigawatt forces of nature.
God was in a whisper, carried by a breeze.
God was in a whisper, heard only when everything was quiet.
For weeks and months, we’ve had a degree of quiet enforced on us, even as the storm and fire and earthquake of a pandemic raged around us.
No large crowds. No concerts or movies or stadium sports. No shopping malls. No church services.
And, yes, having the entire family hunkered down at home for work and school and avoiding infection has been noisy at times. Really noisy at times.
But in those rare, beautiful moments of quiet, have we heard the whisper of God?
God’s whispered wisdom and comfort are always there if we pause to listen. When we pause to listen.
Those whispered words of wisdom are the answer to what God wants us to do, how God needs us to change and adapt to change.
Those whispered words of comfort always restore our faith.
I would like to trust that those whispered words did just that but I appreciate your encouraging me to think so. I enjoyed your delivery of this at mass yesterday. It added a depth to the written words.