HOMILY AT OBLATE
JUBILEE MASS
IN SAN ANTONIO
April 23, 2003
By Fr. Warren Brown, OMI,
celebrating 25 years of religious profession
It is a great honor for me to be the homilist tonight at this liturgy, and I am humbled in the presence of so many of my fellow jubilarians whom I have looked up to and admired for many years. I must admit that when I heard that Fr. Gus Petru would be the presider, accepting this role as homilist was a cinch. Fr. Gus was the provincial and presider at the first vow ceremony for Kevin Collins and myself in Illinois 25 years ago, and it is a privilege to celebrate with him this important moment in his life, as well as to celebrate this moment in the lives of all of the jubiliarians. For those who are counting, we jubilarians represent 570 years of religious profession and 605 years of ordination, having ministered to and with God’s people in a variety of cultures, nations, languages and continents. We are a diverse group!
I am conscious that we stand upon the shoulders of spiritual giants, our Oblate predecessors, who have come before us and have blazed the way for us to follow. We have been blessed in so many ways.
We are grateful for all of you our family, friends, brother Oblates, superiors, bishops, women and men religious, laity, and fellow workers in God’s vineyard who in so many ways have inspired us, sustained us, encouraged us, chastened us, loved us and challenged us to be more.
Today as Church we are in the midst of our celebration of Easter joy, as we commemorate once again the central defining moment of our Christian faith. We celebrate Jesus Christ yesterday, today and forever. We recall the paschal mystery in the life of Christ and celebrate it in our own lives. Tonight we honor our lives as Oblates and priests in light of the paschal mystery of Christ. As Easter people, we recall our own suffering, death and resurrection in light of our Savior. As Ron Rolheiser reminds us in his book, The Holy Longing, we must grieve, let go of the past and let the past bless us as we face the future with hope. Our highs and lows, our joys and sorrows are part of our story, the story of our salvation written by God’s own hand.
It seems fitting that the Gospel text for our celebration is that of the personal experience of Mary Magdalene with the risen Lord. As religious and priests, I think we can identify with her and her struggle. Hopefully, we can be united with her joy as well.
There
seems to be a lot of confusion about Mary Magdalene’s identity in church
history, as the Gospel texts mention several women called Mary. Often she
had been identified with the public sinner or prostitute who washed Jesus’
feet with her tears and wiped them dry with her hair. However, Scripture
scholars don’t identify Mary Magdalene with that woman today, though she was
definitely a sinner who was forgiven and became follower of Jesus from early
on in his ministry in Galilee.
One legend about Mary Magdalene, and particularly interesting to us Oblates, is that she and her family traveled to Marseilles and Provence in France and settled there after Jesus’ Resurrection. References to Mary Magdalene are frequent in French religion and culture, and in many French communities there is a Church of the Madeleine, including one in Aix where young Fr. Eugene de Mazenod preached one of his most familiar homilies. Interestingly, there is a local French restaurant with her name as well, La Madeleine. They do serve a good meal, certainement!
What seems to be clear to scholars is that she was a Galilean, like Jesus, from a small village named Magdala, on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. The name Magdala, and its Greek name, meant “house of fish” or “salted fish”, apparently that was the source of the village’s economy. As Mary Magdalene was a supporter of the Christian community, she was a legitimate 1st century businesswoman, and probably had made some income from the fishing trade. She, thus, had financial resources which she made available to Jesus and the other disciples. She loved Jesus dearly as the Master, the Rabbi, and most of the Gospels recount a resurrection appearance of Jesus to her. Precisely because of her great love, she suffered greatly to see Jesus suffer and die. Correspondingly, her joy was also great when she recognized that he was alive after all.
‘Whom are you looking for?’ was Jesus’ question to Mary. This is the question asked of any disciple. Jesus had asked the same question in the 1st chapter of John’s gospel to two of John the Baptist’s disciples. As Oblates, I think that we must listen to Jesus ask us that question every day of our lives, ‘whom are you looking for?’. Mary Magdalene herself did not recognize Jesus when she saw him, she thought he was the gardener, perhaps the evangelist’s allusion to this as the new story of creation. Mary’s tears express her concern and explain her momentary distraction.
Suddenly, surprisingly, Jesus calls her by name, Mary! Mary hears the voice of the Good Shepherd, and she responds. Jesus had said, “I am the Good Shepherd. I know my sheep and mine know me. My sheep hear my voice. I know them and they follow me.” We as Oblates have heard Jesus call us by name, perhaps 25, 40, 50 and up to 80 years ago. We have responded, each in our own way. Each of us could write a book on our personal journey with its ups and downs, its highlights and its disappointments. Perhaps like Mary we were a little startled at first, but we gradually awaken to recognize and respond with love to the loving call of the Shepherd.
The final exchange between Jesus and Mary Magdalene is the most challenging, to Mary herself and I think also to us as Missionary Oblates. Jesus tells her, “Don’t cling to me, don’t touch me.” As a consequence of her new realization of love, her relationship with Jesus must evolve into a more profound recognition of his divine person. He is no longer Rabboni, the Master, he is the Lord. Mary Magdalene must let go of her old relationship in order to move to a more perfect one. As a result, she becomes the first to proclaim the risen Lord to others. Jesus’ Father, is now her Father and God, and that of her brothers and sisters, and all humanity as well. Mary becomes the first missionary to proclaim the joy of the risen Christ who has overcome death and sin forever.
We, as we come to celebrate this milestone in our lives as religious and priests, also know that the world, our world, is very different from what it was. By the grace of God, we have our brother Oblates, family and friends to love us and challenge us. In order to be the missionary for the future, we know we cannot cling to past successes, nor can we be burdened by our past failures. Tonight we celebrate and remember our past, yet we know that we cannot cling, we cannot hold on to the past. And that is a challenge, it calls for us to grow. With a loving faith in the one who loves us and calls us by name, we look forward to a future with Easter faith and hope, as Mary Magdalene, proclaiming Jesus Christ, the risen Lord, the same yesterday, today and forever. The past, as good as it may have been, is only the foretaste of what is to come. Our own suffering, death and resurrection, both personal and communal, this is the paschal mystery we preach, not just in words, but with the witness of our lives. As our former superior general Fr. Fernand Jetté once said, “In the midst of this world, be authentic witnesses of the Gospel Beatitudes – by your life, by your activity, your works. And do not be afraid to speak openly to this world of Jesus Christ. This is what it expects of you, and this is why you [as Oblates] exist in the Church.”
Ron Rolheiser has captured the missionary challenge of Mary Magdalene, this same challenge to us tonight as we celebrate the past yet look forward to an unknown future in this beautiful poem with which I close:
Mary Magdala’s Easter prayer
I never suspected
Resurrection
and to be so painful
to leave me weeping
With joy
to have met you, alive and smiling, outside an empty tomb
With regret
not because I’ve lost you
but because I’ve lost you in how I had you ---
in understandable, touchable, kissable, clingable flesh
not as fully Lord, but as graspably human.
I want to cling, despite your protest
cling to your body
cling to your, and my, clingable humanity
cling to what we had, our past.
But I know that … if I cling
you cannot ascend and
I will be left clinging to your former self
… unable to receive your present spirit.