Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church

Homily for October 1, 2006
Liturgical Year B - Cycle II
26th Sunday in Ordinary Time
By Fr. John Carney
 Topic:  Be Humble
+  +  +

Reading 1
Num 11:25-29
The LORD came down in the cloud and spoke to Moses. Taking some of the spirit that was on Moses, the LORD bestowed it on the seventy elders; and as the spirit came to rest on them, they prophesied. Now two men, one named Eldad and the other Medad, were not in the gathering but had been left in the camp. They too had been on the list, but had not gone out to the tent; yet the spirit came to rest on them also, and they prophesied in the camp. So, when a young man quickly told Moses. "Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp, "
Joshua, son of Nun, who from his youth had been Moses’ aide, said, Moses, my lord, stop them.” But Moses answered him, "Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the people of the LORD were prophets! Would that the LORD might bestow his spirit on them all!”

Gospel
Mk 9:38-43, 45, 47-48
At that time, John said to Jesus, "Teacher, we saw someone driving out demons in your name, and we tried to prevent him because he does not follow us.” Jesus replied, "Do not prevent him. There is no one who performs a mighty deed in my name who can at the same time speak ill of me. For whoever is not against us is for us. Anyone who gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ, 
amen, I say to you, will surely not lose his reward. "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed than with two hands to go into Gehenna into the unquenchable fire. And if your foot causes you to sin, cut if off. It is better for you to enter into life crippled than with two feet to be thrown into Gehenna. And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into Gehenna, where 'their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.'“
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It’s nice to have Deacon Tony Porto with us, our Deacon Emeritus. On this weekend each year, our active deacons are required to attend a gathering with the Archdiocese and have a weekend retreat. It was somewhat interesting that three years ago, on the 26th Sunday of Ordinary time that Tony was here also and he preached on these Scriptures. He chose the rather harsh words of Jesus in the Gospel today, saying that “If your arm causes you to sin, then cut it off” etc. As I read his homily recently online, he went on to remind us that the Jewish people or the Semitic people, do frequently use hyperbole, but the point is a good one: let nothing get in the way of your eternal salvation, nothing. If you do not get to heaven, regardless of whatever you did in life, you fail. That is a good clean, simple message.

Today, I would like to talk about something else in these readings. The first reading and the Gospel are very closely connected. Interesting, there are some 12 centuries between the two events, but they are very similar. In the first reading, Moses is leading the people and he is overburdened. He complains all the time to God. Moses is an interesting character. A couple of times he says “Take my life. These people, they are a burden. Leave me alone.” So, God told him to appoint 72 elders to assist him in leadership of the people. He does that but Eldad and Medad miss I would guess you would say the commissioning ceremony but the spirit rested on them anyway. Of course, Joshua, son of Nun, no doubt jealous, comes to Moses and says that these two who were not at the ceremony, were prophesying, which was speaking in Gods name, which is of course, is your job Moses and of the elders who had been commissioned. Moses, of course has a very Jewish answer, “Would that everyone would be a prophet! I could get some rest”. He says, “Are you jealous on my account Joshua?” He knew Joshua was jealous because he wanted to be in control, he wanted to be in power, he wanted to be in the elite club of those who can speak for God. He didn’t want to spread that authority around.

Well, 12 centuries later, we see a similar incident with Jesus and his disciples. A disciple comes along and says that someone is curing people in your name, someone who is not in our company, not of your twelve. Jesus responds in the same, “Good. Anyone who is not against us is for us. Anyone who is using my name to cure is for us. “Again, you can hear the jealousy of the disciples who wanted the control for themselves.

Jesus, in many places in the Scripture, attacks this attitude of superiority or this attitude of arrogance. It does not go well with the Lord who calls us to be humble servants. Even those who lead are called to be humble in their leadership and service. I guess this is part of our basic human instinct, or maybe it is part of our basic sub-human instinct, to control.

You’ve heard the terms the alpha male and the alpha female. I think those terms are borrowed from biology. We apply them to each other, don’t we? I love zoos and I visit them whenever I can. Several years ago, I was in San Francisco. I remember it was kind of a cold period, as it often is there. One sunny warm day I went to the zoo. The gorillas captivated me. There were about seven or eight gorillas in this troop. By the way, after the 4 pm mass in White Rock, I referred to a troop of gorillas. This one guy said, “Well, actually Father, gorillas are anthropoids so we should call them families.” Well, I looked it up and it’s true. Of course, oftentimes the Silverback, the big male, leads the troop. There was this big silverback male, several black back males, and several females in this troop. The silverback outweighed the next largest gorilla by 200 lbs. I watched them, I was there for some time, and he just sat on the tallest point in their little area and he just sat like this and looked around. He kept looking at the other gorillas, watching them. Then he left his high point. They have an arm span of 8 ft. They are huge. He left his high point and goes up to this black back and he looks at him and he goes “boom”(Father demonstrates slugging the other gorilla). Then he goes back to his high point and starts watching again. About 15 minutes later, he leaves it again, and all the black backs were cowering. He goes up to one of them and he goes ‘boom”. There was this little boy next to me and he said to his father, “Dad, why does he do that?” His father said correctly, “Because he can.”

We are not animals. Yet we refer to the Alpha personality don’t we? We say he is an alpha male or she is an alpha female. We know what that means--don’t corner him. Yet we are Christians. We are supposed to be Christ-like. Those who are called to leadership have a special burden frankly. That’s true in the family. That’s true in the workplace. That’s true in the church. St. Augustine in his writings, almost bemoans the fact, like Moses, he bemoans the fact that he is a leader. He says, “I am a Christian with you for my sake, I am your Shepard you for your sake. I’ll be held accountable to a higher standard because I have more responsibility.” His point and Jesus’ point is that leaders must be servants. So if you’re in a leadership position at work, clearly parents are in a leadership position in the family, we are to do that as servants, as gently as we can, understanding that at times, people won’t agree with you.

Again, it is part of our human or sub-human nature that we need to address. Years ago, in 1972, I went to a 6-week course at Ft. Bragg. It was in preparation for an assignment to Vietnam. I was assigned to be an advisor. Three weeks of the 6-week course, we had cultural training so that we would not offend the Vietnamese because our cultures are very different. Of course, that’s true with many cultures. I remember some of the things we were taught. Hand gestures in English that are innocuous or even friendly can be insulting to the Vietnamese. Even little things, when we would say, “Come here” (he makes hand gesture to call someone to him). That is very insulting. To the Vietnamese, you have to go “lại đây”, come here, this way, (Makes the correct gesture in Vietnamese). I do not know what that means, but it is not nice. A smile can be their way of saying "I’m sorry, I messed up." You don’t touch a child on the head. The spirit is in the head and it is considered impolite to touch the spirit of the child.

The thing I remember the most and I think that’s applicable here is that you always keep your feet on the ground. When you are sitting across from someone, it is considered a great insult to cross your legs, because then one of your feet is higher than his feet. It is especially an insult if you are pointing at him with your foot. Of course, the rationale is, look, there are big shots, and little shots, some people are in charge, etc., but we are all the same on the ground. That is what humility means, from humus, from the word earth. We are all connected to the ground. I think what a wonderful custom. I think it might be an aspect of Confucianism.

One other sorry that will demonstrate that point. One thing is for sure, when we do act aloof, or above everyone else, we have a tendency to make a fool of ourselves. You probably know an NBC reporter named Mike Leonard. He is kind of the Andy Rooney on NBC. He does these snippets on human nature. Mike Leonard went to Providence College and he graduated three years after I did. We are alumni of the same college. Several years ago, he gave the commencement address. The point he was trying to make to the class is that everyone is important, everyone is sacred, everyone has a place in God’s plan, but don’t get too full of yourself because life has a way of taking you down a notch. He told this story. The story is almost not believable so I emailed him through NBC and got an answer back right away from him. I was surprised at that. He said that indeed the sorry is true. He knew the cameraman who had reported the story to him. So listen to this story. Remember the point is, don’t get too full of yourself or life will take you down. This is from his commencement address.

“An NBC cameraman friend of mine was covering a yacht race in Australia. One of the European teams had a few days off and so they decided to go rent some cars and go racing through the outback. A few hours out of town, the lead car went racing around a corner and hit a kangaroo. Down it went. All the yachtsmen piled out of their cars wearing their designer blazers with their club logo, their crest, on the chest pocket. They looked down at the kangaroo. None of them had ever seen a kangaroo in person, dead or alive. So, one of the guys had the bright idea to prop the kangaroo up against the car and take a group picture with it.” It gets worse.

“Not stopping there, one of the fellows thought the photo would be even funnier if they dressed the dead kangaroo in one of the team blazers. So, a yachtsman took off his coat, slipped the kangaroo’s little arms into its sleeve, buttoned up the jacket, and right when they were about to take the picture, the kangaroo’s eyes snapped right open. It wasn’t dead. It was stunned. It had been knocked out. All of a sudden, the kangaroo bolted into the wild wearing the yachtsman’s designer sports coat, which contained his passport, his yachting credentials, and his wallet filled of credit cards. Everything that made that yachtsman a big wig went hopping across the outback. Suddenly he was nobody.” Leonard concludes, “Obviously at that moment, the yachtsman wasn’t a big shot. The kangaroo, on the other hand …” I wonder what the kangaroo’s mates thought when he showed up for dinner. I guarantee you the yachtsman had his feet firmly on the ground at least for that moment in his life.

I received an email yesterday morning about the lessons of life from an old cowboy. They had a pencil drawing of this fellow who was very old and wrinkled but with a big smile on his face. He had about 30 or 40 pieces of advice. The last two were these.

“If you get to thinking you are a person of some kind of big influence, try ordering someone else’s dog around.”

He concluded, “Live simply, love generously, care deeply, and speak kindly because that’s what Jesus did and if we are to be his followers that is what we must do. The greatest among you is the one who serves the rest.”