Homily for Sunday, July 28, 2024

17th Sunday in Ordinary Time |

[Father Paul]

Monsignor Ray Montague was my pastor growing up, and he used to say to us,

"To those who have faith, no explanation is necessary; to those who don't have faith, no explanation is possible."

This week, I begin a new series of four sermons on faith entitled "Tell Me Why," which explores faith and doubt.

As your pastor, let me say this: more than anything else, I want you to feel the same joy, happiness, courage, wisdom, and strength of spirit when I do everything I do in Jesus' name.

My problem, and your problem too, or maybe not, is that sometimes I doubt. And when I doubt, I feel less joy, happiness, courage, wisdom, and strength of spirit.

So why do I doubt?

You may have your reasons for questioning and believing. So, I can only share my reasons, and maybe you can relate. I will spend the next two weekends speaking about my doubts -- good reasons and more questionable reasons. Let me begin with my first experience of real doubt when I left the seminary for the first time.

As I have mentioned many times before, when I was in high school, I flirted with becoming a Baptist. The Baptists taught me the importance of accepting Jesus as my personal lord and saviour. I will be eternally grateful to them for that; perhaps that's why I'm so involved in the ecumenical movement here in Pelham. But I decided to remain Catholic and go to the seminary, and this is where the problems began. I didn't feel that closeness to Jesus with the Baptists.

But it got worse.

I remember falling in love with philosophy and wanting to study great minds. I used to walk over to the bookstore and see the textbooks for the advanced philosophy courses. Imagine a course on Plato's Republic or Kant's critique of pure reason. When I approached the seminary faculty about doing this, they said no, my mission here was to become a priest. And they were right, but eventually, I just saw this need for more attention to the fundamentals of our faith. And that drew me away. I thought I would take a year off and get this philosophy out of my system. Again, they said no. Like they had a choice, it was my life. They said that if I went to the main campus and studied philosophy, I would be rejected once they discovered who I was and where I came from -- a seminarian.

But here's the thing: I went anyway, and was I met with prejudice, judgement, and rejection? Not at all. Not. I was just met with curiosity and respect. And I did well in that environment. I felt like I had my enlightenment. Was the seminary holding me back in my intellectual and spiritual life?

And I was very, very angry with the church. I just stopped going. The source of this anger was a false feeling of isolation that the seminary was creating in me, that the world was somehow evil and that I was not to expose myself to it. To be fair to the seminary, the isolation and fear were in me, not in them.

Nevertheless, I made some wonderful friends, and because of this anger, I stopped attending church. I rejected it. Many of us might feel the same way about the church today. Who could not feel betrayed by the clergy abuse crisis or the discovery of how our history has contributed to the mistreatment of children of our Indigenous communities - among others in our society, to be sure, but many feel the hypocrisy of a church that preaches peace on the one hand and yet is so blind that it causes such profound harm.

Here's my question: Is that a good enough reason to reject the teachings of Jesus?

Is the corruption of the church a good enough reason to stop listening to the call of Christ for a better world?

For me, no.

On the contrary, Jesus' teachings should call us to make a better world and a better church. Yes, if all you want to do is watch the church and consume what we offer when it is convenient for you, as if we are a restaurant or a store that sells stuff, then no, your faith will not last. But have you ever felt called to something deeper?

Have you ever felt that maybe what Jesus is saying is true, even despite the despicable behaviour of some in the church?

I want to conclude with one more little story.

I remember talking to someone who once bought a golf course. Let's say for the story that it was a miserable golf course; the greens were all mottled, the fairways were in horrible condition etc., etc. Why on earth did you buy such a golf course? Because they believed in the beauty of the game and saw something they could do, create, and improve. They were not just members; they were owners.

Ownership is what being a follower of Jesus is.

Not only do we need a church, but we are given a church by the cross of Christ. We know that he will guide and protect it, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it, but he will do that through us if we are willing to participate in the church's mission.

Next week, I will speak more about doubt from my own life, but this time, it is a different kind of doubt, a much deeper one that can lead to genuine faith if you let it.

But always remember, "To those who have faith, no explanation is necessary; to those who don't, no explanation is possible."