Seeds of Faith

Increase our increase our faith.

It is easy to identify with the prophet Habakkuk's

lament of difficult times. 

We sometimes identify our times as the most difficult at times,

that we are under persecution with our faith.

Sometimes people are not taking religion seriously anymore.

The secular society seems to be winning the battle,

and we look at what is happening around the world.

Violence and wars and it is hard not to get seduced

by the lament of prophet Habakkuk.

But the Lord's response to Habakkuk is very clear.

Remain faithful, remain steadfast

in the midst of violence and persecution.

It is good for us to hear that,

and we hear it in the second reading to Timothy as well

and in the gospel, to remain faithful

to that seed of faith within us. 

It is helpful to understand the context of our times

in the context of all of history,

these are not the worst of times.

Things have been far worse and

persecutions have been real at other times.

We just returned from our pilgrimage to Ireland.

As much as I knew it in my own history,

having been raised in Ireland and read all the history,

I forget it until I relived it again in this visit.

Ireland was persecuted for being Catholic

by the British in a radical way for hundreds of years,

generations upon generations.

And while we often focus on the famine years, the 1840s, 

that was two hundred years later,

after the persecution has been rampant.

At one point in Irish history, it was illegal to be Catholic.

Just to understand the consequence of that,

you had no right to own anything.

You could not own any land, a home.

You could not even own an animal.

The only thing you could own were the clothes on your back.

You could not own anything else beyond that.

And it was illegal because of being Catholic,

celebrating the Mass was a death sentence.

In particular, for the priests,

because there was a bounty on the priest's head.

You can imagine that not only was it illegal to be Catholic,

but to be a priest and to celebrate Mass was risky,

as every single person in the community

celebrating Mass could sell you out.

They would get a bounty for giving you up.

So it was highly risky.

What came about in that time of persecution,

were what they called hedgerow Masses.

These Masses were literally in the hedgerow.

They were often at what is known as a Mass rocks,

a rock where you could celebrate Mass, like an altar.

It was often in a little gully or a valley

where they could have lookouts,

and they could easily disperse when the English were coming.

During this recent pilgrimage in Ireland,

we had an opportunity to celebrate Mass

at one of those ancient Mass rocks,

and here is the picture of it.

It was actually spectacular

because we had had rain just prior to this,

and it does not look like it,

but everybody else is in cloud cover,

and they are freezing cold.

But look at me, I am standing in the sun,

and this beam of light was shining on the rock

and only on the rock.

Just amazing!

It was as if the Lord was reminding us

that this place is a thin place.

This is a sacred space.

And even as I say it, I can feel the presence.

But when we were celebrating Mass,

there was no one was sitting

because there were no seats.

Why? Because they have to be ready to run.

There is a little water well there. Why?

Because the people would have walked

10 or maybe 15 miles to get to Mass,

and they needed some water

and then would head back to their to their respective homes.

They risked everything just to come to Mass.

And without them risking everything,

the chances of me being a Catholic today

would have been next to zero.

Many of you have Irish Catholic roots

and those people are the seeds.

Their labor, their perseverance, and their faith,

their seeds, we are the fruit of their labor.

I am the product of their seeds having given over to the faith,

to not have given in, to having persevered in the bad times.

That is what the letter to Timothy

and the gospel are saying, that

we are called to persevere in our faith, to keep showing up.

Now as I said, it is easy for us to get disenchanted

with so few coming to church after COVID,

and people who do come, are coming maybe once a month.

The regular weekly Mass is a thing of the past.

But we must not give in.

No matter what the secular society says,

how wonderful everything is, it is so important

that we take the seed of faith that we have been given

and that we plant it deep within our soul.

And we water it by our faithful attendance

like you all are here today.

That we keep showing up and that we need to trust,

as the Lord reminds us, we need to trust

that that faith is going to produce much fruit.

We we need to trust that is what will happen for generations after us.

They will see that we came back,

and we filled the churches, and that we continued to to do

what we are called to do.

Now what is really important about this is

that it was not just about going to Mass

that was important to the Irish back then.

They bonded as communities.

They helped each other.

They shared whatever little they had with each other

because it was only together they were going to survive.

And so they shared everything in common

so that everyone, as best they could,

would survive those difficult years.

That is why it was so important.

Now what we do, it is important

that we come to the Eucharist, no question.

That is why we come here,

but it is equally as important that

we become what we receive.

We become the body of Christ broken in the world.

We become the blood of Christ poured out in the world.

What does that mean for us?

It means exactly what the

second reading to Timothy is talking about,

that we are called to be faithful to the gospel.

We are called to be the ones who are kind, forgiving.

To not get seduced into these arguments,

political arguments, religious arguments,

but that we remain faithful to the one command the Lord said,

to love the Lord your God with all your mind,

with all your heart, and to love your neighbor with yourself.

He did not separate out who is your neighbor.

He said your neighbor is everybody in need.

That means that we are called to love

that immigrant who is coming looking for a person.

We love the homeless person who is broken and wounded.

To love the divorce and remarried.

To love the LBGT community.

Why?

Because they need our love and we need to witness.

That is why we do it, because we need to do it,

because that is who we are,

and because we do that this generation,

generations after us will remind

and will look at that witness

and say they were faithful to the gospel.

And so will we be faithful to the gospel.

You have to understand what a mustard seed is.

Yes, it is tiny, and it produces a large bush

that has thousands of seeds.

That is what we are called to be,

to be faithful to plant that little seed of faith

that we have been given and let the Lord multiply in our lives.

But we need to be faithful to the gospel.

We need to be faithful to coming back here,

not just one Sunday, but every Sunday,

and renew what we see here.

This excitement is that we are in it together.

Because that is what the Irish did when they were celebrating.

When they came together,

they realized they were not alone,

and these people were coming from all over Ireland

to do these Masses, and

they emboldened themselves in seeing each other.

That despite what everyone else is doing, they were faithful.

So too we must be faithful by coming to the Eucharist

and becoming the Eucharist in the world.

So my friends, let us ask the Lord to increase our faith,

but let us do our part by showing up

and by giving ourselves away to the world

so that the seeds can be spread to all.

Increase our increase our faith.