4th Advent Joy of Sharing

God inspired Sacred Scripture. We believe this as Catholics. So how did we write our Sacred Scripture? Did any of the writers of the texts sit down and say “Today, I will write a book of Sacred Scripture?” Did Micah one day just have that thought? Or did God appear and dictate what was to be written?

The People shared experiences, they shared their stories of how they perceived God was present to them and to the people. These stories were passed along eventually were written down and shared more and more. In time the community decided “yes, these are true experiences of God”, and accepted them. The community wrote and formed scripture.

This includes the Gospels. We know there were other Gospels written aside from our four. They all shared their experiences, their understanding of Jesus and his mission; but of all those, the four were accepted by the community of believers as those that reflect the true intent of Jesus. There was no secret Church cabal that gathered in a back room. Eventually, an authority decided to close scripture, authorizing what the community had accepted, and said that is enough.

The community shared their stories of God working in their lives: from the ancient Hebrews to the Jewish people to those who believed Jesus as the Christ.

Mary and Elizabeth would have known their people’s stories and would have recognized that in those stories God worked through in them. They rejoiced at this! They came together to rejoice and share in their own experience of God with each other. The joy of this jumps from the pages!

“Father, I think God has abandoned me.” “Father, my faith seems so weak. I can’t pray. I don’t feel anything.” “Father, how is God calling me?” These are a synthesis of common questions I get from people. People who sense something is amiss, off in their lives. Their common spiritual practices no longer seem to work. Their way of understanding how the world “SHOULD” be is not happening. They feel stuck, in a rut. They feel fear and/or anger. It is great!  God then, as St. John of the Cross might say, has begun to pull them, pull us into a deeper relationship.

We all have stories to share of God. We all have had experiences in which God has moved us, inspired us, maybe shook us up a bit; God always inspires us with the goal of deepening our understanding of God and being drawn into a greater understanding of reality. With greater understanding comes more joy.  We need, if we want to enliven our faith, enliven our parish, enliven our church throughout the diocese and world, we need to share our stories. We need to share our faith.

How do we imagine Jesus attracted people to him? How do we imagine he built up the disciple’s faith? He did not have classes, programs or workshops. He taught them through his experience of God. He attracted people through his sharing his story of God.

I am privileged in so many ways as a priest. The best privilege (maybe) is that I am allowed to hear people’s stories. People share their struggles and also how God worked with them to become better, to become more free! I love it. I learn a lot. And I will share those experiences, those stories, in a generalized way through homily. This way you all hear the stories, and hopefully may connect to your own lives and find a deeper and livelier faith.

Yet, that is not sufficient. Faith Sharing among ourselves does so much more! Faith sharing among ourselves builds us up, as persons and community. It breaks down the divisions and builds unity. It opens us up to the wonder of God present in our world.  We faith share at our staff meetings and we have begun to share at Parish Council meetings too. Small groups have begun to form in the parish to allow this.  

But consider this in your own homes. Imagine parents and children sitting around at the end of the day sharing how they experienced God that day. Imagine a husband and wife building up intimacy by sharing faith. Imagine alongside reciting rosaries and other devotions, we started with Sharing on Daily Scripture.  Jesus was born into a family, the first place in which faith is truly learned.  This community too is family; there are amazing stories right here that can be shared; great wisdom that can be given.

Pope Francis, I think is a true Prophet, sees that the Church has been called by God to go deeper in our relationship. We can look at our world and we see so much division and violence, and that is just us Catholics. We have stopped listening to each other, we do not know each other, we do not know our stories. Pope Francis calls us to listen to one another. We need to discern the Holy Spirit at work, through Jesus Christ, beyond our own individual agendas and egos.

It starts locally.

I get it, it can be difficult to share. At times we lack the vocabulary. At times we may think our story as not worthy, not relevant. At times we simply may not know how. All of this can be helped with.  I believe that one of the most important ways I understood God calling me to priesthood was here at OLS, 22 years ago learning to faith share.  

We come back to Mary and Elizabeth, and their joy. They worked with God to help bring about the Kingdom. They participated in the Divine Plan: this very vulnerable young woman and this elderly barren woman. So too did the youngest son of a man with six other sons. So too did a pagan woman in Jericho. So too did a strictly observant Jew who encountered Jesus on his way to arrest followers. So too a rich Italian playboy who was awestruck by the reality of God being born as a baby. So too a spoiled little French girl that joined a Carmelite convent. So too, many women and men struggling with addiction, find strength and joy. 

Scripture may be officially closed, but the story of God with us continues on, in billions of personal ways. What a story we have to share.