Homily for 5th Sunday of Ordinary Time Year C 2022
Isaiah 6:1-2a,3-8; 1 Corinthians 15:1-11; Luke 5:1-11
Introduction
The death and funeral of Pope John Paul II
in 2005 was a great media event. Even in
my remote village of Uganda, where I was pastor, we followed everything both on
Radio Maria and on EWTN television via satellite. In fact, on the day of the funeral itself, an
hour before the funeral in Rome we celebrated a Mass for his soul, and then we
set up the TV in church and followed the funeral Mass.
At the end of it, one of my parishioners
came to me rather disturbed. He had
heard that the Holy Father, before he died, had asked for prayers for his
soul. “Why does the pope need prayers,”
he asked? “I thought he was a holy man. If
he needs prayers, what hope is there for us ordinary Christians?”
I don’t remember what I told him exactly,
but I think I must have assured him that the pope too was a mortal human being,
an imperfect Christian, subject to temptation and sin like everybody else. That is why he also needed prayers.
But perhaps I should have referred my
parishioner to our readings of today, which remind us that the men God calls
for his ministry, are often not perfect men.
In fact, often they are sinners.
But with God’s grace, they can be his instruments.
Scripture and Theology
We heard the prophet Isaiah declare: "Woe is me, I am doomed! For I am a man of
unclean lips, living among a people of unclean lips." How did he know this? No human being, by his own power, can realize
his own sinfulness. Isaiah does so only by
the grace of God. Think of our first
parents Adam and Eve; after they had sinned, the weight of what they had done
began to dawn on them only "When
they heard the sound of the LORD God walking about in the garden"
(Gen. 3:8); that is when they hid from the Lord. Isaiah too came to this realization of his
sinfulness, during his vision in the Temple, when the Lord came upon him.
Similarly in the gospel, Simon the
fisherman declares: "Depart from me,
Lord, for I am a sinful man."
But even he says this only after an encounter with Jesus Christ, after
the Lord has worked on him as it were, after Jesus has demonstrated his power
by the miraculous catch of the fish. Simon was able to accomplish that fete only
after following the instructions of Jesus to throw into the deep water.
And so, for both men, Isaiah and Simon, the
first step is that God entered their lives and brought them to a realization of
their unworthiness.
The second step was cleansing. In the case of Isaiah, after finding out that
he was a man of unclean lips, we heard that "Then one of the seraphim [that is an angel] flew to me, holding an
ember that he had taken with tongs from the altar. He touched my mouth with it,
and said, 'See, now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is
removed, your sin purged.'"
This image of cleansing clearly shows that before Isaiah could take up
his mission from God, he had to be prepared.
In the case of Simon, Jesus cleansed him
with these words: "Do not be afraid;
from now on you will be catching men."
These words together with the interaction that Jesus had with Simon and
the others, especially with the miraculous catch of fish, led them to become
changed men. Of course, Jesus did not
force himself upon him; Simon was free to reject or accept this infusion of
grace. Simon could, like any self-respecting
fisherman, have refused to listen to the directives of carpenter; what does a
carpenter know about fishing? But he
cooperated with this graced moment, allowing the Lord to work on him through
the miraculous catch, and allow him to see himself in a new light.
Now that they have been cleansed, the third
step for Isaiah and Simon is that they are given and accept a mission from
God. Isaiah tells us that after his lips
were cleansed he "heard the voice of
the Lord saying, 'Whom shall I send? Who
will go for us?'" And he
replied: "Here I am send me!" Because his lips had now been cleansed, he could
now carry out the work of speaking God's word as a prophet.
Simon and his three colleagues similarly
accepted the invitation by Jesus for them to become fishers of men. For "When
they brought their boats to the shore, they left everything and followed him." And they were his closest friends, witnesses
to all Jesus said and did, especially his death and resurrection, and would
eventually be charged with passing on this Good News to the rest of the world.
Christian Life
The Lord has not stopped calling people in
this way. He continues to call men and
women, who are imperfect, to be his messengers, to do his work. But he also continues to clean their lips by
sending his grace upon them.
Like his predecessor Simon Peter, that is
what Pope Francis has kept reminding us.
You might recall an interview he gave several years ago when he was asked:
“Who is Jorge Mario Bergoglio?” And in what has now become a famous answer, he
said: "I do not know what might be
the most fitting description.... but the
best summary, the one that comes more from the inside and I feel most true is
this: I am a sinner whom the Lord
has looked upon.”
Similarly, for Pope Benedict, the very
first words he said publicly in St. Peter’s square as pope were the following:
“After the great Pope John Paul II, the
Cardinals have elected me, a simple and humble labourer in the vineyard of the
Lord. The fact that the Lord knows how
to work and to act even with inadequate
instruments comforts me, and above all I entrust myself to your prayers.”
If the last three popes have acknowledged
that they are sinners in need of prayer, inadequate instruments at the Lord’s
service, how much more should the rest of us, priests and deacons, married men
and women, recognize our sinfulness and our unworthiness. But we must also recognize that despite this
sinfulness, despite this unworthiness, strengthened by his grace, the Lord will
use as for his work
For those of called to a life of marriage
and family, you probably realize how inadequate you are. After the honeymoon of
romantic feelings dies down and the task of building the marriage bond and
raising helpless babies into adults begins, then you realize “I don’t know what
the heck I am doing!” I now look back at
my own parents and realize, they really didn’t know what they were doing. But try they did and I think I came out
alright, somehow. You too must like Isaiah,
Simon Peter, Pope Benedict and others, entrust yourselves to the Lord,
especially by prayer and by learning from him and his church what your
responsibilities are. You don’t give up
because you are unworthy; you strive to make yourself worthier with his help.
Imagine you were the owner of a company,
you were falsely imprisoned and your employees had abandoned you; on your
release and exoneration, would you hire back that bunch of losers? Is that not what Jesus did after the
resurrection? He took back the Eleven
Apostles, who had abandoned him at his hour of suffering, one of whom, Simon, had
even denied him not once, not twice, but three times. The only one that he did not receive back is
Judas Iscariot, not because his crime had been more heinous, but because unlike
the Eleven, Judas refused to repent and return to the Lord, so that he might
work on him a little more, to lead him to repentance, and cleanse him with his
grace like he did with the others.
Conclusion
I would like to leave you with one final
image, the image of a used car. Many of
us can never afford a brand-new car and buy used ones. It seems that God too, in choosing vehicles
to use for his ministry, he prefers the human equivalent of used cars. Like used cars which are often dented,
broken, and in need of repair, he chooses imperfect men and women, in need of
repair and cleansing. But then, like an
experienced driver, after closely examining them, he painstakingly works on
them, perhaps gives them an oil change, a flush of the fluids and a new coat of
paint, and then he puts back on the road.
Can we allow God to make some repairs on us, perhaps give us a new coat
of grace, a new infusion of faith, and a flush of our sins, and so renew us to
go and do his work?
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