6 /4 /00 Homily
Father Brian Joyce


 Today we celebrate the feast of the Ascension of Jesus.  And, according
to some, this feast we observe, the Ascension of Jesus, represents the
biggest mistake that Jesus ever made. What He did was He left us. And He
took the Gospel and the Life of the Church, and He left us in charge.
Looks like a big mistake.

 There's a story that, after Christ ascended into Heaven, all the angels
raced around to meet Him and to hear how things had gone. And Jesus told
them about His birth, His life and preaching, His death and
resurrection, and how He had saved the world. And the angels said,
"Well, now that You are back here, how is Your work going to be
continued? What is Your plan?" And Jesus said, "Well, I gathered a group
of people who believe in Me and love Me, a group of human beings, and
they're going to continue the Gospel and the Church."  The angels looked
at Him in shock and then said, "Well, what will You do if it doesn't
work?" And Jesus said, "I have no other plans."

 We're it!... There are no other plans! The readings for the Feast of
the Ascension remind us of our call and of our concern. The call, the
first reading says to us, "You are sent to be my witnesses." And in the
second reading, St. Paul gets a little concerned and prays, "May God
enlighten the eyes of our heart so that we may know the great hope to
which we have been called."

 Well, I want to suggest that some of the enlightenment to the eyes of
our heart, some of the vision, and some of the hope we need may come
from those who have gone before us and who have witnessed to Jesus very
well. Earlier this year, we talked about some of the "Stars of the
Millennium." We talked about Hildegarde of Bingen, Clare and Francis of
Assisi, Dorothy Day of New York. Today I want to add just two more.

  The first one is Catherine of Siena.  Now Catherine was born (I'm
going to be very precise!) a long, long time ago. Is that good enough?
For those who are historians, she was born in 1347. All the way back to
1970, not so long ago, the Church proclaimed her officially as a Doctor
of the Church. "Doctor of the Church" means someone that either a Pope
or an Ecumenical Council has officially designated as an eminent,
competent teacher of the Catholic Faith.  In 2000 years, there have been
33 so designated, 3 women. One of those is Catherine of Siena.

 A few years ago, a number of us went to Italy. And one place we visited
was the small house in Siena where Catherine grew up.  She was the
twenty-fourth of twenty-five children. And, although she taught
obedience in her life, she defied her parents who wanted to marry her
off.  And she was constantly critical of Church leaders and lack of
Church reform. She never learned to read or write. She died at the age
of 33. And yet, in her short life, she became one of the greatest
mystics in the history of the Church. She produced wonderful works on
spiritual life and its meaning, over 400 letters, at least that we have
copies of, of correspondence with the religious leaders, the political
leaders, the Emperor and the Popes of the time. She became the chief
negotiator between warring families of Florence, of Siena, and of the
Papacy. She gathered a community around her of laymen, laywomen,
religious brothers and priests. She went as a nurse to the sick in
Siena, as a visitor, almost chaplain, to the prisons and prisoners. And
those who were executed she walked and took by hand to the gallows each
time. She later challenged Church leaders, became an advisor to the
Popes, and also, at the same time, their greatest critic.

 What she taught in her spiritual writings (She dictated them.) was that
you cannot have union with Christ unless you have solidarity with the
poor.  And you cannot have union with God except through love of
neighbor and service of neighbor.

 Her final years were spent entirely trying to reform the Church and its
leadership. And she's often pictured this way with that large boat on
her shoulders. Toward the end of her life she was in Rome, and in prayer
at the old St. Peter's Church. And they had a huge mosaic there with
this boat representing the barque of St. Peter but with the flag and
trappings of medieval Papacy. And in her prayer and her vision she saw
that boat come onto her shoulder, that she had to carry it, and she saw
it crush her. And she had a stroke and died two weeks later.

 But, in her effort to reform the Church, there were three things she
insisted on. One was that we face our problems, no denial; the second
one, that we name our demons, we name our evils; and the third, that we
change our ways. For example, one of the great problems in her lifetime
was that the Papacy, the Pope and all his court, had moved to a very
luxurious palace in the south of France, had left Rome and the people
entirely. She said, "You have to face your problems and don't deny
them." She traveled to France to confront people about it. Secondly, she
said, "You have to name your demons." She went to Pope Gregory who was a
good friend of hers, and told him that his palace stank with sin. And
his successor, whom she supported, Pope Urban, she said to him and to
the world that he was mad with power. She wasn't afraid of naming the
demons. And she called on people to change their ways. After seven
generations of being in the south of France, she went to the Popes and
said, "You move it." And they moved. They changed.

 The second  person I want to share with you is much more recent than
St. Catherine of Siena. And that's Pope John XXIII, affectionately known
as "Good Pope John." When he became the Pope in 1958, he succeeded the
long leadership of Pope Pius XII who was slim and ascetic and very
serious. The most common thing people did when they first saw his
picture on Time Magazine was say, "He certainly doesn't look like a
Pope." One bishop I know describes his own feelings when he first saw
the picture of the new Pope, John XXIII. He said, "He looks like he
should be baking pizza somewhere."

 And he had a great sense of humor about himself. The day after he
became Pope, he invited the press corps into the Vatican to give them a
tour and answer their questions. And the first question was, "How many
people do you have working here at the Vatican?" And his answer was,
"About half of them.... About half of them." In those days, they carried
the Pope on a large chair called the Sedia Gestatoria, which made it
possible for you to see the Pope in large crowds. Took six or eight men
to carry it. He immediately doubled their wages because he said, "I know
I've doubled the weight that they have to carry." Even in facing death,
he had a sense of humor. He smiled just before his death and turned to
his friends and said, "My bags are packed. I'm ready to go." Very
positive person.

 But, at the age of 77 (That's when he became Pope.) everyone expected
him to be a "caretaker" Pope, which means "Don't change anything or do
anything. Just wait until a few years and we get a real young, strong
pope." To that, Pope John XXIII said, "We are not on earth to guard a
museum, but to cultivate a flourishing garden of life." And he ended up
changing our understanding and vision and future of ourselves as  a
Church. He did it by calling the Second Vatican Council against the
advice and without the cooperation of practically all his advisors, and,
secondly, by being very positive and open to the world, to ecuminism and
to dialog with other religions. It's interesting,  you know, he called
to this Council all the Bishops of the World. And those who had to set
it up for him, his staff, kept coming in and saying, "We got to postpone
it. We really can't.... We're not ready yet." Every time they did that,
he moved the date up another month. The fourth time he did that, they
got the message and left him alone.

 The day the council opened, in 1962, there were 2800 bishops gathered
in front of him, including his close advisors, and this is what he said
in the formal address, opening the Council:
 In the daily exercise of my pastoral office, I sometimes have to
listen, much to my regret, to voices of people who, though they are
burning with religious zeal, are not endowed with much common sense. In
these modern times, they can see nothing but evil and ruin. I feel I
must disagree with these prophets of gloom. In the present order of
things, Divine Providence is leading us to a new order of human
relations, which by human effort, and even beyond human expectation, is
directed toward the fulfillment of God's design. And everything, even
human differences, lead to the greater good of the Church and of the
world.
What a positive approach to life, and to the Church!

 Well, what have we learned from these two figures? I would say four
things. One is, we can't be into denial. Whether it's the Church or
ourselves, we have to face our problems. We have to be willing to change
and not be rigid, willing to reform. We have to have a sense of humor.
And we have to be open and positive about those who differ from us.
Thursday night, I'm giving a lecture and presentation, discussion, on
the future of the Church in the year 2000 and beyond. People have asked
me, "What is the future of the Church?" My answer is, "I don't know. I
haven't given the talk yet. But you're all invited, 7:30 in the parish
hall."

 So what about ourselves personally? I think St. Catherine tells us that
we have to take an honest look at ourselves and make an honest effort
every day, not to deny things, but to see how we relate to people, how
we live, and whether we need to change. I find the most common thing
that gets us into a negative rut is resentment and  grudges and
unforgiven items in our life that we have to let go of.

 And Pope John tells us, first of all, if you're going to be Christian,
you got to have a sense of humor. Now, that doesn't mean being a Bob
Hope or a Billy Crystal. But what it means is (In fact, there's a talk
show host that uses this line whenever he closes.) angels fly because
they take themselves lightly. I think Pope John XXIII would say you have
to take yourself lightly and take the GOOD NEWS of the Gospel seriously,
the GOOD NEWS of its joy. One thing he said about the Gospel was "The
Gospel never changes, but we just keep understanding it better and
better." And finally, we need openness to views and ways and people that
are different than us because our God is always out to surprise us with
wisdom and with the truth.

 May St. Catherine of Siena and Good Pope John companion us and pray
with us as we seek to understand well and to witness faithfully to the
Gospel of the risen and ascended Christ. Amen.