Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (B), Conversations with Consequences Podcast, September 25, 2021

Fr. Roger J. Landry
Conversations with Consequences Podcast
Homily for the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (B), Vigil
September 25, 2021

To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below: 

The following text guided the homily: 

• This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a privilege for me to be with you as we enter into the consequential conversation the Risen Lord Jesus wants to have with each of us this Sunday, in which we will enter into a dramatic dialogue in which Saint John tells Jesus that the apostles saw someone driving out demons in his name and they tried to stop him, because he was not one of their number. Jesus replied that they shouldn’t stop him, because no one who performs a mighty deed in his name can at the same time speak ill of him. Then he gives a principle: “Whoever is not against us is for us.”
• We live in a society polarized by politics and a Church rent with various sad divisions. Jesus himself admits that some are “for” him and others are “against” him. We know that eleven of the twelve apostles were for him, that Mary and Joseph were for him, that Mary Magdalene, Susanna and Joanna, the Centurion, the Syro-Phoenician women, so many of those Jesus had healed who couldn’t stop talking about him even when he asked them not to were clearly on his side. But we also witness that there are those who are actively “against” Jesus, likeSatan in the desert; some of the Scribes and Pharisees during Jesus’ public ministry, Herod the Great at Jesus’ birth, Pontius Pilate and Herod Antipas at Jesus’ death, even, for a very short time, St. Peter, whom Christ called Satan and told to get behind him when he rejected the possibility that the Lord would suffer.
• Yet, despite the reality of division, Jesus gives a principle with which he wants his followers to live: “Whoever is not against us is for us.” There’s a temptation among many serious believers to focus so much on what distinguishes us from others that we lose what unites us, and as we and others focus on those differences, we pull ourselves and push others away. We can begin with what we criticize rather than what we admire. We can fault others for what they don’t get right rather than commence with what they do. We see this tendency in the Gospel with many of the Pharisees, literally the “separated ones.” They were constantly distinguishing themselves from others that they really grew no longer to focus on uniting them. They began to pray like the Pharisee in Jesus’ parable, giving thanks that they’re not like others who are guilty of various types of notorious sins. Jesus wants us to recognize in others those parts that are united with him and not to stop them, like St. John the Beloved was trying to stop people from casting out devils, as if Jesus’ will would have been that they should suffer diabolical possession or obsession another day.
• Against this tendency to distinguish and exclude, Jesus wants us to have a different attitude, his own, who came to seek and save what was lost, to reunite the lost sheep of the house of Israel, to go out after the one and bring that person back to the 99, ultimately to reconcile all things in himself. He had come to set prisoners free, to defeat Satan once and for all, but the still-immature disciples wanted to stop someone from casting out devils, from doing the Lord’s work because, essentially, they were more concerned with what they wanted to be their exclusive prerogatives in God’s kingdom than in accomplishing his work. None of us should ever think we have a monopoly on the name, mission, message and power of Jesus.  We should never find God’s action in others a threat, but rather something to marvel at and praise him for. We should of course want to help others to come to the fullness of the truth about God revealed to us by Christ in His Church, but we should rejoice that others, at whatever stage of revelation they’ve received, would be corresponding to the work of the Holy Spirit. Jesus tells us in the Gospel this Sunday that anyone who gives us a cup of water to drink because we belong to him is ultimately cooperating with grace, is corresponding to the kingdom.
• But we shouldn’t have too soft a distinction about who is doing God’s work and who isn’t, as if everyone, including us, is doing God’s work by the simple fact that we say we or think we are. Jesus immediately in the Gospel specifies those who are in fact against him: namely, those who give scandal, those who by their words and example teach others, especially the young, not about how to know, love and serve the Lord but rather how to sin.  Such is Jesus’ love for his children that he passionately warns everyone who harms little ones through scandal to know what punishment they should expect: “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and thrown into the sea.” The word “scandal” in the original language of the Bible meant two things: something that causes another to fall and something that is an obstacle to someone’s doing good. Applied to the matters of faith, scandal is something that either causes another to sin against God (i.e., fall from God) or something that prevents the access of another (an obstacle) to the kingdom of God. We can easily call to mind those whose deeds lead others astray: bishops and priests who haven’t walked the walk, as we’ve seen in the recent scandals of sexual abuse and the failure of those in positions of authority to eradicate them or to tell the truth about them; celebrities from the world of music, movies and sports whose example draws the young into drugs, into using others in relationships, into the worship of status; educators, who teach young people in public schools confusing ideas about human nature or who promote premarital sex, homosexuality, abortion and other topics in ways that are totally contrary to what God wants; politicians who pretend that their interpretation of the Constitution trumps their duties to God. If it were possible to buy stock in a millstone business, now would be the time to buy.
• But we should never focus on the speck in others’ eyes and miss the plank in our own. Each of us needs to ask whether by our words and actions we facilitate or frustrate the lessons God wants others, especially the young, to learn: does our example inspire or discourage young people to pray, to come to Mass, to go to confession, to learn the faith, to fight against sin, to sacrifice ourselves to care for the poor and needy, to use appropriate language, to be honest, to stay faithful to the Lord in terms of love, sex, marriage and family, to forgive and give people second, third and seventy-seven chances? Do we encourage people to see the good in others or the evil? Do we inspire others to live off of every word that comes from God’s mouth or to think they’re fine if they ignore it? Are we motivating or dissuading the young to become true saints, to love God with all their mind, heart, soul and strength? The young learn from those who are older what’s really important in life and so we need to focus on what we’re teaching by our words and example.
• At the end of the Gospel, Jesus speaks about being brutal with ourselves to cut from our life whatever leads to sin, telling us to cut off our foot or pluck out our eye if it leads us to sin or leads others to take scandal. If we have bad habits, the Lord wants to give us the grace and motivation to change. In another part of the Gospel, Jesus says words that seem to be in contradiction with his phrase this Sunday,“Whoever is not against us is for us.” When he was challenged by those who accused him of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons, Jesus, after reminding them that divided kingdoms can’t stand, said, “Whoever is not with me is against me; whoever doesn’t gather with me, scatters” (Mt 12:30). The statements are not contradictory, but they do need to be harmonized. By the reconciliation of both truths, we learn that it is possible for someone to be gathering “with Jesus” while not necessarily being visibly “with us.” That’s why we should never presume that someone who is not with us is necessarily not with Jesus. This is a key point in terms of ecumenical and interreligious work for the kingdom and the common good. But second and more profoundly, reconciling both statements helps us to see that there are parts of us that are with the Lord and parts of us that are not with Him. Parts of us gather with him and parts of us scatter. St. Augustine says that because there can be people partially with and partially against the Lord, the Lord affirms that we should not reject that which in a person is with the Lord but that we should reject that which in a person, or in us, is against the Lord. St. John Chrysostom makes essentially the same point, that those who are not against the Lord are at least partially on his side, like different nations fighting a similar adversary, as the man in the Gospel was casting out God’s enemy, the devil, in Jesus’ name. The essential takeaway is that it’s God’s will that we seek to bring all parts of us into alignment with God and to bring everyone into a communion willed by God.
• The great opportunity we have for growing in wisdom and bringing our entire life into conformity with God happens at Mass, as we seek to enter into holy Communion with him, something that is not meant to be partial but total, and in him with each other. He wills that nothing in us will be against him but totally with him and with his Church. That’s why we begin every Mass calling to mind those parts of our life that aren’t in total agreement with God’s will and ask him for the grace of forgiveness and to help us precisely achieve that total communion. As we prepare to hear him in Sacred Scripture, and to receive His body and blood inside us, let us ask him to heal our wounded eyes, or sinful hands, or occasionally scandalous feet, so that every part of us — and the lives of those whom he has entrusted to us — may be “with Him” in this life and in the next.

The Gospel on which this homily was based was: 

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