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September 20, 2009 Cycle B
Wisdom 2:12,17-20 James 3:16-4:3 Mark 9:30-37
Catechetical Sunday – Time and Talent
How often have you been in a conversation when a topic that is uncomfortable for you comes up? What do you do? Keep silent? Or do you try to change the topic and the focus of the conversation?
If you try to change the conversation you are in league pretty much with the disciples in our Gospel today. Here we find Jesus telling His community that He is aware that there is a plot to silence Him by putting Him to death. Christ realizes that they will succeed sooner, rather than later.
Then Jesus does something very startling. He brings a child before their eyes. It is a visual aide of how His disciples should see themselves. “Be like a child, not seeking power, prestige, lording over someone, is the point that Christ is making. You see, that image of a child is one difficult for us to understand in our own culture. But we recognize that in Christ’s days, in the First Century, a child was a non-person, a non-entity, a nobody. There was no reason for a little child to be close to a great teacher such as Jesus or in the middle of a group of men. Children were expected to stay with the women and keep themselves out of the way until they grew up and started exercising some adult responsibilities.
Christ teaches that when you welcome a nobody, you welcome Me. And when you welcome Me, you welcome God. So if you want to be first in the Kingdom of God, then you had better get use to being a child, a welcoming servant of all people. For that’s what it means to be One with the Son of God.
You see, Jesus is calling us to flip our usual attitudes towards greatness, and honor, and fame, completely upside down.
So here we are with Christ saying to us, “Change your perspective.” Look at life from the bottom up and give your greatest attention to the people who have no fame. Focus on the children, on the single mothers, on the dishwasher, on the maids, on the working poor, on the homeless. “Whoever welcomes one such child in My name, welcomes Me. And whoever welcomes Me, welcomes God.”
This is a fitting weekend then to begin to reflect on our sharing of our Time and Talent in the Christian community. Every year we invite all of our parishioners to reflect on ways that they can be of service to the greater Christian community.
Today in your pews you’ll find again the outline of the various opportunities that await you in the New Year. Some of you have been doing this for many years, and I thank you for that. But again, this is like our annual altar call to sign up again and to let us hear what you would like to do in the New Year, 2009/2010. The Gospel passage is a great one to think about as we enter into another year of service. For we are called to treat one another with dignity who are people made in God’s image. And that opportunity surely is given to us time and again in the various time and talent areas that you are welcomed to sign on with today.
This is also Cathechetical Sunday. We honor our religion teachers, our Directors of Religious Education, our catechists, as well as parents. We know that our parents are the primary instructors by word and example. But we also lift up the whole formation enterprise that we have here at Christ the King and highlight the need for all of us to approach the spiritual life as an ongoing occasion of learning.
We may have well imagined that we have heard everything there is to know about religion because we went to Catholic School or through Sacramental Prep Programs. Even those who were college educated by the Benedictines, Jesuits, or Domenicans still need to grow and develop in their understanding of faith, discipleship, and the mission of the Church.
When the disciples were quarreling among themselves and their importance, the visual image of a child put everything on hold and forced the disciples to revisit who should be welcomed in the community. In a symbolic way by putting a child in their midst, Jesus calls us to look at the child at our own centers. That aspect of ourselves that must continue to be open to growth, to change, to embracing instruction without arrogance, to retain in the innocence of doves while seeking to dispel ignorance at every opportunity.
Another school year is here. It is an opportunity to learn more about the world and how things work and the wonder of God’s Grace within that world that we live within. We have truly been blessed here at Christ the King with so many volunteers who have stepped forward. I ask you again, as I move into my fifteenth year as your pastor, to consider one more year of commitment and service. Truly the Lord speaks to us in our hearts and we need to discern that voice that calls us forward to be a people of service to others.
Thank you again for all of your energy and vitality to enable our parish to be a vibrant community of faith.
Amen. Amen.
Msgr. Tom, Pastor, Christ the King