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READ THE HOMILY:
Is there anything better than an Alleluia? I mean to forcefully proclaim . . [I stumble over a large rock] Oops.
That’s weird. Anyway, an Alleluia expresses it all . . . [I stumble again] What the . . . ? Oh yea, this is stumbling stone that Peter talked about in the second reading. it looks like an ordinary stone, not even that level or pretty. Yet it was stones like this that entire buildings were built upon. You see, when a building was started back in the time of Jesus, they needed a perfect stone to being with. One that was to be the corner of the building. Then everything else could be laid upon it.
But as Peter wrote, the image of Jesus being the foundation of how to live was widely rejected in his time. It’s not that everyone heard about the resurrection and then immediately wanted to be a follower. No, it’s the opposite. Very few people followed. The Churches that Peter knew would be small “house-churches,” involving only 20-30 people. That’s all. Yet I would imagine that those early Churches were saying and singing Alleluia. What could be better than that?
But saying it is easy, living it was tough. Living it meant to take Jesus message to heart . . . and much of what he talked about didn’t’ make any sense to most people. For example, turning the other cheek when someone hurts you, giving away your coat when someone only ask for a shirt, forgiving that person who’s said those bad things about you, it’s in dying that you will find life.
Those are all bizarre by ANY standards. And yet here is our leader, our Messiah: Jesus telling us, “Yea, it’s crazy. But those are the ONLY thing that really make sense.” You win by losing, you gain by giving it away.
It’s sort of like us dealing with this shut-down from the COVID 19 virus. We win by staying home. We succeed by not interacting.
[I stumble over the rock again]. OK but there is another kind of stumbling stone. This is the personal one that each of us has. You know, that thing about us, that we don’t want anyone else to know about. That part of our stories that bring us lots of shame or guilt. The pattern or character flaw they we reject in ourselves.
Peter is suggesting that it is exactly that part of yourself, the part you are not proud of, that you will find your Alleluia. For it is the most sensitive and sacred parts of our lives . . . once we simply own it, tell someone, that we are set free. The place of your biggest shame is probably the place of your biggest Alleluia.
For example, some of you right now are not doing well. But when someone calls and asks how you’re doing, you say, “Fine.” Come on, you don’t have to be fine. You can be real. Some of you are so good at NOT dealing with feelings or emotions. I guess because you think you aren’t supposed to have any. I don’t know.
And you are probably driving the people you live with crazy, because you won’t express how you are really feeling. It becomes your stumbling block . . . e.g. “I have to be tough. I have to have it all together.”
You don’t.
What’s better than an Alleluia? Words are nothing if they don’t mean anything. Being real is better. Being honest with your flaws, your mistakes is better. You kids, trust your parents to listen and accept whatever you need to tell them. Spouses, trust this person you fell in love with. Friends, reach and be real. And most of all be real to God. Don’t give God the half-truth, or “appropriate answer” or simply go through the motions of saying [I say pathetically] Alleluia.
There’s a song by Amy Grant, which you will hear at the Prep of Gifts. It says. We pour out our miseries, God just hears a melody. Beautiful the mess we are, the honest cries of breaking hearts. Are better than an Alleluia.
Go ahead, trust.