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Monthly Archives: June 2015

I have no flag to wave

28 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by mcummins2172 in authenticy, image and likeness of God, personhood

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american flag, authenticity, Christianity, confederate flag, empty tomb, freedom in Christ, gay pride flag, image and likeness of God, personhood

no flagThere are a number of flags being waved these days.  On the news and all over social media I have seen various flags being posted and waved – the Confederate battle flag, the gay pride rainbow flag and the American flag.  As I have watched this virtual parade of flags I have realized that I have no flag to wave.

I will not wave the Confederate battle flag.  Even though I live in a state that was part of the Confederate South (though East Tennessee was pro-Union I would note), I will not wave this flag.  I recognize what is good and true in the south and southern culture but for too many of my African-American brothers and sisters this flag is an all-too-painful symbol of oppression and slavery and I cannot abide that.  This flag holds none of my identity.  I will not wave this flag.

The gay pride rainbow flag?  No, I cannot wave this flag either.  I recognize that homosexuals also have experienced oppression and pain throughout history and I sadly recognize that Christianity has been warped to legitimate this oppression and hatred but this flag also holds none of my identity.  Despite the appeal to diversity, this flag equates for me the tendency to reduce the fullness of the human person to one single component – sexual orientation – and to state that this one component holds primacy and even dominance over all others.  I cannot accept this.  As a Christian I hold the deepest core identity of a person to not be orientation, gender, race, nationality, or economic class but rather the Imago Dei – the image of God in which every man and woman is made.  Although these components are important to a person’s identity and not to be dismissed, no one component should ever eclipse the Imago Dei.  Sadly, though, this happens far too often and we forget the full truth of who we are and we get lost.  I cannot applaud this when I see it happening.  It is, in essence, a form of tyranny.  I cannot wave this flag.

The American flag?  Sadly, I am beginning to wonder if I can wave this flag and I do not say this lightly.  Since my youngest days I have been taught that religious freedom was one of the foundational principles of which this nation was based.  Yet, I currently see a secularism developing and being triumphed in our society that makes no room for religious freedom and its expression outside of the privacy of the home.  It seems that just as the activities of the bedroom are being celebrated and paraded in the open public square; religion is being told that it must be content with remaining behind the locked doors of one’s home.  No, I claim my religion to be just as constitutive to my identity as any other qualifier out there.  Therefore, I cannot leave it behind when I walk out the front door each morning – to do so would be to live a schizophrenic life.  Does the secularism developing in our society have room for me or will I and my core beliefs be written off as either too antiquated or even bigoted?  The answer seems uncertain.  Will I be able to authentically wave the American flag or even be allowed to?  I am not sure and I say this even as I love this country and what is so good about it.

So, at this point, I have no flag to wave.  What I do have though, is the empty tomb of our resurrected Lord and here is where I will remain and here is where I will draw my strength, my inspiration, my resolve, my joy and my decision to love.  In a way I am grateful for this recent virtual parade of flags because it has reminded me that as a Christian there never really is any flag that we can ever truly wrap ourselves in – whether that be national, social or ideological.  Flags can quickly become idols and idols quickly turn into tyrants.  All that the Christian has is the empty tomb and in this is found our freedom which the world can neither comprehend nor contain.  The Christian, it has been said, is in the world but not of it.

The good people at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston have witnessed this freedom of the Christian to our entire nation.

I will not squander my freedom.  I have no flag to wave.  All I have is the empty tomb.  All we have, as Christians, is the empty tomb but here is found our freedom – a life that has overcome even death itself.

I will remain at the empty tomb.

The Eucharist, the “guest room” and twenty years of priesthood

07 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by mcummins2172 in Body and Blood of Christ, Corpus Christi, Eucharist, homily

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Body and Blood of Christ, Christ, Corpus Christi, discipleship, Eucharist

The_Last_SupperThe teacher says, “Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?”

With this question in this kind of clandestine encounter in Mark’s gospel the stage is set for the Last Supper where the Lord enters into his sacrifice for us and where he gives us his very body and blood that we might have life.  It is worthy, I think, to reflect on this question of our Lord, “Where is my guest room?” because it is a question that our Lord continues to ask now throughout history and in each of our lives.  Where, amidst all the distractions of life, might I meet you?  Where might I encounter you?  Where might I be welcomed by you?  Where might I bring you life and share with you my very body and blood?

One way to begin to understand the great mystery we celebrate today as Church – the mystery of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ – is to reflect on the different contexts, the different “guest rooms” through which we ourselves have been privileged to encounter and experience that mystery.

On June 3rd I celebrated my twentieth anniversary of ordination.  As a priest – not by merit but by call – one is privileged to serve at the altar and in this “guest room” of our Lord.  Whenever we gather for Mass we are gathered at that Last Supper of our Lord with his disciples.  It is an amazing thing really yet so common that it can be taken for granted.  Praying over the gospel this past week has led me to reflect on all the “guest rooms” that I have been privileged to enter into these past twenty years where our Lord encounters his people in the gift of the Eucharist.

The chapels at the two seminaries I attended – daily encounters along with friends wrestling with the same questions of call and vocation.  The warehouse church of All Saints Church in Knoxville which had no air-conditioning; where you had to turn off the industrial fans in order to hear the readings and the homily.  The chapel at Knoxville Catholic High School celebrating Mass with classes and different sports teams before a game.  The old A-frame church of St. Mary’s in Athens which shook whenever a truck drove by and then the new church that we built with devotion and sacrifice.  The little chapel of the ETSU Catholic Center tucked away in a neighborhood by the university where we would celebrate Mass, move the chairs around and then sit down for dinner together.  The chapel at UTC where we did the same thing … college ministry revolves around food!  The auditorium at Notre Dame High School, up on a stage trying to help high school students encounter Christ as both Lord and friend.  Now here, in this beautiful church and community of St. Dominic’s – at the church and at the school.

But there have been other “guest rooms” I have been privileged to enter these twenty years – the chapel where Bl. Oscar Romero was shoot and killed, the Basilica of Santa Maria in Trastavere, Rome for the celebration of Pentecost when at the main altar my friend, Fr. Marco Gnavi, tapped me on the shoulder pointing upwards where I looked to see rose petals being dropped from the top of the church’s dome for the feast, the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the chapel of an orphanage in El Salvador, an outdoor altar in Assisi, Italy where St. Francis often prayed, at a poor senior center on the outskirts of Rome, on the boat of some friends, at national youth gatherings of twenty-five thousand people and in innumerable small gatherings of two or three, in nursing homes in South Bend, IN and New York City.  In my mother’s room at the Assisted Care facility where she lived her last years with just she and I sitting at a table.

It is worthwhile to reflect on the “guest rooms” we have been privileged to enter in our own individual journeys of discipleship.  On this feast when we reflect on this great mystery of the Eucharist, I encourage us to take the time to do this.  We each have them – our home churches, places of retreat, churches we have stumbled upon while on a trip or vacation, churches we have entered for funerals, baptisms or weddings.  For each of these places and each of these moments sharing in the Body and Blood of our Lord we should give thanks because they are indeed holy places and moments filled with beauty and life – places and moments where we have encountered the Lord and where he has fed, nourished and strengthened us with his Body and Blood and with his Word.  The very contexts of encounter, the “guest rooms” where we have met and received our Lord in the Eucharist themselves lead us into a greater understanding of this most sacred and holy of mysteries.

I think it safe to say that the true “guest room” our Lord most earnestly seeks to be welcomed into and dwell within is each person’s heart.  God wants nothing other than what is best for us.  God wants relationship with us and to give us his very life!  If priests are able to help facilitate this encounter, even in the smallest way, then we are indeed among the most blessed of people – given a richness that the world can never afford.

I give thanks to God for these twenty years and for the “guest rooms” that the Lord has allowed me to enter to encounter Him and to serve his people.

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