What About God

On August 22, 2021, we had the privilege of hearing Fr. Mike Schmitz at the Our Lady of Lourdes Church, Pine River Mn. Each summer he goes home and says Mass at the various home town parishes. His homilies are always extra special. I would like to share some of his words [and mine] with you.  

The Sunday Gospel Reading  - John 6:60 - 69 - [8/22/21] read: “His disciples [after hearing Jesus’ teaching in the synagogue] said: “This saying is difficult; who is able to listen to it?” Father Mike spoke to the Gospel like he does everything else - enthusiastically and full of conviction. First, Father described his life as a teen employee working the candy counter at a special candy store in Nisswa, Mn. Customers would come in and select any types of candy they wanted; and the employee would fill candy bags to the customers delight. Fr. Mike went on to explain how the candy shop is like us. We take what we want and we avoid things we don’t want. But, in reality this take what we want and scrub the rest mentality doesn’t work if we expect to have a relationship with God. There’s where the actual rub happens. That’s why the disciples said [in the Gospel reading] that this is difficult. We don’t like to live with what’s difficult or hard to understand. We want what we want when we want it.  

Fr. Mike reminded us that God has fully revealed [disclosed] who He is! There are no surprises there! But his disclosure gives us a choice. “Do we want  to have a loving relationship with God as He is? Or do we want to have a relationship with God as we would like Him to be? Years ago, Pope Saint John Paul ll said that we can’t love who we don’t know. That applies to our human and our supernatural relationships. We know who God is. He told us who He is. His Church further explains God using these words: God is all virtuous; infinite, self-existing, without origin, immutable, self-sufficient, omnipotent, omniscient, wisdom, faithful, true, good, kind, just, merciful, gracious, loving, holy, perfect, glorious. So our choice is very simple. Are we striving [and working] to understand God as He revealed himself to be? If not, chances are high that we will not love Him authentically. Father Mike explained that we actually don’t try and understand who God is when we ignore what He himself revealed! He has revealed what he hates! He has revealed what He loves.

The question for each of us is this: who do we serve? The Real God or a made up version of Him? “Our culture has perfectly curated versions of anything and everything.” From candy to TV to the News. We create lists of what we like. We only watch news programs we agree with. We only socialize with people we agree with. We only like people on Social Media we agree with. Everyone else we block or unfriend. “Unfortunately, we bring that same mentality to Church. We are consumer Catholics.” 

Fr. Mike’s words were difficult to hear. They made me wonder “who is able to really listen to it?” Shortly after that homily, we were informed by the diocese that they were conducting a synod for the parishioners to provide input in three areas: how to evangelize to unbelievers; how to make Church more welcoming to young people; and a third area which I have forgotten. The approach seemed to conflict with Fr. Mike’s challenge to accept and love God for who and what He has revealed about Himself for this reason. The synod approach seems to suggest that we need to find out what it is that people need in order to bring them back to Church and God. By way of contrast, John’s Gospel seems to ask us to reflect on what it is that we can do for God. How can we learn to love Him? How can we get to know the Real God?

Nearly two thousand years ago, St. Augustine of Hippo taught: if we only accept what we like in the gospels and reject what we don’t like, we don’t believe in the Gospels [or Jesus] but we believe in ME. What does God ask us to believe? The Nicene Creed pretty much sums it up. We are told that hundreds of people walked away from Jesus; the same thing happens today because people only want to believe what they want to believe. They only want what to surrender things they weren’t really willing to do in the first place. 

“Jesus isn’t giving us a chance to have a personally curated relationship with him or not.” We can’t just believe in the Nativity Story and then walk away from Church when it charges us to surrender our will to God in and through God’s Moral Laws, His Natural Laws and His Divine Plan. “Our choice is to accept Christ and His Church - or not. Neither do we have to understand everything about Christ. “For great is the might of the Lord he is glorified by the humble. Seek not what is too difficult for you nor investigate what is beyond your power. Reflect upon what has been assigned to you and do not be curious about many of His works for you do not need to see with your eyes what is hidden. Do not meddle in what is beyond your tasks for matters too great for human understanding have been shown you.” Sirach 3:20 - 23 “We just need to trust Jesus because when we know and trust him this is where we belong even if/when it's a struggle.” [Fr. Mike]