God's agenda

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There were once seven young men who embarked on a spiritual quest for enlightenment. They had heard of a desert far away that was full of gurus, miracle-workers, and holy men. They dropped out of society and left their home with nothing more than hope, curiosity, and a few provisions. They traveled to a faraway country. The first holy man they visited lived in a cave on the side of a cliff, a five mile walk into the desert from town. He ate only raw food, was a vegan, and was said to have powers to heal. He was clairvoyant and could see into the future. 

This sounds like California in the 1970’s but actually it was Egypt in the 390’s. The holy father’s name was John of Lycopolis, a saint of the church, and his seven visitors were monks from Palestine. John greeted them joyfully through the hole in the wall of his cave, and the monks asked him to say a prayer. John was ninety years old and a renowned and experienced ascetic. Yet he was a layman and he asked if any of the brothers was a clergyman who could lead them in prayer. One of them was a deacon, but a little shy about it. He had not even told his six companions that he was ordained. Perhaps he was thinking, “This is a holy man full of the grace of the Holy Spirit. I’m just a deacon, what do I have to offer?” He kept silent and stayed back.

The old man looked straight at him, and with the gift of clairvoyance said, “You are a deacon!”

“Oh no, father, you are mistaken!” the young monk replied, a little timidly. John reached out and took the deacon’s hand and kissed it, out of respect for his office.

Yet he gently challenged the young man, “Do not spurn the grace of God, my child, and do not lie by denying the gift of Christ.” The ordained brother accepted the rebuke, and began the visit with prayer. The monks stayed there three days and John gave them good practical advice on living the Christian life.

The deacon was intimidated in the presence of a famous ascetic. He thought the grace that had been bestowed on him at ordination didn’t compare to the grace of the saint. In his fear, he decided to remain silent and out of sight. Perhaps he was newly ordained. A newly ordained deacon is often nervous that someone will criticize the way he swings the censor, or laugh at his mistakes in the altar, or find today’s sermon boring and irrelevant.

All of us, ordained or not, do exactly the same thing as that timid deacon. We sometimes hide our God-given talents and gifts, because we think they don’t measure up. We are afraid that someone will laugh at us, or look down at us. We think “My gifts and talents seem so puny next to his.” Full of fear, we procrastinate on tasks that will bring light to those around us. In the language of the parables, we hide our light under a bushel, or bury our talent in the ground.

When I compare my gifts to someone else’s I make the same mistake as the deacon in the story. I think my gifts and talents are my possessions, rather than God’s gifts. I compare the gifts I think are mine with that guy’s gifts and I feel like I just don’t measure up. Fearfully, I keep part of myself silent and out of view. When we do this, we are denying God’s grace; we say “no” to God’s agenda for us.

But how do we say “yes” to God’s agenda for us? Remember the story of Andrew the Apostle in the gospel of John. John the Baptist was standing in his camelskin suit by the Jordon with two of his disciples, Andrew and John. It was late afternoon on the day after Jesus’s baptism.

John saw Jesus and said to his two disciples, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

The two disciples heard this and went to Jesus. Maybe they hoped that Jesus would take away their sin. Maybe they saw something special in Jesus’s countenance. Maybe they just couldn’t take one more meal of locusts and wild honey.

Jesus saw them and said, “What are you looking for?”

“Teacher, where are you staying?” they replied. “Come and see.” Jesus told them. So they followed him and stayed where he was staying. Andrew then found his brother, Simon Peter, and told him, “We have found the Messiah!” By being the first one to proclaim that Jesus is the Messiah, Andrew said yes to God’s agenda for him. Unlike the timid deacon, he did not spurn God’s grace and he did not lie by denying the gift of Christ, but embraced the mission given to him by God.

Each of us has talents and gifts given to us by God. Each of us has a unique place in God’s universe. We may not know God’s plan for our whole life. We do not know what we will be doing after graduation, or in a year, or in ten years. We may not know if we are called into church work or not. But Christ calls you and me to be faithful to the mission he gives us today. As baptized Christians, we belong to Christ, not to ourselves. Our agenda for the day is set by Christ, not by us.

Perhaps your day will be filled with study, domestic duties, or administrative tasks. Today’s agenda probably does not seem as exciting as Andrew’s was that day by the Jordon. But we follow Andrew’s example when we faithfully attend to today’s tasks even when we don’t want to, even when our gifts seem puny next to those of our peers. When we use our talents and gifts with courage, for the service of our Lord and our neighbor, in whatever task we are presently occupied with, we answer the call of Christ. 

*This was originally given as a homily on the feast of St. Andrew

Guilt-free life

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One of my favorite television shows is Firefly. The writing is clever, the characters are likable, and the fans of the show are madly loyal. Think wild west in space. But... not boring like I made it sound. 


The outlaw Malcolm Reynolds (below right) is the captain of a small spaceship that scraps together a living among the frontier planets by thieving, smuggling, and avoiding the "feds." One of the paying passengers is Shepherd Book (above, and below left), who is a Christian clergyman.

In one memorable exchange, the Shepherd is convalescing in the ship's sick bay. He had received special emergency health care by the feds after showing them his identity card. Something from Shepherd's past had given him high-security clearance with the bad guys. Was Shepherd's history was not as idyllic as his clerical occupation suggested?

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Malcolm had expected to be arrested and wondered why they had such cooperation from the feds. He visited Sheperd in the sick bay and asked him, "What kind of ident card gets us that kind of reception and send-off?"

Book responded, "I am a shepherd. Folks like a man of God."

Sensing he was avoiding a direct answer Malcolm said, "No, they don't. Men of God make everyone feel guilty and judged. That's not what I saw. You like to tell me what really happened?"

Shepherd answered mysteriously "I surely would... and maybe someday I will." The show's cancellation ended any further exploration of Book's secret past.

Mal's comment points to a sad fact: the guilt trip is alive and well. Christians use it. all. the. time. Liberal Christians feel guilty for driving anything other than a Prius. Conservative Christians feel guilty for thinking about sex. Orthodox Christians feel guilty for eating meat on Friday. Catholic Christians just feel guilty.

Guilt is used by Christians to motivate good thoughts and behavior and discourage bad behavior. The problem is that guilt doesn't work too well as a motivator. It tends to make us feel guilty for sin and not help us stop sinning. Instead of only suffering the ill effects of our sin, we suffer the sin and the guilt. Adding suffering to suffering drives people away from the church, and away from the medicine for sin: Christ.

The guilt trip arises from the idea that we can stop sinning if we want to and try hard enough. But this is not what Paul says. The human default is slavery to sin. Slavery. We are not strong enough or smart enough to free ourselves from this slavery. Jesus Christ redeems us from this slavery. Redemption is manumission, buying a slave out of slavery. We do not and cannot redeem ourselves. Feeling guilty about it does not help us to be free in Christ.

The guilt trip is a last gasp effort of the ego to have its way. I want to not sin, and darn it, I'm going to do it myself. To guilt trip is to pray “God, we no longer need you to care for us, since we do justice for ourselves.” 


The outlaw Malcolm Reynolds cautions Christians to go easy on the guilt. It doesn't work, and is really pride in disguise. Guilt's antidote is humility. Humility is not a permissive attitude to sin. Rather, humility engenders freedom from sin. 

Wrestling with Demons

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Demons and devils are the personification of evil. To think of demons is to imagine that misfortunes, temptations, and sufferings are caused, not by accident or by impersonal “forces of nature” but by sentient beings. Belief in demons arose from a time and place where it was assumed that all events and phenomena, good or bad, originated from a person. Demons were part of a worldview in which the universe was inhabited by a rich variety of unseen persons: angels, demons, saints, dragons, monsters, powers and principalities, thrones and dominions.

We no longer always assume that events and phenomena have their origin in persons; we believe in impersonal or abstract forces of nature. The unseen realm has been all but depopulated. Nature is morally neutral. Bad things “just happen.” Misfortune is just unhappy accident. Demons, it seems, have been given the metaphysical pink slip; we no longer need their services to explain evil. Humans, and perhaps God, are all that is left of the sentient beings in the universe.

This difference in worldview makes it difficult to understand the writings of Scripture and the early church. However strange those writings seem to us today, it is worth making the intellectual leap into their worldview. Early Christians spoke about demons in order to understand the mysterious source of evil. Belief in demons helped them explain a particular part of life that still puzzles us today. “Why do I do things I don’t want to do?”

The first Christians knew that the biggest evils start out small. Evil cuts through the heart of every man and woman; temptation is just around the corner. Evil does not only exist “out there” in genocidal maniacs, illegal immigrants, or politicians. Imagining demons as the source of evil can help us grasp and name evil, from the most egregious to the most subtle. Demon-talk shows us that the most visible and heinous evils are only magnifications of the smallest secret evils.

The same demon causes both the smallest prideful thought and genocide. He whispers in our ear, offering judgmental thoughts about our neighbor next to us. “That guy is really stupid,” he suggests. We enjoy thinking that we are better than our neighbor, and we can get in the habit of thinking like this. What starts as the demon’s provocation can become a habit. We begin to think that not only is that guy stupid, but other people too, whole groups of people, are stupid. This can progress until we think it’s a good idea to kill all the Jews, capitalists, or other scapegoated minority. Perhaps this is an oversimplification, but it seems that Jesus himself held this opinion. (Read, for example, the gospel of Matthew, chapter 5.)

Their way of imagining evil in the world has diagnostic and therapeutic credibility even if we are skeptical of its etiological usefulness. Demon-talk is the early Church’s ethical technology. Even if we are not solidly convinced on the demons existence, we can employ this technology. When I hear the demon whisper “That guy is really stupid” I can choose to indulge the thought and take fleeting pleasure in feeling superior to my neighbor. When I indulge this thought, it interferes with my own happiness. Alternatively, I can turn away from the thought and pray. Although I seem to be unable to stop the demon’s suggestions from entering in my thoughts, the Lord, who is victorious over the powers of evil, never fails to help me. The prideful thought against my neighbor begins to dissipate, and is replaced by love.

Thinking of demons and devils seems at first glance to be an outdated superstition. However, on  closer examination, this personification of evil may show us the way to overcoming stubborn thoughts and desires that work against our own best interests.