Homily for August 31, 2008

There was the baptism of a baby during Mass. It was linked to the Gospel in which Jesus says, "If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself, take up the cross and follow . . ."

Sometimes the readings don't cooperate with what I might have in mind to say about what we're doing in church on a given Sunday. I thought of today and the baptism of a baby, and the Gospel that says “Deny yourself, take up your cross and follow in my path,” and I thought, how do you link the two?
First, I want to talk about how this teaching fits into the Gospel story in the narrative. Coming where it does in the Gospel narrative, Peter has just acknowledged Jesus is the Messiah. So it's put in there to prepare the disciples for what is going to happen. For the reader, it's there to tell us that what happens is not Jesus being the victim of circumstances, but it's all part of God's plan, and Jesus knew that plan and embraced it fully.
In our tradition, we've handled that teaching in different ways. Those of you who are my age or maybe close to it will remember this. When we were in grade school, the way we were taught was that it was all about sacrifice and self denial. Can you relate to it? "Offer it up," and that's all we were hit with, so much so that you could wonder, did God want us to have any fun, or what about happiness and fulfillment?
Then the 60s and the 70s I think we discovered the happiness and fulfillment side of it, and we started emphasizing that, so much so that sacrifice and self denial went out the window. Am I on target?
So now to relate it to the baptism of a baby, those of you who have raised children, if you were to talk to Andrew and Jenny on this day of baptism of their child, let me ask, is raising children a source of happiness and fulfillment?
Don't leave me hanging. Is it? Yes? Okay, good. Thank you.
Is raising children a source of sacrifice and self denial. Yes. Good. The second "yes" was a little louder than the first "yes."
So, which is it? Both. Actually it’s neither. It's really not about you and your happiness and fulfillment, or your sacrifice. It's about the baby and what the baby needs. It's not about fulfillment or sacrifice, it's about how do children grow and what do they need.
Those of you who are in education, know that when teachers or principals have a conference with parents, the hardest thing is to get the parents to realize that it's not about them, it's about their child and what the child needs, and how we can place our lives in service of that.
So if you were to ask me, "Well, what is Christianity about? Is it about happiness and fulfillment? Or is it about sacrifice and self denial?" I'd say neither. It's about God's plan for our world and putting our lives at the service of God's desire for the world in which we live. The promise of the Gospel is that surrendering your life to that will undoubtedly mean sacrifice and self denial, but it will also mean tremendous happiness and fulfillment, just as we might say raising a child or having children in our midst will be a source of sacrifice and self denial, but it will also be a source of great joy and happiness and fulfillment.
And as we worship today, as we baptize this baby, as we think of the children in our schools and in our midst, let's just pray that we might be up to the sacrifices that it will ask of us, but also that we might know the joy and the happiness that it will bring.