Monday, August 2, 2021

Heaven's Gate

 

On the day I finally entered the abbey, first we prayed in this church before going to the guest house to meet Fr. Marius, the vocation director. Two weeks earlier, toward the end of my observership, my Dad had died suddenly. The Dominican Prior had picked me up and had driven me to my family's house. After the funeral and some time there to mourn with my family about my dad, my mother drove me back to the Abbey. “Tommy,” she said in her Irish way, “I haven't ever prayed in your Church, so I get three wishes. Let's go in.” We prayed for a while. I thought I might be holding my mother up, so I left the side chapel, but she did not. I waited and waited and waited. Finally, she came out with a sparkle of joy on her face. “Tommy!” she said, “I'm sorry to have taken so long, but your Father was there with me.” 

What a gift that was for me from my mother and dad and from Our Father in heaven. “This is truly the House of God!” I felt in my heart. In the first reading, we just heard Solomon pray at the dedication of the Temple, “You, O Lord my God, looked kindly on the prayer and the cry of supplication of your servants.” That day long ago, it was as if my Dad had walked in on us through heaven's gate as we knelt in prayer in the side chapel. My mother was mystic enough to perceive him. Truly this place is the Gate of Heaven. That was 48 years ago.

On August 1, 1975, 46 years ago we dedicated this Church in rites that were spread out over two days—the 31st and the 1st. I remember there were trowels and mortar and relics and oil and blazing fire on the altar. We lit the candles on the walls for the first time-- the walls that had been anointed in dedication. There was a beautiful homemade Ark of the Covenant filled with the altar relics carried on two shoulder poles by two priests. The abbots of Berryville, Guadalupe, Belle Fontaine, and Mother Angela of Wrentham joined us for the celebration. The community numbered around 65 members. Our saintly Bishop Bernard Flanagan was his usual regal self as he traced the Latin and Greek letters in the sand across the transept with his crozier. When a monk makes solemn profession of vows, he makes those of obedience, fidelity to monastic life, and stability. 

The dedication of a monastic Church is very much like a solemn profession of stability and of faithful obedience to the monastic way of life that we make corporately, even across time including all our members past and present and future. For as long as it is God's will, we monks of Spencer will be here in this holy temple to worship the Lord in the presence of all his angels and saints and all the people who come here to pray with us. And we will be here to receive thankfully all the gifts that come to us from Above. This House is a House of Prayer for all people.

The Patriarch Jacob went to sleep at Bethel with a conscience troubled by the deception of his father and his brother. Not expecting anything he lay down to sleep against a rock and then dreamed about angels ascending and descending to and from Heaven. He awoke amazed and filled with reverential fear and awe. So, he named the place “Beth-el”, the House of God. He was totally surprised by the tangible presence of God, the Intangible One. I believe that this is at the root of his reconciliation with Esau. My mother, in mourning, expected only to say a good prayer for her departed husband and was surprised by a mystical encounter with my dad.

Zacchaeus, likewise, with his conscience wounded by co-operation in the Roman oppression of his people, has the very modest hope that if he just climbs that sycamore tree over there, he might get a glimpse of this Jesus as he passes by. Thomas Merton who identified with “the man in the sycamore tree” has made it easier for us Trappists to identify with Zacchaeus in his modest expectations that stem from the fact that Zacchaeus seems to be coming to the realization that every Jew--including the poorest who is living even only somewhat uprightly--is better than himself: a corrupt tax collector. Yet, the God of surprises, incarnate in Jesus actually halts in his tracks and invites himself to stay with Zacchaeus, yes, at the home of this sinner whom everyone in town despises. This home of a sinner will become the resting and refreshment place of God in Jesus Christ, just as Zacchaeus' soul will be renewed in his conversion as a temple of God.

St. Benedict seems to have the experience of Zacchaeus in mind when he points out that in the seventh step of humility the monk “not only confesses with his tongue but also believes with all his heart that he is lower and less honorable than all the rest.” (RB 7:51) It is this kind of humility that grounds a monk in his stability as a living stone firmly planted in the ground as a foundation that builds up the community into a spiritual house of God. The gospel text tells us that Zacchaeus was “short in stature.” Well, we are all morally and spiritually “short” in some way or another, shortness of stature being unimportant. We may want not to be but certainly can be at times short in our practice of heartfelt compassion, short on kindness, short on gentleness, short on the practice of patience, short on bearing with one another, short on forgiving one another, short in faith, short in hope and short on the bond of perfection which is love.

There is a man, the Son of Man, who just passed through Jericho. Now he is passing through Spencer—he says he is coming to seek and to save what was lost. Let's try climbing a sycamore tree to get a better view of things—whatever that tree is to each one of us. If we climb that personal tree with the help of God's grace, we can be sure right now that as we continue this Eucharist, Jesus will halt in his tracks and invite himself into our house. He says to Zaccheus and to all of us here today celebrating the dedication of this House of God, “Come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house!” The Eucharist is a real saving encounter with the God-Man, Jesus Christ. The time to be morally and spiritually “short in stature” is over. It is the time to grow to the full stature of Jesus Christ. Receive him with joy.

Sunday's homily by Father Luke.