In our Gospel today, Jesus is very hard on the Pharisees. In a lot of our Gospel readings this week, he is very critical of them. He tells them that they invent external things for themselves to follow, yet in their words and actions, charity and love are nowhere to be found. It is a tough balance, isn’t it, living our as a disciple of Christ in the world today? As a priest, I am called to a life of prayer, I am called to practice social justice, I am called to celebrate the sacraments with my congregation and to minister to them in different ways; it is a hard balance a lot of the time, especially with the time I have to devote to my job in working in the administration of the diocese in the chancery office in downtown Jackson, which is really a full-time job in itself. But, I cannot devote myself to just one of those things and ignore the rest. I am sure it is a big challenge for all of you as well, balancing your life of faith.
The world today can be a challenging place to try to live out our Catholic faith, even with all of you attending a Catholic high school. You look at news programs on the TV – it seems like everyone is yelling at other and not trying to find a compromise or to understand the other person’s point of view. It is a lot easier to criticize someone that to reconcile with someone or to gain understanding, isn’t it? In today’s polarized climate, it seems like you are labeled on thing or another.
I remember that in my last year in seminary, I took a class on the spirituality of the priesthood. Our instructor asked us: What type of priest are you going to be? He explained that we cannot be everything as a priest, and so we priests have to choose how we are going to live out our priesthood. At the time I naively thought that I could be everything I wanted to be as a priest. As I am running around trying to do so many things as a priest, I know now what our instructor was saying was true. That is the challenge for all of us as Catholics, even you youth. How are we going to live out our lives of discipleship? How are we going to live out our faith?
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