SATURDAY HOMILY: We voted for mammon and rejected God.
On Tuesday, November 6, we faced as a nation a "God or mammon" choice of mammoth proportions. In the most consequential election of our history, the majority of Americans voted for mammon and rejected God.
PrintLONG BEACH, CA (Catholic Online) In one of Jack Benny's classic comedy routines, a bandit with a gun snarls at the late comedian: "This is a stickup! Your money or your life!" After a long pause the assailant, nervous and growing impatient, repeats: "Look, bud, I said, 'Your money or your life!" Then Benny, whose on stage shtick was playing the cheapskate, says in a raised, exasperated voice: "I'm thinking it over. I'm thinking it over." The audience explodes with laughter.
Today's Gospel invites us to "think over" a similar question. But this time it is no laughing matter. Jesus tells us: "No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon."
Songwriter Bob Dylan, during the "Christian phase" of his long career, put it this way in a song: "You're gonna have to serve somebody. Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you're gonna have to serve somebody."
Whom will you serve? Which will you choose? God or mammon? The things of God or the things of this world? The Lord or the devil? This is the choice that is ever before us in a myriad of ways both large and small. And there is no sitting on the fence. If we hate one, we will love the other.
On Tuesday, November 6, we faced as a nation a "God or mammon" choice of mammoth proportions. In the most consequential election of our history, the majority of Americans voted for mammon and rejected God. Some did so knowing full well what they were doing (e.g., the Planned Parenthood and the LGBT crowd). Others did so unaware of the dire and far reaching ramifications of their vote.
This was certainly the case with the Hispanic vote. According to the Pew Research Center, "Latinos voted for President Barack Obama over Republican Mitt Romney by 71% to 27%." This is an astounding statistic not only because the differential is so great but more so because the majority of Hispanics identify themselves as Catholics.
This can only mean that millions of believing Hispanic Catholics, the very ones who pack our churches Sunday after Sunday and who have such a deep devotion to the Mother of God, voted for the following: (1) for more aborted babies, (2) for the destruction of the family through the promotion of homosexual marriage and (3) for the persecution of the Church they love so dearly and which has served them so well. In other words, they voted against their own values and deeply held beliefs; they voted against themselves. What is more, they did so (many of them, at least) not knowing what in fact they were voting for.
The day after the election I received an email from a parishioner of a parish where I was once served. She is a knowledgeable Catholic and was devastated by the results of Tuesday's election. She wrote: "My mother who is a fervent Catholic and a Guadalupana (i.e., devoted to Our Lady of Guadalupe) voted for Obama. I tried to dissuade her but I couldn't get through to her. My sister was completely closed to hearing anything negative about the President. She is an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion and she told me that if voting for Obama meant she was going to hell, so be it." Shocking.
This is very troubling and does not portend well either for the future of our nation or for the future of the Church in America. There is undeniably a huge disconnect between piety and practice, between faith and life. The Fathers of Vatican Council II addressed this problem fifty years ago in their Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World. They wrote: "This split between the faith which many profess and their daily lives deserves to be counted among the more serious errors of our age" (Gaudium et Spes, 43).
Errors have consequences. Deadly errors have deadly consequences. Our nation is now on an even more deadly path. Only God knows the tribulations that lie ahead. I am a priest, not a political scientist. But from my perspective I do not see any easy political remedy to this most serious problem. I may be wrong, but as I see it, last Tuesday was the last chance for at least an attempt at a political solution.
So what happens now? Where do we go from here? We who are believers have to abandon ourselves into God's hands. He is our Lord and our King! We must also pray for our President and for those share his radical ideology; we pray that they may be converted. We must pray for our nation and for all its citizens. Many of us have grown selfish and self-indulgent and our sins have blinded us.
But there is more. We are in this Year of Faith! It could not have come at a better time. How wonderful is the providence of God who inspired in our Holy Father this desire for the whole Church to rediscover and renew its faith! Let us take to heart the invitation of Pope Benedict and begin now to work at growing in our friendship with Christ, deepening our knowledge of the content of the faith so that we in turn may be used by God to open the eyes of the blind, both within the Church and without.
We also need to be prepared to embrace the cross. In his Apostolic Letter, Pope Benedict explains: "The life of Christians knows the experience of joy as well as the experience of suffering. How many of the saints have lived in solitude! How many believers, even in our own day, are tested by God's silence when they would rather hear his consoling voice! The trials of life, while helping us to understand the mystery of the Cross and to participate in the sufferings of Christ (cf. Col 1:24), are a prelude to the joy and hope to which faith leads" (Porta Fidei, 15).
Finally, today is the liturgical Memorial of Saint Leo the Great, successor of St. Peter, who in the 5th century guided the Church through very turbulent times. The Collect from his Mass should lift our drooping spirits and spur us on to greater faithfulness.
"O God, who never allow the gates of hell to prevail against your Church, firmly founded on the apostolic rock, grant her, we pray, that through the intercession of Pope Saint Leo, she may stand firm in the truth and know the protection of lasting peace."
In closing, we turn to Holy Mary, the Virgin of Guadalupe, and humbly ask her to intercede for us and for this nation we love.
-----
Fr. G. Peter Irving III is a priest of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and pastor of Holy Innocents Church, Long Beach, California.
Today's Gospel invites us to "think over" a similar question. But this time it is no laughing matter. Jesus tells us: "No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon."
Songwriter Bob Dylan, during the "Christian phase" of his long career, put it this way in a song: "You're gonna have to serve somebody. Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord, but you're gonna have to serve somebody."
Whom will you serve? Which will you choose? God or mammon? The things of God or the things of this world? The Lord or the devil? This is the choice that is ever before us in a myriad of ways both large and small. And there is no sitting on the fence. If we hate one, we will love the other.
On Tuesday, November 6, we faced as a nation a "God or mammon" choice of mammoth proportions. In the most consequential election of our history, the majority of Americans voted for mammon and rejected God. Some did so knowing full well what they were doing (e.g., the Planned Parenthood and the LGBT crowd). Others did so unaware of the dire and far reaching ramifications of their vote.
This was certainly the case with the Hispanic vote. According to the Pew Research Center, "Latinos voted for President Barack Obama over Republican Mitt Romney by 71% to 27%." This is an astounding statistic not only because the differential is so great but more so because the majority of Hispanics identify themselves as Catholics.
This can only mean that millions of believing Hispanic Catholics, the very ones who pack our churches Sunday after Sunday and who have such a deep devotion to the Mother of God, voted for the following: (1) for more aborted babies, (2) for the destruction of the family through the promotion of homosexual marriage and (3) for the persecution of the Church they love so dearly and which has served them so well. In other words, they voted against their own values and deeply held beliefs; they voted against themselves. What is more, they did so (many of them, at least) not knowing what in fact they were voting for.
The day after the election I received an email from a parishioner of a parish where I was once served. She is a knowledgeable Catholic and was devastated by the results of Tuesday's election. She wrote: "My mother who is a fervent Catholic and a Guadalupana (i.e., devoted to Our Lady of Guadalupe) voted for Obama. I tried to dissuade her but I couldn't get through to her. My sister was completely closed to hearing anything negative about the President. She is an extraordinary minister of Holy Communion and she told me that if voting for Obama meant she was going to hell, so be it." Shocking.
This is very troubling and does not portend well either for the future of our nation or for the future of the Church in America. There is undeniably a huge disconnect between piety and practice, between faith and life. The Fathers of Vatican Council II addressed this problem fifty years ago in their Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World. They wrote: "This split between the faith which many profess and their daily lives deserves to be counted among the more serious errors of our age" (Gaudium et Spes, 43).
Errors have consequences. Deadly errors have deadly consequences. Our nation is now on an even more deadly path. Only God knows the tribulations that lie ahead. I am a priest, not a political scientist. But from my perspective I do not see any easy political remedy to this most serious problem. I may be wrong, but as I see it, last Tuesday was the last chance for at least an attempt at a political solution.
So what happens now? Where do we go from here? We who are believers have to abandon ourselves into God's hands. He is our Lord and our King! We must also pray for our President and for those share his radical ideology; we pray that they may be converted. We must pray for our nation and for all its citizens. Many of us have grown selfish and self-indulgent and our sins have blinded us.
But there is more. We are in this Year of Faith! It could not have come at a better time. How wonderful is the providence of God who inspired in our Holy Father this desire for the whole Church to rediscover and renew its faith! Let us take to heart the invitation of Pope Benedict and begin now to work at growing in our friendship with Christ, deepening our knowledge of the content of the faith so that we in turn may be used by God to open the eyes of the blind, both within the Church and without.
We also need to be prepared to embrace the cross. In his Apostolic Letter, Pope Benedict explains: "The life of Christians knows the experience of joy as well as the experience of suffering. How many of the saints have lived in solitude! How many believers, even in our own day, are tested by God's silence when they would rather hear his consoling voice! The trials of life, while helping us to understand the mystery of the Cross and to participate in the sufferings of Christ (cf. Col 1:24), are a prelude to the joy and hope to which faith leads" (Porta Fidei, 15).
Finally, today is the liturgical Memorial of Saint Leo the Great, successor of St. Peter, who in the 5th century guided the Church through very turbulent times. The Collect from his Mass should lift our drooping spirits and spur us on to greater faithfulness.
"O God, who never allow the gates of hell to prevail against your Church, firmly founded on the apostolic rock, grant her, we pray, that through the intercession of Pope Saint Leo, she may stand firm in the truth and know the protection of lasting peace."
In closing, we turn to Holy Mary, the Virgin of Guadalupe, and humbly ask her to intercede for us and for this nation we love.
-----
Fr. G. Peter Irving III is a priest of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and pastor of Holy Innocents Church, Long Beach, California.
- - -
Pope Benedict XVI's Prayer Intentions for January 2013
General Intention: The Faith of Christians. That in this Year of Faith Christians may deepen their knowledge of the mystery of Christ and witness joyfully to the gift of faith in him.
Missionary Intention: Middle Eastern Christians. That the Christian communities of the Middle East, often discriminated against, may receive from the Holy Spirit the strength of fidelity and perseverance.
Keywords: Fr G Peter Irving III, voting, pro-life, pro-family, homosexual marriage, Hispanic Catholics, Barack Obama, abortion, religious liberty
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I'm late to this party but I still would like to weigh in. The Headline and cartoon picture of this article says it all. 52% of Catholics voted to hang themselves. But our church leadership was Obama's ally because the vast majority of the Bishops and priests sat quietly throughout the whole campaign. Inspite of the Law Suits by Cardinal Dolan that were filed against the Obama Admin, the vast majority of the faithful don't know a thing about it. We are in for some hard knocks.
Thomas, who is really compromising? Our GOP elected officials do not needs the bishops concurrence to pursue real legislation to eliminate this evil. When the same zeal is applied to this issue as it is for tax cuts, defense etc, then we'll see movment. And there is absolutely nothing holding the church back from filling in all the gaps our government wont to ensure abortions are avoided. We can adopt kids, foster kids, catholic business owners can hire single mom's etc. etc. etc. But it's as if we are all content to sit back, cast a vote and wait and then become outraged when nothing happens. 40 years, time to get a clue....nothing is going to happen.
What is responsible for 40 years of this is an extremely complacent public who has grown satisfied with election grandstanding and has failed to require real action. It really is as simple as that.
To Fr. Bellacer:
It is because of people like you that Catholics in the US are misguided in how they vote. They voted for a president who has no respect for life! We cannot continue to be "Cafeteria" catholics, we must follow the teachings of Christ above all things.
Poor Latinos aside, Catholics were free to vote for a candidate who received an honorary degree from University of Notre Dame three years ago.
I'm late to this post also, but I find it interesting how the left and left leaning Priest always want to compromise with the evil of Abortion, Same sex marriage, and the hhs mandate. I have in my life been expose to the first two evils and find no good or value in either. They are what the bishops say pure evil, and to compromise as we have on these issues has for 40 years has brought us to this. When the full weight of the HHS mandate is felt we will be confined to the four walls of our churches, and told again Gods laws do not matter.
Considering that this is a Catholic website I won't bother using Bible quotes because we should all be readily familiar with the New Testament. I see that some people think we should have a Catholic political party in the US, well Germany had one in the late 1800s into the 1930s, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centre_Party_(Germany) ) I'm not sure how accurate the article is, I'm just bringing it up as I remember this from my German history classes years ago. This will not happen in the US because no third party has ever gained enough momentum to be credible for the Presidential elections. This is also unobtainable because Christianity has been weakened too much in the US and it would also give rise to the question of political parties for every religion. This country will never move in that direction.
One major reason is because of that 'separation of church and state' phrase that should be removed. Too many people read into that literally and it is there because our 'founders' were Freemasons and because history teachers like to teach that these men are unquestionable geniuses. Now, I'm not saying that they weren't very intelligent but they put that in there because they were Freemasons and the Catholic church and Christianity in general are against Freemasons. The 'founders' will fleeing 'persecution' (I think there is more to the story then the history text books tell us) and they didn't want Catholics, Anglicans, or anyone with anti Freemasonry views to come to power to challenge them or the people/institutions that they supported. Christians need to vote to alter that phrase and make this a Christian nation and set up clear definitions as to what that means. Of course these things will never happen and that leads to the bigger message that I would like to mention.
Jesus said that His kingdom is not of this world. Well we belong to His kingdom and we shouldn't be of this world if we want to pass into His kingdom. I understand that people are upset and in shock but I'm not because I knew Obama would win. When George W Bush was running for his second term he had 100 times more bad publicity on his best day then Obama had on his worst day. This world will come to an end but we do not know when. The next election may be different for us but I don't hold high hopes for that. Just remember that we have to be prepared to take up our cross and die for God just like his son died for us. Jesus didn't worry about politics and neither should we. Go for a walk and blow off your steam but remember that we have to live a certain life and that this world will pass away but we will not if we stay true to God. Our kingdom is the kingdom of heaven not the US, Canada, or any other country.
Late reader here; but glad to visit this post - well said, Father, and I dearly appreciate the hopeful, faithful last quarter. I agree with your thoughts and am glad that you are one of these contributors. Blessed Year of Faith to you.
Father Robert Ballecer, SJ., and All My Brothers and Sisters: Earlier I said that I enjoyed Fr. G. Peter Irving III article "to the max". To support his claim in this article, I would ask Anyone who is interested here, to read CO Homily Video: Oct. 31. Calling Good Evil. To me it is most settling, answering any and all questions. Peace of the Flowing River To You...
Thank you Father Irving for stating exactly how i feel & what i believe. This is the Year of Faith,and i cannot help but wonder --just at the right time. Our Holy Roman Catholic Church
will survive and with God's help, we can overcome evil.....I pray for all other Christian religions
as they are being attacked along with us......I think of Pope John Paul the Great and what he
did in Poland, and that gives me hope for us here in America......WE need to pray and never
dispair!!!!! Jesus Saves!!!!!! May God Bless All of You and the Holy Spirit direct you on the
true path. We can overcome, all of us together.......I am so proud to be a Catholic!!!!!!
Franny 11/15/2012
I am a Catholic "revert" having returned to the Church after many years. I thank Jesus Christ and his holy Church for my return from my deliberate "exile". The following is my humble opinion and my personal solution.
The election was won by President Obama. That is reality. We all need to work together now whatever our political persuasion. Those of us who describe ourselves as Democrats, Independents, Republicans (however few), etc.who voted for Obama are many and varied in our reasons. On the EWTN network (which I love) the commentators stated that this was a "lesser of two evils choice". Mr.Romney was declared the best choice. The homily I just read on this excellent site said voters had voted for Mammon. Mr.Obama was seen as representing Mammon.
I spent some hard nights with my conscience and flip flopped on many occasions as to who to vote for. I also prayed about it. In the end I saw Romney and his political ilk as the greater evil. Having said that I also realized that if the Republicans had nominated a more moderate man , I , mainly a Democratic voter would have crossed over and voted for him.
Now, in my opinion, I and all those other Catholics who voted for Mr. Obama need to work for change within the Democratic Party. President Obama needs to remember that one of the main reasons he won this election was the Catholic vote as well as blue collar workers in Ohio. This election is certainly not a great mandate for the far left. The Hispanic race will outnumber the Caucasian race by 2050. There will be many more Catholics in the U.S. with an even greater influence on politics.
I , for one, hope that the Republican Party delivers itself from Tea Party and other extremists on the far right. So far the signs do not look good for this. Many , but not all, of the conservative commentators I have read blame various things for the defeat but don't see that systemic changes need to be made. If they stubbornly refuse to do this then they will be even more a "fringe" party and may lose even more in the Mid-term elections. Even as a registered Democrat I realize the need for choices and opposing views. One party dominating the political landscape is not good.
I will hope and pray that all parties come together in the spirit of seeking the welfare of all Americans. I think the Catholic Church can and will play an even bigger role in this area. The demographics tend to favour it.
As for me, my duty as a Catholic is to work for reform within the Democratic Party. Hopefully my brother Catholics on the Republican side will do the same.
Thank you again for your excellent web site. God bless us all.