Recent Sermon

December 25, 2007

Christmas happens because of us,
We are the stars of the show.
Christmas is all about God loving you and you and you
And everyone, ever.
Throughout the year it is so easy to feel unloved
To feel unimportant
To have no one regard what you say or how you feel,
To have your abilities overlooked, discarded.
In the world, in the church and in our families
We can be forgotten, it happens.
Because it happens,
To so many and so often
It is easy for us to feel that God has forgotten us too;
Returning the favor, we forget God.
That is why God came to earth
To remind us that he is here
Here in the ordinary times and in ordinary ways
He is here whether we notice him or not.

His first appearance among us was not as
Well, as spectacular, as you would expect
God’s arrival to be.
The special effects were far from dazzling.
A helpless infant was born to a
helpless homeless immigrant family.
It happened all the time then,
It happens all the time now.
Unless angels called attention to his birth
the shepherds would never have noticed, known, or cared
that Jesus was born.
To tell you the truth, the shepherds
were a bit mystified themselves as to what all the fuss was about.
They saw no Savior, no savior as we think of one anyway
No one all powerful, almighty,
someone to inspire them and awe their enemies;
they saw only a child,
wrapped in swaddling clothes-as all children are-
And laid in the straw, as only poor children are.
They saw someone who looked just like they did
When they were a child,
They saw someone who looked just as their children did
When they were born.

Each year the angels try to draw our attention
To the same place
To the same child
Who still looks no different from any other child.
“This is Christ the Lord,” the angels tell us,
“The savior born for you this day in the city of David,
Glory to God in the highest
and peace to all people on whom God’s favor rests.”
Like the shepherds before us,
we wonder what all the fuss is about.
God, we expect, comes in a bigger package,
A much more impressive present,
That would dazzle us,
frighten our enemies,
and make us the envy of all.
But all they got, and all we get
Is the infant, wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

That is the whole point, after all.
God is here, just like us, accessible to all of us,
Not desiring to be feared, just loved.
All we have and all we ever will be
Is embraced and shared by God
Who will now, as then, continue to be part of our lives,
Whether we know it or not,
Coming to human beings, through human beings.
That is the central point of the Christian faith
And only eyes glistening with faith
Can see in that child the presence of their Savior.
But for those of us that do, however dimly
Hear the words of the angels
And focus our attention on the child
Who is God’s gift to us;
Then ever after we will look on every child,
Even homeless immigrant children,
Differently than we ever looked upon them before;
We will see them as God’s gift to us
As the way God continues to come to us,
Through human beings.
That is actually it, that is what all the fuss is about,
That is all there is at the heart of our faith:
This indissoluable association between God and human beings.
Christmas is our way of remembering
that God has not forgotten us or left us alone.
Remembering is why we give gifts at Christmas:
To remind other people that they are gifts to our lives.
We may ignore them and take them for granted
through most of the year, but this day we remember
They are God’s gift to us.
Our little present, whatever it is,
The “Merry Christmas” with which we greet them,
This is actually our way of remembering that they are a gift.
Each gift, each “Merry Christmas” we receive,
Reminds us that the most important thing we do
Is add our love in some small way to the lives of others.
This may not be very glorious, you may say,
but this is as glorious as God gets.
If we spent our lives as we spend this day:
Appreciating that each person is God’s gift,
Adding our love to the lives of others;
We would discover that we would be Saved
And that there would be peace on earth
And good will towards all. 
Amen.

December 23, 2007
Tomorrow is Christmas Eve,
Christmas is almost here
Ready or not it is coming
And our thoughts and energies are drawn to the celebration.
This fourth Sunday of Advent is a liturgical anachronism,
Where we try to pretend that we are still waiting
For what is already upon us.
So let this evening be, if not our final preparation,
Let it be perhaps the beginning of feast in which we remember
What the scriptures would have us remember:
Emmanuel-God with us.
Tomorrow, and the next day
and through the twelve days of Christmas
we will be celebrating that God has chosen to be with us.
Christmas is not the achievement of Mary and Joseph,
Though both were necessary for it to come about,
Emmanuel, God with us, is the result of the Holy Spirit
God’s promise and power
Choosing to embrace all that we are
With all the love that God is.
“Do not be afraid to take Mary in your house”
The angel tells Joseph,
Do not be afraid to believe that God will do the impossible
And bring love into the world.
Do not be afraid to believe
That God is entering the world.
God’s presence in the world may be as foolish and unbelievable
An idea as Mary becoming pregnant
by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Cosmologists are debating among themselves whether
The universe is indeed governed by universal laws
or is simply a byproduct of random events
that while fortunate for us,
indicate no governance of any kind at all.
They are not wasting their time wondering about
the likelihood of a virgin birth brought about by
A providential God who desires to be
Emmanuel-God with us.
If anything,
it is harder for people in the 21st century to believe
than it was for Joseph to believe
That God was acting in the world.
If anything, we have a more pressing need for angels
than did Joseph!
 “Do not be afraid” the angel tells us
Do not be afraid to take into our rational houses
The irrational idea that God is with us.
Take this idea into your home
The angel tells us,
And you will not be diluting reality,
You will not be escaping from reality,
You will actually encounter a reality so deep and profound
You will be alive as never before to the God of love
Who has made and embraced the world.
We are told that when Joseph awoke from his dream
He did as the angel commanded,
And took Mary into his home.
Tomorrow, we will wake up to Christmas Eve,
And will be our turn to decide whether we will do
What the angel commands us to do:
Cast off fear of belief,
And take God’s action in the world into our home.
Amen.

November 21, 2007

To the Gallagher family, especially his brothers, Peter and John
on behalf of Bishop Walter Hurley,
the Bishop of Grand Rapids,
my brother priests and people of the Diocese of Grand Rapids,
the Very Rev. John F. Duffy, the President of the Paulist Fathers and all of Joe’s Paulist brothers,
I offer you and your entire family,
our deepest consolation on the death of your brother;
and our deepest thanks
to the entire Gallagher and McGovern clan
for sharing him with the universal church.  
This is the third death your family has suffered within a month,
a  beloved wife, your sister and now your brother. 
This is a heavy burden for shoulders
even as broad as those carried by the Gallagher men.  
We are with you in faith and love.
“In all truth I tell you when you were young
you put on your own belt and walked where you liked;
but when you grow old you will stretch out your hands,
and someone else will put a belt round you
and take you where you would rather not go.
In these words, Jesus indicated to Peter the kind of death
by which Peter would give glory to God.
After he had said this he said, “Follow me.”
Joe Gallagher certainly put on his own belt
and walked where he liked,
he walked decisively and in style.
Afflicted with Parkinson’s disease,
he also knew what it was to be led places he would rather not go. Whether choosing his own course,
or submitting to the course laid on his shoulders,
Fr. Joe followed the Lord. 
In the next few minutes we will trace, however briefly,
the missionary steps of Fr. Joseph Gallagher,
steps that gave glory to God;
his steps as a priest, as a Paulist, and as a man.
He was known to one and all simply as Fr. Joe,
a man who served God and God’s people as a priest.
The ordination rite says:
“For your part you will exercise the sacred duty of teaching in the name of Christ the Teacher to everyone the word of God which you have received with joy. Meditating on the law of the Lord see that you believe what you read, that you teach what you believe, and that you practice what you teach.”
On the inside cover of the program there is an excerpt of Joe’s teaching from his book, “To be A Catholic. ”  
We can let Fr. Joe’s words speak for themselves:  
Who do I belong to?
I belong to God, Father, Son and Spirit,
I belong to my family, friends, co-workers,
to all who cross my path. 
We are here today because Fr. Joe first of all belonged to God, and then Fr. Joe belonged to us.
He gave each of us the feeling that he belonged to us;
and we liked that,
because he made us feel that we too belong to God.  
Many people have told me:
“The reason I became a Catholic,
the reason I came back to the Church,
the reason I am still in the Church,”
and then they would point to Fr. Joe and continue,
“is that man.”   
The ability to see within a person’s story
the mysterious presence of God
was the distinctive charism of Joe’s priesthood. 
Having seen the presence of the Holy Spirit in that person,
Fr. Joe would patiently, persistently, respectfully
work to reveal the God whose loving arms
had always surrounded them. 
The bigger a person’s doubt,
the more numerous, grievous and repetitive someone’s sin,
the more deeply engaged Joe became
in revealing to them the central truth of his catechism: 
they already belonged to a loving God
who would not let them go
and who also had work for them to do.
The last two years of Fr. Joe’s life,
when his disease prevented him from saying public Mass,
every week, from Monday through Saturday,
Joe heard noontime confessions
at the Catholic Information Center,
revealing to people the mercy of God
and the power of the Spirit within them
calling them to love with greater courage or heroism
than they thought they possessed.
I do not know this to be a fact,
but I do suspect, that at age 83-84,
Fr. Joe Gallagher was the most active confessor in Grand Rapids.  He could no longer put on his own belt and go where he wished, but people came to him as the symbol of God’s love
that communicated the grace he proclaimed.  
“What is the purpose of my life?”
Fr. Joe asked in his catechism.
His answer and his life were identical:
“To respond to my Father’s loving invitation
by coming to know him
and growing in love of him
and giving myself to him in service of others.”
I would like to say something of Fr. Joe as a Paulist,
so I apologize in advance
if some of the names, situations and nuances
are only able to be appreciated by other Paulists.
“A Paulist” Isaac  Hecker wrote,
“is a religious entirely dependent on God for his spiritual life,
lives in community
and labors among all to supply the most pressing needs
of the Church and humanity of his day.”
By this definition, Joe Gallagher was a Paulist.
The first time I met Fr. Joe Gallagher, the Paulist,
he was in his prime, pastor of our Mother Church,
St. Paul the Apostle in New York.
He scared the hell out of me.
I was a mere seminarian,
and on ordination day was given a job fitting my rank,
I was to open the door of Cardinal Cooke’s car when he arrived.  The steely eyed lord and master of 59th street
walked down the stairs of the rectory where I was waiting
and said to me:
“What are you doing here?” 
“I’m waiting to welcome the Cardinal,” I stammered.
 “No you’re not.” He informed me.
“That’s my job kid. Go away.” 
There are many stories of Joe Gallagher ‘s community life
with the Paulists,
some that can be told in church and some that can’t.  
He loved telling stories of Frank Ryan’s Friday night lobster feasts at Park Street, summers on Cape Cod,
the famous “spring retreats” held on Hilton Head Island
with Jac Campbell, Frank Diskin, Stan MacNevin
and Joe Gallagher as the foursome of retreat masters. 
Joe enjoyed the company of Paulists
and it was his great gift to us to want to die at home,
in a Paulist house.
Joe was a leader in the Paulist Fathers,
ultimately the leader, “El Jefe” Frank Diskin called him,
usually while Joe was in the middle of his backswing. 
In fact, if you scan the listing of Joe’s assignments
you are hard pressed to find any where he had to answer
to anyone else.
He introduced me to his doctors as “my boss”
and I thought to myself, “yeah right - that’ll be the day.” 
Dave O’Brien, one of Joe’s vice-presidents
told me that Joe possessed a characteristic
he found common to all Paulist presidents:
confidence in his own judgment
and a lack of excessive reliance on the advice of others.
“Joe, I’m telling you for your own good”
Dave would say when offering advice to Joe.
After one such advice session Joe replied:
“Dave I know you are telling me for my own good,
but do you have to be concerned for my good every day?” 
Almost all Paulists who respect Joe
can easily speak of at least one good argument with him. 
If you were a Paulist and did not have at least one
knock down drag out fight with Joe,
well, you simply weren’t trying.
How he would get mad at us!
But he was also proud of us, beyond our merits! 
He could see a pretention walking into a common room
from a mile off,
but he could also see,
and as pastor and President,
he had many occasions to see,
our wounds, faults and failings.
To these he responded with persistent generosity
and a willingness to try with us once again.
That was an attitude that mystified some.
Infuriated others,
But for which he never apologized.
Joe’s clarity about Paulist Mission is enshrined in our constitution, for the section on Mission and Purpose
primarily comes from his pen.
The Paulist Mission Direction statement
which translates Hecker’s vision of the conversion of America
into our three fold mission of
Evangelization, Reconciliation and Ecumenism
is also the result of Joe’s tenacious leadership.
The ordination rite says that:
“a priest is man, taken from among men, for the things of God.” 
So let us finally speak about Joe as a man.
He was more specifically an Irish Catholic New Yorker,
fiercely loyal to his family.
In the hospital with pneumonia
he was making plans to come to his sisters funeral,
and his last great outings were just a weekend ago,
in the company of his brothers John and Peter.
At his beside where he died
were the pictures of his mother and father.  
He was educated at Portsmouth Abbey
and the University of Notre Dame,
and he was for 62 years a devoted fan.
He did not die as rumor has it, because Navy beat Notre Dame, nor did he die,
so that Notre Dame could beat Duke with his heavenly assistance.  Although the coincidence is remarkable.
After college Joe served in the Navy
and saw combat saw as the commander of troop ships.
But like most who fought in that war,
he did not speak much about it
and never glorified his participation in it. 
Joe enjoyed good scotch,
could tell the difference between a good wine and a great one, relished Long Island bay oysters,
a rare steak, and in his day, a Cuban cigar. 
He preferred Eli Manning over his celebrated brother Peyton
because Eli played for his New York Giants. 
He played golf at the most prestigious golf courses in this country and sold Italian sausages at the Festival.
In short, he loved all the dimensions of his life
and translated his enjoyment to others.
His personal list of charities is impressive by anyone’s standard.
He had an incisive intellect,
And could tell within a minute if you actually had anything to say;
And often what he thought was most important
In what you were saying was
not what you thought was most important.
He had an incisive wit.
Once while watching a television story about a local mall
that employed mounted officers to deter crime.
The officer commented on how the children loved the horses
and petted them 500-600 time a day.
During the commercial I commented to Joe
it might not be so bad to be a horse,
to which he replied,
“Don’t worry kid, you’re half way there.”
At the end of his life, when all was taken from him,
even his contagious smile,
he lived through sheer spirit alone. 
Reduced some might say,
but I suggest he was simply a concentrated version
of Joe Gallagher,
which so many, certainly so many here
saw as holiness in pure form,
but a form not so different from ourselves
that we could not grasp it.
Let me give you a small example,
Bishop, you know how we tore up your house
to install a chair lift so Fr. Joe would not have to use the stairs? And Remember Fr. President
the $20,000 dollar check your wrote to pay for it?
Well, Joe hated that chair lift.
When talking with his brother John, about Joe’s insistence
on dangerously using the stairs
he said most subtly, and please forgive me sir
if I quote you incorrectly,
“My brother has some characteristics
that we would all be better off if we did not have.” 
Well that is true.
But as I have been thinking of Fr. Joe
there is a phrase from Shakespeare that rings in my ears.
It is a dialogue between Hamlet and his friend Horatio .
Hamlet says of his departed father:
Hamlet-methinks I see my father
Horatio-where, my lord?
Hamlet-In my mind’s eye Horatio.
Horatio-I saw him once my lord; he was goodly king,
Hamlet- No, say he was a man, take him for all in all,
I shall not look upon his like again.
Nor shall any of us, this side of heaven anyway.
But let the last words today be his, his answer to question 16
in his catechism:

"When will my purpose be achieved?
It is achieved every time I say yes to his invitation.
Its final achievement comes
when I give myself completely over to him at my death."

Fr. Joe did not die of Parkinson’s disease,
he died because he gave himself completely
over to his Lord at his death.,
and by his death, as by his life
this man gave glory to God
and because of him, so do we.
Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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