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Perhaps some of you may rightfully be wondering, “Why are we
celebrating the birth of St. John the Baptist today? After all,
shouldn’t we be celebrating the twelfth week in good ol’ boring
‘Ordinary Time’?”
There are many reasons we’re celebrating the birth of St. John the
Baptist today, not the least of which is that the Church celebrates
it as a solemnity each year on June 24th and, this year, June the
24th happens to fall on a Sunday.
But, in light of today’s gospel, let me suggest one reason that’s
identified in the Catechism of the Catholic Church: “[St.
John the Baptist] proclaims the nearness of Israel’s consolation; he
is the ‘voice’ of the Consoler who is coming….[through whom] the
Holy Spirit begins the restoration to humanity of ‘the divine
likeness’” (#719-720).
Today, I’d like to focus upon that word “voice” and how the God
wants to work through our voices—as
God worked through St. John the Baptist’s voice—to
restore others to that divine likeness in which God created them.
Or, as may be the case for those of us who sin, to recognize that we
are incapable of using our voices to restore others to that divine
likeness in which God created them and need to atone—like
Zechariah—as
St. John the Baptist preached at the Jordan River.
In today’s gospel, we heard of Zechariah, a minister at the altar of
incense in the Temple of Jerusalem. The Angel Gabriel visited
Zechariah, announcing that his wife, Elizabeth, would have a son who
“will be great in the sight of the Lord” (1:15). The spirit and
power of the great prophet Elijah would guide Zechariah’s son.
That’s quite a revelation because, after all, tradition teaches us
that Zechariah told the Angel Gabriel, “I’m an old man and my wife
is well along in years.” Instead of praising God for blessing
Zechariah, this priest of the Temple—he’s
not just any priest—is incredulous, not believing the Angel’s
revelation.
At that very moment, Zechariah loses his voice.
At least, that’s what tradition teaches.
That said, the gospel hints at a somewhat different and perhaps more
interesting explanation.
Apparently Zechariah’s wife, Elizabeth, was adamant that her son be
named John, which in Hebrew means “God is gracious.” And indeed,
God was doubly gracious because Elizabeth was well beyond her
childbearing years when she conceived her infant. With this
gracious pregnancy, God lifted decades of self-doubt and ridicule
from Elizabeth’s shoulders because, for the Jews, despite
Elizabeth’s well-recognized righteousness, her inability to conceive
an infant was an irrefutable sign that Elizabeth was a sinner.
But, as I noted, God was doubly gracious because this infant was
male, meaning that he was destined to bear his father’s name and
carry on the family’s legacy in the Jewish priesthood. The infant
would be named “Zechariah bar Zechariah,” meaning,
“Zechariah, the son of Zechariah.”
That’s the conflict generating the scene we heard about in today’s
gospel.
When Zechariah and Elizabeth brought their infant son to the Temple
to be circumcised on the eighth day, the priests had every intention
of naming him Zechariah. Instead, Elizabeth told the priests, “No.
He’s going to be called John,” which in Hebrew means, “He will be
called ‘God is gracious’.” Imagine the priests’ incredulity. They
had to be wondering: “Who’s this woman to tell us what to do,
contravening our religious tradition whereby the first-born son
bears the father’s name?”
If the priests had only had known this was “Elizabeth,” whose name
means “God is my oath.” Stubborn, yes, and for a purpose! She
isn’t going to take any of what these priests were saying.
After decades of hoping that God would save her, God was faithful to
his oath and brought Elizabeth consolation. There’s no way
Elizabeth is going to allow her son to be named Zechariah.
Perhaps Elizabeth’s husband Zechariah should have known better than
not to listen to, to understand, and to accept what his wife
Elizabeth knew by faith. After all, Zechariah was a priest.
Shouldn’t he have known exactly what Elizabeth was demanding when
she was adamant that the only name they could assign to their son
was precisely what the miraculous pregnancy revealed, namely, “God
is gracious”? While Elizabeth was praising God for what He had
accomplished within her, Zechariah—the priest who should have known
better—was interested in mere human tradition, that this son carry
his name and family legacy into the next generation.
So, at a minimum, Zechariah was mute for nine months. Imagine what
Zechariah must have felt like and endured during those long weeks
and months as his dream for an heir is being fulfilled—yes, “God is
gracious”—but Elizabeth won’t countenance Zechariah’s plan for the
infant’s name. Imagine having to listen Elizabeth jabber-jaw about
this so-called “John” and being completely incapable of saying
anything about it.
Sartre once wrote that “Hell is others” (“l’enfer, c’est l’autres”)
and Zechariah’s enforced silence was certainly a punishment.
But, it wouldn’t have been a divine punishment if Zechariah’s
silence didn’t contain a blessing. After all, divine punishment is
for instruction and spiritual growth, not to beat human beings down
into submission, although divine punishment might very well feel
like that! It’s all about recognizing something that human
beings don’t want to see or admit.
Unable to speak or converse, Zachariah’s punishment forced him to
concentrate on the simple act of seeing what was transpiring around
him.
And that’s when something odd began to happen, as Zechariah started
to concentrate more upon seeing rather than speaking. More
conscious about what was going on around him rather than imposing
his will on everybody and everything around him, Zechariah gradually
developed greater awareness. As Zechariah began to see God at work
in everything around him rather than using God’s graciousness to
effect his own ends, that awareness is what eventually makes it
possible for Zechariah to speak…and out of his silence would come a
new way of speaking, one more in tune with God’s will.
During those months, God was slowly transforming Zechariah overcome
his blindness and to see God at work in everything around him. The
transformation came to its completion not with the miraculous birth
of his son, but when Elizabeth told the priests, “No.
He will be called John.” Those months of silence—more a gift than a
curse through which Zechariah learned to detect the deep, spiritual
meaning of what was transpiring around him—erupted after writing on
the tablet what Elizabeth had been saying all along, “John is his
name,” which is to say,
“That’s what I will.”
What happened? Zechariah not only spoke but gave voice to a prayer,
the Benedictus, the prayer to which the Church throughout the
world awakens every morning.
The shorthand lesson might be, “Husbands, listen patiently to your
wives by keeping your big mouths shut. Put a cork in your pie
hole.” But the application of this story to our spiritual lives is
far more important. If you and I we are to speak with even a vague
echo of divine power, we must learn to be silent and to prepare to
speak by seeing what’s really transpiring around us. It’s a
lesson that speaks to spouses, to children, and to parents as well.
Start listening to what’s going on and see God at work rather than
demanding that everyone do what you say because you believe that you
are God. The change in attitude and behavior will be evident
when your words form prayers of gratitude to God,
“God is gracious.”
For example, converts to the Catholic faith have told me how this
particular gospel story reminds them of their opinions about the
Catholic Church before God intervened in some mysterious way in
their lives. Suddenly, they found themselves struck silent,
incapable of voicing all of those negative attitudes and opinions
about the Church and its teaching, its hypocritical popes, bishops,
and priests, as well as its people in the pews who profess one thing
on Sunday and live quite another thing during the other six days of
the week. Whereas giving voice to simple, snotty, straightforward
opinions had been so easy and for so many years, those converts
routinely report experiencing God putting His hand over their
mouths, sometimes saying in the nicest possible way, “Please shut
up,” and, if necessary, “Put a cork in it. I have a bigger plan.”
Then, after they learn to see what’s going on all around them rather
than imposing themselves and their opinions on everyone around them,
these converts report developing greater conscious awareness about
how God is at work in everybody and everything around them. That
awareness then made it possible for these converts to speak…and out
of their silence over a long period of time came a new way of
speaking, one that was more in tune with the Word of God they
discovered in the Church and its teaching.
Just as God did with Elizabeth, so God does with us. He breaks into
our long-barren world, re-defining what we take as “normal.” In
other words, God is re-making everything around us. This isn’t just
another pregnancy, but a “game changer.” The challenge confronting
us is whether we see this miracle for what it is, “God is
gracious.” Or, will we stubbornly cling to our negative attitudes
and opinions, using our voice to demand that everybody conform to
our dictates?
Today we celebrate the birth of St. John the Baptist who proclaimed
the nearness of Israel’s consolation; he is the ‘voice’ of the
Consoler who is coming….[through whom] the Holy Spirit begins the
restoration to humanity of ‘the divine likeness’.” Just as the Holy
Spirit used the voice of Elizabeth to restore others to that divine
likeness in which God created them, so too God wants to use our
voices today to do the same.
“We think that evil is basically good,” Pope Benedict XVI once
noted. “We think that we need it, at least a little, in order to
experience the fullness of being…If we look, however, at the world
that surrounds us, we can see that this is not so; in other words,
that evil is always poisonous, does not uplift human beings, but
degrades and humiliates them.”
Hopefully by contemplating today’s gospel, we will see world
surrounding us as God wants us to see it. That way, God won’t
have to put His hand over our mouths and say, “Put a cork in it. I
have a bigger plan than you could possibly imagine.”
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HOMILY
