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Readings Wisdom 3:1-9
from 2 Corinthians 5:1–10
Scripture: John 5:24–29
I
think it pretty safe to assume that all of us have at one time or
another been told, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” This
generations-old pearl of wisdom reminds us that whenever we look at
someone, we should be pretty careful, because we really don’t see who
that person is. All we really see is what that person is.
The
information provided by the testimony of our eyes oftentimes gives us
reason to make judgments about other people, both positive and negative
judgments. For example, well-pressed clothes, a well-kept personal
appearance, and a modicum of jewelry may lead us to conclude that a
particular individual is honest and trustworthy. In contrast, tattoos,
body piercings, a Gothic appearance, and hair that has been dyed pink with luminescent green
streaks may lead us to conclude that another particular individual is
somewhat odd and not worthy of trust.
We may
be accurate in our assessment but all too often and as many of us have
learned to our great embarrassment, the judgments we make about people
based upon what they are can be very misinformed. The only way
to judge a human being more accurately is to open the book, to read its
entire contents, and to consider them thoughtfully and reflectively.
Perhaps, then, we are positioned to make a better and more informed
decision about who that person is.
Jesus
understood all too well the human tendency to judge a book by its
cover. When people looked upon Jesus teaching, whether it was in the
temple, marketplace, or dinner table, what they saw was a human
being, one just as human as you and me. When people looked upon Jesus
interacting with and responding to people, whether they were political
and religious officials, rich or poor, and especially if they were
sinners, what they saw was a human being who experienced feelings
of joy, sorrow, anger, and pity, just like you and me. And, when people
beheld Jesus crucified on the Cross, what they saw was a human
body subject to death and decay, once again, just like you and me.
Succumbing to the all-too-common temptation to judge Jesus by what
they saw, the gospels uniformly report that almost all of these people
failed to see who Jesus was. Judging the book entitled “Jesus of
Nazareth” based solely by its cover—a human body subject to death and
decay just like you and me—all of these people failed to take the
required next step: to open the book and to read its entire contents
thoughtfully and reflectively. Had these people done so, perhaps they
may have recognized who Jesus truly was: God’s only begotten Son,
the one who would rise from the dead on Easter Sunday morning.
It’s
the same with Jane Irene McDevitt Schultek who died on Monday, May 3rd.
Today, eleven days later, it’s easy to succumb to the temptation to
judge this particular book by its cover. Jane has died—“given up the
ghost,” as Jane used to say—and there is absolutely nothing any of us
can do to change this fact. What we see is death and its effects.
All we can do is to accept and live with this fact, to pray for Jane’s
resurrection
from the dead,
and to lay her to rest at the mausoleum beside her beloved
and devoted husband of more than five decades, Bob. Then, we’ll have a meal, leave Cherry Hill behind—perhaps some of us never to return—and get on with living out the
remainder of our days. That is, until
we
“give
up the ghost.”
The simple fact is that not many of us will remember Jane as the years
and decades move on, just as we tend to forget our grandparents, great
grandparents, aunts and uncles, and the like.
“Out of sight, out of
mind”
pretty well sums up this fact.
This
is the very stuff the French existentialist philosopher, Albert Camus,
pondered in the book of life he wrote and entitled The Myth of
Sisyphus. Surveying the tragedy that devastated the European
continent in the wake of two World Wars where everything that had given
European culture for centuries was destroyed, Camus arranged the
contents of his book of life into three chapters: Chapter 1: all of us
are born; Chapter 2: all of us work; and, Chapter 3: all of us die.
It’s
a
simple, straight-forward, and rational timeline that most of us know
very well through observation and personal experience:
[The Front Cover]
Birth→Work→Death [The Back Cover]
Camus
argued that most people don’t want to read this book of life
thoughtfully and reflectively. In fact, he asserts, most people
will actually do just about everything they can to evade even opening its cover. Instead, most people live
the majority of their days in the hope that what
they do during their lives—their work—will make them immortal and, thus,
they will live beyond the grave through what they do.
“Thanks for
the memories,” Bob Hope would always sing at the conclusion of his USO
stage shows for our nation’s
Armed Forces and most of us hope that others will sing of us.
For
evidence, Camus suggests that we consider all of those great explorers, thinkers, writers, artists, and
entrepreneurs throughout the millennia. Consider also all of those great
military, political, and cultural icons throughout the millennia.
Lastly, consider all of those last wills and testaments written throughout the
millennia. Although many people have done all of these things
throughout the millennia, Camus argued, only a miniscule percentage of
the entire human race has achieved any degree of immortality.
Furthermore, a cataclysmic event—a
nuclear, biological, or radiological attack or an electromagnetic
impulse—has
the power to destroy the collective memory of even these giants. As
Camus reminds us, the simple fact is that all of the work which all of
us perform during our lives—the what—will return to earth when we
give up the ghost and return to the earth ourselves who once lived among
us. Then, people
experiencing the psychological burden of grief and loss will turn their backs on us in the same way
we will soon turn our backs on Jane, her beloved husband, Bob, and
Cherry Hill. This is the third chapter that brings Camus’ book of life
to its end.
All of
this sounds pretty pessimistic, no?
Before
we rush and judge Camus wrong after having opened this book of life and
considered its contents somewhat thoughtfully and reflectively, might it
be true that Camus’
assessment of the human condition
is more accurate than many of us are willing to admit? Is there
nothing more to life than those three chapters? Is all of what
we do in the course of our lives, in the end, absolutely and utterly
meaningless?
Well,
Camus may be correct. Nobody knows for sure what happens after
death—excepting
the body, which we knew corrupts and decays—and anyone who is cocksure that there is immortality, I submit,
hasn’t read
The Myth of Sisyphus thoughtfully and reflectively enough.
After all, using the example of the life of Jane Irene McDevitt
Schultek, there is no doubt about the veracity of Camus’
argument: Jane was born; Jane
worked hard to be a good wife and mother; and, now Jane has died.
Yet,
we’ve gathered today because we believe—as Jane believed—that there’s
more to the book of life than those three chapters found in Camus’
book. In fact, Jane’s book of life contained five very different
chapters. Here’s a brief synopsis of each chapter:
- In Chapter 1, God
creates each person as a unique and unrepeatable being in all human
history. For all of us who knew Jane, there never was nor will there
ever be another Jane Irene McDevitt Schultek. Each of us can tell
numerous stories that identify just how unique Jane was.
- In Chapter 2, each
person is born into a particular place and time in human history. Jane’s
life spanned eight decades, beginning with the Roaring ’20’s, living
through the Depression, World War II, Korea, Viet Nam, and the Gulf War.
Telephones were a relatively new invention during Jane’s early years.
The “Man on the Moon” and Dick Tracy’s cell phone were the stuff of
imaginative science fiction writers and comic strip
artists.
Jane’s
life started with an “ice box” and ended with a microwave oven.
- In Chapter 3, God sends each person into the world, disguised in the
garb of what they do, to reveal who they are as God’s
beloved children. Some of us knew Jane as
“Mom,” “Grandma,” aunt, cousin,
neighbor, friend, and member of the parish. From the day I first
met Jane when I was a teenager, she was always “Mrs. Schultek.”
When I was an adult and after ordination, she would insist that I address her as “Jane.”
Despite
our different experiences, I think it safe to say that all of us knew
Jane to be a fierce, Irish Catholic.
- In Chapter 4, each person
dies. After being afflicted for several years with the effects of Alzheimer’s
disease and more recently suffering from a bowel obstruction and surgery, Jane
“gave up the ghost” and died on May 3rd.
-
In Chapter 5, those “who have heard the voice of the Son of God will live,”
as we heard Jesus teach his disciples in this morning’s gospel.
This is why we have gathered today.
You
and I have knowingly or unknowingly professed this belief during the
past eleven days since we heard of Jane’s
death
whenever
we said or thought something along the lines “Jane is in a better place”
or “Jane has gone to God” or “Jane now shares in Jesus’ resurrection.”
When we said or thought those and other similar statements, we were
using Jane’s five-chapter book of life. Had we been using Albert Camus’
three-chapter book, we’d
say something like
“At least
Jane isn’t
suffering.”
In
today’s
reading from the second letter to the Corinthians, we heard St. Paul
discuss the fourth and fifth chapters of Jane’s
book of life, using a metaphor associated his trade, a tent. St. Paul
wrote: “We know that when the tent that we live in on earth is folded
up, there is a house built by God for us, an everlasting home not made
by human hands, in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1). For those who read
Jane’s
book of
life—by the way and as you probably have already guessed, it’s entitled
“The Holy Bible”—and reflect thoughtfully and prayerfully upon
its contents, death is not the end to be feared, as it is in Chapter 3
of The Myth of Sisyphus. No, the folding up of the “tent”—the body as it corrupts and decays—directs our attention to Chapter
4—death—but can distract us from thoughtfully and reflectively
considering the final chapter of this book of life, Chapter 5—the
resurrection of the dead. It is Chapter 5, not Chapter 4 and the
futility of trying to manage and deal with the fact of death, which
brings us together today.
What
we are doing here is counter-cultural in that our
extremely secularized and materialistic culture accords greater value to the
“tent,”
the what of a person rather than to the who of a person. As
a consequence, many of us spend all too many of the days of our lives
working very hard to acquire and possess so many things—the what—which
we believe will make us “somebody.” Yet, the day will come for us
all—as it
did for Jane—when
18 Farmhouse Court had to be emptied out and, even if we are lucky
enough not to have to deal with that, we know for absolutely sure that Schretter’s
won’t be attaching a U-Haul filled with all of those material things to the hearse
that will transport our corpse to the cemetery. In that sense, the “wicked
deeds” Jesus describes in today’s gospel end up being all of the what—the
work—we’ve performed during all of those days to improve our place in
this world. This is what merits what Jesus called the “resurrection
of condemnation.”
In
contrast, when we accord value to the who a person is, we spend
the days of our lives translating into practice Chapter 3 in Jane’s book
of life, as God sends us into the world, disguised in the garb of what we
do, to reveal God’s love in everything we do. In this way, what
we do and possess becomes secondary to and supports who we are. These
are the “good deeds” Jesus describes in today’s gospel which prepare us for our
place in the next world, what Jesus called the “resurrection of
life.”
If you
read the gospels carefully, you will discover that no one seems to have
been able to judge the book entitled “Jesus of Nazareth” accurately
simply by judging its cover—although some, like Peter, James, and John,
did have a momentary glimpse of its divine content on Mount
Tabor—because they were more concerned about what they saw than
they were concerned about who they saw.
And so
it is with each and every one of us gathered here today. We experience
sadness and grief because judging the book entitled “Jane Irene McDevitt
Schultek” by its cover—the
tent folded up—we’re using the third chapter of Albert Camus’
book of life to form our judgment. It’s that final, closing, and very
pessimistic chapter of The Myth of Sisyphus.
Yet,
all of us have been told “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” We live on earth
in a human body subject to the forces of decay and death. Each morning,
many of us look at ourselves in the mirror, seeing and assessing
ourselves only by the cover, what St. Paul called the “tent.” Let
us not vainly hope to preserve what we know one day is going to decay
and die for that is to live each day in denial and fear about what is
inevitable. And, as the number of our years increase, we can allow
ourselves to become so concerned about the cover of this book that we
neglect entirely what’s most important, the contents inside of the book.
Furthermore, let us not fall prey to the “Out of sight, out of mind,”
mentality whereby we forget about all of those who gave us life and have
preceded us in death. Let us call all of them to mind, pray for
their resurrection from the dead, and imitate their example even though
they have gone to their final resting place.
As
Jane has taught us through her life, work, and death, let us not forget
the first, third, and fifth chapters of her book of life, “The Holy
Bible.” Each and every one of us is one of God’s beloved children
and we’ve been so since the moment of our conception, Chapter 1, and
birth, Chapter 2. God has also sent us forth into the world to
perform those
“good works”
that fulfill the personal vocation for which God has created us as unique
and unrepeatable human beings in all of human history, Chapter 3.
In Jane’s
book of life, death is not the final chapter and our destiny ultimately is not the
grave. No, Chapter 4 is the transition to Chapter 5—the
resurrection of the dead—the beginning of our new and eternal life in
God where, having cast aside all that defines what we are, we
discover our fulfillment in who we always have been since the
moment of our conception as God’s beloved children.
With hearts filled with gratitude for the
this important spiritual lesson concerning the book of life which Jane
Irene McDevitt Schultek has taught us through the example of her life, let us pray:
V.
Eternal rest grant unto
Jane, O Lord.
R.
And let perpetual light
shine upon her.
V.
May Jane’s soul and all
the souls of the faithful departed rest in peace.
R.
Amen.
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HOMILY
