Table Flipping
It's time to flip some tables and clean house.
This past week, the Church celebrated National Vocations Awareness Week, a time to recognize the need for increased prayer and encouragement offered for those who are feeling the stir of a religious calling in their heart.
Bishop Koenig has asked his priests to tell their vocation stories during the weekend homily as a way to inspire young men and women to be open to the Spirit, to remind them that we need holy priests, religious and deacons to serve the Church in selfless charity. It's a great idea with just one problem: my story is boring.
I received no visions; heard no angelic invitations; saw no billboards on the interstate flashing the message: "Rich, I need you to be a priest. Love, God." Rather, my path to priesthood involved more than a few twists and turns, a lot of doubt, moments of cold feet, and a detour via the classroom before I was ready (willing?) to pick up the Cross and follow after Christ.
In the end, I think that's what finally captured my heart: the one thing necessary that allowed me to say "yes" to the possibility of discerning priesthood: the Cross.
When I first entered seminary out of college, I was enamored by what I believed priesthood was: graced times of prayer and liturgical celebrations; the mystical offering of Sacraments; catechizing the unchurched with great success. It was a united brotherhood who saw Christ as the only goal, who worked tirelessly for conversions, and who wanted to save souls at any cost. Priesthood was "the way" -- the best way -- to love God and one's neighbor.
None of this is wrong, per say, but to be frank: it's idealistic. It's living Church and vocation through the lens of rose-colored glasses. It's wanting the Temple worship without the reality and necessity of Calvary.
It's for this reason that Christ flipped tables that day in His Father's House. He looked around at what worship had become, and He knew it was an empty shell of what it should be.
In theory, there was nothing wrong with selling doves and having moneychangers in the outside court of the Gentiles. Worshippers coming to pray were required to offer a token of sacrifice, and so the animals offered and the sellers of such creatures were needed. One could say they were the external wrappings of the law's fulfillment: God desired sacrifice, and this was the way to fulfill the requirement.
There's just one problem: it was a lot of smoke and mirrors. Empty offering. Smells and bells, so to speak, without the understanding of why such things were being asked of the Temple visitors and traditional Jewish worshippers.
And so into that artificial emptiness comes Jesus Christ, Savior and Son of God, who knew where he was heading and what he must do: pour out His life on the Cross for our salvation. Offer all to heal humanity and set us free. Die and rise so that we may all rise in Him.
God no longer needed turtledoves and sheep. He needed converted hearts and lives, freed from sin and selfishness, willing to take up the Cross and follow after Him. He needed disciples who weren't looking for power and prestige but ones willing to become feet-washers, leper-embracers, adulterer-healers and fellow Beatitude-walkers.
That's why Jesus came to the Temple and flipped tables that afternoon shortly before his Crucifixion: to cry out "Look-up" Look-up and see who you are to become -- another Me poured out in mercy for the world. Looking down means staring at oneself; looking up allows for the building of a new Temple: one based on sacrifice. A Temple in which all are invited, included, healed into wholeness, and loved without counting the cost.
From that Cross came the Church. From that Cross came the way to follow, to live one's vocation and to give one's heart away to and for a world crying out to be redeemed. From that Cross came the Catholic priesthood and religious life. From that Cross came the definition of what true marriage is built upon. From that Cross came everything we do here when we gather around the Eucharistic Table and feed on the Word and His Body and Blood.
I think it's time we start flipping tables again.
I've been privileged to work in vocation discernment for a while now, and it's clear to anyone who has been watching the Church these past decades that we're struggling in many ways. Fewer men and women are answering the call to priesthood and religious life. Some even leave after having taken vows. Priests and religious who stay are often overwhelmed and overworked, even with a dedicated laity who do so much in all areas of Church life (thank God).
The scandal of abuse still casts a deep shadow over how the world views us, and the culture constantly tries to remind us that religion is pointless, hateful, and not for the learned. The Catholic Church is archaic, misogynistic, and hateful, say many. She is too rich and too powerful for her own good, according to others. She is deeply flawed.
That last statement is true. The Church as the Body of Christ is broken, for she is filled with souls who are broken. The Church is on the Cross, but it's where she must be: for it's only there where she finds her Messiah.
A Church without the Cross is not the Church. And a Church that doesn't point the way to Calvary will never have the vocations she needs if she lives her existence from the vantage point of moneychangers and pigeon sellers.
If we want holy vocations, we can't be afraid to start flipping tables again and point toward the Cross.
Don't let the world fool you. Young people today are longing to love authentically. They want to give themselves away for something greater than wealth, technology and empty past-times that never fill the God-shaped hole in our hearts. Just last week, I sat with a young man from UD -- a junior -- who said to me, "I know I'm made for more than what I'm being told I should want. I'm filled with nearly everything, but feel so empty. What am I missing?"
He's missing the chance to love at Calvary. He's missing the opportunity to be emptied and healed at Calvary. He's not been told that there's a whole world waiting for him to lay down his life and serve the least at Calvary.
If the Church is to invite others into dedicated service as priests and religious, never be afraid to point to the need for Cross-carriers and men/women willing to sacrifice.
Vocations will never come and stay -- they will never bring Christ in his fullness -- if we don't tell them we need them to be spiritual fathers and mothers in every sense of those relationships: accompanying those who mourn the death of loved ones for months and years; staying at the bedside of the sick at 3 a.m. on a Tuesday; listening with one's whole heart to another's fears, anxieties and shattered dreams.
Vocations won't come if we don't flip the tables and boldly ask for men and women to accompany our families and our children in their struggles with a world that often doesn't make sense; a world where Satan seems to be dancing through our daily lives, pulling us from truth and holiness.
Vocations won't come if our own priests, deacons and religious sisters don't look like we've been in a battle. Because we are, or at least we should be.
Padre Pio and St. Jean Vianney spent many a sleepless night wrestling with demons on behalf of their spiritual daughters and sons. Mother Teresa took on the interior darkness her suffering poor experienced every day. Mother Theodore Guerin in Indiana and Mother Katherine Drexel of Philadelphia took on anti-Catholic bigots who tried to destroy their schools, their ministry, and the faith of the pupils whom they promised to serve and protect.
All of them looked like they were beaten and battered with the Cross, and in a very real way, we can say they were. They resembled the crucified Christ for their people. Why? Because they knew in the depths of their souls that it is the only way to truly love. It's the only way to flip tables. It's the only way to look up and see the God who gave everything to set us free and call us back to Him.
Looking back on these eight years of priesthood, as well as the journey it took to get here, I can see now that the vocation was formed and grew not in ease and comfort but every time I was willing to go to Calvary. My brother’s car accident; hospital anointings; sitting with college students in moments of their deep depression; losing loved ones and parishioners … this is where my priesthood was shaped and my spiritual fatherhood lived most fully.
Holy vocations come from sacrifice. They come when we stand at Calvary and allow our hearts to be shaped by the One who gave all in love. It’s the only way to flip tables and keep looking up.