AIDS AND REJOICING?
5
December 2003
ADVENT (C) Third
SundayÝÝÝÝÝ Phil. 4: 4-7
St. Patrickís parish is in
Kowloon, Hong Kong.Ý There are four
weekend Masses including a childrenís Mass at 10:45, Sunday.Ý This is the parish where I was formerly pastor.
[email protected].Ý Cf. also Social Concerns Education: www.acpp.org --ÝÝ Fr. Gene Thalman M.M.]
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ The theme today is rejoicing. This is a difficult subject to preach on.
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ Last week on the radio, I heard this account.ÝÝÝÝ In the mid 1990ís the communist party authorities in Henan Province encouraged poor farmers to sell their blood.Ý Mobile collection units toured rural villages.Ý Millions of villagers took up the call. But the blood collectors ignored the most basic standards of hygiene and perhaps 500,000 people in Henan Province have been infected with the AIDS virus.
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ Recently a journalist sneaked into one of the villages in the far northeast corner of Henan Province.Ý Shuang Miao Village has a population of 3,000 and at least 600 are already HIV-positive. In this village 150 people have already died.Ý The fields around the village are dotted with fresh grave mounds.
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ The journalist went into one of the cottages. He reports that in the corner was an emaciated man lying on a rickety bed.Ý He had a shallow rasping cough.Ý Beside the bed stood a woman and two small children.Ý Between sobs the smaller, a little girl, called to her father.Ý He is crying too.Ý ìBe good, childrenî he whispers, ìlearn your lessons well.îÝ He knows that death is now very near.Ý Standing at his bedside his wifeís anguish is mixed with fear.Ý She has HIV, too! She knows it will not be long before she also will die on this bed.îÝ The two children will then be orphans as are millions of other orphaned children in the world.Ý By 2010, scientists predict that they will be 20 million orphans in Africa alone.
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ There is so much to be miserable about these days. December 1st was World AIDS Day. 40 million people in the world have AIDS.Ý In China, official Chinese figures report that 840,000 are HIV-Positive.Ý But there could be many more.
The theme today is rejoicing. I
find it difficult to promote ìrejoicingî when I think about forty million
people with AIDS plus the twenty million orphans as well as the victims of
poverty, wars, hunger, disease. It seems a cruel joke to stand in this pulpit
and advocate: ìRejoice in the Lord always! I say it again Rejoice!î
GODíS WORD: Philippians 4: 4-7. (NAB)
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ Yet that is just what Paul tells the
Philippians and we at St. Patrickís Church this morning to do: ìRejoice.î
Ý .Ý
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ When Paul wrote todayís
text, he wasnít sitting in a lush sauna bath drinking coca cola and munching on
potato chips.Ý He was a Roman prisoner.Ý We can presume that a Roman prison didnít
have tablecloths and linen napkins. Nor were the staff friendly to Jews. Also
these prisons must have been boring.Ý No
TV.Ý No chaplains or social
workers.Ý No basketball.Ý If anyone had occasion to be ìmiserable in
the Lordî, it should have been Paul.Ý So
when Paul tells his favorite Christian community ìRejoice!îÝ He had experienced huge dosages of all kinds
of suffering. He had the credentials to speak of ìrejoicingî and ìsufferingî
from experience. He was ìwalking the walk.íÝÝ
He was not standing in a shiny pulpit ìsquawking the squawkî [as I am
doing this morning].Ý
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ 2 Cor: 11: 23-28.Ý About five years earlier Paul had written to
the Corinthian Christians and he mentions that he is no stranger to bad patches.
ì(23) Öwith many more labors
and imprisonments, with far worse beatings and frequent brushes with death.
(24) Five times at the hands of the Jews I received forty lashes less one; (25)
three times I was beaten with rods; I was stoned once, shipwrecked three times;
I passes a day and a night on the sea. (26) I traveled continually, endangered
by floods, robbers, my own people, the Gentiles; imperiled in the city, in the
desert, at sea, by false brothers;(27) enduring labor, hardship, many sleepless
nights; in hunger and thirst and frequent fastings, in cold and nakedness. (28)
Leaving other sufferings unmentioned, there is the daily tension pressing on
me, my anxiety for all the churches.î
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ Paul
was so busy suffering that you wonder what he did for fun.
Ý
ìRejoice in the Lord
always! I say it again. Rejoice!î (4)
ìEveryone should see
how unselfish you are.î (5)Ý
First, Paul tells us that unselfish people do
the best kind of ìrejoicing.îÝÝ I think
you all have experiences of selfish people. More often than not, they donít
smile much. At the same time we like to be around unselfish people.Ý They make us feel good and make us happy
about living.Ý They do!
ìThe Lord is near.î (5)
When we are facing deep trouble, we may
ìfeelî that the Lord is far away and couldnít care less what we are going
through.Ý But in the midst of our
miserable world, we believe that the Lord is near and suffering with every AIDS
victim, every child sold into prostitution and with every abandoned
orphan.Ý But this takes a great deal of
ìbelievingî that the ìLord is
near.î
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ ìDismiss all anxiety from your minds.î (6)
When we are anxious about very serious
thingsóat least things that we think are serious and scaryóthere is no way we
can control how we feel by saying:Ý
ìStop worrying, you cowardly and sniveling emotions!îÝ [At least it never works for me.] But once
again through our Faith in Jesus, deep down, we know that some day we will have
the last laugh.
ìPresent your needs
to God in every form of prayer (6)
We repeat over and over again: ì(Luke 11:13) If you, with all your sins,
know how to give your children good things, how much more will the heavenly
Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask.îÝ
Öand in petitions
full of gratitude.î (6)
People who are grateful for the gifts they
receive always find something in which to rejoice. I think of Anna.Ý I first met her in 1962.Ý She was twenty. We went to her home to
baptize her because she was invalided. The doctors had already diagnosed that
she had multiple sclerosis.Ý For the
next forty years she was confined to her bed in the Cheshire Home.Ý Yet whenever I visited her she would always
smile.Ý One day I visited her and she
was exceptionally exuberant. Anna had difficult time speaking.Ý So one of the other patients explained: ìSomeone
gave our center a special van with a glass roof. Anna was able to lie down in
the van with the other patients and see the Christmas decorations in Central.
That is what she wants to tell you.îÝ
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ
ìThen Godís own
peace, which is beyond all understanding, will stand guard over your hearts and
minds, in Christ Jesus. (7)
Finally Paul tells us something that he
admits that he doesnít understand.Ý Nor
does he expect us to understand.Ý But it
is his experience, that in midst of all kinds storms and misery, we Christians
and (we expect non-Christians as well) from time to time experience the very
peace of God standing guard over our hearts and minds.Ý
FINALEÝ What
is one word that you want to remember this coming week. Iíll give you a hint it
starts with the letter ìRî.
5
December 2003
ADVENT (C) Third
SundayÝÝÝÝÝ Phil. 4: 4-7Ý
TWO WORDS: ÝMiserable Rejoicing
THEME:Ý Paul
describes how Christians continue to rejoice in a miserable and often
terrifying world.
TEXT:Ý
Philippians 4: 4-7: ìRejoice in the Lord always! I say it again.
Rejoice!î
DESIRED RESULT:Ý Father, all week long I kept thinking that I
could be a little oasis of ìrejoicingî for some folks I know who donít seem to
have much to rejoice about.Ý I wrote a
newsy letter to a friend of mine who has been sick a long time.Ý Thank-you, Father, for the homily.Ý Most of your sermons are boring.Ý But occasionally you say something that
makes me think.
REFERENCES:
In the interest of National Security, Chinaís
communist rulers are now doing everything they can to stop the outside world
from finding out.Ý As one villager said:
ìThey are waiting for us to die. Once we are all dead their problem will be
solved.îÝ Rupert Wingfield-Hayes,
ìChinaís forgotten Aids victimsî BBC website http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/mpapps/pagetooÖo.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/3269269.stm
(downloaded December 4, 2003).
ìAfrica
Aids orphan crisis worsensî BBC website http//news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/frl-1/hi/world/Africa/3239326.stm
(downloaded December 4, 2003).
2.Ý It is not always necessary that the homilist have all the answers.Ý
In this homily, the homilist shares his/her own difficulties in understanding the Word of God and asks for help from the Christian community.
ÝÝ
6.Ý It goes without saying that
Christians just donít look happy or
talk happy, they do stuff to bring justice
and love to peopleóeven if it gets them into sticky situations.
7. Another time I visited Anna. She was very
happy.Ý After some
twenty years lying in the same cot, the staff
gave her an extra cot-- next to her bed. Anna was delighted with the luxury.
5
December 2003
ADVENT (C) Third
SundayÝÝÝÝÝ Phil. 4: 4-7
NAME_________
Grade_____________
1Ý __T/F One way to console people who are
suffering grievously is to tell
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ them that after they die, they will
enjoy a heavenly reward. Explain
ÝÝÝÝÝÝÝÝ your answer:
____________________________
2. Where was Paul
residing when he wrote telling the Philippians to rejoice?
in p________.
3.Ý List the types of people that Paul says are
likely to go around
ÝÝÝÝ ìrejoicingî?ÝÝÝÝ u_________,Ý gr_______
and pr________ people.
4.ÝÝ What will constitute our security
guard?ÝÝ Godís p_______.
5.Ý (Optional) Relate an
experience in which, contrary to all
ÝÝÝÝ expectations, you ìrejoicedî
in a painful set of circumstances.Ý If
you
ÝÝÝÝ have not had such an
experience, interview a senior citizen for help.