4th Sunday of Easter (B) – April 21, 2024

St. Paul – Lyons, KS

Acts 4:8-12; Psalm 118:1, 8-9, 21-23, 26, 28, 29; 1 John 3:1-2; John 10:11-18

The Revolution Continues

Last week I left you with some simple questions: Am I keeping Sunday holy? Or, is this day just part of the “weekend”? Remember, we’re in the middle of this series called The Day the Revolution Began. And we’re talking about how the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead—the Resurrection is not just a really cool miracle; it’s not just another “party trick” of Jesus. The Resurrection is like the Boston Tea Party or the Storming of the Bastille: the Resurrection begins a revolution in the world, a revolution against the World! And not one where we now need to go get violent, no. The revolution is against the World as Scripture understands “the World”: the “normal” ideas, and values, and morals, and ways of operating, and social norms—the mentality that says, “Just be a good person. We all die, so just enjoy life while you can. ‘Eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.’ You do you. Stay busy! Enjoy life while you can!” This is that Option 1, the mentality of the World—and it leads nowhere, it’s a dead end (literally). And yet, people choose it every day, many of us choose it! And the more people embrace it (and they are), the more those three deaths of despair go up, the more people live life going toward a dead end, the more we are numbing out with screens, the more life feels hopeless, and on and on and on.

Jesus’ Resurrection is the day that began a revolution against that! Why? Because his Resurrection signals that there is a new option! Death is not the end; there is something besides money and sports and a good time on the weekends or at the lake that can give meaning and purpose to our life; there is a new path that isn’t a hopeless dead end. And in fact, as Peter said in our first reading, this is the only other path! “Jesus Christ…whom you crucified…God raised from the dead… [and] there is no salvation through anyone else” (Acts 4). 

And so what is the first step for us in this revolution? What did Jesus and Peter tell us last week? Step number one is to repent, metanoia, meta-nous: go beyond your current mindset (the current mentality), and see things differently. In other words, see reality in light of the Resurrection! We all see things in this Option 1 mentality—we do! The invitation is to metanoia, to go beyond that mindset, to see things and to evaluate things differently. Chick-fil-A was our image, right? Chick-fil-A, my favorite restaurant in the world, is also the number one restaurant in the United States because it had a metanoia about business—a concrete change in mind that led to a concrete plan of action—and that led to “victory.” St. John told us that, “The victory that conquers the World is our faith.” But our faith must be lived out concretely.

And (uncoincidentally), what is one of Chick-fil-A’s essential, concrete actions? They are closed on Sunday. Why? Because since the beginning, since the day it began, Sunday, the Lord’s Day, was the fundamental and essential expression of this revolution. The week is not seven days of work; it’s not five days of work and then “the weekend” (which is how we think, right? Right.) No, Chick-fil-A sees reality clearly: there are six days, and then one day is set apart, completely different, holy. Today, more than ever, this is the ground we have to reclaim, we have to win this back. We need to reclaim Sunday as the Lord’s Day. Why? Because more than anything else, the metanoia and conversion it takes to reclaim this day will begin to affect every other part of our life. 

And so that brings us back to the questions: How well am I living Sunday? Is this day holy, set apart, completely different? Do I keep this day holy? OR, Does Chick-fil-A live the faith better than me? What I want to do today, then, is just two things. First, I just want to just share my experience, my experience growing up and how we kept Sunday holy in my family. Second, I want to share a concrete proposal to help us begin to reclaim Sunday in a radical way.

Experience of 15900

Like I began to mention last week, when I was a young kid, my dad had a real metanoia when it came to the Lord’s Day, to Sunday, and keeping it holy. One concrete thing I mentioned was how we stopped going out to eat on Sundays—but that was just the tip of the iceberg. The entire day, the entire “weekend” changed! Why? Because it wasn’t just “the weekend”! The whole week was focused and centered on the Lord’s Day.

Let me just share what the Lord’s Day looked like for us, because we lived Sunday very, very differently than ever other day, but very, very structured. There was a rhythm to the day, a ritual to the day. First off, it began the evening before. (In the Jewish concept of time, the day began at sundown on the previous evening—that’s what we can have Mass on Saturday evening and it is the Sunday Mass, or vigil Masses: the day begins on the evening before.) So on Saturday evening, we had a ritual: every Saturday evening, my dad would grill hamburgers for dinner. Then, after all the kids had gotten cleaned up, we would gather in the living room and pray the Rosary: we would share our personal intentions and things we wanted to prayer for, and then offer the Rosary for those. After that, we would watch a movie as a family (that’s why I’ve watched so many classic movies!) The next morning, we would have breakfast on our own, and get ready for Mass: put on our Sunday best, slacks, shirt, tie, dress shoes—and go to Mass. Mass was clearly the most important part of Sundays. And our parents never had to tell us that, we just knew. When we got home from Mass, we would make brunch as a family: usually pancakes and eggs, bagel breakfast sandwiches. We would pray the Angelus before the meal, and then eat together. And at brunch, we knew the question that was coming! Our dad would ask, “So, what struck anyone about the homily?” After brunch, we would clean up, and then the day was spent doing different things: playing football together, reading, playing music, taking a nap. Then, Sunday evening, our dad would make a big meal and we would help—usually some big Italian dish: carbonara, linguini, fettuccini, parmesano. And while we were making dinner we’d be listening to music. Like, this rhythm was so engrained in us that to this day certain music brings back certain smells, you know? Then we would pray the Angelus again and sit down to eat as a family. Afterwards, we would clean up, the kids would get cleaned up, and we would meet in the living room to pray the Rosary again. And afterwards, the little kids would go to bed, the older kids would read or get things ready for the next day, and then go to bed. And that was it. But like I said, that was every Saturday evening and Sunday. It was very structured, a rhythm, a ritual. None of us every wondered what was for dinner on Saturday. We never wondered if we were going to Mass. It was just a rhythm of life. A rhythm of stoping, resting, delighting, and worshiping. And yeah, every now and then there were exceptions, but they were just that: exceptions. The “rule,” the rhythm was there.

So that’s what we did. But notice, my dad and mom were also very intentional about what we didn’t do on Sundays. We didn’t go places, unless we had to. If we asked to go places, the answer was usually, “no.” Why? Because it was the Lord’s Day, it wasn’t a day for going out and about, and running errands and whatnot, no. We didn’t go out to eat on Sundays. It was a different day, a day set apart, a holy day. We also didn’t watch TV on Sundays—yup, that included sports, and yes, that included the Chiefs. My whole life growing up we were Notre Dame football fans: one, because they were nationally broadcast every week; but two, because they played on Saturday, not Sunday. (Also, the Chiefs really stunk when I was growing up, so that was easy.) And we also didn’t play sports on Sundays: we would only do sports that had games and practices Monday through Saturday. (I remember, they put up a big soccer complex near our house, and we had to drive by it every Sunday. And as you can imagine, Sunday morning was packed! And as little kids, we were just shocked! We asked our dad, “Dad, don’t they know it’s Sunday?!”) But again, what’s the point? The point is that not only did we have a rhythm and a ritual for living the Lord’s Day, we also knew what we weren’t going to do on the Lord’s Day. Why? Because this was a day set apart, a different day.

Why do I share all of this with you? One reason is that I want you to know that it can be done. Neither I nor one of my siblings nor my parents died from living this way (ha!) It is possible to reclaim Sunday, to live it differently. But also, I think it helps to have a concrete model for how things can be, right? Like I said, a change in mentality is worthless if it is not turned into concrete action, a concrete plan.

A Concrete Proposal

Ben Franklin is famous for saying, “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.” And this is the second point today. The second point is: if you walk out of here talking more about how weird Fr. Michael’s family is than you talk about how you or you and your family can reclaim Sunday—well, then this was an utter failure. Right? We’re here, we all profess to have faith in Jesus Christ and in his Resurrection—we have glimpses of this metanoia, we begin to see things more clearly—but what is the concrete change, the concrete plan moving forward for you? 

The concrete proposal for our parish is this: to reclaim Sunday as the Lord’s Day. Ok? Ok. But concretely, we need to eat this elephant one bite at a time. Not everyone is a cold-blooded German like my parents, so not everyone can just make a huge, life-altering decision like this and then follow-through 100% of the time—it’s rare! So we’re going to make incremental, real, concrete steps together. Ok? And these steps are concrete battles in the revolution. And just like a revolution, we aren’t going to win every battle, we won’t come out of battle unscathed, and we aren’t going to win the war overnight. But—but we can begin and we can strive to be faithful. 

So here is the proposal. We’re calling it “RECLAIMED SUNDAYS.”

Every fourth Sunday of the month, we are proposing a “Reclaimed Sunday.” And what that means is that on those Sundays, to the best of our ability—we are going to live those Sundays as completely reclaimed for the Lord. Now, if you’re a cold-blooded German like my parents, you just reclaim every Sunday starting yesterday, ok? Great, do it! But, the proposal I’m making, in order to eat this elephant one bite at a time, is for the next twelve months to reclaim every fourth Sunday of the month. Next week, I’ll have a really cool handout to help us sort through the nitty, gritty, the nuts and bolts. Like, literally breaking down every single step, every single thing (work, food, prayer, sports, TV, NFL, cell phones, ice cream, confession)—break everything down and help everyone make a concrete plan, a concrete ritual and rhythm for the Lord’s Day, the “Reclaimed Sunday.” And then, on the fourth Sunday of the month, you or you and your family are going to live it together; as a parish, we can live this proposal together. Maybe by the third month you’ll just reclaim every Sunday. Awesome! Maybe, every “Reclaimed Sunday” will come up, and it won’t be easy, but you’ll live it: hey, that’s twelve more Sundays than you reclaimed last year, right? The point, though: Sunday is about more than just making sure we get to Mass; it’s about an entire day reclaimed for the Lord. And this day isn’t just a precept, a rule, a law we have to follow—it’s something our heart desperately needs. It’s something we need, our kids need, our community needs. 

Everyone keeps trying all of these programs and clubs and teams and events and on and on. We keep talking and talking, thinking and thinking. But I think it’s actually a lot more simple than we make it out to be: what if we just need to return to the essentials? What if we live the proposal that has been there since the beginning: to make the Lord’s Day holy.

So we are going to do a soft-start next Sunday, April 28—fourth Sunday of the month. You don’t have all of the tools and ideas and stuff—we’ll get there. For next Sunday, just begin simply. Make the intentional decision to live next Sunday more intentionally. We’ll talk about practicals later. Maybe you want to steal a few ideas from my family’s rhythm. Fine, great! But the big thing: just begin. Next Sunday, reclaim that Sunday for the Lord in an intentional way. 

The Good Shepherd

One last quote from one of the fathers of the Revolution, this one from Thomas Paine: “We fight not to enslave, but to set a country free.” “Reclaimed Sundays” is not about another rule, or program, or just another thing we have to do in our already-too-busy life, no. I’m not fighting this fight to enslave you with more rules and to-dos. I’m fighting, we’re fighting for freedom, the freedom of the children of God.

A big theme in our Mass today is the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd. And this is what the Good Shepherd is calling us to: into his flock, into a place where he will protect us and care for us. Our job? To go to him, to enter into the rest only he can give. I honestly think reclaiming Sunday will do just that.