(Twenty-second Sunday of the Year (A): This homily was
given on August 30, 2020 at St. Pius X Church, Westerly, R.I., by Fr. Raymond
Suriani. Read Jeremiah 20:7-9; Psalm
63:2-9; Romans 12:1-2; Matthew 16:21-27.)
[For the audio version of this homily, click here: Twenty-second Sunday 2020]
One day a man was walking through the woods and he came upon a butterfly cocoon. He watched it for a long time as the creature inside struggled to force its way through the very small opening at the bottom. Well at one point it appeared that the butterfly had gotten stuck on its little journey, so the man decided to come to its rescue and offer a helping hand. He took a pair of scissors and widened the hole of the cocoon ever so slightly. The butterfly, of course, came out quite easily—but, much to the man’s surprise, it didn’t fly. All it could do was crawl on the ground, since its wings were too small and its body swollen and much too heavy. And sadly, that’s how this particular butterfly spent the remainder of its very brief earthly life.
What that man didn’t realize was that the butterfly needed to struggle. In fact, EVERY butterfly needs to undergo
this kind of difficult, challenging experience!
As I learned in preparation for this homily, by squirming and struggling
to get out of its cocoon, a butterfly forces fluid out of its body and into its
wings, a process which makes its body lighter and its wings stronger. Thus, when it does finally manage to get out,
it’s able to fly on its own.
UNLESS SOMEONE INTERFERES WITH THE PROCESS, LIKE THIS MAN
DID! He perceived that this butterfly
was suffering in some way, and he tried to shield the creature from the
experience. But—as he very quickly found
out—that was the wrong thing to do!
In our relationships with other people—especially our loved
ones—we all have this very same tendency, do we not? We want to shield them from suffering. We want to protect them from trial and from pain. Now in some cases, of course, that’s exactly
what we should try to do. But at other
times it’s wrong to try to shield our loved ones in this way—as Simon Peter
found out in today’s Gospel story from Matthew 16. After Jesus tells him and the other apostles
that he will soon suffer and die a horrible death, Peter says, “God forbid, Lord! No such thing shall ever happen to you.” Jesus then snaps back at Peter, “Get behind me, Satan. . . . You are
thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.” In other words, “Peter, you are trying to
shield me from a suffering which I must
experience—for your good, for your sake, for your salvation. If I don’t
die, you won’t live with me forever in my kingdom!”
As much as we might hate to admit it, some sufferings are
necessary, and for our own good—and it’s wrong for others to keep us from
passing through them! Imagine, for
example, a young mother who is diagnosed with breast cancer. The doctors have told her that she needs
radical surgery and extensive chemotherapy or she will die. The operation and the follow-up treatment
will almost certainly cause her terrible suffering. But it would be wrong for you or for me to
try to shield her from that pain by foolishly trying to convince her to fight
the disease on her own. She needs to
experience this suffering, and she needs to pass through it, in order to get
well. Without the suffering, there will
be no healing for her (unless she’s blessed with a miracle).
Most of the young people here will be back in school within
a few days, if they aren’t already. (Hopefully
most will be back physically, but all will be back at least virtually.) Now some of you young people may hate school
with a passion. (I hope you don’t, but
some of you might.) For you, sitting in
a classroom (either physical or virtual), reading books, and doing 3 hours of
homework every night may be a suffering like no other. But it would be wrong for your parents to
shield you from that suffering by allowing you to stay in your room all day
playing video games! You need to pass
through this suffering (which really isn’t that bad) for your own good.
After one of my parents’ friends from Barrington passed
away a number of years ago, his family sent me a prayer-card from his funeral. On the back of the card was a little
meditation (supposedly recording the words of the deceased). The meditation had
this line in it: “I’d like the tears of those who grieve, to dry before the sun
of happy memories that I leave when life is done.” In other words, “I want their sadness at my
death to pass quickly.” Here’s yet
another suffering we often try to shield people from: the suffering from grief
caused by the death of a loved one.
That’s wrong! People need to
grieve—and for much longer than a few short hours! It’s psychologically unhealthy to
short-circuit the grief process; any good psychologist will tell you that.
This, I would say, was one of the worst effects of the
pandemic lockdown. People were not able
to grieve properly; they were not able to grieve in a healthy way; they were
not able to grieve as they needed to grieve.
First or all, they couldn’t experience support and consolation from family
and friends at the wake, because wakes were not allowed (in some places they still
aren’t!). And, even more importantly, they couldn’t experience the Lord’s
consolation and strength that comes through the Eucharist and the Mass, because
public Masses were not allowed. People
were forced to deal with their loss in almost total isolation.
That’s not the way it’s supposed to be.
That’s why, if something like this ever happens again,
churches should demand to be designated as providing an “essential service.”
Because they do!
The bottom line is this, my brothers and sisters: Our
response to the suffering of others should include compassion, encouragement,
prayer, and active assistance. But we
must always beware, lest we make the same mistake Peter made in today’s Gospel,
and try to shield someone from a suffering which they need to experience.
And here’s one closing, sobering thought: In heaven, there
will probably be many people who will look back on their earthly lives and say
that their worst sufferings were actually their greatest blessings—because
passing through those sufferings brought them to conversion. And their conversion happily brought them to
God’s eternal kingdom.
