Out of the Depths I Cry: Homily for the 5th Sunday of Lent

  

Ez 37:12-14

Ps 130

Rom 8:8-11

Jn 11:1-45

 

These are extraordinary, almost overwhelming  readings that deserve prolonged meditation. 

                                  

Ezekiel begins with a promise:  “Thus says the Lord God . . .  I will open your graves and have you rise from them.”  The commentary on this passage in The Jewish Study Bible is succinct:  “Traditional Jewish exegetes find here the idea of the resurrection of the dead before the day of judgment, a fundamental belief of rabbinic Judaism ascribed to Moses.”   Obviously the resurrection of the body was not a new or exclusively Christian belief.  In fact belief in the resurrection of the dead separated the Pharisees and the Sadducees.  We will reiterate our belief in the resurrection of the dead shortly in the Creed and yet again as we renew our baptismal promises at the Easter Vigil. 

 

Paul comments on the cost of sin and announces good news: Although the body is dead because of sin, if Christ is in us the spirit is alive because of righteousness.  What more could we want? 

 

Psalm 130—De profundis—is one of the most beautiful and evocative of the 150 hymns in the entire psalter. 

 

De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine:

Domine, exaudi vocem meam.

 

Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord.  Lord, hear my voice.   

 

We call to the Lord out of the depths of sin. We call from the tombs in which we find ourselves again and again.  We call to the Lord who hears our plea; the Lord who forgives our sins. 

 

The readings and psalm prepare us to hear the cinematically detailed story of Lazarus. It is not only the story of Lazarus.  It is our story.  It is the revelation of being brought from death to life in Christ through the forgiveness of sins—until  the final resurrection of the dead. 

 

Jesus, fully human, weeps at Lazarus’ tomb.  Jesus, fully God commands Lazarus to come forth from that tomb.   Jesus, fully human, wept over Jerusalem as he weeps over us.  Jesus, fully God, called the son of the widow of Nain to rise from his stretcher and the daughter of the official to get up from her bed, just as he calls us to eternal life.  In his commentary on this Gospel Jesuit Fr. Stanley Marrow points out the fundamental difference between Lazarus and the others who were brought back to life only to have to die again later; and Jesus, who rises from the dead never to die again.  If one were forced to choose only two words to describe the difference they would be reanimation and resurrection. 

 

Lazarus, the widow’s son, and the young girl were reanimated for a period of time, only to die later; not unlike the modern analog of cardiac resuscitation or the miracles wrought daily in hospitals throughout the world.  They are temporary stays.   Only Jesus came back from the dead never to die again. 

 

If Lazarus is us so is Martha.  The same Martha who complained to Jesus about Mary now makes a profound act of faith,  “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.  But even now I know that whatever you ask of God, God will give you.”   And then  the climax of this narrative: “I am the resurrection and life; whoever believes in me will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” 

 

It is not that we will not die to this life.  Jesus is not promising that we won’t suffer. Our deaths may come quickly without time to prepare.  Our deaths may come at the end of a slow but easy passage from this life; a deep sigh at the end and nothing more.  Or we may die after a prolonged period of pain, suffering, and decay.  It is not ours to choose.  What Jesus is promising is that, in Stanley’s words, “the eternal life which we possess here and now cannot and will not be interrupted even by death.” 

 

We cry to the Lord out of the depths of our souls.  The Lord answers with kindness and plenteous redemption. 

 

What more could  we want? 

 

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The photos are all black and white conversions from a ten-day visit to Vietnam after tertianship in Australia.  I can still see the provincial's face who, as we were discussing tertianship asked, "Do you want to stop in Hawaii on the way home?"  My reply?  "No.  I've never wanted to go to Hawaii.  Can I stop in Viet Nam.  It would take too long to explain why asking to go to Viet Nam was one of the best decisions I could have made.  

 

 

Fishermen killing time until high tide.   At low tide the sand extends for hundreds of yards and the boats are stuck.  

Vietnamese scholastics playing volleyball during recreation. 

 

A bike ride along the ocean.

This anonymous kid saw my camera and began hamming it up

 

Fr. Jack, SJ, MD