Baccalaureate Mass
May 18, 2002
Edward Glynn SJ

Acts 2:1-11
I Corinthians 12: 3b-7, 12-13
John 20: 19-23

This evening's readings speak about the Church, both implicitly and explicitly. Given what is reported daily in the media, we may be uncomfortable speaking about the Church. We may be more inclined to speak against the Church. Or perhaps we would rather not speak of it at all. If we don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything. But I think these readings are helpful to us, as believers, while we sort our way through all that the Church has done and has failed to do. This is, I think, an especially appropriate matter for reflection for you graduates, as it is this Church --so publicly crippled, so obviously sinful, but nevertheless ongoing -- in which you will decide whether to participate or not, whether to lead or not. Perhaps you will choose to declare it irrelevant, or more seriously, irredeemable. Amidst the testimony of so much personal pain and evidence of such institutional failure, we may wonder what or, more accurately, where is the Church?

The readings from the Acts of the Apostles, from Paul's first letter to the Corinthians and from John's gospel give us three insights that are helpful as we try to understand what and where the Church is.

The first reading from Acts recounts the dramatic entry of the community of believers into a larger world. Together in the upper room and fearful that the fate that befell Jesus would be theirs, the Twelve had an experience of God that drew them out of their safe place and into their ministry. Depicted here with the imagery of fire and strong wind, this experience of God is the experience of the same Spirit who hovered over the abyss at the time of Creation; who breathed life into the nostrils of the earth creature; who gave voice to the prophets of Israel; who confirmed for Jesus his status as Son and who raised him from the dead. Now this Spirit of God, like a mighty wind, is the force that drives them out into the world. If the Apostles were left to foster their own drive toward self-preservation, the Good News of Jesus Christ would have stagnated and died in the upper room with them. When the Apostles leave their room, they embrace the simple but profound truth that the community of believers is most faithful to the Gospel when it turns its attention away from self-preservation and toward the very real life struggles of men and women in the world. The Church's future is ensured when it follows this example of the Apostles because it is then that the driving force of the Spirit of God is carrying it.

The second reading, from Paul's letter to the Corinthians offers us a second insight into dynamics of being Church. Again, it is simple but profound. Paul's letters usually address a specific and concrete problem facing a community of believers. This letter is no exception. The problem in Corinth is the lack of unity in the community. There are social, economic and cultural factions that are hostile to each other. The hostility present in the community bespeaks an obvious lack of understanding and appropriation of the basic Christian message. This is what Paul seeks to address. He says it is the Spirit who prompts all those who proclaim Jesus as Lord. He refutes the assertion of some that they are in elite possession of the gifts of the Spirit. These gifts he says are many and varied, they are available to and shared by men and women, by slaves and free, and by Greeks and Hebrews. It is not uniformity, which he espouses, but unity within diversity. Paul offers criteria by which one can assess the depth of understanding and appropriation of the faith. Different talents, different works, different gifts, all grounded in the same vision, all working for the common good.3 Because no one possesses all the gifts of the Spirit, each is responsible for what they can contribute to the building of the common good. For Paul, and for us, a mature, healthy and vibrant Church is one in which all its members are seen as uniquely gifted and all accept and share in the responsibility to shape the Church in a way that allows the Church to best fulfill its mission.

From the first two reading we know that the Church is to enter into and engage the world. Just as the drama of the Incarnation is played out within the cultural, social and political times of Jesus of Nazareth, so too, does the Church belong in the midst culture and society. And the Church best engages when it recognizes and utilizes the myriad of gifts that its variety of members offer.

But where in the world, where in the midst of culture and society is the Church, really? And what is its mission? The answer is quietly but profoundly proclaimed in today's gospel. Again, we find the disciples behind closed doors, afraid. Jesus appears and says to them: "Peace to you." This is not just greeting from a good friend. This, "peace to you" is not a wish but a declaration of what is now a reality. The breath and depth of this peace, which the disciples now possess, is revealed in the next line, "When he said this, he showed them his hands and his side." He does not show them his wounds as a means of identification. Neither are these wounds signs of destruction, death and despair. Rather, they are marks that point to where in the world God is. They are marks that reveal to us the meaning and purpose of God's activity in the world. And because they are the wounds on the One who is risen, they confirm for us what is finally real.

Jesus freely chose to live a life in which he sought to make humanity more humane by touching the untouchables, by embracing the outcasts, by challenging the presuppositions of power, both religious and civil, that created the conditions of oppression and poverty. In doing so, he himself became a victim and so from the depth of his being was unleashed a cry of despair. It was the same cry that has reverberated throughout all of human history, the cry of abandonment, the cry of futility, the cry of injustice, the cry of defeat. But in this instance this cry entered into the depth of God and was embraced, soothed and finally quieted in the moment of the Resurrection.

And so again in this reading he says to the disciples: "Peace to you". Then he sends them as he was sent - into the world to find God among the dispossessed, to bring a voice to the voiceless, hope to the desperate and the Gospel to those who create the conditions of oppression. He sends them with the confidence that their future has been secured; that the kingdom has been irrevocably established and the causes of ultimate despair finally vanquished. They have peace and so they can act with faith, hope and love.

As they were sent, so are we -- as individuals and as a community of believers, as a Church. When Jesus sends the disciples, when he sends the community of believers, when he sends the Church, he sends them to make an inhumane world more humane; to proclaim an end to the human story different than that of death and defeat; and to participate in the life of God by participating in the liberation of a crucified people.

On this eve of Pentecost Sunday I pray that all of us and in particular our graduating seniors will seek always to direct our various talents and gifts not toward self-promotion or self-preservation but toward the service of the Gospel. And when we seek to find God in all things, we look first among the marginalized, among the voiceless, among the disenfranchised, among the poor, among a crucified people because where Christ is there is the Church.

Honorary Degree Citation for Leslie Lenkowsky
By George Bilgere, Department of English

Iowa rolls on forever
Through the Greyhound's windows
And the young woman from New Jersey,
A Vista volunteer on her first assignment,
Hears herself saying, Why would anyone
Live here? Only emptiness answers.
Six months later she can't imagine
Any other home
Than these rolling cornfields,
Where small town farmers she'd come to help
Rebuild their homes after flooding
Instead helped her
Understand the word community.
And when her job here is finished
She walks away with more than she gave.

One day a nervous kid from Denver,
An AmeriCorps volunteer,
Enters a different world,
A classroom of Detroit first graders
And comes out a year later, a young man
Who has taught them how to read,
But knows he'll never change their lives
As much as they changed his.
And he walks away with more than he gave.

A boy from the east side of Cleveland
Arrives on the surface of the moon
Or so it seems on this Sioux reservation
Baking on the South Dakota plains.
He's here to help build houses
For people who have so little,
But who will come to teach him so much
About the power of family.
To friends back home who ask him
What he did, he simply says,
I walked away with more than I gave.
From his high window in the Capital
A man is watching all of them,
All of the brave young men and women.
He is the one who sent them
To change the troubled face of the land.
And he knows that their sacrifice has changed him too,
That he has grown as they have grown,
And that one day
He'll walk away with more than he gave.

John Carroll University is honored to honor you,
Builder of character and community,
And confers upon you
The degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa.

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