“love thy neighbor, unless he voted for Trump?”
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This past weekend I attended Mass at our local Catholic Church in our “snowbird refuge” here in central Florida.
Florida is a winter refuge for retired priests as well. Many come down from northern climes and lighten the load by joining the “Mass-saying rotation” in parishes throughout the Sunshine state during the season. All are welcomed by pastors who appreciate the help when activities (and collections) at parishes are at peak.
This weekend one of the ‘snowbird padres” presided. He is an elderly man, retired for a number of years from the active priesthood but still quite capable of saying Mass and delivering a reasonably coherent sermon.
The gospel for this week, as most regular attendees know carried the message of love your enemies as well as your friends, all are children of God. This priest chose, for this week’s homily to expand somewhat and explain a bit on that theme.
All well and good, I thought as I sat comfortably ready to hear his message…anticipating a pretty standard followup as to most gospel topics.
No doubt in his effort to hopefully heighten reception to his oration, he began with commentary relevant to today’s world events:
“As the gospel tells us”, to quote as accurately as I can, the father noted, “the Creator requires of us that to earn eternal salvation we must love our neighbors, our friends and family members, and even those who see us as their bitterest enemies.
“If he strikes you in the face, turn the other cheek so that he may strike you again (or something to that effect), the gospel tells. To earn God’s blessings we must love those who would do us harm. ISIS members are children of God and we must love them… and Russians… and even Donald Trump…”!!
As he no doubt expected, his last reference invoked more than a smattering of laughter…rim shot, please! Apparently feeling his attempt at contemporary humor had sufficiently loosened up the crowd, the rest of his homily proceeded in a more conventional manner.
I doubt, however, that I was the only listener who found his “late night comedy monologue quip” inappropriate and more than a little incompatible with the theme of the gospel.
But, restraint and good judgment to the contrary, I felt compelled, as I filed out after Mass to advise, in person and softly, this pious, and as far I know, good and gentle man, that at least this one member of the flock saw his “Jimmy Fallonesque” bit cheap and out-of place, and unworthy as a part of the message he hoped to convey. (Well maybe, it wasn’t in those exact words.)
Seriously, however, I do sincerely hope and want to believe that this priest’s reference to the president, in the context, was only a clumsy effort, intended to “warm up” the congregation to hear his message…and not to reflect and reinforce and advance our current Pope Francis’s undisguised animosity toward America, its traditional national values, its president , and, essentially, all things American.
Questions do linger, however:
– Did the good father perceive a friendly audience for advancement of a “popular” narrative with the Catholic left? This parish is at least 50% hispanic; the other half is heavy with eastern liberals who come here in the winter seeking some “global warming”. Even at that, though, the snickering enjoyment at his quip was somewhat less than he might have expected from this audience mix.
– He has likely considered my criticism as an insane reactionary rage over a little attempt at some harmless humor. If this priest takes criticism from a lifelong adherent to the faith in the same way the liberal, now retired pastor of my former parish in Bettendorf did, I expect he may build his next homily around the “incident”. And in the telling might be a slightly embellished recounting of what occurred. He may relate how the previous week he was “accosted” by a “deranged hater” right there in the narthex who loudly berated him for making a joking reference to a contemporary political figure as he sought to expand upon the Lord’s call for us all to love our neighbor as ourselves and to recognize we are all God’s children regardless of our political views. Hopefully it will not be further embellished by an apocryphal description of how he turned his other cheek to be struck again by that crazed parishioner.
But, at any rate,attempting to live to the spirit of this week’s gospel…I still love the guy…I just hope he removes that cheap laugh line from his spiritual monologue. DLH
