Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, I'm faced today with a slightly difficult task, and that is, in our program of initiating you into the various changes that will take full force on Palm Sunday, we have arrived at another step and that is today the offertory. The offertory is not in a new right in any way as nothing essentially changed but it has been simplified in this way that the priest when he receives the pattern with the bread says the following prayer, blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, this bread which earth has given and human hands have made will become for us the bread of life, period.

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Then when he receives the cup, he says, blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, This wine which earth has given and human hands have made will become for us a spiritual drink. Now you are supposed to answer to these things, but today we don't do that because we have not been sufficiently prepared for that. However, I just let it go with this. That is, in some way, so all the other prayers except what we call the secret or the oblation prayer, all other prayers that were used to be said by the priest have been dropped. Now for us it is important and for you to kind of understand what is the spiritual significance of this change in itself, not earth-shaking, one would say.

[02:30]

And that is the task, and in an attempt to bring this together and somehow show this in the context of today's liturgical setting, Let me just say a few words about this Sunday. As you know, this is kind of the, one can say, halfway on our pilgrimage to the desert, to the feast of the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, to Easter. We see and we anticipate being halfway and looking forward. We see the new Jerusalem in its glory and its ether joy already before us. This is like a little oasis in this pilgrimage through the wilderness of these 40 days.

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So we praise Jerusalem, Jerusalem as the bride of Christ, as the one who is getting ready for the wedding feast of the Lamb. Now the texts which you just have heard all refer to this fact. First, they are the last words, one can say, the last versicles of the second book of Chronicles. Now, this book ends what we would call the history, the historical part of the Old Testament. And it gives indeed a summary of the whole history of salvation. Jerusalem, the city that has the house of God, which is God's home here on earth, has endlessly and again and again been unfaithful, has apostatized.

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And therefore finally, in this great, let us say, judgment, of the Babylonian invasion has been raised to the ground in the sixth century before Christ. But then, and that was the meaning of this lesson today, Jerusalem rises again. The exile is being ended by whom? By Cyrus, a Persian lord and king. So one can say by a Gentile, or at least by somebody who in some way is beyond the strict limits of the Jewish people. That's significant. In some way into this resurrection, if I may say so, of Jerusalem and the rebuilding of Jerusalem, it's important the invitation to rebuild Jerusalem comes from the Persian king.

[05:51]

So it is in some way the, how can I say, the desire of the world that Jerusalem should be rebuilt. I think it's important in the context because then when you turn to the reading according to Saint Paul from the second epistle to the Ephesians, Then you realize that in this, indeed, majestic epistle, the innermost secret of the plan of God's salvation is revealed to us. What motivates, one can say, the whole history of salvation? It's God's love for man. Not man's love for God, but God's love for man. We are saved not by our own deeds, but we are saved by the faith in the fact that God, the Eternal Father, loves us and sends to us Jesus Christ to do for us whatever is needed to rebuild the destroyed walls of Jerusalem.

[07:08]

And that is then also the meaning of the gospel. We are in the midst of the wilderness, and there on the pilgrimage of the chosen people, the sign of the cross is being erected. The symbol of the cross, which is the serpent, the brazen serpent, to which the people look in an act of faith and confidence as the symbol of their salvation. And this serpent represents Jesus Christ and his cross. And what is he? He is the manifestation to us, again, of the Father's infinite love. wonderful sentence of the Gospel of Saint John that just has been read, really is a summary of the entire meaning of Christianity. For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

[08:24]

See, this is the inner heart of our Christian faith. This is what we live on. It starts as you immediately see God so loved the world. One can say the totality of God's love, the infiniteness of God's love, turned towards the world, the world, everything, absolutely universal, the entire world of creation. He loved him so that he gave everything he had, his only begotten son. For what purpose? That nobody may perish, but we all have eternity. That is, here we are at the heart of the whole Christian faith. Now I would ask the one question which of course immediately rises out of this. So what does it mean in this whole context if we bring our gifts to the altar at the offertory?

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If you are invited to give your gifts at the altar, what is it? Are we again, let us say, in some way on the old road, where in last analysis still salvation depends on man and what he is doing and what he is offering and giving to God, instead of depending on God's gift for us, which is Christ Jesus, the Son of God, made man, totally given to us unto death? the giving of the last drop of his blood. Where are we? Now it is simply this way, see, that certainly, and in these texts, the essence of the sacrifice of the mass is Christ's offering himself for us. Christ dying and rising for us. That is the essence of the sacrifice. And the whole meaning of these little corrections in the offertory rite is only this, to make it absolutely clear that this offertory, this act of bringing your gifts to the altar is not the sacrifice.

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This is not the sacrifice which reconciles God and man. So therefore we are not on the pagan line, definitely not. that we give our gifts in order to appease God, this is not the Christian offertory and sacrifice idea. Because if we did this, what would we do? Now let us say the efficacy or goodness of our sacrifice would certainly then immediately depend on the quality or even more the quantity of what we offer. Therefore, the bigger the contribution at the collection, the better our sacrifice. And then, of course, $1 is more than 50 cents, and so on. So we get into this whole business. This is not the essence of it. It's not our contribution which constitutes the sacrifice in the Christian sense.

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But it is Christ doing for us everything that has to be done out of his completely selfless, agape love for us. That is the essence. And therefore, any reference to the idea of sacrifice has been carefully avoided in these words that I just have read to you. But simply what comes in here and what is the intention to express is this, that we as men and also and especially as Christian men, are still naturally, like Adam, members of this world, of this creation, that we are God's lieutenants in this creation. And that therefore, we come to the altar, we act as it were, bringing, and that is also, I think, in a very special sense, it is the contribution and the mission of the Catholic layman.

[12:56]

as a priest, as a member of the common priesthood of Christ, that he takes and brings to the altar creation, the concrete universe in which we live, in which we work, in which every one of us has his profession, in which he therefore contributes to the development, one can say, to the desanctification of this universe. So what you do is that you take, let us say, God's gifts to you, the God of creation, but what human hands have made, that means you have taken what God gives us in creation, you turn it into bread through your work, you take the grapes, God's gift in creation, you turn it through your craft, through your art, through your activity as lords of this creation, you turn it into wine, and the bread and wine, these transformed gifts,

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These gifts of man as man, as priest, as Lord of creation, this you bring to the altar in all its goodness and its wonderful, let's say, inner perfection, representing unity. Bread represents unity. The wine represents unity. Bread represents strength. The wine represents joy. This, one can say, the dance of creation is danced by you at the operatory. But then this is taken by the priest, and at this moment I would also emphasize by the ordained priest. Ordained because it has a specific function that nobody in any way can replace. And that is his specific function as representative of Christ, who comes into this, let us say, dance of creation with his own transforming power, raising and giving eternal life

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to what we offer and what we have here in the realm of this creation, which, after all, is sighing all under the seal of death. But Christ lives, and this is Christ's prerogative, and this is why the congregation as a whole, in that way, does not have the power to represent Christ in that specific act. in which He, as the Word of God, is sent into this world, into this world, in order for us to accept, to offer that sacrifice which alone is pleasing to the Father's infinite love, and in that way in which we as human beings can only receive, which we can only, as Holy Scripture says, believe. Faith is our participation. So I would say, in this way, these two elements have to be pretty clearly distinguished and seen.

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Our sacrifice, what we do as, and I would say what we offer on the gift, on the altar, is already offered by us, not simply as human beings, but it is love is offered by us as priests, and therefore it is offered for us in the Holy Spirit. What we offer at the altar, what you offer, is given in the Holy Spirit. And that is the reason why what we offer, the bread and the wine, is offered by each individual but for the salvation of the whole. And therefore also this sacrifice is accompanied by prayer. Without prayer, our sacrifice as human beings, as Christians, as priests in the common priesthood of Christ would not have any value. We offer it together with prayer, in prayer. We offer it singing. What does this mean?

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In the Holy Spirit. This is an offering which is not made in order to make a name for ourselves, but which is made in order to express our service in the whole order of Christ and of the Father's order of creation and of grace. And therefore, the offering for the poor, I wish, you know, that maybe sometime the time may come, the day may come where, for example, here also at this altar, sometimes the gifts for the poor are offered. This is one of the, let us say, the strong advice which the new order of mass gives. that the gifts offered at the altar should not only be just only the bread and the wine which is being changed into the blood and body of Christ, but then also gifts for the poor should be offered. In some way it's regrettable.

[18:22]

I mean, up to now we haven't done this. Maybe in the future we should do this because we have the poor always with us. So in that way, you see right away, as soon, for example, as the gifts for the poor are added to, let us say, the ritual gifts of bread and wine, you have the context, you have the reality. You have the divine agape working through you to overcome and to deal with the misery of man in the service of creation, in the service of that justice and of that wholeness which the offertory gifts are supposed to present to us. So in that way, you see right away that in this act of the offertory, in the whole act of Christian sacrifice, we act really as bride of the bridegroom. That is the reason why this Sunday is in the sign of Jerusalem.

[19:25]

What is Jerusalem? Jerusalem is in that way the woman What is the, as I say, essential role of the woman? Certainly not to be dead. Certainly not to be passive. But the specific kind of cooperation, and that is the humility of absolute trust. And that is then the healing power of mercy. but not this kind of tendency to usurp power for ourselves. This is not the meaning of Christianity. And therefore in our Christian, let us say, liberality, in our Christian freedom, Also in the act of sacrifice, and especially there, we realize these two things, what everybody offers from the whole world of creation, drawing the cosmos into that love which loves the whole world,

[20:27]

and at the same time leaving, let us say, the decisive, the last word to God's mercy who transforms our gifts that they become the sacrifice of Christ's absolute love for us. And that is, my dear friends, the reason for our joy today, and therefore in singing we offer our gifts and we realize, be joyful, Jerusalem and gather together all who love her be filled with great gladness you have mourned because of her now you may rejoice and suck your fill from the breasts of her consolation that my dear friends is our great happiness that we are filled with this spirit that we assist at this act of, as I say, really, maybe it's not to us, we are not accustomed to it, but it's really the love changes God the Father into a mother.

[21:31]

And in some way, we are here to be filled with gladness by sucking, as it were, the breasts of that love which dies for us that we may live. This morning we have a brief announcement. The Easter celebration this year will begin at a quarter of four in the morning on Easter Sunday, so there will be no midnight mass. This, of course, is intended to gauge our Easter ceremony so that the Easter mass actually takes place at dawn and really gives more significance to the mass.

[22:34]

and there will be no nine o'clock mass in the morning. So this is our Easter celebration beginning at four in the morning on Easter Sunday. If I be lifted up, I will draw all things to myself. These words from the Gospel not only describe the death that Jesus is going to die, but they reveal the purpose of his sacrifice, that all men are to be reconciled in him to the Father, that we are to be made whole within ourselves, that we are to be united to each other. And this new reality which Christ came into the world to accomplish is the very heart of the Christian message.

[23:38]

It's a message of reconciliation, a message of unity within ourselves, and a message of reunion of all mankind. And it is this new state of things which Jesus came into the world to accomplish. and which we are preparing to enter into more deeply during this season. But I think it's essential that we point out right in the beginning that it is not God who has to be reconciled to us. but rather we have to be reconciled to Him. And Christians in the past have confused this notion. And as a result, God has appeared as a wrathful and revengeful God who has to be appeased, who has to be reconciled. He's angry with us. And so we set out to perform good deeds and make sacrifices and offer gifts to God to appease Him.

[24:42]

so that he will put down his raft, so to speak. We realize very keenly that it's an infinite God that we're trying to appease. And because he is an infinite God, his demands then upon us are infinite. And the result of such confused thinking is that we realize that nothing we can do can appease such a God, because his demands are infinite. And what is the result of this failure on our part? Well, we begin to realize that God then has rejected us. If we can't appease him, then he has rejected us. That we are helpless before him. There is a certain hostility then grows up within us. Anyone who has rejected us we grow hostile to such a person. And everyone is in this predicament.

[25:46]

We feel rejected. And whether one calls that which rejects us God or nature or destiny or fate or the social condition, we all find ourselves rejected. Everyone carries a hostility towards the existence into which we have been thrown. We feel hostility towards the hidden powers which determine our life, towards which we feel guilty, you might say, and that threatens us with destruction because we are guilty. And so we naturally feel hostile and rejected towards that which rejects us. And we try to appease this power And in failing to appease it, we grow hostile to God. But this hostility is not only aimed at God, but it's aimed at ourselves, too.

[26:48]

If God rejects us, then we end up rejecting ourself. It's a hopeless situation, we feel. And we reject others, too, because they are in the same position. And as we grow hostile towards destiny, We grow hostile towards ourself and towards all other men. But certainly the message of Jesus is not that at all, but rather it's the message of Jesus is be reconciled with God. And that means at the same time to be reconciled to ourselves and to all others. It doesn't mean that we have to try to reconcile ourselves. It doesn't mean that we have to try to reconcile others. Try to reconcile God and you only end up in failure. The Christian message is that a new reality has dawned, a new state of things has appeared in which we are reconciled to the Father.

[27:56]

We don't have to do anything, we don't have to say anything, we don't have to prove anything. All we have to do is to be open to this new reality, to be grasped by this new reality which is Jesus Christ. And reconciliation means and it makes reality or this new reality possible. Reconciliation makes reunion possible also. This new creation is the reality in which all that is separated and divided is reunited. In Jesus, we find human life perfectly united to the Father. Not only does he represent this new reality, but he mediates it to us. He makes it possible for us to enter into this. And when one is in Christ, as Saint Paul says, if one allows Christ to draw him to himself,

[29:06]

Then we begin to experience this union with God, who is the ground and the meaning of our very existence. And because Christ accepts us and he desires to draw us to himself and to reconcile us to his Father, then we find for the first time the courage and the power to accept ourselves, not in any kind of pride or in any false satisfaction or self-complacency, but in a deep spirit of self-acceptance. It's amazing that you find, even in deeply religious people, this rejection of self. They feel that God has rejected them. And because he has, they can't accept themselves. We think that we love ourselves with a passion, but deep down there is this hostility even towards ourselves.

[30:12]

But once we find ourselves in Christ, once we open ourselves to him and allow him to draw him, to draw us rather, to himself, then we find the courage to accept ourselves as we are. And one accepts himself then as something that is eternally important. And we find that we are infinitely lovable. And all the hatred that one has for himself disappears. And this unity within ourselves, this wholeness that we begin to discover within ourselves, makes it possible for us to accept others, to be united to others. And this is the power that Jesus comes into the world to mediate to us. And when we are grasped, for example, by a human face and see it,

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as a human being and are able to rise up and overcome all our personal distaste and racial strangeness and national conflicts, when we are able to overcome and rise above the differences of sex and age and beauty and knowledge and all the other things that cause separation between men, There is the new creation taking place. There is the new reality dawning. And mankind lives only because this is happening over and over again. And this really is the ultimate significance of the Church. That here, the reunion of man to man is confessed and is continually being realized in the church. Even if it's only realized in fragments, even if it's overwhelmed at times by weaknesses, even if it's only distorted

[32:28]

This is the ultimate significance of the Church, that it's making this new reality possible for man to approach his fellow man, for man to approach God with confidence. This is the message of Jesus. This is the new reality, the new creation. And the Church realizes this as it never did before, that this indeed is its significance. And here in the Mass, the Church is striving to emphasize these three elements in our Eucharistic celebration. trying to realize the depth of the Christian message, that it is here at this altar that we are reconciled, that we are united within ourselves, that we find wholeness within ourselves, that we are united to our brothers, not only here but throughout the whole world.

[33:32]

And it's these three basic elements of the message of Jesus that have received new prominence in the communion rites of the Mass, which we introduced this morning. We realize, of course, that the real preparation for communion begins with the recitation of the Lord's Prayer. And, of course, we've been doing that now for several years, but I think today we should strive to understand it more deeply, what we are striving to do when we all together recite this prayer. Before it was a prayer that was limited only to the priest, but it really didn't make any significant, have any real meaning or significance at all, if only the priest is saying it. Because this is something that we all must participate in. And so the priest introduces the prayer by saying, let us now with confidence pray to the Father in the words our Savior gave us.

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And the key word in that phrase is this confidence. And this confidence now comes from the fact that during the Canon of the Mass we have joined ourselves with Christ in his sacrifice. And through this sacrifice of Jesus, which we have entered into as deeply as man is able to, It is through this sacrifice that we find that we are reconciled to God the Father. And so now we can stand before God and with confidence we can address Him now as Father. It's our public proclamation that we are united to God, that we have risen above all this hostility and enmity that we find in ourselves, that we can now look towards God with confidence and address Him as Father. We realize that it is not we who are striving to appease him, appease a wrathful God, but it is Jesus himself who has proclaimed and allowed us to be reconciled to God.

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He draws all mankind to himself and there we are united to the Father. And this prayer ends on a very triumphant note For all of us say, for the kingdom and the power and the glory are yours now and forever. Amen. Of course, these words are not part of scripture, they're not part of the original texts of the Lord's Prayer, but certainly they are a very ancient formula which dates back to the second century, actually. And it's not simply an ecumenical gesture on our part, because Protestants have been saying that for many years. But if it does serve that purpose, that's very well and good. But if we are simply reinstating an ancient text which has slipped into disuse on our part. And at the end of the Lord's Prayer, our thoughts turn to our fellow Christians, and we try to cement this bond of unity between ourselves by the kiss of peace or by the handshake, whichever you find most natural.

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For a husband and wife to shake hands maybe is not the most natural thing in the world. Certainly they could exchange a kiss of peace. Or a mother doesn't shake hands with her children. It's only natural that she would kiss her children. Maybe as the child grows older a handshake is more natural. or to shake hands with the person sitting next to you, a complete stranger, or your neighbor is the most natural thing in the world. We leave it up to you to give expression, concrete expression, to this unity now that exists between all mankind. You want to share this with others. You want to share the peace which Christ has come into the world to give us. It's not my peace, but it's our peace. And so in the Lord's Prayer we ask that we be forgiven as we forgive those who trespass against us. And this mutual exchange of affection is our gesture, you might say, of forgiveness.

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And our forgiveness is not simply extended to the members of our family, but It's extended to all mankind, not only to the person sitting next to you, but to all men, even to our enemies. Here is the moment in the Mass when we ask God to forgive us the same way that we forgive all others, and we express it in a very concrete way. And as the bread is being broken at Mass, we plead for forgiveness. Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us." And the priest holds up the body of Christ, and present in the bread, and he says, this is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. And these words are a kind of absolution of our sins. After we've been pleading for God's mercy, Now the priest holds up the body of Christ and proclaims that our sins are taken away.

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And in the last stage of the communion rite, the priest extends an invitation to all. Happy are they who are called to his supper. Not only Is he trying to make us all aware that what we are receiving, we are receiving the body and blood of Christ, but it's an invitation to all to come forward now and to participate fully in this meal. A meal is nothing if you don't eat the food that is presented to you. It's an insult to the host. You know, if you're sitting down at the table and the dishes are passed, the food is passed, and you keep saying, no thank you. It simply doesn't make any sense at all. It's an insult to the host. And if what we have been doing in this Mass makes any sense at all, or if it's just, otherwise it's just a formality that we're going through, you know, in the beginning of the Mass we paused, there was an opportunity for you to think of your sins, to recall them, and there again the priest

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You know, acknowledge the forgiveness of Christ that he imparts to us, and we beg continually for his mercy. We forgive those who have offended us during this Mass. If there is any reality to this rite, then when the invitation is extended to all men to come forward to participate in this supper, then even the man who recalls the beginning of the Mass that he is in sin, that he has failed before God, and even if he realizes that he is in serious sin, then such a man should come forward and receive Holy Communion if what he has been doing makes any sense at all. Forgiveness has been imparted to us and we come forward to receive Holy Communion with the intention that at the first opportune moment, certainly he will confess his sins in the sacrament of penance.

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But we are all invited, if we have entered into this Mass, if we have acknowledged ourselves as sinners, if we have been reconciled to God, if we have forgiven our brothers, then what stands in the way of receiving Holy Communion? Nothing at all. And so we rejoice then. Happy are they who are called to the supper, and that's everyone who is present here. And the people respond, Lord, I am not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and I shall be healed. Again, those words don't make any sense at all unless you are willing to receive the forgiveness which God imparts to you at this Mass. And as each approaches the sacrament, the priest says, the Body of Christ, the Blood of Christ, Of course, we've been doing that all along, and you answer, Amen. It's a little act of faith on your part to say, Amen.

[42:40]

You are saying, yes, it is so. I have been reconciled to God with Christ, that I now accept myself for what I really am. Yes, I am a sinner, but I am infinitely lovable, and I have been reunited with all my brothers. Amen. And after receiving communion, the new rite calls and suggests that we spend a few moments in silence or perhaps sing a special hymn. We've been doing that very naturally for the last couple months, just having a period of silence. We went through a time, you know, when we were kind of scandalized at the end of Mass. began talking right after mass. You know, in Catholic churches you simply didn't do such a thing. And some of the brothers were scandalized that all of a sudden this bedlam began to break out and this spirit of quiet was gone.

[43:50]

But then after thinking about it more deeply, we began to realize, well, what is the most natural thing to do after you've received Holy Communion but to greet one another, the people that you haven't seen since last Sunday, to share your joy with them and to talk with them, to exchange greetings with one another. And if you want a period of silence to extend this period of thanksgiving, well then we invite you to go down to the crypt. That is the place of private prayer and meditation. And then to make it even further to emphasize this notion of mutual forgiveness and understanding and unity between each other, as we have been doing so many years now, we've been asking you to come over to the pottery, to the guest parlor, and to have coffee and bread with us.

[44:52]

It's our feeble attempt to carry the rite of communion into our daily life, and not just to be content to express it formally here in church, but to give actual expression to it. But maybe in the throats of some this coffee and this bread sticks as a lump because We realize that maybe we have achieved it here, this reunion of all men with each other, but we know that there are many countless thousands who have never experienced this new reality which Jesus has brought into the world. And I realized it myself very keenly in traveling yesterday. I bought a copy of Time magazine as I was waiting for a plane, and there the feature story just revealed to me so keenly those thousands of people who have no notion of the new creation, of the new reality, who are finding their peace and their joy and their contentment in their addiction to drugs.

[46:07]

And this is not only in teenagers but even pre-teenagers who have nothing to live for anymore. That they find their whole purpose of existence in this addiction. And so we realize this unity here and we find new meaning to life here at Mass and in this new communion rite. But at the same time we realize that there are thousands who have no inkling of what this is all about. And one wonders what we must do about it. And really one doesn't know the answer. But at least here in this church we are beginning to catch on to what it's all about. We are beginning to realize it here just among ourselves. And I think that itself is a great accomplishment. And in that same magazine, forgive me for talking about it, but there was some movie producer who was quoted as saying that Christianity is a thing of the past and at this moment in history we are waiting for something new to replace it.

[47:20]

And when one really stops to think about it, I think that there is a great deal of truth in this. that the Church doesn't have the message to preach Christianity, but the mission of the Church is to preach the new reality, which is Jesus Christ, who has reconciled us to the Father by drawing us to himself. Perhaps churchmen have been too interested in perpetuating the institution itself, and we have overlooked the heart of the message of Jesus. But we realize at this moment that this is beginning to change. And even here at Mass we begin to see that this new reality is being achieved. We catch a glimpse of it here this morning. And so let us at this moment make a profession of faith. We can stand.

[48:23]

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