Parish Missions

GODISNOWHERE

There once was an angry and disillusioned young man

who took a can of spray paint and in large printed letters

sprayed GOD IS NOWHERE on the front of a boarded

up and abandoned building. Some time later a little

girl was passing that way with her mother and shouted,

"Look, Mommie, someone wrote GOD IS NOW HERE!"

The prophet Nathan cautions David that God prefers to be among his people, not in some cedar palace. No, Yahweh protests through his prophet that "I am the one who pitched a tent among you, don't hide me away!" That same God utters that same protest in our day. God does not want to be hidden among the trappings of this modern culture. In a season that has become increasingly materialistic and fed by the frenzy of consumerism, God pleads with us through the story of the prophet Nathan "don't hide me among possessions or obsessions." It would not be hard to see why the latest consumer fad would become the focus of the nation as it prepares--for what?

God doesn't want us substituting things or even persons for the Word made flesh. In the spirit of the Twelve Steps, we would appropriately ask ourselves this season if there are THINGS that are squeezing God out of our lives. Are we out of control? Are we powerless over the lure of consumerism? Are we in fact leading ourselves into a world where God is nowhere? National statistics support the reality that we have not only conveniently relegated God to "church" where God belongs, but now most of us go there only once a or twice a month.

Paul's letter to the Romans proclaims that God who has been hidden for so long is now made manifest in Christ Jesus. This divine secret of the overthrow of all that holds the human race captive and enslaved ended with the Virgin Mary's Fiat, "be it done to me according to your will." Perhaps it is still in some sense a secret through the ages -- a secret which each Advent and Christmas bids us discover, so that we may learn the extent to which God has been gracious, and may have the courage to live and act accordingly.

The angel's invitation to Mary is the ultimate divine wish to be with us: even pitching his tent among us was not enough. God loves us so much that God wants to be with us as one of us. Like Mary we are given the same invitation each time we approach this altar. As we commemorate our God becoming totally one with us, we are invited to become one with him -- to be the body of Christ to the world.

We do this by imitating Mary's Fiat. Her preeminent humility allows God to be where God has longed to be -- with us -- in us. In her encounter with the angel, what was impossible becomes real. So, too, we if we embrace God's Word made flesh in our lives--if we place ourselves humbly before the Lord, rejecting the enslavement of the things of this world -- then we share Mary's prerogative when we say "Amen" as we are presented the Body of Christ. And the impossible becomes real in us.

As the world seems to overwhelm us with consumerism and materialism, as eltism governs dealings with others less fortunate, it would appear that God is nowhere. But in this Eucharist we are offered again an invitation to allow our lives to reveal the divine mystery once again.

What is true in this Eucharist is as true of us in the world: the world of our family, the world of our work, the world of our church, the world of our nation. The Eucharist becomes real in us! Perhaps our lives need to proclaim that GOD IS NOW HERE!