By Stuart Hamilton
I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but it seems like something has gone a little haywire in our country. If you’re like me, the failed assassination attempt on former President Trump’s life three weeks ago was quite possibly one of the most shocking moments of American politics during my lifetime. Shocking, but, sad to say, not unexpected. To me, it is the natural culmination of the dehumanizing rhetoric that has become increasingly heated on both sides of the political spectrum since about 2013. It seems you can only label your political rival “the end of democracy” for so long before someone takes you seriously enough to do something violent about it.
Still, surprising or not, the July 13th attempt left me a little shaken and concerned about where, exactly, our country is headed. It’s within that context, that I took my family to weekend mass at Holy Trinity Church. That evening Fr. Anthony Chandler, the vicar of priests, was filling in. I have never met Fr. Chandler, but the homily he gave spoke to my heart and I thought I’d share some of the insights I got from it here.
Father didn’t directly address the news of that weekend, rather, he opened his homily by asking for our prayers. The prioritization of the prayer request is what struck me.
“First, pray for the ongoing Eucharistic Congress.” The weekend before I had taken my family to my childhood home, Washington county, to attend the Eucharistic procession that was working its way through Kentucky as part of the US National Eucharistic Congress. We processed from the St. Catherine motherhouse three miles down the main highway to St. Rose Priory, the first Dominican parish in the US, and my home parish growing up.
I was quite moved by this experience. I sensed our Eucharistic Lord, leading the crowd of approximately 200 towards the parish where my children and I had first received our sacraments, where many of my family members have worshiped for generations and are buried, and where my wife and I plan to be buried. Walking with my children in prayer, with friends and family, it seemed to me like the past became physically entangled with the present and the future. It truly opened my eyes to the timeless miracle of the sacrament and it’s power to drive out evil wherever it is present. I am reminded of St. Paul’s words “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31)
“Secondly, pray for our country.” He followed this request with a simple explication of that weekend’s reading; Mark 6:7-13–Jesus sending the apostles out to preach in his name. As Fr. Chandler pointed out, these were ordinary men, fishermen and farmers, empowered by Christ to do the extraordinary–changing the world with the gospel of Christ. They were ordinary men, like us, and like them, we also have been called. “The world is going haywire,“ Fr. Chandler said, “The world needs the gospel, and we’re the one’s called to share it with them.”
I don’t know where things are headed. However, Fr. Chandler’s words remind us of one thing I do know: politics alone cannot fix what’s wrong with our country. As one Christian songwriter put it, “There’s never been a savior on capital hill.” It’s time for us to follow the lead of our Eucharistic Lord. We must put him at the center of our efforts, with prayer and adoration. Then, like the apostles, saints, and martyrs before us, our mission is to take Christ out into our world, and change it. Only through Christ can we escape the fatal American binary that makes enemies of our neighbors. It is Christ who cuts through all the noisy conflict, presenting us with a vision of unity and peace that we are all longing for.
Archdiocese Of Louisville Family Ministries 