Good morning! What a joy to be able to share in the Eucharist together! Happy father’s day to all our fathers living and deceased.  Having been a father and grandfather for many years, as I prepared for this homily I am sharing with you, the Holy Spirit led me to a reflection on what it means to be a father, what it means to be a good father, and what it means to be a good, Christian father. I recognize—my wife and children/grandchildren even more so-that I have not always lived up to the ideal father I am about to draw. But I draw comfort from the following anecdote. Someone once asked a monk how to become a saint. The monk replied, ‘fall down, get up; fall down, get up; fall down get up!’ Everything that follows applies to all of us, fathers, mothers, singles, children, even though I am emphasizing fatherhood this morning.

There are many images of father in our pop culture and how they have changed over the years! They range from Ward Cleaver, an idealized all round good guy, in the 1950’s sitcom, Leave it to Beaver (1957-1963) to Don Draper, a tortured unfaithful husband in Mad Men,  and finally, to Modern Family’s gay couple, Mitchell and Cameron  who have adopted Lily a Vietnamese orphan.  What is the image of a father who is a follower of the Lord?  The great prayer that Jesus taught us gives us many clues as to how we should answer the question.

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name

First, note that we say our Father, not my father. We are a community, pilgrims together and all adopted sons and daughters of one Father. All fatherhood is rooted in the great revelation that although God is totally transcendent, totally beyond our comprehension he loves us and cares for us. Reflect for a moment on the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Our First Reading today from Job reminds us of God’s transcendence, “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?” He is transcendent beyond our understanding but He is also a loving presence among us.  Our Second Reading emphasizes God’s love in sending his Son to save us from ourselves: “The love of Christ urges us on, because we are convinced that one has died for all.” The first characteristic of a good father, then, is to remain rooted in this reality. We must always remain connected to our Father in heaven through prayer, placing ourselves in His presence with the confidence of a son or daughter.

Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Jesus spoke constantly of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is not some imaginary Utopia but a reality among us right now in this very Church. The Kingdom of God is both present now but not yet fully present because we need to make it fully present through our lives. God’s Kingdom is one where there is justice for all: the little people, the dispossessed, the powerless, the poor, the vulnerable. There is no place in God’s kingdom for violence against women and girls seen so often in today’s world. There is no room for the exploitation of sex through trafficking and pornography. As fathers and husbands we have a role in evangelizing our communities so that these abuses do not occur.

There are many other ways in which we can evangelize our world. Every time we act with love to the “least of my brethren, you do it to me.” God’s Kingdom is inclusive; no one is excluded because of the way they look or the size of their bank account. There was a wonderful article in today’s Gazette by Rabbi Leigh Lerner of Beth Immanuel Temple who suggested that we should give money, not to the panhandlers at the stoplights, who often are not the poor, but to the organizations that try to really attack the problem of  drug addiction, mental illness, and homelessness. His rule was to count every person who asked for money until he reached 100. Then he multiplied whatever money he would have given to the panhandler by 100 and wrote a cheque to those organizations eg Old Brewery Mission, trying to attack the structural reason why people take to the streets. If you would have given a quarter, then you would write a cheque for $25.00 and so on. Pope Francis’ new encyclical , ‘Laudato si’’ which we will all be reading in the next few weeks asserts that God’s Kingdom also includes our blue planet, earth, our home and the home we share with all creatures. He quotes Patriarch Bartholomew of the Eastern Orthodox Church

Patriarch Bartholomew has spoken in particular of the need for each of us to repent of the ways we have harmed the planet, for “inasmuch as we all generate small ecological damage”, we are called to acknowledge “our contribution, smaller or greater, to the disfigurement and destruction of creation”.14 He has repeatedly stated this firmly and persuasively, challenging us to acknowledge our sins against creation: “For human beings… to destroy the biological diversity of God’s creation; for human beings to degrade the integrity of the earth by causing changes in its climate, by stripping the earth of its natural forests or destroying its wetlands; for human be­ings to contaminate the earth’s waters, its land, its air, and its life – these are sins”.15 For “to commit a crime against the natural world is a sin against ourselves and a sin against God”.16

Bringing about God’s Kingdom means we fathers need to be involved in whatever way we can in preserving this home we call earth.

Give us this day our daily bread

God’s kingdom becomes a reality when each of us not only shares our ‘daily bread’ but also when we only take from the economy or the environment what we need. Consumerism is a disease brought about by powerful interests through marketing. Many technological advances are marketed to us as something we simply must have whether we need it or not. Eg Apple Watch. Let us always ask ourselves, “do I really need this?” before purchasing. Be mindful in our daily lives. Mindfulness will help close the gap between the ‘is now’ of God’s Kingdom and the ‘not yet’. Live simply. Pope Francis has given us this message through his papal life style in which he lives as a middle class person, not a prince. As fathers involved in providing our daily bread, let us always do so in a way that makes us always mindful of those in need so that we do not demand more than our share.

Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us

This puts us in a paradoxical bind: if we can’t forgive others who have offended us, we can’t be forgiven for our own transgressions. In God’s Kingdom, we are dependent on one another for love but most of all for forgiveness that restores us to life and hope. I am always astounded by the ability of someone who has been terribly hurt to forgive the person who has hurt them. There was another example of this in the terrible tragedy of the shootings in South Carolina where many of the families prayed for the young man who killed their relatives or friends. I always pray that I will receive the grace to do likewise if I were ever in their position! Jesus lived his life forgiving those who hated him, ‘Father they know not what they do.” AS Christian fathers we will have many opportunities to forgive!

Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil

As pilgrims on this journey to the fulfillment of God’s Kingdom, there will always be the tension between our ego and God’s plan. This began long ago in the original Kingdom we were meant to live in, the Garden of Eden. But we ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and we tried to displace God, thinking that we can decide what is good and evil for ourselves. Think of the temptation to ignore the Truth and Reconciliation Report on our First Nations peoples. Think for example of the temptation to consider euthanasia or abortion as good. Think of the temptation to think we can do whatever we wish to the environment. Do we really need to buy bottled water which has resulted in our oceans being contaminated with thousands of square kilometers of plastic-some 8 million tons of plastic being deposited annually. As fathers let us always be aware of our need for the grace to align our plans with God’s plan for us.

Finally, I would like to close with Pope Francis’ words that Father Ray has put in today’s bulletin:

“…a father must be present in the family. That he be close to his wife, sharing everything joy and sorrow, hope and hardship; and that he be close to his children as they grow. To say, ‘present’ is not to say ‘controlling’! Fathers who are too controlling cancel out their children, they don’t let them develop.  Fathers must be patient. Often there is nothing else to do but wait; pray and wait with patience, gentleness, generosity and mercy.”

Happy Fathers’ Day to all our fathers!