Wedding Homily for my Daughter

Deacon Bruce Maltzen's Homily for his daughter's wedding...

Today we gather to celebrate Bobby and Annaleah’s marriage. We celebrate it because it is customary to gather with family and friends to witness and rejoice with them as they join in this marriage. But just what is it we are celebrating?

We need first of all to begin to understand just what a marriage is in the eyes of the Church and of God. Most people just see it as a legal contract, or even worse a bondage of one to another. The Church however sees it as a uniting in the mystery of the Triune God.

The Triune God, that is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each God, each having a separate purpose in relation to the salvation of the World. However, all the Divine Persons of the Trinity act in perfect unity, that is they work in union with each other, since God is one and has but one will. On God’s level, so to speak, we find a being who is three persons while remaining one Being. Now we probably cannot fully conceive of a being like that, as we cannot conceive the dimension of heaven and in what we can perceive of our dimension we have no such thing. However we can gain some sort of faint notion of it as he has given us clues to it.

We see a slight notion of that joining together of persons when we see a marriage as we do today that is steeped in faith. We see that these two were separate and God will reach into this dimension and join them together in a way that they will be more than two, but they will become just one, somewhat like lines joined together to form a figure. A triangle is a single figure but in it exists 3 separate but conforming lines. In our Christian faith we can see this marriage as a sign of that three person God, such that we can begin to see the glimmer of just what that joining together, that unity of persons is really about.

In this marriage we should see reflections of something larger. You see, this is a Sacrament, that is, a sign - no - more than a sign, a touchstone or intervention into our normal everyday lives of God's presence with and in us. It is where God becomes one with us, and makes a covenant with us, a pledge to us, to promise to be with us in all things.

You see, Christ is a sacrament of God, that is, He makes God the Father more visible, that is, He makes God's love for us visible and touchable. He is the sign of God, the Covenant with God. Marriage then, is a Sacrament of Christ, making Christ more visible, that is Christ's love more visible and touchable.

In “Deus Caritas Est” (God is Love), Pope Benedict says that being Christian is not the result of making an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the result of an encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction. Therefore Love itself is not so much a decision as it is an encounter with another. Therefore marriage, the combining of our human love with God’s love to become one becomes an encounter with a person, that person being not only our spouse, but God who draws us and forms us together in him.

What a concept. To share the love that God shares, a gift that only can come from God. That is why this is a sacrament, to receive the Love shared between the Father and Son and Holy Spirit as John's Gospel states, "So that they may be one, as we are one…", that as husband and wife, Bobby and Annaleah can share that very same love. All it takes is belief, hearing and doing the Word of God. Can we believe Jesus? If you can, then what He says must be true, and therefore it is possible to share that love that Jesus talks about. Bobby and Annaleah, you MUST become one in that same love so that you can reflect the Father's glory in His Son. You do that by doing what Paul says in our second reading:

“Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another. And let the peace of Christ control your hearts, the peace into which you were also called in one body. And be thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly”

So that in this unity, this oneness, this marriage, you can become that Love of Christ. That as husband and wife you can become that light, that beacon of love for the rest of the family. Seeing this light, this Love, the rest of the family will begin to desire that light and love shared between the two of you, shared with Jesus the Son who shares it with the Father in heaven. With this immense and unlimited love abiding in you, Bobby and Annaleah, you should be able to surmount all the difficulties that will surely arise. You should be able to not only have love enough for your family, but should be able to extend that love beyond your family to the world that is so in need of love today.

And the world is definitely in need of all married couples to reflect God's love, example it to them. Today's culture does NOT support a sacramental marriage. Today's culture is a culture about “I” not “we”. Today's culture is about diversity in lifestyle's and getting what's yours and looking out for yourself. Today's culture is not supportive of sacrificial love, of giving oneself for another as our Gospel commands:

"This is my commandment: love one another as I love you.
No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. "

Today's culture does not support the idea of spending your life in love for another.
Today's culture looks at marriage as a cost reduction method, as a temporary “deeper” relationship, as a state recognized tax status, as an agreement to pool resources, as a security transaction to prevent loneliness, as a hedge against old age alone.

Oh yes, there will be problems; problems around and in your marriage. I won't give you the idea that marriage is easy. There will be troubles and sickness and pressures and interferences and all kinds of situations that will push you to the very edge and beyond of your ability to cope but never to the edge of your love if you continue to tend to it and grow it.

The nice thing is that in this time before your wedding – I’ve seen the two of you remain true to the commandment to love one another and to also “Put on … heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another.” I’ve seen you go through these trials in your life and support each other. I’ve seen you live lives of chastity and charity. I’ve seen you become the beacon of light that this world needs in your life and actions. Continue to do so, continue to act as if Christ is watching every action you do, not because he wants to catch you at something, but because like a good parent, He loves you and wants to see you doing your best to live life fully as He has provided for you.

So you must remember to lean on the covenant that the three of you, yes three... (Bobby, Annaleah and God)… the covenant the three of you will make here today. You will find in your lives that you will often be asked to go a little further, expend a little more of your time and energy when all may seem futile, you will be tempted to give up when it seems that it’s just too tough to go on. Yet it is then that you will need to rely on God's word and His grace, it is then that you need to rely on the covenant that you make here today. It is then that you need to continue to put on heartfelt com[passion, kindness, humility and gentleness. You will be asked to extend yourself, but you need to rely on God to work through your actions.

Marriage in the church is something far different from what the world thinks it is. You will start this marriage today pledging that you will be "true to each other in good times and bad, in sickness and health, to love and honor each other for all the days of your lives." These are things I’ve already seen you doing with each other. These are things you need to continue to do. Remember that marriage is more than consenting to live together and share your lives. You must remember at all times that it is a consenting to be a reflection of God's love.

This wedding is the beginning, the first vows, the public statement of - "not only do I love you, but I will put your needs and good foremost in my life, and I will treat you and see you as Christ has treated you and as Christ sees you." You see, He laid down his life so that you might have eternal life. His sacrificial love for you requires of you to love each other beyond all human capability. This is why the first rule of married couples is to make sure that their spouse gets to heaven. The reason that you will make these vows is far beyond the "I do it because I love you". You will do it because Christ has already done it for you, and He now asks you to do so for one another. In our Gospel He asks that you go and bear fruit, fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in His name he may give you. You must bring the taste of this fruit, His love, back into the world, to preserve the goodness He has placed into this world. He asks you to bear fruit in your marriage so as to prepare a place in your souls for Him as He prepares a place in Heaven for you!

Your brother in Christ,
Deacon Bruce

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Deacon Bruce Maltzen's Homily for June 19, 2011 - Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity


First of all - I want to say Happy Father's day to all the fathers gathered here. It such a great calling to be a father , and today we acknowledge those who have taken on that calling with great joy. Today, besides being Father’s day – which I will get to just a little later, is the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, a Sunday where we recall the most fundamental mystery of the Christian faith – that our one God is a Triune God. There is but One God as Our Lord declared to Moses on Mount Sinai. Yet, in the New Testament we realize the true nature of Our God - He is three persons. For God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are but the same God merely in three different persons. So how do we know that?

The Holy Trinity is first declared in Matthew’s Gospel through the words of Jesus:

"Go and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 28:18).

Later when Paul talked to the Corinthians – in our second reading from 2nd Corinthians:

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ
and the love of God
and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you

While the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each God, each has a separate purpose in relation to the salvation of the World. However, all the Divine Persons of the Trinity act in perfect unity, that is they aren’t out doing their own thing, but they work in union with each other, since God is one and has but one will. While all of this is certainly confusing, we can only pray that through the Holy Spirit's inspiration, we can hope to understand the Trinity. In time, through study and discernment, we can understand the Trinity and the nature of Our One God better, but only in Heaven will we truly experience the joy of serving the One God and seeing the mystery of the Holy Trinity face to face
Now, while this is all a mystery we do still have the ability to search into it and understand it better. That is the wonderful part of being Christian – or being Christ-like. We partake of this three personal God and enter into that mystery every time we come to Mass and actually more often than we know. So let’s try to understand this triune nature of God slightly better this time so that we can partake in it even more abundantly.

I intend to use here the explanation of the mystery of the Holy Trinity used by C.S. Lewis in his masterpiece called “Mere Christianity”. Now the name of the book might do it dis-service as it is not indicating that Christianity is simple or as in the dictionary definition of “MERE” as “being nothing more or better than”, but meaning at the basics, at the level of what all Christians believe in, one of the basic denominators of our faith found across all Christian denominations.

Let’s start this study with a simple Geometry lesson. How many here ever studied geometry in school (raise your hands). For those of you who haven’t or have forgotten everything you learned about geometry – this shouldn’t be too hard to follow. Let’s start with the simplest form in geometry - the line, where in one dimension the only figure that can be drawn is a line. Moving up the ladder – so to speak – we come to a place where there are two dimensions and the basic figure that can be drawn is a square or a rectangle, this is where we join two or more lines together to make a figure. Going even further up we come to the 3 dimensional world which we know and experience. Now we can join figures together to form solids – such as 6 squares joined together make a cube, such as we would see in a box or a package. I see that some of you are catching on. In a one dimensional world we can have a line, but many lines in a two dimensional world can make up a figure and many figures in a three dimensional world can make a solid.

In other words, as you advance to more and more complicated dimensions you do not leave the things from the previous dimensions behind, you simply combine them in new ways to make things in the new dimension. You combine them in ways that you could not have thought of if you lived in the simpler dimension.

Now let’s take what we learned from geometry and apply it to our faith. In the Christian account of God, we find a similar principle. The human level, although complicated enough for us to understand is a simple level. One person is one being like one line or one figure, and any two persons are two perhaps similar human beings but definitely different and separate, just as we find that any square in a two dimensional world can exist alongside another square and they remain squares but separate squares.

However, on the Divine level you still find personalities as in the human level and the same as in a three dimensional world you still find squares, but in the Divine level they are combined in new ways that we, who do not live on that level, cannot fathom. In that level, God’s level, so to speak, we find a being who is three persons while remaining one Being, just as the a cube is six squares while remaining a single cube.

Of course this is simply an exercise or example so that we might begin to grasp a piece of the enormity of the mystery of the Triune God. We truly cannot fully conceive of a being like that, as we live in a dimension that has no such thing. However we can gain some sort of faint notion of it as he has given us clues to it.
We see a slight notion of that joining together of persons when we see a marriage that is steeped in faith. We see that the two were separate and God has reached into this dimension and joined them together in a way that they are now more than two, but they are now also just one, somewhat like lines joined together to form a figure. This marriage we see in our Christian faith is a sign of that three person God, such that we can begin to see the glimmer of just what that joining together, that unity of persons is really about.

Remember back at the beginning of this I said that:

While the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each God, each has a separate purpose in relation to the salvation of the World. However, all the Divine Persons of the Trinity act in perfect unity since God is one and has but one will.

Well, one way to experience this is to watch people who kneel down in prayer. Observe them closely and you will see all three persons of God at work here. Those who have knelt down in prayer, do so to get in touch with God. They knelt down in prayer at the bidding of the Spirit who works within us to call us to be in communication with the Father, and then it is the Father to whom this person is praying, either asking for something or giving thanks or being silent before Him as He reveals himself to the one in prayer. But notice whom it is that is standing beside him, helping him talk with the Father. It is Jesus, as He is the bridge to the Father, it is through his sacrifice, it is through his humanity, it is through his relationship with the Father, that we have any access to God the Father at all.

Remember in the scriptures where Jesus, through whom we know these three persons, talks about the Father:

Amen, amen, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in my name he will give you. Until now you have not asked anything in my name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete.

and

“If you know me, then you will also know my Father.
From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

and

Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.
How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?
Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?
The words that I speak to you I do not speak on my own.
The Father who dwells in me is doing his works.
Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me,
or else, believe because of the works themselves.

In our geometry lesson we would say about the previous statement that if you have seen a cube you‘ve also seen the lines that make up the cube.

And of the Holy Spirit, the Advocate he says:

But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth. He will not speak on his own, but he will speak what he hears, and will declare to you the things that are coming. He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to you.

And of himself:

I came from the Father and have come into the world. Now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father.

So it is we have a three personal God, one in being, three in persons who loves us and wishes us to know him. Don’t let the mystery of that statement put you off, and don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t know anything about him, He gives us hints and clues for us to know Him everywhere in life.

Its Father’s day and I would be remiss if I didn’t say anything about fathers here – so let me go on just a little about fatherhood.

Jesus talked a lot about his Father in heaven and he always used the term Father for his “father”. He didn’t use any other term to describe the relationship with the Father. He didn’t call him “brother” or “mother” or “friend”. He called him Father. In this he brought that relationship to a new height. He relayed to us what relationship we needed to have with our Fathers and what relationship we as fathers need to have with our children. It was a very loving relationship.

Jesus said:

If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask for whatever you want and it will be done for you. By this is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples. As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and remain in his love. "I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete. This is my commandment: love one another as I love you.

And

I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father. It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you. This I command you: love one another.

It would help if we could remember this on Father’s day, to remember that as the Father loves his Son, so his Son loves us. And all that He and his Father want is for us to love one another.

Your brother in Christ,
Deacon Bruce

Joseph and Christmas

Deacon Bruce Maltzen'sHomily for December 19,2010 4th Sunday in Advent, CYCLE A (readings found here)
Reading I Isaiah 7:10-14
Reading II Romans 1:1-7
Gospel Matthew 1:18-24

When I read this Gospel, I began to wonder about Joseph. Just what did I know about him? What did the scriptures say about him? Other than this paragraph or so in Matthew – we only have the following references to Joseph in the Bible
His lineage traced back to David and to Abraham given in Matthew 1:16 also in Luke Chapter 3 ending in

“Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary. Of her was born Jesus who is called the Messiah”

And in Luke 2 where he takes them to Bethlehem

And Joseph too went up from Galilee from the town of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David that is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child.

And the story of Joseph’s taking Mary and Jesus into Egypt in Matthew 2:13-14

“ When they had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. Herod is going to search for the child to destroy him." Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed for Egypt

You’d think that they’d give us a little more of a picture, but maybe that’s all they needed to say. And actually that’s quite a lot. It starts by saying he was the direct descendant of David – which fulfilled the messianic prophecy that the Messiah would be called the son of David. But its more than that. Look at what else it says:

Joseph was a righteous man, meaning that he followed the laws of Moses and kept the faith alive in his life. He more than likely had already put into effect in his life the law that Jesus would say later in Matthew what is the greatest of the commandments:

You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Remember also that the penalty for adultery (which Joseph could have exposed Mary to if he had not followed what the Angel had said ) was death by stoning. He rejected that – knowing that doing so would violate the greatest of all commandments, the commandment to reflect God’s love for us by loving each other. Instead he thought he would quietly divorce her, which would free him from this union and would not expose Mary to the penalty of the law.

But God had other plans for Joseph and Mary so He sent his angel to Joseph to tell him just who exactly Mary was carrying in her womb. You can imagine the surprise that Joseph had. Joseph receives a message directly from an Angel who had received it from God himself that Mary was carrying the long awaited Messiah. Joseph could have determined it was all just something he ate before going to bed, but remember that Joseph was a righteous man and feared God. He would not put aside a visit from an Angel so lightly. He believed that God worked among men in mysterious ways.

He knew that the Messiah was awaited, he knew the scriptures about the Messiah, he knew that all of Israel longed for and felt that the coming was upon them, he knew the stories of the angels and how they had many times in Israel’s history intervened in the life of God’s people. Joseph had to weigh all that and make a decision. Remember also on his mind was that by taking Mary into his home he was declaring the child to be his, which would greatly diminish his standing in the eyes of the community as having broken the vows of the betrothal- which was to be chaste before marriage.

My guess is he also didn’t go around telling people that he was visited by an angel. My guess is he did tell Mary because it confirmed what she had probably told him when it became evident that she was pregnant. She undoubtedly told him of what the Angel had told her and of being overcome by the Holy Spirit and, that she would bear a son and his name would be Jesus and he would be the Savior of his people.
Joseph was not without free will. There is no doctrine about his immaculate conception or sinlessness. Yet he responds with obedience, generosity and faith. He listened to this message from God told to him in a dream. He rose above his fear. He rose above his confusion. He did not know how the story was going to end other than knowing now that this child was going to save his people from their sins. The words -- HE DID AS THE ANGEL OF THE LORD COMMANDED HIM should be inspirational to all of us. And there begins the story of Joseph in Christmas – Joseph takes her into his home, which is the last step of the marriage process.

By taking Mary and the to be born child into his home he was adopting Mary’s child and in that adoption gave to him the lineage of David, all falling into God’s will. Both of them listening to God’s messages from the Angels, both of them hearing not only with their ears but also with their hearts and then placing themselves at the will of God and doing what his Holy Spirit led them to do.
Oh that we could gain that ability back again. Oh that we could become so open to God’s word that we could be called RIGHTEOUS. That we would actually stop and think about the ETERNAL ramifications of what we are doing? How many of you men in the congregation could look to your family and your friends and know that if they wrote about you, as they did about Joseph, that they would call you RIGHTEOUS in the best sense of that word; righteous as in thoughtful, faithful, ardent believer.
How many of us would listen to an Angel in our dreams tell us something that made no sense in the everyday world and THEN GO and do it? How many of us would just chalk it up to a bad night’s sleep?

We could you know. We could gain that attitude, that capability to know when God wants us to do something special, but it would take the courage of a Joseph and Mary, the love for God of a Joseph and Mary. Having a heart for good, having a mind focused on God, being steadfast and knowledgeable in our faith.

When will that Joseph time come for you? When will God’s messenger tap you on the shoulder and say, God has called you to a great endeavor, and he asks that you do something out of the ordinary, something that might seem a little different or not quite right for you in your life and to your friends and family, but is absolutely right and magnificently holy in His sight?

What would you do,… NO – I would like to rephrase that:

What WILL you do – as it WILL happen in your life, matter of fact - it may already have.


Your brother in Christ,
Deacon Bruce