Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday/Ordinary Time Year B: August 9, 2009

Given by the Most Reverend Stephen E. Blaire at the Cathedral of the Annunciation in Stockton.

I have just finished reading the life of Albert Eistein. There are some who say that he was an atheist. I do not think so. He did not believe in a personal God as we do, but he did believe in the order of the universe and said: “Try and penetrate with our limited means the secrets of nature and you will find that, behind all the discernible laws and connections, there remains something subtle, intangible and inexplicable. Veneration for this force beyond anything we can comprehend is my religion. To that extent I am, in fact, religious.”

I am not a scientist but I do not think there is any incompatibility between genuine science and religious faith. Einstein himself believed that truth was one and spent his life trying to find the unifying principle of all physics. He never accomplished his goal.

As believers I think we can say that God is beyond time/space. When one enters eternity one is immediately beyond time/space. God is transcendent to the millions of galaxies which exist in the universe. To be raised up by Christ on the last day is to rise above and beyond all galaxies, beyond all limitations, beyond that which is finite. Einstein’s religion was not transcendent. Einstein did believe in something larger than himself but did not believe in immortality.

Jesus said that He is the living bread come down from heaven and that if we eat this bread we will live forever. To live forever is to live beyond all electro magnetic fields. To live forever is to live beyond all gravitational fields. To live forever is to live beyond all the probabilities of quantum mechanics. To live forever is the reason we follow Jesus Christ.

“Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life….I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever.” Belief in God, belief in eternal life, receiving Jesus as the bread from heaven is not a matter of science. It cannot be scientifically demonstrated. There is no mathematical equation to illustrate the truth of God’s existence. But the reality of God is not contrary to science. In fact, science argues to a transcendent being at the root of all order and probability in the universe.

We believe in a personal God. As Jesus said: “They shall be taught by God.” Through Jesus and in Jesus we are taught by God. What we are taught is the following: that Jesus will raise us up on the last day; he that listens to God comes to Jesus; whoever believes has eternal life; Jesus is the bread come down from heaven. If we eat this bread, we will not die. We will live forever.

We need to be as serious as any physical scientist exploring quantum particles and relative motion in the universe. We need to be serious in following Christ who has come from God, who is the Son of God, and who will raise us up on the last day to eternal life.

Last Update August 11, 2009