"Tough Love: Receive and Rejoice" | 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Fr. Mike's Homily) #sundayhomily

so there was a film in 1984 and the 1984 film that was the best it was Academy Award picture best picture it's called um Amadeus and it's Loosely based was actually fictionally based off of the life of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and so this musical genius right this incredible composer back in the middle of the 18th century we all know Mozart's name the movie is kind of about Mozart I mean there's such an incredible film there are some people who say that this is the greatest movie of all time it came out when I was 10 and so I remember watching part of it and being really bored but going back now as an adult I realized this is this movie is a masterpiece in fact very unusually both male leads were upfront academy awards for best actor one of them won the one who played the man who's who is the enemy of Mozart essentially in the the movie the story again it's fictional is mostly it's about Mozart but it's mostly about this man named Antonio salieri and salieri himself was his musical genius and he's in fact salieri he devoted his whole life to two things he devoted his life to God and he voted his life to music that was it and those were they're so combined for him in his mind and his heart basically here in salieri and he lived this life again devoted to God devoted to his face devoted to his craft he made so many sacrifices for his music and in order to be great and he was great he made so many sacrifices to the Lord to look for the Lord's blessing and he was blessed he was great he was blessed he made sacrifices and he was incredible no I've been saying for the last two weeks we've been in the middle of the series called tough love I've been noting that love always involves sacrifice and I believe that that's true but I want to make a clarification saying that love always involves sacrifice is not the same thing as saying that sacrifice guarantees us love because that's not the truth sacrifice does not guarantee us love sacrifice does not earn us love sacrifice does not make us deserve love but this is that's how salieri approached God he's like he had lived the life of incredible sacrifice he was very rigid he was very Pious um he basically lived incredibly disciplined life and he sacrificed everything for God in fact that's what he would say that he sacrificed everything he sacrificed everything he had everything he desired for God but we realize that as the movie unfolds it's revealed to whom and for whom salieri actually sacrificed his life it wasn't for God it was for himself it was for his art and that's revealed when he meets Mozart because he heard about Mozart he heard Mozart's music and so he is it was blown away by it he was blown away by The Genius of Mozart's music and when he met him he assumed that he would he he in his life he said okay the more disciplined the more Pious more faithful I am the more God will bless me the more he'll give me more give me his genius and so if I hear this music of this man Mozart it must be because he's even more faithful he's even more Pious he's even more saintly than I am and then we met Mozart he found this essential essentially a child who was spoiled and was foolish and was a cheat and a philanderer and an adulterer and a drunk and was lazy and he just it was silly and he was still a genius and salieri was his whole life was put into this tailspin how could God bless someone even more than he blessed him who was so foolish so undisciplined so the opposite of holy how could he how could he do this and so the rest of the movie the rest of the story the rest of his life this thing that gets in salieri's heart it destroys him because he simultaneously hates Mozart like he he despises his behavior he despises his character and at the same time he is captivated by his music he's captivated by what Mozart can create and he knows he realizes that Mozart is a musical genius and not only a musical genius but the greatest musical genius that he had ever heard of in his entire life and so his life becomes fixated on this love hate ultimately salieri manipulates things that ends in Mozart's death you know it's the crazy thing is salieri in this film he thought loving God was a transaction that um I sacrificed this and this and this and God blesses me in that other way if I give good all these things then he's going to give me the things that I want that's what he that's what he thought love of God was without a relationship with God was and that was all killed it was all killed when he met Mozart and realized that God does actually love the just and the unjust that he causes the rain to shine on the good and the bad that causes the sun to shine on the just and the unjust and this destroys cellulari it's like the gospel today because what salieri realizes in this film is what the people in the parable realize and we know the story the landowner goes out hires people at 6am they have to work 12 hours 12 hours in the hot sun but it also goes out throughout the course of the day and the big people the big like the most dramatic is we hires people at 5 00 PM they work one hour and they get the usual daily wage right of course so as we know the parable when it gets the people who worked 12 hours they thought that they would get more at the end of this Parable there's these incredible lines the landowner says to those who are resentful they resented the fact that they go got the daily wage actually they didn't resent the fact that they got the daily wage they resented the fact that others who didn't work all day got the usual daily wage and the landowner says this he says are you envious because I'm generous are you envious Envy is um what what a thing and envy is maybe possible and it is potentially the worst sin in the world right after Pride it's connected to Pride but envies potentially and it's it's possible that Envy has done more damage in this world in our relationships and in history than any other sin and I truly mean that not only because we can see this in our own lives but also we can see this in Scripture scripture says that we all know that Satan Satan's first sin right Lucifer's sin is pride of course that that he says I will not serve I will not love God in return I will not receive God's love but scripture goes on to say in wisdom chapter 2 verse 24. yeah the sin the devil sin through Pride what was the motivation of his sin what was the what was the impetus of his sin wisdom chapter 2 says through the Envy of the devil death entered the world so n Envy has destroyed Envy is the thing that caused the downfall of humanity and what was it well it wasn't that Satan wanted to get something out of the downfall of humanity Satan Satan didn't want to get anything out of causing Adam and Eve to sin and causing us to sin Satan knew he couldn't get out of anything he didn't want anything in fact I talked about this at the end of the summer this last year we were talking about the series on Parabellum and I shared how I hate board games that was one thing that got a lot of response but it's true um they're silly and a waste of time but also uh the reality is sometimes you play board games with people who they're not interested in winning the board games they are interested in simply making it so that you lose and they're they're called little brothers and sisters they're they're called older brothers they're called siblings and they're the people who they're not playing the game to win they don't want to win they just want you to lose this is Satan that is what he is he's a little brother no he's Satan is the kind of person Satan does not want to win he doesn't want to win this world he doesn't want to win God back he doesn't want to win anything because not only because he knows he can't but he doesn't want to he has Envy he just doesn't want you to win because your blessing you're being loved the gifts God gives you him seeing that makes him sad Envy has done more to destroy this world than anything and so so kind of the question is what is Envy no a lot of times people when they talk about Envy they also talk about jealousy as if they're the same thing and they're similar but they're not the same thing jealousy I'm jealousy can be good but it can be bad it can be bad but it can be good so we realize that that it can be good jealousy can be a good thing because God describes himself as a jealous God so he says that no you're my people I love you therefore if you give your heart to someone else I'm jealous of that because you're mine and I'm yours it's kind of like jealousy is good in a healthy married relationship if a husband wife are married to each other and one of the spouses starts giving their heart to someone else it's the proper response of the other spouse is to be jealous is jealousy means that no wait I'm yours and you're mine and we're meant to love each other if you're taking your heart away then the proper response is jealousy or even just sometimes jealousy can be good when you see someone who's doing something excellent you see someone who's living in such a way that you're like wow that is amazing or maybe they're they're they have something that's amazing or Talent OR skill that you look at them and think that's amazing I can do that too that's amazing I'm inspired by this jealousy can be the kind of thing the good kind of jealousy that can Inspire us to go after this because jealousy says this jealousy sees what someone else has or what someone else can do and says I want what you have that could be good it also can be bad right a jealousy can also look at what someone else has what they do and says I want what you have and they take it so jealousy can lead to either inspiration or it can lead to theft Envy is different Envy doesn't say I want what you have Envy looks at someone else who has something or can do something and is saddened by the fact that they're blessed Envy looks and says I don't want what you have necessarily I just want you not to have it I've heard this before the day before my my senior of high school started with my family came back from like a weekend away before school started and uh I realized that our house was had been broken into and so uh we went through all the all the rooms of the house and saw all the things that these these thieves have broken into the house had stolen and and once we figured out everything was safe and we're all all fine with not not too much of a big deal but there was one room in which people didn't steal anything the people who broke in they didn't steal anything just broke a bunch of stuff and I remember my dad having this kind of he's very sensible man he's very compassionate so he was he I remember him saying this he said you know the fact that people broke in and stole our stuff he says I mean obviously I'm upset by that but it doesn't bother me because I get it like I get it if you're hungry I get it if you don't have I get it if you need something to break in and to steal something because you need to feed yourself or whatever I understand that he says I don't understand just coming in and breaking things because one is I want you to have her to take it the other is I just I don't need it I don't want it I just don't want you to have it that's the difference between jealousy and envy jealousies as I want what you have and envy simply says I don't want you to have this and that's what's happening in the gospel today you know some people could say the people who work 12 hours no they they're not envious they want more that's not the case it's very actually clearly not the case they had agreed for the usual daily wage that's all they wanted but then when they found that others were getting the exact same thing as them they didn't want more they just wanted the others to have less and that's the key I don't want you to have this why because I deserve more than you and this is the heart of envy foreign I don't want you to have what you have because I deserve to have more than you it's one of the reasons why we'd say that Envy is essentially competitive and the envy and pride are like are similar then that way is envy and pride are essentially competitive C.S Lewis talks about this he says that Pride the heart of pride is not just taking pleasure in being smart or being pretty or being well liked or being funny that that's that's fine that's good Pride is taking pleasure in being prettier or smarter or more well-liked or funnier than someone else that's what makes pride a sin and envy is similar it's not the same it's similar though Envy is not taking Joy or pleasure in being smarter or or funnier Envy is experiencing sadness when you see someone else who is smart or funny or well liked or pretty that's one of the reasons why Envy is so it's kind of insane because other other sins give us some moment of pleasure Envy doesn't give any pleasure at all it's just sadness it's sadness the fact that someone has something I don't want them to have it it's one of the reasons why Envy takes everything and it truly gives us nothing it's essentially competitive I mean we know we've seen this in our lives of course you think we've seen this um there's such a thing as called schadenfreude I'm sure you've heard of Chad and Freight shenford this German word that essentially means taking Pleasure in someone else's pain and it's the reason why like fail blogs exist in like videos of people falling down exist it's the reason why schadenfreude is the reason why um when we hear about we hear bad news about some celebrity we we have some kind of sense of righteousness some kind of sense of pleasure in this like for example I just happened what happened a couple weeks ago Aaron Rodgers first game oh I can't believe this guy he thinks he can still play first game he gets injured or first player or whatever it is first minute gets injured and there's some kind of degree of pleasure that some some people will take in his failure in his loss that's shadow fight but it's also it's not just Envy I don't want what you have Aaron Rodgers I just appreciate the fact that you don't have it anymore Pride essentially and envy essentially are competitive we see we see this in the Bible I know the story of of King David and King Saul so before King David was King David he's just little David and King Saul was the king now Saul had been Anointed The King and at one point he was going through a torment kind of thing and the young boy David came and played music speaking of Music he played music for King Saul and it soothed his heart and so he was blessed by this young boy David later on we know the story of Goliath who comes out and challenges the armies of the Israelites and for weeks upon weeks there's no one who's going to fight Goliath until this young boy comes out and says I'll do it for you and this is the kind of situation where Saul King Saul should be rejoicing over this and he was at first at first Saul was talking it was was incredibly thankful that David had done what David did and then there's this moment and it's it's recorded in scripture it's a moment where King Saul takes this young boy this young man David who had just slain Goliath and they ride triumphantly into the City and everything's fine because Saul doesn't mind Saul's the Mind honoring David he's the King David is the guy who just killed the Goliath until there's this song that people in the city are singing and they're singing the song that says King Saul has slain his thousands and David has slain his tens of thousands and in that moment scripture says something shifted in King Saul's heart where he says wait they're giving David tens of thousands they're only giving thousands to me no you pause on this for just a moment if he said he probably Envy wasn't essentially competitive you'd say great yeah there's no problem why because David is he's a soldier he's going to be one of my great generals David's also placing his sword his his strength he's placing his fighting at my service David is an incredible servant of King Saul so yeah slayer Slayer tens of thousands that's awesome he could he could have rejoiced in David's gifts but he didn't but it also doesn't make sense is the King Saul believed the song that he he gave it a weight in his life that didn't it didn't deserve well first of all because it says Saul his Lane is Thousands he has not slain his thousands he didn't kill anybody and David his Lane is tens of thousands David killed one guy like if he just were to pause for a second he would realize this is simply not true he could have Let It Go but we know this Envy is essentially competitive funny thing is we also end up choosing our competitors I don't know if you've ever noticed this that Envy is essentially competitive and we we end up choosing our competitors we end up choosing our Rivals we're not envious of everyone have you ever I don't know if you've ever thought about this we're not envious of everything we're not jealous or envious of everyone around us or everything and not every one's gifts makes us sad but only certain people's gifts only certain people we choose our competitors we choose our Rivals and also you know we choose our friends I remember hearing someone describe how do you know if you have a good friend they said a good friend is someone that you can tell bad news too and they're not going to tell you why you're stupid they're not going to tell you that you're dumb for for being sad about this but then he went on to say a good friend is someone you can also tell good news to and they're willing to Rejoice with you so we choose our competitors but we also choose our friends and this kind of friendship is is love this kind of but this kind of friendship is it's tough love to to Really choose to choose to receive the love that you've been given rather than resent the love someone else has been given that's that's tough it's tough to choose to receive the blessings you've been given rather than resent the blessings that someone else has been given this this is tough love to choose to rejoice in someone else's blessings that is tough love because their blessings take nothing away from you to realize that if we have tough love we can be friends with those people that we can now consider our Rivals there's a moment at the end of the movie Amadeus of almost friendship between these two men Mozart and salieri it's a scene where here's Mozart he's he's been living a horrible life and he's on his Deathbed and he's actually in the process of dying but he's written this Requiem Mass as a musical piece for a funeral mass and he's not going to finish it but salieri's there with him and he's encouraging him and so as Mozart's lying in bed dying here he's he's dictating out loud and salieri's writing this down and it's it's this incredible I mean it's the climax of the movie it's incredible moment where you get a glimpse at what could have been because they spent the entire night finishing this Requiem and you have this person's brilliance added to this person's person's brilliance creating something truly brilliant and you realize as you see this scene this could have been their entire life if salieri hadn't allowed Envy to corrupt and poison his heart and resentment to corrupt and poison his heart this could have been their entire life they could have had joy and not envy the life could have been marked by friendship and not being enemies but when we give into resentment and we give in to envy we choose our own enemies the most tragic aspect of the movie I think is not just that salieri chooses Mozart as his enemy the most tragic part of this movie is that celery ends up choosing God as his enemy he had said he had believed the more disciplined I am the more sacrifices I make the greater I'll be that's our Arrangement guide It's a transactional relationship when he found out that God even blesses the unrighteous so God that God blesses those who didn't work as hard as he did he actually says out loud that he chooses to make God his enemy this is the last thing he didn't have to we hear in the scripture today that God's ways are not our ways his thoughts are not our thoughts that his love has a logic that we that we don't live by that he doesn't wait for us to earn his love he doesn't wait for us to deserve his love he just wants us to receive his love that's it just wants us to receive his love and salieri's problem was that he chose resentment he chose Envy and he could not rejoice because he would not receive the love that he'd been given he just simply focused on the love that someone else had been given but this is tough love tough love is being willing to receive the love the blessings the gifts that you've been given not what you think you've earned not what you think you deserve I think so many times we spend so much of our Lives we spend we spend so much time being envious and bitter by looking at what others have so we miss out on what we have most importantly I think we're envious because we miss out on the fact that we're already loved by God that's the that's the irony of the entire movie is irony the entire story here's Lucifer already loved by God here's Saul loved by God here is US already loved by God and if we receive that love then we can Rejoice if we receive that love then there's no room for Envy because you're already loved by God again the greatest irony of this movie is it's called Amadeus Amadeus literally means loved by God the very title is the irony here's Mozart who's a fool and a a waste and a scoundrel and he's loved by God and he's salieri who is devoted but bitter and resentful and envious and he's loved by and he is loved by God the remedy is this irony that Envy can only take up root in a heart that refuses to be loved by God so our challenge in our invitation is to let go of resentment to let go of envy and to receive the love that God has offered us instead of looking at the love he's offered to someone else to receive his love and to rejoice in the love that he's given to those around us foreign [Music]

Channel: Sundays with Ascension

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Keywords: ascension presents, fr. mike live mass, ascension, fr. mike schmitz, father mike, sunday mass, Catholic Mass, short homily, short catholic homily, sunday homily fr mike, Holy Mass with Fr. Mike, catholic mass, Year A, Sundays with Ascension, sunday mass 2023, Short Homily, Catholic homily, homily today, mass for Sept 24, Sunday Mass for September 24th, homily september 24th

Id: AxgE3HLBqw8

Length: 24min 9sec (1449 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 24 2023