Jan. 20th

Post date: Jan 21, 2019 5:37:6 PM

Jan 20, 2019 Homily by Fr. Karl Schray

This Sunday’s Gospel always reminds me of a story

I often use at weddings. Most of you may remember Johnny Carson.

He hosted the Tonight Show on television for many years.

One night he interviewed a boy who had been in the news

for helping his friends escape from a mine cave-in in West Virginia.

The boy explained how he prayed and was able to dig them out.

Understanding he was a Christian,

Johnny asked him if he went to Sunday School. The boy replied ‘yes’.

So, Johnny asked him what they talked about at his last class.

The boy answered

that it was about Jesus turning the water into wine at a wedding feast.

The audience thought this was really funny

but Johnny kept a straight face. He then asked the boy

what he learned from this miracle of Jesus.

The boy thought really hard for a minute and then said,

“If you’re going to have a wedding, be sure to invite Jesus and Mary.”

Great advice!

What happened at Cana happens sooner or later in every marriage— the wine runs out.

The typical marriage starts off with a feast of joy.

The couple is surrounded by family and friends who shower them with gifts.

Full of hopes and dreams, they set off. The wine is flowing freely.

They come back from the honeymoon and the real business begins—

setting up a home and learning to live with one another.

At first, they find great happiness in each other’s company.

They are convinced their love was preordained in heaven

and meant to last for eternity. The wine is still flowing.

But when human beings are very close to one another problems inevitably

occur. Tensions arise.

They discover that they did not marry an angel after all,

but a human being wounded by sin and selfishness.

They are surprised at the poverty they discover in one another.

The honeymoon is over. The wine has run out.

All that is left is the water of their own meager resources.

Now that the first wine has run out, what are they to do?

Some are tempted to run out with the wine, saying

‘there’s nothing in it for me any longer.’

While this attitude is all too common, it implies a terrible selfishness.

For such people

marriage is only a passing alliance of two self-centered human beings.

So, when they have taken all they can from each other, they begin to look

elsewhere for more fruit they can pick and eat without effort.

What can a couple do?

They must acknowledge that “Yes, the first wine has run out.”

But they shouldn’t panic or despair when it happens. They must hold on.

They must resist the temptation to abandon the relationship

and lose themselves in a career, a hectic social life, or obsessions.

What they have to do is work on their relationship through which

they can grow as human beings and discover the real meaning of love.

And here is a surprising thing, it is necessary that the first wine should runout.

Otherwise, the new wine can’t come in.

First love, however romantically beautiful it is, cannot last.

It is bound to wear out. But it must wear out if a new and deeper love is to

be born. The new love consists in putting the other person before oneself.

One must forget oneself and find joy in loving rather than in being loved,

in giving rather than receiving.

Love is a challenging journey.

To enter marriage or to remain married is to be in a school of love.

Hopefully, we are all constantly learning.

That is why we need the presence of Jesus and Mary.

The new wine is meant not just for married couples but for everyone.

The new wine cannot be put into old wineskins.

This means we must change.

Christ wants to touch our hearts and help us to love unselfishly.

For those who seek his help, the miracle of Cana still happens—

the water of routine and selfishness is changed into the wine of true love.

And as wonderful as the old wine was,

the new wine is still better.