Introduction

TONYA (0:00 - 0:06)
Hello and welcome. You are listening to the Word This Week Deep Dive Podcast. We're so glad you're here with us.

ANDREW (0:07 - 0:07)
We are.

TONYA (0:07 - 0:17)
We are doing something really special. We're taking a stack of homiletic sources, articles, and insights, and we are cracking open the text for the first Sunday of Lent.

ANDREW (0:18 - 0:28)
It's the start of the heavy-hitting season. Lent is here.

And for anyone scratching their head, the core scripture we're working with is the Gospel of Matthew chapter 4 verses 1 to 11.

TONYA (0:28 - 0:31)
The famous story of the temptation in the desert.

ANDREW (0:31 - 0:37)
That's the one. And we're also pulling in the first reading from Genesis, which is the story of the fall of Adam and Eve.

TONYA (0:37 - 0:47)
So two of the most famous confrontations with evil in human history right there in one weekend. But here's the mission for this deep dive. We aren't just going to summarize the readings for you.

ANDREW (0:47 - 0:51)
No, you can read the Bible on your own time. We are looking at the craft.

TONYA (0:51 - 0:52)
The craft, exactly.

ANDREW (0:52 - 1:07)
We have a stack of homilies here from priests and deacons, some quite recent, some going back 10 or 15 years, and we're going to dissect how they actually communicate this stuff. Because let's be honest, the temptation in the desert is a story everyone thinks they know.

TONYA (1:07 - 1:11)
Oh, completely. You hear stones in the bread, and your mind just wanders.

ANDREW (1:11 - 1:22)
You tune out. So the challenge for any preacher this week is, how do you make it fresh? How do you make a text that's thousands of years old land for someone who's, you know, worried about inflation or addicted to their smartphone?

TONYA (1:22 - 1:25)
Or just watching a lot of reality TV, as it turns out.

ANDREW (1:25 - 1:35)
It really is an art form, and the sources we have today are wild. I mean, we've got references from the TV show Undercover Boss, all the way to Zen Gardens in Kyoto, Japan.

TONYA (1:35 - 1:42)
And ancient legends about the devil in disguise, jokes about self-made men. It's a master class in metaphors.

ANDREW (1:42 - 1:43)
It really is.

TONYA (1:43 - 1:55)
So let's jump right into the deep end. The first thing that really struck me in these sources is the hook. I mean, if you're a priest or deacon standing in the pulpit, how do you grab the listener in that first 30 seconds?

ANDREW (1:56 - 1:56)
It's crucial.

The Undercover Boss Metaphor

TONYA (1:57 - 2:07)
And Deacon Greg Kandra has this brilliant comparison. It's from a homily he gave back in 2010, and he revisited it in 2017. He talks about the reality show Undercover Boss.

ANDREW (2:08 - 2:11)
Oh, I know the one. It's such a great premise for a homily.

TONYA (2:11 - 2:24)
It really is. So Deacon Kandra describes the setup. You have these CEOs of, like, Fortune 500 companies. He mentions Larry O'Donnell of Waste Management or Kobe Brooks of Hooters.

ANDREW (2:24 - 2:29)
The big shots. The guys in the corner offices totally insulated from what's happening on the ground level.

TONYA (2:29 - 2:36)
Exactly. And the gimmick of the show, for those who haven't seen it, is that they agree to go undercover as, you know, entry-level employees in their own companies.

ANDREW (2:37 - 2:42)
Right. They put on a disguise, maybe a fake mustache or a wig, and they go clean portable toilets or wash dishes.

TONYA (2:43 - 2:49)
And they're usually terrible at it, but they see the struggles of their employees firsthand. They experience the low pay, the hard conditions, the fatigue.

ANDREW (2:50 - 2:58)
And here is where the theological pivot happens, which is just so smart. Deacon Kandra argues that Jesus is the ultimate undercover boss.

TONYA (2:58 - 3:00)
I love that. Unpack that for us.

ANDREW (3:00 - 3:15)
Well, I mean, think about the Incarnation. You have God, the CEO of the universe, so to speak, who decides that looking down from the corporate headquarters of heaven isn't, you know, it's not enough.

TONYA (3:15 - 3:17)
He wants to experience the grit of the shop floor.

ANDREW (3:17 - 3:37)
He wants to experience the grit. He lowers himself. He becomes man. He experiences hunger, powerlessness, pain. He steps out of that corner office. Right.

And Deacon Kandra makes the point that in the desert, when the devil shows up, he's essentially offering Jesus a way out. He says, turn these stones to bread. Throw yourself off the temple.

TONYA (3:37 - 3:40)
He's saying, look, you're the CEO. You have the power.

ANDREW (3:40 - 3:43)
Exactly. You don't have to suffer like these humans. Just fix it for yourself.

TONYA (3:43 - 3:45)
That is a fascinating way to look at it.

ANDREW (3:45 - 4:02)
And by saying no to those shortcuts, to that raw power, Jesus is saying yes to humanity. He's saying, I'm gonna stay undercover. I'm gonna feel what you feel.

Wow. It frames the temptation not just as some like test of willpower, but as a real commitment to solidarity with us.

TONYA (4:02 - 4:06)
It makes the desert feel less like a boxing match and more like a statement of loyalty.

ANDREW (4:06 - 4:07)
I think so.

The Gazelle Trap: Mechanics of Temptation

TONYA (4:07 - 4:17)
Now, moving from reality TV to, I guess, nature documentaries. Let's talk about the gazelle trap. This comes from Deacon Peter from a homily in 2020.

ANDREW (4:17 - 4:24)
This one is chilling. It is such a vivid illustration of how temptation actually works, you know, mechanically.

TONYA (4:24 - 4:34)
So the story goes like this. There's a wealthy man who wants to catch this rare, uncatchable African gazelle for his private zoo. You can't chase them. They're too fast.

ANDREW (4:34 - 4:35)
If you run at them, they bolt.

TONYA (4:35 - 4:43)
Right. So what does he do? He goes to where they graze and just leaves some sweet feed oats and molasses on the ground. And then he leaves.

ANDREW (4:43 - 4:46)
No threat. Just a reward. Classic conditioning.

TONYA (4:46 - 5:02)
And gazelles come, eat the sweet stuff, and nothing bad happens. They're happy. Then, the next night, he puts down the feed.

But he also puts a single post in the ground. Just one. The gazelles are wary, but the feed is sweet, so they eat. And every night, he adds another post. And a board. And a piece of a fence.

ANDREW (5:03 - 5:08)
And slowly, day by day, the gazelles trade their freedom for the sweet feed.

TONYA (5:08 - 5:12)
They get used to the structure. They've stopped looking at the horizon and start looking at the molasses.

ANDREW (5:13 - 5:19)
Until finally, the gate shuts, and they walked right into it. They weren't chased. They were seduced.

TONYA (5:20 - 5:28)
It's the perfect metaphor for addiction, or what tradition calls the seven deadly sins. Deacon Peter points out that the devil doesn't usually start with the cage.

ANDREW (5:29 - 5:37)
No, he starts with the oats and molasses. It starts pleasant. It answers a hunger. Deacon Peter even quotes Shakespeare here, doesn't he? From Hamlet.

TONYA (5:38 - 5:41)
He does. The devil has the power to assume a pleasing shape.

ANDREW (5:42 - 5:49)
And that's the key. If temptation looked like a trap, we wouldn't step in it. It has to look like sweet feed, and before you know it, the fence is up.

TONYA (5:49 - 5:55)
It really challenges you to ask, where am I eating the sweet feed right now? Where is the fence being built in my life?

ANDREW (5:55 - 5:57)
That's a great Lenten question.

The Zen Garden: A Matter of Perspective

TONYA (5:57 - 6:06)
That connects really well to another visual metaphor from our sources, but this one takes us from Africa to Japan. Father Kevin, in a YouTube homily, talks about a Zen garden.

ANDREW (6:07 - 6:12)
A total shift in tone, but it gets to the heart of perspective, which is so crucial for Lent.

TONYA (6:12 - 6:14)
So describe this garden for us.

ANDREW (6:14 - 6:22)
It's deceptively simple. It is just 15 stones arranged in white gravel. It's the Ryoan-ji Temple in Kyoto.

TONYA (6:22 - 6:22)
Okay.

ANDREW (6:23 - 6:33)
But the genius of the design, and this is ancient wisdom here, is that no matter where you stand on the viewing platform, no matter what angle you take, you can never see all 15 stones at once.

TONYA (6:33 - 6:34)
One is always hidden.

ANDREW (6:34 - 6:36)
One is always hidden by another.

TONYA (6:36 - 6:38)
That would drive me crazy.

ANDREW (6:38 - 6:54)
That is the point. You can only see the whole picture, all 15 stones, if you're looking from above. And Father Kevin uses this to talk about the stones in our own deserts, our struggles, our temptations, our suffering. From our perspective on the ground, we just see obstacles.

TONYA (6:54 - 6:55)
We're just blocked by the rocks.

ANDREW (6:55 - 7:04)
Exactly. He says a contractor sees building materials, a madman sees a wall to hide behind, a poet sees beauty. We are limited. We can't see the whole pattern.

TONYA (7:04 - 7:07)
So we need God's perspective, the view from above.

ANDREW (7:07 - 7:15)
That's the argument. We need that perspective to understand how these stones fit into our salvation. We're stuck on the ground level while God sees the whole garden.

TONYA (7:16 - 7:19)
I like that. It helps you stop fighting the rock and start asking what it's there for.

ANDREW (7:20 - 7:23)
Precisely. It turns the obstacle into a mystery to be pondered.

Distorted Goods and Temptation of Strengths

TONYA (7:23 - 7:38)
Okay, let's unpack the theology a bit more because we have some heavy hitters here, like Father George Smiga and Monsignor Charles Pope, digging into the psychology of this. Father Smiga has this concept from a 2005 homily he calls Distorted Goods.

ANDREW (7:39 - 7:58)
This is a crucial distinction. We often think of evil as this dark, ugly, obviously bad thing. You know, the cartoon villain offering you a poisoned apple.

Right. But Father Smiga points out, looking at Genesis, that Adam and Eve weren't tempted by poison. The text says the fruit was good for food and pleasing to the eye.

TONYA (7:58 - 7:59)
So it was a good thing.

ANDREW (7:59 - 8:15)
It was a good thing, but in the wrong way. Father Smiga calls them Distorted Goods. Evil takes something good like food or connection or rest and just twists it.

He connects this to modern addictions, too. Not just drugs, but being addicted to work or shopping or even the need to please others.

TONYA (8:15 - 8:19)
Those all start as good things. Being industrious is good. Being liked is good.

ANDREW (8:20 - 8:30)
But here is where it gets really interesting. And this is a quote from Father Smiga that just stops you in your tracks. He says, we are usually tempted more by our strengths than by our weaknesses.

TONYA (8:31 - 8:34)
Wait, really? I always thought temptation attacks the weak spot.

ANDREW (8:34 - 8:56)
Think about the gospel. The devil says to Jesus, if you are the son of God, he attacks Jesus's identity and power, his strength. Father Smiga says if you're an industrious, hardworking person, you aren't going to be tempted by sloth.

You're going to be tempted by greed or workaholism. You'll be tempted to think you can save yourself through your own effort.

TONYA (8:56 - 8:59)
That makes so much sense. If you're intelligent, you're tempted by arrogance.

ANDREW (8:59 - 9:06)
Exactly. If you're charming, you're tempted to manipulate. The devil uses your best assets against you.

TONYA (9:06 - 9:09)
That's actually kind of scary. It means you have to watch your back even when you're doing well.

ANDREW (9:09 - 9:13)
Especially when you're doing well. That is often when the sweet feet shows up.

Temptation vs. Sin: The Spiritual Gym

TONYA (9:13 - 9:28)
Which brings us to Monsignor Charles Pope. He has a great homily from 2014 where he tries to sort of lower the anxiety level a bit. He makes a very clear distinction between feeling tempted and actually sinning.

ANDREW (9:28 - 9:33)
This is so important for people to hear. A lot of folks feel guilty just because a bad thought popped into their head.

TONYA (9:33 - 9:34)
I'm sure.

ANDREW (9:34 - 9:46)
And Monsignor Pope reminds us, Jesus was tempted. Jesus did not sin. Therefore, temptation itself is not a sin. The thought is just the knock at the door. Sin is opening it. He uses a weightlifting analogy.

TONYA (9:46 - 9:47)
Right. I remember that.

ANDREW (9:47 - 9:57)
He says the spiritual life is like the gym. Resistance builds muscle. If you never had to push against anything, you'd be spiritually flabby. Every time you resist a temptation, you're actually getting stronger.

TONYA (9:58 - 9:59)
It's not a sign of failure. It's a workout.

ANDREW (9:59 - 10:05)
It's a workout. But he does issue a warning. He talks about presumption.

He uses the phrase cruising for a bruising.

TONYA (10:05 - 10:08)
I love Monsignor Pope's colloquialisms.

ANDREW (10:09 - 10:25)
Me too. Cruising for a bruising refers to that second temptation. Throwing yourself off the temple and expecting angels to catch you.

He says this is the modern sin of presumption. It's the attitude of I can party hard. I can skip prayers.

I can mess around and God will just catch me.

TONYA (10:26 - 10:28)
The I'll repent later strategy.

ANDREW (10:28 - 10:36)
Exactly. He warns that God is merciful. But you know, gravity is still gravity.

You can't just recklessly test God and expect a soft landing every single time.

TONYA (10:36 - 10:39)
You can't walk into the gazelle trap willingly and expect the gate to stay open.

The Legend of the Imposter

ANDREW (10:39 - 10:49)
You really can't. Speaking of soft landings or the lack of them. Father Smiga has another story, a legend this time from a 2008 homily.

It's about the imposter.

TONYA (10:50 - 10:50)
OK.

ANDREW (10:50 - 10:58)
It's this haunting ancient legend where the devil tries to sneak into heaven on Easter morning and he disguises himself as the risen Christ.

TONYA (10:58 - 11:00)
He looks the part. He's shining with light.

ANDREW (11:00 - 11:26)
Everything. The angels are about to open the gates, ready to worship. But then one angel hesitates and asks to see his hands.

Oh, and the devil lifts his hands and they're smooth. No nail marks, no wounds. The angels slam the door because the real Christ has wounds.

And Father Smiga's point here is just devastatingly beautiful. Discipleship requires wounds. Salvation comes through the human condition, not around it.

TONYA (11:26 - 11:31)
If we want a religion that's all glory and no suffering, we're following the imposter.

ANDREW (11:31 - 11:38)
That's it. It grounds this whole discussion. It's not about avoiding bad cookies. It's about embracing the struggle. It's about not taking the shortcut.

Cultural Context: Economics and Individualism

TONYA (11:39 - 11:50)
I want to shift gears to the cultural context because homilies don't happen in a vacuum. Father Leo Edgar, in 2023, was preaching to a congregation facing some very real economic stress.

ANDREW (11:50 - 12:03)
Yes. He explicitly mentions inflation, mortgage hikes and strikes. I mean, this is the reality for the people in the pews. And Father Leo contrasts the uncertainty of the economy. We don't know if you can pay the bills with the certainty that Christ brings.

TONYA (12:03 - 12:07)
He quotes Pope Francis there doesn't hear from Evangelii Gaudium.

ANDREW (12:07 - 12:20)
He does. "God does not hide himself from those who seek him." It's a message of stability in a time of chaos. The devil offers bread economic security, but it's a trap. God offers a relationship that survives the economic downturn.

TONYA (12:20 - 12:27)
And speaking of economics and sort of American culture, Father Joe has a critique of rugged individualism.

ANDREW (12:27 - 12:37)
Oh, this fits perfectly with the temptation to turn stones into bread. Father Joe references David McCullough's book, The Pioneers. We have this American myth of the self-made man.

TONYA (12:37 - 12:38)
And he tells a joke about that.

ANDREW (12:38 - 13:02)
He does. A self-made man tells a priest, I created myself. And the priest asks, It took God a full day to create Adam. How long did it take you?

That's a zinger. It is funny, but the point is so serious.

The devil wants us to believe we are self-sufficient, that we can provide our own bread, our own safety. But Lent is about admitting we are dependent. We're creatures.

We need the creator.

Led by the Spirit: Accompaniment and Scripture

TONYA (13:02 - 13:18)
So we've looked at the hooks, the theology. Now let's talk strategy. If you're sitting down to write a homily for this week or even just trying to understand the text better as a listener, there is a tricky theological knot to untie.

Oh, yeah. Matthew says the spirit led Jesus into the desert to be tempted.

ANDREW (13:18 - 13:24)
That is a stumbling block for a lot of people. Why would the Holy Spirit essentially lead Jesus into a trap?

TONYA (13:24 - 13:28)
Well, it's not into temptation, right? Exactly. So how do our sources handle this?

ANDREW (13:29 - 13:40)
Father Smiga tackles this head on in both 2014 and 2023. And he says we have to look at that word led. It is not about manufacturing a test like a teacher setting a pop quiz.

TONYA (13:41 - 13:41)
OK.

ANDREW (13:41 - 13:42)
It is about accompaniment.

TONYA (13:43 - 13:43)
Accompaniment.

ANDREW (13:43 - 13:52)
The spirit knows that the battle with evil is unavoidable. It is part of the human experience. So the spirit leads Jesus into it so that he doesn't have to face it alone.

TONYA (13:53 - 13:58)
It's the difference between pushing someone into a fight and walking with them into a battle they have to fight anyway.

ANDREW (13:58 - 14:08)
That's the perfect way to put it. We aren't alone in the desert. And that connects to the broader scriptural arc.

You see Father Han and Father Smiga both connecting Matthew back to Genesis and Exodus.

TONYA (14:08 - 14:14)
You have Adam and Eve in the garden failing. You have Israel in the desert for 40 years struggling to trust God for manna.

ANDREW (14:14 - 14:27)
And now you have Jesus 40 days in the desert succeeding where they failed. It's like Jesus is rewriting the history of humanity. Where Adam grasped, Jesus let go. Where Israel complained, Jesus trusted.

TONYA (14:27 - 14:37)
Right. And one tactic for how to fight temptation that came up in a couple of sources, Father Smiga and Monsignor Pope both mention it, is Jesus's use of scripture.

ANDREW (14:37 - 14:47)
Yes. Notice that Jesus doesn't debate the devil. He doesn't argue logic. He just quotes the Bible. Monsignor Pope calls scripture the sword of the spirit.

TONYA (14:47 - 14:50)
But there is a catch, right? Father Smiga quotes T.S. Elliott here.

ANDREW (14:50 - 14:59)
The greatest treason is to do the right thing for the wrong reason. Which is a profound insight, because the devil quotes scripture too.

TONYA (14:59 - 15:00)
In the second temptation.

ANDREW (15:00 - 15:01)
He quotes the Psalms.

TONYA (15:01 - 15:01)
Yeah.

ANDREW (15:01 - 15:05)
But he twists it. He uses the right thing for the wrong reason.

TONYA (15:05 - 15:12)
So the lesson for the listener is you need to know your sword. You need to know scripture so you can spot the counterfeit.

ANDREW (15:12 - 15:15)
Or you're going into a gunfight with a knife or with nothing at all.

Recap and Final Thoughts: The Angels Among Us

TONYA (15:15 - 15:28)
So we have covered a lot of ground. We've seen Jesus as the undercover boss. Temptation is a gazelle trap. The spiritual life is a Zen garden. We've learned that evil is often a distorted good and that we tempted by our strengths.

ANDREW (15:28 - 15:31)
And that the spirit accompanies us into the battle. We're not alone.

TONYA (15:31 - 15:42)
It really gives you a toolkit for this first Sunday of Lent. It's not just about giving up chocolate. It's about perspective, dependence on God and seeing the trap before the gate shuts.

ANDREW (15:42 - 15:47)
Absolutely. It transforms the season from something dreary into something dynamic.

TONYA (15:47 - 15:50)
Now, before we wrap up, you always have a final thought for us. Something to let simmer.

ANDREW (15:51 - 15:59)
I do. And this one comes from Father Joe's 2023 homily. It is a detail at the very end of the gospel passage that we almost always overlook.

TONYA (15:59 - 15:59)
With that.

ANDREW (16:00 - 16:04)
The text says that after the devil left, angels came and ministered to him.

TONYA (16:04 - 16:05)
Right. The cleanup crew.

ANDREW (16:05 - 16:18)
So Father Joe asks a provocative question. Who are the angels? We usually picture winged spirits with halos, but he suggests we look around the church.

He asks how many angels are in this building right now?

TONYA (16:18 - 16:18)
Oh, wow.

ANDREW (16:18 - 16:26)
He challenges us to think, are the angels who minister to us after our battles, the people sitting right next to us in the pews?

TONYA (16:26 - 16:29)
The person who brings you a casserole when you're grieving.

ANDREW (16:30 - 16:35)
Or the friend who checks in on you when you're struggling with addiction. Maybe those are the angels Matthew is talking about in our lives.

TONYA (16:36 - 16:40)
That is beautiful. We focus so much on the devil in this story. We forget the angels.

ANDREW (16:40 - 16:45)
And we forget that we might be called to be those angels for someone else who has just come out of their own desert.

TONYA (16:46 - 16:54)
Well, on that note, I think we have plenty to think about for the week ahead. Thank you for listening to the Word This Week Deep Dive podcast.

ANDREW (16:54 - 16:55)
We'll catch you next time.