Homily at the Funeral of Joseph E. Loya
By Fr. Thomas J. Loya
Monday December 16, 2013
Joseph E. Loya Fr. Thomas J. Loya
Joseph E. Loya had the distinction of being probably one of the few people on earth who was both a son of and a father of a Byzantine Catholic priest. This put him in the “middle,” a place he never liked being. My father never liked sticking out. But he could not help it. He was tall! He was gifted. And as my brother Timothy said before the Parastas service last night at the funeral home, “Joseph E. Loya was truly a unique individual. “ He left an unforgettable impression on anyone who met him.
So, even
in death, I will not dishonor the way that my father wanted to live. I will try not to put him too much in the
middle of our focus this day. Besides, if I did, I KNOW he would find a way to
yell at me from the grave!
We honor
my father by remembering those things that mattered most to him, the things he
wanted most for his family what he wanted his life to leave upon this earth.
Indeed a
Christian burial is a time in which we come to remember and to be thankful-- to
call to mind and remember, forever, in gratitude how this person was gift. How God, as He does with all of us, shown
through this person in the ways that were absolutely unique to this
individual--to celebrate that gift and be better people for it. How
Providential it is that my father died during this season of gift!
On the
day I received the news of my father’s passing, I sat alone in my rectory
pondering the mystery of it all.
Suddenly I had a very intense experience. It was so intense I thought maybe I was going
mad. It was beautiful and frightening at the same time almost too much for me
to take. A vision had entered my mind
of my father. He was young or even ageless. His face had this beautiful, warm,
loving, tender countenance. It was the uniquely, tender and loving gaze that my
father was capable of and which I remember from certain moments in my life even
though he was basically a stern individual, the ‘Old School’ type.
And then
this profound feeling came over me that I just wanted to run up into his strong
arms with those big hands and have him hold me like he did when I was a child.
I wanted to run into his fatherhood. The feeling was so intense I thought it
was going to take me out of my body. And I wondered what was going on. And then, I realized what it was. Through the
vocation of fatherhood that my father embraced, I touched the Fatherhood of
God.
Now I
know intellectually and theologically that earthly fatherhood is a reflection
of God’s fatherhood. But through this
experience coming only after my father’s death, through Joseph’s earthly
fatherhood that is now finished, I could feel, and really know intimately the
Fatherhood of God. In a time when Fatherhood is missing in action and father
wound is the most devastating and universal hurt of our time, the faithful
fatherhood of the Joseph Loya’s of this world is an immense gift.
As I
could touch God’s fatherhood through my father’s vocation, so too, I was able
to touch the suffering of Jesus Christ.
Joseph
Loya faced much adversity in life and he suffered deeply in many ways on many
levels. Instead of J-O-E his name could have been spelled J-O-B (like the
Prophet Job.) Fatherhood is all about spending oneself completely--taking the
hits on behalf of the family regardless of the cost to oneself and to die doing
so. Just like Jesus Christ did on the Cross.
I did
not always understand my Father’s suffering and how I would wish that I could
bring him consolation, resolution, take it away. But as my life has gone on, as have the years
of my priesthood, I came to realize that through my father’s witness of
suffering, I was able to touch the meaning of redemptive suffering. Like Jesus Christ, we all suffer on behalf of
others. Another person’s suffering transforms us and our suffering transforms
them. It is one of the most priceless
gems of our Faith, one of the things that sets us apart from the unbelieving
world that suffering itself is never the last word. Rather, because of Jesus
Christ, suffering always becomes redemptive.
But there
is one gift that sums up the whole of Joseph Loya’s gift of fatherhood and his
life on earth:
He would
say: “I have one
purpose for being on this earth—to bring you kids into this world and into the
Faith and help this family get to Heaven.”
And to know
the very soul of this ultimate gift of Joseph E. Loya, we have to turn to the Liturgy of this
Byzantine Catholic Church. Last Sunday, Florence Oris, from the Cathedral
parish here said to me that during the last few months of my father’s life when
he could no longer come to this church and attend this Liturgy my father told
her that it “physically
pained him” not to be able to come to church.
My
father’s hope was that his family would live that Faith and get to Heaven by
way of the Byzantine Catholic Church. “I was born a Byzantine Catholic
and I will die a Byzantine Catholic!” he
proclaimed,” with a voice full of passion and his mighty fist pounding the
table.
Why this Church? Of all the people that ever walked this earth
in the last 100 years, Joseph Eugene Loya knew the warts and dark sides of this
Byzantine Catholic Church. He lived it,
was wounded and traumatized by it. He watched his priest father physically
attacked in this own rectory by parishioners. All in the name of God and
religion!! They dragged his priest father into court, shamed and maligned him
all in the name of God and religion!! What terror this must have been for a
child to witness!! My father knew the scandals, the divisions and schisms,
the failings, the hurts, the prejudice, and the perennial confusion of this
Church to know its real identity and destiny. My father had every reason to
leave this Church. He had every reason to stop believing in God!! When my father would tell some of these
stories to Fr. Mike Hayduk, his pastor here at the Cathedral parish, Fr.
Michael would say to me, “You know Tom, it is a wonder you father still goes to
Church or even still believes in God at all!” So why would my father say, “I was born a
Byzantine Catholic and I will die a Byzantine Catholic!!?” Why this
Church?!!
Because this church is not defined by its human
profile, however glorious or fallen.
Most importantly this Church is not a religion. I repeat: This Church is
not a ‘religion.’ It is not an
institution or an organization or a cult.
This Byzantine Catholic Church is about a way of seeing--seeing the invisible, infinite, incomprehensible,
immeasurable God, become visible, tangible and living according to that one and
only vision of life.
It was
through the Liturgy, the chant the mysticism of this Church that my father
touched God. As my father would touch
God through this Liturgy, and as I could touch the Fatherhood of God through my
father’s fatherhood, so too can we touch the very interior life of the Holy
Trinity through this Church. So too can
we touch the suffering Christ in this Church, not just think about it or talk
about or pretend. But to really touch
it.
When you
love someone and someone loves you, you don’t just read a book about them, or
quote things about them, or just think about them. It is not enough just to
have them privately “in your heart.” You want and need to touch them. You become intimate with them and they with
you, physically, spiritually, emotionally, intellectually. So it is between God and us. And the vehicle
for that intimacy with God is this Church.
That is what my father knew and wanted above else for his family to know
and to never forget.
The time
of a person’s death and burial is always significant, even Providential. My
father died when his beloved Church is in between two feast days of
fatherhood. This past Sunday was the
Feast of the Holy Patriarchs of the Bible and this coming Sunday, the Sunday
before Christmas, is the Feast of the Fore-Fathers of Christ’s entire earthly
lineage. Both Sundays are called Sundays of the Holy Forefathers.
On the
day that my father died, God gave us a wink and he gave my father a playful
nudge. My father would struggle with certain things in our faith, as we all
do: He would say, “You hear about these guys that went off into a
cave for thirty years and didn’t do anything.
They sat in a cave and became saints! Or
these guys that climbed up on a pole and sat there for forty years—those
stylites—they didn’t have to work for a living,
pay bills support a family and they became saints! That’s what I want to do. I just want to go to a cave somewhere or
sit on a pole and not have to worry about anything!”
Well,
according to the liturgical calendar of his Byzantine Catholic Church my father
died on the feast of St. Daniel the Stylite!! Listen to how Providential the
prayer is for St. Daniel the Stylite:
“You became a column of endurance and rivaled
the forefathers, O holy one, becoming like Job in your sufferings and like
Joseph in your trials, and like the bodiless angels though lived in the
flesh. O Daniel, our holy father,
intercede with Christ our God that He may save our souls. “ (Tropar for St.
Daniel the Stylite).
But now
Joseph Loya will be laid to rest on the Feast of the Prophet Haggai. The people
of Haggai’s time were called by God to rebuild the temple, to renew their
Faith. But they had become despondent
and complacent under the seemingly hopeless circumstances of their time. Haggai’s message was motivational—“rebuild
this temple”, he told them. “Renew your Faith!” I truly believe that the gift
of Joseph Loya’s entire life would be summed up in that same message to all of
us today: “Love
this Church. Be faithful to it! Rebuild it!” Again, the prayer for Prophet Haggai is
Providential:
“Your mind was enlightened with the fire of
the Spirit, you proclaimed the hidden things of God, O prophet. You revealed what was to come, pointing to
the mystery of what was to happen. Beg Christ our God to have mercy on us.” (Kontakion for Haggai)
Joseph
E. Loya was the very incarnation of this Byzantine Catholic Church and this
Church incarnates the gift of my father’s life.
As my
father’s ultimate gift to his children was our Faith and this Church and as he himself was gift to this Church, this Church will now give
to him the supreme gift that we offer to all of our deceased. Since we are not capable of worthily
remembering a person, it is the genius of our Byzantine Catholic Church that we
ask God to take that person, Joseph Eugene Loya, into God’s memory. For only God Himself can give to that person
what they are truly worthy of. Only God alone can remember and love perfectly
and forever.
There is
one last “wink” from God: Every man and
father has their “cave,” their personal, special space where they go to
regenerate. Dad’s have their chair, their cup, their
tool, etc. Sometimes when I was home
visiting my parents and I would start to reach for a cup my mother would say, “That’s your Dad’s
cup.”
Well,
this morning, I was going to drink out of Dad’s cup. When I grabbed his cup off of the shelf I noticed
there was a Scripture quote on it from Proverbs 20:7: “When a man walks with
integrity and justice his children are blessed after him.” Joseph E. Loya, our father, walked with
integrity and justice in this life and we his children have indeed been richly
blessed!
December 23, 2013
Commentary
on the More2life Talk Show on Ave Maria Radio
Glory to Jesus Christ! December
21, 2013
Family and Friends,
Below is a message sent
to me by Dr. Gregory Popcak, a noted Catholic psychotherapist, author and radio
host. Twice a month I do a brief
appearance on
Dr. Popcak’s radio
program, “More2Life,” which is carried on Ave Maria Radio. The program that Dr. Gregory refers to in his
message was broadcast on Wednesday, December 18, 2013, two days after my
father’s funeral and the day in which I was scheduled to appear on Dr.
Gregory’s program.
My father, Joseph E.
Loya, never liked having his life or himself personally “put on display in
front of strangers.” It is in his death
that God has put my father’s life “on display” not only as a necessary and
inspiring witness to many “strangers” but I also believe to reveal to my father
the giftedness of his life on earth which comes to its fullness in his death.
December 23, 2013
Thank you for getting
these messages around to so many people. Today, Monday December
23rd, on Ave Maria Radio, I will do a five minute interview beginning at Noon
(EDT) on the program that spoke about my father last week. The program is
"More2Life" and people can access it at www.avemariaradio.net.
Actually I do a cameo
appearance on this program twice a month. It is hosted by two outstanding
Catholics and accomplished professionals, Dr. Gregory and Lisa Popcak. The
program is about how to actually life live according to Pope John Paul II's
theology of the body. It is an inspiring advice driven program that takes
calls as well.
I can also be heard live
every Tuesday (including tomorrow, Christmas Eve) on www.radiomaria.us. I host a program there called, "Beyond the
Veil." And then of course there is my long running radio program,
"Light of the East" which is carried on EWTN Radio affiliates all
over the world. You can access this program on www.catholicradiointernational.com. All to my complete surprise Almighty God
has opened many doors to me in media (TV, radio, print, conference
speaking) in recent years which in turn are doors that are opened for the
Church both and East and West.
--Fr. Thomas J. Loya
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