Are we ready for heaven? (Sunday homily)

One of the things I thought about, as I looked at these Scripture readings, was this: 
what do we think heaven--life after this--really is?

Listening to how people talk about heaven, 
some folks seem to think it’s just more of the same, only somehow better. 
So if we drink beer here, we’ll drink more, and better beer, there.

Well, I confess I like that idea! But that doesn’t make it true.

The other idea I think people have, which is related, I call, “home free.”

When I was in boy in school, I was always looking forward to summer. 
As the March led to April, April to May, 
and we scrambled to get everything finished--
we were thinking, “oh, we’ll just get past this, and then we’re ‘home free!’”

Of course, part of the problem is that we don’t really know much about heaven.
But it’s more than “home free.”

And the way we know that is by considering how much trouble 
God has gone to prepare us for heaven.

He sent the prophets, like Daniel, to give us hope. 
He gave us the Ten Commandments, to give us a way to live. 
He himself came--and he gave everything to us, at the Cross, 
which is poured into our lives through the Sacraments of our Faith.

He established his Church as an ark of salvation to bring us to heaven. 
And despite all the efforts of bishops and priests, 
kings and knaves, to shipwreck the Church, she’s still here!

God has gone--and continues to go--to a lot of trouble to get us to heaven. 

So maybe we ought to think about what we need to do to be ready?