"Exorcism and Hope" - Sermon for 5th Sunday of Easter, 5-3-26

† Exorcism, writes David Fagerberg, is “reclaiming something for its original purpose” (a). In scary, suspenseful movies – and in the rite carefully administered in real-life, yes, even in the Episcopal Church – exorcism reclaims the body and soul from Satan’s possession and gives it back to its owner, who is cast in the image of God.

But exorcism is even more common and less scary than what is depicted in the eponymous novel and film. Jesus, who is the second Adam, and Jesus’s Church, which is the second Eve, exorcise us. They reclaim us for our original purpose as members of a royal priesthood. Jesus exorcises us – reclaims us – through the paschal mystery of his incarnation, death, resurrection, and ascension. It is into this mystery that the Church exorcises us – reclaims us – when we are baptized in the water of the font, and when we are fed by Jesus’s Body and Blood at the altar.

As royal priests, you and I, we offer spiritual sacrifices of our souls and substances at every liturgy. We are concelebrants with Christ, whose sacrifice on the altar of the cross we remember and proclaim. Important in that proclamation, and sometimes overlooked, is the statement, “Christ will come again.” Eschatology is the word for that. And hope, the third of the theological virtues, is, Fagerberg writes, the “embodiment of eschatology” (b).

David Fagerberg is a professor of liturgical theology at Notre Dame. I heard him speak at a conference several years ago. I have read his book On Liturgical Asceticism four times now, and I am finishing his Consecrating the World: On Mundane Liturgical Theology. You will hear more about my response to Fagerberg’s work at our parish retreat in September.

Fagerberg quotes a teacher of his, Aidan Kavanagh, who said that liturgy calls us “to do the world as the world was meant to be done” (c). We lost our royal priesthood in Eden, when the first Adam and Eve reached for what they were not yet ready or able to receive. We reclaimed our royal priesthood in the exorcism of Jesus’s paschal mystery. Christian liturgy is our celebration of this Paschal accomplishment, which brings us “from death to life, from darkness to light, from Satan to God” (d). But we are not all the way there yet, which is where hope comes in. Fagerberg quotes another theologian, Charles Péguy, who wrote this poetic reflection on the three theological virtues.

“Faith and love are older;

hope is the youngest and smallest of the three.

The little hope moves forward in between her two older sisters and one scarcely notices her.

On the path to salvation,

on the earthly path,

on the rocky path of salvation,

on the interminable road,

on the road in between her two older sisters, the little hope pushes on …

And no one pays attention,

the Christian people don’t pay attention,

except to the two older sisters.

But it’s she, the little one, who carries them all.

Because Faith sees only what is.

But she, she sees what will be.

Charity loves only what is.

But she, she loves what will be” (e).

Every Christian liturgy is about hope, and today’s lections are full of hope, even though this important word does not appear in them. “Do not let your hearts be troubled,” Jesus said to his disciples. He could easily have said, do not let your hearts lose hope, “for I go to prepare a place for you and will come again and take you to myself.” This place is understood to be heaven, and this interpretation is correct. But in the intervening time on Earth, Jesus comes to us again and again in the liturgy and prepares our place at the altar, where we “are sitting,” in Fagerberg’s words, “across from God at a festal banquet table” (f).

Yet eschatology, he continues,

“Is not a place whither we go; it is something that happens. The Christian liturgy is not an escape into otherworldliness; it is finally doing this world, our mundane world, in a way that is free from vice, selfishness, disordered love, idolatry, corruption, and so forth” (g).

It is these powers of death, darkness, and Satan – and Jesus’s victory over them – that true Christian liturgy must address. Fagerberg writes,

“Eschatology’s major symbol of victory over Satan is a warp that must be woven into every liturgical woof, or else the liturgy is just whistling past the graveyard. Without the sacramental presence of the eschatological victory, the liturgy becomes the Jesus club whispering comforting platitudes to itself while in a holding pattern over death” (h).

And such Christian liturgy, therefore, is beautiful. Not because of the ritual. There are no theater critics to impress here; no clickety, clickety, clack of my liturgics professor’s shoes, finding us in the sacristy after Mass to point out our mistakes. Liturgy is beautiful, rather, because it is true. “When truth shines, there is beauty,” (i) Fagerberg writes, because in this and every Christian liturgy, the principal celebrant is Jesus, who is “the way, and the truth, and the life.”

The martyred deacon Stephen saw the truth and beauty of this liturgy when the heavens revealed “the glory of God and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.” Stephen joined this liturgy when he offered himself as a sacrifice – “Lord Jesus,” he prayed, “receive my spirit.” In that liturgy, Stephen glimpsed the beatific vision and overflowing joy of God, and he entered it fully when he died. In concelebrating the liturgy, Stephen had hope: he saw what will be.

We concelebrate the liturgy with Jesus. Jesus is the chief celebrant. Does the liturgy bring us hope in what will be? If not, we Christian people might begin to pay attention to hope, Péguy’s youngest and smallest of the three theological virtues.

Perhaps hope – eschatological, liturgical hope – is the one thing we ought to ask of Jesus in his name, one more promise for him to keep. The kind of hope that inspires us in our liturgy to do the world as it was meant to be done. And then to go out into the world and to do it liturgically.

Fagerberg quotes another theologian, Jean Daniélou, who wrote of the missed opportunity of hope unasked for:

“In spite of the promises of Christ, how many Christians there are who haven’t the slightest certainty that they will one day enter into possession of the beatific vision and the overflowing joy of God! How many Christians there are who live without the conviction that they are moving toward this joy! And these people thus show little disposition to generosity because lacking certainty about what is to come, one would rather, as they say, get the most out of this life” (j).

Which is to say, to do the world as it was not meant to be done.

Beloved, do not let your hearts be troubled. Do not let your hearts lose hope. Believe in the promises of Jesus, the incarnate Son of God, who died and rose and ascended to prepare a place for you.

Believe in the promise that Jesus descends yet again to lift you to himself as he comes to us in Word and Sacrament, in the eschatological happening right now in the truth and beauty of this liturgy.

Believe in the promise that Jesus has prepared a heavenly place for you, and that he will perform the final exorcism, reclaiming you to your ultimate original purpose: that is an eternity with God. †

(a)      Fagerberg, “Consecrating the World” 39.

(b)     Fagerberg 49.

(c)      Fagerberg 5.

(d)     Fagerberg 49.

(e)      Péguy, in Fagerberg 49.

(f)      Fagerberg 48.

(g)     Fagerberg 48.

(h)     Fagerberg 44.

(i)       Fagerberg 50.

(j)       Daniélou, in Fagerberg 48.

Father Daniel S.J. Scheid, SCP

Fifth after Easter A – May 3, 2026

All Saints’ Episcopal Church, San Francisco

“Exorcism and Hope”