Dedication of the Lateran Basilica

Imagine for a moment standing in the desert. It is dry, it is dusty, and the heat feels as though it might crack the very earth beneath your feet. It is a place of thirst. Then, suddenly, you see it: a trickle of water emerging from the stone of a temple, growing, widening, until it becomes a river that brings life to everything it touches. This is the vision Ezekiel sees today, and it is a vision of how God works. He does not sit apart from our thirst; He lets the river of His own life flow right out of the sanctuary and into the salt-crusted, barren places of our history. He turns the bitter sea fresh. He makes the desert bloom. This is the promise of the temple—not just a building of stone, but the place where God’s life meets our human need.

Today we celebrate the dedication of the Lateran Basilica, the mother church of all churches. It is a beautiful, grand structure. But Saint Paul reminds us in his letter to the Corinthians that the real temple, the one that truly matters, is you. 'Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?' This is a staggering thought. It means that when you walk into a room, you carry the sanctuary with you. When you sit in the silence of your home, you are sitting in the house of God. And when you carry the heavy, aching cross of grief—that weight that has been yours for these four months since Benjamin went home to God—you are not carrying it alone. You are carrying it within the temple of your own soul, where the Spirit of God is already present, already sighing with you, already holding you.

I think of Benjamin, and I see a boy who understood this architecture of the heart. You know, Ben was a boy of such incredible, sharp intellect. He was a builder. He loved the logic of code, the complex systems of cloud infrastructure, the way a Boeing 737 is engineered to lift off the earth and soar. He had this brilliant, analytical mind that wanted to know how things were put together. But he was also a boy who knew that the most important things in life aren't the things you can measure with a ruler or a line of code. He knew the value of a smile. He knew the weight of a kind word. He knew that the 'con chim airlines' he dreamed of wasn't just about planes; it was about the joy of sharing a vision, of talking with his dad, of connecting with the people he loved. He was a boy who looked at the world and saw a place where love could be built, brick by brick, act by act.

There is a story about a boy who wanted to give his entire piggy bank to his uncle, not because he was told to, but because he saw a need and his heart simply reached out. He didn’t break the bank, he didn’t empty it; the offer was the truth of who he was. That, my friends, is the river flowing from the temple. That is the grace of God moving through a young life, showing us that the most powerful thing in the world is a heart that is willing to give everything away. Ben didn’t need to be a saint in a stained-glass window to show us the face of Christ. He showed it to us in his braces-filled smile, in his curiosity, in the way he looked at his dad as if every story told was the most important one on earth. He was a living temple, and he still is.

I know that for you, Alan and Thao, these months have been a long, dry season. I know the temptation to look at the 'salt waters' of your sorrow and wonder if they can ever be made fresh again. There are nights when the house feels too quiet, when the absence of that 'Good morning, Dad' leaves a hollow space that feels impossible to fill. You might wonder if you missed something, if there was a sign you didn't see, or a path you didn't take. Let me say this as clearly as I can: you are not to blame. There was no missed sign. There was no failure of love. You loved him with a completeness that is rare and beautiful. God does not hold you responsible for the mystery of a life that ended too soon. He holds you in the same arms that are holding Ben. The guilt that whispers in the dark is not from God; it is a weight you were never meant to carry. Lay it down at the threshold of the temple. Let the water of God’s grace wash that stone away.

In the Gospel today, Jesus cleanses the temple. He is zealous for His Father’s house. He clears out the clutter, the noise, the commerce that distracts from the true purpose of the space. Sometimes, grief acts like that. It clears out the clutter of our lives. It strips away the things we thought were important—the schedules, the plans, the worries about the future—and leaves us with only the essential: the love we had, the love we have, and the God who sustains it. When you feel that sense of being 'cleared out' by your loss, do not fear it. It is the beginning of a new foundation. Jesus says, 'Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up.' He was talking about His own body, but He was also talking about the promise that death is not the end of the building process. It is the beginning of the resurrection.

Ben is part of that resurrection. He is not a memory fading into the past; he is a life that has been raised into the light of the Father. Think of him as he was—brilliant, gentle, always ready to share a laugh. He is in the 'Banquet of Heaven,' and he is just as alive, just as curious, and just as much your son as he ever was. When Ryan dreams of roller coasters with his brother, that is not a trick of the mind. That is the reality of the communion of saints. It is the way the river flows across the boundary of death to remind us that we are still a family. You are still the 'perfect four.' Nothing can change that. Not time, not distance, not even the grave.

I want to speak to anyone listening who feels like their own life is a ruin today. Maybe you are a parent carrying a cross, or a young person feeling the weight of the world, or someone who has lost their way. Look at the trees on the banks of the river in Ezekiel’s vision: 'their leaves shall not fade, nor their fruit fail.' That is the promise for your life. Even in the midst of your sorrow, you are being watered by the flow from the sanctuary. You are being sustained. You don't have to be strong enough to carry this alone. You just have to be willing to let the water flow. Let God love you. Let Him be the strength that carries you when your own legs feel weak. Let Him be the one who whispers to you that you are not forgotten, that you are not forsaken, and that your tears are being gathered into a river that leads to life.

What do you carry out the door today? Perhaps it is the simple, quiet decision to trust. Today, when you feel the ache of missing Ben, try to turn it into a prayer. When you see a plane in the sky, remember that he is soaring. When you see a glass of clear water, remember the well in Cà Mau that flows in his name, a sign that his love is still working on this earth, still bringing life to those who need it. You are the temple of God. You are the place where He dwells. And because He dwells in you, you can survive anything. You can walk through the desert, you can face the salt waters, and you can trust that at the end of the journey, you will meet him again, face to face, in the city where there is no more tears, no more pain, and no more goodbyes. You are held. You are loved. You are not alone. Amen.