Gospel, Homily and Coffee

Ever long for simpler days? When Life gets confusing, seemingly difficult, hard to figure out? Ahh, why can’t we go to simpler times, when everything made sense and we thought we had it easier.  Of course, it means looking back with a bias, forgetting that maybe back in the day, it wasn’t so fine. We just conveniently forgot all the unfortunate stuff. Adulting can be difficult.  We have responsibilities and duties; many have those little ones that insist on being fed, clothed, taken to various events, want clean sheets, tucked in. We have doctor appointments, aging parents, friends whom we want to spend time with, priests making demands of time and money….. Parishioners making demands of time and money. Bosses and employees, groceries, cleaning, bills, repairs, chores…CALGON take me away!!!!!!      Add to the mix, we don’t always get life correct. We make mistakes. None of us like this, and for some, getting past mistakes can be really difficult. We feel ...

God created all in harmony, for harmony. This includes humanity. The destiny of creation, of especially us, a predestination if you will, is to participate consciously and actively in this harmony. We thrive when we do this.  This comes from Genesis, and if we were present on the Easter Vigil we would have heard reading that wonderfully proclaimed.  We read in that Sacred Scripture of God’s breath, God’s spirit, God’s words moving across the chaos, and bringing harmony. Humans resisted and resist this harmony. We have this tendency to want to sing our own tunes, our own way, whether it is in harmony with God or others. We see the results, a cacophony. God never rescinds the invitation to us to sing with God, to be in harmony.  God desires us, always has desired us to be in harmony with God; just as the Trinity is. God is good.   Singing means we need to listen. We follow the lead of the director who guides us along the music. Music itself has structure, ...

We celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. We celebrate his being raised from the Dead by the Father. And so… what does this really mean? One of the great aspects of the Easter Vigil is the readings; the amount and the trajectory of them. They always begin with Genesis; the story of creation and we remember how God created all with Goodness and that in this world we too were created with goodness, for goodness, to be able to encounter God as God truly is. Our destiny, to see God face to face. The Scriptures move through the story of God walking with humanity, accompanying them on a journey towards liberation; to be free to encounter the divine. Throughout this journey God gave surprises to humanity, to push us forward towards that liberation. God called out to a simple elderly man and woman and made them fertile, and made a people out of them. God took that same people, now enslaved and freed them, even splitting the sea and thwarting the power of an empire. ...

  Very few talks/homilies do I remember from the Seminary.  Not just because it was a few years ago, but to be honest, we heard a lot, and most were not noteworthy.  Two do stick out for me.  One, from Fr. Gene Konkel talking about why saints are patrons of such and such…e.g. Lawrence patron of Chefs, because he was cooked alive.  Sebastian, of archers because well he was martyred by being shot with arrows.  It ended up being a humorous homily on the quirks of our catholic faith. Another homily/talk was by my Spiritual director Fr. Jim.  Memorable for me because for me it was an honest talk to the body of seminarians.  Now seminarians and priests have a habit of talking about “my” priesthood or “my future” priesthood.  He said, although I paraphrase, “Gentleman, it is never “my” priesthood.  There is only one priest, that is Jesus.  He shares his priesthood with us, and will with you; it is not yours.  Our work as priests is to...

Caravaggio - Taking of Christ Palm Sunday and the Passion of Jesus Christ; next week, Holy Thursday/Good Friday; we are seemingly confronted with the fallen state of humanity. Yet, is that what these readings are really about? Is this what our faith is about, how bad we humans are? What we do need to remember and what we gather to celebrate is God’s great love, as revealed in Jesus Christ.  What we do need to remember and give thanks for is that no matter how horrible we may be; God’s love reigns supreme. God waits, invites, pleads, desires us to see, grasp this and turn to God; and God will wipe away everything. And that will change us. Empowered by this, we begin to walk a different path, one of life. God loves us no matter what. Remember that, celebrate that; give thanks for that. Live it.

In case anyone has forgotten Easter will soon be here! Easter we celebrate the Paschal Mystery of Jesus Christ, his death and Resurrection. We celebrate in Gratitude for this revelation of Life. We commit ourselves again to the way of Christ, and we join with those newly baptized and newly received into the Catholic Church to be disciples, to be better disciples of Christ. Yet, what will that mean for them and what does it mean for us, already fully initiated and living out the faith? In the United States the Bishops have called for a two year Eucharistic Revival. Two years for all Catholics in the US to contemplate our grasp of the meaning that the Bread and Wine become the very person of the Resurrected Son of God, and how we can give thanks and live that out. A critique of what some bishops have suggested is that they simply want to restore those acts of piety from the past and that they think this will prompt people to believe in the real presence. The critique is that many p...