The Oil of Love - Waiting in Hope

Audio: Click Here

Baby box save. How hard it must have been to make that decision but a blessing.  Cutting off a relationship so that the child might have a safe and profitable future.
"I do not know you" - how much harder it would be to hear those words directed to us from the Lord.  To avoid this eternal heartbreak, we need to do what is required: we need to be like the wise virgins in today’s Gospel.
This parable, like all parables, offers us an analogy of the spiritual life.  It is a truth wrapped in a story, and the story isn’t about oil.  It’s about “Staying awake!”, Christ tells us.  But what does that mean?  Well, staying awake ultimately means living our baptism day by day, moment by moment –living in continual relationship with the Lord Jesus, our heavenly Father, and the Holy Spirit.  If we are doing this, then we are keeping the fire burning – and that fire is love, and unlike oil, love cannot be bought or sold.  You either have it or you don’t – and that is why the five wise virgins cannot share their oil.  Their love is their own.  Our love for Jesus is either there or it isn’t.  When I get to heaven I cannot say: “I know I never really prayed but, hey, my mom went to daily Mass!”  Saint Peter will not be amused or deceived.  Do you love Jesus?  Do you seek Christ tirelessly?
Pray. Hope. Don't worry.
Being on retreat last week was such a great gift.  I feel refreshed by the time I was able to give solely to God. The world would say it was wasted if it wasn't for personal benefit, but even if I got nothing out of it (and there were certainly times of waiting), it was worth it. Why did Jesus die on the Cross and rise from the dead? To give us heaven - who is a relationship with God, something we already experience in prayer. If we don't pray, we are ultimately saying we don't care about heaven. 
Another message from this parable is that we do have to wait. We can't force God. Must wait patiently. Even when on retreat.
Indeed, the Thessalonians were waiting for Jesus to return, and they like Saint Paul thought that the Lord's return was to be very soon, which is why they worried for those who died before the Second Coming.  Indeed waiting is necessary for us all in the spiritual life. We live in a beautiful mess of "already" mixed with a healthy dose of "not yet."
We already have a relationship with the Lord, but we don't yet see Him face to face. We already are God's children, but we do not yet always live as such. We already see the beginning of the kingdom of God, but we know that it is not fully realized.
Ultimately the message of these readings is the same one Padre Pio often gave: Pray. Hope. Don't worry. (Padre Pio’s relics visited SJHS just over a week ago on the 3rd, a total surprise to me, and I received a special blessing from the priest guardian who was holding P. Pio’s gloves over my head.  What a gift!)  …  But anyways: Pray. Hope. Don't worry. We pray to experience the "already”.  We hope joyfully for the “not yet” to be realized and completed.  And we don’t worry about the rest, because God has us in His gaze, and His love is proven to us by the Cross and by this Eucharist.  Lord, help us to pray, hope, and not worry.

"Father's" Day - The Priestly Ministry - prayers needed

Audio from 9:30am Mass - click here 

 
This upcoming week is National Vocations Awareness week in the USA, so it is very fitting to talk about the priesthood, especially when the Gospel includes Jesus saying to us: "call no man father..." I'm sure you all can guess that I've been hearing people call me Father every day for the past 6.5 years, and we of course mean the same even when we call our fathers "dad" or "papa" or whatever.  So this teaching of Jesus must not be taken literally.  It needs to be seen in context with the rest of the passage ("master" and "teacher") as well as the context of the whole bible. In fact, Saturday morning we heard the same closing phrase in a different passage where Luke speaks of taking seats of honor at banquets: "whoever exalts himself will be humbles, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted." So Luke 14 has something to say about Matthew 23, and the important part - the overlap and the echo - is about how we deal with authority, fame, influence.  So this fits not only the priesthood and teachers and parents, but all types of worldly authority and influence.  More on that in a bit, but first I would like to talk a bit about the priesthood.

The priesthood of Jesus Christ which I share in by ordination is the reason for many of the most difficult as well as the most amazing moments in my life.  A priest will never forget the joy of walking with someone who joins the Church as an adult and receives Communion for the first time from his hands; just as he never forgets blessing a man or woman who just died or grieving with their loved ones.  The priest weeps when he sees a soul running from the Lord unaware of His Mercy, and rejoices in giving absolution to one who returns after many years.

          I'm sure the same could be said about any role of leadership and authority, especially parents, teachers, coaches, and civil authorities.  It is difficult and rewarding.  

We aren't to reject these leadership roles, but we cannot let them feed our age-old weakness of pride.  Authority is ultimately an opportunity for humble service. 

Yesterday there was a great example of this for the priesthood, and I wish you to think about how this applies to yourself in your various roles of leadership, authority, and influence.

          Saint Charles Borromeo -  November 4th.  Actually my first summer parish assignment - my childhood rivals.  Msgr. John vs. Msgr. John (best friends)  "that other parish" "de-program him"

Saint Charles really helped complete the reform of the Catholic church at the Council of Trent and afterwards, making the church work to finish the response that was essential for the Church after the spark of Martin Luther ignited revolution and rupture from the Catholic Church precisely 500 years ago, 1517.  He is the patron saint of seminarians, because he really started seminaries.  He said more or less that the university system should be adapted to train men to be priests in an organized way with more direct supervision, instead of the bishop placing someone in an "apprenticeship" under a good priest-mentor-guide.  More was needed, because priesthood is important - very important.  The fact is, priests can really help people and can really hurt people.  Just like a good coach can build someone up, and a bad coach can crush someone's spirit.  Of course, the same goes for a teacher, parent, etc.  If the priest is not holy, why would the congregation be holy?  He is meant to be an example, like Saint Paul says.

          St. Paul in the 2nd reading: Brothers and sisters: We were gentle among you, as a nursing mother cares for her children. With such affection for you, we were determined to share with you not only the gospel of God, but our very selves as well, so dearly beloved had you become to us. You recall, brothers and sisters, our toil and drudgery. Working night and day in order not to burden any of you, we proclaimed to you the gospel of God.

Every year, the priest reads great advice from Saint Charles in the office of Readings.

          From a sermon given during the last synod he attended, by Saint Charles, bishop

(Acta Ecclesiae Mediolanensis 1599, 1177-1178) Practice what you preach

I admit that we are all weak, but if we want help, the Lord God has given us the means to find it easily. One priest may wish to lead a good, holy life, as he knows he should. He may wish to be chaste and to reflect heavenly virtues in the way he lives. Yet he does not resolve to use suitable means, such as penance, prayer, the avoidance of evil discussions and harmful and dangerous friendships. Another priest complains that as soon as he comes into church to pray the office or to celebrate Mass, a thousand thoughts fill his mind and distract him from God. But what was he doing in the sacristy before he came out for the office or for Mass? How did he prepare? What means did he use to collect his thoughts and to remain recollected?

Would you like me to teach you how to grow from virtue to virtue and how, if you are already recollected at prayer, you can be even more attentive next time, and so give God more pleasing worship? Listen, and I will tell you. If a tiny spark of God’s love already burns within you, do not expose it to the wind, for it may get blown out. Keep the stove tightly shut so that it will not lose its heat and grow cold. In other words, avoid distractions as well as you can. Stay quiet with God. Do not spend your time in useless chatter.

If teaching and preaching is your job, then study diligently and apply yourself to whatever is necessary for doing the job well. Be sure that you first preach by the way you live. If you do not, people will notice that you say one thing, but live otherwise, and your words will bring only cynical laughter and a derisive shake of the head.

Are you in charge of a parish? If so, do not neglect the parish of your own soul, do not give yourself to others so completely that you have nothing left for yourself. You have to be mindful of your people without becoming forgetful of yourself.

My brothers, you must realize that for us churchmen nothing is more necessary than meditation. We must meditate before, during and after everything we do. The prophet says: I will pray, and then I will understand. When you administer the sacraments, meditate on what you are doing. When you celebrate Mass, reflect on the sacrifice you are offering. When you pray the office, think about the words you are saying and the Lord to whom you are speaking. When you take care of your people, meditate on how the Lord’s blood that has washed them clean so that all that you do becomes a work of love.

This is the way we can easily overcome the countless difficulties we have to face day after day, which, after all, are part of our work: in meditation we find the strength to bring Christ to birth in ourselves and in other men.

          For this reason, I will be gone on my retreat this week.  To enter more deeply into meditation and prayer and my priesthood.  So I can hopefully improve my example of the faith, so I can give myself in service to you more perfectly.  Please pray for me.

          Pray also for all our seminarians.  I would encourage you to pick one and pray for him daily.  Or pray for one every day of the month.  Today, I wish to end by lifting up in prayer these men discerning the priesthood.  Please respond: Lord, watch over him.

                   Seminarians 2017-18

Deacon Patrick Hake

Deacon Jay Horning

Deacon David Huneck

Deacon Nathan Maskal

Deacon Thomas Zehr

Jose Arroyo

Daniel Niezer

Spenser St. Louis

Stephen Felicichia

Daniel Koehl

Michael Ammer

Jonathan Evangelista

Benjamin Landrigan

Keeton Lockwood

Logan Parrish

Brian Isenbarger

Joe Knepper

Augustine Onuoha

Samuel Anderson

Vincent Faurote

Brian Florin

Brian Kempiak

Bobby Krisch

Zane Langenbrunner

Jacob Schneider

Jonathan Alvarez

Dominic Garrett

Mark Hellinger

Caleb Kruse

David Langford

Nicholas Monnin

All Saints' Day - big siblings and mountain climbing

Audio only - click here!

Three Steps to Love - Three Loves to happiness

Audio: CLICK HERE

Love of God – Love of Neighbor -  Love of Self

Nowadays we would like to make Christianity exclusively a matter of head knowledge.  But a Christianity that is merely discussion, organization, and a bit of morality does not support us; we cannot grow fond of it; it does not provide joy and strength for our life.  IN order for the faith to support us and not to be a burden, it has to touch the heart, we must be able to grow fond of God.  And so [today] we want to call the Lord Jesus by his name, ask him to make us grow fond of this name again, so that by our fondness for this name we might again sense his own closeness and so that this might bring joy to our heart, the joy of not being alone, which remains and guides us even in the hours of darkness.  – A Homily from Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) in year 1998.

Sr.Eop  Elizabeth McDonough – Dominican nun. 80lbs. scared us all.

SELF-KNOWLEDGE   à  SELF-POSSESSION à SELF-GIFT

1.    Know who you are.  Strengths.  Weaknesses.  Gifts.  Wounds.  (HUMILITY)

2.    Mortification.  Interior battle of will.  Ideals.  “Brother ‘donkey’” (Francis)

3.    Choose love.

Then you find who you truly are, since “man does not discover himself except in a sincere gift of self.” (GS 24)

Love of self leads us to love of God.  And thus we have come full-circle, and Christianity is freed from being simply head-knowledge – it is what it was always meant to be: a path by God leading us back to God, through the journey of love.  May the Eucharist take us one step further along that journey.

"Whose Image and Whose Inscription?" In a society of BRANDing

Audio: CLICK HERE

The main message of today, brothers and sisters, is very simply put: our entire life is God's, and everything else needs to fit into that truth.

CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

450 From the beginning of Christian history, the assertion of Christ's lordship over the world and over history has implicitly recognized that man should not submit his personal freedom in an absolute manner to any earthly power, but only to God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Caesar is not "the Lord".⁶⁷ "The Church. . . believes that the key, the center and the purpose of the whole of man's history is to be found in its Lord and Master."⁶⁸

2113 Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, "You cannot serve God and mammon."⁴⁴ Many martyrs died for not adoring "the Beast"⁴⁵ refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God.

We in our society have our own strange gods, our false idols, but I do not think we are temped to worship our government.  But that wasn’t really the point of today’s public showdown anyway, for indeed the Pharisees and Herodians were interested in something that is much closer to our hearts: control, power, popularity, reputation.  What is interesting is the malice of these two groups.  The Pharisees were deeply religious, whereas the Herodians were indeed lovers of Rome and of Herod.  Almost the only thing they could agree on was their dislike for Jesus and the need to bring him down.  Evil always make a mockery of true goodness, just as their collaboration for evil is a perversion of true friendship which is rooted in the good.

But Jesus deftly walks right through their snares with his pithy response to the challenge.

Jesus says: who the image and the inscription? ... what belongs to Caesar... The implicit message is that the image and inscription makes it Caesar's - he made it, or his authority did so.

And you: who made you? You may remember the Baltimore Catechism began with this question. Who made me? God made me.

And that is the main point, clear and simple: God made you. You should give him your entire self, your whole life. And the coin is really quite trivial. It doesn't have the importance we often think. Rather, when we see that our entire life is God's, it is put in the proper perspective.

In our hyper consumerist culture, there is something pretty ironic that we all take for granted: BRAND names are all over us and around us. That word itself, brand, is a good indication of the problem. Branding is what was / is done to animals to claim them as one's property. It was done to slaves when we used to treat human beings as property (and sadly still do). Now we run around with brand names all over us and don't seem to think too much about it. Or perhaps we do when we realize what type of watch or shoes or dress or car this or that person has.

Now this isn't a problem if we remember that it is only the thing that is branded and not ourselves. That we take all that off and strip it away and we still are the same persons with the same dignity, created by a loving God.

The problem is that we often blur those lines: we are tempted to let the brand become an idol.  We are tempted to let Caesar's coin, and all the stuff it can buy, become the defining image of our lives and the source of our dignity.

In our consumerist society, we often give more to Caesar and to the coin than we do to God.  We give lots of time to that coin.  We give lots of worry to that coin.  We pursue that coin in so many ways.  Some of this is necessary: we have an obligation to make good use of our talents, to provide for ourselves and those entrusted to our case, especially the needy.  Thus, the coin is not evil, just as Jesus himself doesn’t shy away from touching it.  We just need to never forget, God has given us everything, as we see in the Eucharist which is His Son, and so we owe Him the same.  Our entire life is God's, and everything else needs to fit into that truth.

Invitation Accepted!

Audio: click here! (9:30am Mass)

Before we get into today’s readings, I think it will be helpful if we recall last week’s parable, which leads right into today’s section from Matthew’s Gospel.  Last we heard Jesus speak of a vineyard prepared for tenants who were not very obedient.  When the master sent servants to collect produce, they were beaten and even killed!  Finally, the Son was sent, and he too was murdered so they could “acquire his inheritance.”  Through this parable, Jesus is interpreting the history of Israel: God has done everything to provide for them; they reject the prophets; they reject the Son; the Gospel goes to the Gentiles.  Remember the closing phrase: “the kingdom of God will be taken away from you
and given to a people that will produce its fruit."

Very similar to this parable is today’s passage.  It is another reinterpretation of the Bible.  Everything is an invitation to the wedding feast of the King’s Son.  This is easily seen as an image of the offer of the gospel: God wants a relationship with you and invites you into this celebration.  How do they respond?  Many don’t care.  Others get hostile and even kill the messengers! So the King takes vengeance and then invites everyone else (this would be the Gentiles), and the house is filled.  Then, the parable ends with another encounter of the upset king with a man who does not have a wedding garment, which would have been like a ticket or invitation, but symbolically means much more.  The man is thrown out.

So “many are invited, but few are chosen.”  Many are invited, but few cherish the value of the invitation.

The wedding garment has two symbolic meanings.  First, it is a clear symbol for baptism, where the new Christians bear on their bodies a sign of their entrance into the life of Christ – an outward sign of their acceptance of the invitation to the King’s feast.  But secondly, like in last week’s parable, it represents the “good fruit” we are to produce.  When our lives as disciples are not showing any fruits of the Holy Spirit, when we are not living the moral life in a manner worthy of God’s children, when we do not put on love over all things, then we are not wearing our wedding garment as we should.  If we need to, we should get to Confession and get our souls clean before we return to Communion.

But most importantly, friends, all of today’s readings are a reminder to us of the beauty and the privilege we have of attending Mass.  Just as it is nothing but a direct insult to reject the invitation of the king to his son’s wedding, so too it is an affront to God for us to tell Him by our actions that other things are more important than Sunday Mass.  Here God provides us with the best food possible in the best place possible for the best reason possible – not by worldly standards but from the perspective of eternity.  Nothing can replace this offer, so let us not allow the world to steal the gift of Sunday from us.  Let us help and encourage each other to this gift.


OTHER NOTES: (I decided to go a different direction with the above homily)
Deitrich Bonhoffer - The Cost of Discipleship

"Many are called, few are chosen" So many people think God's grace costs us nothing.  As if the Gospel only brings us prosperity.


Run around and tell people you don't agree with abortion, that you don't agree with human trafficking nor the horrible slaveries to sensuality that create the demand for it, that you don't agree with same sex marriage or the exploitation of the environment at the cost of future generations.  If you do that, then I'm sure you will learn that discipleship costs you something.  When you have an enemy truly harm you or your reputation and you try to follow Christ's command to "pray for those who persecute you," then it is obvious that grace is not cheap.  When we begin to realize that "you cannot serve God and mammon" is directed at us in a world that's full of mammon being thrown to us, we then start to notice the price of following Jesus.  That is the Cross.

Bearing Fruit

Audio: click here!

This may be a hard truth, but I think it could be safely said that you and I are at times ungrateful. Here in the USA in the now 21st century, we have so much already given to us that we tend to take it for granted. We assume that what we have as gifts from God and from those who have gone before us are actually things that are our own and that we earned them. Like the tenants in the vineyard, we can get trapped into a way of thinking that ends up placing ourselves as the center of things, as the ones in charge, and even trample upon others as we seek for power and for stuff.  Whereas we recently heard of the parable of the vineyard workers who wanted more pay, now we have ones who want it all - the whole vineyard.

The church is the new vineyard. And you could say each on of us is a branch in a vine in that vineyard.

Each of us are expected to bear good fruit.

12 fruits of the Holy Spirit, expanded from Saint Paul's letter to the Galatians, ch. 5:

Love joy peace patience kindness gentleness goodness generosity faithfulness modesty chastity self-control

Poisoning the ground, disease of the vine so we cannot bear fruit: 7 deadly sins: Pride, Envy, Lust, Greed/Avarice, Sloth/laziness, Wrath/Anger, Gluttony.  If we let any of these grow in our hearts, we will not bear fruit.  These need to be rooted out – that is what Cnofession is for.

Rain and sunshine is ultimately God’s grace, but we can open our hearts to it through the 3 eminent (always at-hand) good works: prayer, fasting, charity.

Choose a fruit of the Spirit you want to grow in this week, and pray for it during this Mass.