Homily - Humility - Mother Teresa of Kolkata

Audio: click here!

In this parable today, Jesus wants us to face the fact that we really aren't big shots or VIP's.  The comparison game of getting on top and looking down on others gets us nowhere, like a game of running in circles, wearing yourselves out with no results.  The humility that Jesus calls us to is a simple awareness of the fact that what divides me from my fellow human beings is superficial stuff compared to what unites me to them.  I am much more alike them than I am different.  I need to be loved and to give love.  They need to be loved and to give love.

We encounter Jesus - and this was Mother Teresa's deepest conviction - first in the Most Blessed Sacrament and second in the poorest of the poor, indeed, in every fellow human being who is suffering.  For her, the presence of Jesus in the poorest of the poor was just as real as in the Eucharist.  Jesus teaches, 'truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.'

We should not hide from abject poverty or run away from it.  For if we do, we are running away from Jesus.
That's why we are told to invite those who cannot pay us back.  Because we are inviting Jesus.

"Father, you will meet Jesus there in His distressing disguise as the poorest of the poor.  Our visit will bring joy. for the most terrible poverty is loneliness and the feeling of being unloved.  The worst disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but the feeling of being unwanted."  Her words reminded me of something else she had said: "There is more hunger in the world for love and appreciation than for bread."

So what are some ways we can put this into practice in our lives?  How can we burst the bubble of our pride and meet Jesus in others?
1. Supporting our food pantry.  This is one way we invite the poor to eat.
2. Associate with the lowly.  Don't chase after the "big shots" to talk with them and get yourselves a place among the important.
3. Give the person in front of you the attention they deserve.  Love them, and thus love Jesus in them.  He is in there if you can believe it.
4.

Homiy 8/25 Strive - Marathon

Audio: 9:30am Mass: click here

No room for complacency, cruise control, “taking it easy” in the spiritual life.

“broad road to destruction”  / “narrow road”

STRIVE – PERSEVERANCE – DISCIPLINE (virtue of Hope & courage)

Hebrews "My son, do not disdain the discipline of the Lord or lose heart when reproved by him; for whom the Lord loves, he disciplines; he scourges every son he acknowledges." Endure your trials as "discipline"; God treats you as sons. 

Abraham. Isaac. Jacob. – they persevered, they strove with discipline in the journey of faith that lasted a lifetime.

Christianity is a race, and not a sprint race that’s requires one hard burst of ourselves.  Rather, a marathon.

Marathon Race – why I can’t beat my brother.  LACK OF DISCIPLINE to train.

We must make sacrifices for the sake of what we want.  We must organize our life for this one thing.

We must desire sanctity.  To be saints.  Holiness.  Discipline.

We were designed for this.

Revolution of Love

Audio: click here

The last verse of Hebrews Chapter twelve which is the conclusion of the exhortation we heard from today, says: For our God is a consuming fire.  The old testament reference in Deuteronomy, which the author quotes, also says the Lord is a jealous God.  Or other English translations say “zealous” because of the bad sense of the word jealous today that isn’t included in the original languages.  God’s heart is burning for us to live.  He created us to live a life in the fullest sense, and sin is the opposite of living a human life.  Sin is the least human thing about us, for we were created by Love, created in Love, created for Love.  God is that blazing fire of Love we were made for, and thus He wishes the world were ablaze. 

No, God is not an anarchist.  Except that he wants to see the revolution of Love take over the tyranny of selfishness, sin, slop and senselessness that we are swimming in day after day.

When you live for the Lord, it will mean opposition.  You won’t be creating much of a fan club with popular society if you spend day after day speaking against abortion, no-fault divorce, sexual immorality, immigration reform, and all the other things our faith stands for that go against the grain of our society.

It may not get you physically thrown into a pit to be left for dead, as Hebrews tells us “You have not resisted to the point of shedding your blood.”  (though this is true for far too many Christians today).  But it will very easily get you thrown into other types of mud in what we call “smear campaigns” that can turn social media into a flash fire of hateful comments and writing people off.  Sometimes it seems it’s just as evil today as it was for Jeremiah.

 We should pray for courage as we follow our Crucified Lord on this campaign of Christian service, this revolution of love. 

CCC1808 Fortitude is the moral virtue that ensures firmness in difficulties and constancy in the pursuit of the good. It strengthens the resolve to resist temptations and to overcome obstacles in the moral life. The virtue of fortitude enables one to conquer fear, even fear of death, and to face trials and persecutions. It disposes one even to renounce and sacrifice his life in defense of a just cause. Psalm 118 says "The Lord is my strength and my song."⁷⁰ And Jesus tells us: "In the world you have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world."⁷¹

We must keep our eyes on Christ as we follow in the faith that Abraham showed us in the reading from Hebrews last week.  Jesus is the “author and perfector of our faith.” He is our guide who ignites our torches with the flame of love.  May we embrace the division that Love brings, and through merciful forgiveness, absorb the pain, and bury it with Christ so that a new kingdom can be reborn.

John of the Cross: “Where you do not find love, put love, and then you will find it.”

Homily 8/4/19 - Brian Garland - Brevity of Life

Audio only:

9:30 Mass - click here

11:30 Mass - click here

Homily - Christian Waiting

Audio (8pm): Click here

“Where your treasure is, there also your heart will be”

How do we tell where our treasure is?

1 - Look at your calendar, how you spend your time, and ask why.  Particularly perhaps how you spend little bits of free time: 20 minutes here, an hour there.

2- Watch where your money goes, and ask why.

3 - How do you spend your mental energy? Watch where your mind goes.  What do you get worried/anxious about, and why?  What are the things that you pursue?

It doesn’t so much matter what we carry in this life, but how we carry it.  For what we carry is ultimately received from God as a gift.  How we carry it is our gift to God.  “Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more.”

A huge part of the Christian life is waiting. 

Chrism Mass, or ordination Mass.  “hurry up and wait” seems to be the rule of such big Church events.  We have to arrive 30 minutes or an hour ahead of time, and then we are ready in three minutes, the next 27 is waiting in line to get into church.  Sometimes they give us instruction like “Fathers you are going to walk in and genuflect and kiss the altar and sit down over yonder, etc. etc.” as if this is rocket science that we’ve never heard before - and oh my goodness, I better take notes or I just might mess this up!

But in some ways that waiting in line with all those priests is kind of like what the Christian life is like.  While I wait in line, I am focused on one intention, one goal: getting into that Mass.  Just like all of us, in this life, ought to be focused one one intention, one goal: seeing God face-to-face in eternity.  That is where I want my heart to be.  So man, I need to be sure that my calendar, my wallet, my mental energy, and every other part of myself points to that one reality I’m supposed to be focused on.

When I’m in line for Mass, I have vestments on, I am not playing basketball or staring at my phone bingeing on Stranger Things.  My focus is where I’m headed, so I don’t get wrapped up in stuff that leads somewhere else.  I can’t, and I admit it by the fact that I’m in vestments and waiting in line.  Do we live our Christian life in such a way that emphasizes we are on the journey?

The liturgy is an opportunity to reflect on what life is about, and to wait in line for the fulfillment that God will give.

It is a good type of waiting.  It is a way that we “get in line” for where God wants to lead us.  But we have to do this in so many other ways.

Ask God, beg the Holy Spirit to show you, where we may need to readjust our treasures, so that our hearts can be more firmly rooted in the Sacred Heart of Jesus that is burning with love for you.  Your heart was made for His Heart.

Mass Times Announcement

After a couple years of thought, prayer, and discussion about the Sunday experience for our parishioners, I have decided that our parish needs to make a change in regards to the number of Masses on Sunday morning.  As pastor of the parish, I obviously want to be able to celebrate Mass for my parishioners, to be their shepherd and guide as God has called me to be.  However, due to restraints of Canon Law, I am not allowed to be celebrating more than three Masses on Sunday except in case of emergency.  I have been giving up one, sometimes two Masses on Sunday for the past three years, and it doesn’t feel right.  So, instead of three Masses on Sunday morning, we will be switching to two Masses, starting in September.  This will allow for me to be pastor to the whole parish every weekend, as well as still have the energy for the other events that occur on Sundays during the year, including religious education, RCIA, youth group, and other special events.  Often I am so drained that I cannot do it all, and it is important that I be part of these ministries as well.

With some discussion about what would be the best rearrangement, I am confident that our Sunday Mass schedule should be Masses at 9:00am, 11:30am, and 8pm.  But we want hard evidence to confirm that with a super-quick (two question) survey after Mass today in the back of church, to be sure that no Mass would be overflowing.  So please fill out the quick survey to help us estimate what Mass attendance would look like under this proposed schedule of 9, 11:30, and 8pm (and of course, Saturday at 5:30).  It is expected that the 9am Mass would include many but not all from the 8am crowd and many but not all of the 9:30 crowd, with some opting for other Mass times.

I understand this is not an easy change, and that is why I have thought long and patiently about it before discussing it with the Parish Leadership Team and the staff as a whole and ultimately coming to the decision we have now.  While it will certainly be a difficult change because it will mean a new Sunday morning routine and saying farewell to what we were used to (including perhaps our favorite seats and our pew neighbors!), we are excited about the various opportunities this change will offer us.

Along with the primary goal of better ministry of presence as your pastor, another benefit of the new schedule would be the extra time between Masses, allowing for other parish initiatives during that time.  Community functions such as coffee & donuts or a pancake breakfast could reach a larger crowd more easily, as well as a great potential for parish-wide talks, presentations, or adult education series.

One of the primary concerns was the Religious Education program, which due to this decision would be forced to start 30 minutes earlier, from 10-11:30. However, by keeping the 11:30am Mass, our new schedule allows for two options for families to attend Mass together with their children who are in Sunday school.  If the children are early birds (or families need a freer afternoon), the family could attend the 9am Mass and be done by 11:30am.  If extra rest is needed, they could come to class at 10am and then stay for the 11:30am Mass.  I believe this adjustment will end up allowing RE families to participate more fully in the parish life.

It will also be a benefit to have fuller Masses (without overflow) to create a stronger community within the parish, and to allow for less strain on the musicians and cantors, liturgical ministers, and Mass coordinators.  This should make the Sunday experience better for everyone with more lively liturgies, and allow our eyes to witness more fully the vitality of the parish community!

This month of August will include more updates and information as we approach the new schedule date of Sunday September 1st.  Please keep each other in your prayers that this will bring a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit for our parish!

ASK .... for what God wants to give.

Audio: click here!

ARE WE ASKING FOR THE RIGHT THINGS?

ARE WE ASKING AT ALL?

We might be more like the prodigal son’s older brother: we complain because God doesn’t give us anything, but we actually don’t ever ask.  (and perhaps we at times are just as self-interested as the older brother: “a young goat with my friends.”).  Our image of God is the core of the problem.  We forgot who God is and who we are.

WHEN YOU BELIEVE A LIE, YOU EMPOWER THE LIAR.  You give them power over your life by letting the lie dictate how you perceive reality.

If Abraham’s story tells us anything, it tells us that God doesn’t get annoyed with me or simply tolerate me.  He loves me and wants to hear from me.

If we want to get something from God, we should Praise before we ask (as in the Our Father).  Of course, this sounds like we are tricking God or playing Him like we play our parents or others when we are working for something we want.  And of course it doesn’t really work that way.  In some mysterious way Jesus speaks of a certain power of prayer to “change” God, but it is really not as simple as we are changing His mind by buttering Him up.

 Kirkengaard and C.S. Lewis: “Prayer doesn’t change God, it changes the one who prays.”  It hopefully lines us up to His divine plan so that our prayer eventually fits into the Our Father, and we begin to ask for what God wants us to ask.

II-II, Q. 83, a. 2, c: For we pray not that we may change the Divine disposition, but that we may impetrate that which God has disposed to be fulfilled by our prayers in other words "that by asking, men may deserve to receive what Almighty God from eternity has disposed to give," as Gregory says (Dial. i, 8)

While it is true that prayer does not (simply and absolutely) change God, it is also true that the good Lord regularly chooses to wait for our prayers before accomplishing his own will. Hence, to use a specific example, when God desires to save someone (and we mean when he desires this simply and absolutely, such that the person is among the predestined and elect souls who will certainly be saved), he yet chooses not to save them without their prayers. So, St. Augustine: “He who made you without you, will not save you without you.” That is, God will not save any who have attained to the use of reason without also moving them to will salvation and to merit it through prayers and good works.

Hence, prayer works and makes a difference not as though it changes God absolutely, but insofar as the Almighty chooses to receive our prayers as a means of accomplishing what he had already willed to accomplish from all eternity, namely, the salvation of his elect.

So once again: Are we asking?  Are we asking for the right things?

What does God want me to ask for?  THE HOLY SPIRIT.

Father, give me a deeper outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  Renew my mind to seek the things that you want for me, and not the lies I have been told about who I am and who you are.

O Holy Spirit, soul of my soul, enlighten me, guard me, strengthen me, console me.  Tell me what I ought to do, and command me to do it.  I promise to be submissive to everything you would ask of me, and to accept all that you have for me.  Only show me what is your will.  Amen.

After a couple years of thought, prayer, and discussion about the Sunday experience for our parishioners, I have decided that our parish needs to make a change in regards to the number of Masses on Sunday morning.  As pastor of the parish, I obviously want to be able to celebrate Mass for my parishioners, to be their shepherd and guide as God has called me to be.  However, due to restraints of Canon Law, I am not allowed to be celebrating more than three Masses on Sunday except in case of emergency.  I have been giving up one, sometimes two Masses on Sunday for the past three years, and it doesn’t feel right.  So, instead of three Masses on Sunday morning, we will be switching to two Masses, starting in September.  This will allow for me to be pastor to the whole parish every weekend, as well as still have the energy for the other events that occur on Sundays during the year, including religious education, RCIA, youth group, and other special events.  Often I am so drained that I cannot do it all, and it is important that I be part of these ministries as well.

With some discussion about what would be the best rearrangement, I am confident that our Sunday Mass schedule should be Masses at 9:00am, 11:30am, and 8pm.  But we want hard evidence to confirm that with a super-quick (two question) survey after Mass today in the back of church, to be sure that no Mass would be overflowing.  So please fill out the quick survey to help us estimate what Mass attendance would look like under this proposed schedule of 9, 11:30, and 8pm (and of course, Saturday at 5:30).  It is expected that the 9am Mass would include many but not all from the 8am crowd and many but not all of the 9:30 crowd, with some opting for other Mass times.

I understand this is not an easy change, and that is why I have thought long and patiently about it before discussing it with the Parish Leadership Team and the staff as a whole and ultimately coming to the decision we have now.  While it will certainly be a difficult change because it will mean a new Sunday morning routine and saying farewell to what we were used to (including perhaps our favorite seats and our pew neighbors!), we are excited about the various opportunities this change will offer us.

Along with the primary goal of better ministry of presence as your pastor, another benefit of the new schedule would be the extra time between Masses, allowing for other parish initiatives during that time.  Community functions such as coffee & donuts or a pancake breakfast could reach a larger crowd more easily, as well as a great potential for parish-wide talks, presentations, or adult education series.

One of the primary concerns was the Religious Education program, which due to this decision would be forced to start 30 minutes earlier, from 10-11:30. However, by keeping the 11:30am Mass, our new schedule allows for two options for families to attend Mass together with their children who are in Sunday school.  If the children are early birds (or families need a freer afternoon), the family could attend the 9am Mass and be done by 11:30am.  If extra rest is needed, they could come to class at 10am and then stay for the 11:30am Mass.  I believe this adjustment will end up allowing RE families to participate more fully in the parish life.

It will also be a benefit to have fuller Masses (without overflow) to create a stronger community within the parish, and to allow for less strain on the musicians and cantors, liturgical ministers, and Mass coordinators.  This should make the Sunday experience better for everyone with more lively liturgies, and allow our eyes to witness more fully the vitality of the parish community!

This month of August will include more updates and information as we approach the new schedule date of Sunday September 1st.  Please keep each other in your prayers that this will bring a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit for our parish!