First Sunday of Lent

There has never been a time when God has not watched over and cared for us. From the days of creation, to the time of the oppression that the people of Israel endured and were rescued from, to the days of Jesus time here on earth, right up to this very day – He is ever watchful and loving.

In our earliest days He was stern and commanding because we were young and rebellious and were easily led down wrong paths. We had no roots in the land. Gradually though, we grew as a people, through His grace, and became more than nomadic tribes, we took root in Israel. We learned and worked to educate others about Israels God. We stopped wondering, and we built our homes, cities, and places of worship. We matured and grew and sought knowledge of our Creator.

In his time, our Lord came to us in our own fleshly manifestation, and walked among us, taught us, healed our bodies, and gave his own for our sake so that our souls might be healed and we could be reconciled with our Father in heaven. He took the suffering that should have been ours upon himself and gave everything of Himself for us so that nothing was left. He did this out of love.

Yet with all this history of love and caring, we sometimes doubt. We think that the God of the universe who did all this for us, somehow may not understand us and what we deal with in our daily struggles. It doesn’t make sense if we really think about it. This is especially true in light of todays Gospel. There is literally nothing that the devil did not try to get our Lord to give in to temptation. The narrative doesn’t fully do justice to what our Lord endured and stood fast against. We all know that Satan has many means at his disposal to try to tempt us, and he certainly did not spare effort when he encountered our Lord in human form. This, however, is the whole point, he tried everything and failed. Our Lord would not give in to sin, and yet experienced all the powerful temptations we do because He was one of us in the flesh. This should give us a great deal of confidence in both his understanding of all that we are subject to, and also in His mercy because he has been through it and knows how difficult it can be to remain unscathed. Difficult, yes, but not impossible, He proved that as he was both God and man. He gave us a model to follow, a success to take confidence in, and an unwavering love so that we are to be assured of his forgiveness for each of us when we stumble and come to him in repentance and humility. No temptation is not understood, no sin is beyond His forgiveness, and no person beyond his loving gift of redemption.

Eighth Sunday in Ordinary time

One of my favorite quotes ever is from Hamlet when Polonius states that “brevity is the soul of wit”. Truer words have rarely been spoken. What we say speaks volumes about who we are, and what we believe. Subsequently the more we say, the more opportunities there are for us to make that impression about ourselves either positive or negative. From a purely analytical point of view, we are likely to make a far more favorable impression by limiting our words and giving greater thought to the things we do say. (talk about the antithesis of most behavior observed in the various forms of media).

Shakespeare was not the first one to utter words along these lines. In our first reading from the book of Sirach, we hear something philosophically similar – “When a sieve is shaken, the husks appear; so do ones faults when one speaks”. The moral of both of these statements is also quite similar – we are better off with more thinking and less talking, at least until we have truly given thought to what is going to come out of our mouths.

If the two excerpts above are not enough to convince us that we need to be incredibly careful with what we say, then perhaps we will listen to Jesus himself. He did not focus on how our words would define our own standing, but presented a far more urgent reason for caution. The power our words can have on others. This is true of both the good and the bad. Our Lord tells us that we must always be conscious of our own situation and actions before we try to guide others. Not simply because we want to avoid being seen as hypocritical, but because we don’t want our own errors in thought adversely affect someone else – we cannot guide someone else effectively if we ourselves are blind to the path. This is one of the reasons why humble self-assessment is so crucial to anyone who wants to be of help to those around them. We need to be brutally honest with ourselves (not always and easy thing), but without this we cannot hope to be effective in assisting anyone else.

Each and every day comes with great potential for us to either help or harm others with our words. Whether this is in a casual conversation at our work, discussion around the dinner table, or an opinion stated online, our words can have a deep impact on others that we often cannot anticipate. We have relatively few ways of knowing the things that those around us are sometimes dealing with. Only our Lord truly knows these things. It is however, all the more reason for us to be judicious with our speech, and at all times strive for kindness, compassion, and truth. “For from the fullness of the heart, the mouth speaks”.

Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Life in this earthly existence can sometimes be filled with drudgery, perhaps even misery, as the prophet Job tells us in our first reading. It can sometimes seem like there is no way out of difficult circumstances, and so we even descend into despair. This is not exactly an upbeat way of beginning this discussion of our readings this Sunday, but the reality is that life can be hard, and it is not typically lived in the carefree and grandiose fashion that the media often portrays as the norm. This illusion that we have grown accustomed to, particularly in this country, is a falsehood.

Job spoke of the limited number of days that we have on this earth, and how swiftly they pass by. He spoke of the restlessness that he felt, and how sometimes he felt like a man without hope. Given what we know he endured, some of these sentiments are rather understandable. Job may have heard some of the prophecies about the coming messiah, but he did not have the knowledge of Him that we do, and that is a fundamental, and frankly mindset altering difference. We who are followers of Jesus Christ, know of the hope that is to be found in him, even when times are hard.

In our Gospel today we hear of how Jesus went about healing not only the mother-in-law of Simon, but also those even in the nearby villages. He healed those who were ill in body, and in spirit. He brought hope to those who had been without it. He labored because he loved. Everyone was looking for him like sheep who seek the voice of the shepherd that they know is their refuge of safety and hope. This is the same hope that we carry today, so that when life becomes hard, we too have that hope to sustain us. Our Lord will always bring about in us the healing of our spirit in the time that He knows to be best for us. However, He does not always heal every physical infirmity that comes in this life. This is certainly not because of a lack of caring, but because it is a reality of our earthly existence since this is not where we truly belong. Yet, this harsh reality is not without purpose. Our infirmities can be a binding force between us and others who are suffering on the journey with us, so that we can band together and draw solace from one another as we share the path of suffering in this imperfect existence. This is one of the ways in which we are to function as parts of the body of Christ – to uphold one another as sinews that sometimes share affliction and the intimacy that can come only from that shared experience. In this way we can hold one another up as we journey toward our intended life with our God.

Fourth Sunday of Advent

What a daunting message to a young girl, to be told by an angel that you will be the mother of God. It is understandable that Mary was troubled by the angel’s words. She was young, unmarried, and probably unsure that she could even take care of herself, let alone a child, and in particular the Son of God. This was an incredible amount to take in.

Yet, Mary asked only one simple, practical question in the course of the conversation, and when it was explained to her that she would conceive through the Spirit of God, she asked no more, and humbly accepted being part of God’s plan, and never looked back. She trusted in the Lord alone and needed nothing more than to know His will. Once this was revealed, this young virgin knew that nothing further was necessary. Her trust in God was complete, and she was content to let Him take over and manifest His plan through her.

As we prepare to celebrate the birth of our Lord, it is perhaps a good time to ask ourselves in this final Sunday of Advent, how accepting we truly are of God’s plan for us. Do we trust in the Lord enough to move forward with what we can sense to be His will, or will we ask more questions, do more investigating as to how His plan for us will fit in with our own, and perhaps delay or derail what has been revealed to us simply because we don’t like the message. Do we trust Him enough to move ahead with what He has in mind for us, or do we love and value our own feelings and opinions more? These are hard questions to ponder, yet they are crucial to our preparedness for the coming of the Savior. The coming that was begun so long ago with the birth of a small child, who came into the world for the express purpose of reconciling mankind with His Father by His life, death, and resurrection. Our Lord was born to this purpose, and in fulfilling it with everything He had, is deserving of the faith, love, and trust of each one of us, including our unhindered acceptance of His will for us. We too need to utter the words “May it be done according to your will”.

Third Sunday of Advent

The words from John in our Gospel today are incredibly powerful as both a statement of humility, and as a proclamation of authority as the one chosen by God to be His herald when He came to us as man. The words that he speaks – “I am the voice of one crying out in the desert, make straight the way of the Lord” are indeed forceful. Yet this bold statement is proclaimed after a full admission that he was not one of the authoritative sources that those questioning him supposed him to be. Moreover, he stated that he was not even worthy to untie the sandals of the one coming after him. In the Jewish culture this is a profoundly humble remark. Yet for all this, there is an undeniable passion in his words that proclaim his mission. Words that we would do well to draw close to ourselves as an example of our own mission as followers of Christ – to evangelize and to proclaim the good news to those who may not be familiar with it, and so prepare them for when He comes again.

Yet sometimes there is the danger of our efforts becoming sluggish or losing momentum. John was a man on fire, and so we should be as well. Yet in our second reading Saint Paul makes a statement of caution that should continually resonate for us to remind us that we too need to maintain the fire within ourselves. He tells us “Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise prophetic utterances.” What he is cautioning against is the tendency to let the world distract us so that the flame within us becomes dim, and the very mission we are charged with – to continue to proclaim the words that the prophets passed along to us, becomes inconvenient, even distasteful to us. We can become poisoned by the world so that the very words that have the power to save can become something we despise because we are afraid to proclaim them since they may not be well received initially. We fear rejection and derision from those who have no real power over us, and forget the One who has power over all. We may no longer seek to prepare the way for Him to enter the hearts of others, and so save them. In this season of Advent, as we hopefully spend time in reflection, we need to ask ourselves where we stand. Do we seek to proclaim Gods word and prepare His way first and foremost, or have we let the world convince us that there is actually something in our lives that is more important?

Second Sunday of Advent

In ancient times it was traditional that every kind should have a herald who would precede his coming among his people so that they could prepare and make all things ready for his arrival on the few occasions he would travel. In those days, the king often remained in his palace for reasons of safety and security, as the paths and roads were often not safe. If a king presided over a large kingdom, the people of any given region might only see him once, or perhaps a few times in their lifetime, so preparing for such a special event was very important.

This preparation is even more important for us, as we await the celebration of the coming of the Lord and King of all creation in human form, which we celebrate at Christmas each year. The season of Advent which we now are in is our time of preparation, and in our Gospel today we are reminded of the herald who preceded our Lord’s coming – John the Baptist. John lived a life of asceticism and penance to prepare himself because he recognized the sinfulness that we are each plagued with, and to set an example to help prepare us by his own ready acknowledgement of sin. We do not necessarily have to dress in such rugged attire, nor even eat such spartan foods, but we do need to be keenly aware of the need to prepare ourselves by recalling our sins and seeking forgiveness. We need to prepare the house within each of us that Jesus seeks to dwell in and so be close to us, just as He came to us as a man to be even closer to us. We need to heed the herald of the King, and to make straight the roads into our hearts, and to smooth and level the paths into our souls. We need to be humble enough to stoop low to loosen the sandals on His feet by being willing to humbly serve those around us who were created in His image. In this season we are each called to repent, to atone, and to change so that the house that we prepare for our Lords coming is swept clean and put in order to receive Him.

The birth of our Lord is often celebrated with many decorations, traditions, and gifts, yet none of these compares with the gift that we were each given in that humble manger so long ago. The gift of God living among us as man for the express purpose of dying for our sins so that as John told us, we would be able to be baptized with fire and the Holy Spirit and to be restored in our relationship with our Creator. In this season I hope that each of us can pay a bit more attention to how we live and interact with those we encounter, so that by our way of living we can each be an echo of that voice crying out in the desert – Prepare the way of the Lord!

First Sunday of Advent

As we celebrate the first Sunday of Advent, the message to us from our readings is one of anticipation, and a call to watchfulness. The season itself is one of preparing ourselves and of anticipating the celebration of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ at Christmas. It is a time for prayer and self-evaluation, as well as taking action.

In our first reading from the prophet Isaiah, as well as in our Gospel, we are called to an accounting of our own sinfulness, and to be watchful for the coming of the Master. It is a time of focused humility as we honestly assess our own shortcomings, even in the things we did “right”, because no matter how well we may have accomplished some things, it is only done well by human standards, not by those of God. This should not be seen as a discouraging statement, as no one can truly measure up to the standards of someone who is perfection, power, and creation incarnate. It is instead an opportunity to humbly ask the One who is perfect to look mercifully upon our shortcomings, and to forgive us.

One of the things that always comes with the season, is a distinct change in our outlook on our fellow man, our extension of generosity, and perhaps our willingness to more overtly express love to those around us. This is a nice occurrence, but if we are really caught up in what should be the true manifestation of this season, it should also be a time of questioning why we did not do these things for our brothers and sisters in Christ all year round. Why do we only now focus so much more on modeling our behavior after our Lord? This is not to say we should not, it is simply an acknowledgement of how far we have yet to go in our learning and our pursuit of modeling ourselves after Christ. As the saying goes, we can’t fix something if we don’t recognize that it is broken.

In this season, let us not be discouraged with our brokenness, but optimistically look to how to fix it. Let’s take the time to step back from the rush and immerse ourselves in what is truly a worthy gift to our Lord for the celebration of His birth – our humility and love. Let’s express it with joy and not out of a sense of obligation. Let’s awaken from the sleep that we were caught up in during the year and prepare ourselves so that we are not lacking in spiritual gifts to lay at His feet when He comes and finds us watchful for Him.

The Solemnity of our Lord Jesus Christ

Of all the Gospels read throughout this past year, this is the one that absolutely should have our ears perked up in attention. The reason is simple, while other Gospel readings have focused on what we are to be aware of in Gods teaching, this one is about the consequences of whether we put any of that into practice.

The parable of the separation of the sheep and the goats is purely about who our Lord will find as having followed His commands, and who did not. In the case of those who will be seen as not having done so, there are really two areas that we should be concerned with. The first is whether we deliberately did not follow what was taught, in other words, did we rebel against Gods teaching in favor of our own preferred way of living our lives. This is usually fairly clear cut, in particular for those of us fortunate enough to have been taught specifically what our Lord said. Yet there is another area of concern, in this second category the question is whether we did anything at all about what we were taught, or did we simply go on about our lives as if nothing had been said or taught? This is perhaps the more dangerous of the two, because it is insidiously easy to fall into this category without perhaps even realizing it.

The end result of our time here on earth though will be the same for all, in that we will ALL stand before our Lord and be accountable for our actions whether good or bad, or perhaps our inactions whether deliberate or simply due to sloth. It is worth noting incidentally, that sloth can be either an actual inclination toward laziness and apathy, or an inclination toward inaction due to placing our focus on other things that distract us from taking righteous action. When we are so busy with ourselves and our own concerns that we brush past those in need without rendering any kind of acknowledgement or assistance, we are as guilty as though we had blown past them in a deliberate attempt at avoidance of helping them (conscious inaction). This is the incredibly dangerous subtlety that we must be vigilant against. We need to truly be on watch, for we will know neither the day nor the hour that we will be called to judgement, the only thing we can count on for sure, is that we WILL be judged.

Thirty Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

If there is one thing that gives most people a sinking feeling, it is when we arrive somewhere and find that we are unprepared. This was likely doubly true for the virgins in our Gospel today, since not only did they have to scramble to try to find the oil that they lacked for their lamps, but on top of that, they were shut out from the wedding celebration because they were late arriving back. They found themselves shut out of what they had been looking forward to because of their own lack of preparation.

Very often in scripture, a wedding celebration or marriage in an of itself are used to describe the joy of establishing an intimate relationship, or to convey a sense of deep intimacy itself. The metaphor is excellent in both cases because what we seek with our Lord, and what He seeks with us, is the same level of joy and intimacy that is found in the context of marriage. How tragic then it would be for us to experience the same sorrow and despair of being shut out from that kind of experience the way the virgins in the Gospel narrative were. The last thing we want to do is find the door locked, and to hear from our Lord, that He does not know us.

The key to building any relationship is time spent, and experiences shared. It is no different in building and maintaining a relationship with God. We do this by spending time, and by talking to him. When we attend Mass, we worship and communicate together, and we receive Him through the Eucharist which is a deeply intimate and reverent Sacramental bonding. When we spend time in prayer by ourselves, with only our Lord present with us, we have the opportunity to share everything that is going on in our lives without the need to hold anything back. This does not need to be anything formal in terms of prayer. There is a time and place for formal recitation of the prayers we know so well, but there is also a time for simply having a conversation like we would with anyone who is truly close to us and knows us. There is nothing off limits in what we can share because our Lord knows our minds and hearts. We can truly tell Him about anything that is going on in our lives. He wants to hear all this from us, just as any parent wants to hear what their children are up to. It doesn’t matter if they know the circumstance already, it is still good to hear it from us as a way of sharing and connecting. This is what our Lord longs for from each of us, and this is how He will truly know us when the day and hour arrives when we will knock at the door.

Thirty Second in Ordinary Time