For this week’s homily, please play the video below.
For this week’s homily, please play the video file below:
For this week’s homily, please play the video below.
For this week’s homily, please play the video below:
“Where are you?”
I’m beginning a retreat today with the Franciscan Sisters of Christian Charity in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, near Lake Michigan. The sisters have a college and a large motherhouse here. They serve the church as educators and spiritual directors and in health care.
We’re reflecting in the retreat on Pope Francis’ recent exhortation on holiness, Gaudete et exultate. “Where are you?” God asks us:
“The LORD God then called to the man and asked him: Where are you? He answered, “I heard you in the garden; but I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid.” (Genesis 3)
That call of God to Adam is also a call to Eve, to all humanity, to you and me. “Where are you?”
It’s not an angry call that God makes in the garden. In the end there’s mercy.
Yes, man and woman, humanity, you and I, are part of a fallen world and must recognize our nakedness, our nothingness. Before God no one can boast, but addressing the serpent, God announces a merciful redemption:
“I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
They will strike at your head,
while you strike at their heel.” (Genesis 3, 15)
We’re promised victory in the battle of life.
“Where are you?” God asks. In a retreat we hear that question, try to answer it and wait for the merciful grace of God.
Pray for us.
For this week’s homily, please watch the video below.
June 24 SUN THE NATIVITY OF SAINT JOHN THE BAPTIST
Solemnity
Is 49:1-6/Acts 13:22-26/Lk 1:57-66, 80 (587)
25 Mon Weekday (Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time)
2 Kgs 17:5-8, 13-15a, 18/Mt 7:1-5 (371) Pss IV
26 Tue Weekday
2 Kgs 19:9b-11, 14-21, 31-35a, 36/Mt 7:6, 12-14 (372)
27 Wed Weekday
[Saint Cyril of Alexandria, Bishop and Doctor of the Church]
2 Kgs 22:8-13; 23:1-3/Mt 7:15-20 (373)
28 Thu Saint Irenaeus, Bishop and Martyr
Memorial
2 Kgs 24:8-17/Mt 7:21-29 (374)
29 Fri SAINTS PETER AND PAUL, APOSTLES
Solemnity
Vigil: Acts 3:1-10/Gal 1:11-20/Jn 21:15-19 (590)
Day: Acts 12:1-11/2 Tm 4:6-8, 17-18/Mt 16:13-19 (591) Pss Prop
30 Sat Weekday
[The First Martyrs of the Holy Roman Church;
Lam 2:2, 10-14, 18-19/Mt 8:5-17 (376)
1st and 2nd Kings are Old Testament books that relate the history of the Jewish people after the time of Judges when Israel was ruled by kings, but they are not historical accounts as history is written today. Prophets like Elijah and Isaiah have an important part of play in these accounts. However grim and violent the accounts may see, the destiny of Israel is in God’s hands,. We might see them too much like the violent stories of today and turn away from them, but they’re reminders that our destiny is in God’s hands, no matter how bad our times are.
The saints we remember this week, Peter and Paul, Irenaeus, Cyril of Alexandria, take us back to the first centuries of the church. God provides leaders for every age, from the first centuries till now. The graces of the prophets are never lacking from age to age.
What does it mean to be holy today, Pope Francis asks in his recent Letter “Gaudete et Exultate.” We’re called to holiness, God calls us. Jesus Christ is with us and saints encourage us to achieve that call. There’s a ”great cloud of witnesses” the Letter to the Hebrews says, and we’re called to be in that number.
Don’t miss “the saints next door,” the pope says. “These witnesses may include our own mothers, grandmothers or other loved ones (cf. 2 Tim 1:5). Their lives may not always have been perfect, yet even amid their faults and failings they kept moving forward and proved pleasing to the Lord.”
Canonized saints are not the only ones who are holy, Francis says. “I like to contemplate the holiness present in the patience of God’s people: in those parents who raise their children with immense love, in those men and women who work hard to support their families, in the sick, in elderly religious who never lose their smile. In their daily perseverance I see the holiness of the Church militant. Very often it’s a holiness found in our next-door neighbours, those who, living in our midst, reflect God’s presence. We might call them “the middle class of holiness”. (7]
The pope’s interested in ordinary holiness, and he has a gift for speaking about it. .
We are all called to be holy. “Each in his or her own way,” the Vatican Council says. Each of us has to discern God’s call; we must find our own path, discover the gifts God gives us. We don’t have to follow someone else’s path or have someone else’s gifts. To be holy means to grow with the gifts God gives us.
Some may think only those who have a church calling can be holy. We may think only those who belong to our religious tradition can be holy. Not so, Francis says, It’s a universal call.
You can read Gaudete and Exultate online at the Vatican website. Worth reading. It’s Francis at his best.
By Orlando Hernandez
This Thursday’s Gospel continues with the extremely challenging statements that our Lord pronounces in the Sermon on the Mount:
“I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, ‘You shall not kill; and whoever kills will be liable to judgement.’ But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgement, and whoever says to his brother, ‘Raqa,’ will be answerable to the Sanhedrin, and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna. Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar, and there recall that your brother has anything against you, leave your gift there at the altar, go first and be reconciled with your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” (Mt 5: 20-24)
Our faith and religion is the great gift of God, but we can spoil this gift if we use it as an excuse to feel that we are “better” than our neighbor. Even prayer and piety can unfortunately be used as a cover for inhumane behavior. Our Lord points out the dangerous practices of self-righteousness that can lead to the escalation of conflict which condemns us not only to the loss of love of neighbor, but even to the total disregard for the sanctity of human life, whether through unfettered anger, cold calculation, or simple indifference. We find ourselves imprisoned by hate and guilt: “Your opponent will hand you over to the judge, and the judge will hand you over to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison.” (Mt 5: 25)
Abraham Lincoln’s famous quote explores this sad situation when he talks about the two sides in the Civil War: “Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God,and each invokes His aid against the other.” I imagine those prayers and see them as ferocious darts, adding to the countless wounds of our Jesus on the Cross. What is right and what is wrong? Why is there so much divisiveness in our country, in our world? Is our real “opponent” happily leading us in chains to the Judge? Are we already in a hopeless Gehenna, where truth and mercy are incinerated along with God’s goal of human unity within His loving embrace?
My conservative son complains that those on “the left” are merely hypocrites, calling themselves compassionate while they approve of the killing of unborn life. This kind-hearted couple, my friends, who were influential in my conversion, now call themselves “Buddhists.” After decades of being zealous Pentecostals, they now feel betrayed by their fellow fundamentalists, who support so many things that they consider divisive and cruel.
Lincoln goes on to say in his speech, “With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds…” How do we begin to do this? How can I gauge what is “the right as God gives us to see?” How can I hold fast to love, to tolerance, to acceptance of so many people who seem so difficult to me? Only in prayer, in faithful surrender to the love of God can I find the way out of Gehenna, to defeat the real “opponent”, the accuser, the divider. Only God can give me the strength.
But oh, sometimes I feel totally bound up by these negative aggressive thoughts. My loving wife sees me there with that disturbed look she knows so well, and tells me, “Snap out of it! Look around!” Out of concern for me she got me this challenging checklist by Richard Rohr OFM, that she got at her last retreat. It sounds a lot like the Sermon on the Mount. And it is titled “What Might A Joyful Spirit Be?” Joyfulness seems to be the only way out of the prison, and this joy is the Grace that only communion with Jesus can give. Here are some examples, which can be fruitful conduits to prayer:
“ When you do not need to be right.
When you no longer need to compete–not even in your own head.
When you do not need to analyze or judge things as in or out, positive or negative, black or white.
When you can follow the intelligent lead of your heart.
When you are curious and interested, not suspicious and interrogating.
When you do not brood over injuries.
When you do not need to humiliate, critique, or defeat those who have hurt you- not even in your mind.
When you can let go of obsessive or negative thoughts.
When you do not divide and always condemn one side or group.
When you can find truth on both sides.
When you can critique and also detach from the critique.
When you can wait, listen, and learn.
When you can admit it was wrong and change.
When you can actually love without counting the cost.
When you can live satisfied without resolution or closure.
When you can find God in all things.”
Amen.
Orlando Hernández
JUNE 10 SUN TENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME
Gn 3:9-15/2 Cor 4:13—5:1/Mk 3:20-35 (89)
11 Mon Saint Barnabas, Apostle
Memorial
Acts 11:21b-26; 13:1-3 (580)/Mt 5:1-12 (359)
12 Tue Blessed Lorenzo Salvi, Passionist
1 Kgs 17:7-16/Mt 5:13-16 (360)
13 Wed Saint Anthony of Padua, Priest and Doctor of the Church
Memorial
1 Kgs 18:20-39/Mt 5:17-19 (361)
14 Thu Weekday
1 Kgs 18:41-46/Mt 5:20-26 (362)
15 Fri Weekday
1 Kgs 19:9a, 11-16/Mt 5:27-32 (363)
16 Sat Weekday
[BVM]
1 Kgs 19:19-21/Mt 5:33-37 (364)
Our first readings this week and next are from the Book of Kings–the story of Elijah, the prophet, who challenges Ahab the King of Israel and his notorious wife Jezebel. Elijah is a powerful prophet, one of the greatest of the prophets, who raises people from the dead and brings fire from heaven on his enemies, yet he left no writings; we know him mainly from the life he led.
In the First Book of Kings, Elijah is on the run most of the time, Ahab and his wife in pursuit. We follow him from water hole to water hole, hiding in mountain caves and isolated wadis in the desert, with scarcely enough to eat.
A difficult, humbling flight. Elijah appears in an icon hand to his head, wondering if he will make it, even as a raven hovers behind him bringing bread for the day. He makes it through a desperate drought, thanks to a poor widow who helps him out.
The powerful prophet is helpless, but God keep him going. And Elijah learns from experience how to see, so he sees God’s redeeming presence in a tiny far-off cloud and the whisper of a wind that says God is here.
Three holy people are remembered this week. St. Barnabas, a companion of Paul, is remembered on Monday. The Passionists remember Blessed Lorenzo Salvi on Tuesday, and the popular St. Anthony of Padua is remembered on Wednesday.
The Victor's Place 