We have an interesting dichotomy in today’s Liturgy of the Word. First, we have the people Israel, who, as you know if you’ve been following the story these last couple of weeks, have been saved miraculously from abject slavery in Egypt, led through the desert and through the Red Sea to safety, fed with bread from heaven, and hydrated with water from the rock. They have continually been in God’s presence and have been led by a column of cloud by day and fire by night. But they have time and again rejected God and refused to have faith that he would deliver on his promises. Today, at the precipice of the Promised Land, they reject him yet again. And then we have the Canaanite woman in today’s Gospel, who has absolutely no claim on God’s mercy. The Canaanites are the pagan people thrown out of the Promised Land to make room for God’s chosen people. That she would even believe in God is a miracle, and yet her faith today is relentless. Today’s readings embody the question of faith for all of us. Will we give up on grace when we are faced with tough times, or will we choose to believe, against all odds, that God will hear our prayers and say, “Let it be done for you as you wish”?
Tag: faith
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![Eighteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time [ Cycle B]](https://father.mulcahy.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/cropped-IMG_1212-e1379750321530.jpg)
Eighteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time [ Cycle B]
When I was growing up, sometimes we would ask Mom what was for dinner, and she would often reply, “I don’t know; it’s not three o’clock yet!” We were blessed, though. We could count on the fact that there would always be something for dinner and that it would be good. We just had to be a little bit patient and wait to find out what it was.
It seems like the Israelites might have benefitted from that lesson. They are out wandering in the desert and of course, they are hungry. I think we can understand that. But what is hard to understand is the content of their grumbling about it. They say that they would rather be back in Egypt, eating bread and the meat of the “fleshpots.” Why on earth did God have to drag them out into the desert only to kill them by hunger and let them die there? They would rather be in slavery in Egypt than be in the situation in which they find themselves. This is a complete rejection of God.
And it’s a shocking rejection, to be quite frank. The slavery they were subject to was not some kind of minor inconvenience. It’s not just that they were a little underpaid for their labor. No, they were beaten if they didn’t meet outrageous quotas, any kind of discontent would have cost them their lives. They lived in fear all the time, not knowing what new cruel joke their oppressors would subject them to. And so they cried out to God, who heard them, and delivered them.
And the deliverance wasn’t some tiny little act of mercy. God basically made a laughing stock of the pharaoh, who had made a laughing stock of the people Israel. He gave pharaoh a dose of what he had given the people. God made the plight of the Egyptians so bad that they were glad to be rid of the Israelites and basically helped them pack for the journey, giving them all of their gold and silver valuables to take with them. When the Israelites could not figure out the way they should go, God provided a column of cloud by day and fire by night so that they could see the right path. When the Egyptians pursued them and gained on them, God opened up the Red Sea for the Israelites to pass through, and then closed it back up over the Egyptians, swallowing up their armies, their horses and their chariots.
But now they’re a little hungry, so they’d like to return the gift, thank you. And when you think about it, this is really illogical. Is God, who was powerful enough to overthrow the Egyptians, and to deliver his people through the Red Sea, not powerful enough to feed them besides? Of course he is, and God will certainly feed his people when it’s time, and will not let them die of hunger and thirst in the desert.
Today’s Gospel provides a similar situation. The people have enjoyed the food that Jesus provided in last week’s Gospel, and they are looking for more of the same. He has retreated with his disciples, fearing they will try to make him a king, and they pursue him. When they catch up with him, Jesus engages them in dialogue. This dialogue is important for us to hear, because it unpacks the meaning of last week’s miracle. Jesus, of course, recognizes that they have pursued him not for any religious or spiritual reason, but because he fed them and they are looking for more of the same. But the real feeding he intends is not just barley loaves, but instead something a little more enduring.
They ask him how they can accomplish the works of God, which is a fair enough question. That’s really the purpose of our lives too. But they probably mean that they want to know how they can live the law, which is not nearly as deep as Jesus wishes to go. He tells them that the best way they can do God’s will is to believe in him – the one God sent. So they have the audacity to ask him what kind of sign he can do so that they can believe in him. Can you believe that ? He just finished feeding thousands of people with five loaves and two fish, and they want to see a sign? I don’t know about you, but I’m beginning to think they wouldn’t recognize a sign from God if it came up and bit them in the nose!
Jesus, instead, would redefine hunger. Like I said, he wanted to go much deeper. Barley loaves and manna are nice, but they are nothing compared to what Jesus really longs to give them – and us, by the way. He makes a very bold claim at the end of today’s Gospel that tells us just exactly what he has in mind: “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” They may have to toil very hard for physical bread, bread that will perish, bread that doesn’t last more than a day or so. But Jesus would have them work for bread that lasts for eternity, the bread of life. And all they have to do to work for it is to believe.
The question is not whether Jesus will feed them, the question is whether they can accept it. And in the next few weeks, we will explore that more closely. But what I think we see in today’s Liturgy of the Word is that we have to be clear about what it is we hunger for. And that question is very pressing on all of us today. Every one of us comes here hungering for something. Our hungers may be very physical: some here may be unemployed or underemployed, or perhaps our hunger is for physical healing of some kind. But perhaps our hungers are a bit deeper too: a relationship that is going badly, or a sense that we aren’t doing what we should be or want to be doing with our lives. Our hunger very well may be very spiritual as well: perhaps our relationship with God is not very developed or our prayer life has become stale. Whatever the hunger is, we need to be honest and name it right now, in the stillness of our hearts.
Naming that hunger, we then have to do what Jesus encouraged the crowds to do: believe. That is the work of God that we are called upon to do. Believe that God can feed our deepest hungers, heal our deepest wounds, bind up our brokenness and calm our restless hearts. Believe that Jesus is, in fact, the Bread of Life, the bread that will never go stale or perish, the bread that will never run out, or disappear like manna in the heat of the day. Jesus is the Bread that can feed more than our stomachs but also our hearts and souls. The Psalmist sings, “The Lord gave them bread from heaven.” And we know that bread is the most wonderful food of all, because it is the Body of Christ. Amen!
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Thursday of the Sixteenth Week of Ordinary Time
During the summer before my final year of seminary, I worked as a hospital chaplain. It ended up being a pretty rough summer for me and the other men and women in the student chaplain group: we had a record number of deaths and tragic accidents to deal with, and it was, as you might expect, getting us pretty down. Then for morning prayer one day, one of my fellow students brought in today’s Gospel, and we reflected especially on the end part of the reading:
“But blessed are your eyes, because they see,
and your ears, because they hear.
Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people
longed to see what you see but did not see it,
and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.”
The more we explored that reading, the more we became aware that, even in the midst of all of the very real tragedy we were experiencing, we were also experiencing some very real great blessing. How true that is for all of us in life. We tend to dwell on the negative things we are seeing, and no one would ever doubt that we all have to see some pretty rotten stuff in our lives, some people it seems more so than others. But the problem comes when we let go of the blessing that comes too. We people of faith have to be convinced that God is with us even in, perhaps especially in, our darkest moments, and gives us glimpses of the kingdom of God that perhaps others don’t get to see. Blessed are our eyes when we get to see them!
The people in Moses’ day didn’t ever really get to see God. They got to see Moses, who sort of acted as an intermediary for them with God. No one else could see God and live. But our eyes do get to see God. We can see God in the Eucharist, we can see God in the person sitting next to us, we can see God in the graced moments of our day. Maybe we just need to open our eyes to see God more often, but he is there, longing to bless our eyes with the vision of him.
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Monday of the Sixteenth Week of Ordinary Time
It’s easy to have faith when our enemies aren’t pursuing us, isn’t it? When things are going well, we can be people of faith with the best of them. But it does take a certain amount of sainthood to have faith in the face of opposition of whatever kind you can imagine. For the Israelites, it was the pursuing Egyptians; for the Pharisees, it was the destruction of their worldview; for us it might be illness, or unemployment, or the death of a loved one. It’s hard to have faith when our faith is tested. But that’s when faith is faith, really. Like the Pharisees, there is something greater than Solomon here. We have Jesus Christ, who proved that God loves us first by laying down his life for us. If our faith is real, then we must trust that God has hold of us even in our darkest moments, and that the way he chooses to answer our prayers will be greater than we can imagine.
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St. Thomas the Apostle
I think that St. Thomas often gets a bad rap for his doubt. He merely expresses what we would probably be thinking if we were him, and for that matter what the other disciples would have been thinking if they didn’t get to see Jesus the first time. But in his doubt, Jesus invites him to blessing. Thomas is invited to touch the Lord so that he could believe and be one with him. That’s the same invitation we have every time we approach the Lord in the Eucharist. “Take and eat,” Jesus says, “Touch me and do not be unbelieving but believe.” May the invitation to touch our Eucharistic Lord be the occasion to dispel our own doubt and become more closely one with him.
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Thirteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time [B]
These readings today are just incredible. In one sense, they give us a reason for hope and a foundation for faith, but in another sense, they raise some pastoral questions that are difficult to answer. The very first words of today’s Liturgy of the Word reach out and grab us: “God did not make death, nor does he rejoice in the destruction of the living.” And perhaps we already knew that. Perhaps we know that God does not intend our death or our suffering, but the really hard thing for us is that he permits it. Why is that? Why would God permit his beloved ones to suffer so much here on earth?When I was in seminary, I worked as a fire chaplain the last couple of years. We were called out one wintry night, just before Christmas break, to speak to some medics who had extracted a nine-year old child from a badly mangled car, only to have the child die on the way to the hospital. These medics were from a neighboring fire department, so we didn’t know them, and I didn’t have too much hope that the conversation would go well. But, to my surprise, these men did open up and expressed the frustration they felt.
One of the men was Catholic and he was the one who had the task of extracting the child from the car. His enduring question was, why did this innocent child have to suffer and die? There was no answer for that question, but my fellow chaplain was able to give some meaning to it all when he pointed out that the child died in front of Marytown, a Franciscan monastery near our seminary that provides 24 hour exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. He pointed out that he died near the physical manifestation of Christ’s own body, and that Jesus was always letting the children come to him. They had struggled so much to find a reason for this sadness, but only faith could provide help in the situation.
Which is the story of today’s Gospel. Two people reach out in very different ways to end suffering and provide healing. One is a man, who approaches Jesus and falls at his feet, begging the teacher to heal his daughter. The other is a woman, who dares not make herself known, who sneaks up behind Jesus to touch his clothing. The situations were different, but what unites them is their faith. They have faith that reaching out to Jesus in their own way will bring them the healing they desire.
And there was a pretty serious leap of faith involved for the hemorrhaging woman. Touch was her enemy. She had suffered much at the hands of many doctors. Not only have their ministrations failed to heal her, but they have also left her penniless. And to touch anyone in her state of ritual impurity makes them ritually unclean too. So she is totally marginalized: she is a woman in a patriarchal society, afflicted by an enduring and debilitating illness, she has no money to take care of herself, and she is unable to be part of the community or participate in worship. Things could not have been worse. Finding the courage to reach out to Jesus, even in her impure state, she is healed by her faith.
Now that same faith was lacking in the people who were attending to Jairus’s daughter. They may have believed that Jesus could cure her illness, but now that she is dead, his assertion that she is merely “sleeping” meets with ridicule and scorn. So Jesus has to throw out the faithless ones so that they would no longer be an obstacle. The child cannot reach out to Jesus so he reaches out to her, taking her hand, and raising her up.
So it’s as simple as that. An act of faith on the part of the hemorrhaging woman and the synagogue official provide healing and restore life. But how realistically does that match our experience? I am guessing that those medics threw up a prayer or two in addition to all of the life-saving actions they performed on that nine-year old when he was in the ambulance with them, but the boy died. How many of us have prayed faithfully, constantly, only to be met by seemingly deaf ears? We don’t even have the same opportunity as Jairus and the hemorrhaging woman. We can’t reach out and touch Jesus in the flesh. So I can’t stand here and tell you that one simple act of faith is all it takes to make all your problems go away.
But what I will say is this: as I have walked with people who have suffered, those who have reached out to Jesus in faith have not gone unrewarded. Maybe their suffering continued in some way, but in Christ they found the strength to walk through it with dignity and peace. Maybe Jesus won’t always stop the bleeding of our hurts and inadequacies and woundedness. But through his own blood, he will always redeem us. We who are disciples need to make those acts of faith if we are to live what we believe.
I am struck by the Eucharistic imagery at the end of today’s Gospel. Jesus comes to the home of Jairus and finds his daughter asleep in death. He reaches out to her, touches her, and raises her up. Then he instructs those around her to give her something to eat. We gather for this Eucharistic banquet today and Jesus comes to us, finding us asleep in the death of our sins. Because we are dead in our sins, we can hardly reach out to touch our Lord, but he reaches out to us. He takes our hands, raises us up, and gives us something to eat.
We come to the Eucharist today with our lives in various stages of grace and various stages of disrepair. At the Table of the Lord, we offer our lives and our suffering and our pain. We bring our faith, wherever we are on the journey, and reach out in that faith to touch the body of our Lord. We approach the Cup of Life, and whatever emptiness is in us is filled up with grace and healing love, poured out in the blood of Christ. As we go forth to love and serve the Lord this day, all of our problems may very well stay with us, remaining unresolved at least to our satisfaction. Our suffering and pain may very well be with us still. But in our faith, perhaps they can be transformed, or at least maybe we can be transformed so that we can move through that suffering and pain with dignity and peace. And as we go forth, perhaps we can hear our Lord saying to us the same words he said to the woman with the hemorrhage: go in peace, your faith has saved you.
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Saturday of the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time
Today’s first reading reminds me of times growing up when I’d laugh at inappropriate times, which was pretty often. Come to think of it, some things might not have changed that much, but I digress. But growing up, especially when there was tension, I’d often laugh, and I’d hate it when I got caught. “Who me? No, I didn’t laugh…” That kind of sounds like the conversation between the Lord and Sarah today. Yesterday, it was Abraham who laughed, and for the same reason. They simply could not believe that God’s generosity and blessing could overcome the limitations of their advanced age. But God had plans for Abraham and his family, and so age and even laughter could not prevent the beginnings of the covenant.
Contrast their incredulity and lack of faith with the faith of the centurion in today’s Gospel. Jesus didn’t even have to go to his house to cure his servant. The centurion’s faith was so great that even distance provided no obstacle to blessing. As I mentioned yesterday, we can’t be too hard on Abraham and Sarah. They didn’t yet have the experience of the Lord that we have, or even that the centurion had. That centurion had seen Jesus’ mighty deeds and probably had come to believe because of that.
This raises a rather uncomfortable pastoral question, I think. How many good, faithful people, have prayed their hearts out, totally trusting in God’s power to heal and save, and yet their loved one remains ill, or perhaps was not saved from death. That’s a hurt that a lot of people carry with them for a long time, it may even be that they have felt they had done something wrong or perhaps didn’t have quite enough faith. The answer of course, is that none of those are true. God’s answers to prayer can take a lot of different forms, and sometimes he doesn’t answer the way that we would have picked. That doesn’t mean that God is not merciful, just, or good, and it doesn’t mean that we are not faithful. It just means that whatever the blessing is, it’s different that we expected, and perhaps we can’t even see it just yet.
The responsorial psalm today is actually Mary’s Magnificat, her song of praise and faith. What a wonderful model this is for all of us who struggle with faith and who struggle with the way God answers prayer sometimes. Mary’s life was not without its struggles and pain, but still she was able to sing, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.” That is the prayer for all of us who struggle but still have faith.
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Friday of the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time
“Lord, if you wish you can make me clean.” In some ways, that is the biggest understatement in all of Scripture. We would say to the leper, “of course God can make you clean, God can do anything God wants to do.” But for the leper, I think it’s less of an understatement than it is a statement of faith. He has obviously heard of or maybe has even seen some of Jesus’ other mighty deeds, and he is expressing the faith that Jesus can help him. The big “if” for him, though is the “if you wish” part. And of course, Jesus does wish, and he is made clean.
In our first reading, God wishes to bless Abraham and Sarah too. They display far less faith than our leper, but in their defense, they are new to the whole experience of God. They would be happy enough for God to just bless them through Ishmael. But God intends to do more for the aged couple: he will give them a child through Sarah. Abraham laughs in the face of such overwhelming blessing. But it is God who has the last laugh: he indeed gives them a son through Sarah, whom they are to name “Isaac,” which in Hebrew means, “God laughs.”
God can do anything God wishes. Nothing is an obstacle for God, except perhaps for our lack of faith. If we have the faith that our leper had in the Gospel reading, we might well be amused to see what God can do in us and through us and among us. That doesn’t mean every whim of ours will be God’s pleasure, but it does mean that the ways he blesses us might make us all laugh for joy.
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Twelfth Sunday of Ordinary Time
It’s time to get going, to set out on the journey. That’s the message of our Gospel today, and I think it’s a timely one, coming as it does as some of us are preparing for, or maybe even returning from, our summer vacations. I have fond memories of taking vacations in the summer with my family when I was growing up. Dad loved to drive even long distances, so he’d be up and ready to go at like five in the morning! We had packed the car the night before, and got started early to avoid any rush hour traffic. Even though I’m not really a morning person, I used to look forward to those early-departure journeys. I think it’s just fun to be going somewhere else, no matter what time of the day it is.
The point of a journey is often to set out and begin something new, to reach out to new horizons. Jesus was always doing that in John’s Gospel. The reading we have today is at the end of chapter four, in which Jesus has been standing next to the sea, teaching the people by means of parables. He has told them the parable of the sower who went out to sow seeds, the parable of the mustard seed, and the lamp placed on the lamp stand. He is explaining the kingdom of God to them, but they don’t quite get it. Even the disciples have to have it explained to them. When he’s done the best that he can with them, he is ready to move on. There are other people that need to hear the Good News, others who need to know Jesus’ power and authority.
And so he sets out on the journey, and the reading says that the disciples take him with them in the boat “just as he was.” That’s a curious detail, I think. But it makes me remember those trips with my dad. It’s time to get going, no time to change clothes or freshen up, just get in the car – or in this case, the boat – and let’s get started on the journey. But the journey isn’t always without its problems. On vacation trips we may run into traffic, or if in the air, perhaps turbulence. On the sea, the disciples experienced the raging waves of a fearsome storm. So they wake Jesus up, because apparently these storms don’t really affect him, and he rebukes the storm, and then rebukes the disciples for their little faith.
We’re all on a journey. That journey, like that of the disciples, is from fear to faith. We very rarely have time to thing about it; we just have to get in the boat and get moving, just as we are. The journey is not always smooth: storms arise, and when they do, it often seems like our God is sleeping, seeming not to care that we are about to perish. I’m not going to fill in the blanks for you – you can all do that well enough. You’ve been on many journeys in your life, and sometimes the ride has been bumpy. But if we stay on the journey, we definitely get to experience this One whom “even wind and sea obey.” Even when our God seems to be sleeping, he is never unaware of our situation, and his love for us is never on pause.
The thing is, sometimes the storm doesn’t seem to stop so quickly as it does in today’s Gospel reading. Would that Jesus would stand up in the boat of our uncertainty and yell out: “Quiet! Be still!” But maybe he is. Maybe the “Be still” is directed at us and not at the storm. There is a contemporary Christian song which I like that has a wonderful line in it: “Sometimes he calms the storm, and other times he calms his child.” That song has given me peace in many situations. Because as frightening as the storms of our lives can be, they are no match for the grace of God. Even if God allows the storm to rage in our lives, if he is with us, calming us, we have nothing to fear. And maybe that is the occasion when we make progress on that journey from fear to faith.
I want to talk about two other journeys today, because they are heavy on my heart. The first one was the final journey of my dad. I think of him not just because of our vacation trips together, but of course, because this is Father’s Day. On the last day of his life, I gave him the last rites, which I had done countless times before and since. But that was the hardest thing I have ever done as a priest, and also one of the most significant. When I was done, I went down to the chapel and cried for about half an hour. Finally, Jesus came to me and gave me some consolation. He wasn’t going to calm the storm this time, but he did calm me. He reminded me that dad prepared me for so many journeys in my life, and I just had the incredible honor of preparing him for his most important journey, the journey home. Dad kept saying that day, “It’s almost time to go.” And he was right. This man who got up early for every vacation we ever went on was not going to get a late start on the journey home.
Today we remember those fathers who have gone home and we honor those fathers who are still with us. The example of their lived faith helps us all to make our own journey from fear to faith. Today we pray for God’s blessing on all fathers and on the institution of fatherhood in general. We are grateful for their heroic witness to faith that places value on God, virtue, and family when our society would sooner ridicule those three.
The last journey I want to talk about today, is of course, my own personal journey. This is my last homily here at St. Raphael, and it’s time for me to move on to whatever lies ahead for me. This one will be a little harder to talk about, so I’m going to begin with a little humor.
The new priest arrived at his parish, and found a note attached to three envelopes in a little bundle. The envelopes were numbered one to three. They were from the priest he was replacing and the note said that if ever things got bad and there was a little storm, he should open an envelope, beginning with the first. He chuckled a bit, and set them aside, and things went so well that he almost forgot about them. Until there was a controversy. Things were getting ugly, and he remembered the envelopes and decided to open the first. It said, very simply, “Blame me, your predecessor.” So he did. He blamed the priest before him, and everyone accepted that, and they moved on. But eventually there was another controversy, and so he decided to open the second envelope. It said, “Blame the pastoral council.” So that’s what he did. He blamed the pastoral council and things blew over and they moved on. But, after a little while, there was a third controversy, so in desperation, he opened the last of the envelopes. This note was a little longer than the others, but the first line really got his attention: “Prepare three envelopes.”
Well, Father Dennis didn’t leave me three envelopes and I won’t be leaving any for Father Dindo either. But I did want to take a moment and express my gratitude for three things. First, I am grateful for the ways you have cared for me. I know that many of you pray for me and all priests every day, and that is a powerful thing. But you have also brought me soup when I was sick, you’ve stopped to tell me how a homily touched you, you’ve written me an encouraging note. Your love for me and your nurturing of my vocation has been so powerful in these first years of my priesthood, and I will always remember that.
Second, I am grateful for the ways you have cared for my family. In a very real way, you have been part of my family. You have been there for me during the illness and death of my dad. When my family has been here for Mass on occasion, you have been so welcoming of them. After three years, it seems like we’re just getting to know each other, but in some ways, some very important ways, it seems like we have known each other forever and I love that. It has been wonderful to be part of your families, and wonderful to have you as part of mine. Family may move away physically, but spiritually, we will always be part of each other.
And finally, I am grateful for the ways you have cared for others. I have enjoyed serving with you on Service Day, raking leaves in the cold but having a great time helping others. I have enjoyed serving with you on various commissions and committees here at the Church – even though meetings are not my favorite thing! – we have accomplished so much together in Christ’s name. Whether it was worshipping together for 40 Hours Devotion, or helping out the food pantry with donations on Holy Thursday, or whatever it is that we’ve done together, what we did became so much more by doing it together. Your willingness to pray and to serve and to witness is what makes St. Raphael such a great parish, and I will always love that.
So thank you for the great blessings you have been to me these last three years. We now set out on a new journey. Me to St. Petronille, and you to welcome Fr. Dindo. The ride may be smooth, or it may be bumpy. But however it is, we know that Jesus will be with us through it all. He may calm the storm, or he may calm his children, whichever is most appropriate. And we know that the journey from fear to faith will lead us back one day to the place we really belong, at the banquet table in the kingdom of everlasting life. May all of our life’s journeys end up in that same, great place!
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The Sacred Heart of Jesus
I remember when I was growing up, often visiting my dear grandmother. She and I were best friends in so many ways. I remember when we visited that she had a beautiful framed picture in the living room, given a spot of honor where everyone could see it, and that picture was of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Whenever I think of the Sacred Heart, I remember grandma, whose name was Margaret Mary, named after the saint who promoted veneration of the Sacred Heart in the first place.And so, today we celebrate, with incredible gratitude, the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Through his most Sacred Heart, the love of God is made manifest among us. This love is a pervasive love that burns in our hearts and changes our lives and leads us back to the God who made us for himself. This love is irresistible if we give ourselves over to it. It is a love that pursues us and a love that can go far beyond whatever distance we have fallen from grace. It is a love that, as Hosea tells us in the first reading, is rich in mercy, and, as St. Paul tells us in the second reading, dwells in our hearts through faith. The love of God pours forth from the heart of Christ just as the water and blood poured forth from his side as he hung dead on the cross. Death could not stop the outpouring of grace that he came to bring.
God, of course is love, and because we were made to love him, we have some of that love that is God within our own imperfect, sometimes stony hearts, that love that helps us to reach beyond ourselves and reach out in our need.
Three years ago, when I first came to St. Raphael, the first daily Mass that I celebrated with you was the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. And so it only seems appropriate, and yes, a little sad, that my last daily Mass with you is this same feast day. It’s appropriate because all of you have helped me to come to know Christ’s love in so many beautiful ways. In our worshipping together, and also in our serving together, we have loved one another and loved others in Christ’s name. Celebrating Mass with you on these weekdays has been a labor of love for me, because you all come every day ready to celebrate and listen and pray and take the grace with you into your service in the day ahead. What a great gift you have been to me; I will never forget that.
St. Paul prays that we would be filled with the fullness of God. May we all be filled to overflowing with the love of Christ, so that we can pour that love forth onto a world which longs to be soaked in that love. May the Sacred Heart of Jesus have mercy on all of us.
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