Caritas Christi Urget Nos

Tag: Lent

  • Thursday of the First Week of Lent

    Thursday of the First Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    The readings for these early days of Lent have been teaching us how to accomplish the various disciplines of Lent – which really are the various disciplines of the spiritual life.  Today’s discipline then, I think, would be persistence in prayer.  In the first reading, we have Queen Esther, who is really between a rock and a hard place.  The king does not know she is Hebrew, and worse than that, if she goes to the king without being summoned, she could well lose her life.  But, Mordecai, the man who was her guardian and raised her as his own daughter, revealed to her that the king’s advisor had planned genocide against the Jews, and she was the only person in a position to beg the king to change his mind.  So today, she prays that her life, as well as those of her people would be spared.  Esther prayed for three days and nights that her prayer would be answered, and her persistence was rewarded.  She received the reward that Jesus promised when he said, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

    Which is nice for her and the Israelites, certainly, but how many of us have prayed persistently to God that he would answer our prayer and have yet to be answered?  I think most of us at some point or another have experience the exasperation of prayer unanswered, or at least prayer that seems to be unanswered.  We can be so frustrated when a loved one is ill or unemployed, or whatever the issue may be, and God seemingly does not hear.

    But the discipline of prayerful persistence is not like wishing on a star or anything like that.  There’s no magic to our words.  We may or may not be rewarded with the exact gift we pray for; in fact, that rarely happens.  But we will always be rewarded with the loving presence of our God in our lives.  In fact, it could well be that God’s answer to our prayer is “no” – for whatever reason – but even in that “no” we have the grace of a relationship that has been strengthened by our prayerful persistence.

    The Psalmist prays, “Lord, on the day I called for help, you answered me.”  This Lent, may the discipline of persistence in prayer lead us to a renewed and enlivened sense of the Lord’s will and presence in our lives.

  • Thursday after Ash Wednesday

    Thursday after Ash Wednesday

    Today’s readings

    Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
    and sorry I could not travel both
    And be one traveler, long I stood
    and looked down one as far as I could
    to where it bent in the undergrowth;
    Then took the other, as just as fair,
    and having perhaps the better claim
    because it was grassy and wanted wear;
    though as for that, the passing there
    had worn them really about the same,
    And both that morning equally lay
    in leaves no feet had trodden black.
    Oh, I kept the first for another day!
    Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
    I doubted if I should ever come back.
    I shall be telling this with a sigh
    Somewhere ages and ages hence:
    Two roads diverged in a wood, and I –
    I took the one less traveled by,
    and that has made all the difference.

    This poem, as you may recognize, is “The Road Less Traveled,” by Robert Frost, and it was always one of my favorites.  Today’s readings speak, more or less, to the same sentiment, but with a more radical and crucial twist.  Frost’s opinion is that both roads are equally valid, he simply chooses to take the one most people don’t.  But the Gospel tells us that there really is only the one valid path, and that certainly is the road less traveled.  We commonly call it the Way of the Cross.

    Moses makes it clear: he sets before the people life and death, and then begs them to choose life.  Choosing life, for the Christian, means going down that less traveled Way of the Cross, a road that is hard and filled with pitfalls.  And maybe the real problem is that there is a choice.  Wouldn’t it be great if we only had the one way set before us and no matter how hard it would be, that was all we could choose? But God has given us freedom and wants us to follow that Way of the Cross in freedom, because that’s the only way that leads to life; the only way that leads to him.

    Our Psalmist says it well today:

    Blessed the one who follows not
    the counsel of the wicked
    Nor walks in the way of sinners,
    nor sits in the company of the insolent,
    But delights in the law of the LORD
    and meditates on his law day and night.

  • Thursday of the First Week of Lent

    Thursday of the First Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    Have you noticed that the readings for these early days of Lent have been teaching us how to accomplish the various disciplines of Lent, which really are the various disciplines of the spiritual life? Today’s discipline then, I think, would be persistence in prayer. In the first reading, we have Queen Esther, who is really between a rock and a hard place. The king does not know she is Hebrew, and worse than that, if she goes to the king without being summoned, she could well lose her life. But, Mordecai, the man who was her guardian and raised her as his own daughter, revealed to her that the king’s advisor had planned genocide against the Jews, and she was the only person in a position to beg the king to change his mind. So today, she prays that her life, as well as those of her people would be spared. Esther prayed for three days and nights that her prayer would be answered, and her persistence was rewarded. She received the reward that Jesus promised when he said, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

    Then again, how many of us have prayed persistently to God that he would answer our prayer and have yet to be answered? I think most of us at some point or another have experience the exasperation of prayer unanswered, or at least seemingly so. We can be so frustrated when a loved one is ill or unemployed, or whatever, and God seemingly does not hear.

    But the discipline of prayerful persistence is not like wishing on a star or anything like that. There’s no magic to our words. We may or may not be rewarded with the exact gift we pray for. But we will always be rewarded with the loving presence of our God in our lives. In fact, maybe God’s answer to our prayer is “no” – for whatever reason – but even in that “no” we have the grace of a relationship that has been strengthened by our prayerful persistence.

    The Psalmist prays, “Lord, on the day I called for help, you answered me.” This Lent, may the discipline of persistence in prayer lead us to a renewed and enlivened sense of the Lord’s will in our lives.

  • The Word from Father Pat

    The Word from Father Pat

    May this water receive by the Holy Spirit
    the grace of your Only Begotten Son,
    so that human nature, created in your image,
    and washed clean through the sacrament of Baptism
    from all the squalor of the life of old
    may be found worthy to rise to the life of newborn children
    through water and the Holy Spirit.
    Blessing of Baptismal Water, Easter Vigil Mass

    Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

    One of the wonderful things about Lent and Easter is that these holy seasons help us to understand just what it is that we believe about the necessity of Baptism.  Because if Baptism is just a nice little ritual that precedes a family party, it’s hardly of any consequence, indeed it’s not necessary at all.  And if that’s true, Lent and Easter aren’t really necessary either.  But if we truly believe that Baptism is the integral washing away of our sinfulness so that we may be made worthy of the life of heaven, then there’s nothing that should get in the way of it, and these holy days are of utmost importance.

    Over the last few weeks, I’ve begun taking a look at the texts for the celebration of Holy Week.  As you know, the new Roman Missal re-translated everything, including all of the texts for those holy days.  What is disconcerting, but also in some ways refreshing, about the new translation is that it doesn’t beat around the bush about our need for Baptism.

    Looking at the text above, from the Blessing of Baptismal Water on the Easter Vigil, the text speaks about the new life the Baptized receive.  Nothing too shocking about that.  But notice how it refers to the life before Baptism: “from all the squalor of the life of old.”  Well, that seems a little harsh, doesn’t it?  Really, squalor?

    It’s not so different from the language of the Exsultet, the Easter Proclamation: “This is the night that even now, throughout the world, sets Christian believers apart from worldly vices and from the gloom of sin, leading them to grace and joining them to his holy ones.”  Worldly vice and the gloom of sin are hardly things we want to think about, but we all know they’re there, and the only chance we have of being delivered from them is by being united to Christ through Baptism.

    So yes, squalor is part of the human condition.  If humanity weren’t in such disarray, Christ would never have had to die on the Cross.  But thank God he did, or we’d be mired in that squalor for all eternity.  God forbid.

    People are often taken aback by the language of Ash Wednesday, that leads us into this holy season: “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.”  Dust?  Yes, that and squalor!  “Repent and believe in the Gospel.”  Repent?  Yes, we all need to repent from the gloom of sin and worldly vices.

    Catholic theology is based on the premise that we pray what we believe.  So the words of Lent and Easter might come across as a little harsh on the human condition, but that’s only because the human condition is actually pretty harsh, left to itself.  Thanks be to God it isn’t ever left to itself: Baptism into the death and resurrection of Christ makes possible deliverance from all that dust and gloom and squalor and vice.

    I’ve found myself bristling a bit at some of the new language.  Thank God!  I need to bristle and come to new awareness of the awesome deliverance that we celebrate during the holy days and the real gift that is our Baptism.  All that bristling will make the “Alleluias” of the Easter season that much more poignant!

    Yours in Christ and His Blessed Mother,

    Father Pat Mulcahy

  • The Third Sunday of Lent [B]

    The Third Sunday of Lent [B]

    Today’s readings

    Most of us have probably experienced at least one time in our lives when it seemed like our whole world was turned upside-down.  Maybe it was the loss of a job, or the illness or death of a loved one, or any of a host of other issues.  It probably felt like the rug was pulled out from under us and that everything we believed in was toppled over.  Kind of like the table in front of the altar, like the story we just heard in the Gospel.

    You may have heard the interpretation of this rather shocking Gospel story that says that this is proof that Jesus got angry, so we shouldn’t feel bad when we do.  That sounds nice, but I am, of course, going to tell you this interpretation is flawed.  First of all, there is a big difference between the kind of righteous indignation that Jesus felt over the devastation of sin and death that plagues our world, and the frustration and anger that we all experience over comparatively minor issues from time to time.  It might make us feel better to think that Jesus acted out in the same way that we sometimes do, that he felt the same way we do about these things, but that doesn’t mean it’s right.

    So feeling better for being angry isn’t the theme of this reading, or the intent of today’s Liturgy of the Word.  And I do think we have to take all of the readings as a whole in order to discern what we are being invited to experience.  Our first reading is extremely familiar to us all.   The ten commandments – we’ve heard them so often, violated them on occasion, perhaps we don’t even think they’re relevant any more.  But the mere fact that they are read at today’s Mass tells us that the Church says they are.  And while every one of them is certainly important, one of them stands out as having top billing.  And that one is the very first commandment: “I, the LORD, am your God … you shall not have other gods besides me.”

    That one commandment comprises the whole first paragraph of the reading, a total of thirteen lines of text.  I think that means we are to pay attention to it!  It’s the commandment that seems to make the most sense, that it’s the most foundational.  We have to get our relationship with God right and put him first.  But this commandment is rather easy to violate, and I think we do it all the time.  We all know that there are things we put way ahead of God: our work, our leisure, sports and entertainment, and so many things that may even be darker than that.  Don’t we often forget to bring God into our thoughts and plans?  Yet if we would do it on a regular basis, God promises to bless us “down to the thousandth generation!”

    Saint Paul is urging the Corinthians to put God first, too.  He complains that the Jews want signs and the Greeks want some kind of wisdom, but he and the others preach Christ crucified!  We are a people who want signs.  We almost refuse to take a leap of faith unless we have some overt sign of God’s decision.  And we are all about seeking wisdom, mostly in ourselves.  If it makes sense to us and it feels right to us, it must be okay to do.  But nothing could be further from the truth.  We get tripped up in our own wisdom and sign-seeking all the time, then we wander down the wrong path only to end up several years down the road, wondering where it all went wrong.

    And then we have the really challenging vignette at the end of the Gospel reading.    Jesus knows how long it took to build the temple.  But he wasn’t talking about the temple.  He was talking about his body.  His body is the new Temple, and that was the Temple that would be torn down and in three days raised back up.  Because Jesus is the new Temple, none of the money changing and animal selling was necessary.  It was all perfectly legitimate commerce for the old temple worship.  But worshipping the new Temple – Jesus Christ – would require none of that, and so he turns it all upside-down.

    It’s not easy to put God first.  It’s not easy to glory in Christ crucified.  What a horribly difficult and unpopular message to have to live!  But that’s what we are all called to do if we are to be disciples of Jesus, if we are to yearn for life in that kingdom that knows no end.  Glorying in Christ crucified, putting God first, that’s going to require that some time or another, we are going to have to take up our own cross too, and let our entire lives be turned upside-down.  God only knows where that will lead us: maybe to a new career, maybe to a fuller sense of our vocation, maybe to joy, maybe to pain.  But always to grace, because God never leaves the side of those who are willing to have their lives turned upside-down for his glory.

    There’s no easy road to glory.  You don’t get an Easter without a Good Friday.  Jesus didn’t, and we won’t either.  Our lives will be turned upside-down and everything we think we know will be scattered like the coins on the money-changers’ tables.  But God is always and absolutely present to those who pray those words the disciples recalled:

    Zeal for your house will consume me.

  • Men’s Ministry Lenten Breakfast Talk: How Do Men Observe Lent?

    Men’s Ministry Lenten Breakfast Talk: How Do Men Observe Lent?

    Last night, I was in church for the Living Stations.  The junior high kids were leading it and they did an awesome job.  They even got me to shed a few tears along the way.  I’m half Italian: we just do that!  But what was it that got to me and caused those tears:

    1. 1. That the kids took it seriously and were very reverent and prayerful?
    2. 2. Was it the story of salvation, in awe and wonder that God would send his Son to die that horrible death for me?
    3. 3. Or was it that I was hoping and praying those kids are being touched by the meaning of what they were doing?

    And the answer is yes, all of that:  As the father of this big family, my heart is moved in all of those ways and more.  That’s what fathers do.  And so I’ve been reflecting on Lent and what that means for men.  How is it that we men observe Lent?

    Maybe I should ask, how is it that we men should observe Lent?  Because I know that we live busy lives, and we can scarcely give Lent a second thought if we’re not careful.  But that does nobody any good: not us, not our families, not our communities or workplaces.  If we want to be the best we can for all of them, we have to let Lent permeate who we are and what we do.

    And it’s a quandary with which I’m familiar.  When I worked in my pre-seminary days, if I didn’t put prayer on my to-do list – literally – there would be no prayer.  And when there was no prayer, I was not at my best at work, I was not at my best with anyone.  Lent gives us the opportunity to take stock of this and turn it all around.

    Reading: Isaiah 64:4-7

    I probably don’t have to pound home that point from Isaiah: we have become like unclean men.  The opportunities to go wrong abound, don’t they?  We intend to be men of integrity, but business is complicated.  We intend to love our families into heaven, but we’re tired, we’re busy, and we just don’t always have the patience.  Our sins abound, and we don’t intend that – we so wish we could turn back to God once and for all.  Would that he might meet us doing right.  Maybe that can happen this Lent.

    Here’s a question to think about – we will discuss it later, but for now, just think:  have you ever had a really significant Lent: a time when you felt a new springtime in your faith, a time when you grew as a man and really came to know the plans God had for you?  If so, when was that, and what was it that got to you?

    (Pause a minute or two.)

    I think Lent encourages at least five manly traits, and I want to reflect on those a bit.  Then I want to take a look at the three habits that Lent demands of us.  Finally, without stomping too much on Dr. Muir’s presentation coming up, I want to take a brief look at three men of Lent and reflect on what they model for us.

    So first: five manly traits that Lent encourages.

    First, Lent encourages us to be men of prayer.  Yes, men of prayer are men who pray, but not just men who say prayers.  Men of prayer are men who:

    • • pray first and often
    • • look around them and see God’s hand at work
    • • are grateful for their gifts
    • • look for an opportunity to worship
    • • experience the sacraments
    • • teach their families how to pray, how to have a relationship with Jesus
      • o We never go alone to the kingdom … we are supposed to take everyone with us, especially our families!

    Second, Lent encourages us to be men of faith.  Men of faith know that God is with them in good times and bad.  Men of faith have that relationship with Jesus that helps them to relate well with others.  Men of faith are courageous, and tenacious, and confident, but they are never arrogant.  Humility marks men of faith because they know the source of their strength.  This is not a false humility that makes them doormats for everyone who wishes to take them on.

    Third, Lent encourages us to be men of charity.  This might not mean what you think it does.  It’s not primarily about giving money to the poor, or even doing good things for other people.  Yes, these are acts of charity, but what I mean by being men of charity takes us to the Latin root of the word, caritas.  Caritas is a kind of self-giving love, a love that looks for the good of others, a love that sometimes finds its expression in works of charity, but is always characterized by putting the other one first.  Men of charity are men who have a strong, burning love for God that translates into the way they love their families, spouses, children, co-workers, employees, everyone God puts in their path.  Men who exhibit this charity certainly do not overlook another’s faults, but gently and firmly corrects them because he knows that setting the person right is what is best for them.  Charity sometimes means saying no, or not yet; it means saying do this even though you don’t think you want to.  Think how often God does that to us!

    • • Example from my life: my parents urging me to go on a retreat or be part of a group.

    Fourth, Lent encourages us to be men of integrity.  Men of integrity exhibit what we generally refer to as “character.”  These are men who do the right thing even though someone isn’t breathing down their neck or micromanaging them.  Integrity is what we all want to say that we have.  But integrity is definitely difficult to always achieve.  Because integrity means walking away from a lucrative business deal because it doesn’t feel right.  Integrity means setting priorities for yourself and your family that are probably counter-cultural, like saying no to sports or activities that make it impossible to go to Mass or to spend adequate time with our families.  Integrity means we are as good as our word, that we can always be relied on to do the right thing.  God does not want to be a micromanager: he wants to set us on the right path and have us walk it every day.  Men of integrity do that.

    Finally, Lent calls us to be men of grace.  This doesn’t mean we are able to burn up the dance floor, it means rather that we are aware of God’s action in our life, that we live by that action, and that we spread it on to others.  Grace says that everything we have is a gift, no matter how hard we think we’ve worked for it.  Grace says that we are sinners, men who have committed sins and are guilty of every possible offense against God, but even so we are loved and forgiven and called and blessed.  Grace says that God is infinitely greater than our sins, that there is no way that we can fall so far that God can’t reach us, that he longs to pull us up out of the waters of death and give us life that lasts forever.

    The truth of grace is this:  on one day in time, let’s call it December 25, of the year zero… (footnote Fr. Larry Hennessy).

    Men of grace are aware of their sinfulness and bring it to the Sacrament of Penance on a regular basis; they are grateful for the gift of forgiveness and celebrate it at the table of the Eucharist.  Men of grace enthusiastically pass the faith on to their families, keenly aware of their vocational responsibility to help their spouse and their children get to heaven.  Men of grace witness to others by being men of prayer, men of faith, men of charity and men of integrity!

    Another question to think about – of the five manly traits, which do you find most present in your life?  What do you think got you there?  Which do you find least present in your life?  What do you need to do to pursue it?

    So now, three Lenten habits: fasting, almsgiving and prayer.

    Fasting helps us to:

    • • give up what we truly do not need
    • • let go of things that keep us tethered to the world, to our own self-interest
    • • find in our hunger that there is nothing we hunger for that God can’t provide.

    Almsgiving helps us to:

    • • realize that we are not the center of the universe, and also we are not alone
    • • see other people as God sees them and love them as God does.

    Prayer helps us to:

    • • find God in the midst of our business, brokenness, despair
    • • have a relationship with God that sees us through good times and bad
    • o Joke about the guy who was going through a hard time and looked at the Bible randomly for some help
    • • see God’s work in our lives

    A question to think about:  What’s your Lenten plan?  How will you implement fasting, almsgiving and prayer in your life?

    Men of Lent

    Peter: Matthew 14:22-33

    • o A man of fledgling faith
      • ♣ courageous, tenacious
    • o A man of grace
      • ♣ fallen and forgiven

    Paul:  Philippians 1:19-26

    • o A man of converted faith (his past)
    • o A man of grace (knows who is in charge, where he is being led)
    • o A man of charity (is concerned about others, and fruitful labor)

    A question to think about:  Which of these men inspires you most?  Why?  What can you take from his life to create a powerful life-changing Lent?

  • Ash Wednesday

    Ash Wednesday

    Today’s readings

    Behold: now is the acceptable time!
    Behold: now is the day of salvation!

    We have come here today for all sorts of reasons. Lots of us may still have the remnants of old and bad teaching that you have to come to Church on Ash Wednesday or something horrible will happen to you, or maybe you even think that getting ashes on Ash Wednesday is what makes us Catholic.  When you don’t come to Church on a regular basis, you lose contact with God and the community, and yes, that is pretty horrible, but not in a superstitious kind of way.  The real reason we come to Church on this the first day of Lent is for what we celebrate on the day after Lent: the resurrection of the Lord on Easter Sunday.  Through the Cross and Resurrection, Jesus has won for us salvation, and we are the grateful beneficiaries of that great gift.  All of our Lenten observance, then, is a preparation for the joy of Easter.

    Lent calls us to repent, to break our ties with the sinfulness and the entanglements that are keeping us tethered to the world instead of free to live with our God and receive his gift of salvation.  Our Church offers us three ways to do that: fasting, prayer and almsgiving.  So first, we fast.  We give up snacks, or a favorite food, or eat one less meal perhaps one day a week, or we can give up a favorite television program or activity.  Fasting helps us to be aware of the ways God works to sustain us when we’re hungry.  The whole idea of fasting is that we need to come to realize that there is nothing that we hunger for that God can’t provide, and to cut our ties with anything that keeps us from God.  Some people say they don’t have to give something up for Lent because they would rather do something good and focus on the positive.  I’ll tell you right now, it doesn’t have to be one or the other; in Catholic teaching, it’s always both/and.  You can give something up to strengthen your relationship with God, and do something good to strengthen your relationship with others.

    Second, we pray.  We already must pray every day and attend Mass every Sunday; those are obligations that we have as people of God.  But maybe Lent can be the opportunity to intensify our prayer life, to make it better, to make it more, to draw more life from it.  Maybe we are not people who read Scripture every day, and we can work through one of the books of the Bible during Lent.  Maybe we can learn a new prayer or take on a new devotion.  Maybe we can spend time before the Lord in the adoration.  Maybe we can just carve out some quiet time at the end of our busy days to give thanks for our blessings, and to ask pardon for our failings.  Intensifying our prayer life this Lent can help us to be aware of God’s presence at every moment of our day and in every place we are.

    Third, we give alms or do works of charity.  We can donate money for organizations that feed the poor, or perhaps help to provide a meal at a soup kitchen.  Maybe we can devote some time to mentoring a child who needs help with their studies, or volunteer to help in our school or religious education program.  Works of charity might be a family project, perhaps volunteering to help in our food pantry together, or shopping together for items for our 40 Cans for Lent campaign.  When we do works of charity, we can learn to see others as God does, and love them the way God loves them and us.

    And none of this, as the Gospel reminds us today, is to be done begrudgingly or half-heartedly.  None of it is to be done with the express purpose of letting the world see how great we are.  It is always to be done with great humility, but also with great joy.  Our acts of fasting, prayer, and charity should be a celebration of who God is in our lives, and a beautiful effort to strengthen our relationship with him.

    It is my prayer that this Lent can be a forty-day retreat that will bring us all closer to God.  May we all hear the voice of the prophet Joel from today’s first reading: “Even now, says the Lord, return to me with your whole heart!”

  • Lenten Penance Service

    Lenten Penance Service

    Today’s readings: Romans 5:12, 17-19; Matthew 26:20-25

    In Jesus Christ, we have absolutely everything that we need for the forgiveness of sins, except one thing.  In Jesus Christ, we have our God who became man.  We have in Christ the Saving Sacrifice, his life poured out on us to take away the penalty of our sins and nullify the sting of our death.  Not only that, but Jesus Christ strengthens us with the gift of his Holy Spirit, who enlivens in us the desire to be close to our God and to put our sins behind us.  That Holy Spirit gives us the grace not just to know and confess our sins, but also the grace to avoid the sin ahead of us.  In Christ, the way to forgiveness is open.  We have all we need – except one thing.

     

    And that one thing is the thing that must come from within us, namely, repentance.   Because once we repent of our sins, turn away from them, and confess them, we can then accept God’s grace and mercy, and become a new people, marked by faith, hope and love.  But repentance is a choice that’s up to us; it’s a habit we have to develop, because it’s not a habit that we see demonstrated much in our world.  Our world would rather take mistakes and put a positive “spin” on them so everyone saves face.  But that’s not repentance.  Our world would rather find someone else to blame for the problems we encounter, so that we can be righteously indignant and accept our own status as victims.  But that’s not repentance.  Our world would rather encounter an issue by throwing at it money, human resources, military intervention, lawsuits or legislation.  But that’s not repentance.

     

    Our Gospel tonight shows us what happens when we forget repentance and penance and the grace of reconciliation.  Despair over our own sins blinds us to the mercy of God that has been staring us right in the face, walking with us all along the way.  In our own desperate and fumbling attempts to make all that is wrong in us right, we make ourselves miserable, we give up on what is good, and we betray our Lord, again.  But we can’t be like Judas, trying to save face – “Surely it is not I, Lord?”  We have to learn the rich virtue of repentance, we have to become people of repentance.

     

    But where and to whom do we look to become that people?  World leaders are no help at all, and even if the media were to see an example of repentance, I’m not sure they’d give it much play.  So that’s no help.  Perhaps in these Lenten days, the Liturgy of the Word can be our teacher.  We might look at the wayward son’s interaction with the Prodigal Father, or perhaps the woman at the well who left her jug behind to live the new life.  We might look at the woman caught in adultery or even at the “good thief” crucified with Jesus.  All of these got the idea and turned from their sin toward their God and received life in return.  This is the habit of repentance that we have been called to develop in ourselves.

     

    The only thing our God wants to do is to forgive sinners.  Not just once, not twice, not even seventy-seven times, but rather as many times as we fall – so long as we repent and turn back to him, the source of grace and the font of salvation.

     

    And that’s why we’re here tonight.  God is aching to pour out on us the grace of his forgiveness and to bring us to his peace beyond all of our understanding, and we have chosen to come and receive it.  We have chosen to be a people marked by faith, hope and love.  We long to develop that habit of repentance which allows us to receive the new life God has always wanted for us.  The only thing God wants to do is to forgive sinners.  So let us now as a community of faith examine our conscience and repent of our sins.

     

  • Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent

    Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent

    Today’s readings

    Susanna’s story is one of the most eloquent and deeply moving in the Old Testament Scriptures.  In it we see the wisdom of the prophet Daniel, as well as the mercy and justice of God.  But sadly, we also see in this story the fickleness of the human heart and the evil and treachery that makes up some of our darker moments.  Susanna’s story serves well as a backdrop for the woman caught in adultery, whose sin was loosed by Jesus.

     

    This morning’s Liturgy of the Word calls us to right wrongs, to be completely honest and forthright in our dealings with others, to seek to purify our hearts of any wicked intent, and most of all to seek to restore right relationships with any person who has something against us, or against whom we have something.  So basically, these readings are the spirit of Lent.  Our prayer this day is that God’s mercy and justice would reign, and that God’s kingdom would come about in all its fullness, starting first and foremost in our own hearts.

     

  • The Ninth Sunday of Ordinary Time [A]

    The Ninth Sunday of Ordinary Time [A]

    Today’s readings

    Today’s readings get us to the heart of a very sticky matter.  What is it that is most important in terms of our salvation?  Is it faith in Jesus Christ?  Or is it doing good works?  This question has been the lightning rod of the faith for a long time now.  Disagreement over the answer contributed to the protestant reformation in the sixteenth century, and it is only recently that Catholics and Lutherans have come to some sort of agreement on it.  So let’s see if we can come up with the answer in five minutes!

     

    Ironically, today’s readings present both sides of the issue.  On the one hand, there is the teaching found in the first reading from the book of Deuteronomy.  Here, Moses tells the people that they have a choice.  Live the way they want and turn away from God, or remember all that God has done for them and follow the Law.  In the second reading, Saint Paul writes a contradictory opinion to the Romans: a person is justified by faith apart from works of the Law.  So hearing that, what are we supposed to do?  Do we just have to believe and have faith and let that be our salvation, or do we follow the Law?

     

    So here’s the rule of thumb: in Catholic theology it’s never either one or the other, it’s pretty much always both/and.  Jesus, of course, gives the answer in today’s Gospel reading: “Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock.”  Yes, we have to believe and have faith, but we also have to act on that faith.  Saint James tells us in his letter in the New Testament that faith without works is dead.  The essence of it is that if we really believe, then our faith will move us into action.

     

    That’s what the Gospel is all about really.  We believe in Christ and have faith because of his great love for us, because of the saving sacrifice of his life on the cross.  That’s what brings us to salvation.  But if we really do believe in that, then we also have to do what Jesus did.  Maybe not in such a radical fashion, but we do have to lay down our lives.  We have to forgive when forgiving is hard to do.  We have to reach out to the poor and marginalized when we would rather not.  We have to live as people of integrity when it would be easier to do what everyone else seems to be doing.  That’s living the Gospel.  That’s what people of faith do.

     

    We gather here on the precipice of Lent.  As we enter that holy season on Wednesday, we are called to take that time to become more authentic people of faith.  The Church gives us the traditional ways to do that: fasting, almsgiving and prayer.  What do we need to let go of so that we can be closer to God?  We should fast from that.  How can we give of our time, talent or treasure so that others can live better lives?  That’s our almsgiving.  And what do we need to do in our prayer and worship life to reconnect with God in ways that we have been lax on during the past year?

     

    A lot of people say that you don’t have to give something up for Lent – that’s so old fashioned; you should just do something good.  Well, again, it’s not either/or.  You can do both things, and you should.  We all need to give something up for Lent: unhealthy relationships, addiction to drink or drugs or food, time-wasting habits – all of those things keep us from God and don’t really make us happy anyway.  Give them up at least for Lent!

     

    And who knows, giving them up may just give us energy to do something really good for Lent too.  Maybe giving up our Starbuck’s addiction will help us to give those dollars to the poor.  Maybe cutting down on our television intake will give us the time to spend with our families in important ways or have more time for prayer or reflection on Scripture.  Maybe getting up a little early to attend daily Mass will make our work day more peaceful.

     

    The message for us on the precipice of Lent is that we all need to do something.  None of us is in the right place with Jesus right now; we can always grow in faith and get closer to God.  This Lent is the gift of time to do just that.  So let’s go into it with a plan, and it doesn’t have to be grandiose.  Let’s have an idea of fasting, almsgiving and prayer that works for us and helps us to make even one small step forward in our faith.

     

    So Jesus tells us that our faith has to be grounded on belief in him and has to yield good things.  We have to take that rock solid foundation of Christ and build a life of faith that reaches out to others in their need and witnesses to others how much our God means to us.  We never want to hear those words, “I never knew you.  Depart from me, you evildoers.”  And one great way to get there is to make the most of these upcoming forty days.