Homily for the First Sunday of Advent Cycle A - Preached Sat/Sun Nov. 26/27 St. Cecilia Church

Today's readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/112716.cfm

I always found it curious that we would end a Church year like we did a week ago, with readings about the end times, about the final judgment, about the fulfillment of the Kingdom.  And then, a week later, begin a new Church year with readings about the end times, final judgment and fulfillment of the Kingdom.  Why is that, huh?

I think the meaning behind these readings can be found summed up in one of those Seven Habits of Highly Effective People that Steven Covey writes about – “begin with the end in mind.”  Begin with the end in mind.  The gist is – if you don’t know where you’re trying to get to, it doesn’t matter much which road you take.  But if you start with a firm goal, then how you get there makes all the difference.  So I think the Church is teaching us to begin again, begin with a firm goal in mind.

And we who gather this evening/morning do share a common goal, do we not?  Eternal life, eternal communion with our God, Father Son and Holy Spirit. 

But how often do we think about that?  How often as we live the day-to-day busy-ness of our lives, do we take the time to stop and think about where we’re going, where we’re trying to get.  And are we on the right road to get there? 

This new season of Advent - this new Church year - provide us a time to stop and think, and examine our lives.  Ironic, huh? That this time of year that this world has made more and more hectic, preparing for the “holidays” – is supposed to be a time of retreat, reflection, self-examination. 

And but don’t dally - do it now. All these readings seem to say - don’t delay!  There’s an urgency to these readings, huh?  We recognize that our salvation is nearer than when we first believed, nearer than last advent, nearer even than our last breath.  So we’d better get on with it.

Why? Because Jesus, the “Son of Man, is coming.”  On Christmas morn.  At the end of our lives.  At the end of time.  And this season gives us a time to reflect on Jesus’ coming in all three ways, but especially at the end of our lives.  The Gospel speaks to this.

Let’s take a moment and put ourselves into this Gospel.  Two men out in the field – one taken, one left.  Two women grinding at the mill – one taken one left. 

Imagine - what if you or I were there in the field, or grinding at the wheel?  Working away, here before you stands Jesus the Son of God Himself.  The “coming of the Son of Man.”  For your judgment – such that one is taken and one left.  To judge my life.  What have I done?  What have I failed to do?   Have I been faithful to Him?

Just this week, the Holy Father Pope Francis spoke of this – that we must take stock of our lives in preparation for that judgment – “We’d do well to think,” he said, ‘…what will the day be like when I will be in front of Jesus? When He asks me about the talents that he gave me, what use I made of them, when He will ask me: how was my heart when the seed was dropped, like a path or like thorns: that Parable of the Kingdom of God. How did I receive His Word? With an open heart?  Did I make it germinate for the good of all or in secret?”

Now, imagine again, Jesus standing before you.  What if, at that moment, rather than stand in judgment, He points straight at you and says “you decide?”  Tells you to judge, presents you at that moment a stark choice – Him or not Him?  On one hand a smiling Jesus, arms outstretched, open wide, beckoning me to embrace Him.  On the other hand an eternity entirely devoid of His love.  Pretty easy choice, huh?

Now what if, at that moment, the choices completely morph.  On one had you’re presented with all the glamour, the glitter, the good feelings, the undeniable attraction of sin.  Those deeds of darkness which the evil one puts in front of you, to tempt you.  Those deeds of which St. Paul wrote in our second reading. 

And on the other hand you’re presented with a life of faithful discipline, of resolve strengthened by frequent visits to the confessional and Eucharist.  A life of clinging to the crucified Lord.  Now perhaps the choice is not so easy, as one looks so tempting, so gratifying.  The other looks - so hard.

Now what if, on one hand you’re presented with a life of comfort and ease, of riches and pleasure and amusement.  And on the other hand Jesus morphs.  He becomes a homeless woman.  An immigrant child.  An elderly person lonely and dying.  An unwed mother, an unborn baby.  Each with arms outstretched, open wide, beckoning for our help.  And the judgment is again ours, yours and mine, to make.

You see, I’m not sure that the end times will be any different than our daily lives, that the judgments we make day in and day out aren’t the exact same as those we’ll be called to make when standing before the Lord.  That the final judgment won’t be a replay of all the many little judgments we make along the way.  Do we choose Jesus, or not Jesus?

Sisters and brothers, I think the message for each of us today, as we begin this new Church year and enter into this holy season of preparation is to ready ourselves - prepare ye the way of the Lord, for the Son of Man is coming.  Prepare for that day of our judgment.

For what time is it?  It’s the time to wake from our slumber.  To arise, to change our lives, our priorities, change the path we’re on if the path we’re on isn’t leading us to the only goal that matters – that is - eternal life, eternal joy, eternal communion with God, who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.  

Homily for today's Feast - Solemnity of Jesus Christ, King of the Universe - Nov. 20, 2016 - 9a St Cecilia, 11a St. Margaret Mary

Today's readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/112016.cfm

I preached last week and my wife was a little worried that I would go off and say something about the election in my homily, and was much relieved when I didn’t.  So - how about the election?  Just kidding. Thank God it’s over, that’s what I’m thinking.  We all got to vote, America got to choose.  We have a winner and we to deal with it, huh?

Well not exactly.  All across America there have been demonstrations.  People, mostly young people, protesting the result of the election.  Chanting things.  Carrying signs.  The favorite seems to a simple three words “not my President.”  Interviews reveal that many of the protesters, in fact, didn’t even vote.  And I’m not sure what the protesters’ goal is, since, as I said, we had an election, we all got to vote.

So what’s this got to do with today’s Feast, the Solemnity of Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, or more simply, Christ the King?  I mean, you don’t vote for king.  There’s a little skit in the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail that says as much:  “Who are you,” a woman asks King Arthur.  “I am your king.”  “King, eh, well I didn’t vote for you.”  “You don’t vote for king,” replies Arthur.

I guess the point I’d like to make is this, in the kingdom of Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, we do, in fact, have a vote.  We vote all the time.  Oh, most of us entered His kingdom at our baptism, but this kingdom requires more than the vote of a tiny baby. This kingdom requires us to vote with every passing day, with every decision we make.  Am I to be a part of the kingdom or not?

And what really stuck in my head, all this week, what with the protesters carrying signs saying “not my president” was this – how many of us, by our words, by our actions, by how we live our lives, in effect walk around carrying signs that say “not my King.”

You see, whether we like it or not, our lives are walking signs, walking billboards.  They either say “Jesus Christ is my King, my only King.”  Or they say “Not my King.”

It seems to me that we humans have two competing impulses.  Like the Israelites in our first reading, we have a desire, a need in fact, to have a leader.  So they acclaim David as their new king.  King of the Israelites.  And at the same time, we have a desire to throw off authority, huh?  I think of the slogan from the 60s – distrust authority.  I can think and decide for myself, is sometimes our attitude.  I don’t need no leader, I don’t need no king.

And that’s what you and I must decide – will we submit to Christ as King of our lives?  Or will we live a life of “not my king?”

I am confident that we wouldn’t be here this morning if we didn’t believe that He is our King.  Or at least if we didn’t have the desire that He become more and more the King of our lives.  So - what does it look like to show the world that He is our King?

First of all it means following His commandments.  It means submitting to His authority over our lives, submitting to His law. And His law is not burdensome, but a gift to us, for our good, for our happiness.  “If you love me you will keep my commands,” Our Lord tells His disciples, including you and me.

The most important of His commands is, of course to love.  Love God and love neighbor.  We have a stark image of our King in today’s Gospel – a King not robed in splendor and sitting on a throne.  But a King stripped naked, beaten and nailed to a cross.  And why? Out of obedience to His Father and unfathomable love for each of us, for by His suffering, death and resurrection, He has purchased for us the promise of eternal life.  Imagine - what kind of love is that, that surrenders His life for you and for me?

And so you and I, who are called by our baptism to build His Kingdom, who are anointed at our baptisms as “priest, prophet and king,” must follow in His footsteps.  To serve Jesus Christ as King of our hearts means to surrender our entire lives to Him and serve Him.  So that by our “yes” to Him, you and I, united in His Holy Spirit, may build His kingdom, here and now.  Exhibit His love in our sad, broken and divided world.  Be His healing and peace in a world of conflict.

Wherever Christians are living His love in service, there is His Kingdom.  All around us, in our own parish and community, we are living signs of His Kingdom.  Giving food to the hungry in our food drives.  Serving unwed moms at Bethany House.  Comforting the grieving through our funeral ministry.  Caring for the dying at the Sunset House hospice. Giving transport to the elderly through Good Samaritan Transportation, and I could go on. There is the Kingdom, and there are committed Christians giving witness to Christ as King of their lives.

So the question to ask ourselves as we go through this week…as we go into the Advent Season and prepare to celebrate once again the birth of the infant King in a cold stable…and as we take time to examine our lives, is this:  what does the billboard of my life say?  By my sin, by my turning away from Him, by my lifestyle, my priorities, my living only for myself, my conformity to this world, am I carrying a sign that says “not my King?”

Or by my obedience, my faithfulness, and by my loving service do I joyfully proclaim to the world around me – Jesus Christ, my Lord, my King, my God?

Homily - 33rd Week in Ordinary Time, Cycle C - November 12/13 St Kateri

Mass Readings for Today:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/111316.cfm

A few weeks ago my wife and I were visiting in the home of man and his wife, the man applying to become a deacon  In their living room they have a beautiful painting of the Blessed Mother Mary. She is a very young woman in this painting, sitting with the scriptures open before her, and she’s staring not quite into the viewer’s eyes, sort of off into the distance.

The man told me the painting is called the Annunciation, and portrays a teenage Mary at that moment, the scriptures representing the prophecies about to be realized in her “yes.”  In the painting her hand is raised in such a way so as to signify her acceptance. The painting, he told me, is a hand-painted copy of the original, painted about 500 years ago, which survives in a city in Southern Italy.

He showed me a picture of the original, and I remarked that the look on Mary’s face is different in their copy, that in the original Mary has a look of peace, almost a smile, as she looks off into the future.  Perhaps considering the joy her Offspring will bring, the salvation He will bring.

But in their hand-painted copy, the artist gave Mary a more somber, more foreboding look even.  As if at that moment the Blessed Virgin could see into the future, see all that would occur, all that would happen to this child she would bear, all the pain He, and she, would have to endure. As if she could see at that moment the way in which He would bring about our salvation.

That wistful look of Mary came to mind as I was pondering this Gospel.  Jesus is, like that painting of His Blessed Mother, looking far into the future, prophesying.  What’s it going to be like?  For Himself, and for those who claimed to be His disciples?

And a difficult path ahead – is what He foretells.  We’re approaching the end of Luke’s Gospel, just before Our Blessed Lord’s passion, death and resurrection.  Jesus is prophesying - looking into the future, first of all His own future – He sees the persecution He will endure, how He will appear before “kings and governors,” how the temple of His own body will be destroyed.

And, brothers and sisters, He’s looking into our future as well.  Foretelling that the life of His disciples, including you and me, will not be easy.  Some say we humans tend to be pessimists, that we’re always on guard against every threat against us, that we’re always seeing the worst coming. 

But I think we usually think the opposite, that we tend to see good things, rosy things in our future.  I mean, what new mother has a look of foreboding on her face as she looks upon her infant?

But we know from experience that life isn’t always good and rosy. Every year makes this more and more apparent. Who hasn’t experienced the anxiety and suffering of illness, our own, or our loved ones?  Or the pain of broken relationships.  The crushing fear of loss of work.  The grief of the loss of loved ones.  We can honestly pray with the psalmist “Our span is seventy years, eighty for those who are strong.  And most of these are emptiness and pain. They pass swiftly and we are gone. Give us joy, O Lord, to balance our affliction.”

Similarly, Our Lord is telling us in this Gospel – the life of faith aint gonna be easy.  Not if you’re going to be my disciple.  You will face ridicule, persecution, and even hatred, all because of your belief in me.  That prophecy has been found to be true all throughout the history of the Church, and isn’t it becoming more the case today, huh?

And in this future of chaos He’s describing, Our Lord is also promising a future of conflict, of spiritual battle.  The forces of evil against those of good.  The prophet Malachi speaks of that coming battle, and the final judgment, where the proud and evildoers will finally be burned up, but those who fear His name will be raised up.

So what’s the message for you and me in these readings, as we approach the end time, the second last Sunday of our Church year?  I think it’s found in the second reading from St. Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians.  Be in this world, but not of this world, he seems to be telling us.  Follow our good example, Paul says, work quietly, peacefully, and most importantly, in unity.  Don’t let the concerns of this world divide us one against the other. 

And in the spiritual battles that rage around us, the battles that rage within us, cling to Him, Our Blessed Lord.  Our Lord promises us in this Gospel that if we persevere, if we remain faithful to Him, faithful to the end, we have nothing to fear.  “Do not be afraid,” He is telling us.  For by our perseverance, by our faithfulness, we will “secure our lives” – we will achieve the everlasting peace and joy that He has won for us by His cross and resurrection.

[For He is the rock to which we must cling in the storms of this life.  Nourished here by His Sacraments, and filled with His Holy Spirit, we have His promise that He will always remain with us and that His Holy Spirit is always with us to help us remain in Him.  Do not be afraid.  I am with you to the end of time.]

[For He is the rock to which we must cling in the storms of this life.  In a moment we will welcome little Eleanor Justine to the Church, welcome her as a disciple of Jesus Christ.  To a life of discipleship that we know won’t be easy.  But guided by your example of faithfulness, Chris and Laura, and nourished by the Sacraments, beginning today, she inherits the promise our Lord gives to all of us, that He will always remain with us and that His Holy Spirit is always with us to help us remain in Him.]

Now one other thought - two homilies for the price of one this week.

As we approach the end of the Church year, we also approach the close of the Jubilee year of mercy.  All around the world, in every diocese, the Holy Door of mercy will soon be closing.  Which to me is kind of a ridiculous concept because Christ’s mercy is never closed, never ends.  But this is a special year, in which we especially celebrate His never-ending mercy, in which we especially heed His call to repentance of our sins.

If we haven’t yet availed ourselves of the special sacrament of mercy, the Sacrament of Reconciliation, during this Holy Year of Mercy, there is still time to do so.  There is still time to receive His particular graces during this time, to hear His call to conversion and turn away from our sin, and receive the magnificent grace of being washed clean of our sin.  What a wondrous way to pick ourselves up, start over, and live each day ever so much closer to Him, Our Blessed Lord, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Homily - Solemnity of All Saints, November 1, 2016 - 7p St.Kateri at St. Margaret Mary

Today's Readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/110116.cfm

I haven’t had dinner yet, so I’ll make this quick.

My day job is in downtown Buffalo, and in the evening as I drive home from Buffalo, it’s hard to miss the giant Powerball billboard just north of I-190.  They keep that billboard updated every day with the current Powerball jackpot.  $198 million, it said last evening.  198 million dollars if you pony up for a ticket and you’re the only one with the winning combination of numbers. 

Now of course you don’t get that much.  If you take it in a lump sum, you forego about a third, and you’re down to $130 million.  Then there are state and federal taxes, which will take almost half of it, leaving you with a paltry $71 and a half million.  Hardly enough to live on!

But can you imagine the good fortune, the incredible luck, of winning that much money?  What would you do with it?

This is what came to mind as I was thinking on the meaning of this solemnity, this feast.  For as much money as 71-and-a-half million dollars is, those women and men who have gone before us and whom we celebrate as saints in heaven have won a prize far greater, far more valuable than any Powerball jackpot, huh?  They’ve won the crown of eternal life, eternal peace, eternal joy, eternal love in the presence of God, standing before the throne of God, gazing on the face of God!

We gather this evening to celebrate their incredible good fortune, to celebrate the lives they’ve led, the example they are to us in the struggles of our lives, the help they provide us by their intercession in our struggles.

But we’re tempted, aren’t we, to think of this day as a feast for them, for those really good people, incredibly better people!  Indeed, we do celebrate today the named saints, those great women and men whose holiness, and courage, and faithfulness have been formally recognized by Holy Mother Church. 

But we also celebrate the host of unnamed men and women who’ve lived quiet lives of holiness, selflessness, and faithfulness to the end, those who’ve died in Christ and now live with Him.  We can be confident that many of the people we knew, who’ve gone before us, are counted among the saints.

But this Feast is not only for them. I think the message for this day is that you and I, brothers and sisters, <pause> are called to join them.  You, and I, are called to be saints.  In fact, if you think about it, that’s really the only thing worth living for.  You. Me. Saints.

Now most people would scoff at such a notion.  Me, a saint?  You’re joking.  You don’t know me very well, do you? You have no idea what I’ve done, all the things I wish I could do over, all the mistakes I’ve made, the sins I’ve committed.

But here’s the thing – with the exception of Saint Mary, the Blessed Virgin Mother of God, every single one of the saints we celebrate today - was a sinner.  Not all were horrific sinners, but some of them terrible sinners.  Thieves.  Adulterers and prostitutes. Murderers, even.

But every saint has one thing in common – each accepted the salvation freely offered by Our Blessed Lord, by His cross and resurrection, by the Blood of the Lamb, and each became a new person.  A new creation as St. Paul, himself a great sinner, wrote.  Saint Augustine, a renowned sinner who is now honored as one of our greatest saints, once said “there is no saint without a past, and no sinner without a future.”

Some, like Paul and Augustine, had dramatic conversion stories, but most a lifelong process of surrender, of turning from sin, seeking His forgiveness, letting Him take possession of their hearts. Living lives of ever-increasing faithfulness. And letting Christ work His amazing work through them.

So the message I hope you’ll take home and take to heart is this – you, and I – each of us – should embrace our call to be saints.  In the words of EWTN host Patrick Coffin:  “Be a saint. What else is there?”

And unlike Powerball, where the odds of winning are about one in 292 million, becoming a saint, something infinitely more valuable and eternally more lasting, is being offered to us as a gift.  If only we accept the gift, repent of our sins, and surrender our lives to Him so that He can work His grace, and mercy, His beatitudes through us. 

Then we have His assurance, His promise, Him who died to save us, that He will cleanse us and gather us on the last day and present us as His pure and spotless gift to His Father. To live forever in the joyful embrace of God, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.