I
was on my way to work this week, listening to Catholic radio as I’m wont to do,
and heard a fundraising promotional spot which I hadn’t heard before. It was a tape of the Chili fire department
radio, middle of the night, January 1, two years ago. It was only a snippet I heard on the radio, but I found the
complete radio call on youtube. Went
like this –
Beep-beep. Company number 3 – automatic alarm
activated…St. Pius Tenth Church, thirty-ten Chili Avenue, Box 3604. 4332 responding. 4332 be advised we’re getting additional
alarms from the alarm company – front foyer, east smoke, front office, north
smoke, south and west – smoke. 4332? Go ahead.
Firefighter on location reporting heavy fire in the building – St Pius
the Tenth Church thirty-ten Chili Avenue. Got
heavy fire from the church. 4332 on
location – we have water. 32 on location
– they have water. 4332 has command in
front of the building and he has a fully-involved structure.
If
you’re a fire-fighter with one of our local companies – Ridge Culver, Sea
Breeze, Point Pleasant, Laurelton, St. Paul perhaps – you might find that kind
of interesting, and you’d certainly appreciate those who get up in the middle
of the night to risk their lives to go put out a fire. For doing that, for making yourselves
available like that, let me say “thank you!”
But
why did I listen to that and repeat it today?
Well what really caught my ear when I first heard that this week were a
couple of lines – “got heavy fire from the church” and “he has a fully-involved
structure.” Got heavy fire from the church. Fully-involved structure.
And
I said to myself, isn’t that sort of our goal?
I mean, we don’t want to see our church buildings literally on
fire. But isn’t it our goal as a parish
to be on fire as a church, to have a fully involved church?
These
readings today seem to me to have one thing in common – a calling to action, a
calling to apostleship, a calling to action.
And, it seems to me that our call is to be fully involved, fully on
fire.
It
is too little, the Lord says to the prophet Isaiah, to be His servant. Rather, the Lord says “I will make you a
light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.”
The psalmist
responds “Here am I, Lord, I come to do your will.”
And
the beginning of his first letter to the people of Corinth, St. Paul writes to
a people “who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be holy,
with all those everywhere who call upon the name of the lord Jesus Christ,
their Lord and ours.”
And
we heard two callings in this evening’s (morning’s) Gospel – the calling of
John to baptize with water and testify that Jesus is the Son of God – and the
calling of Jesus, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.
For
us who testify that we are His disciples, we, too are called. It is too little for us, too, to serve Him –
rather you and I – we the Church – are called to be a light to the nations that
His salvation may reach to the ends of the earth. Some, of course, may be called to literally
go forth and be a light to the nations – just yesterday/Friday we buried a
parishioner, a dentist, who without fanfare went on dental missions to a couple
nations in South America, taking vacation time to do much-needed dental work
for the poor in those countries.
But
even if we aren’t called to go to other nations, we certainly are called to be
His light to the ends of our town, from the river in the west, lake in the
north, bay in the east and city in the south.
That is our calling, that is our mission. It is our vocation! It is right there in our statement as a
parish – To invite and welcome people of all ages, backgrounds and walks of
life to embrace and celebrate our vocation – to be Christ to the world.
We
are still at the beginning of a new year – I would encourage everyone to pray
and consider – how can I, how can we, be more fully involved? How is He calling me, right now, to more
fully live out that vocation? What is my
role in building up His Kingdom?
One
idea – volunteer firefighter! We assume
someone will come and come quickly when we make that 911 call. What if there were no “someone” willing to
give of their time, willing to sacrifice and take risks, to come?
Another
idea – hospice worker. Our local
hospice, Sunset House, has had a number of very long time volunteers
retire. Might the Lord be calling you to
bring your talents and big heart to help those in the last days and hours of
life? Just a thought.
Other
ideas – children’s liturgy, Good Samaritan transportation, visiting the
homebound, teaching a faith formation class, and I could go on and on.
Maybe
you’re at a place in your life where you can do no more than pray – but how
important, how vital, is prayer! To use
your time to pray, for the Church, for its ministers, the faithful, that we may
together continue to build His Kingdom right here in Irondequoit – that is a
beautiful and necessary thing!
So
as we begin this new year – we’re only half way through January after all, let
us pray that 2017 may be a year in which we as a parish are fully on fire for
the Lord. And as we behold the Lamb of
God, Who takes away the sins of the world, let us implore Our Blessed Lord to
send His Holy Spirit to us to fan the flames of the fire in our hearts, so that
we may burn ever more brightly, and truly be a light to the nations.
That’s
homily #1. Homily #2, briefly:
One
other way of building the Kingdom and being Christ to the world is through the
CMA. I know you’ve heard a lot of
pitches for the CMA, and hopefully this will be the last for this year. We’re nearly at our goal, 95% at last
count. I urge you, if you haven’t
donated to the CMA, please prayerfully consider doing so.
I
stand here as a beneficiary of the CMA – except for the cost of books, my
entire 4-1/2 years of masters-level education and formation for deacon ordination
was paid by the Diocese out of CMA funds.
For that, I promised to give back my service, without pay, through
retirement, to the diocese and my assigned parish. That is my vocation, that is my calling, and
indeed it is my great joy – to serve Him and His people, and in my own way try
to be a light to the nations. But it was
made possible through generous gifts to the CMA.
So
please, if you haven’t yet given, please consider doing so. Thank you and may God richly bless you.
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