Here's my homily for this weekend. As always, comments, questions, and more are always welcome!
Resp. Psalm: Ps. 113:1-2, 4-6, 7-8
2nd Reading: 1st Timothy 2:1-8
Gospel: Luke 16:1-13 (OR Luke 16:10-13 {short version})
Location: Basilica of Saint Francis
Xavier (Dyersville, IA) – 5 p.m. Sat., 8:30 & 10:30 a.m. Sun.
Date: Sunday September 22nd,
2013 (25th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C; women’s CRHP retreat)
READINGS:
1st Reading: Amos 8:4-7Resp. Psalm: Ps. 113:1-2, 4-6, 7-8
2nd Reading: 1st Timothy 2:1-8
Gospel: Luke 16:1-13 (OR Luke 16:10-13 {short version})
FOCUS: Conversion of mind and hearts
leads to honest stewardship of God’s gifts.
FUNCTION: Examine your life; reprioritize
if necessary; grow in the grace of conversion.
I’m
convinced that life has become far too busy. One article I read on our working habits here
in America mentioned this – “Not only are
Americans working longer hours than at any time since statistics have been
kept, but now they are also working longer than anyone else in the
industrialized world. And while workers in other countries have been seeing
their hours cut back by legislation focused on preventing work from infringing
on private life, Americans have been going in the other direction. (…) Road
rage, workplace shootings, the rising number of children placed in day care and
the increasing demand on schools to provide after-school activities to occupy
children whose parents are too busy have all been pointed to as evidence that
Americans are overstressed and overworked.”
Some
of this can’t be helped; but something needs to change if we’re actually going
to live healthy, happy, and holy lives. If
we keep rushing around at the break-neck pace we’re going, we’re either going
to burn out or die trying to keep up; we end up living to work rather than
working to live. All this constant busy-ness
is not good for us spiritually, physically, emotionally, or intellectually. When we’re overworked and overstressed, we’re
deprived of peace and we begin to lose perspective; life begins to feel more like
a vicious cycle of things to do rather than an adventure to be embraced; constant
work makes us more like robots and less like human beings, when all we really
want to do is live life to the full without having to constantly worry about
having money to pay the bills. We need
to keep things in proper perspective.
Jesus
tried to provide us with that much-needed perspective in this weekend’s Gospel –
“No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other,
or be devoted to one and despise the other.
You cannot serve both God and mammon.” And yet this is exactly what many of us are
trying to do. We’re constantly trying to
serve two masters – on the one hand, here we are in Church, seeking to be in relationship
with God; and on the other hand, we serve whatever “idol god” appeals to us
most: maybe it’s drinking, or sports, or our social lives, or achievement, or popularity,
or entertainment, or….whatever. We’re
all idolaters – we’re all worshipping something else other than God. We’re all guilty of violating the first of
the Ten Commandments – “I am the Lord
your God; you shall have no other gods before Me.” And why did God ever give us such a
commandment? Because He created us; because
He knows that we creatures can only find our fulfillment in God the Creator.
We
need conversion – and I say this pointing to myself first of all. I need conversion. I need to know and firmly believe that only
God will satisfy me, and that I can’t be satisfied by anything or anyone else;
the weight of the human desire for happiness is so profound that nothing in this
world can satisfy it except for God alone.
In the famous words of St. Augustine, “Our hearts are restless, O Lord, until they rest in You.” When we begin to believe those words, then we
start living as we should; then we regain some of the perspective that we so
often lose when we get entangled in worldly pursuits.
God
wants your heart – are you willing to give it to Him? God wants to give you true fulfillment and
peace – are you willing to receive? We
need the grace of interior, spiritual conversion; only when God is at the
center of our lives will we be at peace and know true happiness; only then will
we start achieving our true potential for greatness; only then will we become
the kind of person that God wants us to be – the kind of person who can make a
difference in the world.
This
life we live is a gift; God didn’t have to create us – but He did so out of
sheer goodness. The very first paragraph
of the Catechism tells us the meaning of our lives – “God, infinitely perfect and blessed in himself, in a plan of sheer
goodness freely created man to make him share in his own blessed life. For this reason, at every time and in every
place, God draws close to man. He calls
man to seek him, to know him, to love him with all his strength. He calls together all men, scattered and
divided by sin, into the unity of his family, the Church. To accomplish this, when the fullness of time
had come, God sent his Son as Redeemer and Savior. In his Son and through him, he invites men to
become, in the Holy Spirit, his adopted children and thus heirs of his blessed
life,” (CCC, no. 1).
How’s
that for perspective?! That’s why we
exist! That paragraph from the Catechism
tells us the very purpose of our lives. It’s
not about work; it’s not about drinking and pleasure; it’s not about sports, or
our social lives, or achievement, or popularity, or entertainment, or anything
else. We exist to know, love, and serve
God in this life, so that we might enjoy eternity with Him in the next; that’s
the purpose of our lives. Are we living
as good stewards of God’s many blessings?
Are we living with an eye on the prize?
Or have we gotten distracted by the busy-ness of life around us?
Every
once in a while, we all need to step back and evaluate what we’re doing and how
we’re living so that what we’re doing and how we’re living don’t simply become
matters of routine but ways for us to live full and healthy lives. Conversion of mind and heart – which happens
when we realize God is our goal – helps us live as good stewards of God’s many
blessings.
This
weekend, women from our cluster parishes have gathered together for their
Christ Renews His Parish weekend retreat; they’ve realized the importance of stepping
back and taking time to focus on their relationship with God so that they can
live life to the full; they don’t have the answers, but they know the
questions; and those questions will lead them to the only answer any of us need
to hear: Jesus. Knowing Him is the task
of our lives; so how are we going to make that happen? Examine what consumes your thoughts; reprioritize
what’s important in your life; and ask God to help keep you focused on Him. And then peace and fulfillment will be yours,
along with the whole kingdom of heaven.
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