2nd Sunday of Easter - God's Great Love and Mercy

 It's quite late, but here's my homily for Divine Mercy Sunday.  Comments are always welcome.  God bless you!

Location: Basilica of Saint Francis Xavier (Dyersville, IA) – 5 p.m. Sat., 8:30 & 10:30 a.m. Sun.

Date: Sunday April 27^th, 2014 (2^nd Sunday of Easter, Year A – aka Divine Mercy Sunday)

READINGS:

1^st Reading: Acts 2:42-47

Resp. Psalm: Ps. 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24

2^nd Reading: 1 Peter 1:3-9

Gospel: John 20:19-31

FOCUS: God’s great love and mercy makes everything we’re celebrating this weekend possible. 

FUNCTION: Have recourse to the sacrament of mercy when you fall into sin. 

          There is a lot happening today – we observe today as Divine Mercy Sunday; Beckman has prom (tonight); we are celebrating First Holy Communion for our 2^nd graders; and this weekend Pope Francis will also canonize two modern popes: Blessed John Paul II and Blessed John XXIII.  We have a lot to celebrate.

          But how do they all connect?  It’s all about God’s great love and mercy.  That’s why a school like Beckman Catholic exists which enables students to go to Prom; that’s why Jesus gave Himself to us as the Bread of Life and the Chalice of salvation in Holy Communion at the Last Supper; that’s why we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday and the revelation of merciful love by Jesus to St. Faustina; and that’s why two Popes were inspired to live a life of heroic virtue and holiness.  God’s great love and mercy is the reason we’re here today.

          First of all, God’s great love – it was love that led God to create humanity; and after humanity’s fall from grace, it was love that led God to give humanity a Savior in the person of His only Son, Jesus our Lord; it was love that led Jesus to suffer and die on the cross and be raised to life again on the third day; and it was love that led Jesus to form the Church and send that Church forth to proclaim the good news of the Gospel and the promise of new life in Christ.  Love created us, Love redeems us, and Love sustains us. 

          Secondly, God’s great mercy – because God knew that we could not repay the debt that we would accrue because of our sin, God had mercy on us.  God instructed the Jews in the beginning to offer various sacrifices in atonement for sin; but knowing that the blood of bulls and lambs could never take away sin, God offered a sacrifice that only He could provide – the sacrifice of His only Son.  Jesus suffered and died and rose again so that we might experience the forgiveness of sins and the joy of eternal life; His death on the cross paid the price of our sin.  While He was on earth, He exercised a ministry of mercy; and before He ascended to the Father, He entrusted to His disciples the new ministry of mercy – they were given authority, by the Holy Spirit, to forgive sins and to reconcile people to God and to each other. 

          We see Jesus doing that very thing in today’s Gospel – “…he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.  Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.’”  Jesus gives the authority to forgive sins to His disciples; He Himself had and exercised that authority during His earthly ministry; and after His resurrection, He entrusted His disciples to do the same; this is the biblical origin of the sacrament of reconciliation.  We confess our sins to a priest because Jesus gave the authority to forgive sins to His disciples, who transmitted that same authority to their successors, the Bishops, who likewise shared that authority with their co-workers, the priests.  It all goes back to the words and actions of Jesus Himself. 

          The sacrament of reconciliation is vitally important in today’s world as a source of grace and healing for God’s people; our 2^nd graders celebrated their first reconciliation last year in preparation for receiving their First Holy Communion today; our students at Beckman (and our other area Catholic schools) go to confession at least twice a year in Advent and Lent in order to be prepared to celebrate the solemnities of Christmas and Easter.  The sacrament of penance and reconciliation cleanses us of our sins and helps us experience the grace of Jesus’ sacrificial death on the cross; it is the sacrament of conversion by which we try to turn away from sin and be faithful to the Gospel. 

          Jesus entrusted that great sacrament to the Church so that we might become saints by experiencing spiritual conversion and growth in grace.  Ss. John Paul II and John XXIII weren’t born Saints; they were made Saints by their cooperation with God’s grace; they sought to live a life focused on God, because they knew that only God would satisfy them; and so they continually turned from the many false pleasures and dark allurements of the world and, with God’s help, worked hard to be faithful to the message of the Gospel.  They are Saints because they were faithful, and because they knew Jesus. 

          Today’s Gospel also gives us the story of “doubting Thomas,” who also proved to be an incredible man of faith; after He experienced the risen Lord, He said one of the most remarkable acclamations of faith in the whole New Testament – “My Lord and my God!” 

          And we can have that kind of faith, too, but we have to allow ourselves to believe in more than what we can see and touch.  We believe that Jesus is really and truly present in the sacrament of the Eucharist; but we can only know that by the gift of faith.  To our eyes, it looks like bread and wine.  But when we look at the Eucharist with eyes of faith, we see that it is so much more – it is the very Body and Blood of Jesus, who seeks to reconcile us with God and with each other.  After St. Thomas’ incredible acclamation of faith, Jesus says to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me?  Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”

          That can be us!  But it all starts with recognizing God’s great love and mercy.  God wants to make us Saints.  He wants us to become men and women of heroic virtue and authentic holiness.  How does that happen?

          Jesus shows us – we should live as His disciples and follow where He leads; we should practice what He taught; we should love God with our whole being and love our neighbors as ourselves; we should approach the sacrament of penance and reconciliation whenever we fall into sin; and we should look to the example of the Saints who have gone before us and imitate their faith. 

          May we be strengthened by the intercession of the Church’s new Saints, John Paul II and John XXIII, to live as disciples of Jesus, the Risen Lord.                                    

Good Friday - The Cross = True Love

Location: Saint Joseph Catholic Church (Earlville, IA) – 3 p.m. Good Friday Liturgy

Date: Friday April 18^th, 2014 (Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion)

READINGS:

1^st Reading: Isaiah 52:13-53:12

Resp. Psalm: Ps. 31:2, 6, 12-13, 15-16, 17, 25

2^nd Reading: Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9

Gospel: John 18:1-19:42

FOCUS: Jesus loved us so much that He was willing to suffer to save us and bring us back to God. 

FUNCTION: Be willing to suffer for the sake of Christ; remain always steadfast in your faith. 

          Let’s face it: it’s not popular to be a Catholic.  We’re living in a day and age that is “spiritual, but not religious.”  The wider culture is more open to New Age spirituality than Christianity; any mention of God is stifled in the midst of public discourse; certain groups of people attempted to have the phrase, “under God,” removed from the Pledge of Allegiance; the religious meanings behind the celebrations of Easter, Halloween, and Christmas, for instance, have all been replaced by secular meanings (or no meaning at all); it’s popular to portray Christians in TV, film, and the wider media as insensitive and intolerant; and we’ve all experienced the pressure to conform more to the message of the world rather than the message of the Gospel. 

          Good Friday reminds us that it’s not popular to be Catholic, to be one of the Lord’s disciples.  But we’re not Catholic because we’re trying to be popular; we’re Catholic because of what Christ accomplished for us.  Good Friday reminds us that Christ suffered in order to save us and bring us back to God.

          I’m struck every year by the words of the “Song of the Suffering Servant” from the first reading:  “He was spurned and avoided by people,/ a man of suffering, accustomed to infirmity,/ one of those from whom people hide their faces,/ spurned, and we held him in no esteem./  Yet it was our infirmities that he bore,/ our sufferings that he endured,/ while we thought of him as stricken,/ as one smitten by God and afflicted./  But he was pierced for our offenses,/ crushed for our sins;/ upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole,/ by his stripes we were healed./  We had all gone astray like sheep,/ each following his own way;/ but the LORD laid upon him/ the guilt of us all.”

          Sometimes we take the cross and Jesus’ passion for granted.  Sometimes we think of Jesus as so divine that we forget about His true humanity – how He felt every one of the lashes when He was scourged; how He felt the pain of the crown of thorns as the thorns pierced His flesh and were pushed into His skull; how the rocks along the way of the cross felt under His feet; how it felt to have large nails driven into His hands and feet.  Sometimes we forget these things.  Sometimes we forget that our salvation came with a price – the sacrifice of the Lord’s Body and Blood, offered up for us first in the institution of the Eucharist on Holy Thursday and then on the cross on Good Friday.

          Good Friday is supposed to inspire us to love the Lord with our whole heart, mind, and soul, and to love our neighbor as ourselves; the Lord willingly gave up His life for each of us.  Each of us is known and loved by God.  Jesus was willing to submit to the suffering of the cross for the sake of our salvation, because He loved us with an undying love. 

          True love must always hurt, it must always cost something, and it must always push us outside ourselves.  The cross that we celebrate today is God’s most profound declaration of love.  He did no spare His only Son, but gave Him up to death for our sake.  So what can we do in response to so great a love?  We can live our faith; we can share our faith with those who do not yet know the Lord; and we can be willing to suffer for the sake of our faith when believing in Christ makes us unpopular.  May our celebration of Good Friday inspire us to love God and to love others more generously each day.                  

The Longing for a Savior - Christmas 2013

Location: St. Joseph Catholic Church (Earlville, IA) – 4 p.m. Saturday – Christmas vigil

                  Basilica of Saint Francis Xavier (Dyersville, IA) – 12 a.m. (Midnight) & 10:30 a.m.

Date: Wednesday December 25^th (Solemnity of the Nativity of the Lord; “Mass during the Night”)

 

READINGS:

1^st Reading: Isaiah 9:1-6

Resp. Psalm: Ps. 96:1-2, 2-3, 11-12, 13

2^nd Reading: Titus 2:11-14

Gospel: Luke 2:1-14

 

FOCUS: The birth of Jesus is good news; it brings with it the promise of a new life.  

FUNCTION: Come regularly to Sunday Mass; live in relationship with the Lord.  

 

          An ancient promise. An unexpected and unusual pregnancy. A long journey. An anxious young couple.  A strange and unique place for birth.  An angel from heaven announcing good news.  A choir of angels singing praise to God.

          This is the stuff of Christmas.  It’s all part of the story commonly called, “The greatest story ever told.”  But for all of us here today (tonight), it’s more than just a story – it’s the truth of our Christian faith.  We don’t gather every year to celebrate a fairy tale like Peter Pan or Cinderella or Alice in Wonderland or any other such story; what we celebrate today (tonight) isn’t the stuff of children’s bedtime stories – it’s the stuff of history.  Today we celebrate the fulfillment of God’s plan to send us a savior.

          The longing for a savior is written on our hearts; it takes on many variations in pop culture, but it’s the same desire – the desire for someone to come and be the hero we need, the hero who will save us from our wickedness, the hero who will conquer darkness and bring forth the light of victory.  Think about the popular versions of the story of a savior – maybe it’s Maximus from the movie, Gladiator, or William Wallace from the movie, Braveheart, or Neo from the Matrix trilogy, or comic book heroes like Superman, Batman, or Wonder Woman; I’d argue that all these characters are a product of the human desire for a savior.  These people represent a desire for a special, “anointed” person – a hero who will pull us back from the brink of destruction, restore order, and establish peace.  We love these stories because they fill us with hope and they help us believe that good can conquer evil, that light can gain the victory over darkness.  

          And we have this desire because, deep down, we all know we need a savior; when we look around us, it’s easy to see that we’re living in a fallen, sinful world, and that’s why war, hatred, violence, disease, racism, bigotry, and death all exist in our world – we’re surrounded by imperfection because we’re living in an imperfect world, a world in need of a savior.  And when we take a good, hard look at our hearts, we realize that we, too, are capable of great evil – many of the things I just mentioned exist because of our capacity for evil.  We are capable of committing terrible atrocities like the WWII Jewish Holocaust, or the 9-11-01 terrorist attacks, or the WWII bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or any of the other awful things we might see on the evening news.  Deep down, we all know we need a savior. 

         

          And the good news of Christmas is this: God has sent us a Savior, and His name is Jesus Christ.  Christ is a title that literally means, “Anointed One,” and Jesus is the “anointed one” sent to us from God above to save us from our sins.  Consider the angel’s words said to the shepherds from the Gospel we just heard – “Do not be afraid; for behold, I proclaim to you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  For today in the city of David a Savior has been for you who is Christ and Lord.  And this will be a sign for you: you will find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger.” 

          And we need to understand that the child Jesus is not simply one savior among others, because no other “savior” has ever been identified as the Lord, the maker of the heavens and the earth.  God didn’t just send us a savior; God Himself became our savior by becoming a human being in the womb of the Virgin Mary.  He chose to take on our humanity that He might save us not from the “outside-in” but from the “inside-out” – He took on our heart in order to transform our heart; He took on our eyes in order to transform our eyes; He took on our hands in order to transform our hands; He took on everything about us (except sin) in order to transform us from within; anything less would have been like putting a Band-Aid on a mortal wound.  Jesus, our Savior, is one of us, but He is also the best of us, because not only is He the Son of Man, He is also the Son of God.

          The first reading said, “For a child is born to us, a son is given us; upon His shoulders dominion rests.  They name Him Wonder-Counselor, God-Hero, Father-Forever, Prince of Peace.”  Jesus is the fulfillment of that ancient prophecy – He is the child lying in the manger, the newborn King, the infant Savior of the world. 

 

          It is Jesus – only Jesus, always Jesus; He was born in a crib for us so that He might one day carry a cross for us; He was born in a manger where animals feed so that He might one day feed us with His Body and Blood; He was born an infant so that He might grow up and show us what it means to be a man; and He was named Jesus (which means “The Lord saves”) so that He might be our Savior.

 

          Dear friends, Christmas is good news for us – the Savior we desire has been sent to us by God; He is Jesus of Nazareth; and He was born in a lowly stable more than 2,000 years ago because God loved the world so much that He didn’t want to see us die because of sin, but wanted to give us eternal life in His kingdom.  This is the good news of Christmas – God has not abandoned us or forsaken us; He has loved us so much that He sent us His only Son to be our Savior. 

          This is the real meaning of Christmas.  The infant child – Jesus of Nazareth, the babe lying in the manger – is God’s greatest gift to us; we give good gifts to others because God gave His best gift to us.

 

          How might we respond?  Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was born among us and became a man so that we might become more like God.  What can we offer Him in thanksgiving?  What gift can we give to God, who gave His Son to us?  The best gift we can give is our very life; only our heart and soul, which He created, is a fitting gift back to the Creator of the heavens and the earth.

        This Christmas, if you’ve been away from Church and from God for a while, we’d like to invite you to come back – come and worship with us on Sundays; come and listen to His word speaking to your heart; come and find new hope in the midst of the craziness of life; come and discover God’s gift of peace by forming a relationship with the Prince of Peace, born for us this Christmas.