January 25, 2026 at Saint Peter the Apostle and Saint William Churches in Naples, FL

Isaiah 8: 23 to 9: 3 + Psalm 27 + 1 Corinthians 1: 10-13, 17 + Matthew 4: 12-23

Galilee. It is to this day a fertile region of great beauty. In some ways, it is the “breadbasket” of the whole region. It is the place where Matthew has the work of Jesus begin. It is also the place from which the risen Lord departs and where he commissions his disciples. Then, there is Capernaum. It was, before tourists, a small agricultural fishing village. The people there were poor, not necessarily hungry, but because it was productive, it was heavily taxed by the Romans leaving the people bearing the brunt of imperial greed. In short, the people there are oppressed, without any hope of liberation. A kind of darkness and gloom as spread over the place. Yet, it is from this gloomy place of little importance that Jesus seeks disciples.

John is arrested, and Jesus goes home to Galilee, but not for long. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus is on the go all the time, moving from place to place because the message of Jesus is not confined to one place or one person. Over and over again Jesus and the message of the Kingdom will conflict with the authorities both religious and civil. Why else was John put in prison by King Herod? Why else was Jesus a threat to the Roman, Pilate? Matthew would have us see that the kingdom of God with it’s Justice and Peace is not to be spiritualized. It is for this world, and any ideology or person that stands in opposition to the Kingdom of God will be threatened and, if we can believe history and the Gospels, violence will be their defense.

Uncomfortable as it may make all of us feel, spiritualizing the Kingdom of God or believing that it is for some after-life or distant future ignores or denies what John and Jesus both had to say to us. Herod thought he could shut John up by locking him in prison and then killing him. Then Jesus comes along. We should have noticed that his first words repeat what John said word for word. Then he goes even further by revealing what the Kingdom of God must be like with his openness and compassion. Pilate and the religious leaders whose power and privilege were threatened by what Jesus had to say thought they could stop him and shut him up by killing him as had happened to all prophets earlier.

But God will have none of this. Jesus is raised up and goes home once again, but not before he gathers his disciples and sends them out to the whole world not just to proclaim the Kingdom of God, but to bring it to fulfillment by the life and work of the Church. It is real, my friends. The Kingdom of God is at hand, and as disciples of Jesus Christ, we are its heralds and its proof. It cannot be spiritualized as though it has nothing to say to this world today, to governments and civil leaders just as before. This is not imposing some religion on the state. There is nothing sectarian about compassion, kindness, respect, justice, generosity, or the truth.

We have just celebrated the birth of Christ, the Word of God taking flesh. The presence of Jesus Christ to this day is not some “spiritual being” that we cannot see. The Word became Flesh, real flesh, our flesh. It is in us, and through us, and by us that Kingdom of God is to becomes a reality. If there is no mercy, no justice, no lasting peace, no healing forgiveness it is because too many people and sometimes we have allowed that kingdom to become some vague spiritual idea silenced by those who think it is for some distant time in the future. But that is not what Jesus said, and it is not what he meant. The Kingdom of God is at hand.

January 13 2012

Isaiah 42, 1-4,6-7 + Psalm 29 + Acts 10, 34-38 + Luke 3, 15-6, 21-22

The culture and the age in which this event takes place believed that a person’s identity depended completely upon the father. This even carried over into biology. They had no sense or knowledge of genes and chromosomes. They thought that at conception the an entire human being was passed from the father to the mother for her nurturing. In other words a tiny but complete human being smaller than the eye could see was passed from father to mother for a time of nurturing. Then at age twelve, the relationship with the mother was over, and the two men began their relationship. When you understand that cultural/historical fact, then the story of Jesus in the temple begins to make sense as a rite of passage, and this story takes on even greater significance, because here, the Father is claiming his son. By this time, Joseph is our of the picture. The work of the Holy Spirit at the conception of Jesus is now acknowledged and settled. This is the Father’s Son. Notice the words: “The Holy Spirit descended upon him in a bodily form.”  In other words, the Holy Spirit was already there, but now visible, active, and effective. Luke will make an issue of the Holy Spirit again and again throughout this Gospel.

We proclaim this Gospel to confirm who we are, and what has become of us because of our Baptism. We proclaim this gospel to one another because those who share faith and life with us are Spirit Born people made holy by the Spirit that has filled us and burns in our hearts when we are together and recognize the risen Lord at this table. We proclaim this gospel to acknowledge and remember that we are claimed by God as His own no less than God claimed Jesus Christ. For having been baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, we have been, as it were, grafted into Christ and in communion with Him we are God’s own. Because of that, every time we acknowledge the presence of God and pray, we begin In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. When we do that in public, we are signaling to everyone who sees us that we are Baptized. We are God’s own children. We make that sign to draw brothers and sisters who are baptized into prayer with us as God’s claimed and chosen ones.

Young people, hear this. When others look at you and make so bold as to ask if you are saved, or suggest that because you are a Catholic you are not a Christian, get in their face with the Sign of the Cross. It is the fullest witness to your companionship with Christ and fellowship among the Baptized and Saved that God has called His own. If they who question you have any memory at all of their Baptism, they will recognize the sacred formula of that rite for they too were Baptized in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. That is how Jesus commanded us to embrace one another and gather God’s children together.

This world is full of lonely and sad people who do not know or feel claimed by God or by anyone, and this is the surest sign that the work of Jesus Christ is not yet complete. Who is to do it? Who is to claim them, to embrace them, to hold them except God’s own children. This in the end was exactly what Jesus came to do, and it is exactly why we have been privileged and called into this faith.

Once Jesus realized, knew, and understood who he was and what he was as God’s Son, he was free to act with courage, to stand up for the poor, to reach out to sinners, the unpopular, and heal those others feared. Belonging to God frees us all. Once we begin to exercise and live in that freedom, we will have no need to impress others or seek their approval. We will know our gifts and what a difference they will make when we use them for God’s purpose and God’s will.

So today is not just the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord. It is the Feast of our Baptism as well. It is the day when we remember again and remind one another that we are God’s chosen ones. We are claimed by our God. We have a purpose, a mission, and everything we need to accomplish that mission. We have a God/Father who will not ask more than he has given. We have a God/Father who will seek and find us even if we stray. We have same Spirit that moved Jesus Christ into his mission which began as soon as he stepped out of that water. We know how to do it by watching our brother Jesus Christ. We know what it will cost. We also know that nothing can stop that Spirit-driven mission, not even death itself for we are a people who live and pray, play and rejoice always In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

December 7, 2012

Genesis 3, 9-15,20 + Psalm 98 + Ephesians 1,3-6,11-12 + Luke 1, 26-38

This feast is a tough one for us for we live more or less in a world without sin. I have discovered that many people these days have no sin, but they do have “issues.” From my point of view it’s hard to tell the difference. So we bumble along with murder, adultery, abortion, theft, lies, and cheating everywhere. Instead of calling this behavior sin, they just shrug it off and say: “Oh I’ve got some issues.” Despite unparalleled advances in knowledge and technology, human kind has made a mess of things. We don’t know, or don’t care to know how to distribute the abundant food supplies of the world, with the result that many go hungry while others are overfed and die of diabetes. We continuously struggle to keep deadly chemicals out of our water. Terrorism has become a way of life all over the world. War is endemic, and we count ourselves lucky if it is confined to far off places and not affecting us here at home. Many ndividuals find their lives to be without meaning. The most sacred ties between human beings, marriage and family, are looked upon as outdated by some and as the source of heartbreak and ruin for others. Suddenly if you look at the whole picture, you can begin to understand what “Original Sin” really means. This way more than a world with “issues.” So, our rich tradition suggests that just before we celebrate the Feast of our Redemption at Christmas we take a day to reflect upon our need for that redemption by looking again at the possibility that there could be and has been a life without sin.

There is an old joke that you may well have heard that leads us to a very important truth behind this feast. The Pharisees bring the woman before Jesus for judgment and Jesus says, “Let the person who is without sin cast the first stone.” They fell silent, and then, all of a sudden a stone came flying from the crowd. Jesus looks up, surprised and amused, and then says, “Hold it, mother? I am trying to make a point, here.” Sinlessness or “Grace” is a gift. It is not something we can achieve on our own. In my 45 years as a priest, I’ve met a lot of people who think they have earned holiness. They look at holiness and approach it as a personal achievement. The result of that thinking is a holier-than-thou attitude toward others who have not attained their level of holiness. While they may not be murderers or thieves, they become intolerant, angry and judgmental toward those they regard as sinners. People like that would not hesitate to throw the first stone at a sinner caught red-handed, like the woman in our story. They want punishment not mercy. They demand an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. That is not holiness.

This is why the message of the Immaculate Conception, becomes a very important one. It reminds us that Mary’s sinlessness is not something Mary achieved by her own power. It is a gift of God, given to her right from the very moment of her conception. In the same vein, those of us who sin less than some others, should regard their holiness as basically a gift of God and not an achievement. Our attitude should then be characterised by two basic attitudes, thankfulness to God, and humility before those who are naturally and spiritually less gifted than we are. It leaves us standing humble and in awe before a God who have favored us.

The dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary was defined by Pope Pius IX in 1854 means that Mary was not burdened with any separation from God. She came into the world with a perfect human nature like that of Eve and Adam before they sinned and fell from grace. God gave her this perfect human nature not as a reward for anything she did, not on account of any merit on her part, but in view of the singular role she was to play in life, namely, that of being the mother of God’s Son. The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception tells us something about who Mary is. But maybe it tells us more about who God is and who we are in light of God’s providential love.

Belief in the Immaculate Conception of Mary is belief in a provident God, i.e., a God who provides for the future, who prepares His children for their assigned task in life even before they are born, a God who foresees and equips us with all the natural and supernatural qualities we need to play our assigned role in the drama of human salvation. God anoints them already in the womb those men and women whom He created to be His prophets. As He told Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5). God does not just throw us into this world wide wilderness and then leave us to fight it out among ourselves. The theory of evolution with its doctrine of the survival of the fittest may describe human nature in its fallen state, in the state of original sin, it does not describe life for the people of God redeemed by grace from the unbridled effects of the Fall.

As we rejoice with Mary, God’s most favoured one (“full of grace”) on the feast of her conception, let us thank God for His love and mercy which embraces us right from the moment of our own conception. As Scripture says, “For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not?” (1Corinthians 4:7). Everything is gift, everything good in us is God’s grace. For we all, children of God, are also favoured ones and heirs of God’s grace. Yet Mary remains the most favoured one, the mother of all favoured ones, the one that enjoys the fullness of grace.

September 23, 2012

Wis 2:12, 17-20 + Psalm 54 + James 3:16–4:3 + Mark 9:30-37

I am a people watcher. I can sit for hours and watch people coming and going, talking, laughing, reading the paper or their Kedalls. The other day I was having lunch and there was a mother sitting across the restaurant with her child – perhaps a 4 year old. It was a beautiful sight, but I could tell that mom was growing impatient with her son as he played with the silverware, the glass, the plate, the food, and finally with her cell phone which I think she handed to him for fear something was going to end up on the floor. His thumbs were lightening fast! I don’t know what he was doing, but he had not a care in the world. He was worried about nothing, focused on the moment, living in the present. That’s how it is with children, even the one’s I’ve watched down in Haiti who ought to have plenty to worry about. Even in that poverty they just play with whatever they can find leaving the adults to their big schemes of revenge and ambition. I think this is what Jesus was proposing in today’s verses from Mark’s Gospel when he talks about children.

Those apostles have just embarrassed themselves with their easy ambition: their plans about their future. They are not living in the present. They are not focused on where they are, who they are, and they have not been listening to Jesus. They are full of their plans and ambitions. Jealous of one another, they are looking at each other instead of looking at the master. He speaks of what will happen to the “Son of Man”, a title he has just used a few verses earlier for himself. The title means: “One who is living in solidarity with others.” So jealous, so individualized, so isolated from each other, they cannot live in solidarity with the one who has called them to be such a community. It’s all about them, their future, their power, their position in life. Instead of comfort for their friend and master, instead of compassion, or seeking some understanding, they are afraid and say nothing except to continue their arguing. Of course arguing is never about the issue that starts it. It is only about being right. They look at each other with a jealous eye wondering who sits where. In no time at all it’s an argument, and nothing matters after that except winning, being “right” while the other is wrong is all that matters. Where is the solidarity in that?

They are not living in the present. There is no center to their lives. That is what it takes to live in the present: a center. A rock solid core, a focus that allows one to be in the moment, not pulled one way  by a past full of resentment or disappointment, or pulled into the future by cheap ambition or fear. Just a quiet center that can bring an extra ordinary kind of freedom.  This is what Jesus expects of his apostles who are  free, focused, and fearless. As James says in the second reading today, this is a kind of Wisdom that comes from on high. This is the kind of wisdom that is pure, peaceable, gentle, full of mercy and good fruits. For that Wisdom today we must pray. For a solid centered life with Christ as the focus, we should live. For a desire to remain in solidarity with others and therefore in solidarity with the Son of Man, we must yearn.

April 2, 2010

Isaiah 52: 13- 53:12 + Hebrews 4:14-16,5: 7-9 + John 18:1-19:42

Someone once said, and I wish I had thought of it, that a cynic is a person who has given up…….. but not shut up. Isn’t that wonderful? It’s so true! This world is full of cynical people. They are everywhere. They are on radio talk shows. They write acerbic letters to editors. They are talking heads on television. They shout out in congress proclaiming Armageddon, and a few sit in theses pews hopeless and angry, cynical and negative. One great cynic is featured in John’s Gospel. He has given up but does not shut up – hopeless, his cynical exclamation ought to leave us stunned yet challenged, looking and longing, restless and miserable, dissatisfied and searching. In the 38th verse of chapter 18, the cynicism stains the page with bitterness and hopelessness. “Truth,” Pilate sneers, “What is that?”

Caught between Jesus and the leaders of the people he listens trapped between what they said and what he said both insisting that they are telling the truth. How often have we been there; trapped between what one says and what the other says, both insisting that they are telling the truth. We hear it from politicians, and sadly enough, we even hear it in the church. The New York Times says this about the Pope, the Vatican says something else. Fox News says this, and CNN says that.

Democrats say this is the truth, Republicans insist that they know the truth. In the formerly respectful, polite, halls of congress, someone shouts; “Liar” at the elected head of State. It’s the cry of a cynic. The child comes home from school and says the teacher said this, and when questioned, the teacher says, “I did not”, and the battle begins. The boss at work says one thing, and another insists that he said something else. Before long the seeds of hopelessness are sown deeply and begin to spring to life and a cynic is born.

My people, the cynic is without hope. The cynic has given up. Pilate gives up and the Truth gets crucified. In spite of all appearances, this day is about hope, and if this day does not stir hope in the human heart, all is lost, this death we remember today was in vain, and we are left to shout at each other in anger, in fear, and we shall be hopelessly lost forever.

Pilate wants to know what Truth is, and Truth is right in front of him, but it is not an angry shouting mob. We want to know truth, and we live in a world like Pilate’s not knowing who to believe even when we really do know the truth because sometimes recognizing and accepting the truth will require courage or a change in our thinking and behavior. We live in a world in which heads of state lie openly to advance their agenda or to conceal their sins; a world in which attorneys, guardians of the law, advise clients to deny the truth, conceal facts, and lie in order to “get off.”

We live in a world where parents tell their children to lie about why they have not been in school or church, or why the homework isn’t done. We live in a world just like Pilate’s where the good-old-boys hide their friends and their crimes and pass the blame. It’s all a trap into which the hopeless can fall and be lost.

What is to become of this nation?
What is to become of this church?
What is to become of us? If hopelessness and the cry of the cynic has its way?
We have no future, and there will be no Easter.
The faithful believer, the true disciple of Jesus Christ does not look to others to save, to rescue, to

relieve, heal, or calm the storm.
When we are caught and know not which way to go,
When the truth seems impossible to grasp, to find, or to hold on to,
There is only one place to look and that is to Christ Jesus, the one who is the Truth. No one possesses Christ. No one possesses the Truth.
Truth does the possessing.
What we must remember and discover in the telling of this passion story is that looking only at Christ leads us to truth, the truth about ourselves; and looking only to Christ secures our hope when there is every reason to be the cynic.

We do not give up on ourselves, or on each other.
We do not give up on our dreams and hopes
that rest upon the Gospel’s vision of the Kingdom of God.
We do not give up on this church which is founded upon a group of men who fled at the first sign of trouble and one who outright denied knowledge of Christ not once, but three times.
We do not give up on a vision of justice for all
even if securing it is expensive and means some sacrifice of comfort and security.
This day in the face of the cross and standing at the feet of a dead man is about hope believe it or not. If you believe it, there will be something to do tomorrow night in this church.
If you don’t your cynical cry will face a growing shout of Alleluia.

December 27, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Sirach 3: 2-6, 12-14 + Psalm 128 + Colossians 3: 12-21 + Luke 2: 41-52

There are two strong themes that weave their way through the whole of Luke’s Gospel. One is a place the other is a person. This is unique to Luke, and as we now settle into the coming year with Luke’s Gospel, these themes stand out clearly in today’s verses and prepare us for more to come.

The place is the Temple. This place is prominent. It only takes Luke 8 verses in the first chapter to bring us to the temple. That is where Zechariah is conducting his rituals when he experiences the presence of God. After the story of the birth of Jesus, the next thing we hear is that Jesus is being brought to the Temple to be presented to the Lord. It is there that the ultimate theme of Luke’s Gospel begins to unfold: The Holy Spirit. Chapters 9 through 19 form a journey narrative we shall explore this coming summer, and the whole purpose of the journey is to get to the Temple. Luke’s Gospel ends where it begins: in the Temple. It is the first meeting place of the disciples after Pentecost, and there Peter works his first miracle.

So today’s Gospel is not an isolated story. We must hear it and listen to it in the context of the whole Gospel. Our imaginations must be inspired by this Gospel so that the Holy Spirit may lead and teach us when we gather together here. It is Luke’s Gospel that tells that the veil of the Temple was torn in two at the death of Jesus. Imagine that veil which separated the Holy of Holies, the Divine dwelling, from the human side being taken down, torn away so that the Divine plan which begins with the child Jesus could be fulfilled in the union between us and the Holy One. In Jesus a new Temple has come: a new place to meet, to encounter, and to discover the presence of God. In fact, the old one can be torn down for after three days, the new temple will rise.

The action in today’s verses is in the Temple. The first clue to the identity of Jesus is given to us in the Temple. Do not be led by popular misunderstandings to believe that Jesus is teaching the teachers. It never says that. The astonishment of the rabbis in the Temple is simply a preview of the astonishment others will have at the authority of his teaching when be begins to teach in the Synagogues. The disciple who learns from Jesus is not those teachers in the Temple. It is the other figure; the other person so important in Luke’s Gospel.

Here we get the other theme of Luke’s Gospel, the person. It is his mother. She is constantly emerging in Luke’s Gospel as the ultimate disciple. With her, and through her, Luke will put before us the model disciple. She will show us how to be a faithful disciple, and today, Luke tells how a disciple takes in what Jesus teaches.

She is the ideal believer.

Augustine said that Mary conceived Christ first in her heart before she conceived Christ in her womb. In her response to the Angel, she set in motion the Divine plan for us all. “Let it be done to me according to your will.” is the heart of the prayer her Son will teach his disciples: “Thy Will be done.” She hears God’s word, holds it fast in an honest and good heart and brings forth fruit with patience. This is what it means to be a disciple of Jesus. She listens, and ponders. When she does not understand, she takes in the word and rather than refuse what she may not understand, she waits, ponders, listens, and remains open.

We are almost left to wonder who it is that is lost in this story. It does not seem to be Jesus. He knew where he was and was beginning to discover who he was. He was finding his identity as a child of God, a Jewish man who kept and lived his faith. He was finding that in the Temple and in the Prophets and the Law. This was not a discovery that made him proud or led him to think he was special or excused from all the experiences of life. In fact, it made him humble; humble enough to go to Nazareth and be obedient to Mary and Joseph. He was not lost. It seems to me that Mary and Joseph are the ones who were lost, and so they do the seeking. Pay attention to where the lost go: to the Temple and to Jesus. Seems like good a good plan. The Boy Scouts taught me that when I was lost I should stand still and stay put. This Gospel suggests that when lost we should head for the Temple and for Jesus.

There are many times in my life when I feel lost, and I look out from here and into your lives, and recognize that I am not the only one lost. We come to this place to seek out the wisdom, the Spirit, the Word and the plan of God for us. This place is both our Temple and our Nazareth. This is the place where we can grow in wisdom and grace and find favor. The good disciple may not always understand. Sometimes there is anxiety like that of Mary and Joseph. Sometimes what we find is not always what we are looking for, not always perfectly clear to us, but we can learn from Mary how to make that work.

What she teaches she learns from her son: discernment follows commitment. Understanding God’s will only comes from doing it. You first will and decide to be obedient to God, and then you will understand God’s plan. It is not the other way around. We can never understand God’s plan until we have become obedient. Jesus never understood or knew what the Will of his Father was until he became obedient and surrendered to it. Mary had already done that before she conceived him. We must learn from this wise, prudent, faithful, and perfect disciple.

May 17, 2009 at Saint Mark in Norman, OK

Acts of the Apostles 10:25-26 + Psalm 98 + 1 John 4, 7-10 + John 15: 9-17

Worse than a pandemic of flu and more harmful even than HIV or AIDS is another illness spreading through the human community in our time. It is wearing away at human relationships and isolating people. It reveals a profound truth that this Gospel addresses today. The sickness spreading among us is internet porn, and no one is safe from it. Addiction to it begins like any chemical addiction: first simply through curiosity and then before you know it (and that’s the important part: BEFORE) a little is not enough. It has invaded the finest homes and is a secret that worms its way into lives and hearts. With shame and confusion, it leaves helpless those who are trapped by its lure. In the end it is an epidemic of loneliness and self-doubt: a painful condition medicated away wrongly by a cyber person who will never reject us and is available on demand at the click of a mouse. Usually, some cyber face better looking than anyone we would risk meeting in real life appears all because we fear that they would take a second look at us in real life.

It’s all about desire: the desire for another person.  That desire is buried deep in our bones, and this desire is different from other desires. We desire chocolate or peanut butter cups, some new gadget, or clothing. We desire success and money – but these desires are for our sake. The desire for another person at its best is when we desire them for their sake not as a possession but as a partner. We desire them for what we can give them, do for them, and provide for them; not for what they can do for us like money and success, or chocolate. There is something different here.

But that’s not all; we also find a desire that they desire us. Our desiring makes them valuable. Their desire makes us valuable. Here is where today’s Gospel begins to speak to us. It is a Gospel full of love. Jesus wants to be loved revealing God’s desire to be loved. We want to be loved ultimately unfolding our desire for God. I believe that the essence of being human is the desire to be desired by the one we desire.

The words Jesus will speak in today’s Gospel are the last he will speak before he makes his way to the cross. They are the last words of the Gospel we shall hear before we celebrate the Ascension. Now we know why Jesus has come among us, and now we know what His father wants to say to us. “Remain in me!” He says. “Remain in my love.” This is divine desire for us on the lips of Jesus. The desires that stir in us all spring from the depth of our humanity, and no matter what they are on the surface, it is always and ultimately our desire for the one who desires us. The essence of being human is the desire to be desired by the one we desire.

Everyone one of us knows that even when a desire is satisfied, it is less than perfect. If that taste of a piece of chocolate was perfect, we would never reach for the second piece. If some other person was perfect in desire with us, it would never wane or get distracted. If some other person was perfect, we would never look at another, Yet the truth is, no one can ever meet our needs, match our wants or complete our desires. We always desire more. Intellectually we understand this through our spiritual tradition; but somehow, we fail to integrate that understanding into our experience.

In other words, we know that the root of our desire is for God, and we understand the revelation of scripture that God desires, loves, and cares for us; but we split our love into two compartments. We elevate love of God and spiritualize it, and in effect, we de-humanize God’s love, and this is a problem.

We have to keep our love on a single level. We have to understand that our desire for piece of pie or four scoops of ice cream is part of our desire for God, and that our desire for peace is a desire for divine shalom; that our desire for another person is a participation in our desire for God. Every desire leads to God if it is a good desire. Each of us is a living throbbing desire to be desired by the God we desire.

That God is not found on a computer screen or a chat room. All we find there is ourselves.

That’s the difference between a cyber relationship and a marriage covenant. In fact, it is what make marriage a covenant and sacrament, because in that sacred relationship the desire for God is ordered into a desire for another who desires us. It is the same with a Eucharistic community. Our hunger for God finds its expression in our hunger to be here together. God’s hunger for us finds its expression in God’s desire to feed us with this sacrament.

And so that God speaks to us today with desire and longing that is not just spiritual. It is real, human, powerful, and healing. “Remain in me.” It echoes the plea of those disciples on their way to Emmaus: “Stay with us.” It is the cry of the church a week before the Ascension of Jesus. “Do not leave us.” It is the cry of God in the human heart: “Do not leave me.” It is the cry of the church to its young people; “Do not leave us.” Here we learn the meaning of desire. Here we learn the meaning of love.

Immaculate Conception8 December 2007Genesis 3:9-15,20 + Psalm 98 + Ephesians 1:3-6,11-12 + Luke 1:26-38

It has taken me a lifetime to figure this out; this matter of Adam and Eve and this business of sin and redemption. I’m not sure if I am just slow to process things or have simply had to live sixty-five years to get it; but I finally am getting to the heart of matter here. These two figures from the beginning: the problem with them is that they simply never said “I’m sorry.” When asked the question: “Why did you do it?  The blame started. She blamed the snake. Adam blamed her All they needed to say was: “I don’t know. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but it was foolish, and it was wrong.” All they needed to say was: “I did it. I’m sorry.” Confronted by God after their sin, they were unable to admit it. Had they simply admitted their sin, human history may have been different, and I am beginning to believe that this is the point of the story the writer of Genesis wanted to share with us. The tragedy of blame, the foolishness of hiding the truth, and the consequence of a failure to cry out for redemption and forgiveness.

The refusal to admit that we sin begins a lie that gets retold and retold again and again until we begin to believe it ourselves. We rationalize, make up excuses, project blame, use psychology and sociology to justify our behavior. All the while it’s lie. This ability and easy way of not admitting our sin is the greatest of all temptations that faces us. Failure to admit weaknesses and acknowledge our sin as sin is infinitely more damaging than the weakness and sin itself.

Failure in self honesty is the start of the sin against the Holy Spirit, the only sin that cannot be forgiven. We are all familiar with the warning Christ gave against the one sin that cannot be forgiven: blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. That sin is simply lying to oneself until one become so warped that the lie is believed. Falsehood become truth. The reason this sin cannot be forgiven is not that God refuses, but because the person no longer sees the need to be forgiven. Living in darkness is seen as living in light; sin is seen as grace; perversion as virtue. This person would not accept forgiveness if it were offered, because to do so would mean admitting sinfulness and the need for redemption.

It always begins with the rationalization and the failure to admit sin, and everything in this world supports that way of getting off the hook,

of making ourselves look good by denying our weakness and sin. We see this everywhere, and for us Catholics, the most obvious sign is our tendency to avoid Confession of all kinds. It means an inability to take personal responsibility for our own unhappiness, and in our tendency not to admit our moral misery. It shows up in our inability to be contrite in confession in church and everywhere else.

What does all this have to do with the Immaculate Conception you might ask about now in the middle of this homily. My thoughts have gone this way because this feast declares that only one of us human beings is without sin: that is the Immaculate Conception. Only one. The point of celebrating Mary’s sinlessness is to move honestly toward admitting our own sinfulness. She stands before us in her human perfection so that we might see our human imperfection and know what to do about it because of her Son.

Only the sinner can be saved. Only those who say: “I am sorry.” or “Forgive me.” can ever hope to hear the angel’s message: “Fear not.”

and become “full of grace.” But that is what He came to bring us: grace and a life without fear.

April 5, 2007

Exodus 12: 1-8,11-14 + 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 + John 13:1-15

Before we can get to Communion we must get to the point that this day is also about food. It may not be politically correct to say it, but while much of the world is starving, Americans are eating themselves to death.  Latest statistics record that 60% of us are overweight. The chronic obesity of children is an alarming public health issue. Meanwhile there is a multi-million-dollar diet industry in place. It is also a fact that other than the Bible, Cookbooks are the largest selling items in our book stores. The supermarket has become a temple of excess with music, lighting, deli counters, sushi bars, coffee bars, and all kinds of visual seductions designed to prompt us to buy more than we need and especially things we should not eat. Just this week I read an article about how junk food ads are scheduled at times children watch television.

Living to eat has become the focus of much of our culture.

While eating to live is what we are about as a church.

We live in a fast-food world with a microwave beeping, grabbing a sandwich or chips on the run and eating in our cars! This is a long way from Sacramental living which is what we are called to. Sacramental living requires something else. The Table is the center of life TV tables, card table or stools that face no one or a television will not do. In Sacramental living, no one eats in a hurry. No one eats and runs. For believers, there is no running from communion. There is too little of it anyway. There is a question to be asked about a society that builds homes with huge home theaters and recreation rooms and no dining rooms.

There is no mistaking that the largest piece of furniture in this room is a table. It is in the center, and everything and everyone faces the table.

While through the passage of time it has taken on the language of sacrifice and been called an altar; from our very beginnings, it was a table around which followers of Christ gathered to eat and be nourished. The heart of our identity is this table and food we share gathered around it. It shapes us, and it forms our values and our lives. We are a people of communion. We do not eat alone, or in a rush. We do not grab a bite and run.

It is no wonder our children and young people have no respect, interest in, nor hunger for the Sacrament of the Eucharist when they know nothing of communal and family dining. The dress, the behavior, the pace all betray a collapse of Sacramental life to which this night and what it recalls puts before us.

We are in communion, with one another, with the whole church and with God through, with, and in the Body of Christ which we share in this place.

Consequently, world hunger is not a political or economic issue to be solved by diplomats or politicians. It is a moral issue to be solved by believers. We don’t gorge ourselves with our faces in the plate unaware or uninterested in those around us. That is what gluttons do. We don’t grab and run, nor do stroll in at any hour as though it were drive through or take away.

In a world that continues to hammer away at us to take more and more, this gift from God teaches a different lesson: Less is more. Anyone who looks at the banquet on this altar would have reason to think: “There is not enough.” But there always is. Here the issue the glutton cannot ever address between quality and quantity is finally settled. Eating here is more than a refueling operation. Here, we eat to live, not live to eat. So the opposite of a glutton is not someone on a diet who counts out calories and carbohydrates, nor is it someone who fasts. The opposite of a glutton is someone for whom food is a means to an end, not an end in itself. It is a person who uses food and loves people, instead of loving food and using people.

Decide tonight why are eating here? Who are you eating with? Who is hungry while you are satisfied, and why are they hungry? Communion gives life. Take. Eat. This is my Body broken for you. Take. Drink. This is the cup of my blood poured out for you. It isn’t much; but to those who live in the mystery of sacrament, it is more than enough. Inside this awesome reality we never find ourselves alone or lonely; for we will have discovered the mystery of Holy Communion.

December 25, 2006

Isaiah 9: 1-6 + Titus 2:11-4 + Luke 2: 1-14

In the lean and simple language of Luke,

we take delight again in the ageless story which begins

in the most humble setting, with the least likely people.

The story of tells of boundaries broken and creation restored.

It proclaims as John’s Gospel puts it, that the Word is Made Flesh.

In English, five words so powerful and significant

That today when we proclaim them in the Creed, we are instructed

by the ritual to put our knee on the floor: to genuflect.

Already in Luke’s telling of this new Genesis,

two figures have emerged

who tell us what happens when the Word takes flesh.

Elizabeth and Mary are the first to experience this new creation,

but they are not the last.

Elizabeth the barren, and Mary the Virgin have both had an encounter with the creative power of God’s Word.

She who was counted as nothing, discarded as useless and old

without even an identity in Israel because she could not bear a son

to continue the race is suddenly redeemed and made whole by this wonder.

And a young girl from no-where, out of the main stream of life,

from out in the hill country is called highly favored and chosen.

The boundaries are broken.

Heaven and earth get mixed up together.

The Divine and the Human mingle in flesh and blood

breath and spirit, dream and hope, and the future becomes the present.

Words have the power to change the course of human events.

“Be it done to me according to your word.” said Mary.

Because of that willingness to say “Yes” to the Word, the course of human events changed forever. And it still does.

“Is it your with that we Baptize this child?” parents are asked at that font.

They say: “Yes.” and that child is changed forever.

“Will you marry me?” one says to another, and those people are changed forever.

“Will you love and honor each other for the rest of your lives?” the priest or deacon asks, and nothing is ever the same.

There is such power in Words.

They can sting and kill, and they can give life and joy, peace and hope.

Words of kindness to a stranger can bring joy.

Words of comfort can bring hope.

Words of forgiveness can bring peace between enemies.

We assemble here because a Word has been spoken.

So once again we retell the story of the Word

which when spoken in Genesis made all things good.

Once again we retell the story of the Word

which when spoken restores that good creation

with its promise that human life and God have once and for all

been bound together as they were meant to be from the beginning.

It means that our future and our growth are in God’s own hands.

We need not wonder where our life is taking us.

The peace, the joy, the satisfaction of Isaiah’s vision is what lies ahead.

Whatever burdens we may bear now,

whatever we may have suffered in the past,

whatever we may have yet to endure,

is really not important.

Whatever our burdens may be, they are uncomfortable and inconvenient, but that is all they are.

They do not last, and they do not keep us from the promise.

What happened to Elizabeth and to Mary

is happening to everyone who will listen and say, “yes.”

This world is now a holy place, a sacred place because what we proclaim today is that God has come to dwell here,

and so we are a holy people living in a sacred world.

The only evil here is a refusal to honor and recognize that holiness.

This is not a birthday party. It is an invasion. It is an interruption of a “business as usual” world by the divine insistence

that we live up to what we were made and called to be.

Why? Because God loves us.

This no sentimental love that fits into a thirty-minute TV special,

but a terrifying divine love that is literally ready to turn the world inside out to rescue and restore us. We are not spectators in this divine plan.

This is not just about the birth of Christ.

It is about our birth into life everlasting