Merry Christmas!
God rest ye merry gentlemen let nothing you dismay
Remember Christ our Savior was born on Christmas Day
To save us all from Satan’s pow’r when we were gone astray
O tidings of comfort and joy, comfort and joy
O tidings of comfort and joy
4th Sunday of Advent
In this Advent Homily Series we are journeying through the greatest story ever told, the story that has changed and will continue to change the world (if we let it): our story – the creation, the capture, the rescue, and our response! Listen this week as Deacon Brian focuses in on what our response can be to the God Who has done such incredible things for us!
3rd Sunday of Advent
In this Advent Homily Series we are journeying through the greatest story ever told, the story that has changed and will continue to change the world (if we let it): our story – the creation, the capture, the rescue, and our response! Listen this week as Fr. David focuses in on what it means to be rescued by Jesus.
2nd Sunday of Advent
In this Advent Homily Series we are journeying through the greatest story ever told, the story that has changed and will continue to change the world (if we let it): our story – the creation, the capture, the rescue, and our response! Listen this week as Deacon Dave focuses in on what it means to be captured.
1st Sunday of Advent
In this Advent Homily Series we are journeying through the greatest story ever told, the story that has changed and will continue to change the world (if we let it): our story – the creation, the capture, the rescue, and our response! Listen this week as Fr. David zooms in on what it means to be created.
Solemnity of Christ the King
On this great Solemnity, Deacon Brian prepares us for our Advent journey by outlining the great story we will be sharing over the homilies of Advent, the story that has changed and will continue to change the world (if we let it): our story – the creation, the capture, the rescue, and our response!
32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
In the midst of very important, but ultimately short-sighted, concerns of this world and concerns of politics, I believe that we are losing our way. And when we don’t keep our eyes on the world to come, our outlook on this world, on our country and on others begins to degrade – it loses the light of Christ, and it festers into hatred and unnecessary division. To put priorities in order, I think it’s worth stating:The worst thing that can happen in this world, is that a person ends up living a life apart from God for all eternity; the best thing that can happen in this world, is that a person ends up living life with God for all eternity! Everything else, no matter how important, is secondary to that long distance vision.
Want to know what would actually change the world more than the solving of any moral issue, political issue or cultural practice? If every Catholic for the last 2,000 years had reached out and brought 3-5 people to Christ during their lifetime, if that’s what each Catholic expected of their role in God’s plan of salvation (for WE are the Body of Christ on this earth here and now)…our whole world would be transformed by now! So let’s get going!
31st Sunday in Ordinary Time
In our familiar Gospel story of Zacchaeus, Jesus does something that might entirely change how you see Jesus’ life, and what that means about how you are called here and now to live as disciples of Jesus! In our Gospel today, we hear that Jesus came to Jericho and “intended to pass through the town”…Jesus intended to pass through the town, but when he sees Zacchaeus he changes his mind and decides to stay. For Jesus, following his Father’s will didn’t look like having a checklist in his head of every single pre-planned-from-all-eternity thing that had to happen on that particular day to achieve our salvation…Jesus changed his mind and his plans during his days with the nudges of the Holy Spirit (and in this case the Holy Spirit moved him to change his plans and have dinner with Zacchaeus – and this interaction changed Zacchaeus’ life).
God’s plan to change the world is not primarily through heady knowledge of theology, nor is it primarily through large-scale events that normal folk like us are unable to bring about. God’s plan to change the world is to change it primarily through normal, personal interactions, when we as individuals (as the hands and feet of Christ here and now), inspired by the Spirit, reach out and touch the lives of particular people that God has us come in contact with. Personal interaction, personal invitation – that’s how Jesus lived and that’s how we are called to live, too!
28th Sunday in Ordinary Time
Why is it that so many people (including many of your children whom you raised in the Church and brought to the sacraments and taught to be generous and to care for others) have fallen and continue to fall away from our incredible Catholic Faith and belief in Jesus Christ? The Church has three jobs: to evangelize, to celebrate the sacraments, and to care for the poor. These are three legs of a stool; if any one of them is missing or lacking, the stool will tip and fall. I would propose that we as a Church, in the midst of a total culture change from a Christendom time/culture to an Apostolic time/culture, have unintentionally lost the “evangelization” footing of our identity as a Church. What we see now is people naturally falling away from the faith because they (even unconsciously) sense that something is lacking in the current lived practice of the Catholic faith in America…and something would be lacking: our essential call as followers of Jesus Christ to personally witness to Him – to evangelize, to speak about the good news. How did that happen and what are we called to do about it now? Listen to hear my thoughts and to be invited on board for where our parishes will be focusing our efforts into the future!
26th Sunday in Ordinary Time
In today’s Gospel we hear of the rich man and Lazarus both before then after their deaths; after death, Lazarus find himself in the bosom of Abraham (i.e. heaven) while the rich man is in the netherworld (i.e. hell). What sin did the rich man commit? There are two kinds of sin in Scripture, and in our culture we tend to consider one kind of sin much more than the other: sins of commission and sins of omission. Sins are choices that we make – in our thoughts, words and/or actions – where we put distance between us and God. Those can be choices of commission (where we actively do something that puts distance between us and God), or choices of omission (where we choose NOT to do things that will maintain our relationship with God and draw us closer to Him). God is alive and at work in this world! God is on the move! If we put our relationship with God on hold, standing statically in one place, we don’t pick up right where we left off; since God is on the move, when we pick up again it means that we’ve allowed distance to grow between us and the God who is always moving and yet always beckoning to us, “Come, follow me!” The rich man is not cited for sins of commission, today, but sins of omission – complacency – all those choices that he made NOT to make God the priority in his life. As disciples of Jesus Christ, where are areas that we have become complacent? How can we recommit to continual growth in a life lived with the Lord?