Homily – 6^th Sunday Easter B 5/13/12

Beloved, let us love one another.

Whoever is without love does not know God,

for God is love.

In this is love, not that we have loved,

but that we have been loved,

that God has loved us, unconditionally.

This is my commandment,

love one another, as I love you.

This I command you (and only this),

love one another.

That’s a whole lot of love in today’s readings: seventeen times is the word love mentioned, nine times its Jesus himself using that four letter word.

Love in the Christian religion is of primary importance:

St. Augustine goes so far as to say “Love, and do what you will” – i.e. “love, and you’re free to do whatever you desire.” for the person who truly loves will only desire to will and do what is truly good and holy.

And the great Spanish Poet, St. John of the Cross says “In the evening of your life, you will be examined in love.” Meaning that when we die and come face to face with Jesus, we will be judged on how well we loved others in this life.

As love is of the primary importance, it is very essential therefore that we know what love is, and that we try to love.

And so then, what is love? What does Jesus and the Scriptures mean by “Love”?

Well, first of all, if what St. John says is true, if

God is Love, then probably none of us humans will ever fully understand the great mystery of love.

Probably a lot of what we think is love really isn’t love, and a lot of what we think isn’t love really is.

To put it another way, the times that we have loved the most truly and have grown the most in the way of love might very well have been the times we didn’t feel those warm and fuzzy feeling that we call love,

and the times when we’ve felt the most loving might very well have been the times we in reality loved the least.

Christ says: This I command you: Love one another.

What is love? Perhaps the best definition of love ever to be written comes from St. Paul in His First Letter to the Corinthians Chapter 13, which is read at most every wedding ceremony, both Catholic and non-Catholic.

St. Paul prefaces his definition by saying “I could have great wisdom and knowledge, I could have great faith to move mountains, and I could sacrifice my whole life – but if I don’t have love, none of that matters, I have nothing.” But if I have love, I have everything!

And then he tells us: Love is first and foremost – Patient.

Its interesting how St. Paul puts that first. He gives us 14 more things that love is, but before them all, Love must be Patient. The true lover must be patient, must have patience.

The secretary at my last parish used to say “Patience is a virtue, possess it if you can, seldom in a woman, never in a man!”

That’s probably true for short term patience, like waiting in a traffic jam or in a grocery line, but St. Paul more means long term patience, what’s also called long-suffering, endurance.

Today we celebrate Mother’s Day, and really what we probably all honor most in our Mothers is this patient, long-suffering, enduring unconditional love Mother’s have for us their children.

Moms aren’t born patient; they learn patience by experience, they exercise patience time and time again raising their kids, and watching them after they have grown. Their patience muscles are really in tone!

St. Monica patron of Mothers, was patient for 30 years as she prayed and wept over her wayward son St. Augustine, until he finally had a big conversion and turned his life around. How many Monica Moms there are in the world, thanks be to God!

But not only is maternal love called to be patient, all human love requires great patience, long-suffering, endurance.

Parents and priests give chastity talks to young people. And Christs whole teaching on chastity can be summed up in three words: True Love Waits. Love is Patient. If one can’t be patient and wait until marriage, it’s not true love, and one is lying to oneself that it is.

Those called to marriage vocation wait until marriage to consummate their love with their beloved, while those called to a celibate life wait until the next life to consummate their love with God their beloved.

There’s the beautiful passage in Genesis 29 v. 20, which says Jacob served (Laban) seven years for (the hand of his daughter) Rachel, yet they seemed to him but a few days because of his love for her.

And those of us already in a vocation must be patient and long suffering with our spouse and our own weaknesses, as Love takes a lifetime to come to full flower.

As we celebrate this Mother’s Day Mass, let us turn to our Blessed Mother Mary. Today is actually the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima, the day Mary first Miraculously appeared to the three shepherd children in Fatima Portugal, May 13, 1917 – and it was actually a Sunday also that year, the second Sunday of May and therefore Mother’s Day when Mary came to us and asked us to pray the Rosary each day for Peace and an end to all war.

May we this Mother’s Day ask our Blessed Mother Mary to bless our Mothers, and to obtain for us all that Patient, Long-suffering Love she showed us at the Cross: that we may have patience to endure amidst trials and setbacks, that we may be patient with our own weakness as Jesus is with us, that we may patiently wait for the Lord to act in His time not ours,

that we may truly fulfill Her Son Jesus’ commandment to truly Love one another as I have loved you.

About a month ago, the School had a lock-in on a Friday night, and so I went over to visit the kids who were having fun playing games in the cafeteria and gym.

The school has in the cafeteria about four new Foosball tables, and I never really paid much attention to them since they were purchased, but I went up to a group of kids playing at one of the tables and noticed that instead of little soccer players, they were star wars characters – Jedi Nights and Storm troopers I think.

I said to the kids “Wow, a Star Wars Foosball Table.

The Foose be with you!”

And one of the kids answered and said “And with your Spirit!”

Luke Skywalker knows the New Translation of the Mass!

In the New English Translation of the Creed, we now all say “I believe . . . . Jesus . . . rose again on the Third Day

in accordance with the Scriptures”

The old translation was

“He rose again in fulfillment of the Scriptures.”

While we certainly believe Jesus rose again in fulfillment of the Old Testament Scriptures, that the Old Testament predicted the Passion and Resurrection of Jesus, the Latin word secundum doesn’t mean that. It means “in accordance with” or better yet: “according to”.

Its actually the same exact word as when the priest says A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to Luke.

So in the Creed when you and I say “I believe He rose again in accordance with the Scriptures” we are saying that Jesus Rose again just as the Scriptures say He did, not only in accordance with the Old Testament prophets, but also in accordance with, according to, the New Testament writers.

And so in that part of the Creed, we are professing not only our belief in the Resurrection, but also our belief in the Scriptures as telling us the truth about the bodily Resurrection of Jesus.

The Tomb was really empty on Easter Sunday, just as the Scriptures say it was, and Jesus of Nazareth was truly seen, Risen Body and Soul from the Dead, by his disciples, just as the Scriptures say.

In looking over today’s Gospel, and all of the other appearances of the Risen Jesus mentioned in the Four Gospels, one similarity about all of them jumped out at me that I had never noticed before until this Easter: I noticed for the first time that the Risen Lord Jesus asks the disciples a heck of a lot of questions.

In almost every one of his appearances to them, Jesus is posing questions to His disciples. The first recorded words out of the Risen Lord’s mouth are “Why are you crying? Who are seeking?”

The first words out of His mouth at His second appearance on the Road to Emmaus: “What are you guys talking so excitedly about? What’s been happening around here anyway?” “Don’t you realize Christ had to suffer so as to enter into his Glory?”

And in today’s Gospel, after saying “Shalom – Peace” to them, the Risen Jesus says: “Why are you afraid? Why do doubts, questions, arise in your hearts?” “Got anything to eat?”

And finally, at the Third appearance to the Apostles early in the morning at the Sea of Galilee, he says “You guys catch anything the last eight hours? No?” and then when they get on shore, the Risen Jesus says “Peter, do you love me more than these? Do you love me? Do you at least like me?”

Before His Passion and Resurrection, Jesus gave them many teachings. But after His Passion, Jesus became Socratic, drawing out of them the seeds He had planted in them.

And the Risen Lord Jesus does the same with us, asking us the same questions so that we might come to an awareness of His presence in our lives. (Perhaps He does so even more after we have experienced the Cross in our lives.)

Why are you sad? Its all right if you are, but tell me why?

Who are you seeking, deep down inside?

What are you excited, passionate about? Do you understand why you are passionate about that, that it is pointing to me, to my passion and resurrection, that I wish to purify and fulfill those passions and desires?

Why are you afraid (to give yourself to me)?

Why do doubts arise in your heart? I’m not upset that they arise, I just want you to think about why you doubt – to make vocal your doubts, bring them to the light.

Do you got anything to eat? Will you eat and drink with me, at the table of the Eucharist, and we can have a nice long talk over candlelight dinner?

Have you been at it for a real long time and have nothing to show for it again? Do you feel like giving up? Tell me about it.

And one last question: Do you love me more than these?

Do you love me?

Do you at least like me?

May we mull over and over those questions that the Risen Lord asks us. Maybe in our prayer time this Easter, we can verbally answer some of those questions, or write our answers to them in our prayer journal.

In every one of the his appearances in the Gospels, the disciples didn’t at first realize the Risen Jesus was with them, until he started posing questions.

And as they thought over the Lord’s questions, and started answering them, they began to realize: It is Jesus asking these things to me, He is Risen, and with me always, alive in my life, making my heart burn with love as He reveals His Word to me.

Homily – Mercy Sunday MMXII 4/15/12

When the Risen Lord appeared to the Apostles that first Easter Sunday Night, St. John says He showed them His hands and his side. And, The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord’s wounds, now glorified in His risen body.

And just as there are Five Glorified Wounds in the Risen Body of Jesus that the Apostles rejoiced over, so today’s Gospel gives us Five Glorious Fruits of the Resurrection which you and I and every believe can rejoice over.

And in the Spirit of the Fathers of the Church, who loved to do such things, and at the risk of making this sound a bit contrived, I’m going to relate each of these Five Fruits of the Resurrection with one of the Five Glorious Wounds of Christ.

The First Fruit of the Resurrection comes from one of the pierced Feet of the Risen Jesus, and this First Fruit is that the Resurrection turns Fear into Joy.

Before the Resurrection, the Apostles ran away from the Cross, ran away from doing God’s will, ran and hid from the hostile outside world, out of fear of all these things.

But after the grace of the Resurrection, the Apostles no longer feared the Cross, no longer feared sin and temptation, no longer feared persecution for the Faith, rather their fear was transformed into Joy that Jesus had conquered all these things.

Blessed Pope John Paul II, who died 7 years ago on the Eve of this Divine Mercy Sunday, was a man who had tremendous Crosses in his life, but because of his great faith in Christ’s Resurrection he would tell people everywhere he traveled “Be Not Afraid! Christ is Risen, and is with us always!”

The Second Fruit of the Resurrection corresponds to the other pierced foot of the Risen Lord, and it is that the Resurrection breaks down all barriers.

We see Jesus in the Gospel taking those two pierced feet of his, and walking right through a locked door so that the people he loved so much could encounter Him.

And just as Jesus back then went through a lock door, so today Jesus can get through a locked heart, a heart imprisoned in sin and sadness, a heart that has rejected God and lock Him out of its life – the Risen Jesus will not give up on that person, no matter what, til their last breath Jesus will touch their hearts with his grace, and patiently wait for them to open wide their hearts again to him.

The Third Fruit of the Resurrection, corresponding to the Pierced Right Hand of Jesus, is that the Resurrection bestows Peace to our souls.

The Risen Jesus lifts up that pierced hand of His (as he does in the Divine Mercy image), blesses us with it, and says Shalom – Peace be with you!

The Peace of knowing that our sins are forgiven and that we are reconciled to God; the peace of knowing that God is with us amidst our trials; the peace of knowing that we will be reunited with our deceased loved ones in Heaven.

The Peace that enables us to love our enemies and forgive those who sin against us, that enables us to hold out our hand and shake the hand of a brother or sister, in a gesture of peace and friendship and reconciliation.

The fourth Fruit, corresponding to the pierced left hand of the Risen Lord, is that the Resurrection dispels all doubt and imparts a concrete and lasting Faith on believers.

We see the Risen Jesus in today’s Gospel holding up that pierced left hand of His and saying “Go ahead Thomas, put your finger through the nail marks.”

Many scripture commentators say Thomas wasn’t with the other Apostles that first Easter Sunday, because he took the Cross harder than all the other Apostles did; Thomas was so upset with himself after abandoning Jesus on Good Friday that he didn’t want to face the other apostles.

But while a part of him doubted, another part of him believed enough not to despair like Judas did, and believed enough to come back to the Christian community of believers.

And so, because the Cross weighed heaviest on Thomas, in the end, Thomas’ faith in Christ was the strongest among all the other Apostles, as he is the first to say My Lord and My God, the first person to so explicitly affirm Jesus as not just the Son of God, but truly God Himself.

Lastly, the Fifth and Final Fruit of the Resurrection, which corresponds to the Pierced Side of Christ, is that the Resurrection Floods the World and our Hearts with the Mercy and Love shining forth from the Heart of the Risen Jesus.

Through Faith in the Cross and Resurrection of Christ, our hands, our feet, our hearts become the hands/feet and heart of Jesus for others.

For the True believer in Christ, faith without works is a dead faith.

Some influential people in our society have been trying to narrow the definition of what a religious institution is, saying that while a house of worship such as a church or mosque or synagogue is a religious institution, a catholic hospital or jewish school or baptist soup kitchen isn’t a religious institution.

But such thinking is totally opposed to Catholic thinking. Listen to what our Holy Father Pope Benedict XVI says in his 2005 Encyclical Deus Caritas Est (“God is Love”), paragraph 22.

He states (quote): “the exercise of charity,. . . love for widows and orphans, prisoners, and the sick and needy of every kind, is as essential to (the Church) as the ministry of the sacraments and preaching of the Gospel.”

Good Shepherd School, Catholic Social Services, Fatima Hospital, according to the Pope, are as essential to the Church as the Mass, Baptism, Confirmation, the best Sermons are; these institutions are as Catholic as this Parish is,

and God have mercy on us and on our country if we start thinking they aren’t just as Catholic and start allowing our culture to treat them that way.

And so, my brothers and sisters in Christ, may we Rejoice along with the Apostles this Easter Season, that Jesus, who was Crucified, is now Risen Gloriously from the Dead,

and that His Resurrection will enable us to Rise gloriously with him from all our trials, to an ever greater Faith, Hope, and Love in our lives.

Well, I tried real hard at the beginning of Mass not to put the microphone into the Easter Fire when I was done using it, and thankfully I didn’t! (You had to be at one of last week’s Palm Sunday Masses to get that joke).

Actually, what I was really worried about was getting through the Exultet, that long, 1500 year old Easter proclamation I sang at the beginning of Mass, without passing out. There’s a whole new translation of it, and I just got around to really practicing it today, and I kept getting out of breath singing it all the way through.

Most Catholics either love the Easter Vigil, or else they find it, shall we say, lacking in brevity. But there are some of us who really love it and think its the best Mass of the whole year.

And those of you who attend each year might have noticed something new about the Easter Proclamation besides that it is a new translation. Namely, that there are bees in it!

After 40 years of being lost in the 1970s English translation of the original 6^th Century Latin text, the bees are back in the Exultet, and are happily buzzing around English speaking churches throughout the world tonight.

On this, your night of grace, O holy Father,

accept this candle, a solemn offering,

the work of bees and of your servants’ hands,

an evening sacrifice of praise,

this gift from your most holy Church . . .

(whose) light . . . is fed by melting wax,

drawn out by mother bees

to build a torch so precious.

You may or may not know this, but church law requires that this Easter Candle and all Candles used at Mass be at least 51% beeswax.

So tonight I thought I’d give you all a little talk on the bees. Not on the birds and the bees, not tonight at least! Just on bees.

The Fathers of the Church used to say that the Church is like a colony of honey bees.

I found a neat website called “Buzz about Bees” and here’s what it says:

“Honey bees live in very large, well organized colonies, (average hive has 50,000 bees). . . The colony functions as a single unit, with workers assigned ‘tasks’ or duties that ideally will help the colony to be successful.

“This efficient organization is vital – at any time there may be thousands of mouths to feed and eggs to tend to, as well as predators to fight off, all on top of general ‘house-keeping’ tasks!”

And in some ways, the Church as a whole is like a bee colony, and each parish is also like one. Just as every little bee in the hive matters for the good of the whole, so every one of us matters in the Church, in our parish, for the well being of one another.

And the Church, like the bee colony, has a lot of work to be done. We have thousands of hungry mouths to feed, the poor, the hungry, the uneducated, those who don’t know Jesus.

The Church also like those bees has predators to fend off – the world, the flesh and the devil, temptation and sin, which constantly threatens the well being of the Church.

All the worker bees in the colony work hard and go from flower to flower in order to make honey and beeswax, which they make to store the honey in for the winter.

And in some ways, this Big Easter Candle is a symbol of all the toil and efforts, all the hard work and prayers and struggles and crosses of each parishioner at St. Joseph’s parish over the past years.

Tonight, the Church on earth, and our Parish of St. Joseph in particular, offers to God the fruits of our labors for Him, we offer to God everything we have, all the faith, hope and love we’ve been able to bring forth throughout the year – we all kind of symbolically take all the wax we’ve all made, and pour it into this Candle, and say as we just did,

On this, your night of grace, O holy Father,

accept this candle, a solemn offering,

the work of bees and of your servants’ hands,

this gift from your . . . .Church . . .

We give to God tonight, this lump of wax which represents our lives, our humanness.

And in turn, God our loving Father tonight gives us the Flame.

The Resurrection of Christ lights up the darkness of our lives on earth with the Brilliant Faith that Jesus is Risen, that for the believer in Christ, there is always Hope, that Christ’s Love is stronger than death,

that no matter what happens in this life, Jesus is with us and He will bring us through every Cross and Dark Valley to New Life and Love.

My brothers and sisters in Christ! God hasn’t made us to be lone ranger bees, but Honey Bees, depending upon one another, working and praying together, called to be one in Christ and in His Holy Church.

Each one of us is singular, unique and unrepeatable, each one of us has special gifts to share. Our world today emphasizes diversity and individualism, and that is good, but this needs to be balanced with a greater sense of community.

May God bless all the bees of St. Joseph Parish this Easter Season with Resurrection Faith, and may the Risen Lord Light up the Way for us which leads to Peace, Happiness, and Love.

It was now about noon,

and darkness came over the whole land

until three in the afternoon

because of an eclipse of the sun.

Then the veil of the temple was torn down the middle. Jesus cried out in a loud voice,

“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit”;

and when he had said this

he breathed his last.

when they came to Jesus

and saw that he was already dead,

they did not break his legs,

but one soldier thrust his lance into his side,

and immediately

blood and water flowed out.

The Veil in the Temple in Jerusalem, which barred the entrance to the Holy of Holies, a Veil which, according to Jewish Legend, was 4 inches thick, about 70 feet high, 30 feet wide, and so heavy that took 300 priests to hang, is torn open, from top to bottom, and as that Veil is torn open on earth, the Veil, barring the entrance to Heaven is also torn open at the same time, never to be closed again.

And as both of those Veils are torn open, a third Veil, the side of Jesus hanging on the Cross, is at the same time torn open, opening wide His Sacred Heart, revealing fully the intimate secrets of His heart and the depths of His love for us.

And in a few moments, we will have the unveiling that caused all these wonderful unveilings – the unveiling of the Cross. The priest and two servers will go to the back of the Church, and the priest takes the Cross, which is wrapped in a purple cloth, and unveils it, tears it open, saying Behold the Wood of the Cross, on which hung the Salvation of the World. And all will kneel and respond Come, let us adore.

We have had the Cross veiled, wrapped up, for the past two weeks, and today we unveil it, unwrap it.

When you or I love someone, we most especially show that love by giving our beloved a present.

And we don’t just give them the present, say “Here it is, see, a diamond ring, take it!” Instead, we wrap it up, and watch them open it, tearing the wrapping paper off as they wonder what it is.

And so today, we unwrap, unveil this most precious of gifts from the one who loves us more than any other person – God.

And this, my brothers and sisters, my spiritual children, is how we should view the Crosses of our lives – as the most precious gifts God our loving Father, and Jesus our Friend and Lover sends us.

Through the Cross, unveiled this day, Heaven is torn open, the Love of Jesus is fully revealed, the sins of the world are forgiven and man is reconciled to God.

And through the Crosses God permits me to suffer, when I unite them to the One True Cross of Christ, the Way to Heaven is revealed to me, the Love of Jesus is known to me, and begins to be seen through me, and my many sins are forgiven and atoned for, and I am reconciled with God.

This Good Friday, let us call to mind, and thank God for, the many gifts of the Cross God the Father and Jesus His Son have given us, both past and present, and for the ones still wrapped up and veiled that He will give us in the years to come.

Ave, Spes Unica – Hail O Cross, our one hope!

We adore your Cross, O Lord,

we praise and glorify your holy Resurrection,

for behold, by your Holy Cross,

joy has come to the whole world.

Homily – Holy Thursday MMXII 4/5/12

 He loved his own in the world,

 and He loved them, to the end;

 He loved them, to the extreme;

 He loved them, to the depths.

 I give you a new commandment,

 Love one another

 as I have loved you.

 Ubi Caritas

 Where true love is found,

God is present there.

 We recline at Table tonight with Jesus

 at the Agapé banquet,

at the Love Feast.

Here it is that we learn from the Master and Teacher, first how to receive love, how to be loved; and second, how to give love, how to be love.

The Eucharist teaches us and enables us, first to be loved, and then to love.

 But what is love? Do I, do you, does anyone really know what Love is?

Probably not. This life is really all about learning more and more fully what Love is all about, and when, after years of trial and error, God sees that we’ve finally learned what love’s all about – or, God forbid, that we will never chose to learn from Him what its all about, then He takes the breath of life away from us and brings us to eternal life, where we will then fully know what love is all about.

 I’ve been thinking and praying a lot lately about Love. CS Lewis wrote a great book on the subject that I read this past year.

He says that the ancient Greeks and Romans spoke of Three Kinds of Love that every human being naturally experiences.

 The first love is called Storge or Affection – which is family love, the love of parents for children and children for parents, the love of siblings for one one another, the love of grandparents for grandchildren, aunts and uncles for nieces and nephews, etc.

The second natural love is called Philios or Friendship – what we men call our band of brothers, our buddies, our gum-bas. I don’t know what you women call your friends!

And the third natural love is called Eros – that crazy, all consuming, terrifying, fickle, frustrating, god-like love that occurs when one “falls in love” with another. Lewis says that while friends walk side by side, looking at a common goal or interest, lovers face each other and look into each others eyes.

 All three natural loves are part of our human experience, part of what love is all about. But CS Lewis’ book is called the Four Loves. There is a forth love, not a natural but a supernatural love, called in the New Testament Agapé, or in Latin Caritas, Charity, and that is God’s Love.

God’s Love, Agapé, governs and guides the other three loves. When we put God’s love over our family, friends, romances, we will then appreciate them to the fullest, we will have the best possible family relations, the best possible friendships, the best possible romances.

But when we don’t let Agapé rule over our natural loves, our family relations, our friendships, our romances can become strained, unhealthy, disfunctional, manipulative.

 St. Paul tells us that the Agapé of God, the Love of God has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

Its Agapé, Divine Love, that enables us to love God above all other natural loves in our lives. This is dramatically seen in the lives of the saints who sacrifice one or more of the three natural loves for the sake of Divine Love.

For example, St. Thomas More greatly loved his wife and four grown children, and was very good friends with King Henry VIII, but the love of God drove him to give his life rather than renounce his Catholic Faith.

 St. Augustine loved passionately the girlfriend he was living with for many years, but the love of God drove him to ultimately embrace Holy Purity and break things off with her.

 It is this same Agapé that will enable each of us to love our enemies, to forgive those who hurt us, and to see the face of Christ in the least of our brothers and sisters, the poor and oppressed.

It is Agapé that causes a young man or woman to renounce marriage and children and give themselves totally to God as a priest or religious sister.

Finally, it is Agapé that enables us to ultimately let go of this life and our loved ones here, and let God take us and our loved ones to the next life, knowing that the love of God will gather us together again in the joy of His Kingdom of Heaven.

 My brothers and sisters in Christ! I dwell on Agape, Charity, God’s Love, tonight, because here in the Eucharist is where we receive this Love. The Eucharist is the source of God’s Love, and the summit of God’s Love.

 Tonight we celebrate the institution of the Eucharist, and the institution of the Priesthood.

 The priest is called to the awesome task of making present God’s Love, and ministering this love of God to the people He is called to serve.

 I would like to take this opportunity to thank Jesus for calling me to be a priest; for using me to bring people closer to Him. Please pray for me, and for Fr. Marcin and all priests, that we would always be faithful to our calling and that our ministry would be fruitful.

I’d like to also take this opportunity to share with you some news. Today I got a letter from Bishop Tobin informing me that our parish will once again be getting a Transitional Deacon for the summer!

 We welcome this summer Thomas Woodhouse, who is a 3rd year seminarian at Blessed Pope John XXIII Seminary in Boston. Thomas is from St. Paul’s Parish in Cranston, and is what they call a late vocation seminarian (I’m not sure if he’s older than I am or not, but he’s no kid like Deacon Frank was last year!).

He will be ordained a Deacon Saturday, May 19, 2012 at 10:00 AM at St. Luke’s church, Barrington, and I hope to have him start his 10 week assignment soon after that so he can visit the school before it gets out for the summer.

Next June 2013 he will be ordained a priest, God willing. So keep Thomas Woodhouse in your prayers and give him a warm welcome which I know you all will when he comes.

The Eucharist and the Ministerial Priesthood are gifts Jesus gives us this Night, so that you and I would always know how much Jesus loves us, and so that you and I would be able to love others as Jesus did.

May Christ, truly present to us in the Eucharist, bless our families, our friends, and our lovers, may He save them all, and forgive them their trangressions, and bless them with many many graces, and may Agapé, the love of Christ, reign over all our loves, purify them and by His Holy Cross and Resurrection give them back to us at the end of our lives, that we all may love one another with a perfect love, for ever and ever in the Kingdom of Heaven. Amen.

Homily – Palm Sunday MMXII 4/1/12

When I was a seminarian studying for the priesthood, at the seminary I went to in Connecticut we would every year put on a play that many of the seminarians would act in.

We were probably the only seminary that did such a thing, and we mainly did it because for one, there was a young lay man taking theology classes at the seminary who had just got an undergraduate degree from the London Stage; and two, the seminary was very friendly with and close by to the Nuns of the Abbey of Regina Laudis. One of the Nuns at the Abbey is Sister Dolores Hart, a former famous movie actress who starred in a number of movies with Elvis Presley and still is a judge for the Oscars, and as a result a number of famous actors and actresses kind of hang out around the Abbey and would come to see our plays and even take the lead roles in a number of them.

One year we performed a Passion Play, which was a medieval retelling of the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Christ. Almost every man in the seminary was in it, and I had multiple roles: I was a blind man who was healed by Jesus on Palm Sunday, the Angel in the Garden of Gethsemane, Nicodemus, and the Angel who announced to Mary Magdalene that Jesus was risen from the dead.

 Academy award winning actress Patricia Neal attended the play one night, and when we asked her what she thought of it after the show she said “I adored the play – I simply adored it!”

As William Shakespeare said “All the World’s a Stage”, and today, the curtain opens on Holy Week 2012: Jesus rides into His Holy City, your heart and my heart, He rides into our Church and our world to once again be rejected, and betrayed, and abandoned by his best friends, and scourged and crowned with thorns and crucified and buried,and to rise victorious from it all, to forgive us of our sins and reconcile us to God and show us the Way which leads to true peace and eternal life.

 And each Holy Week, you and I and every human being is one of the characters in this drama of dramas, each one of us playing a major role in Christ’s suffering and death.

 Many of us are like those thousands in the crowds on Good Friday: Jesus in dying alone outside the city walls, and they could care less; they are more interested in the latest charismatic immoral media darling Barabbas.

Others of us find ourselves this year being one of the Pharisees: proud, in massive denial over our many sins, judgmental, looking down on the rest of humanity, most complicit in Jesus’ death.

Or maybe we are Nicodemus or Joseph of Aramethia: closet Christians, too afraid to stick our neck out and say we believe in Jesus for fear of what it would cost us or what others would say, and so we watch silently as He is crucified!

Maybe we are a Pontius Pilate or Roman Soldier: just following orders, not letting objective truth and right and wrong and our conscience rock the boat of our lives.

Maybe we are one of the Apostles: we love Jesus and want to die for Him, but in the hour of darkness find out we lack vigilance and courage.

Or maybe we are one of the two thieves: our sins have caught up with us and have totally made a wreck of our lives, and we start off by cursing Jesus for not getting us off this cross.

Or Simon of Cyrene: we were minding our own business, being a good person, when fate pushed a heavy, crushing cross onto our shoulders that we carry totally against our will.

Every human being has a role in the Passion, you and I and every man and woman will by our sins help nail Jesus to the Cross once again in our world this year.

But Jesus says to us from the Cross: I forgive you, I love you.

 But by God’s mysterious grace, each one of us is also called each year to play that lead role of Christ Crucified in one or more scenes.

 Some of us find ourselves this Holy Week being betrayed by their best friend, or being rejected by their peers or family members, or being abandoned, misunderstood, unfairly judged.

Some of us find ourselves this year suffering under great unbearable injustice, suffering great physical, emotional or spiritual pain.

Or we find ourselves this year playing the role of Mary, standing helplessly as someone we love dearly goes through such terrible suffering, and our hearts suffer alongside them.

The Curtain has opened, and the Passion Play 2012 has begun. Those of us who take our roles seriously will be rewarded with a lead role in the sequel, the Easter Play, coming soon to a theater near you, at the end of your life on earth.

My grandfather on my mother’s side, who died 30 years ago, was a florist by trade, but a fisherman at heart.

Any opportunity he could, he went fishing. His florist shop was right along the River, and he would literally hang a fishing line out the window of the shop during business hours.

He bought 5 acres of woodland out in the country, just to fish on in the stream that ran through it.

And after he died, we found under the floor boards of the attic his fishing diary, which had the location of all his secret fishing spots, and what he caught there.

I must confess though, that while I inherited my grandfather’s love for the great outdoors, I didn’t at all inherit his passion for fishing. I guess if I had the time to do it, and someone to fish with I would, but since I don’t usually have both I end up instead going for a nice hike in the woods alone or with a friend, or kayak on a lake while on vacation, which lets me get some good and needed exercise in at the same time.

But on the other hand, in some ways I probably did inherit some of my grandfather’s fisherman qualities.

And that is because I, like Peter and Andrew in today’s Gospel, am called by Jesus to come follow after him and be a fisher of men. I am called to go out in the world and catch souls for Jesus by my words and actions.

As an ordained Priest of course, this is kind of my full time job, fishing for men; but really, all Catholics are called by Jesus to be fishers of men out in the world they live in, each day using all the natural and supernatural talents we have to bring everyone we come in contact with to Jesus.

But in some ways, every disciple is also called to be not only a fisher of man, but also a fisher of the Son of Man, a fisher of Jesus. In other words, you and I are called to search for Jesus in our lives, and through a daily prayer life, to try to “catch” Him. (fish symbol)

And really, the qualities one needs to be a good fisherman are also the qualities that one needs in the spiritual life.

The serious fisherman needs the virtues of patience and silence, as he must at times wait for a long time quietly before he gets a bite.

In the same way, if we are serious about prayer, we must have the same virtues of patience and silence. Before we can get a bite, feel the presence and peace of God, we oftentimes have to first quiet our souls, and wait patiently in prayer for God to speak to us.

And like the fisherman, sometimes we will go for long periods of time and catch nothing, not hear God speak to us at all. But the good fisherman doesn’t give up, nor does the person serious about prayer give up, but perseveres in seeking to catch Jesus.

And so, we are called by Jesus to Fish for Men and to Fish for God. And Jesus on His part is forever Fishing for us, forever trying to hook us and bring us into his kingdom.

Jesus is the worlds greatest fisherman, He is able to outsmart and catch the toughest of fishes.

In the Gospel today, the Greek word Matthew uses for the net Peter and Andrew are using makes clear that it was a deep sea fishing net, which had weights on it that made the net sink to the bottom of the sea.

Well, Jesus has his own deep sea net – He can whenever he wants reach down into the deepest darkest parts of a person’s soul, in order to catch them off guard with his love and bring them up from those murky depths.

And finally, as the great British authors GK Chesterton and Evelyn Waugh remind us, even the person who looks to us like they are the furthest away from Jesus has actually has already been hooked by Him without him or her knowing.

Jesus has already caught them “with an unseen hook and an invisible line, which is long enough to let (them) wander to the ends of the world and still bring (them) back with a twitch upon the thread.”

May Christ give us the grace to be good fishers of men and good fishers of Jesus, and may we not be at the end of our lives “the one that got away”, but may Jesus catch us and reel us in, and place us safely on those shores of heaven.

We interrupt the regularly scheduled homily for this important announcement.

The countdown has started.

In just nine weeks from today, things will never be the same again.

Everybody get ready, because here it comes:the New English Translation of the Mass begins Nine Weeks from today, on November 27, the First Sunday of Advent.

This new English translation of the Mass from the Latin original has been 10 years in the making. Over 7000 people have worked on the project, translating prayers most of which were written over 1500 years ago.

The final translation was completed and approved by all the English Speaking Bishops and the Vatican about a year ago. New Mass books or Missals have all been published and will be shipped out to Parishes and Religious goods stores next week. New musical settings of the Gloria, the Holy Holy and the Memorial Acclamations have been written.

To give you an idea of how much is going to be changed, let me just say that the Our Father hasn’t changed at all, and the Lamb of God hasn’t changed at all. The Holy Holy Holy and May the Lord Accept the Sacrifice at Your Hands have both only changed by a word or two.

But almost everything else in the Mass, both my parts and your parts, are a noticeably different translation than we’ve been used to for the past 40 years.

Certainly, such a major revamping of the Mass is going to take some getting used to for many if not all of us.

And some of us I know are wondering, was there really a need to make a new translation? What’s wrong with the one we’re using now?

Maybe some of us are asking: Isn’t there more serious problems going on in the Church that we should be concerned with other than the Liturgy? Is this just some way for the Bishop’s to make money selling a lot of new Missals that they own the copyrights to?

Those are all valid questions, which I’ll try my best to answer in the weeks to come.

To answer just the first question for now, “did we need a new English translation?” the answer, which anyone with even a remedial knowledge of Latin will tell you, is a definite yes.

In general, the new translation is a much more accurate translation of the original Latin that the current one.

The translation we currently have, which was completed in late 1960s/early 1970s, using a new method of translating that was the in thing in the 60′s but has since been discredited by everyone, is in large part more of a paraphrase than a word for word translation.

And just as I think all of us would want to have as accurate a translation of the Bible as possible, we as Catholics should want to have as accurate a translation of the Mass as possible also, seeing as the Mass is even more important to us than the Bible, as important as that is.(Also, the Mass is rich in quotations from the Scriptures, but with the current translation many of these scripture references aren’t evident.)

Again, most of the prayers of the Mass are over 1500 years old. These same prayers were prayed by the saints and martyrs and all the faithful down through the centuries; and have been faithfully handed down to us. We want to be able to pray those same prayers and benefit from them in the same way they did.

So the translators these past 10 years have worked hard to try and make the new translation more faithful to the original, but at the same time making the English prayers beautiful to hear when prayed out loud, poetic, theologically rich, meaningful, moving and memorable.

And in my humble opinion for what its worth, for the most part they did a good job doing all of that. I’m really looking forward to praying and singing these new prayers, I think it will enrich my faith and help me to appreciate the Mass more deeply.

At the same time, I think it’s going to take me and all of us awhile to get used to it, how long I’m not that sure yet. And their will probably be some parts I and some of you will have a hard time getting used to or even liking.

I’d like to close by saying a few practical ways our parish will be getting ready for this new translation.

First, I am getting a Mass pew card made with all the people’s responses on one double sided sheet of paper. These will be in all the pews for as long as we need them, so you won’t have to fumble around in the missallette to find say the new response or the Creed say.

I’ll probably for the first few weeks have to hold up the card during the Mass and point to it and say “The Lord be with you” to remind you when a different response is coming.

Next weekend, we will be starting to sell at the doors of the Church for $2 this booklet, “The Magnificat Roman Missal Companion” It has the whole new translation of the Ordinary Parts of the Mass used every week, including the Four Eucharistic Prayers, on one side of the page, and a commentary on the new words on the other side by Catholic Writer and Providence College Professor Dr. Anthony Essolen.

Also starting next week, Bishop Tobin has given Parishes in the Diocese permission to start singing the Gloria and the Memorial Acclamations, so I made up a smaller sheet I’m going to put in the pews with the music for the Revised Mass of Creation Gloria on one side, and the Three new Memorial Acclamations on the other.

On Thursday evening October 27^th in the Church Hall, we are also going to have a guest speaker come in and give a Talk and Power point presentation on the New Translation.

Finally, I’ll probably talk more about the new translation in my homilies and in the parish bulletin in the weeks to come. You can also feel free to talk to me one on one if you have any questions or concerns.

I will conclude with something Bishop Tobin said to all the priests at our annual priest study day last spring. He said that we should all prepare for the New English Translation by praying for the virtues of patience, humility, and a sense of humor; if we are all patient and give it a chance, humble and open to the new words and what they can teach us, and laugh it off when we screw up and get frustrated with the changes (after all, it is only a new translation), all will go smoothly, and we will in a short time end up appreciating ever more fully and deeply the awesome “Mystery of Faith” which is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, Christ’s greatest gift to His Church.

Homily – 24^th Sunday OT C September 16, 2001

On behalf of St. Mark’s Church, I want to express my deepest condolences for all of you who have lost a relative or loved one in this week’s attacks.

We gather here at Church each Sunday, my brothers and sisters, to remember two things: to remember who God is, and to remember who we are.

It is so important, brothers and sisters, that we remember at this time who God is. Because the people who are probably responsible for these terrible crimes claim to worship the same God that we do. What’s worse, these people think that God is happy with what they have done.

So let’s stop and remember who God is: God is a loving God, and He condemns the killing of innocent people.

It is true that both we and these terrorists believe in the same God, the God of Abraham. But Cain and Abel also worshiped the same God.

And just as God was totally against what Cain did to his innocent brother, so also is God totally against what these terrorists did who claim to believe in Him.

And not only is God totally against it, but the majority of Moslems around the world are appalled at what has been done in the name of their peace loving religion.

Our God, brothers and sisters, is a God of peace. Peace I leave you, my peace I give you says Jesus. Not as the world gives, do I give.

We now know how the world gives peace, and how the world takes it away. But we need to now know that God’s peace never leaves us. No one can take away the peace that Jesus has given us. No one.

We are here to remember who God is, to remember that His peace is still with us when the world’s peace is shaken.

And we are here to remember who we are.

We are followers of Jesus. We need to be reminded of this, especially at this time.

We have been watching news all week from New York and Washington. But there has also been some news from Heaven, news from God this week, and I will share it with you.

As you know, the Scripture Readings for Mass each day are predetermined, based on the Church calendar. I want to read you the Gospel reading that was read in Catholic Churches and Anglican Communions all over the world this past Thursday, Sept. 13^th: the Gospel of the 23^rd Thursday in Ordinary Time:

Jesus said to his disciples: ‘To you who hear me, I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you; bless those who curse you and pray for those who maltreat you. When someone slaps you on one cheek, turn and give him the other; when someone takes your coat, let him have your shirt as well. Give to all who beg from you. When a man takes what is yours, do not demand it back. Do to others what you would have them do to you. If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, how can you claim any credit? Sinners do as much. If you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what merit is there in it for you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full. “Love your enemy and do good; lend without expecting repayment. Then will your recompense be great. You will rightly be called sons of the Most High, since he himself is good to the ungrateful and the wicked.

“Be compassionate, as your Father is compassionate. Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Pardon, and you shall be pardoned. Give, and it shall be given to you. Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over, will they pour into the fold of your garment. For the measure you measure with will be measured back to you.” Lk 6, 27-38

There are thousands of people who didn’t want to hear those words last Thursday. Most of us here today don’t want to hear those words. But God wants us to hear those words – God wants to nip in the bud any hatred within our hearts starting to take root. Forgiveness is a process, and God wants us to start trying to forgive. We must put our anger and desire for justice in perspective.

We can be angry and want these people brought to justice, but we can’t have hatred for these people or we will become like they are.

And we especially need to beware of racism and bigotry towards Arabian people.

Again, the vast majority of Arabian people in our country and around the world are totally against these terrorist acts.

We need to remember that as Christians we are not lovers of violence.

Today at Mass, we remember who God is and who we are.

And the answer to both who we are and to who God is can be found in one place: in Jesus Christ

Second message from God came Friday, the national day of Prayer and Remembrance. That day, if you look in the missallette, the Church celebrated the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross – each year on September 14^th we remember how Jesus brought great good out of the great evil of the Cross: how the tragic death of the most innocent man opened for us the gates of Heaven.

Because just as in the evil of the Cross came the great good of our redemption, so also from this great evil there has and will continue to come great good.

Great good of compassion

of people risking their lives and sacrificing to help the victims

of people giving blood and donations

of political parties working together

And hopefully we will also soon see the great good of justice being dealt to these terrorists.

And hopefully we’ll continue to see a stronger freedom, faith, and respect for the sanctity of human life among us Christians and all the citizens of our nation and of the world.

I finally want to share with you one last message from God that you may or may not have heard about.

On Friday evening, at about 7 p.m., at the end of the national day of prayer and remembrance, I was putting out this statue of Mary holding her crucified son for the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, which was fittingly yesterday’s Feast Day (Sept. 15^th of each year).

I had to run over to the Rectory to get an iron, as I was ironing the linens, and coming out the Church door I saw out of the corner of my eye a rainbow.

And turning around I saw the most perfect rainbow I ever saw in my life. The whole bow was visible, and from where I stood our whole Church fit right under its arch.

So I ran and got Fr. Donnelly to show him, and then I called some parishioners and told them to look out their window, and finally, I ran over to Garden City Mall where there was a crowd of people in front of Applebees, Café Luna and Ben and Jerry’s just staring up at this rainbow in the sky.

And I said to them “God gave Noah a rainbow after the flood. And God said to Noah ‘this destruction will never happen again’”.

Believe what you want, but I know that at the end of that grey and rainy National Day of Prayer – at the twilight’s last gleaming – God put that rainbow over our Church Friday. And God is going to keep that rainbow there so long as we keep God’s love in our hearts. Because that is who God is.