Homily: 13th Week of Ordinary Time - Monday - Don't get too comfortable

The Gospel reading from Matthew should sound very familiar, we heard Luke’s version yesterday. 

“Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.”

After Jesus left his home in Nazareth, he was an itinerant preacher—he moved from place to place—never getting too comfortable.  He and the apostles, who followed him for the three years of his public ministry, weren’t staying in luxurious hotels on their travels throughout Galilee. 

When they were still fishermen on the sea of Galilee, after a long night of work, they would clean their nets and go home to their families, but after they followed Jesus, they like him, had no place to lay their heads.  And this is an attitude that every disciple is to adopt in a way.  To not get too comfortable in the world.

You’ve probably heard that as Christians we are to “be in the world, but not of the world.” 

The world has a way of lulling us to sleep, intoxicating us with its riches and pleasures, encouraging us to store up treasures here, rather than in heaven.  The spirit of the world has a way of decreasing our desire for heavenly treasures and increasing our desire for worldly treasures.  And if our hearts are attached to earthly things, they cannot be attached to heavenly things and on fulfilling the will of his heavenly Father. 

This is why 70% of Catholics do not come to Mass on Sunday, they took the bait, they’ve swallowed the lie, that worldly pursuits are more important. 

This is why you hear stories of the saints putting pebbles and rocks in their shoes. Some of the saints would wear scratchy hairshirts.  I visited the room of a Franciscan saint in Viterbo, Italy, who slept on the same wooden board for decades. 

Is it extreme?  Perhaps.  But it worked for them.  Little acts of penance and mortification helped them to fan the fire of their Christian fervor.

So, perhaps we each need some little act of mortification, or fasting, or penance every day to remind us not to get too comfortable—to remind us that we are not meant for this world.  And to offer up those penances for those who are losing or lost their desire for heaven is a powerful practice.  

For the Christian, having my desires satisfied all the time, but fanning the fire of faith and working constantly on earth for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.