2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time 2025 - Cana Epiphanies

 Two weeks ago, on the Feast of the Epiphany, the babe at Bethlehem was revealed to be the Son of God and savior of the world. What an epiphany: Jesus is revealed as God in the flesh come to earth to save and redeem all people of all nations of all time.

Last Week, we celebrated the Baptism of the Lord.  The voice of the Father proclaimed Jesus to be his beloved Son, with whom He is well pleased and the Holy Spirit in the bodily form of the dove was seen, revealing Jesus as Christ.  What an epiphany—Jesus is revealed as what…as the second person of the holy Trinity, beloved by the Father, anointed by the Spirit for the work of salvation.

Today, we heard in our Gospel another epiphany, a set of epiphanies, really! The Gospel of the wedding feast of Cana contains epiphanies about Jesus, epiphanies about his Blessed Mother, and it even reveals something about us and the response God wants from us all, of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus.

Firstly, what does the Gospel reveal about Jesus? At the Wedding at Cana, Jesus is revealed to be the divine bridegroom. And you might say, Jesus wasn’t getting married, how is he the Bridegroom. Well, at a Jewish wedding, it was the responsibility of the bridegroom to provide the wine. We can see this to be true, even in the text, for when the headwaiter tastes the wine, he immediately calls the bridegroom, assuming that he was the one who procured the vintage.

But, in this story, it was Jesus who provided the wine. By taking on the bridegroom’s responsibility to provide the wine, and doing so in a spectacular style, miraculously changing 120-180 gallons of water into the finest vintage, Jesus reveals himself as the Divine Bridegroom, who provides the wine of salvation for his bride, the Church.  

This epiphany was hinted at in our first reading. Isiah prophesied about how God himself would take us as his spouse: “As a young man marries a virgin, your Builder shall marry you; and as a bridegroom rejoices in his bride so shall your God rejoice in you.” 

In joining the Church to himself, through his Passion, Death, and Resurrection, Jesus Christ has united himself to humanity as Bridegroom to his Bride in a union of love.

And that Jesus revealed himself as a Bridegroom through a miracle of changing water into wine, is also significant. Wine, drunk at a wedding brings joy to the hearts of those who imbibe in it. So too, those who join the church, are able to rejoice at being united to God through Baptism, and most especially, receiving Holy Communion with God through the Sacrament of the Lord’s Body and Blood, the Eucharist.

What an epiphany! Jesus is the Bridegroom who unites himself to us, through Sacramental bonds, that we may live in joy. 

The second epiphany at the wedding at Cana is regarding Jesus’ mother, something that also gladdens our hearts. 

You can imagine how embarrassing it would be today if, at a wedding reception, the banquet hall ran out of food or beverage.  Even though most people would sympathize with the couple and blame the banquet facility, it would still be embarrassing. Well, in the ancient world, it would be incalculably more so, because the family threw the wedding party. If they ran out of supplies, especially with days to go for the duration of the wedding celebration, it would be an embarrassment that likely would never be forgotten.

Well, who noticed first that the family had run out of wine? Jesus’ mother. Mary noticed the impending catastrophe before anyone else, even the mother of the bride and even the wine steward.  Mary’s love made her notice details that others were missing.  To remedy the problem, she went to her son.  She didn’t twist his arm.  She simply said, “they have no wine!” confident that her Son would miraculously intervene even though his “hour” had not yet come.

What’s the epiphany? Mary is involved in the gritty details of our lives, and she is at work before we even know we have a problem. Our Lady is looking down on all of us right now with maternal love, bringing our needs to Christ, even the ones we are not aware of, the needs we might even be ashamed to acknowledge—praying that we may have the strength and patience and humility, to bear our crosses in union with Christ.  Mary brings our trials, our heartaches, our challenges, our vices and sins to God, so that we may obtain the wine of grace we need to endure and overcome them.

Mary’s role in the Church reveals something about God too. God has placed Mary in this role of heavenly helper and intercessor. God has chosen her and thereby God wants us to have a relationship with her, trusting Mary, entrusting ourselves to her, bringing our needs to her. God formed the Church as a family with the greatest mother in all existence. 

And there is the epiphany about us as well: God has formed us into a family, united us through Jesus in Word and Sacrament, having Mary as mother. And  we are joined with each other for a purpose.

In the second reading today, St. Paul reflects on the variety of spiritual gifts…gifts of healing, mighty deeds, prophecy, discernment, varieties of tongues. Gifts given to glorify God and spread the Gospel. All these gifts are given to help us serve God. But notice, St. Paul says that none of us have received all of these gifts. Meaning, we are to work together, using our unique gifts, to serve God. We aren’t meant to do it on our own. Perhaps, this season, you’d do well to consider how God is calling you to work together with a brother or sister in Christ, in service to God—that all people of all places may come to drink the wine of salvation.

While the extraordinary seasons of Advent and Christmas have come to an end, our Ordinary Time scripture readings help us to realize the extraordinary nature of being members of the church, being loved by God, joyfully gifted with a variety of blessings, and spiritual helpers, the blessed Mother, our patron saints, our guardian angels  for the work of the Gospel. 

When we are faithful to our mission— Epiphanies of Christ’s goodness and power and love are made known in us and through us, in how we treat people, in the people we serve, and forgive, and witness to, for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

2nd Week in Ordinary Time 2024 - Monday - Christ the Bridegroom

 Throughout the Old Testament prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Hosea, as well as in Song of Songs, God reveals the mystery of His desire for union with humanity – a union so intimate that He describes it as spousal love: God is the bridegroom and Israel is the bride.

Despite the infidelity of the people of Israel, God still pursues them with a merciful love. The promise of the bridegroom, however, remained incomplete in the Old Testament.

In the Gospel of John, John the Baptist makes the astonishing claim that Jesus is the Bridegroom—Jesus is God come to earth to unite humanity. John says, “The one who has the bride is the bridegroom… He must increase; I must decrease” 

And in the passage from Mark’s Gospel today, we heard how Jesus identifies himself as the Bridegroom. St. Matthew also reports Jesus’ self-identification as the Bridegroom.

In fact, the Lord also shows that he is the Bridegroom through his deeds. At the wedding at Cana, the wedding party runs out of wine. In Jewish culture it was the groom’s responsibility to provide the wine. And what do we find happening at the wedding at Cana? Jesus miraculously changes jugs of water into an abundance of wine, showing himself to be the long-awaited bridegroom.

Jesus further reveals himself as the bridegroom at the end of his life through the Eucharist and on the Cross. More than a last meal, the Last Supper is a wedding banquet wherein Jesus, like a good husband, offers the total gift of Himself. On the Cross, Jesus consummates this gift and weds himself totally to humanity forever. On the cross, too, his dying breath, in Greek was tetelestai—it is consummated. 

The Church celebrates the Eucharist daily as a memorial of what our Bridegroom has done for us. St. John Paul wrote "The Eucharist is the sacrament of our redemption. It is the sacrament of the Bridegroom and of the Bride." 

Moreover, "the entire Christian life bears the mark of the spousal love of Christ and the Church.” We seek to live upstanding lives, lives full of virtue and grace-- "prepared as a bride adorned for her husband" (Rev 21:2).—that the union we have begun in Christ on earth, may come to its fulfillment in heaven, for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

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To God the Father Almighty we direct the prayers of our heart for the needs and salvation of humanity and the good of His faithful ones.

For the holy Church of God, that the Lord may graciously watch over her and care for her.

For the peoples of the world, that the Lord may graciously preserve harmony among them.

For all who are oppressed by any kind of need, that the Lord may graciously grant them relief.

For ourselves and our own community, that the Lord may graciously receive us as a sacrifice acceptable to himself.

For our beloved dead, for the poor souls in purgatory, and for X, for whom this Mass is offered.

O God, our refuge and our strength, hear the prayers of your Church, for you yourself are the source of all devotion, and grant, we pray, that what we ask in faith we may truly obtain. Through Christ our Lord.

2nd Week of OT 2021 - Monday - Christ the Bridegroom and High Priest

 

In the time of Jesus, Jewish law required fasting once a year, on the Day of Atonement, which we know as Yom Kippur, and a few other minor fast days. Above and beyond what the law prescribed, the Pharisees practiced fasting twice a week. Jewish rabbis and their followers would practice increased fasting as well. The disciples of John the Baptist, too, apparently imitated John’s ascetic lifestyle, fasting as a sign of repentance and in preparation for the coming of the Messiah. So there was a sort of religious attitude toward fasting in Jesus’ day that the more one fasted, the holier one must be. 

In contrast, Jesus and his disciples are seen not only feast with sinners but failing to observe the days of fasting prescribed by the law. 

In reply to those voicing criticism concerning his practices, the Lord takes the opportunity to reveal something about his identity. These meals that he has been sharing, these feasts, are no mere ordinary gatherings for physical sustenance. When he gathers with his associates, his friends, and with sinners, he is a bridegroom with his wedding guests. 

What is more important, in the course of his public ministry than fasting, is revealing that he is the long awaited for Messiah—who will fully restore the nuptial bond between God and his people lost by sin.

He is the High Priest, as we heard in the first reading from the letter to the Hebrews, who reconciles God and man, through his flesh, who becomes a “source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.”

So, this Gospel is much more about how often we should fast as followers of Jesus, for as he said, “the days will come when my disciples will fast.” This Gospel is about recognizing that Jesus was much more than a common rabbi, a pharisee, much more than even John the Baptist. 

And again, this is still just chapter 2 of Mark’s Gospel. So imagine you are reading this for the first time, and more and more of Jesus’ identity is being revealed. You’d be thinking, this keeps getting better and better! God is not just doing something of the same old thing, he’s doing something new.

And just as it was 2000 years ago, God wants to do something new in our lives—to bring about new gifts, a flourishing of new ways of showing his glory, new ways of reconciling sinners to himself, new ways of reaching the hardest of hearts, new ways of revealing the love of the Bridegroom for his Bride the Church. May we be attentive to the ways the Holy Spirit wishes to use in in new ways for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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For a deeper openness to God’s will, readiness for service, attentiveness to those in need, and peace in our world and our hearts.  Let us pray to the Lord.

For all those preparing for baptism and full initiation: that they may be open to the grace of conversion and the joy of the followers of Christ.  Let us pray to the Lord.

For a new springtime of justice: that all people of good will may work together against the increasing threats to civility, religious liberty and human life.  Let us pray to the Lord.

For those who struggle because of addiction, discouragement, mental illness, chronic sickness, unemployment, or ongoing trials of any kind:  that the new wine of God’s grace through Christ will bring them consolation and peace.

For the repose of the souls of our beloved dead, For the deceased members of our family, friends, and parish, for the souls in purgatory and for…N. for whom this mass is offered.

O God, our refuge and our strength, hear the prayers of your Church, for you yourself are the source of all devotion, and grant, we pray, that what we ask in faith we may truly obtain. Through Christ our Lord.

2nd Week of OT 2020 - Monday - The Bridegroom's mysterious invitation

Although Jewish law required fasting only once a year, on the Day of atonement, the Pharisees practiced fasting twice a week. The disciples of John the Baptist apparently imitated John’s ascetic lifestyle as well, fasting often as a sign of devotion to God and as a sign of repentance for sins. In contrast, we read in this morning’s Gospel how Jesus and his disciples are not only practicing minimal fasting, they are seen feasting with sinners.

When questioned about his practice, the Lord answers in a way that becomes quite typical of his ministry, he answers with a rhetorical question inviting his critics to a deeper level of understanding, in this case, a deeper understanding of his identity.

Fasting would be fine, if he were just another itinerant preacher. Fasting would be fitting, if he was simply a devout Jew seeking to imitate the currently popular religious faction, the Pharisees. But the Lord answers the question about his fasting with another question: “can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?”

Jesus’ ministry is different than anything that had come before. And so he and his disciples will appear to act differently, especially in regard to popular conceptions of holiness.

So too, Christians, our behavior will likely appear strange to non-believers. Our values are different from the world. The topics of our conversations are different. We pour over ancient texts and the wisdom of saints who have been dead for hundreds of years. We pause from the daily grind of pursuing wealth and power, to pray, to meditate, to contemplate the presence of God. And we leave the comfort of our safe routines to serve others, to feed the hungry and clothe the naked.

And through prayer, repentance, and works of mercy, our lives begin to take on the characteristics of that original group of disciples: joy, generosity, courage, self-sacrifice, even the occasional miracle or two. Our strange way of life, though, contains an invitation to others to seek faith and intimacy with the Lord Jesus, that they too may have life.

We honor today, St. Sebastian, a soldier in the Roman army who was arrested for his kindness to imprisoned Christians who awaited their martyrdom during the Roman persecution. Artistic depictions often show Sebastian standing by a Roman column with arrows sticking out of him, having miraculously survived his execution.

This strange scene is not unlike our Gospel: God mysteriously breaking into the world, confounding popular expectations, but with a sense of invitation: those who belong to the world of death and violence and unbelief, are invited into this mysterious company of the disciples of Jesus Christ, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
 
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To God the Father Almighty we direct the prayers of our heart for the needs and salvation of humanity and the good of His faithful ones.

For the holy Church of God, that the Lord may graciously watch over her and care for her.

For all who are oppressed by any kind of need, that the Lord may grant them relief and move Christians to come to the aid of the suffering.

For the safety of all those traveling to the March for Life this week in Washington D.C., and that the witness to the dignity of human life may bring about greater protection for the unborn and conversion to the Gospel of Life.

For our beloved dead, for the poor souls in purgatory, and for X, for whom this Mass is offered.

O God, our refuge and our strength, hear the prayers of your Church, for you yourself are the source of all devotion, and grant, we pray, that what we ask in faith we may truly obtain. Through Christ our Lord.

22nd Week in OT 2019 - Friday - Weddings and Wineskins

In the Gospel of John, Jesus’ first miracle takes place at a wedding, the wedding at Cana, where water is turned into an abundance of wine. It was there that Jesus ushered in something radically new. He wasn’t just a teacher, he wasn’t just a commentator on scriptures, he wasn’t just a do-gooder: that first miracle at the wedding, with the wine, signaled something new in God’s plan of salvation for sinful humanity.

Today’s from Luke’s Gospel, we encounter those two images again of weddings and wine. Jesus first compares his presence with his disciples to a wedding celebration.  Just as a wedding is filled with joyful celebration, so too, Jesus’ public ministry is a time of great joy for his disciples.  And so too, as Jesus is our companion throughout our own lives, there is a joy that cannot be taken away by any earthly misfortune.  Things can never become so dark that we cannot call upon Jesus as Lord.  No matter how severe our suffering, it can always be united to Him.

Second, Jesus says, “no one pours new wine into old wineskins.”  Since leather wineskins would become dry and brittle with age, the new wine, still in the process of fermenting would burst the old wineskins. 

Before baptism, before discipleship, we had an old nature, an old wineskin.  But when we were baptized and truly made the commitment to follow Christ, we set aside the old nature, and acquired a fresh new nature. For many of us, baptism was very long ago, and those fresh, new wineskins, if they are not constantly renewed can start to grow brittle again, resistant to change, resistant to the new wine of the spirit.

Many of us know Christians, even members of our families, who dabbled in Christianity, practiced it for a while, even 12 years of Catholic school, but now they seemed to have lost their taste for the things of God; even mentioning the faith leads to a heated argument.  The wineskin has burst.

They have allowed their souls to resemble the old nature, prior to baptism, without Christ as Lord.
In the first reading, we heard the great Christological hymn from the letter to the Colossians, proclaiming Christ the first born, the head of the Body, all creation is to be subject to Him, His Lordship. In order to keep the winskins of our souls pliant and fresh, in order to know the joy of the bridegroom in our every suffering, we must subject Ourselves to the Lordship of Christ in all things, in our every endeavor, every relationship, in our every need.

Rejoice for the bridegroom is with us, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That all Christians may experience the profound renewal of Spirit needed for spreading the Gospel in our modern world.
For the return of all Christians who have fallen away of the Church and into serious sin, for their conversion, and the conversion of all hearts.
That our young people may be kept safe from the errors and poison of the world, so to grow in the ways of righteousness and truth.
For all the needs of the sick and the suffering, the homebound, those in nursing homes and hospitals, the underemployed and unemployed, victims of natural disaster, war, abuse, and terrorism, for the sanctification of the clergy, for all those who grieve the loss of a loved one, and those who will die today, for their comfort, and the consolation of their families.
For the repose of the souls of our beloved dead, for all of the poor souls in purgatory, for the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish, for the deceased priests, deacons and religious of the diocese of Cleveland, and for those who have fought and died for our freedom.
Incline your merciful ear to our prayers, we ask, O Lord, and listen in kindness to the supplications of those who call on you. Through Christ our Lord.

28th Sunday in OT 2017 - Mystical Marriage and the Wedding Feast

On Tuesday evenings, we’ve been offering the video series titled “The Pivotal Players”. The series beautifully presents the lives of men and women who deeply impacted Church history. We’ve studied St. Francis of Assisi who brought important reform to the Church of the Middle Ages by calling men and women back to Gospel simplicity in a time when Christians were beginning to become enamored with the luxuries of their day.

We learned from St. Thomas Aquinas, the priest, scholar, and theologian whose writings and systematic thinking about God and the Church continue to be of inestimable value.

Last week, we studied the life and impact of different sort of theologian, the mystic St. Catherine of Siena who is pivotal in helping the Church to contemplate the mystery of God’s love. Listen to her words: “You are a mystery as deep as the sea;” she says, “the more I search, the more I find, and the more I find, the more I search for you.  But I can never be satisfied; what I receive will ever leave me desiring more.  When you fill my soul, I have an even greater hunger, and I grow more famished for your light.”

Catherine’s deep yearning for God was also accompanied by extraordinary mystical phenomena such as visions and revelations, raptures, the stigmata. Catherine, lived many years eating nothing except the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist.  And often, her prayer was so intense, she would begin to levitate.

Catherine was named by Pope Paul VI as a Doctor of the Church, which is surprising because she was illiterate. As a Doctor of the Church Catherine teaches the Church of all ages essential lessons about the Christian Life. And Catherine is very clear that the purpose of the Christian life is to grow in union with God through prayer, fervent meditation on the suffering of Christ, fasting, cultivation of the virtues, purification from sin, reliance on the Sacraments of the Church, and total abandonment to the Holy Will of God.


Union with God was a theme of her writings and reflections. At the age of 19, having already attained tremendous sanctity, St. Catherine had a vision, in which Jesus gave her a wedding ring, symbolic of her union with Christ the Bridegroom of the Church. Theologians call this the Mystical Marriage, a foreshadowing of the eternal union the blessed obtain in heaven. This is the point of the Christian life, to grow in this union here on earth, that we may share in this union in heaven.

This image of mystical marriage with God isn’t just the fanciful imagining of medieval mystics. Jesus himself uses this image in the Gospel parable we heard today: A king had thrown a wedding feast for his son and sent out servants to invite the guests.  Some guests ignored the invitation.  Others abducted the king’s servants, mistreated them, and killed them. One guest was found unworthy or at least unprepared for the feast.

Who is the king in this parable? Who is the son? Who is his unnamed Bride? Who are the servants? Who are the guests?

Well, of course, the King is God the Father, who celebrates the Marriage of Christ, His Son to  the Church. The Marriage was accomplished on the cross. Jesus himself announces this on the cross, when he says, “Consummatum est”—it is consummated. The servants are the apostles and all those God has sent out into the world to invite sinners to repent and become members of the Church. The guests are those who are given a choice: will you join the wedding feast or not?

At the end of the parable, there is a guest who is thrown out because he is not wearing the wedding garment. Perhaps, this is a Christians, who had lost his wedding garment through sin. Perhaps here is a Christian-in-name-only who went through life simply going through the motions, but never actually sought the intimate union that God wants to establish with us.

In baptism we do receive a wedding garment. But it is up to us to keep that wedding garment unstained and intact. And if it becomes stained or tattered or lost by sin, it must be cleansed and repaired through the Sacraments, particularly the Sacrament of Confession.

The wedding feast of the parable is certainly an allegory for heaven. And yet, we cannot help but see a parallel to what we are doing here, right now.

Since the earliest days of the Church, the Mass, celebrated each Sunday and every day for almost two thousand years, has been called “the Wedding Feast of the Lamb.” Here at Holy Mass, we are the wedding guests who have responded to the invitation of the King. Here at Holy Mass, those who are prepared through Sacramental Confession, are able to feed on the richest food and choicest wine of all, the Body and Blood of Jesus. Here we are able to receive a foretaste of the Communion the blessed enjoy at the eternal wedding feast of heaven.

Over the last few decades, millions of Catholics have fallen away from the Catholic Church.  BUT, the number one reason why Catholics return to the Church is because of their hunger for the Eucharist.  People return to the Church, because here and only here does Christ give us his true flesh and blood.

Many Catholics come to Mass every day because of this deep hunger for Him. To paraphrase Catherine of Siena, the more we eat, the more we hunger. The desire to know God, to be with God, to be close to God is very good, it’s our deepest longing. But it’s up to us to pursue it, to pursue the God who wants to see us flourish in holiness, who wants to see us become saints.

As I mentioned St. Catherine subsisted for years only on the Eucharist. This was possible because the Eucharist is the supersubstantial food of heaven, it is the very life and presence of God. St. Catherine would often see blazing fire in the consecrated host, for rightly so, the Eucharist is the ardent fire of God’s love for us. The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Church’s life, for from it we receive the grace to live out our union with Christ in the world.

May each of us like Saint Catherine be set aflame with divine love, be united to the Lord in his sufferings, and be devoted to the building up and serving of his Holy Church for the glory of God and salvation of souls.