7th Week in Ordinary Time 2024 - Wednesday - Humility in decision making

 St. Augustine said that his three favorite virtues were “humility, humility, and humility”. And that is a fitting quip for a saint, as it appears that our Lord felt the same way. The very first beatitude preached by Jesus on the Sermon on the Mount is about humility. We heard it echoed in our reponsory this morning: “Blessed are the poor in spirit”. To be poor in spirit isn’t to rub dirt on our faces and deprive ourselves of sustenance in order to imitate the homeless.

To be poor in spirit means to be humble before God. Jesus’ followers must recognize on a fundamental level that we are dependent upon God for everything: for our biological life, for the time on earth that we’ve been given, and for the gift of eternal life. You cannot begin ascending the mountain of beatitude until you recognize that you cannot climb it on your own. You can’t even see the mountain, let alone climb it. 

In the short passage from the Letter of James this morning, St. James too emphasizes humility.

 St. James addresses those who are making plans about their future activities, such as going to a town, doing business, and making a profit. 

He reminds them that they do not know what their life will be like tomorrow. Life is uncertain and fragile, likened to a "puff of smoke" that appears briefly and then vanishes. There but for the grace of God go you and I. 

James condemns the arrogance of living without reference to God. These planners hadn’t even considered what God’s will was for their life. 

Often times, our young people talk about what they want to be when they grow up without any consideration of what God wants for them. This is why so many don’t even consider for a moment a priestly or religious vocation. They want to be an athlete or internet influencer because they want the fame and the money. Not considering that the selfish pursuit leads to unhappiness. 

Our secular society breads this sort of practical atheism that even many Christians fall into, making decisions, planning for the future, without reference to God, without seeking God’s will. And it’s a habit that really takes a miracle to break. 

Whenever we are at a crossroads, we need to seek God’s will. We need to take the time to kneel down and ask God for guidance, and have the patience to wait for an answer, and to discern, to ensure that we aren’t just following our own willfulness, or own earthly attractions, to weigh our desires against the teachings of Christ and the call to holiness, and to pray with the words of Christ in the garden, “not my will, but thy will be done”

Humility is to mark our every decision, humility which subjects the entirety of our lives to the will of God and the truth and goodness revealed in Christ for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

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That Christians may respond generously to the perpetual call to prayer, fasting, and works of charity. 

For our young people beginning summer vacation, that they may be kept safe from the errors of our culture and kept in close friendship with Jesus through prayer and acts of mercy.

That during this month of May, all people may turn their hearts to the Blessed Virgin Mary, seeking her aid and imploring her intercession with increased and fervent devotion, imitating her example of Faith, Hope, and Love.

For all the needs of the sick and the suffering, the homebound, those in nursing homes and hospitals, the underemployed and unemployed, immigrants and refugees, victims of natural disaster, war, and terrorism, 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 all who have died, and for all the poor souls in purgatory, and for X. for whom this Mass is offered.

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

June 13 2023 - St. Anthony of Padua - Priest, Doctor of the Church - Man of Beatitude

 For the next three weeks, thereabout, our weekday mass Gospel readings will be taken from the Lord’s great Sermon on the Mount.  It is clear from the very beginning of the Sermon, with the Lord’s delivery of the beatitudes, that Christians are to live differently from others in the world—with a righteousness even surpassing that of the Jewish scribes and Pharisees, as the Lord teaches. In short, the Lord teaches that we must seek to be like Him, to be like his Father, to be holy.

St. Anthony desired the radical holiness preached by Jesus.  He entered the Augustinian Order as a young man as a way of turning away from the temptations of the world in order to seek the perfection of his soul.  One could say that he followed the call to religious life as a way of pursuing that purity of heart to which the Lord calls us in the beatitudes.  The pure of heart are those who love God with undivided allegiance.  They pursue God’s Holy Will single-heartedly, without mixed motives.  This is what Anthony desired.

Though he had dedicated his life to study, prayer, and learning, immersing himself in Sacred Scripture, it was a rather strange event which caused St. Anthony to become a Franciscan.  It was when he heard news that Franciscans had been put to death for preaching the Gospel in Morocco, that he felt called to join the order.  Where most of us run away from suffering, St. Anthony ran toward the opportunity to practice the final two beatitudes: blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness, and blessed are those who are persecuted for Christ’s sake.  

St. Anthony, through his practice of the beatitudes, through his desire to totally belong to Christ through the vows of his religious profession, became a radiant beacon of the light of Christ, to whom we look to imitate 800 years later.

In the face of the many problems in the world—violence, materialism, poverty, moral relativism, Jesus calls us each of us to radiate the holiness of God by putting on His mind and heart—seeking to be holy as He is holy—suffering for the Gospel, as he suffered.  Christians are called to beatitude—and the world will be impacted for better or for worse by the way Christians live our lives.  Through the example and heavenly intercession of St. Anthony of Padua, may we be faithful to this call of holiness today and all days—for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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

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

That the members of the Franciscan Order and all those consecrated religious may inspire us to strive for greater holiness.

For the priests of the diocese who begin a new parish assignment today, especially for the newly ordained, that they may be faithful to Christ in every dimension of their ministry. 

For all who are oppressed by any kind of need, that the Lord may graciously grant them relief, especially for the sick and victims of war and terror and natural disaster.

For the repose of the souls of our beloved dead, For the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish, for the deceased priests and religious of the diocese of Cleveland, for the poor souls in purgatory, and for those who have fought and died for our freedom.

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.

6th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2022 - The path of beatitude and the path of woe

 

In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus gives his most famous sermon on top of a mountain: his Sermon on the Mount.

In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus gives his first major sermon, which we heard today, not from the top of a mountain. In fact, St. Luke tells us that Jesus came down from the mountain, and taught his disciples and this large group of people on a stretch of level ground. This passage of Luke’s Gospel is known as Jesus’ Sermon on the Plain, and is delivered immediately after spending a night in prayer and naming the 12 apostles.

In this sermon, the Lord teaches us how to live in such a way on this earthly plain, that leads to the joy of heaven. The path to lasting joy, he indicates, is the life of faith, one in which we place our trust in God rather than in money, in pleasure, in entertainment or in the esteem of others. 

Whereas Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount features eight aspects of the path to beatitude, in the Sermon on the Plain, the Lord offers four beatitudes contrasted with for “woes” or warnings. 

In contrasting the four beatitudes with the four woes, the Lord contrasts the way that leads to holiness and heaven with the way that leads to perdition. 

And the path of beatitude is a serious business, which is why the Luke introduces this sermon by telling us, “ Jesus raised his eyes toward his disciples,” In other words, Jesus looks each of us straight in the eyes as he gives us this teaching. It’s like a scene in the movie where the action stops and the main character stops and looks directly into the camera to explain what is really going on.

So let’s look closely at these four contrasts.

Firstly, the Lord contrasts “Blessed are you who are poor, for the Kingdom of God is yours,” with “Woe to you are rich, for you have received your consolation.” This was a revolutionary teaching and still is one today: earthly riches are not necessarily a sign that you are blessed by God, nor that you are on the road to heaven. Riches cannot buy you real happiness, and they certainly cannot buy you eternal life; you cannot buy your way into heaven. So, a life bent on obtaining riches is a misguided life. We must never, never, never allow the pursuit of riches keep us from cultivating holiness. 

The second contrast is “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be satisfied,” versus, “Woe to you who are filled now, for you will be hungry.” 

There are people who make earthly pleasure their highest good. They live to satiate their bodily appetites to the detriment of their souls. Those who are physically full without Christ are spiritually starving to death.

The Christian, rather, is to hunger and thirst for holiness more than for bread and water—to hunger for God and the things of God.

Fulton Sheen used to say that there are two philosophies of life: The pagan philosophy is first the feast, then the fast. The Christian philosophy is first the fast, then the feast. Pagan seek to enjoy the goods of the earth now, but are deprived of what is truly substantial. Christians practice fasting, and self-control of our bodily appetites, so that we may feast in the eternal banquet of heaven. 

For a culture bent on instant gratification this is a difficult teaching. But if we don’t learn how to say “no” to some appetites we may find ourselves indulging in what is forbidden and deadly to our souls.

Next the Lord contrasts “Blessed are you who are now weeping for you will laugh” with “Woe to you who laugh now, for you will grieve and weep.” 

There are many today who go from earthly diversion to earthly diversion, party to party, who don’t take life seriously because they claim they’re living for the present moment, as if that’s the most important thing in life. But in reality, they are trying to escape from reality, trying to insulate themselves from sadness and suffering as much as they can. They don’t realize that there will be a time when the music will stop, and poor choices catch up to you, not to mention having to come face to face with the eternal judge and being required to give an account of our use and waste of our earthly time and treasure.

Rather, the Christian, instead of running away from sorrow, fear, and death, we face these things with courage, faith and hope. There is power and grace when we unite our sufferings with Christ. There is heavenly consolation when we allow ourselves to weep with His blessed mother, or like St. Monica offer up our tears for the conversion of our misguided family members. 

Lastly, the Lord contrast “Blessed are you when people hate you, … exclude and insult you, and denounce your name as evil on account of the Son of Man” with “Woe to you when all speak well of you.”

Many people find it unbearable when people don’t like them. Social pressures are among the most driving forces in our culture. So when Jesus says, you will be hated by all because of me, some people, even Christians, say, fine, I’m not going to let anyone know that I follow Jesus, especially if my Christianity would affect my professional or social standing. 

The Lord presents us, here with a choice: will you live for pleasing God or pleasing man? Will you be a prophet or will you persecute prophets?

And this is a very serious choice—the most serious. Because this word “woe”—“woe to you” is a warning. Jesus is warning us that there are consequences for rejecting his teaching here. He doesn’t say, “it’s preferable if you are poor in spirit, but I understand, no big deal, it’s of no consequence if you ignore this stuff, live your best life as your feelings dictate them.” That’s the world talking. That’s the world perverting the Christian message. Living only for the earthly feast will mean exclusion from the heavenly one.

So, how can we take the Lord’s teaching today to heart? The Catechism recommends making an examination of conscience based on the beatitudes. That means reading through the Sermon on the Mount or the Sermon on the plan and asking yourselves questions related to these truths: “have I sought after earthly riches to the detriment of heavenly ones? Have I pursued sinful pleasures instead of practicing temperance, chastity, moderation? Have I given into diversions instead of bringing my wounds and difficulties to God? Have I hungered and thirsted for doing what’s right, working to right the injustices that I perpetuated or participated in? Have I retreated in fear when it was my time to witness to Christ?” 

Jesus looks us in the eyes, he looks into our heart and speaks these words of truth, that we may follow the way he has tread before us. We do well to consider all those things we should fast from, restrict, and restrain, in order to walk more faithfully the path of beatitude for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

All Saints 2020 - Who we are, where we're going, how to get there

At the tail end of Vatican II, Pope Paul VI promulgated a document called Gaudium et Spes, the pastoral constitution on the Church in the Modern World. It’s purpose was to help the Church understand her position and role and mission in the changing modern world with all of its advancements and strengths and foolishness and errors. For it’s important for the Church to reflect upon the “signs of the times”—a phrase which came from this document—to understand better the concrete details in which we are to live out our Christian mission and identity.

While explaining the need for Christians to bring our faith and live our faith in the many different levels of society in which we find ourselves, Gaudium et Spes is also very realistic in speaking about monumental struggle against the powers of evil and darkness.  History is not just the story of human progress, right? We are opposed by satan, the father of lies, who seeks to corrupt souls and bring ruin to nations and families and the Church. 

Last week, when we celebrated Priesthood Sunday, I asked for and thanked you for your prayers for priests—because there is a real battle involved in working for the good of souls. And if the devil can bring ruin to priests, well, that’s going to have an impact on parishes and families, isn’t it? 

But it’s not just priests, Vatican II says, all Christians are involved in this struggle, this battle. Facing such hostility and wickedness and personal demons, we recognize we need God. We need the Sacraments. We need prayer. We need the guidance of good solid Catholic teaching from our Pope and Bishops. If we are going to survive the battle with our souls intact, we need to make sure that we are drawing as much strength and protection and light from our faith as possible. 

And, this weekend, on this solemn feast, we look to the holy souls, the saints, the men and women and children, from every age, and place, and profession, who “survived the time of great distress," as St John calls this life on earth in our First Reading. The survivors, the spiritual war heroes, those who are glorified by God in eternity because of their Christian faith, hope, and love.

Contemplating these brothers and sisters in Christ encourages us: for if they can do it, so can we. I propose three short lessons on how the saints can be our teachers and guides. 

The first lesson is that the saints live with the destination in mind—they know what is at stake—that there is more to life than this earthly life. In the first reading, we get a glimpse of those saintly victors standing, robed in white in the heavenly throne room. In the presence of God stand this great multitude—people of every nation, race, and tongue, who have put on the wedding garment of Christ, who have been baptized, and have kept their faith amidst all the temptations and persecutions in this life—again, knowing what was at stake: in the end they would stand victorious in the heavenly throne room, or be banished from it for all eternity.

Why do we resist those terrible onslaughts of temptation? Why do we pray to remain faithful in the midst of persecution? Because heaven is at stake. Not only does sin diminish us—weaking our will and clouding our mind—it puts our souls at risk of hell. 

This first lesson is so important—because if we aren’t living with the destination in mind, we are likely to veer off the path—perhaps even forget there is path. There are many souls living this way--as if this earthly life was all that is—eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we shall die, and that’s it. And their souls are in danger. Because if you don’t live as if heaven exists in this life—why would anything be different in eternity?

So the saints remind us to live with the destination always on our minds. 

Secondly, it’s not enough to know the destination—you have to know where you are starting from—where you are, right now, spiritually, and who you are. If you can’t pinpoint yourself on the map—how do you know the direction in which you are to walk? 

And this is the second lesson: the saints understand who they are: they understand that they are human beings, with fallen natures due to sin in need of salvation. They know they need Christ. They know they need the Sacraments. They know they need prayer. 

And, they know that through baptism they have become Children of God. We read in our second reading: "See what love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called the children of God. Yet so we are." Children of God. Members of God's family. God’s love for us is so profound—we are gathered into his family through the blood of Christ. And the saints are animated by this profound self-knowledge. In whatever hostilities we face, whatever temptations: we do so as Children of God. 

The saints know that they were made for love, by the one who is love. Love animates us, love guides us, love fills us, love protects us. The saints recognize because they are loved they need to become love--loving God and neighbor in the concrete details of their life. 

And that’s the third Lesson. it is not enough just to know who we are and where we are supposed to be going, but we also need to know how to get there. In order to cross a lake, you need a boat. In order to cross a mountain, you need mountain gear. In order to get to heaven, the home of the saints, you need to practice saintliness, blessedness.

This is what today's Gospel passage reminds us of: the Beatitudes are the practices and attitudes that you and I must cultivate if we wish to join the saints. 

We must practice poverty of spirit—recognizing our fundamental need for God in all things. We must mourn for our sins—those lost opportunities to live for God. We must be meek—treating each other with gentleness. We must hunger and thirst for righteousness—seeking to justly give God what belongs to God and to treat our neighbor and the poor with the respect and fairness due to every living human person. We must not just be just but merciful—going beyond what is merely fair and just—but practicing true mercy to become a blessing for others. We must be clean of heart—turning away from anything impure, corrupt, perverted, vile, or selfish, in order to seek God through prayer and worship and divine contemplation. And we must keep the faith amidst persecution—in fact, if we are not living our faith in such away that the world hates us, we might not be really living the faith.

Live with the destination in mind, live with the humble knowledge that you are a sinner, reborn in baptism as a child of God, now called to strive to live the beatitudes in this life, that we may join the ranks of the blessed in eternity.

May the saints help us and preserve us for this our destiny, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

23rd Week in OT 2019 - Wednesday - September 11 and the Promise of Peace

Yesterday, I mentioned how the short letter to the Colossians is divided into two parts: the doctrinal and the practical. Well today’s reading begins Paul’s practical advice to the Christians of Colossae; and what practical advice does he give?

“Put to death, then, the parts of you that are earthly: immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and the greed that is idolatry…by these you once conducted yourself…but now you must put them all away…so put away anger fury, malice, slander, and obscene language out of your mouths.”

He doesn't begin with how they are to structure their community. He doesn't say what sort of charitable programs they are to offer. He begins with conversion. Putting sinful actions to death is a key to life. 

Though Christians have been raised up “in company with Christ” we know all too well how easy it is to fall back into the tendencies of the old nature, what Paul calls the “practices of the old self.” So, those sinful attitudes and tendencies have to be put to death over and over and over, lest they dominate our lives and reclaim our souls, and tear their community apart.

18 years ago, on September 11, 2001, the world evidenced what happens when those worldly powers have their way. Left to their own devices the world and the worldly are bent on self-destruction. Two smoldering heaps of ash and rubble is a perfect example of where immorality, fury, and malice leads.

Rather, Our Lord gives us the recipe for beatitude in the Gospels, to true fulfillment in union with God, the way to true, lasting and eternal peace. Jesus addresses in the beatitudes those who are poor, those who are weeping, those who are hungry, those who are insulted and excluded, and he promises that something better is possible through Him.

Through His help, through His Grace, and the grace of the Sacraments, may we seek what is above always, that beatitude the Lord desires for us, that he suffered and died to obtain for us, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That through Our Lady, Queen of Peace, terrorism and war, may be brought to an end.

That our civil representatives may use their authority to lead and build our nation in godly ways.

For all those who harden their hearts toward God, for those who have left the Church, for all those in serious sin, for their conversion and the conversion of all hearts.

For the sick and afflicted, the homebound, those in nursing homes and hospitals, for victims of natural disaster and inclement weather, those who suffer from war, violence, and terrorism, for the mentally ill, those with addictions, the imprisoned,  for the comfort of the dying and the consolation of their families.

For the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish and all the poor souls in purgatory, for deceased priests and religious, and for those who have fought and died for our freedom. We pray.

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.