Good Friday 2023 - Be hold the wood of the cross

 When visitors come to St. Ignatius, one of the things they often point out, is how the shadow cast by the cross in the main sanctuary here, remind them of the three crosses of Calvary on Good Friday. The two thieves crucified on the right and the left, with our Blessed Lord in the middle.

I do not know if this lighting trick was intentional, it was not part of the original design, for some of you may remember the baldachino that stood behind the high altar for…oh, about 80 years.

But the removal of the baldachino allowed for the placement of one of the most beautiful crucifixes in the diocese, if you ask me. 

The crucifix, the cross, is the great symbol of our faith. Many Catholics wear crosses and crucifixes around their necks, some of them simple gold or silver, some decorated with precious jewels. We hang crucifixes in our homes, some of us in every room. 

In a sense, this is a strange tradition. After all, the cross is an instrument of cruel torture - the cruelest torture perhaps ever invented by man: nails driven through the nerve bundles between the wrist and the palm of the hand, so every time the crucified moved - which he had to do if he wanted to keep breathing - the nails rubbed against the raw nerves and shot lightning pain through the body.

A cruel instrument of torture, and yet, wherever you go in the world, you will see crosses and crucifixes beautifully, exquisitely decorated with gold and jewels, adorning churches, crosses clutched tightly in moments of fear, sadness or held delicately by the pious to help direct their prayer.

Why adorn our crosses, why venerate them, why grip them so tightly?

It is certainly a reminder. The most important reminder of the most important truth: the very intensity of the suffering of the cross represents the ineffable intensity of love that God has for each one of us.

While dying on the cross, Jesus looks out at each one of us, whose sins have nailed him there, and he says: I forgive you, do not fear, come back to me, I want your friendship. 

This is why we reverence, we venerate, we kiss the cross today. For by doing so we kiss the heart of God, who forgives us…all sins.

The love shown on the cross, which is manifest for us today, embraces us in our sinfulness, and invites us to conform our hearts to his, to trust in Him, to follow in Christ's obedient footsteps, never fleeing from the vocation to which God has called us, so that we can deepen our communion with him and experience the fullness of life that comes from that communion.

Venerate the cross with all the love and contrition and gratitude you can muster today. Kiss it, bow your head to it, kneel before it. By doing so you express your faith, hope, and love in our crucified Savior, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

July 22 2020 - St. Mary Magdalene - Ardent love for Christ

It can be argued, that Mary Magdalene is the second-most important woman in the New Testament. Throughout the four Gospels, she is named 14 times, more than most of the apostles.  Yet, there is a lot of confusion about some of Mary Magdalene’s biographical information.

There is no scriptural evidence that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute.  Nor is she the woman to have washed the feet of Jesus, that was Mary of Bethany in John’s Gospel; St. Mark and Luke do tell us that the Lord had cast out of her “seven demons”.

Movies like The Last Temptation of Christ and Jesus Christ Superstar portray Mary of Magdala as young, beautiful and as having…romantic interest…in Jesus, and we won’t even go into what Dan Brown, author of The Davinci Code has to say about her.

Mary Magdalene was a woman of deep faith and ardent love for the Lord. Everything we know about her speaks of her love for Jesus. St. Luke tells us that she helped provide for the needs of Jesus and His apostles out of her resources (Lk 8:3).

She, unlike many of the apostles, followed the Lord all the way to Calvary, and stood at the foot of the cross with Jesus (Jn 19:25). On Easter Sunday, she went to the tomb, found it empty and began to weep, believing the Lord's body to have been stolen.  But the Lord had risen, as he said he would, and spoke her name, "Mary".  Faith and Love then impelled her to bring the news of the resurrection to the apostles.

That is the last we read of her in the Scriptures.

Though we can’t take everything in pious legend as historical fact, there is something of her spirituality that we do well to consider. There is a legend that Mary Magdalene who was present at the crucifixion meditated on the Lord’s sufferings every day for the rest of her life. Faith and love for her meant contemplating the depths of the Lord’s sufferings, his wounds, his “stripes by which we are healed” as Isaiah says.

Why did she do this? So that she might not take his suffering for granted. To love a person is to value what they suffer, especially what they suffer on our behalf. This is one of the most important lessons in all of Christianity. We cannot overvalue the sufferings of Our Lord—what he suffered for us poor sinners who did not deserve salvation. Love itself suffered immeasurably for the unlovable.

By coming to deeper appreciation for what he suffered, we seek to conform our lives to his, that our lives may reflect the gratitude his sufferings deserve for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That all Christians may seek to imitate the examples of the saints and grow in the virtues of faith, hope, and love.

For the demon-possessed and those hardened in sin, that they, through the intercession of St. Mary Magdalene, may know true deliverance and that young people  may be preserved from evil, and discover the great joy of loving and being loved by Christ.

That Christians may imitate the generosity of Mary Magdalene in providing for the needs of the mission of the Church.

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 human trafficking, natural disaster, war, and terrorism, for the unborn, 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.

Hear Our Prayers, O Lord, and through the intercession of St. Mary Magdalene, free us from all that keeps us from the love of Christ. Through the same Christ Our Lord.

3rd Week of Lent 2018 - Monday - The Cycle of Rejection

Very early on in his Public Ministry, Jesus returned to his home town of Nazareth, where word of his preaching and miracles in Capernaum proceeded him. We are familiar with the story of Jesus attending Synagogue, there in Nazareth, unrolling the scroll, and reading from the prophet Isaiah, “the spirit of the Lord is upon me, he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor, liberty to captives, recovery of sight to the blind, freedom for the oppressed.” His townsfolk began to speak highly of him, they no doubt were excited about the prospect of receiving these blessings, and receiving healings from Jesus.

The townspeople of Nazareth were surely happy to welcome home the local-boy-made-good, drawing praise across the synagogues of Galilee. However, when it came to actually choosing to believe that he was the Messiah, admiration quickly turned into violence.

Jesus detected their hardheartedness and began to preach about how Israel often rejects its authentic prophets who call them to conversion and faithfulness to the covenant.

These events at Nazareth foreshadow the events leading up to the Lord’s passion. Relative openness to Jesus’ healings and teachings, turn into opposition, as Jesus is rejected by many of His own people, who succeed in having Him put to death on the Hill of Calvary.

We can smugly condemn the townsfolk of Nazareth, but I think this Gospel calls us to acknowledge the times when we have become like them.

This pattern, this cycle, reveals a truth of our fallen human nature. We love blessings, we love healings, we love when God fits into our conception of Him, we love when he doesn’t demand much of us. And how we hate change, conversion, being led out of our comfort zones in order to grow in faith.

Here is certainly a reminder to persevere in our Lenten observances, that just because they grow difficult at Lent progresses, doesn’t mean we should reject them. And here is also a reminder that the Christian life is aimed at our conversion from comfortable familiarity to apostolic witness that takes us out of our comfort zone in order to bring the Gospel to others.

Our Lenten penances prepare us to perhaps be rejected like Christ, to risk embarrassment, rejection from family, even to face apparent failure in the eyes of the world, but to remain faithful to God nonetheless, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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For the whole Christian people, that in this sacred Lenten season, they may be more abundantly nourished by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

For the whole world, that in lasting tranquility and peace our days may truly become the acceptable time of grace and salvation.

For sinners and those who neglect right religion, that in this time of reconciliation they may return wholeheartedly to Christ.

For ourselves, that God may at last stir up in our hearts aversion for our sins and conviction for the Gospel.

For all who have died, and for all the poor souls in purgatory, and for X. for whom this Mass is offered.

Grant, we pray, O Lord, that your people may turn to you with all their heart, so that whatever they dare to ask in fitting prayer they may receive by your mercy.