5th Sunday of Lent 2025 - (Third Scrutiny) - Raising of Lazarus

 

Two weeks ago, we heard the story of the woman at the well.  She encountered the Lord Jesus, who said to her, “I will give you living water, which alone can satisfy”.  She represents all of us, all thirsting for God. Jesus invites all people of all time to drink deeply of the living waters of God through Him.

Last week we heard of the man born blind.  Again, he is all of us, born in the blindness of sin.  We desire to do good and avoid evil, but it’s not always easy to see clearly. Sometimes our egos and our sinful attachments are so great, they blind us to seeing how God wants us to live rightly. Jesus says to the man born blind and to all of us, “I am the light of the world.”  If you want to see rightly, let the light of Christ and His teachings enlighten you.

These stories in John’s Gospel move toward a sort of crescendo. I am living water which quenches thirst. I am the light by which you see. And today Jesus says, “I am the resurrection and the life.” He’s not just water, He’s not just light. He is Life itself. And he desire that His life might animate us in this life, that it might sustain us through death, and animate us in all eternity, including the resurrection.

One of my favorite quotations from the early Church fathers is from St. Ireneus of Lyons, who said, Gloria Dei Homo Vivens, “the glory of God is Man fully alive.”  Jesus himself said, I came that they might have life, and have it to abundance. Christ died, that we may live, free from sin, full of divine life.  God’s glory, what gives God happiness, is that we are fully alive.  Conversely, what saddens the heart of God is when we allow death to reign in us at any level: physically, emotionally, or spiritually.  Sin diminishes us, God restores life.

Next, week, on Palm Sunday, we’ll come to understand the price the Lord pays to defeat the powers of death in us. But on this fifth Sunday of Lent, we’re invited to consider how the Lord commands us to live.

Today, our three catechumens present themselves for the last of the three scrutinies. They do so because they want to live and they recognize that Jesus is the resurrection and the life. So, you’ll notice in the scrutiny prayers many references to life, being restored to life and raised to life, like Lazarus in our Gospel today.

We heard in our first reading about God’s desire to free us from the powers of the grave: “I will open your graves and have you rise from them…I will put my spirit in you that you may live, and I will settle you upon your land” we heard in our first reading.

Our three Catechumens will receive the gift of new life in Baptism this Easter Vigil. They have heard that same promise that God made to Israel all those centuries ago, the promise of life, and through prayer and fasting and study have opened themselves to the fulfillment of that promise in them. Thanks be to God. They have heard the Lord calling them to come out of their tombs, like Lazarus. Thanks be to God.

Why follow Jesus Christ? Why seek baptism and faithfulness to him? The promise of being raised from the dead is a pretty good reason. Living forever in God’s kingdom of peace is a pretty good reason. And it’s not just an empty promise--the promise of some delusional California cult leader.

Resurrection: it’s really the ultimate argument against anyone who says all religions are the same. No. They aren’t. Show me a member of another religion who not only raised the dead but also rose from the dead.

“I will open your graves and have you rise from them. Here the Lord is not just speaking of the promise of rising from our graves on the last day, when he returns. The grave is also wherever the powers of sin and evil and death reign in us still: an addiction, a habitual sin, an inability or unwillingness to forgive, anger and bitterness, perversion, fear of leaving behind the comfortable to follow Christ more devoutly, lack of fervor for the spiritual life…the grave is whatever limits the life of God in you. Think of laying in a grave, there is no place to move, you are constricted, unable to move, tied up, and God says, from your graves, I will have you rise up.” 

In the Gospels, we have not one story, but three stories of Jesus raising the dead. We just heard the story of Lazarus; can you think of the other two? The first one is the daughter of Jairus. Remember the little girl who died in her home when Jesus was on the way to heal her?  The second is the son of the widow of Naim.  Jesus sees the widow weeping as they brought out the body of her son, and Jesus is moved to raise him from the dead.

St. Augustine offered a spiritual reading of these three encounters with the dead.

Because Jairus’ daughter dies inside her house, St. Augustine says that her death symbolizes the sort of spiritual death that remains locked up in us—the sort of sins that poisons us from the inside: the resentments, the old grudges.  They aren’t necessarily expressed in words or actions, they just sort of fester within us, poisoning our thoughts, and our wills, and our imagination.  These are the sins we do in private—though no sin is private to God, of course. Jesus raises this little girl, just as he wants to heal us from all of our interior sinful attitudes.

Secondly, the son of the widow of Naim.  He had died and was being carried outside the house to the cemetery. St. Augustine says, he symbolizes the sins that have begun to express themselves in action.  When the interior anger and resentment, selfishness and lust bubble over in words of actions. But Jesus forgives these too.

The third person Jesus raises from the dead, his friend Lazarus.  Lazarus had been carried out of the house and placed in a tomb.  By the time Jesus gets there, Lazarus has been in the tomb for four days.  His sister, famously says, when Jesus instructs them to roll away the stone that blocks the tomb, “but Lord, surely, there will be a stench.”

St. Augustine says that Lazarus in his grave, symbolizes that evil, that spiritual death, that not only has come out of the heart in words and actions, but has established itself as a habitual.  Now, the anger, the hatred, the violence, the lust, have taken root, and have become such a part of my life and my activity, that, like Lazarus in the tomb, there is a stench, and it’s affecting the people around me.  That anger, addiction, selfishness or lust now affects the well-being of the family. Neighbors begin to avoid us because of our stench.

Jesus is of course able to heal those sins too, but like the others, there must be confession, there must be acknowledgement that these sins exist in me, and that I need a savior.

May we have the humility and honesty to recognize the need to be raised by Jesus, healed by Jesus, that we may truly live with him for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

3rd Sunday of Lent 2025 (C) - Burning Bush and the Fig Tree

 

Each Sunday of Lent, our first readings lead us to consider the different stages of salvation history. Last week, remember we read from the book of Genesis of God making a covenant with Abraham. And God foretold how Abraham’s descendants would go down to Egypt, and there they would become numerous, until God led them out of Egypt into the Land of Canaan, the promised land.

This week’s first reading takes places about 400-450 years later, and it has come to pass jut as God said it would: Abraham’s decedents had indeed become very numerous in Egypt, so much so that Pharoah begins killing off the little boys. Under the tyranny of Pharoah God’s people cried out for deliverance. And so, our first reading today describes Moses receiving this task from God to lead the descendants of Abraham out of slavery.

Now Moses, wasn’t a political leader or a soldier, rather he had occupation of a shepherd, an occupation so despised by the Egyptians that Egyptians would not even eat with such men. In the midst of Moses’ lowly existence, God reveals himself to Moses and gives Moses this monumental task.

And, initially, as you might expect, Moses is reluctant and hesitant. He doesn’t speak well, he’s just a shepherd, he has the respect of neither Egyptian or Israelite. But what fills Moses with confidence is when God reveals his name. From the burning bush, God reveals himself to Moses: “I am who am” in other words, “I am the One truly existent One.” The one true God is with you Moses, don’t be afraid of Egypt, don’t be afraid of your own limitations. I AM with you.

Have any of you ever had a burning bush moment? Where either at mass, or in quiet prayer, or at a retreat, or at a festival of praise, you have an undeniable experience of God’s presence. You know you are in the presence of the Great I AM. And that fills you with confidence? I know many priests who received such a grace, and they became secure in their vocation—confident in their calling—upon experiencing an extraordinary encounter with God.

To be honest, I’m not sure everyone gets those. Yes, all of us are able to encounter God in the sacraments. Jesus Christ is truly present in the Eucharist. He’s present in the proclamation of the Word. But God’s presence, in the sacraments is veiled. We know he is present through faith, but, again, I’m not sure every gets burning bush experiences in this life time. Many of us simply need to walk by faith, not by sight.

But if you have received some sort of Burning Bush experience of God, know that you like Moses have a task to fulfill. That experience isn’t just for you. You have a task to help those who haven’t to believe and to walk in the ways of the Lord. To bear fruit that will last.

So God reveals himself to Moses at the burning bush. Fast forward about 1500 years to our Gospel this weekend. And Jesus tells a parable about a very different type of plant, not a burning bush, but a fig tree.

In the parable, a landowner has planted a fig tree in his orchard, expecting fruit. After three years of disappointment, the landowner decides it should be cut down. Yet, the gardener steps in with compassion and hope, pleading for patience: “Leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future. If not, you can cut it down.”

This parable was being directed to the religious leaders of the day who claimed to be spokesmen of God. Jesus was critical of them because they were not bearing fruit. They were not helping God’s people strive for authentic holiness and they certainly weren’t helping people believe that God was in their midst in the person of Jesus. So the Lord foretells how they will be cut down, like a barren fig tree, if they don’t start bearing fruit for the kingdom of God.

But, the parable is not only directed to the religious leaders of Jesus’ day of course, the parable is also directed at all of us. We were all made by God to bear spiritual fruit. St. Paul, in his Letter to the Galatians, clearly identifies these fruits as love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. The fruits of our faith hope and love are to be seen in our lives.

But, we don’t always bear the fruit we are supposed to, do we? Our struggle with sin, our laziness, causes us to bear less fruit, or no fruit. Many people, even some baptized Christians are essentially fruitless because they walk the way of the world rather than the way of Christ. Prayer has been replaced with entertainment, fasting has been replaced with indulgence and decadence. Almsgiving has been replaced with seeking happiness in material things. Repentance has been replaced with convincing themselves that they don’t need God or the Church to be good people or go to heaven.

Now, the image of the gardener in the parable reminds us that God is very patient with us. In his mercy, God gives us many opportunities to repent and believe in the Gospel.

However, The message of the parable is clear: the fig tree is not given infinite time. The patient gardner says, “we’re going to try to cultivate the ground, fertilize the tree, but if it doesn’t bear fruit, you can cut it down.”

There is a practical limit to the time that we have been given on this earth to repent and bear fruit, a window of grace. There is an urgency to Jesus’ message. It is not enough simply to go through life with an essentially dead and faithless relationship with Jesus. We are to cooperate with the gardener as best we can—to cultivate our souls—so that we can bear the fruit God desires us to bear.

So again, here is the Lenten call to get serious about prayer, fasting, almsgiving and repentance from sin. This is the cultivation God wants for us in this season.

Like Moses, we are called to move from hesitation to boldness, from complacency to action, trusting that God will help us in the path he has set before us for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

 

3rd Week of Easter 2021 - Tuesday (School Mass) - Jesus is the bread of life

 All of this week, our Gospel readings are taken from the sixth chapter of Saint John’s Gospel. Earlier in the chapter, Jesus performs the great miracle of the multiplication of the loaves. People had followed him out into the desert, far from their homes, they were starving, and so Jesus performs a miracle to feed them. From just a few loaves of bread, Jesus feeds 5000 people. There was so much bread left over after his miracle, that the leftover filled 12 large baskets.

If Jesus can satisfy 5000 people with just a few loaves, imagine what he can do with all the bread of the world, if we but dedicated it to him. If we took all of our possessions, all of the goods of the world, and consecrated them to Jesus and his purposes. If we were less selfish with our things and gave them to God, how much more peace would we enjoy!

In today’s Gospel the people were asking for a sign so they could believe that Jesus was really sent by God. People aren’t just hungry for physical food, they are hungry for the food of heaven. They are hungry for the things that the world cannot supply: true peace, true joy, eternal life, truth and goodness. Politics and government can’t give us these things. Science and technology cannot grant them. As much as they try, they cannot. But we know we long for these things, so where will they come from?

And Jesus says, the world cannot grant these things, but my Father can.  Peace and truth and eternal life: this is the food my father gives, this is the food I’ve come to give. And the people respond, Jesus, give us this heavenly bread. And what does Jesus say? “I am that bread”.

You want peace, you want joy, you want eternal life, you want your life to be filled with truth, and goodness, and beauty, go to Jesus to be fed. Come to Jesus to be fed. Believe and follow Jesus. Becomes his disciple. Walk in his truth. Follow his teachings. Pray to him. Ask his help. Ask him, like the people in the Gospel, “Sir, give us this heavenly bread. Give us this bread, always.”

In the words of the Psalm “Be my rock of refuge” Jesus. “A stronghold to give me safety.” Jesus. Be my rock and my fortress” Jesus. “For your name’s sake lead me and guide me Jesus” for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

 

Filled with Paschal joy, let us turn earnestly to God, to graciously hear our prayers and supplications.

For Pope Francis, all bishops and priests, that they may have the strength to govern wisely the flock entrusted to them by the Good Shepherd.

That the peoples of the world may turn to God as the source of all true and lasting peace.

That the parish and school of St. Ignatius of Antioch, may bear witness with great confidence to the Resurrection of Jesus.

For those experiencing any kind of hardship or sorrow, isolation, addiction, or illness: may they experience the good graces that come from Jesus’ Paschal Victory. Let us pray to the Lord.

That all of our beloved dead and all the souls in purgatory may come to the glory of the Resurrection.

O God, you know that our life in this present age is subject to suffering and need, hear the desires of those who cry to you and receive the prayers of those who believe in you. Through Christ our lord.

5th Week of Lent 2019 - Tuesday - Jesus reveals God's love

"When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I AM”

Like the bronze serpent which was salvation for those who looked on it in that first reading, Jesus lifted up on the cross becomes salvation for all who look on him in faith.

What a strange utterance by Jesus, though. Upon the cross, we will realize that Jesus is God. To the ancient sentimentality and to ours, the cross was a sign of defeat. To the worldly minded, what better sign to prove that Jesus is not God. Look at his blood. Look at his suffering. Look at his death. How is that Godlike? How is a man, bloodied, beaten, and crucified, a sign of God, and not just a sign, but the sign par excellence.

Why does the cross, more than any of Jesus’ miracles, more than any of his teachings, show us God? Because it is upon the cross that Jesus shows us that God is radical self-giving love. He is not simply a God of strength who has the power to crush his enemies with brute strength.  He is not simply a God of wisdom who can outsmart his opponents. He’s not like the Gods of the Romans and the Greeks are essentially unconcerned with the affairs of mortals. God is Love, St. John says. And not love in the human erotic sense, or even the strong emotional bonds of family or country.

God is self-giving love. And it is upon the cross where that is most evident in the life of Jesus. “There is no greater love than one who lays down his life for his friends”.

And this is what Lent has been preparing us for: All the Lenten practices of helping us to be attentive to the needs of others, willingly undergoing penances so that we are not so afraid of suffering. So that we, like Him, can give away our lives in self-giving. The measure of holiness is our willingness to give of ourselves. Meaning in life is discovered, God is discovered, not in gaining possessions, having control over our peers, but in giving of ourselves in self-sacrifice for the good of others. This is a fundamental dimension of human salvation: being saved from selfishness by embracing self-donation.

May we look to Jesus, and so the merciful self-giving face of God, may we see him and believe in him and follow him unto the cross, unto death, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
 
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That the Church will experience the graces of profound renewal during this season of Lent.  That we may grow in our eagerness in spreading the Gospel of Christ.

That all Christian families will recommit themselves to putting Christ at the center of their family life, so as to grow in faith, hope, and love.  We pray to the Lord.

For an end to abortion and for the reverence and protection of human life.  We pray to the Lord.
For the young people of our Church. May they be strengthened to be witnesses to the Gospel of mercy and work for a future that embodies a genuine culture of life.

For those preparing to enter the Church at Easter: that they will be profoundly blessed in their preparation for full initiation into the Body of Christ.  We pray to the Lord.

For the needs of the poor, the hungry, the homeless, those who are sick, unemployed, or suffering from addiction, mental, or physical illness, imprisoned, and those most in need: that the Lord in his goodness will be close to them in their trials.  We pray to the Lord.

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

Mercifully hear, O Lord, the prayers of your Church and turn with compassion to the hearts that bow before you, that those you make sharers in your divine mystery may always benefit from your assistance.

Wednesday after Epiphany 2019 - Take Courage, I AM

Throughout Epiphany Week, the Gospel readings seem to emphasize the special identity of the Christ Child born at Christmas and adored by the magi at the Epiphany.  Monday we heard of him healing the sick, the paralyzed, the possessed.  Yesterday, we heard of him feeding five thousand with loaves and fishes.  Today, we hear of his mastery over the very powers of nature, the powers of creation—he walks on water.  He does what no man has ever done before.

At the sight of Jesus walking on the water, they thought it was a ghost, a phantasma, in the Greek. Why’d they think this? Living people typically don’t walk on water. St. Mark says, they were terrified at the sight, in fact, the Greek word there is anekraxan—they let out shrieks of terror.

But, their terror is transformed into complete astonishment when Jesus utters the words no good Jew would ever use to describe himself, in the Greek “Ego Eimi” I AM. Take Courage, I AM…Where in scripture do we find those holy words? At the burning Bush, when God revealed his divine name: I AM!  The Lord’s words here echo the divine words of consolation in the prophet Isaiah: “Fear not, I am with you; be not dismayed, I am your God”

The child born at Christmas is identified with the mighty God of the universe who is greater than our deepest fears. In the Gospel of Mark, it takes a while for the disciples to fully grasp who Jesus is, for them to allow Him to transform their fear into courage. Even at the end of this passage, Mark tells us, they didn’t understand his words, and even hardened their hearts.

It is not until Jesus’ great love is fully manifested upon the cross, in Mark’s Gospel, that terror, astonishment, misunderstanding, and fear, are fully transformed into courage for the spread of the Gospel. This is echoed in our first reading, when St. John tells us that “perfect love casts out fear.”
Christmas time, in which we are still engaged, urges us to reflect upon how the incarnation is part of the story of God’s great love for us, how God entered into a terrifying world, a world that hates him and is hostile toward him, in order to save us from hate, and fear, and sin, and death, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.
 
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That our Holy Father and all the clergy may be filled with courage in preaching the full Gospel, especially in the face of opposition.
That Christians may know the presence and love of God when faced with fear and suffering for the sake of the Gospel.
That those who despair of God’s love for them, might discover the great love that casts out all fear.
For all who have fallen away from the Church, for those in mortal sin, for their conversion and the conversion of all hearts to Christ.
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

5th Week of Lent 2018 - Thursday - Jesus Christ is the Great I AM

Christians believe that Jesus is “True God and True Man”, he is “fully God” and “fully human.” We also know that the instances where Jesus clearly proclaims his divinity are rather rare in the pages of the New Testament. But, on this Thursday of the 5th week of Lent, as Holy Week looms ever closer, we have one of those instances.

Jesus had come to Jerusalem for the Feast of Tabernacles—a feast celebrating the abundance of God’s mercy. Having Himself just displayed God’s abundant mercy in the story of the woman caught in adultery, Jesus stands before a group of fellow Jews. Jesus teaches that same God who abundantly forgives the sins of the contrite, those committing to “going and sinning no more”, has sent Him to be a light for the world, “those who follow Him shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.”

Then we hear today, the clear and undeniable teaching, “before Abraham was, I AM.” Jesus identifies himself as the very same God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the very same God who appeared to Moses at the burning bush, the God of creation, the God of Israel.

Even though many Jews had come to believe in His divine mission, they only saw him as a human being, a prophet. His claim of equality with God, to them was blasphemous. And so, following the dictates of Levitical law, they picked up stones to drive Him from their midst.

During these final days of Lent, we show our belief that not only is Jesus a man who suffers for God’s will, as all of us are called to do, he is God with the power to save us from our sins, to heal broken hearts and broken lives. We prepare, during Lent, through our penances, to stand with the newly initiated at Easter, to acknowledge that it is through God’s mercy that we have come to believe that Jesus Christ is “True God, and True Man.” May our Lenten penances help us to deepen our conviction that “those who keep His Word shall never see death” and to strengthen our conviction for solemnly declaring to all the nations that Jesus Christ is Lord and God, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That God may be pleased to increase faith and understanding in the catechumens and candidates who approach the sacraments of initiation in the coming Paschal Solemnity.

That those in need may find assistance in the charity of faithful Christians and that peace and security may be firmly established in all places.

For strength to resist temptation, and the humility to sincerely repent of sin.

That through fasting and self-denial, we may be ever more conformed to Christ.

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

Mercifully hear, O Lord, the prayers of your Church and turn with compassion to the hearts that bow before you, that those you make sharers in your divine mystery may always benefit from your assistance.