Funeral Homily: Florence Harnist - Joy in Adversity

My dear friends in Christ, Jean & Mary Ann and all of Florence’s close family and friends, please know of the prayers and sympathy of the priests, staff, and parishioners of St. Clare Parish.  We pray and mourn with you. May the presence of Christ and his Church bring you comfort and peace.

At the death of a loved one, the funeral rites of the Church gather us as a family of faith for a number of reasons: to be comforted in our time of grief, to pray in thanksgiving for the life and lessons of our dear departed loved one, and also to pray in supplication for their eternal soul.

We seek to be comforted because there is real sorrow at the loss of one loved so much. Whether death is expected or unexpected, sadness fills us because we will miss our loved one, the world and our lives will be different without them.  We grieve, as the old proverb says because it is human to do so.  Yet, the full proverb states: grieve because it is human, hope because it is Christian.

For Christians, grieving the death of a loved one is always met by Christian hope. And our readings at this funeral Mass speak of our hope. Our hope that one, like Florence, who exhibited so much justice, so much faith, is making her way into the hands of God where no torment shall touch her. Our second reading, spoke too of hope.  Saint John in his mysterious book of revelation describes the new heaven and a new earth in which the faithful will dwell forever after our bodily resurrection.  This glimpse into eternal life gives us hope, for Florence and for ourselves.

This is why St. Paul says, Christians do not grieve like the rest of the world who have no hope.  At the death of a Christian, we do so much more than simply eulogize and speak about what has passed.  We gather in prayer to express our hope of what is yet to come.

Yet, at the death of a loved one, we also have a very holy impulse to give thanks to God and to speak well of our loved ones.  As I met with Mary Ann & Jean yesterday, they described their mother Florence as a gentle women, friendly, “easy to love,” young at heart, yet also a woman of great faith.

In Florence’s case, I do not believe this to be a simple platitude.  When I visited her back in October, to bring her the refreshment of the sacrament of anointing, I remember her telling me about the power of prayer.  “Never underestimate the power of prayer” she said.  This was coming from a woman who in her 102 years, had suffered from a serious bleeding ulcer, colon cancer, bladder cancer, a heart attack.  No doubt her faith brought her so much strength in great adversities of her life. 

Florence had a book of spiritual reflections which contained signs of constant meditation, called “My Daily Bread”, and inside its front cover was a saying by St. Francis de Sales, one of the great spiritual masters: “Do not worry about tomorrow, for the same everlasting Lord who cares for you today will take care of you tomorrow and everyday. Either he will shield you from suffering or give you unfailing strength to sustain it. Be at peace then and put aside all anxious thoughts and imaginings.”

Here is a woman who did not allow anxiety to diminish her strength.  A bookmark, a holy card from Eucharistic Adoration chapel hear at St. Clare, marked a chapter within Florence’s daily devotional, titled “Joy in Adversity.”  Florence had highlighted several paragraphs. Listen to these words which must have touched Florence deeply: “You too would find joy in adversity if you exercised more faith, more humility, more patience, more love for Me, instead of favoring yourself so much. If you had even a passing glimpse of the indescribable glory of Heaven, you would no longer seek what is pleasant and satisfying on earth. You would easily admit that all earthly trials and sufferings are small in comparison with the heavenly reward. Never again would you complain in time of adversity.”

Nourished by constant meditation, daily Mass when she was able, frequent reception of communion in her illness, Florence strived to live a virtuous life.  In this she is an example to us all.  If any of you have perhaps fallen away from the practice of the faith, I could think of no greater honor or tribute to Florence, than to make a good confession, and return to the practice of the faith by coming to the altar every Sunday for the rest of your lives.

We pray today that Florence, we lift her up at this altar, to which she came so often with her family, that she may receive all the grace and strength and purification she may need in order to enter that place prepared for her in heaven.  And also to remember that for faithful Christians there are no final goodbyes.  We look forward to that day, when Christ returns in glory, when those who died in communion with Him shall be raised to everlasting life in the resurrection.  We look forward of being reunited with Florence and her late husband Edward, and all of our loved ones on that day of glory, when the love of Christ destroys death forever and gathers the faithful home to God’s eternal kingdom of peace.

Homily: Friday after Epiphany 2016 - Cleansed of sins leprosy

We are situated this week between the last two great feasts of the Christmas season: the feast of the Epiphany, last Sunday, and the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, in just a few days.  The early Church saw the Baptism of the Lord as a second Epiphany in the life of Our Lord.  Where in the first Epiphany, Jesus was revealed as the Savior, not just for Israel, but for the entire world.  This Sunday, we will hear how, as Jesus is baptized in the Jordan, the Holy Spirit descending in the form of a dove, and the voice of the Father speaking from heaven manifest, and reveal Jesus to not only be savior, but the second person of the Holy Trinity.

Our Gospel reading today reveals something about the Lord, while at the same time preparing us for the feast of the baptism this Sunday.  The healing of the leper reveals that Jesus does not recoil from our sins, but draws near, “he does wish to make us clean”.  There is no sin so heinous that the Lord will not gladly forgive us, make us clean, when we come to him with a repentant heart.

Today’s reading prepares us to celebrate the Lord’s Baptism, in which he calls all of mankind to come to the waters to be cleansed of the Leprosy of Sin, where we also come to share in the divine nature of Christ who was in no need of baptism, but was baptized to show us the way to salvation.

Listen to the words St. Leo the great delivers to a group of Christians who were newly baptized: “Christian, remember your dignity! Now that you share in God’s own nature, do not return by sin to your former base condition. Bear in mind who is your head and of whose body you are a member. Do not forget that you have been rescued from the power of darkness and brought into the light of God’s kingdom. Through the sacrament of baptism you have become a temple of the Holy Spirit. Do not drive away so great a guest by evil conduct and become again a slave to the devil, for your liberty was bought by the blood of Christ.”

What beautiful and edifying words, which encourage us to remember who we are.  We are the leper who has been made clean through baptism.  We’ve been given a new chance at life.  Whenever we are tempted to despair because of life’s misfortunes, we can simply call to mind our baptism—that I have been cleansed in order to walk as a child of the light. 

As we come to the end of the Christmas season and the feast of the Baptism, we do well to reflect on the great awesomeness of our own baptism, that we may celebrate that feast with joy and thanksgiving, and live out our baptism with renewed fervor and conviction for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

Homily: Thursday after Epiphany 2016 - Light, Life, and Love

We have been reading, on these weekdays after the epiphany from the first letter of St. John.  Here is another one of those wonderful books of scripture we would all do well to read in its entirety in one sitting, like the original audience would have heard it. 

Although there were many early Christian leaders who bore the name John, major ancient authorities like Irenaeus, Clement, Origen, and Tertullian, were substantially unanimous in ascribing the authorship of this letter to the Beloved Disciple, the one who laid his head on the breast of Christ at the Last Supper, the one who stood at the cross with the Blessed Mother, John the Apostle. The high number of parallels and echoes between the language of this epistle and John’s Gospel adds further weight to this claim. 

The original audience of this letter was probably the Christian community in or around Ephesus, the city where John took the Blessed Mother into his care.  Nevertheless, this letter speaks to every Christian in every time and place.

The fundamental theme of John’s letter is what it means to have a relationship with God, to be in union with God, sharing God’s life through Jesus Christ.  John uses three terms to describe God and the life of God that Christians share through Christ: light, life, and love.  “If you love the Father, you are a child of the father” we heard today.  “God sent his only-begotten Son into the world so that we might have life through him” we heard Tuesday.  Early in the letter he writes, “God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all… But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, then we have fellowship with one another.” 

Light, life, and love: these are the three things everyone in the world needs and wants more of.  There opposites, falsehood, death and hate, are the worst things in the world. Most everyone in the world wants to avoid these things, but not everyone knows how.  John tells us that Jesus is the answer to that question.  If you want the fulfillment of your deepest desires—deepen your relationship with Christ.  Love Him, Walk in his light, and you will share his life.

His commandments are not burdensome, John tells us today, for when we fellow His commandments, and walk by the light of his faith, his victory over falsehood, death, and hate will dwell within us; his victory will be our strength.

We continue our Christmas celebration of the birth of the savior, seeking to be liberated, delivered, and freed from all that keeps us from loving him as we should, walking in his light, and sharing his life, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

Homily: Jan 06 2016 - St. John Nuemann - The witness of brotherly love

Although he was born in Bohemia in 1811, in what is now the Czech Republic, John Nepomucene Neumann is celebrated as an American saint.  After studying in Prague, John Neumann came to New York at the age of 25 and was ordained a priest just three weeks later.  After several years of working among German speaking immigrants, often alone, he joined the Redemptorist community, the missionary community founded by St. Alphonsis Ligouri.  As a gifted linguist who spoke 8 languages, he was a popular preacher among the many immigrant communities, in Maryland, Virginia, even here in Ohio.

By age 41 he had become the fourth bishop of Philadelphia where he organized the parochial schools there into a diocesan system. 

Today’s opening prayer refers to three tasks accomplished by Saint John Neumann which we hope to accomplish by the help of his prayers.  1) To foster the Christian education of youth, 2) to strengthen the witness of brotherly love, and 3) to constantly increase the family of the Church.

Like Saint John Neumann, all of us are to foster the Christian education of youth.  Almost 50,000 children in this diocese attend Catholic schools, and at least that same number are educated in parish PSR programs.  But the number of children attending weekly Mass is abysmal.  We face a very difficult battle in winning the hearts of these children away from the culture, and that is the task of every Catholic. If there is a young person in our family not going to Church, each of us should ask ourselves, what can I do to get them to the altar.

Secondly, we must give “the witness of brotherly love”.  Non-Catholics and weak-faithed Catholics should look at us and say in the words of Tertullian, “look how they love each other”.  The brotherly love we have for each other, the charity, the kindness, the patience we have for each other is to attract others to our way of life—the way of Christ. 

And the third task exemplified by John Neumann to increase the family of the Church.  Again not just the work of priests, not just the work of bishops, but the work of the entire church, to continue to draw souls to Christ.  And that is only possible, when we have truly been drawn to Him, when we have left behind all worldliness, when we have sought him with the entirety of our being.

May Bishop Neumann, “renowned for his charity and pastoral service” spurn us on to holiness through the service of the Gospel of Christ, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

Homily: Jan 4 2016 - St. Elizabeth Ann Seton - A life changed by kindness

Two hundred years ago, Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton founded the Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph, the first new community for religious women to be established in the United States.  Her new community would also staff the first free Catholic School for girls in this country.  1000s of women over the last two hundred years have dedicated their lives through consecrated service in Mother Seton’s religious communities, and 10s of thousands have been educated, cared for, served in her hundreds of schools, social service centers, and hospitals throughout this country and throughout the world.

Who was this remarkable woman who impacted the history of our nation so profoundly? Elizabeth Seton was born, not a Catholic, but was the daughter of a very wealthy Episcopalian family from Manhattan New York.  She married a wealthy businessman at the age of 19, and raised 5 children in wealthy New York social circles.  A dispute between the United States and the French Republic led to a series of attacks on American shipping. The loss of several of her husband's ships led William Seton into bankruptcy, and the Setons lost their home in lower Manhattan.  Through most of their married life, William Seton suffered from tuberculosis. The stress worsened his illness and he died in 1803.

When all seemed lost—widowed, destitute, Elizabeth was taken in by an Italian family who had worked with her husband.  This good Italian family introduced Elizabeth to Roman Catholicism. Despite stern opposition from her Episcopalian friends, Elizabeth was received into the Catholic Church on March 4, 1805. 

Here’s a woman who became Catholic and ultimately a saint because she was treated with great kindness by Catholics at a moment of great tragedy—by ordinary Catholics who were simply living their faith with deep devotion to the Eucharist and the Blessed Virgin.

Friends, we must never underestimate the power of living our faith and reaching out in kindness to those in need.  Because of that family of Italian Catholics, probably immigrants, thousands and thousands of people would be served, educated, and cared for through the charity of Mother Seton and her religious communities. 

Elizabeth Seton was the first person native to American soil to be canonized, and she wasn’t raised a Catholic, but she was cared for by Catholics, evangelized by ordinary Catholics and their love for the Eucharist and Mary.

God can do extraordinary things through our small acts of kindness and through our simple faith.  May St. Elizabeth Ann Seton help all of us to serve God in our daily service with sincere faith for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

Homily: Epiphany 2016 - Bringing gifts for worship

In keeping with the ancient practice, following the proclamation of the Epiphany Gospel, I just chanted the announcement of Easter and the Movable Feasts for this liturgical year. 

As the Magi made procession to honor the Christ child, the Church announces on the Feast of the Epiphany the procession of liturgical feasts throughout the year.  Sunday after Sunday and on the other Holy Days of Obligation the Church does exactly what the magi did that first Christmas, guided by the revelation of God, we journey to worship Christ. And, as the wise men offered gold, frankincense and myrrh, we off ourselves to Him. 

The Church Fathers saw the gifts of the Magi as symbols pointing to Christ’s true identity. St. Ireneus says the gift of gold signifies the Kingship, the royalty of Christ.  Frankincense is used in worshipping God and points to Jesus’ divinity.  And Myrrh is a burial ointment, pointing to the humanity of Christ, who would suffer and die for our salvation.

There is another tradition saying that the gifts of the magi are gifts that each Christian is called to make to God. St. Gregory the Great said the gold represents the wisdom of God and the teaching of Christ by which we are to walk.  The Frankincense is the prayer and adoration we are to give to Him.  Myrrh is our daily sacrifice to the Lord. Daily sacrifice needs to be made to God too, as Paul says, in Romans 12, offer your minds and bodies as living sacrifices to God. 

After coming to worship the Lord, and offering him their gifts, St. Matthew tells us how the Magi returned to their homes by another route.  I always think of Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen who said, of course they left by another route, no one encounters Christ and leaves the same. Encountering Christ changes us.  Every time we go to Mass, or make the Holy Hour, or encounter Christ through Scripture, or in serving Him in the poor, that should change us, so we go home different person.

No doubt the Magi would spread the good news of the savior’s birth. So in this feast we see a sort of model of the Christian life: we are drawn by God to Christ, we bring him our best, we offer him our lives, and after encountering him, we are propelled out into the world to spread the good news about him until it is time to return back to the altar to offer our worship again.

Now most of us are not involved in any formal evangelization: most of us aren’t called by God to go to a foreign land to spread the Gospel. But that doesn’t mean we are exempt from the mission to evangelize. Rather, most of our evangelizing is really done from the home.  People come to know Christ through our hospitality, the ways our families come together for prayer, for study.  The way that spouses and children love each other, and forgive each other, and our generous with each other, and pray with one another really is one of the primary ways the Church spreads the Gospel.  The world shall know we are Christian by our love.

Since much of our evangelizing takes place at home, on this feast of the epiphany there is the venerable practice of blessing the home with blessed chalk.  So after Mass, we will have available at all the church exits, blessed chalk and the short ritual for blessing your homes for the new year.  By this act, we ask Christ’s blessing upon the home and those who live there and those who will visit.  By visibly marking our homes with the church we identify our homes as Christian homes, and invite others to come to know Christ in our homes. 

In a sense our homes are meant to be like the Christmas star, as the wise men followed the star to find Christ, those seeking Christ should be able to find Him in our homes. There are people out there who do not know Christ or do not know him as they should, who are meant to discover Christ in your homes.  The home is also meant to be like the stable of Bethlehem isn’t it? A place where Christ is honored and adored constantly. 

So again, use the gold, frankincense, and myrrh of your families: the wisdom of God, frequent prayer, and personal sacrifice to show the world that Christ has come, that he is God and King, and that he is the savior of the world, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

Homily: Jan 1 2016 - Mary Mother of God - Mary's faith, openness to grace, motherhood

We are just a few hours into the new year 2016. What will 2016 bring? Great successes? Humiliating failures? Unexpected happiness? Sudden loss? Dramatic change? More of the same? Illness, suffering, and death? We wish everyone a “Happy New Year” but in all honesty, none of us knows what this new year will bring. And as we venture into that unknown, the Church gives us on this first day of the civil calendar, a feast in honor of Our Lady, Mary the Mother of God.  And the big question is  ”why—why connect Mary with new year’s day?” And the simple answer is because Mary shows us how to live in this new year in a way that, no matter what happens to us, it will be a truly blessed year.

So I propose three lessons Mary can teach us for 2016.

First, we see in Mary, a woman who lived in a unique way, by faith. Faith was her guide. So she is a model of faith for each one of us. While still in her teens, Mary was asked by God to do something no one else in history had ever been asked to do.  As she ventured into an unknown future, faith was her guide. Though her future would be filled with suffering, confusion, anxiety; though so much of her future would be out of her control, faith was her guide.

By faith, I do not mean optimism that everyone will simply live happily ever after.  Not everyone will win the lottery this year. Rather, as people of faith, we commit to following God’s holy will, his commandments, in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. Even when we don’t understand WHY we are undergoing such challenging times, we cling to God, we follow his commandments.

So Mary, who hears the word of God, ponders it in her hearts, and obeys God in all things, is our model of faith this year.

Secondly: Mary shows us how to remain open to God’s grace.  Her faith was lived in a such a way that her life remained open to all strength, grace, and wisdom, God wished to give her for the journey.  The great theologian St. Thomas Aquinas said, “whatever is received is received according to the mode of the receiver.” In other words, you cannot receive a gift, if you are not open to receiving it.  Mary was full of grace because she remained fully open to God at all times.

There are so many favors, so many gifts, so much grace God wishes to give us during this new year, but we he will not force us to receive these gifts.  So we need to welcome God into all the areas of our life. Think of these areas like rooms of a house.

We need to welcome God into family rooms: the places where we gather with family and friends, welcoming God into our friendships and family relationships, talking about our faith with these people.  Mary and her cousin Elizabeth talked with each other about what God was doing in their lives. We too, must welcome God into these relationships.

We need to welcome God into our studies: opening our minds to him by studying the Scriptures, studying the catechism, studying the faith.  Mary pondered God’s word and his works, so this year commit to opening and reading those Bibles every day. God wishes to engrave His Word on your hearts through study.

We need to welcome God into our recreation rooms: ensuring that our entertainment is of a godly sort. 

We need to welcome God into our kitchens: ensuring that we do not give ourselves over to overeating drunkenness, and gluttony.

Finally, we need to welcome God into our basements and attics and storage closets, the hidden places of our hearts.  Maybe there are some good things, good habits, which need to be brought out of storage, and given away in selflessness.  Maybe there is some clutter that we need to get rid, some bad habits, that we finally need to let go of this year.

Mary teaches us that when we open our lives to God, welcoming God into every area of our life, our lives become charged and changed by God’s presence.

A third and final lesson from Mary for this new Year, is what she shows us by her motherhood. Because of her faith, because of her openness to God, she was able to be a great mother to Jesus.  The Church celebrates Mary today as Mother of Jesus. God made himself dependent on Mary’s love when he chose to be born as her Son.  He subjected himself to be born of her, to be nursed by her, fed by her, and cleaned by her, he learned to walk from her and talk from her and pray from her.  Jesus made himself dependent upon Mary’s motherhood, and that’s the great lesson for us this year.

In 2016, subject yourself, like Jesus, to her motherhood. Call your mother every day. Turn to her in prayer constantly.  Go to her with your sorrows and joys. If you do not know how to pray the rosary, learn as soon as you can this year, and pray the rosary often. 

From Rome this morning, Pope Francis said, “At the beginning of a new year, the Church invites us to contemplate Mary’s divine maternity as an icon of peace.  In her, the ancient promise finds fulfilment. She appears to us as a vessel filled to the brim with the memory of Jesus, as the Seat of Wisdom to whom we can have recourse to understand his teaching aright.  Today Mary makes it possible for us to grasp the meaning of events which affect us personally, events which also affect our families, our countries and the entire world.  Where philosophical reason and political negotiation cannot reach, there the power of faith, which brings the grace of Christ’s Gospel, can reach, opening ever new pathways.”

If we want 2016 to be brighter than last year, we need to turn to our Mother. For the Lord not only chose Mary as His mother, but gave her as Mother to all of us.  Call upon our mother frequently and with great devotion this year, and 2016 truly will be a happy, blessed year, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.