tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75100008974976975432024-02-19T22:58:12.348-08:00Homilies with Holy SpiritFather Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comBlogger60125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-64514128601200328982016-04-24T15:40:00.000-07:002016-04-25T15:40:57.069-07:00Fifth Sunday of Easter<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/042416.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span id="docs-internal-guid-d888ce39-4f8d-f973-ed20-4de031743c09"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Acts 14:21-27 +</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Psalm 145:8-9, 10-11, 12-13 +</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Revelation 21:1-5a +</span><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> John 13:31-33a, 34-35</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, OK</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Did you notice the scene of this Gospel we just proclaimed? </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">The upper room, on the night before Jesus died.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Church would have us go back to reflect on this scene in the upper room</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to bring us back to the crux of the matter...literally. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">You see, it’s easy for us to get all wrapped up </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">in the glory of the moment when we reflect on the victory of the resurrection. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is something warm and fuzzy about seeing the flowers of spring, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">the glow of the Paschal Candle, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">the “brightness” of the colors of Easter,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and the comfort of hearing the post-resurrection stories of the Risen Christ.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And so today we are given the opportunity to reflect on two things…</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">glory and love. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">To understand both of these things it takes the Passion and Resurrection. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">And so we return to that upper room.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Context is always important in looking at a biblical passage. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Just prior to today’s gospel reading we hear of the coming betrayal of Judas.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The passages immediately following today’s gospel are those </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">predicting the three denials of Peter.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And so today’s gospel is framed by these two things.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Jesus begins speaking by saying, “</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Now.</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">...”</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This doesn’t seem like the most opportune time to speak of being glorified, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">when the “Now” is a moment surrounded by treachery and disappointment. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Humans have failed at this crucial moment in Jesus’ life. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Judas and Peter represent all of us in our worst moments. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">We may fail him.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But my friends, he will not fail. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Neither Jesus, nor his Father will fail us.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nothing can stop what is coming. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nothing can thwart what is to be revealed…</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">God’s revelation of love for all humankind. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Now” is glorious because it is the moment </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">when God’s love shines through human sin and darkness...</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">shines on the matter of human alienation from God and from one another.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“I give you a new commandment: love one another.”</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How is “love one another” a new commandment? </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">The 19th Chapter of Leviticus outlines laws that is about love of neighbor. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s new about Jesus’ call to love at this moment?</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNb-3qDGF2r74pm_FpKlLRtME-VE-aFo4jdIBgBmOme00fT0qE-_osM_uEcLEs9rtZKX2VHnuHnqdGks5h5uf4HDZ7GRN29XkWlEpVZYTWG-zhV725YfiS3fMEoXkbIzZ4guRbyC2MVHc/s1600/love-one-another-as-i-have-loved-you-8-638.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNb-3qDGF2r74pm_FpKlLRtME-VE-aFo4jdIBgBmOme00fT0qE-_osM_uEcLEs9rtZKX2VHnuHnqdGks5h5uf4HDZ7GRN29XkWlEpVZYTWG-zhV725YfiS3fMEoXkbIzZ4guRbyC2MVHc/s320/love-one-another-as-i-have-loved-you-8-638.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The love Jesus speaks of does not necessarily lead to warm feelings. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is not the love defined by “duty” in the Old Testament. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sometimes it leads to hurt.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes it leads to suffering. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sometimes it is hard to see the fruits. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">But then again the love Jesus speaks of is agape…</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">a love that one gives of oneself without counting the cost. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is a love that is not turned off or restricted, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">even when one is betrayed or let down by those closest to us. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is a love that is not extinguished under trial and when one is treated unjustly. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is a love even for enemies and, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">in the face of opposition, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">speaks the truth—which Jesus will soon do at his trial.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It may mean, letting the other person have the last word. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It may mean that each time we see one of those Facebook posts </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">that speak ill of our politicians, </span><span style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">of our president, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">of a candidate, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">we stop and say a prayer for the one being slandered </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">and look for the good in them. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">And we say a prayer for those who do the slandering.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This kind of love means that when we hear of persecutions, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">yes we weep and we pray for those treated unjustly, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">but we also weep and pray for those who do such horrific acts. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">They are God’s children as well.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus points us to a love that is beyond ourselves. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">We are called to emulate Jesus. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">And if one thinks, “I can’t do that! I could never love as Jesus loves!”,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I would have to agree. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">But there is one person that we often forget…</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">the Holy Spirit! </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is by the power of the Holy Spirit that all of this is possible.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To love as Jesus loves is an act of the Spirit.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Tradition tells us that the beloved disciple, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">John the Evangelist, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">the one who gives us today’s Gospel and the second reading from Revelation, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">was the only apostle who was not martyred. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">He lived to a ripe old age.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Disciples would seek his council, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">disciples who would struggle and grapple with the same kinds of issues we face. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">They would approach this humble man, </span><span style="font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">this beloved one whom Jesus loved, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">expecting some deep response to help them to deepen their own faith and understanding.</span></div>
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<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He always responded with one word...LOVE.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just...LOVE!</span></span></div>
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<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A couple of weeks ago we heard of the redemption of Peter…</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Peter, do you love me?” three times. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Peter got his chance.</span></div>
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<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In my own prayer, I have imagined Jesus going into the dead after his death on the cross, </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">and before his Resurrection. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are two figures that he encounters. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">One is his earthly father, Joseph. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is an embrace of love and gratitude. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">The other encounter...Judas. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are tears. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is an embrace of love and forgiveness. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is love in a powerful moment. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is not a scene that you will find in the Scriptures, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">but it is a scene we can all imagine if we embrace Jesus’ agape love.</span></div>
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<b style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The glory of this Easter Season </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">is found in a new heaven and a new earth that is rooted in love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">At the end of mass we will be charged with </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Glorifying the Lord by our lives.” </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">We are sent to go out into the world, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">to share that love that Jesus calls us to. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Let’s take time to study and pray those Works of Mercy. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">Others will know that we are disciples of Jesus, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.2; white-space: pre-wrap;">by how we love each other, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; white-space: pre-wrap;">and how we love them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">— <i>Deacon Paul Lewis</i></span></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-23616874054452342302016-04-17T15:26:00.000-07:002016-04-25T15:29:59.153-07:00Fourth Sunday of Easter - Good Shepherd Sunday<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/041716.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Acts 13: 14, 43-52 + Psalm 100: 1-2, 3, 5 + Revelation 7: 9, 14B-17 + John 10: 27-30</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, OK</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Last night we celebrated with Archbishop Coakley the
confirmation of 29 of our high school students. Part of their preparation toward
the end was to come and interview with either Deacon Paul or me to share with
us what they had learned in this two-year process of preparation. One of the
questions that I would always have for them is: “Who is Jesus for you? Tell me
about Jesus.” And, most of them would simply begin naming some facts about Him.
You know, “He is the son of Mary. Joseph is his foster father. He worked miracles.
He died for our sins.” But then I would ask them, “I want you to tell me who He
is for you.” Because there is a difference between knowing things about Jesus
as opposed to <i>knowing</i> Jesus. It is a
difference that emerges from a vital life of prayer, a daily conversation with
Him, a getting to know Him and allowing Him to reveal Himself to us. Really, it’s
all about relationship. And, as it is with any solid, life-giving relationship
in our life, any good friendship. It means spending time with the One you love.
It means listening to them. It means taking the time to be attentive to them.
This is how you get to know someone. And that’s why, for those students
confirmed last night, for all of us, the gift of the Spirit is so vital. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This Season of the Spirit, the fifty days of the Easter
Season, are given to us to remind us that the Holy Spirit is given to us in
order that we might come to know Jesus. Not just know things about Him, but to
know Him. And the gifts flowing from the Spirit, especially Wisdom,
Understanding, and Knowledge, are meant to help us in that growing relationship
with the Risen Lord. I remember one of those students when I was asking about
those gifts mentioned desiring them so they could do better on their exams and
I pointed out the gift of Wisdom, Knowledge, and Understanding is not about
acing your Chemistry exam, it’s about gifts that enable us to know the Lord, to
know Him, to be drawn deeper into a relationship with Him and that one of the
most powerful ways we do that, of course, is by praying with Sacred Scripture,
especially the Gospels — Coming to know the Living Lord through His word given
to us in the Scriptures. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyHmXQOTG04pd6j5UKx2uxNHTasTppwFKHg1rsxVAbs6eXN6CBJj9cJTnCX34VO2Lf2QGpezLIuezEAwiZ8dwvtJCWXdOrdjrNsXLwku0RVbGRfAC9CiB_1kBzLMEM-vtUbvQE0RJLOgg/s1600/good-shepherd-4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyHmXQOTG04pd6j5UKx2uxNHTasTppwFKHg1rsxVAbs6eXN6CBJj9cJTnCX34VO2Lf2QGpezLIuezEAwiZ8dwvtJCWXdOrdjrNsXLwku0RVbGRfAC9CiB_1kBzLMEM-vtUbvQE0RJLOgg/s320/good-shepherd-4.jpg" width="265" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Today we come to know Him in a very special way as The Good
Shepherd. Every year on the fourth Sunday of Easter is Good Shepherd Sunday. The
Church gives us selections every year at this time from the tenth chapter of
John’s Gospel. We are in Cycle C and the selection this year from that tenth
chapter is very small, only four verses, but it speaks about how the Good
Shepherd knows His sheep. He calls them and they follow Him. This Good Shepherd
that we’ve come to know in a very powerful way is the one who leads us through
the Valley of Death and to Eternal Life, and the one who even know leads us
through any sort of Valley of Tears or trials into a new life. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The context of this Gospel reading from the tenth chapter of
John today is a setting in the Temple where Jesus is just being interrogated by
some of the Jews about whether He is the Messiah or not. They want to know,
they want Him to tell them, that He is the Promised One. These interrogators in
the Temple, they know lots of things about Jesus. They know He is from Nazareth.
They know that He’s got a huge following, that He’s been teaching and healing
and doing mighty deeds, but they do not <i>know</i>
Him. They do not know Him. In fact, in the verse immediately preceding today’s
Gospel, Jesus says to them, “You do not believe in me because you are not my
sheep. My sheep listen to me, they know my voice. You are not my sheep.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is interesting also on this Good Shepherd Sunday that we
have another image that seems to be the opposite of the shepherd. If you listen
closely to the Second Reading from the Book of Revelation, the Scripture writer
tells us about this glorified Lamb of God sitting on the throne, and he says “The
lamb will shepherd them.” Imagine that! The <i>lamb</i>
will shepherd them and lead them to springs of life-giving water. The Good
Shepherd in the Gospel and the lamb in the Second Reading, the very Lamb of
God, He is one of us, one of the flock. In fact, He first becomes one of us,
one of the sheep, in order that we might come to know Him as The Good Shepherd.
In our tradition, the Church teaches that He is both lamb and shepherd, He is
both priest and victim, He is both human and divine – human and divine. So this
image of the lamb who shepherds us kind of takes us back to the Mystery of
Christmas when the very Son of God became one like us in all things in order to
listen to the human condition, to know our lives from the inside out, from
birth all the way to death, all of our joys, all of our sorrows. The Son of
God, the Good Shepherd, becomes the Lamb, like us, in order to know us that we
might come to know Him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, we have reason for great joy, great joy, because we have
a God who has pitched his tent among us, who has lived among us, who wants to
be known, who longs to be known by us, a God who spends time with us in Jesus,
His Son, the Good Shepherd, and who has listened carefully to what it means to
be human. He calls you and me, therefore, the Good Shepherd today, to become
more fully a part of His flock and to find in this communion we have with Him
and with one another the power to overcome this rampant individualism that
seems to penetrate every part of our society — to recognize that we do not find
out who we are alone, but rather, we find out who we are together as members of
the flock of the Good Shepherd. As we hear His voice and come to know Him, we come
to know we are members of a family of God. We are brothers and sisters to one
another. And as He continues to lead us, we have this desire growing in our
heart as we know Him better to care about the things He cares about, to do what
he wants us to do with our life. And, in following Him, to know what life is all
about, what the gift of abundant life He shares with us is, and to know the
call to everlasting joy.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>— Father Joseph Jacobi</i></span></div>
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<br />Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-62044727595008495302016-04-10T14:42:00.000-07:002016-04-11T14:53:03.711-07:00Third Sunday of Easter<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/041016.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a><span id="goog_1317680167"></span><span id="goog_1317680168"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Acts 5:27-31; 40b-41 + Psalm 30 + Revelation 5:11-14 + John 21:1-19</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUvo-KiCQc74pGGdLK_p8h5wt7rnUbD96lVLnYFPc-BJrM8jNnguuSYru-EDhxg3o2zYunmCSrypRhPBjAXXnulzaS8BrQ10NuiykcPnEvrocmYPnex-4SC2HI6PS5HbdjGztnmTLnYgs/s1600/breakfast.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUvo-KiCQc74pGGdLK_p8h5wt7rnUbD96lVLnYFPc-BJrM8jNnguuSYru-EDhxg3o2zYunmCSrypRhPBjAXXnulzaS8BrQ10NuiykcPnEvrocmYPnex-4SC2HI6PS5HbdjGztnmTLnYgs/s320/breakfast.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Breakfast on the beach! Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Risen Jesus, destroyer of
death, king of the universe, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">serves up breakfast like a
short-order cook. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Risen Lord in all his
glory appears to his followers in a most ordinary way, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">not with a booming voice proclaiming,
“</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I’m alive!!</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">” </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but with three simple
words:</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Come, have breakfast.”</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every morning of my
growing-up life I heard those words ring out </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">from my mother’s lips:</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Come,
have breakfast</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.” </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">These words we hear from
parents, spouses, friends, but from the Risen Jesus??</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus, risen from the dead,
returns for his friends and performs </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">a very basic act of human
love—he feeds them. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hard at work all night long,
they are famished, so he feeds their hunger. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He nourishes them by his
love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Near the same body of water
where he had taken a few loaves and a few fish </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and fed a multitude, he now
bakes breakfast for his hungry friends.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By doing so, the Risen Jesus reveals
God’s hunger for them, God’s desire for them, longing for them and for their
love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For in his Resurrection,
Jesus does something much, </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">much more than
come back </i><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">from the dead</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">—</span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">he comes into the fullness of life</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">—a
life he longs to share with others. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A life he wants his followers
to share with a world hungering for such abundant life. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sharing in his Risen life,
they then can share Him with the world. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Receiving his love, which is
stronger than death, they can love as they are loved, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and thus lead others into
life with Him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We see this divine hunger at
work in the encounter between the Risen Jesus and <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Simon Peter over a charcoal
fire, a fire similar to the one where Peter </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">had warmed himself while 3
times denying that he even knew Jesus. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus hungers to give Peter
an opportunity to move beyond the shame of his denials, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by giving Peter a chance to
express his love for Jesus. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is a powerful scene as
Jesus challenges the one he has chosen to be the leader of the early Church to
declare his love three times for Jesus, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">matching the number of his
denials.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What we miss in the English
text is <i>how</i> Jesus is calling Peter to
love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the original Greek text,
Jesus asks Peter the first 2 times “</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Do
you love me?” </i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">using the verb </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u>agapao</u></i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, denoting the
self-sacrificial love of God for humanity </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">as shown by Jesus’ love on
the cross.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Agape—love is the kind of
love Christians are to show God and neighbor and enemy—</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">it is a godly kind of love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus longs for Peter to love
in such a way. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But Peter is not there yet,
because Peter responds using the verb </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u>phileo</u></i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">which describes the love
shared between friends.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the 3<sup>rd</sup>
occasion, Jesus changes the verb, asking Peter, “<i>Do you love me</i>” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">using <i><u>phileo</u></i>. Peter
responds using <u>phileo</u> once again.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus accepts the love which
Peter offers at this time. </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s what godly love does</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, because it is self-sacrificing, patient and generous </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">beyond belief---this kind of
love takes people where they are and leads them </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">slowly but surely to where
they need to be. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus alludes to the fact
that Peter will eventually be able to love in this way, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">stating that when Peter is
older he will stretch out his hands and be led where he does not want to go,
referring to Peter’s own death on a cross. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The love of the Risen Jesus
for Peter is a powerful force—</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">such a love transforms
Peter’s life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Throughout his relationship
with Peter, both before and after the Resurrection, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus loves Peter into a new
way of life, a new way of being. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He is patient with Peter,
ever able to forgive Peter for his failings, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">always calling Peter to a
more abundant life and a more generous way of loving. </span><b><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For Jesus what is at stake is not
belief, it is love. </span></i></b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What the Risen Jesus sees
more clearly than anything is that Peter loves him, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">even if that love at the
present moment is not the same love that Jesus has for Peter.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Peter actually starts loving
in an “agape” way even before dying on a cross </span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">
by courageously proclaiming to the same characters who condemned Jesus to death—</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the Sanhedrin—that he will
not obey their command to stop teaching about Jesus.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Such courage will lead Peter to
give his life completely in agape love for the Lord.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Proof of the resurrection
shines forth in those who love others as the Risen Lord<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">loves Peter—with an
agape-like love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Glimpses of this resurrection
love shine forth around us, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">for those who have eyes to
see, as the Risen Lord shows His face </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">in the most ordinary of</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ways by those who love extraordinarily.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Many parents love their
children in such a way, taking their children where they are </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and loving them to where they
need to be. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Such parents feed their
children, even when their children are not loving </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">or kind or even grateful. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Such parents take children
where they are and love them to where they need to go. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is not always a perfect
process--it has its ups and downs. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">However, the self-sacrificial
love of parents for their kids is transformative. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For it transforms not only a
child who grows up being nourished by such a love, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but it </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">also transforms the parent</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is the way husband and
wife are called to love each other. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To love one’s husband as he
is; to love one’s spouse as she is. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the daily act of
self-giving love, of self-sacrificing love, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the recipient of such love
grows and changes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is what God’s love does
through people—takes others where they are <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and leads them slowly and
patiently to where they need to be. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Such Agape-loving nourishes
others in a powerful way by leading them into new life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Perhaps where we catch the
most powerful glimpse of the Risen Lord alive </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and working is through those
who love their enemies. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Talk about “agape” love,
taking people where they are and loving them </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">without expecting anything in
return.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In order to love in such a
way we need to be fed and nourished by such a love.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Which is why the Risen Jesus
invites us to breakfast with Him this morning, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">which is why He invites us to
come and eat at this table over and over again.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As we experience in an ordinary
yet powerful way the love of the Lord for us <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">through sharing in this meal
with one another, we are transformed. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our eyes open and we see clearly
how the Risen Jesus has loved us in our life </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">through the self-giving,
self-sacrificing love of others. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We cannot hold back from
singing His praise, from thanking Him, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">from crying out with
everything in the universe:</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Blessing and glory, honor and might, be to God and
the Lamb.”<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here, we are once again given
an opportunity to express our love for the Lord Jesus, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and to be strengthened to love
with Him and through Him and in Him…..</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 14.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fr. Joseph A.
Jacobi</span></span></i><span style="font-size: 14.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-91534651059282717092016-04-03T14:25:00.000-07:002016-04-11T14:41:29.999-07:00Divine Mercy Sunday<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/040316.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Acts 5:12-16 <span style="line-height: 115%;">|</span> Psalm 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24 <span style="line-height: 115%;">|</span> Revelation 1:9-11a, 12-13, 17-19 <span style="line-height: 115%;">|</span> John 20:19-31</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">"Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">and put my finger into the nailmarks</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">
and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">These words of Thomas forever labels him as “Doubting Thomas.”</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5NYUSoDsU-tvQPMD-h2vRjM7qsz99Ye0gDXqBTFlkQeurR2TjWPIHAEb8fpvdZYHnQSF-iExNzNGfqF0TyNCZdrLHf4nY87lahRmE-RsJhHjoBTG_kJZGNKxcSkI04uf2IvoeJ8Gj2yI/s1600/doubting-thomas.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5NYUSoDsU-tvQPMD-h2vRjM7qsz99Ye0gDXqBTFlkQeurR2TjWPIHAEb8fpvdZYHnQSF-iExNzNGfqF0TyNCZdrLHf4nY87lahRmE-RsJhHjoBTG_kJZGNKxcSkI04uf2IvoeJ8Gj2yI/s320/doubting-thomas.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">Thomas gets a bad rap.</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">The disciples in the upper room when Jesus makes his first appearance </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">are no better than Thomas. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">If we take a look at what goes on in the verses</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">immediately preceding today’s Gospel,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">we find that these disciples are just as unbelieving as Thomas.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">“Mary of Magdala went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the
Lord.”</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">This precedes today’s Gospel. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">And what do these disciples do? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They huddle in fear in that upper room. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">If they have believed in Jesus’ Resurrection, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">their actions suggest otherwise. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They do not believe the words of Mary Magdalene. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They still live in fear.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">They will not believe until they see.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: ES-CL; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">So what does
Jesus do?</span><span lang="ES-CL"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">He appears. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">He shows them his wounds. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They have believed,</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">but only after seeing him...</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">seeing his
wounds.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">God opens the tomb.</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">These disciples lock the doors. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Jesus breathes on them the Spirit. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They in turn do nothing, except talk…</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">to each other and to Thomas. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">So why should Thomas believe? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">After a week, he doesn’t see much change in them. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They still huddle in fear.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
<br /><div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: ES-CL; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">Thomas is not doubting.</span><span lang="ES-CL"> </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">He desperately wants to believe. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">He doesn’t understand how? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Just like the others who have had the benefit of seeing the Risen
Lord, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Thomas wants to see. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">He wants to see and touch for one reason…</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">so that he too might believe.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">My friends, that is not doubt.</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">It is authenticity! </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">It is a struggle that we all know too well.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">What do you want to believe about Jesus’ resurrection?</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">What gets in the way? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">What makes it difficult to believe? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">How are you wrestling and struggling with the resurrection of Jesus in
your life?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">We want to believe in the Resurrection,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but we see wars, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">innocent people being persecuted, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">loved ones who suffer, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">children who experience brokenness, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">the death of a child, spouse or parent.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">We are not much different than Thomas.</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">We seek evidence. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">We want to see the struggles end. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">We want to see suffering eliminated, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">relationships
restored.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">Far too often we fail to see the power of God in the Resurrection,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but instead place our faith in what we judge to be sufficient
evidence. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Our preconceived ideas become more locks on the door. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">They won’t keep Jesus out, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but it will keep us trapped inside</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">and it won’t be long before our house becomes our tomb.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">John doesn’t tell us that Thomas actually touched the wounds.</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">What we learn throughout John’s gospel </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">is that believing doesn’t come from physical evidence,</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: ES-CL; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">but from
spiritual insight.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">The Resurrection does not end wars,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but it does reveal the dignity and sanctity of human life. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">It empowers us to speak out and work </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">for justice, freedom, and peace.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">The Resurrection does not cure disease,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but it moves our hearts to love and have compassion for those who
suffer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">The Resurrection does not heal broken relationships,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but it plants in our hearts that ache to break down walls </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">and heal those
relationships.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">The Resurrection does not eliminate</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">our pain or tears over the death of a loved one. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Rather, it provides us with strength to live without our loved one </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">with fortitude and patience. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">The Resurrection allows us to not mourn without hope, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">but rather be thankful in our remembrance of God’s abundant goodness </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">and with joyful anticipation of everlasting life with those we love.</span></div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">Every time we live in the power of the resurrection</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">we engage the world, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">one another,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">and our life in a new way.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">When we live in the power of the Resurrection,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">we can’t help but find ourselves engaged in the Works of Mercy. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">The hungry, the thirsty,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">the sick, the prisoner,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">the outcast, the naked,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">the doubtful, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">the sinner, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">and the dead, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">experience the power of the Resurrection </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">by our works, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">our words, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">and our prayers.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">In the end,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">it doesn’t really matter what Thomas did. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">That’s not the issue. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">This story isn’t about Thomas. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">It’s about us. </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">How will we live? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">What will we do? </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Have we come to believe?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">As we continue our celebration of this Eucharist,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">as we approach the altar of the Lord,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">as we are nourished by the Body and Blood of our Lord,</span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">Soul and Divinity, </span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">may we proclaim with Thomas…</span><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;">My Lord and my God.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt;"><i>— Deacon Paul Lewis</i></span></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">"Si no veo la marca de los clavos en sus manos y pongo mi dedo en el lugar de los clavos<br />y pongo mi mano en su costado, no creeré."</span></i></b><div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Estas palabras de Thomas siempre le etiqueta como "Tomás el incrédulo." </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Thomas tiene una mala reputación. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Los discípulos en el Cenáculo , cuando Jesús hace su primera aparición </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">no son mejores que Thomas.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Si echamos un vistazo a lo que sucede en los versos inmediatamente anterior Evangelio de hoy,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">nos encontramos con que estos discípulos son tan incrédulos como Tomás. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">María Magdalena fue y anunció a los discípulos,"He visto al Señor." </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Esto precede el Evangelio de hoy. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">¿Y qué hacen estos discípulos? </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ellos se apiñan en el miedo en el aposento alto. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Si han creído en la resurrección de Jesús, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">sus acciones indican lo contrario.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ellos no creen las palabras de María Magdalena. Todavía viven en el miedo. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">No van a creer hasta que lo vean. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Entonces, ¿qué hace Jesús? </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">El aparece. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Él les muestra sus heridas. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Ellos han creído,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">pero sólo después de verlo...</span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">viendo sus heridas.</span></i></b></div>
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<span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Dios abre la tumba. Estos discípulos cierran las puertas. Jesús sopla sobre ellos el Espíritu. A su vez, no hacen nada, excepto conversar...entre sí y con Thomas. Así que ¿por qué debería creer Thomas?<br />Después de una semana , no se ve mucho cambio en ellos.Todavía se refugian en el miedo.</span><span lang="ES-CL"> </span><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Thomas no esta dudando. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Quiere desesperadamente creer. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">No entiende cómo a</span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">l igual que los otros que han tenido el beneficio de ver al Señor resucitado, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Thomas quiere ver.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Él quiere ver y tocar por una razón...</span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">para que él también pueda creer. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Mis amigos, aquello que no es duda. </span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Es autenticidad! </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Es una lucha que todos conocemos demasiado bien. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">¿Qué es lo que quieres creer acerca de la resurrección de Jesús? </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Lo que se interpone en el camino? </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Lo que hace que sea difícil de creer? </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">¿Cómo estás luchando con la lucha y la resurrección de Jesús en tu vida?</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Queremos creer en la resurrección, pero vemos guerras, personas inocentes perseguidas, seres queridos que sufren, los niños que experimentan quebrantamiento, la muerte de un hijo, cónyuge o padre.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">No somos muy diferentes a Thomas. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Buscamos pruebas. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Queremos ver el fin de las luchas.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Queremos ver el sufrimiento eliminado, </span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">las relaciones restauradas. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Con demasiada frecuencia no somos capaces de ver el poder de Dios en la Resurrección, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">pero en lugar de poner nuestra fe en lo que juzgamos ser prueba suficiente.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Nuestras ideas preconcebidas se vuelven más cerraduras de la puerta. No van a seguir a Jesús,<br />pero nos mantendrá atrapados en el interior y no pasará mucho tiempo antes de que nuestra casa se convierte en nuestra tumba. </span></i></b> <b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Juan no nos dice que en realidad Thomas tocó las heridas.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Lo que aprendemos en todo el Evangelio de Juan </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">es que creer no proviene de la evidencia física, sino a partir de la visión espiritual. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">La resurrección no termina las guerras, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">pero sí revela la dignidad y la santidad de la vida humana. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Se nos da el poder de hablar y trabajar </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">por la justicia, la libertad y la paz.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">La resurrección no cura la enfermedad, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">pero se mueve el corazón al amor y la compasión por los que sufren. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">La resurrección no sana las relaciones rotas, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">pero siembra en nuestros corazones que duelen el deseo de echar abajo las paredes que nos separan y sanar esas relaciones. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">La resurrección no elimina </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">nuestro dolor o lágrimas por la muerte de un ser querido.</span></i></b></div>
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<span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Más bien, nos proporciona la fuerza para vivir sin nuestro ser querido con fortaleza y paciencia.<br />La resurrección nos permite llorar pero hacerlo con esperanza, y estar agradecidos en nuestro recuerdo de abundante bondad de Dios y con alegre anticipación de la vida eterna con nuestros seres queridos.</span><span lang="ES-CL"> </span><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Cada vez que vivimos en el poder de la resurrección </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">nos ocupamos del mundo,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">unos y otros, y nuestra vida de una manera nueva.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">Cuando vivimos en el poder de la resurrección, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">no podemos dejar de encontrarnos a nosotros mismos participando en las obras de misericordia. </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">El hambre, la sed, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">los enfermos, los prisioneros,</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">los marginados, los desnudos, el dudoso, el pecador, y los muertos, experimentar el poder de la resurrección por nuestras obras, nuestras palabras, </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">y nuestras oraciones.</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">En el final, en realidad no importa lo que hizo Thomas. Ese no es el problema. Esta historia no es sobre Thomas. Es sobre nosotros. ¿Cómo vamos a vivir? </span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">¿Que haremos? </span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 12pt;">¿Hemos llegado a creer?</span></i></b></div>
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<b><i><span lang="ES-CL" style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: ES-CL; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">A medida que
continuamos nuestra celebración de esta Eucaristía, cuando nos acercamos al altar del Señor, como somos alimentados con el Cuerpo y la Sangre del Señor, Alma y Divinidad,<br />
podemos proclamar con Thomas ...</span></i></b><b><i><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;">Mi Señor y mi
Dios!</span></i></b><o:p></o:p></div>
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Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-77100754568707089442016-03-27T07:48:00.000-07:002016-03-28T07:59:29.379-07:00Resurrection of the Lord — Easter Sunday<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/032716.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Acts 10: 34, 37-43 + Psalm 118 + Colossians 3: 1-4 + John 20: 1-9</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Note: There is no sound file for today's homily</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFJERhWQ8iBiUOFmEYkPGmGDcQ-2f2qS98KueGn2TyGoezO7xj6x4g2I1Irt_L9-d-IfLS-K96fJW9SPKLFKp3gg3T5mAz99z0oVxS8gAveHrPOcUvSinerQUd9gwCDV2_Fjn71y3cERo/s1600/colossians.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFJERhWQ8iBiUOFmEYkPGmGDcQ-2f2qS98KueGn2TyGoezO7xj6x4g2I1Irt_L9-d-IfLS-K96fJW9SPKLFKp3gg3T5mAz99z0oVxS8gAveHrPOcUvSinerQUd9gwCDV2_Fjn71y3cERo/s320/colossians.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Something happened to Peter between the time he saw the empty tomb </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">on the day of the Resurrection and some 50 days later on Pentecost, when he stands </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">courageously before others announcing that the one he thought was dead is risen. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Something happened to Peter, the one who shrank in fear the night before Jesus </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">was crucified, who now not only says he knows Jesus but proclaims him to be alive.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What happened? How did it happen?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Peter himself gives us a clue by what he says on Pentecost day in Jerusalem. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Risen Jesus was made visible to those who ate and drank with him. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the breaking of the bread with the Risen Jesus, by sharing a cup of wine with the </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Crucified One now alive, Peter came to understand better the truth of the resurrection. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As those first disciples sat down to eat with the Risen Lord, their lives were transformed. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not only had their friend and teacher been restored to life </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by the power of the resurrection, but by eating with the Risen Jesus, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">their lives were given back to them anew.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Peter is restored to communion with his friend, Jesus, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">reconciled to the One whom he had denied knowing. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Doubting Thomas is restored to faith. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As Peter and Thomas and Mary Magdalene ate and drank with the Risen Lord, their lives </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">were transformed: despair overcome by hope, courage defeating fear, and all doubts </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">swept away by the power of God’s love stronger than death itself.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even though those first witnesses to the resurrection did not at first understand the </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead, slowly their eyes were opened to the </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">mighty mystery of new life offered to them in Jesus, Risen from the dead. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We come to better understand the resurrection as we sit down at table </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sunday after Sunday to eat and drink with the Risen Lord. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As he rises up in us here, sharing with us his Risen Life by means of blessed bread </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and wine, our faith deepens — we know that he is alive, for he comes to live in us.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That is why the weekly celebration of the Eucharist is so central to our lives. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That is why the Church calls every celebration of the Eucharist the source of our faith. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For in a world that often seems to be overcome by darkness, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we are too easily tempted to despair. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Acts of terror, whether they be in Paris or Brussels or San Bernadino, or OKC in 1995, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">tempt us to think that the Risen Lord has abandoned us. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Where is the joy of the resurrection amidst such sadness and fear?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Which is why we are invited to this feast, to strengthen our trust </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">that in spite of all signs to the contrary, the Risen Lord is with us. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In a country so divided, evident by our divided political climate, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the Resurrection challenges us to work toward reconciliation and union. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As we become one with Christ Jesus and with one another in the breaking of bread, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">so we are strengthened to work for the same kind of unity in a divided world.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Resurrection is not simply an idea, not only a belief. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For it is not simply the idea of the Resurrection that sustains us, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but the Risen Christ himself. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He is alive. He remains with us. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He accompanies us through the dark valleys of life as Good Shepherd. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He shares our sufferings, and partakes in our joys.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sunday after Sunday we are reminded of Jesus’ transformation </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and the need for our own in the words of the Mass. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every week as we celebrate the day of the Resurrection, a day set apart, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we recall not only how God the Father’s love lifted Jesus from the grave, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but also how the Father’s love lifts us up and restores us to life anew. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And it’s all right there in words we hear week after week. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Take this all of you and eat of it. This is my body, given for you. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We are called to receive the body of Christ, but we are also called to build it. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We are called to receive the body of Christ so that our indifference might be transformed t</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">o have our eyes opened to the suffering of others and to walk with them in their pain.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To live lives of mercy, by moving outside the boundaries of our own wants and comforts. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Take, give, do. These words of Jesus spoken at that meal before he died live on in him. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Take time to pray. Give of yourself. Do something kind daily for someone. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In living merciful lives inspired by the Resurrection of the Merciful One, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we become the Body of Christ.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By living merciful lives inspired by the Resurrection, we also care for the Body of Christ.</span><br />
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<i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fr. Joseph A. Jacobi</i></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-43079431491737909532016-03-20T15:30:00.000-07:002016-03-28T07:46:19.783-07:00Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/032016.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Isaiah 50: 4-7 + Philippians 2: 6-11 + Luke 22:14 – 23:56</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank"><br /></a></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Gospel of Mercy becomes the Holy Door for us to walk through </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">into this most Holiest of weeks. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Through the door of Luke’s Gospel, which is the Gospel of Mercy, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we enter into this Holy Week. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus is the Good Shepherd </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">who seeks out and finds the lost sheep, demonstrating </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">that every single person is of eternal value in God’s eyes. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In Luke’s Gospel, Jesus is the face of the Father’s mercy, revealing </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the deep and burning desire of our Heavenly Father to find his lost children.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So Jesus seeks out and finds those who have wasted their inheritance, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">their gifts given to them by God. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He also goes into the darkness to find other children of God who are </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">paralyzed by resentment or bitterness or self-righteousness. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Throughout the Gospel of Luke Jesus seeks out and saves the lost, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">even to the very end of his life, as he saves the criminal crucified with him. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Responding to the cry of the criminal crucified with him — </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom” — </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus promises him eternal life.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What we discover today and throughout these holiest of days this week </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">is that the name of God is mercy! </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That the innocent Son of God dies out of love for the guilty. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That Jesus continues to plead for us daily at the right hand of the Father, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">saying, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Fr. Joseph A. Jacobi</i></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-70144681494015270382016-03-08T20:00:00.000-08:002016-03-13T12:19:49.255-07:00Third Day of Lenten Retreat<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">GREED, </span><span style="font-size: 18.6667px;">GLUTTONY</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> AND LUST<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Holy Spirit Catholic Church, Mustang, OK<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">March 8, 2016<b><span style="font-size: 9pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Luke<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There was a rich man who, having had a good harvest
from his land, thought to himself, “What am I to do? I have not enough room to
store my crops.” Then he said, “This is what I will do: I will pull down my
barns and build bigger ones, and store all my grain and my goods in them, and I
will say to my soul: “My soul, you have plenty of good things laid by for many
years to come; take things easy, eat, drink, have a good time.” But God said to
him, “Fool! This very night the demand will be made for your soul; and this
hoard of yours, whose will it be then? So it is when someone stores up treasure
for himself instead of becoming rich in the sight of God.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Gospel of the Lord<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Homily<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Greed or “Avarice” as I learned it in school
is not so much the love of possessions, as it is the love of possessing. It is
the buying of things we do not need, more even than we need for our pleasure or
entertainment. It is possessing for its own sake. At the risk of offending
someone in here, I’m going to tell this story on myself. I was hunting for a
parking place at my dentist office last week. There were none. Right in the
middle of the parking area there was a Humvee sitting across three parking
spaces. As I was walking across the street from an empty lot some distance
away, the owner of the Humvee came out and very cheerfully greeted me. Making
great effort to hide my annoyance, I asked: “Why do you have a vehicle like
that?” Using everything restraint I had to keep from saying: “and take up three
parking spaces.! With obvious innocence she said: “Because I can.” Opened the
door, climbed up and drove off leaving three full sized parking spots and me
standing there……..”Because, I can.”
Avarice! The issue is not the
vehicle obviously; it is the reasoning and the decision.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just down the street from my last parish, a
large construction site is very busy these days. It will be the largest climate
controlled storage unit facility in the country. Avarice! I am not here talking about theories this
week. I am talking about evidence that we are in the grip of sin. This is not
an idea, it is actual behavior. Evidence of these deadly sins is everywhere you
care to look, not in others but within us all. This Avarice is not an old
fashioned sin even though it is an old fashioned word. It is alive and well.
The evidence is crowding the cars out of our garages and sagging our ceilings.
We set our security systems when we are away, rarely when we are inside because
they are not there to protect human life from danger, but to get a lower rate
on our home owners or apartment renter's insurance premium.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our language betrays our sin. We say and we
hear others say; “I must have that.” Of course, it’s about having it, hardly
ever about needing it. We have more clothes than we need and way more
accessories. The very word “accessory” tells you what it’s all about. “For the
man who has everything…” the saying goes! Then why give him more? Avarice! It
might all seem trivial and harmless until we begin to measure what it is doing
to us. I think of Mrs. Buckett in this regard. You know that lady on the
British comedy series that airs on PBS?
She is possessed by her possession, and they speak for her more than
herself, and her attention to her husband is as though he were a possession she
has to put on her show. It’s as though those things were her --- Avarice.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u>A wise Greek writer reminds us that wealth
consists not in having great possessions but in having few wants</u>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We live in a culture where Greed is not just
considered good. It is considered Gospel. It is the way to do thing, the way to
get ahead, the way to achieve success. Never mind that Enron was just the tip
of the iceberg when it comes to corporate crime sweeping <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">America</st1:place></st1:country-region>. Never
mind that accountants are in cahoots with the companies they are supposed to
audit, insiders trade after hours, and millions of employees have their
pensions robbed. If you’re homeless and rob a 7-11 you’ll get ten years to life
in jail. But in corporate <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">America</st1:country-region></st1:place>,
you can steal all you want and fly away untouched in a first-class cabin seat.
The very fact that I can say that, that you know it’s true, and that we all
just sit here confirms the problem: we have given the “OK” to greed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As a priest of forty-eight years, I have come
to the most amazing observation. You can talk about anything from this pulpit,
and most people will glaze over, and on the way out they’ll wave and say:
“Great sermon, father.” But talk about
money, and the eyes tighten up, and everyone slips out the door without a
glance. We never talk about it. It is the big secret. It is considered rude to
ask what someone makes or how much something cost, but yet we will talk
casually and simply about the most intimate and personal matters! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s not as though there is anything wrong
with desire. Desire is a form of energy. It motivates us about many good things,
the desire for peace, the desire for love, the desire for justice; but the sad
truth is that we are taught to want without limit. Enough is never enough. If
you thought you were going to get out of here without another bumper sticker,
you’re wrong. “Whoever dies with the most toys wins.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The problem, as I said at Mass this weekend
is that “line.” I quoted Chesterton who said that morality like art consists of
drawing a line. No one is drawing any lines. There is no longer a line that
says and means, “That’s enough.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every November, a profoundly sad thing
happens in this country. I have met few people who are as touched and
profoundly saddened by the news reports as I am. People have been killed and
many are injured after staying up all night to be the first through the door of
stores for Pre-Christmas sales. The media shows people in a shopping rage
tearing toys and games out of one another hands with hatred. Avarice has
overtaken us. If you were not in the mob but were not the least bit appalled by
the scene, Avarice has taken us captive.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What virtue we need then is a clear
understanding of when desire is good, elevating life or when it is bad and an
obsessive vice. <b><i>Wanting Wisely</i></b> is the virtue. Some things are valued because
they are instruments for getting more, and other things are valued in and of
themselves. We have to know the difference, because if we don’t the confusion
transfers to people. Friends ought to have value in and of themselves not
because they help us get something. We have all been used by someone, used by
other people, and we know how it feels. Greed brings us to sacrifice what’s
really important for the sake of what is not.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is a television show about Greed in
this country. Now this sin is becoming entertainment no longer shocking.
Avarice is in control. I call it sin. To want something wisely is to want it
for reasons other than status. The desire parents have to give their children
the best possible education and make sacrifice for it is wanting something
wisely. On the other hand, enrolling a child in the most elite and expensive
private school to put them on the fast track to fame and fortune is Avarice.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Those who succeed in this world and become
wealthy are not all immoral, but they all have a moral responsibility to give
something back to a world from which their riches came. The rich are always the
most indignant about paying taxes yet the civilization created by those taxes
is what made the rich in the first place. So now that they have it made, they
want to shut off the system that gave them opportunities. Avarice. No
redistribution of wealth is a world without roads, school, and hospitals. There
is a sign on a freeway outside <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Oklahoma
City</st1:place></st1:city> demanding that we pay no taxes. It is placed for
maximum effect along a federally funded interstate highway built by the taxes
the sign maker wants to stop. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For Christians, the answer to this matter is
simple. It is Stewardship: a way of life, a witness to faith, the response of a
grateful heart. The embrace of that life style will be the end of Greed. <span style="font-size: 14pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 14pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Silent Reflection<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Reading
two </span><span style="font-size: 9pt;">(1
Thessalonians 4: 3-7)</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My brothers and
sisters, <o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">God wills you all to
be holy. He wants you to keep away from sexual immorality, and each one of you
to know how to control his body in a way that is holy and honorable, not giving
way to selfish lust like the nations who do not acknowledge God. He wants
nobody at all ever to sin by taking advantage of a brother in this matter. God
called us to be holy, not to be immoral; in other words anyone who rejects this
is rejecting not human authority, but God, who give you his Holy Spirit.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is the Word of
the Lord.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Homily<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lust is not a sin <b><i><u>of</u></i></b> the flesh. It
is a sin <b><i><u>against it</u></i></b>. It is in our flesh that we are present to
the rest of creation, and particularly present to each other, revealing, and
exposing, sensitive to others and even vulnerable to them, open to hurt. This
then is the problem, the paradox of lust, because Lust is not interested in
partners, but only in one’s solitary pleasure. If there is a hint of concern
for the other, it is simply an ego concern that one did well, performed well,
and of course is then adequate and desirable. Lust then accepts any partner for
a moment, and then they’re gone.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To begin with, we ought to be honest. Sex is
the most powerful human hunger next to survival itself, yet it has now moved
largely out of the realm of sacred mystery and into the realm of commerce. It
sells everything, and like greed, there is never enough. Oddly enough, the
message of most modern advertising is that sex appeal builds self-esteem, but
in our society the opposite may be true. Beautiful women in particular learn to
distrust compliments and to be suspicious of even the most ordinary acts of
kindness. Our children are the most vulnerable to this image building/image
destroying consumer abusing stuff. It may sell a pair of jeans, but the
innocent who buy those jeans will never look like the model in that add, and it
only eats away at their developing and fragile self-respect and self-image all the
more. <b><i><u>We hunt flesh, but what we really crave is intimacy.</u></i></b> Our
culture’s addiction to sex is like our addiction to fast food: more of it never
really satisfies, and it can be more than just unhealthy. The truth is, our
sexual addictions are more rooted in ego than in physical desire. Our insecure,
self – absorbed culture has begun to using sex to satisfy emptiness,
insecurity, loneliness and self-doubt. The pandemic of internet sex is at the
heart of this. Why live in the real world? Escape into fantasy! That body on
the screen will never reject us. There is a huge issue of ego in this behavior.
Self-absorbed and insecure, people sit wide-eyes in front of a computer screen
pretending: pretending because the truth and reality are too hard. All the
while, minutes and hours of one’s life are gone forever. Intimacy is what we
crave, and it has never been found in a chat room or in pornography. It’s all
anonymous – empty, and it leaves the victim even more empty and alone. The only
thing that responds to our longing and need for intimacy is love; and it
doesn’t take long to figure out that <b><u>love
is not something you “make.” It is something you are.</u></b> Like all the
sins, lust makes us solitary. It is lonely, empty, and fleeting. One of the surest signs of its presence in
our midst is pornography. It’s big business. There is money in loneliness, and
the clever have discovered it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pornography is always something used in
secret, alone. A private matter indulged in at late hours by lonely people.
Pornography is a substitute for involvement with another person. It is another
way of condemning ourselves to solitariness. There is a deep and widening
sadness hanging over contemporary culture that is made all the more unbearable
by casual sex. There is the illusion that one can be physically intimate
without being emotionally responsible. In the vernacular, we call that being
used. Lust will not get involved, and so it is absolutely contrary to love. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ultimately it is about <u>desire</u> which is
not at all evil unless it is selfish. The desire that sets it all in motion is
the desire for intimacy, and this is what I propose as the virtue or the
antidote to lust. “Holy Intimacy”. It is something that rests on trust which
makes possible a kind of holy vulnerability. Yet the widespread disinclination
to become involved, the great fear of commitment I spoke of last night lays the
trap for Lust. In no other sin does one feel so much of a void, and this void
is not only inside, it is also outside in our society. There is a profound failure
of our society to make continuing individual relationship seem part of the much
wider social bonds that tie us to them. Marriage and family are still the basic
units of our society, but they are weakened, and we tend to regard them today
as a matter only of interpersonal relationships, rather than as fundamental
elements of the social order. This changed attitude to marriage has resulted
inevitably in a changed attitude to other personal relationships. So, if <b><i>I
don’t get anything out of it, I’m not going to do it.</i></b> Relationships
that rest only on one’s own self-justification are not sacred and holy ground
upon which one may encounter the divine. There is no covenant.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What comes between a couple when one of them
is unfaithful is, not the other woman or man, but what now cannot be shared by
them. He or she knows almost at once that something has been withdrawn, that
there is something that the other is unable to bring and share. Love requires
some effort, but our age encourages us to avoid it by refusing to get involved
and when involved to escape from it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All of us have seen it, and many of us have
experienced it. It comes with that early stage of infatuation with a bit of
curiosity. It happens when there are no words, or words seem too trivial. Use
your imaginations or your memory. Two people are close together, across a table
on a couch, in a car. They look at one another and nothing is said. It is a
matter of attention. We know it from music, from art, or even a poem. We have
to concentrate and give it full attention. So, there they are, gazing. We need
to “gaze” not peer or stare, but simply to gaze and let the eyes bring in the
other, and let the other eyes draw us out and into a presence that is peaceful,
loving, and totally our own. We are doing that in here before this sacrament.
It is the gaze of love, the gaze of affection, the gaze of trust, the gaze of
faith, and most of all the gaze of holy intimacy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Love at its best is here before us. Love in
the flesh is the gift of marriage. But the adventure of marriage is learning to
love the person to whom you are married….love does not create a marriage;
marriage teaches us what a costly adventure love truly is. This holy intimacy
is for a lifetime. It knows that age can add more in tenderness than it takes away
in virility. Sex when we’re young is all about the body, hormones and pleasure.
Then suddenly you’re not young anymore, and sex becomes a feast of reciprocity
and intimate tenderness because the solitary emptiness is filled with a
spiritual presence which is the gift of fidelity and a promise fulfilled.<span style="font-size: 14pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 14pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Silent Reflection<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Reading
three </span><span style="font-size: 9pt;">(Luke
14: 15-21)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A reading of the Holy
Gospel according to Luke<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“When evening came,
the disciples went to him and said, “This is a lonely place, and time has
slipped by; so send the people away, and they can go to the villages to buy
themselves some food. Jesus replied: There is no need for them to go: give them
something to eat yourselves. But they answered, “All we have with us is five
loaves and two fish. So he said, “Bring them here to me. He gave order that the
people were to sit down on the grass; then he took the five loaves and the two
fish, raised his eyes to heaven and said the blessing. And breaking the loaves
he handed them to his disciples, who gave them to the crowds. They all ate as
much as they wanted, and they collected the scraps left over, twelve baskets
full.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Gospel of the
Lord<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Homily<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the last couple of years, I have come to a
curious realization about myself and my appearance. About ten years ago, I had
serious heart surgery, and in the process of surgery and recovery, I lost about
thirty pounds. As time has passed, I have found what was lost; and I did not
have to pray to Saint Anthony. Just after coming back to the parish when I was
on the light side of the ordeal, people would come up to me and will say:
“Father, you don’t look so good.” As time went on they began to say: “Father,
you’re looking good today.” What I have come to realize is that this is all a
code message. “You don’t look so good” means I’m down to size 34. “Father
you’re looking good” means I’m back up to 38! Or, more crudely stated: “Father,
you’re getting fat.” At which point I run home and get out the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">South</st1:placename> <st1:placetype w:st="on">Beach</st1:placetype></st1:place>
book and if nothing else, I read it again. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It may not be politically correct to say it,
but while much of the world is starving, Americans are busy eating themselves
to death. At last count, 60% of us are overweight, and the numbers just keep
rising. Chronic obesity in children is an alarming public health issue.
Meanwhile, there is a multibillion-dollar diet industry in place. Yet despite
endless new diet schemes, and any conceivable piece of exercise equipment
available for three easy payments, we keep getting fatter. But never fear,
there will soon be a pill to fix it all.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To call this a sin would be to imply that
someone is responsible, but in a culture of blamelessness we have decided that
it’s a matter of genes or slow metabolism or a sweet tooth that runs in the
family. That all sounds better than the truth which is that most of us eat too
much and do too little by way of exercise. What makes matters worse is that
chronic obesity may be more psychological and spiritual than physiological,
especially in a culture that idolizes food. Other than the Bible, the only
other kind of publication that is growing beyond leaps and bounds is cook books
--- check out Barnes and Noble if you don’t believe me. It’s a bigger section
of the store than history.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The super market is the temple of excess with
music, lighting and an ingenious array of visual seductions all designed to
prompt us to buy more than we need, especially things we shouldn’t eat. How
many of us go into the super market with a list and come out with just exactly
those things and nothing more? Last Monday I spent $27.00 for a quart of milk!
Two bags! Yet we live in a time when pleasures are regarded as an entitlement,
and anyone who thinks otherwise is a prude or a closet hedonist. The whole idea
of choosing to live a measured life where less is more and austerity is a
virtue sounds almost subversive in our consumer culture.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Gluttony strikes us as sad rather than
deadly. What’s a little overeating, after all, when compared to lust? It
troubles me when my brother priests get together and I notice what shape they
are in. Congregations seem to take pride in getting Father another piece of pie
or another donut.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When the early church Fathers made the list
we’ve been considering and named the sins we are searching for in ourselves,
Gluttony is always placed next to Lust. They are connected. Too much of a good
thing is never a good thing. A few weeks ago, I ran into someone from the
parish who had been bitterly complaining about their tuition in our school. I
was a guest in a very expensive restaurant, and I noticed that the complainer
sitting behind me was well known by the restaurant staff leaving me to suppose
that they frequently dined there. We claim to be over taxed and underpaid, and
so school children go without textbooks and paper. Yet our national restaurant
tab could fund them for a decade. We are raising the tuition All Saints School
this year. The actual cost of that increase passed on to the school patrons
means one less trip to McDonalds each month!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Eating is a “zero-sum game.” The food supply
at any one moment is finite. The more you eat, the less food is available to
some else. What that really means is that our tendency to waste food, quite
literally steals bread from the poor. That story of Lazarus the beggar we just
heard suggests that the two of them, the rich and the poor existed only a few
feet apart, but they might have been living in separate universes. In some
cities, not mine because we hide them under the freeway, you can walk down a
street to an expensive restaurant and step over the homeless hungry. If they
beg for something, we feel offended, embarrassed, and frightened; then we buy a
bottle of wine that would feed them for a month. Gluttony is not just
irrational. It is immoral. And it is pointless.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yet, here’s the paradox. The most constant
and frequently used metaphor for the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placetype w:st="on">kingdom</st1:placetype>
of <st1:placename w:st="on">God</st1:placename></st1:place> is a banquet, and
Jesus was turning water into wine so that there would be more than plenty. He
is criticized for eating and drinking and “reclining” at table as he eats which
signals more than an ordinary meal. It was a sumptuous and drawn out affair. So
here comes the virtue I propose for us to use in the face of Gluttony:
COMMUNION.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In a world that continues to hammer away at
us to take more and more, this gift from God teaches a different lesson: Less
is more. Anyone who looks at the banquet on this altar would have reason to
think: “There is not enough.” But there always is. Here the issue the glutton
cannot ever address between quality and quantity is finally settled. Eating
here is more than a refueling operation. Here, we eat to live, not live to eat.
So the opposite of a glutton is not someone on a diet who counts out calories
and carbohydrates, nor is it someone who fasts. The opposite of a glutton is
someone for whom food is a means to an end, not an end in itself. It is a
person who uses food and loves people, instead of loving food and using people.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We live in a fast food world, eating on the
run or eating alone with the microwave beeping. Sacramental living requires
something else. It requires a table at the center of the family life. TV tables
and card tables will not do. Nobody eats in hurry, and no one eats and runs.
There is no running from communion for believers. There is too little of it
anyway.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some of us probably grew up in homes where
you cleaned your plate. It was a “waste not or want not” life. These days with
“all you can eat” restaurants and a belief that “if a little bit is good, then
a lot must be better” bringing immense portions and larger plates to the table,
there is a conflict and it is costing us. Cleaning your plate has its roots in
gratitude, and the virtue of not wasting is virtually impossible to exercise.
Too much of a good thing is exactly that, and it brings no health and no life.
I often remember that one of the temptations Jesus experienced in the desert
concerned food and using food for power. We face that temptation all the time,
and we’re not making a lot of progress. World hunger is not a
political/economic issue to be resolved by diplomats. It is a moral issue.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The glutton usually eats alone and in
silence. Sin always seems to isolate us. Those who share food in communion on
the other hand pass what’s on the table before helping themselves. There is an
unspoken rule that the portions must be adequate for the number of guests
present, lest the food run out before all are served. So we start with small
portions and discuss leftovers later. We take turns chewing and talking, we do
not eat with face down inches from the plate gulping and gorging. We talk and we
listen. Sometimes a toast is raised and we look one another in the eye and
express our hopes and encouragement that converts nourishment of the body into
nourishment of the soul. It is then not what we eat, but why we eat and with
whom we eat.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even the person who eats alone can be in a
sacramental experience because they begin with a blessing and the spirit of God
is the unnamed guest. A prayer before the meal even though unheard by others
establishes the meaning of the food and the undeserved grace of having it
available. Having all this food reminds us that we are among the privileged in
the world. The most powerful antidotes to gluttony are community and gratitude.
They turn eating into communion and every table into an altar. As a sin,
gluttony makes us solitary. Communion brings us together. Gluttony teaches us
to devour. Communion teaches us to savor. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since 2001 I sit at a table every day and
wonder how it is that we have the funds and the anger and the enthusiasm for a
war on terror but no interest at all for a war on poverty and hunger when the
truth is, poverty and hunger are breeding the terrorists while our gluttony for
oil makes it all possible. Gluttony takes life. Communion gives life. Since
I’ve been sick, I have come back with a new sense of food, eating, and even
dieting: eat less, more often, with more friends. I remember mom’s advice, chew
slowly, pause to speak, and laugh with those at table. It takes half as much
food and it’s twice as good. That kind of eating feeds the body and the soul. A
hangover is God talking. The message is simple: you are gulping when you should
be sipping. Take, Eat. This is my body, broken for you. This is the bread of
heaven; this is the cup of salvation. It isn’t much, but it’s more than enough.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now, for three nights we have gathered
to reflect upon the pervasive power and presence of sin in our lives, and in
the society in which we live because of it. I have proposed to you antidotes to
those sins which we might as well call virtues. The virtue we possess and must
nurture in our lives is bred from the habits of a lifetime. These virtues are
more than ideas; they are a way of life. The movement from understanding them
to living them is the very stuff of conversion. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1. You can recognize a virtuous person
because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Pride</b> is insecurity. Proud and Arrogant behavior compensates for
deep misgivings about one’s true value. When we believe that we are worthy,
that all human life is worthy, there is a deep reservoir of living water on
which to draw. No need to be the center of attention, because we have been
attentive to our own center. No need to be impatient with others because we
know we share the same short comings. These people are recognized because they
are not out to be recognized. They listen to others because they respect the
worthiness of others. They grow old gracefully because looking young is not
what makes you feel worthy. This person wakes up every morning knowing exactly
what they are: a child of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2. You can recognize a virtuous person
because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Envy</b> is the failure to admire and emulate the beauty of everything
and everyone else. There is no cheap imitation in their lives. They do not want
anything except the very best for others. This virtuous person is always wide
eyed in wonder and delight, never squint eyed in resentment.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3. You can recognize a virtuous person
because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Anger</b> is consumptive and useless. Vengeance or Revenge is far from
them, for they recognize the destructive power of that evil. Indignation is
their response to what is wrong and the only anger in their hearts is that
indignation on behalf of others rather than service to one’s self. This person
is recognized as a friend of the poor and defender of people without power or
status. They get mad for the right reasons, and they know when to shout and
when to whisper.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4. You can recognize a virtuous person
because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Sloth</b> rejects the wonder and goodness of everything God has made by
saying, “Who cares? They expend their energy for others, are filled with
compassion and they are content and comfortable with themselves as God made
them, holy and good. They plant seeds and wait, knowing that the planting is
their job and the harvest if God’s. They have peace which surpasses all
understanding.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">5. You can recognize a virtuous person
because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Gluttony</b> is living to eat instead of eating to live. They turn every meal into a sacrament and
they commune with friends to savor every moment rather than ever meal. They
never forget that food is a gift, that less is always more, and that what seems
like too little is always more than enough in the presence of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">6. You can recognize the virtuous
person because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Lust</b> is love of self, and so they never
take those who love them for granted. Considerate and thoughtful, knowing that
physical attraction is rooted in emotional intimacy and tangible tenderness.
Holy Intimacy in love is always Intimacy with the Holy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">7. You can recognize a virtuous person
because they know that the real root of the deadly sin of <b>Greed</b> because they remember that desire is both a blessing and a
curse. Wanting things for them is no sin if those things are a means to an end,
not an end in themselves. They are free of possession. They love life, not
things. They do not serve money, money serves them so that they can serve
others. They are always stewards of God’s gifts.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For all their glamour, the Seven
Deadly Sins are really just seven fallen angels.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Worthiness</i></b> is the quiet,
unspoken antidote to pride;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Emulation</i></b>, not envy is what
makes us all students of beauty and truth;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Indignation</i></b> is how we turn
self-serving anger into a passion for change;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Fidelity</i></b> and trust is how we
keep monogamy from becoming monotonous;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Communion</i></b> is how food become
fellowship with another and with God;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Wanting wisely </i></b>is how desire gets
bent into useful shapes; and<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i>Contentment</i></b> is how we let things
be and trust God Providence to restore all things to goodness.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Praise to God, the source of all our
goodness.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Praise to Jesus Christ, the Word Made
Flesh,<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The path of Virtue for the Saved.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Praise to the Holy Spirit, the giver
life who fills us with Joy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the name of the Father, the Son and
of the Holy Spirit, let us be embraced by the power of grace, conversion, and
peace.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Amen.</span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-69164567593094183742016-03-07T12:07:00.000-08:002016-03-13T12:13:19.078-07:00Second Day of Lenten Retreat<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-size: 14pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">ANGER AND SLOTH<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Holy Spirit Catholic Church, Mustang, OK<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Father Thomas Boyer</span></div>
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 448.5pt right 7.1in; text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">March 7, 2016<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Reading
1 </span><span style="font-size: 9pt;">(Ephesians
4:26-32)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A Reading from the
Letter of Paul to the Church of Ephesus.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“My brothers and
sisters never let the sun set on your anger or else you will give the devil a
foothold. Anyone who was a thief must stop stealing; instead he should exert
himself at some honest job with his own hands so that he may have something to
share with those in need. No foul word should ever cross your lips; let your
words be for the improvement of others, as occasion offers, and do good to your
listeners; do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God who has marked you with his
seal, ready for the day when we shall be set free. Any bitterness or bad temper
or anger, or shouting or abuse must be far removed from you – as must every
kind of malice. Be generous to one another, sympathetic, forgiving each other
as readily as God forgave you in Christ.” The Word of the Lord<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<h1 align="center" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">The
Homily</span></span></h1>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Whoever said that “Sticks and stones may break
your bones, but words can never hurt you.” must have been living with deaf
mutes. That old saying deserves to be deleted from our memory. As a child I
never believed it, and as an adult, I have come to wonder what kind of person
could have ever thought such a thing. What were they thinking? “Careless words
can do untold damage; one word may destroy even a sublime love.” This sin,
called Anger is not about sudden flashes at things gone wrong – those outbursts
here one minute and gone the next make the best of us giggle at how silly we
reacted over something of little consequence. This sin is about a disorder, an
outburst of emotion connected with a desire for revenge. This is an emotion
that becomes an obsession. Perhaps it is better called: “Wrath.” It is a
fixation and we live in an age of wrath. It is observed every day in the
behavior of terrorists, kidnappers, hijackers, looters, and sometimes the
clenched fists of demonstrators.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is an angry age. Our world is crowded
with angry people. Sometimes we are the angry ones. In my reflection on this
third of the Deadly Sins, I am coming to realize that much of this anger is
fueled by a serious confusion over <b>rights</b>
and <b>wants</b>. We have come to a time in
human history when any need, desire, or longing for anything that one lacks but
someone else has, is today conceived to be my <b><u>right</u></b> that, when demanded, must be provided without
challenge, and if it is not at once supplied the one making the demand as
entitled to be angry. In that kind of climate, you can hardly blame the one
making the demand for taking advantage of this foolishness since they are
justified in advance on four grounds:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">What they want, it is their right to have;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When it is asked, it should be granted;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">If it is not granted, it is understandable
that they are angry;<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Since they are angry, it is clear that their
demand in the first place was justified.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I don’t think any civilization in human
history has ever gotten itself in this mess before. It is a vicious circle: any
and every felt want is translated into a “right” which incites the citizens to
Anger then to destructiveness.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I have no intention of “preaching to the
choir” so to speak, or of getting side tracked by this example, but the best
example in front of us day in and day out is the matter of a woman’s “right” to
control her body: “Abortion.” The bottom line here is that there are no
boundaries that can logically be set to the concept of individual and human
rights. We are so individualized in this culture that every individual need,
want, or desire has become a “right.” But any high school student who studies
biology knows that we don’t have control over our bodies. They are subject to infection, disease,
decay, and death. The truth is, one
cannot claim as a right what cannot be guaranteed, and there is no way of
guaranteeing to any of us, male or female, the right to have “control over our
own bodies.” To present as rights what cannot in the end be secured as rights,
as we all too often do today, is a sure prescription for Wrath.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Wrath is inevitably directed, even if not
intentionally, at an innocent object. In this case, it is the conceived child.
The mother may want to abort, but it isn’t a right. To translate a wish into a
right is an example of the absurdly distorted concept of individual and human
rights by which our society is now confused. It sets us against each other in
an endless combat for the rights we claim. Anger is the consequence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Most of these “rights” someone will claim
will, if granted involve the diminishing of another’s rights. The freedom of a
woman to choose not to have a child can be a diminishing of the freedom of a
man to enjoy the child whom he has played some part in conceiving; to say
nothing of the rights of the child to life. If anyone can claim that any felt
want or need or longing is a right, there are clearly no such things as rights
left at all, since everyone’s supposed rights are pitted legitimately against
everyone else’s supposed rights, and we no longer have any way of deciding what
is a right and what is not. We have a mess on our hands and it is deadly: not
just to an unborn child, but to civil and social life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The desire for revenge is both an outcome of
Wrath and a cause. “Getting even”, Getting back” – it’s all the same. Waiting
for that bridge to go down yesterday I sat behind a car which had a bumper
sticker that read: “I get mad, and I get even.” Road rage is an epidemic in our
time, and so is gratuitous violence. Both are directly related to a culture of
hyper-individualism which has placed a giant chip on everyone’s precious
shoulder. “How dare the world slow me down? How dare we be inconvenienced by a
traffic jam, by someone in the grocery store line ahead of us who chats kindly
for just moment with a tired checker? How dare that old person slow down in
front of me before turning right?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We are living through the angriest time in
the history of our nation. The horrible events of September 11, 2001 created
more anger in this country than anyone has seen since <st1:place w:st="on">Pearl
Harbor</st1:place>. The anger raged into wrath and the need to retaliate
against the real perpetrators. We’ll get Osama and his network He’ll be hunted
down, smoked out, and brought home dead or alive. Anger, you know, often causes
us to make promises we can’t keep. What’s more, when dealing with September 11,
the distinction between real and perceived injury becomes more than academic.
Most Americans defended the war to drive the Taliban from power in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Afghanistan</st1:place></st1:country-region> and
shut down the terrorist training camps. The problem came when “perceived” injuries
were ascribed to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Iraq</st1:place></st1:country-region>,
and our anger was directed at a country which, although suffering under a cruel
dictator, had done no real harm to us.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We let our anger get the best of us, and then
later we learned that the weapons of mass destruction and links to al-Qaeda did
not exist. We were right to be angry about September 11, but by focusing on our
own desire for revenge we allowed ourselves to be dragged or manipulated in a
war that has not brought us any closer to capturing the real terrorists. We were
hurt, and so we lashed out. But the convenient target isn’t necessarily the
legitimate target. While our response may have made us feel better, it hurt our
reputation around the world. You know what the difference between a reaction
and a response is? It’s a pause. I remember my mom standing still with lips
tight counting to ten. She taught me to do that. It makes the difference
between an angry reaction (knee jerk) and a reasonable response (wisdom).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mahatma Gandhi warned us that “an eye for an
eye just leaves the whole world blind.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So, when things don’t go well, or we fail to
get something we want, someone else must be to blame. That is the thinking of
our culture. We are taught to assume personal responsibility, but as
individuals we often act like victims. The lyrics of nearly every country and
western song reveal the sorry mess we are in: “Somebody Done Somebody Wrong.”
and, we’re, “Mad as hell and not going to take it anymore.” (Another bumper
sticker I saw this week.) There always has to be someone to blame with this
crazy thinking because Wrath needs an enemy, and even where this is none, it
will invent one. Timothy McVeigh grew up angry and then left a loveless home to
live in a world of cheap hotel rooms, hate radio, and the fraternity of racism.
Failing to find himself worthy of love, he became addicted to hatred, which can
be its own kind of narcotic. After the bombing, our anger was first directed
against Arabs, and we immediately detained several men of Arab descent without
cause, except that they looked to white <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">America</st1:country-region></st1:place> like terrorists. When the
real perpetrator turned out to look very much like a clean-cut Marine, we found
it difficult to believe that he acted alone, and began to spin out conspiracy
theories like cotton candy, because anger can blind us and make us believe we
know something, even when we know nothing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So what about a virtue to use against this
sin? There is a theory about “good anger and bad anger.” Let’s call it <b><u>Indignation</u></b>. Put the word
Righteous in front of it if you want, but I think that’s confusing.
“Indignation” has to do with dignity, and what I want to suggest is that a
little indignation – that is to say, a little good anger about the right things
might help us refocus and surface a little good old passion for justice, not
revenge. It might be a good idea sometime to get angry because we care, not
just because our feelings have been hurt. Lots of people are mad these days,
but not about anything that matters. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT8vHPTePBLOPMtFp-WmSZNJQxLo1HGl9JB_a-WDXtfstKvrN96Tz1zd-WfE7SLtGoUDzj5JSTnZZJkxHaA8ykRaCk25Wi89EKS8DGRAvKv0PBkUetj4qTvOR7ZAMh5pts8CjIDCJrrok/s1600/pope-francis-do-not-give-up--your-dreams-of-a-more-just-world.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhT8vHPTePBLOPMtFp-WmSZNJQxLo1HGl9JB_a-WDXtfstKvrN96Tz1zd-WfE7SLtGoUDzj5JSTnZZJkxHaA8ykRaCk25Wi89EKS8DGRAvKv0PBkUetj4qTvOR7ZAMh5pts8CjIDCJrrok/s320/pope-francis-do-not-give-up--your-dreams-of-a-more-just-world.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Gospel images of Jesus do not avoid the
reality of anger and the human passion of Jesus Christ. That occasion when he
cleansed the <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Temple</st1:place></st1:city>
was an experience of human passion that could not be ignored. The image of
Jesus as “meek and mild” is not always reconcilable with the Jesus of the
Gospels. Remember the time when he walked past a fig tree looking for something
to eat? In fact, when you start looking at the man who cursed a fig tree
because it didn’t give him food when he wanted it even out of season, when you
remember that he suggested a mill-stone as a necklace for those who hurt
children, you might suspect he needed an anger management class. This matter of
anger is really about passion directed in the right way. It is about action,
doing something, not just thinking something. The reality of Jesus is that he
was angry, but not over some injustice done to him. Rather he was boiling over
with indignation over the corruption of religion in his time. I think he is
still indignant. The scandal of our church today is not about sex abuse nor
that people do not believe the right things as some on the far right would like
to suggest. It is that people hardly ever do the right things. Jesus has become
a cosmic pal, a buddy. God has become wise and adorable, maybe awesome, but
never disturbing. The Word of God has become a study guide. It might be time
for God to become frightening again. It might be that so many are obsessed with
the second coming because the first coming was so disappointing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Anger is self-serving passion. When we stir
our passions for the sake of others, stop worrying about our rights and act
more out of justice, it won’t be so dangerous on our streets. We are at war
with terrorism and we will be for a long time to come. The manner in which we
marshal our anger and wage this war will determine whether we make the world
safer or more dangerous. Indignation on the other hand moves deliberately but
patiently to bring terrorists to justice rather than bringing ‘justice to
terrorists. Instead of a deadly sin, we need a lively virtue. The love of justice
perverted into the desire for revenge and the injury of someone else will end
our civilization. Whenever love is translated into hatred, we know that sin has
entered and wrecked its havoc.<span style="font-size: 14pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 90%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 90%;">
<span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 90%;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Silent Reflection<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 90%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 90%;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 90%;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 90%;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 90%;">Reading 2 </span><span style="font-size: 9pt; line-height: 90%;">(Mark
4:26-29)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 90%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A reading from the Holy
Gospel according to Mark<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">A man scatters seed
on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is
sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land
produces first the shoots then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And
when the crop is ready, at once he starts to reap because the harvest has
come.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Gospel of the
Lord <o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Homily<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Life is tough. Then you die.” Another bumper
sticker I saw this week. I think I may work up some talks on “Bumper Sticker
Wisdom”! But there’s another old saying like the one I just mentioned: “Sticks
and Stones”. It’s a simple one; four words that were drilled into me as child:
“Mind Your Own Business.” As an adult and priest, I have begun to question that
wisdom. I have begun to suspect that it is at the root of a seriously sinful
life style. “Live and Let Live.” is part of that false wisdom. “Don’t’ get
involved.” my father once said to me. Bad advice!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Sloth”. I choose to stick with the old
English word because it is so curious. It sounds like being lazy, like laying
too long in the bathwater or sleeping through breakfast. It hardly sounds
deadly, and certainly not like a capital offence, but it is. It is way more
than an energy deficiency. It is not about deciding one morning that you’ll
roll over and go back to sleep, or taking a nap in the afternoon when you
should be doing laundry. It IS about a fundamental loss of faith in one’s
ability to do anything about anything. It is about a feeling expressed this
way: “So what? I couldn’t care less.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">If we are living in an age of Anger, it is
also an era of anxiety. Like the previous sin, it rests upon the false notion
that an individual can find fulfillment and salvation in nothing but his or her
own self and the denial that we are members one of another, and that “the
solidarity of mankind links the crimes of each to the sorrows of all.” It is
that business of individualism again. It is summed up best in the advice: “Look
out for Number One.” It is the first commandment of Sloth.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This whole idea, the whole concept of
individualism reached a new high and new approval/acceptance in this country in
the 1980s. It was first observed in an economic policy called: “Supply Side
Economics” that turned out to little more than an economics of ego centric
individualism. Trickle down didn’t, and now we live with are can no longer deny
a chasm between the rich and the poor that is shocking to everyone who pays
attention. It nurtured a kind of isolated individualism that has set the stage
for a gradual polarization as the rich get richer and the poor take care of
them. Our Church calls this into question again and again.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The first symptom of sloth is Complacency.
Individualism breeds it. It is the complacency of the comfortable. As they have
grown in number, one begins to hear the denials that we are our brothers’
keeper. That’s Sloth in your face. Looking out for Number One has been given
even more enforcement by the self-indulgent idea that if “I’m OK, you’re OK” or
“I’ll leave you alone, and you leave me alone, and if we do that, everything
will be fine!” No it won’t! It will not
be fine. I won’t be fine, and you won’t be fine. In Genesis God said: “It is
not good for man to be alone.” There is something wrong. This is a breeding
ground for indifference, and “Indifference” is another word or manifestation of
Sloth – it is deadly: deadly to individuals and deadly to the human family.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One of the consequences of all this in our
society is getting more and more obvious to people like me. It is at the root
of many divorces and the cause of a pressing crisis in our church. When I was a
pastor I would interview one by one the young people in confirmation class. One
of the questions I ask them is what they will be doing after High School. My
favorite answer is: “I don’t know.” I squirmed when they told me they are going
into law school, medical school, or planning to be an X ray technician. To
those I had a second question: “Do you think that’s what God wants you to do?”
At least those who have not made up their minds might be open to wondering what
God wants them to do with their lives. It’s all about pursuing some purpose in
one’s life, and that means it’s about commitment to someone or something other
than oneself. I am of the opinion that young people have no interest what so
ever in the priesthood because it requires that frightening experience called:
“Commitment.” Avoiding that is what gives so much anxiety to young people
approaching marriage. Living it is what makes keeping a marriage alive so
difficult. Avoiding it because a marriage like priesthood is hard work is
called SLOTH.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Sloth grows quietly and steadily in an
environment of gratification. If it doesn’t feel good, it doesn’t get done. If
the good feeling is delayed, other things will come first. A lot of charity
work is like that, and I am suspicious of it. A large group of young people
from <st1:city w:st="on">Norman</st1:city>, <st1:state w:st="on">Oklahoma</st1:state>
went to a town in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">Mexico</st1:country-region></st1:place>
under the sponsorship of a local Methodist church and they built a couple of
houses. They came home. Some of them felt really good about it and they want to
go again, and I wonder: to build houses or feel good, can they build enough
houses to really matter, will they do something about the system that creates
the problem if it means they will have to suffer with less? Some became
profoundly disturbed, and they have the best chance of all to make a difference
if they stay disturbed. The good feeling here is like a narcotic. It satisfies,
provides contentment, and nothing changes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Those who have taken ill with sloth have no
identity except their personal identity. There is an absence of group identity.
That’s what happens with people too lazy to go to church – they think they are
Catholic, but the very identity of Church springs from the assembly. If you’re not
in it, if you’re not part of it, if you’re not identified by being in the
middle of it, you can’t claim the identity. You’re just claiming an idea. The
individualism that is on the rise in our culture shows it's self in that
question: “What’s in it for me?” with immediate gratification of one’s need
coming before all other loyalties. So, the commitment to marriage or to having
children while debts get paid off begins. The individualism of our age is an
ideology that encourages people to maximize personal advantage while
consideration of the common good is increasingly irrelevant. It’s SLOTH.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I find it fascinating to discover that in
collectivist societies which are often religious (Islam being a perfect
example) a person’s loyalty to his family or group takes precedence over his
personal goals. Such societies have among the lowest rates of crime,
dysfunctional families, and alcoholism. The thought/comparison makes me
uncomfortable, but have you ever wondered why no one among us ever blows
themselves up for a cause or an ideal or a vision of what should be? We don’t
care enough. We are too complacent. We don’t care about the right things and
are too easily satisfied with puny pleasures that never last. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Meanwhile, in the real world, millions of
people are moving through life like zombies, staying outwardly busy but not
finding anything much worth living for. “I’m so busy! I hardly know what to
do.” Business! It is deadly. I’ve given up on a couple of relationships I had
hoped would foster lasting companionship because the other person was just too
busy all the time. All they could ever talk about was how busy they were. I
began to feel like an interruption, an intruder. Personally I hate it when
people walk up to me or call me on the phone and start by saying: Father, I
know you’re busy, and I’m sorry to bother you!” WHAT? My life is not about meetings and reports
which fill in the gaps that anyone else can do. So when I hear that, rather
than be insulted, I simply quietly realize I am being corrected. I can’t count
the marriages I’ve seen blow up because people are so busy or the number of
families that fall apart because of busy parents and equally busy children who
run from soccer to Tee ball, to ballet or swimming lessons. Their refrigerator
doors are covered with schedules and lists, and inside there is nothing to eat
because they don’t have time to sit down and look at one another, so they eat
on the way to or from some game or some practice or some meeting. This is
deadly. It is sloth.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Herein lays the paradox of sloth: its ability
to disguise itself in misdirected activity. The consequence is neglect, neglect
of higher things, greater things, spiritual things, in the end, neglect of
self. This is life in a vacuum.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There is a spiritual side to this as well.
Just as the slothful avoid obligations that demand sacrifice, so do we
experience the same thing spiritually. I think it is what gives rise to some
popular devotions that are so shallow and silly and ask so little of us while
the real stuff of spiritual life gets ignored: Fasting, Prayer, Sacrifice.
Instead of visiting the sick, the nursing homes, the homeless and taking up a
share of Saint Vincent de Paul Society’s work, we just look quickly and think:
that person in the nursing home isn’t my mom or dad. Someone should so
something! I am always suspicious of spiritual exercises that bring consolation
and comfort to those who are already so by their position in life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is an anxious age. Anxiety is
essentially a dread of nothing. What to do about it? I would suggest some
balance in life that the little story from the Gospel suggests. Sow the seed,
and wait. It is the ancient dilemma of when to do and when to wait. The parable
defines something called contentedness in terms of the proper order of things:
first you do, then you wait. After you have done what only you can do (plant
the seed), you wait while the seed does what only it can do. When the time for
harvest has come, you gather in the crop that grew itself, but which cannot
harvest itself. This is divine wisdom – a revelation! “The order here is very
important. First the seed is sown, and then sower knows that he can do nothing
more so he waits. Nobody stands over a seed and screams, “Come on now, grow!” A
seed carries its own future in its bosom. The sower has done all he can do. Now
he waits patiently for God to do what only God can do.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“No one would think to call his waiting
slothful. It is wise. He turns his mind to other things. He hopes for rain. He
mends fences. He watches and waits because he is not the master of the harvest;
he is the steward of the mystery. When that mystery is fully present, his
waiting is over, and he puts the sickle to the stalk.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Mark preserved this parable for an anxious
church, one that waited for the return of Christ and wondered why it hadn’t
happened. The answer is that we cannot know, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t
do what we can and then be content. We plant the seed of the word, and then we
wait for the mysterious way in which God brings it to fullness. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This kind of contentment means that we know
there are limits to what we can do, but these do not produce feelings of
failure. Failure comes from doing nothing. This kind of contentment makes us
more attentive to those moments when we can do something and more patient when
we know it is time to wait. Being busy does not make us happy. “Idol hands are
the devil’s workshop.” is a lie. More than anything, Sloth is a sin of
omission, a sin of neglect. Technology and gadgets have freed us from drudgery
leaving us the challenge of what to do with the time now available. Minding our
own business, not getting involved means we will not hurt nor get hurt. But of
course, the hurt is deep both ways because it leaves us separated from humanity
and that’s a deep inner tear that ultimately separates us from God, which by
ancient definition is sin.</span><span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 14.0pt;"><br clear="all" style="mso-special-character: line-break; page-break-before: always;" /></span>Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-40409555100652938672016-03-06T12:06:00.000-08:002016-03-13T12:09:27.708-07:00First Day of Lenten Retreat<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-size: 14pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">PRIDE AND ENVY<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Sunday evening Holy Spirit Catholic Church, Mustang, OK<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Father Thomas Boyer</span></div>
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 448.5pt right 7.1in; text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">March 6, 2016<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Reading
1 </span><span style="font-size: 9pt;">(Sirach
10 12-18, 22, 26)</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"><br />
</span><i><span style="font-size: 10pt;">“A reading from the Book of Ecclesiastes also
called the Book of Sirach.</span></i><span style="font-size: 14pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The first stage of
pride is to desert the Lord and to turn one’s heart away from one’s Maker.
Since the first stage of pride is sin, whoever clings to it will pour forth
filth. This is why the Lord inflicts unexpected punishments on such people,
utterly destroying them. The Lord has turned mighty princes off their thrones
and seated the humble there instead. The Lord has plucked up the proud by the
roots, and planted the lowly in their place. The Lord has overthrown the lands
of the nations and destroyed them to the very foundations of the earth.
Sometimes he has taken them away and destroyed them and blotted out their
memory from the earth. Pride was not created for human beings……The rich, the
noble, the poor, let them pride themselves on fearing the Lord. Do not try to be smart when you do your work,
do not put on airs when you are in difficulties. Better the hardworking who has
plenty of everything, than the pretentious at a loss for a meal. My child, be
modest in your self-esteem, and value yourself at your proper worth.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-size: 10pt;">The Word of the Lord.</span></i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<h1 align="center" style="text-align: center;">
<u><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: small;">Homily<o:p></o:p></span></u></h1>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">When the church fathers made their list of
sins, pride was always at the top of the list because it was idolatry – the
first sin is the beginning of all sin. There are all kinds of ways to describe
the behavior that manifests pride. The proud are arrogant, haughty, conceited,
egocentric, narcissistic, insolent, presumptuous and vain, and way more
besides! We know when we are angry or greedy, but pride is more clever and
subtle.</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">We are often unaware of pride. It
shows itself in secret: in secret contempt and self-righteous judgment; in
secret illegal and unethical behavior; in the smug attitude we have toward the
weakness and failure of others as well as in a sense of privilege which marks
our age so severely. The proud think they </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"><u>earn</u></i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; text-align: justify;">
things which they then possess because of something they have done. You see,
it’s all about them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Pride easily finds a home among us because
our culture predisposes us to competition, and that’s a bad thing! “Pride must
be competitive, since it cannot concede first place to anyone even when its
real wants are satisfied.” The games and the competitive world of commerce in
which we find ourselves are natural breeding grounds for pride. “I’m number
one.” “I made it.” “It’s mine.” Now
there’s nothing wrong with being one unless you can’t stand being number two.
But the real problem here is the pronoun, that notion that it’s me, that I did
it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Now, part of the problem is language. We no longer
use the word “pride” to only refer to idolatry. Today we sometimes use it
carelessly to mean “self-esteem” which is not necessarily a bad thing. We tell
our kids to take pride in themselves, to be proud of their work. We tell them,
I hope, that we are proud of them. The result is a kind of semantic switch that
gets this all mixed up in a kind of psycholinguistic soup. The result is that
feelings of guilt are no longer interpreted as messages from God or signs of
broken covenant. We are now allowed to think that it is a matter of low self
esteem. So, pump up the old feel – good ego, and I’ll get over the guilt. Then
the higher our self-esteem becomes, the more insulated we become from the pain
of broken relationships. When you start thinking that way, you’ll end up with a
moat around your soul, isolated, lonely, and distant from everything and
everyone beautiful which is just where the proud person is always found.
Lonely!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Perhaps the real truth is that the
excessively proud person is really not in love with themselves at all, at least
not in a healthy way, but actually suffers from the opposite malady. My
experience with the puffed up people is that they are in fact excessively
insecure. They are self-obsessed because they are always trying to prove
something. They look down on others because they never look up to themselves.
We hate our imperfect lives and feel powerless in the face of impossible
standards. These imperfections torment us, and our obsession with
self-improvement leaves little time or energy for meaningful relationships. It’s
Pride.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Now consider this: there is an answer to this
deadly sin that eats at us day in and day out. It is simple, and it stares us
right in the face, yet we do not recognize it. A more authentic and natural
love of self is how pride is disarmed: in other words, Truth! Now, loving
oneself is not the same as being in love with oneself. I am talking here about
a new virtue called: WORTHINESS. You see, a worthy person has nothing to prove
because worthiness cannot be earned. It can only be recognized. It is a gift. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Years ago, I went to summer school in <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:city w:st="on">New Orleans</st1:city></st1:place> at Loyola. The
first morning in the dining room at the dorm my order came out with this small,
milky-colored, grainy-looking pile of mush on one side of the eggs. “What’s
that?” I asked the waitress. </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“Them’s grits,” she said. </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“But I didn’t order grits,” I said </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">“You don’t have to,” she replied. “They just
comes.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Now, that’s the way it is with Worthiness.
You don’t have to order it, and you can’t do anything to earn it. It just
comes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Protestant work ethic that has so shaped
this nation demands that we earn everything, and that’s a set up for pride.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Worthiness at its core is grace. Like true
beauty, which is best described as the “effortless manifestation of inner
peace,” true worthiness is the effortless manifestation of inner gratitude. We
have forgotten that we are born good – at least I think that’s what we heard
God say when he looked at all of this! We may make mistakes, but we are not a
mistake. Imagine what this world would be like if more people felt not just
good about themselves, but worthy. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnWbmw4Af1-2FSfJvOzj2zf4Y2yRAfUXMyDRDpbhLwZ5AIzU-1n8M0fAelMMkMkBVmxOTCk3uZ1xiFfp0siY-vGGdXTM2fpCE_qUTvHPGMzBs86uZJ73R5ZD7p8yn_fJDwrxhVuquBnck/s1600/worthiness.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnWbmw4Af1-2FSfJvOzj2zf4Y2yRAfUXMyDRDpbhLwZ5AIzU-1n8M0fAelMMkMkBVmxOTCk3uZ1xiFfp0siY-vGGdXTM2fpCE_qUTvHPGMzBs86uZJ73R5ZD7p8yn_fJDwrxhVuquBnck/s320/worthiness.png" width="241" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">One of the most devastating and deadly
realties in American life is our obsession with physical beauty. We live under
an astonishing barrage of images whose message is, quite simply, “You don’t
look so good, don’t you wish you did?” Image is everything. Having a look is
not enough. One must have <i>the</i> look.
How else do you explain that plastic surgery is the fastest-growing form of
medicine? This is Roman culture, we are obsessed not with beauty and truth, but
with perfection.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So, this “worthiness” I’m proposing is really
just a new version of an old a trusted virtue: humility. The trouble is,
“humility” too has gotten a bad language twist, and too often we think it has
something to do with being soft and self-depreciating. That is ridiculous. To
be humble is not to put oneself down. In fact thinking too little of oneself is
also a manifestation of pride. The foundation of humility is truth. The sadness
here is that we fail to take truth seriously: the truth about our worthiness,
our goodness, and our inherent value and dignity. The truth is that God loves
us always and everywhere. That is grace unearned, undeserved, and the only response
is gratitude. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Silent Reflection<o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Reading
2<span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 9pt;">(James
3:14-18)<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> “A reading from the Epistle of James.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Anyone who is wise or
understanding among you should from a good life give evidence of deeds done in
the gentleness of wisdom. But if at heart you have the bitterness of jealousy,
or selfish ambition, do not be boastful or hide the truth with lies; this is
not the wisdom that comes from above, but earthly, human and devilish. Wherever
there are jealousy and ambition, there are also disharmony and wickedness of
every kind; whereas the wisdom that comes down from above is essentially
something pure; it is also peaceable kindly and considerate; it is full of
mercy and shows itself by doing good;
nor is there any trace of partiality or hypocrisy in it. The peace sown by
peacemakers brings a harvest of justice.”<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-size: 10pt;">The Word of the Lord.</span></i><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Homily<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I had a terrible time choosing scripture to
lead us into this reflection. There is so much to draw from I finally settled
on the letter of James simply because of time. Yet you might think about Cain
and Able, about the tale of Joseph and his brothers, or about the account of
the relationship between King Saul and David as it deteriorates. And then there
is that wonderful story of King Solomon and how he exposes the envious impostor
who would allow the baby to be split in two when the real mother would not.
Then, there are the two brothers of the prodigal father who stands between them
begging them to come into the banquet.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The roots of envy begin early in life. From
childhood we are compared to others. Our value as individuals is measured by
how much dumber or smarter, uglier or more beautiful, weaker or stronger,
poorer or richer we are than our peers. Competition, as I said earlier: it’s
killing us. These are deadly sins. We begin to interpret our lack of what
another person possess as somehow indicative of our lesser worth in general.
“One of the destructive forms that Envy takes today is the widespread
assumption that everyone should be able to do and experience and enjoy
everything that everyone else can do and experience and enjoy. That thinking is
the beginning of Envy. The idea that we are all equal has been perverted into
the idea that we are identical; and when we discover that we cannot all do and
experience and enjoy the things that others do and experience and enjoy, we take
our revenge and deny that they were worth doing and experiencing and enjoying
in the first place.” The result is that
we make no place for the unique for what is rare and cannot be imitated since
we would then not be able to achieve it. We end up unable to admire, respect,
or be grateful for what is more noble, more lovely, or greater than ourselves.
We must pull down or put down what is exceptional. So, envy is not just
grieving because of another’s good which is an element of pride; but envy grieves
because the good in another diminishes one’s own self. It’s no sin to recognize or even feel badly
that you lack something someone else has. It is a sin when envy makes us wish
the other did not have it at all. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Dejection is a striking symptom of envy. Bitter
regret over what we cannot have is envy. That bitterness leads to chipping away
at the reputation of another. Pointing out their faults becomes an escape from
the dejection. It is a spiteful malignancy. It is an ugly effort to level the
playing field or bring another down because we are not up. The envious are
completely without gratitude. The envious see themselves as “losers.” Again,
competition makes winners and losers. There is something about competition that
dooms those to failure who judge themselves by looking at others. There are two
assumptions: that everyone begins with an equal chance from the starting line,
and that the rules of the competition are fair at every stage. These conditions
are unrealizable, which is the flaw in the idea that there is equality of
opportunity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Someone once said: “Imitation is the best form
of flattery.” I think that idea leads to phony and empty pretense. Admiration
or Emulation is what is called for, and it is the surest antidote to envy. The
attitude: “If I can’t have it, I don’t want anyone else to have it” is the
heart of darkness. It is the loser’s emotion. It is an irrational quality when
there is a better way, a lively virtue, a more noble human response: Emulation.
To be in the presence of excellence, virtue, bravery or enlightenment does not
always produce feelings of sinful envy, or even disappointment that we failed
to reach such a high mark. Sometimes we just wonder how that excellence was
acquired, what part of it might be available to us or how we might be more like
the one we admire! <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Imitation is a counterfeit form of emulation.
Imitators do not take the time and energy required to learn what constitutes
the soul of those they admire. They merely rifle through their bag of tricks,
confusing technique with essence. Dressing like your hero, even talking like
him, does not make you, in any sense, heroic. In fact, that sincerest form of
flattery nonsense is just that. Imitation is hazardous to your soul.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Have you ever noticed in the New Testament
that more people get mad over God’s generous treatment of those who do not
deserve it than they do over God’s harsh treatment of those who do? That parable of the folks hired at different
times of the day and then all paid the same is the perfect example of envy at
work. The parable speaks of our inability to calculate the mercies of God.
Human nature leads us to think that other people are always getting more than
they deserve, while we assume that our rewards are just compensation. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">What would happen if, instead of sinful envy,
the workers actually sought to emulate the owner? That is, you know what Jesus
was always doing. He never told people what to believe. He simply showed people
what to do, and then asked them to go and do likewise. So, the eleventh-hour
workers could be grateful for their good fortune and model their behavior after
that of the owners. Having received beyond merit, they could choose to be
generous beyond deserving. At the very least, they would buy the first round of
drinks.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Envy is always about power. Emulation is
about goodness. In the end, the simple test of determining if the envy we feel
toward another might be redeemed is to ask: “Would I like to be more like that
person? Or do I wish that person would fall from grace? If envy drives us to
hate someone or to wish someone harm, then it’s deadly indeed. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The world is starved for heroes, and we have
settled instead for celebrities. Celebrities are the creature of an envious
age. We ascribe no virtue to them. We never think of them as wise or generous,
they are simply paid more than we are paid. In envy we erect them, for awhile
let our envy prey on them, and then in our envy we destroy them. When we are
asked to name the people who have made a difference in our lives, we almost
always name a teacher, a family member or a close friend. These people did not
make us jealous. We wanted to emulate them, even surpass them. When parents
talk about wanting things to be better for their children than they were for
them, they are not just talking about money. They want their children to be
more, to feel more, to live more. Nothing pleases a real parent like having a
child who actually excels over them in all these ways. Envy is a secret thing
that makes us bitter, lonely, mean and petty. It never allows us nor motivates
us to do better nearly as much as it wishes others to do worse. This malice and
evil-mindedness easily and quietly takes possession of us and hardens our
hearts. Yet, gratitude and admiration, contentedness and joy at another’s goodness
will set us free<span style="font-size: 14pt;">.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "book antiqua" , serif; font-size: 14.0pt;"><br clear="all" style="mso-special-character: line-break; page-break-before: always;" /></span>Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-18938550813837026592016-03-05T20:26:00.002-08:002016-03-12T20:56:07.652-08:00Fourth Sunday of Lent<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/030616-fourth-sunday-lent.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Josua 5:9-A, 10-12 + Psalm 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7 + 2 Corinthians 5:17-21 + Luke 15:1-3, 11-32</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Waiting. It is well past bed time for Mom and Dad, but sleep is out of the question. Their 16 year old son is out with friends. Curfew is eleven, and they know he will be in on time. Sure enough the door slams exactly at eleven. Coming into the living room, he says, “Why did you wait up?” Trying to be cool, they say “We weren’t waiting up – we just wanted to see the end of this movie.” Then it’s off to bed for everyone, home and family once again complete and at peace.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mom and Dad wait. The angry words still resonate in the house. In time, this storm too will pass, like hundreds of others have that rock the family. It will blow over. Until then, Mom and Dad put aside their heartbreak and get ready to be forgiving and welcoming parents when the angry son or the put-upon daughter returns because that’s what you do when you are Mom and Dad.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Wait. Everything has been a blur since that phone call: she was crossing the street on her way home and a car came out of nowhere. The driver never saw here. Someone called 911 and….after hours of surgery, they sit by a hospital bed. Their precious daughter hooked up to a wall of blinking monitors, and for the time being, this small hospital room is home, and they wait.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The love of a parent for a child is a remarkable thing. Children have no idea how much their parents do and would do for them: while many good parents never realize what that love enables them to do. They just do it, and so it is easy to tell this story again from Luke’s Gospel. We understand it. We know what it means, and what it suggests to us about a God Jesus taught us to call, “Father.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Yet, at the same time, it is not easy to tell this story, because there is no peace in that house as the story concludes. The reconciliation is incomplete, and while the father may have one of his sons back alive, another stands outside angry, refusing to even call his father by that name and refers to his brother as, “That son of yours.” What could be a joyful story of a family united in peace is really a sad reflection on the present condition of the human family broken and angry, envious, greedy, and prideful. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWSJPlLtb1AebkiVI_HfPi5iCpe1nYbr4uwp-wp7qGYPEjHR42l3D48C60_Fl8MnlHlj0R7Q05-u1F63D0dyQlVfHKeB_G0IIXRMiKzfUHYM0Fk3KiAmg6DX_UPT5UObjJDi3KTRnRKfU/s1600/Virtue.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWSJPlLtb1AebkiVI_HfPi5iCpe1nYbr4uwp-wp7qGYPEjHR42l3D48C60_Fl8MnlHlj0R7Q05-u1F63D0dyQlVfHKeB_G0IIXRMiKzfUHYM0Fk3KiAmg6DX_UPT5UObjJDi3KTRnRKfU/s1600/Virtue.png" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When the characters are removed from the parable, it chronicles the struggle between virtue and vice that goes on within every one of us. The struggle is made all the worse by a confusion within us over values and virtues. Understanding the difference and putting them in the right order provides the insight and wisdom to see virtue victorious over vice. Virtues and Values are not the same thing. Confusing them is not helpful for those who want to grow wise and holy. Confusing them is a formula for personal, spiritual, and social disorder. A virtue is behavior that makes me good. A value is something I want. Virtue speaks to morality. Value has nothing to do with morality. Morality is about what I do with my values. For example, money is value. It is not good nor bad. I can use it to support my family, or buy drugs. I can use it to do good things or bad things. Only my behavior is good or bad when it is consistent with virtue. Values are relative. $50 is a lot of money. $500 is a greater value, but virtues are absolute. Kindness is always good. Patience is always good. Justice is always good. When we confuse these two, values often are often placed ahead of virtues. For example, our culture often places freedom, which is a value, ahead of responsibility, which is a virtue which can be a disaster, because freedom is not a virtue. It does not make us good. Responsibility does.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The boys in this parable are good examples of Virtue and Value face to face. The older son has a lot of values, working hard, doing what is expected of him, but there is no virtue in him. As he stands there proclaiming his values, there is nothing really good about him, and none of us would want to be like him. He is arrogant, mean, proud, and very much alone. Then there is the other one whom I always like to think of in terms of virtue. He has one no one can miss, and it is probably the most important one of all: humility. That virtue makes him good again, and if you would have to choose which of the two you would want as a friend, I hope you would choose the younger one. He would be good to have around. He is wise, humble, and loving.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Tonight, Monday, and Tuesday evenings here at Holy Spirit, I have come to spend a little time with you reflecting upon virtues and vices. Whether or not such a reflection is of value to you remains to be seen, but I would like to propose that as we move through the last days of this Lenten season, it might be valuable to do something with the time we have left. I am going to speak about what our church tradition has for centuries called: “The Seven Deadly Sins.” These vices that make us miserable and continue to leave the human family broken and alienated. Lots of people these days don’t like to talk about or hear about “sin.” Many may insist that they have “issues”; but hardly does anyone like to say they have “sins.” Yet when recently asked by a reporter who he was, Pope Francis without a pause said: “I am a sinner”, and with those four words, he unmasked the lie and the denial with which we stumble through life blaming and accusing others for the choices we make every day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">It will do no good however to simply list the vice or the sin or the “issue” if you want to pretend. What we need is to learn, understand, and practice the virtue that will, when embraced, will lift us up, restore the human goodness and glory for which we were made in God’s image. I’m going to talk about those virtues each night and contrast them to the vice and the sin their absence allows to wound and fester the human soul. Pride and Envy tonight. Anger and Sloth Monday, and Greed, Gluttony, and Lust on Tuesday. I always save the best till last. So I invite you come for an hour or so to pray, reflect on the Word of God, and learn to cultivate real virtues that will eventually, if we wait long enough, and God is patient with us will get the party started with everyone in the house.</span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Fr. Thomas Boyer</span></i></div>
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Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-30936387177506803322016-02-28T15:00:00.000-08:002016-03-12T21:23:13.168-08:00Third Sunday of Lent<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/022816-third-sunday-lent.cfm" target="_blank">Link Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Exodus 3:1-8A, 13-15 + Psalm 103:1-2,3-4,6-7, 8,11 + 1 Corinthians 10:1-6,10-12 +Luke 13:1-9</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">[Note: Sound recording of today's homily is not available.]</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma by Deacon Paul Lewis</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Bad things happen </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">to good people.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Good things
happen to bad people.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">All we have to do
is read the newspaper,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">or pay attention
to the messages that go out on our parish Prayer Network.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Maybe all we have
to do is look at our own lives,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">both for the good
and the bad.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">One of the things
that links humans through the ages,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">is that we want
to know why.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We want
explanations.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">When good things
happen?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Well, we consider
those gifts from God,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="ES-CL" style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">and indeed they are.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">But what about
those times of challenge,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">of hurt, illness,
injury, broken relationships,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">financial
collapse, calamity, or death?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">These are the
things that tend to get our attention and energy.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Many times we are
quick, too quick, to seek and offer easy explanations.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“God has a plan.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Everything
happens for a reason.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“He is in a
better place.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“There's a lesson
to be learned here.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“This was all
God's will.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Someday when we
get to heaven will know why.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Perhaps the most
unchartiable response…</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“They got what
they deserved.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Most of the time
we mean well when we say these things.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But frankly, they
are not helpful answers for traumatic situations.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">It’s helpful to
keep a particular theme in mind when we read Luke’s Gospel.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">It is not an
accident that this is the Gospel that we will encounter</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">throughout this
Jubilee of Mercy.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">The theme?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Those who think
they are on the inside are really on the outside,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and those who
think they are on the outside are really on the inside.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This will not be
the last time you hear this theme.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We are not much
different than the crowd in today’s gospel.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">People brutally
executed by Pilate,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">or victims of a
tower collapse?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">The thinking of
the day?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Because of their
sinfulness they had it coming!”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">These people
think they are on the inside.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">They think they
know the ways of God.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">I can’t help but
think of the first chapter of Job.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">You might recall
that Job as everything going for him.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Family, land,
health, and wealth.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">And in an
instant…</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">It is all lost!</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">ALL LOST!</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Job’s response…</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Naked I came
from my mother’s womb,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and naked shall I
return.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">The Lord gave,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and the Lord has
taken away;</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">blessed be the
name of the Lord.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Job thinks like a
child of God.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">He is on the
“inside.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">The psalmist
reminds us of a similar theme.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“I will bless the
Lord at all times” is the first line of Psalm 34.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span lang="ES-CL" style="color: black;">At ALL times.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">If you have been
following the reflections in the Little Black Book,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">you might recall
the reflection from last Saturday, a week ago.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Jesus tells us,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Love your
enemies.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Pray for those
who persecute you,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">that you may be
children of your heavenly Father,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">for he makes his
sun rise on the bad and the good,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and causes rain
to fall on the just and the unjust.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">We get caught up
in too much “Old Testament” thinking.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“An eye for an
eye and a tooth for a tooth.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">As a dear old
elderly priest friend would say,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“The law, the
law, the blasted law!”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">We focus so much
on Old Testament justice,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and on the Ten
Commandments,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and gloss over
the fulfillment of the Old Testament…</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span lang="ES-CL" style="color: black;">Jesus Christ!</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">The crowd in
today’s Gospel were likely taken back by Jesus.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“By no means!”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">He calls them,
and us,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">to stop assuming
the sinfulness of others,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and how God looks
on that sinfulness,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">but rather, focus
on that which we have knowledge of…</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span lang="ES-CL" style="color: black;">our own sinfulness.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">When we pass
judgment on others,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">when we slander
others,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">when we rejoice
in the defeat of others,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">even our enemies,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">we are on the
“outside.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">God calls us to
more.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">We all are
objects of the abundant love of God.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">God never gives
up on us.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">He wants us on
the “inside.”</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">We are the object
of his cultivation.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Jesus offers all
of us his divine mercy.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Just as the
gardener pleads to the vineyard owner</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">to let him
cultivate the fig tree that will hopefully produce fruit,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">Jesus pleads for
us at the right hand of the Father.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="border: none; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">“Inside” thinking
means to let go of our preconceived ideas</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">to stop assuming
that we know how God thinks,</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: black;">and to stop
making judgments</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">as to who is
deserving of God’s love or who God favors.</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">“Inside”
thinking means seeking repentance.</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Repentance
is the way to life, </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">the
way of becoming most authentically who we are and who, </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">at
the deepest level, </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">we
long to be.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">It
is never too late. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">“One
more year,” the gardener told the owner. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">That
is not about time but about forgiveness, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">grace,
love, and second chances.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">It
is about accepting Jesus into our very own lives, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">to
accept his love for us,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">to
embrace his mercy, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">and
to embrace true conversion.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">As
we celebrate this Eucharist,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">may
we continue to be nourished by his Body and Blood, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">with
confidence that even in the midst of the challenges of life, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus
is there to love us, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">to
strengthen us, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121; font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">and
to guide us to his kingdom.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><u>Version en español</u>:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Cosas malas le pasan a la gente buena. Cosas buenas suceden a la gente mala. Todo lo que tenemos que hacer es leer el periódico, o prestar atención a los mensajes que salen en nuestra Red de Oración de la parroquia. Tal vez lo único que tenemos que hacer es mirar a nuestra propia vida, </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">tanto por el bien y el mal. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Una de las cosas que une los seres humanos a través de las edades, es que queremos saber por qué. </span><span lang="ES-CL"><o:p><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Queremos explicaciones.</span><span style="background-color: white;"> </span></o:p></span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">¿Cuando suceden cosas buenas? Bueno, tenemos en cuenta los dones de Dios, y de hecho lo son. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">¿Pero qué pasa con los tiempos de desafío, de dolor, enfermedad, lesión, relaciones rotas, colapso financiero, calamidad, o la muerte? Estas son las cosas que tienden a llamar nuestra atención y energía. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Muchas veces amos apurados, demasiado apurados, para buscar y ofrecemos explicaciones fáciles. "Dios tiene un plan." "Todo sucede por una razón." "Él está en un lugar mejor." "Hay una lección que aprender aquí." "Esta era la voluntad de Dios todo." "Algún día, cuando lleguemos al cielo sabrá por qué." Tal vez la respuesta más falto de caridad...</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">"Ellos obtuvieron lo que merecían." </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">La mayoría de las veces nos explicamos bien cuando decimos estas cosas. Pero, francamente, no son una respuesta eficaz a las situaciones traumáticas. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Es útil tener un tema particular en mente cuando leemos el Evangelio de Lucas. No es una casualidad que este es el Evangelio que nos vamos a encontrar lo largo de este Jubileo de la Misericordia. ¿El tema? "Aquellos que piensan que está adentro, están realmente en el afuera, y los que piensan que están afuera están realmente adentro. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Esta no será la última vez que escuches este tema. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">No somos muy diferente a la multitud en el Evangelio de hoy. ¿Las personas brutalmente ejecutadas por Pilato, o víctimas de un colapso de la torre? ¿El pensamiento del día? "A causa de su pecado tenían que ocurrirle!" </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Estas personas piensan que están en el interior. Ellos piensan que saben los caminos de Dios. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">¿La respuesta de Jesús? "¡De ninguna manera! Pero les digo, si no se arrepienten, perecerán de manera semejante." No es la respuesta que buscaban. Estas personas que pensaban que estaban en el "interior" realmente se encuentran en el "exterior." </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">No puedo dejar de pensar en el primer capítulo de Job. Se puede recordar que Job tenía todo a su favor. La familia, la tierra, la salud y la riqueza. Y en un instante...Todo se ha perdido! Todo perdido! La respuesta de Job..."Desnudo salí del vientre de mi madre, y desnudo volveré. El Señor dio, y el Señor quitó; bendito sea el nombre del Señor." Piensa trabajo como un hijo de Dios. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Él está en el "interior."</span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">El salmista nos recuerda a un tema similar. "Bendeciré al Señor en todo momento" es la primera línea del Salmo Treinta y cuatro. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">En todo momento. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Si usted ha estado siguiendo las reflexiones en el Pequeño Libro Negro, se puede recordar la reflexión desde el sábado pasado , hace una semana. Jesús nos dice: "Amen a sus enemigos. Oren por los que os persiguen, que sean hijos de su Padre celestial, que hace salir su sol sobre malos y buenos, </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">y manda la lluvia sobre justos e injustos." </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Nos vemos atrapados en pensar demasiado en el estilo "Antiguo Testamento." "Ojo por ojo y diente por diente." Como ley amigo anciano sacerdote viejo y querido diría, "La ley, la ley, la maldita ley!" Nos centramos tanto en la justicia del Antiguo Testamento, y en los Diez Mandamientos, y pasar por alto el cumplimiento del Antiguo Testamento...</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">¡Jesucristo! </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">La multitud en el Evangelio de hoy probablemente contradecidos por Jesús. "¡De ninguna manera!" Él los llama, y nosotros, a dejar de asumir el pecado de otros, y lo que Dios piensa sobre el pecado, sino más bien, centrarse en lo que tenemos conocimiento de...</span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">nuestra propia pecaminosidad.</span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Cuando nuestro juicio de los demás, cuando otras calumnias, cuando nos regocijamos en la derrota de los demás, incluso de los enemigos, estamos en el "afuera."</span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Dios nos llama a más. Todos somos objetos del abundante amor de Dios. Dios nunca se da por vencido con nosotros. Él quiere en el "interior." Somos el objeto de su cultivo. Jesús nos ofrece a todos la misericordia divina. Al igual que el jardinero ruega al dueño de la viña que le permitiera cultivar la higuera que ojalá produzca frutos, Jesús aboga por nosotros a la diestra del Padre. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">El pensamiento "interior" significa dejar de lado nuestras ideas preconcebidas a dejar de asumir que sabemos cómo Dios piensa, y dejar de hacer juicios en cuanto a quién es merecedor del amor de Dios o que Dios favorece. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Pensamiento "interior" significa buscar el arrepentimiento. El arrepentimiento es el camino a la vida, el camino de convertirse en más auténticamente lo que somos y que, </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">al nivel más profundo, que anhelamos ser. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Nunca es demasiado tarde. "Un año más,” el jardinero le dijo al dueño. Eso no es sobre el tiempo, sino sobre el perdón, la gracia, el amor y segundas oportunidades. </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Se trata de aceptar a Jesús en nuestras propias vidas, a aceptar su amor por nosotros, para abrazar a su merced, </span><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">y abrazar la verdadera conversión.</span><o:p> </o:p><span lang="ES-CL" style="background-color: white; color: #212121;">Al celebrar esta Eucaristía, podemos seguir siendo fortalecidos con el Cuerpo y la Sangre, con la confianza de que, incluso en medio de los desafíos de la vida, Jesús está allí para amarnos, para fortalecernos, y guiarnos a su reino.</span></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-73969767563444346172016-02-21T08:00:00.000-08:002016-03-05T21:43:34.400-08:00Second Sunday of Lent<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: justify;">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/022116.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Genesis 15:5-12,17-18 + Psalm 27:1,7-8,8-9,13-14 + Philippians 3:17-4:1 + Luke 9:28B-36</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU6kVCXpEaUSlKTh9-NndNer9HuFf0K1fGpvx-gF2EiouywjwE4GzYEICG9U61fXqJcuZ8uOGOXHA38xZhtY14_ZoZE2qAuwxBvy9W9CRG1IUetp7D4B-cVy2sQsol_g9J8Z3CUahjxho/s1600/Transfiguration.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU6kVCXpEaUSlKTh9-NndNer9HuFf0K1fGpvx-gF2EiouywjwE4GzYEICG9U61fXqJcuZ8uOGOXHA38xZhtY14_ZoZE2qAuwxBvy9W9CRG1IUetp7D4B-cVy2sQsol_g9J8Z3CUahjxho/s400/Transfiguration.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thomas
Merton, the Trappist monk, was standing on a street corner in Louisville when a
transfiguration hit him. The city seemed to glow. There is no way of telling
people, he marveled, that they are walking around shining like the sun. There
are no strangers. The gate of Heaven is everywhere. Sometimes when we least
expect it, the eye of our soul is opened and we, too, see clearly the divine
within and around us.</span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After
all it wasn’t Jesus who was transfigured on the mountaintop, but like Merton,
it was the Apostles who were transfigured. For just a moment, they saw beyond
the appearances to the reality. Beneath the surface of the everyday Jesus to
the radiant glory shining forth from their friend and teacher – a glory always
there but they had not seen before.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Transfiguration
is not a spectacular special effect, but rather a shining glimpse of Heaven
which comes to us when we are not looking for it. Transfiguration happens in
the most ordinary of experiences when the extraordinary shines through for
those given eyes to see. It comes when we are not looking for it, when the eye
of our soul opens up to see there is something more. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Have
you ever felt what Peter felt? “It is good for us to be here.” Like when
holding a sleeping baby, or being held by a loved one, enraptured by an
Oklahoma sunset, or chasing down fly balls in the spring, swimming in the cool
waters of a lake in the hot temps of August, or drinking in the brilliant
colors of fall, or being transfixed by watching a single snowflake fall when
time seems to stand still?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Transfiguration
is the opening of our everyday mind to the Heaven that penetrates our Earth.
Now you and I cannot make transfiguration happen. We can only be prepared to
notice the glory when it comes to us through the most ordinary of people and in
the most ordinary of places. After all Moses had tended his father-in-law’s
sheep on that Mount of Horub many days, passed by that bush many days, until
one day he saw not just an ordinary bush but the flaming, fiery presence of the
Divine and he took off his shoes in that presence.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The
poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning says it this way: “Earth is crammed with
Heaven, every common bush aflame with God. Those who notice take off their
shoes while the rest sit around picking blackberries.” <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What
happens when we experience these transfiguration moments is what happened to
those first Apostles Peter, James, and John. They tried to freeze what they saw
and in doing so, the vision disappeared as quickly as it appeared. Transfigurations
are like that – fleeting experiences of glory which if we try to capture vanish
from our vision. As soon as we try to capture a transfiguration moment, or make
an idol of it, or take credit for it ourselves, a cloud of ego hides it. To
have a transfiguration, to be open to the glory radiating all around us which
we often do not see, is to not be interested in having one. To not be
interested in having one. Rather, to be prepared for such mountaintop moments,
we simply place no other interest – no other interest – before our interest before
in following Jesus, after all, He is the gateway to Heaven.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This
is why the Father’s booming voice on that mountaintop speaks and says “Listen
to Him”. Not “Look at Him in all of His glory”, but “Listen to Him”. When we
follow the Lord of Glory, when we daily listen and learn from Him, we prepare
the eye of our soul to see more clearly the glory of God’s love shining all
around us, the glory of God’s presence enveloping us. And the way to open our
lives more fully to such glory shining forth from God’s creation, comes by
listening – listening – to the Lord of Glory. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The
words Jesus speaks before He goes up the mountain are these: “I am going to
suffer, and die, and rise on the third day.” Words that Peter and the others
don’t want to hear. And then, “If you wish to come after me, deny yourself.
Take up your cross and follow me.” Words that they turn a deaf ear to. To
listen to the Lord of Glory means that we acknowledge that He has so much to
teach us about the Divine Presence in our world. And we open ourselves more
fully to this presence when we daily deny ourselves. In other words, die to
self-centeredness, self-focus, and instead live our lives for others. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There
is no other way than daily taking up our cross. In other words, the way of sacrificial
love, by giving who we are and what we have in service of others for their good
and lifting them up. There is no other way to this glory than following Him who
is the Lord of Glory, which means listening to what He teaches us and making it
part of our lives. When we do, this kind of listening transforms us because it
helps us to see differently, to even see on the cross in the broken, tortured
body of Jesus, the Glory of God shining forth.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The
reason the command of the Father on that mountaintop is to listen to Him is
because like those first Disciples, we don’t hear the last part of His
suffering and death, you know, the part about rising on the third day.
Oftentimes we are not fully attentive to that Good News that the Lord teaches
us everyday that in the glorious light of the Resurrection, all of our
struggles and sufferings and pain and dying take on a new significance, that
the glory of the Lord’s Resurrection, which is also a concrete promise of our
resurrection, sustains us during difficult, dark days. It is like a light that
leads us and shows us the way because glory is what you are made for. Glory is
what I am made for. Glory is what all of God’s creation is made for. That is
the promise we are given.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To
sustain that promise, we come to this mountaintop of the Holy Eucharist, and
for just a moment, our eyes are open to see the Lord’s glory present here.
Coming to us to feed us with the radiance of His love. Coming to us in the most
ordinary of people who surround us with faith.</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: x-small;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: right;">
<span style="line-height: 107%;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Fr. Joseph Jacobi</i></span></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-50186619034399541572016-02-14T10:30:00.000-08:002016-03-12T20:51:20.568-08:00First Sunday of Lent<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/021416.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Deuteronomy 26:4-10 + Psalm 91:1-2, 10-11, 12-13, 14-5 + Romans 10:8-13 + Luke 4:1-13</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, OK</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The secular society in which we live focuses on the physical
and material. Our society scoffs at the notion – at least many do – that there is
more than we can physically see or touch. But we who are Christians believe there
is something more. In fact, we believe that we are spiritual beings, enfleshed
spirits, that we are not physical beings in search of a spiritual experience,
but rather that we are spiritual beings having a physical experience. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJURwAYKENKnPs7-qNobpLb8WkDbwkDouecEA8QLqwnsi-5Hd7Y57SRaZfyQSdgsAALFW1JVCuc9U7l0viTL20ZYzK45lMPVmd8JU1taSwmD3f6jd8lnSB0cCJtu45oVds7_XG_VF0LG0/s1600/itsnotaboutme.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJURwAYKENKnPs7-qNobpLb8WkDbwkDouecEA8QLqwnsi-5Hd7Y57SRaZfyQSdgsAALFW1JVCuc9U7l0viTL20ZYzK45lMPVmd8JU1taSwmD3f6jd8lnSB0cCJtu45oVds7_XG_VF0LG0/s320/itsnotaboutme.jpg" width="320" /></span></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So we believe that there is an ongoing spiritual struggle in
our lives where we are constantly forced to choose between the way of the evil
spirit and the way of the good spirit, the Holy Spirit. The Church reminds you
and me of this basic truth of our existence every year – every year! – on the First
Sunday of Lent as we go with Jesus into the desert, as the fully human Son of
God enters into a very real struggle with Satan in the desert. Having emptied
Himself of all Divine Privilege by becoming the son of Mary, Jesus enters into
the most basic battle of human life, a battle with the Evil One. The
temptations in the desert and the temptations that will come later in His life,
for the Tempter does not leave Him, even tempts Him on the Cross to come down –
All of these temptations are based around His identity as Beloved Son of God.
The Evil One is trying to rob Him of that identity, trying to strip that
identity from Him. “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to turn
into bread.” In other words, use the power of God given to you to feed yourself,
take care of yourself. The Evil One saying after all, it is all about you.</span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But Jesus will not use the power of God to take care of
Himself. He will use the power of God flowing through Him to feed others who
are hungering for God. “I will give you all the nations of the world, all the
worldly power, if you will simply bow down and worship me.” In other words, “Enjoy
the riches of this world, you deserve it. Make it all about you.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But Jesus redirects the Devil’s temptation to say, “It’s not
all about me, about me seeking worldly power like another king, about others
waiting on me, serving me, but rather it’s about God the Father. It’s about
worshiping Him, about placing all of my gifts at the feet of Him who has made
me. To bring about a different kind of kingdom.” For the kingdom that Jesus initiates
is not a kingdom like worldly kingdoms that operate on division and accusation,
but it is a kingdom where God desires all people to live together in peace.
Where Jesus becomes the bridge between all that separates us from one another
in order that we might offer and receive forgiveness, and understand the power of
compassion to transform lives.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Leap off the templetop. Force your Father’s hand. Make Him
prove that He loves you.” Jesus will not do so. He doesn’t have to force the
Father’s hand because He knows, He knows, that He is the Beloved Son of God no
matter what happens to Him. No matter if he dash His feet on the stones of
suffering. No matter if He walks through the darkness of death. He knows He is
always God’s beloved son. And He will live His life therefore in self-giving
love. He won’t do super-human feats, flying off templetops like Superman. No!
He will do the most powerful feat of all, the most incredible deed of all, He
will give His life away in love of others. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus knows. He knows it is not about Him. It’s not about
feeding Himself, taking care of Himself, having power over others, having others
wowed by His powerful deeds. It’s rather about doing everything for the glory
of God His Father. It’s about obedience to the Father’s will. It’s about
bringing about a kingdom of justice, peace, and joy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">These temptations are not just first century temptations.
They are also 21<sup>st</sup> century temptations. Because you and I live in a
world where it’s all about self-promotion, or so it seems, self-aggrandizement.
It’s all about making it about me, about me. Watch any athletic event. Someone
makes a great play. They strut their stuff and beat their chest, “Look at me!”
Or, watch a reality show (not all of them, but most of them), they’re all about
me, navel-gazing, okay? Focused on the self.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The danger of modern communications, and there are many
blessings to modern communications, especially social media. The danger is it
is so easy to cross the line from sharing with others in friendship, to tooting
our own horn, to thinking it’s all about me and everything I do in my life. We
come together to remember that is not the case, that the Devil wants to tempt
us to focus inward instead of outward to the God whose hand feeds us, to the
God whom we are called to worship, to the God who loves us as His own beloved sons
and daughters. No matter what happens to us we are always, by our baptism,
filled with the Spirit, God’s beloved children.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That wonderful jewel of the first reading this morning reminds
us it is not about what I have done, but it is rather about what God has done
and what God continues to do. Notice the context of that first reading is the Harvest
Festival. Every year at the harvest those who are blessed by the fruit of the
land bring the first fruits in a basket to the Lord God. They present it to the
priest. They give it away. And then, they remember what God has done in the
past for them – that God has made of them a mighty people, saved them from
slavery in Egypt, welcomed them into the Holy Land by being with them,
providing for them through the desert, and giving them that land of promise as
a gift. And so every year at the harvest, giving away the first fruits is a
reminder “The land is not mine, it belongs to God.” Even this fruit of the
harvest is not my doing, it is by the gift of God, by my ability to do this,
that God has produced this fruit. To remember, indeed, that is God doing, and
what God is about, that is most important.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">All of us suffer in our lives at times from spiritual
dementia. We forget what God has done for us – the many ways that God has blessed
our lives. And that’s why week after week after week, we come to remember what
God has done. To remember that God has given us the greatest gift of all – the gift
of His own Son. And not only to remember that but to be strengthened by that very
gift of Jesus’ body and blood. And as we do so, we bring our gifts as a sign of
the gift of ourselves to God, recognizing it’s not about me holding on to my
gifts, but it’s about me giving my life away as a gift to others. And that when
my life – our lives – are joined to the Greatest Gift, Jesus the son of God that
there is no temptation we cannot overcome, that in Him and through Him, we have
the power to reject the lies of the Evil One. And we have the power to always remember
our dignity and that no one can strip or rob that dignity of us as God’s
beloved sons and daughters.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Father Joseph Jacobi</span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-890192202056664882016-02-07T13:00:00.000-08:002016-03-12T21:34:02.309-08:00Fifth Sunday of Ordinary Time<div>
<a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/020716.cfm" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Link to today's readings</span></a></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Isaiah 6:1-2A, 3-8 + Psalm 138 1-2,2-3,4-5,7-8 + 1 Corinthians 15:1-11 + Luke 5:1-11</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to this homily</a></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">[There is no transcript for this homily]</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhSW8NZLOZpMot4xJw8AA7pFzQ3LP1LNaonh4rr4CAbPArxDJFkz0jtnjdtEf8eOcZGOnuHigc3kM3BZ9OCF4SOmQuK6o-OYh393xei-RA1G5jtTHRL5S4g9LhC56cV7an6OqCHOJ2kVo/s1600/DSCN0024.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhSW8NZLOZpMot4xJw8AA7pFzQ3LP1LNaonh4rr4CAbPArxDJFkz0jtnjdtEf8eOcZGOnuHigc3kM3BZ9OCF4SOmQuK6o-OYh393xei-RA1G5jtTHRL5S4g9LhC56cV7an6OqCHOJ2kVo/s400/DSCN0024.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-49713277393875062842016-01-17T12:30:00.000-08:002016-03-12T21:39:54.540-08:00Second Sunday in Ordinary Time<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/011716.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Isaiah 62:1-5 + Psalm 96 1-2,2-3,7-8,9-10 + 1 Corinthians 12:4-11 + John 2:1-11</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to this homily</a></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">[There is no transcript for this homily]</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma by Deacon Paul Lewis</span><br />
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Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-7485621264247386672016-01-03T14:55:00.000-08:002016-01-08T14:55:55.405-08:00The Epiphany of the Lord<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/010316.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Isaiah 60:1-6 + Psalm 72:1-2, 7-13 + Ephesians 3:2-3a, 5-6 + Matthew 2:1-12</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to this homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXOv9IS_EtAm4OfkR3jDmRZYHtfjRMb7nQsM1I3th9vQpwu1khZl87J_zC2oZTROK7dWyOXsA4rECv2jTThdYKbgX7wFbNGzzGVrcfO2d2_U9bqpY-Bhj6ONc40gRmaqCC5UufYBoTROE/s1600/epiphany.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="217" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXOv9IS_EtAm4OfkR3jDmRZYHtfjRMb7nQsM1I3th9vQpwu1khZl87J_zC2oZTROK7dWyOXsA4rECv2jTThdYKbgX7wFbNGzzGVrcfO2d2_U9bqpY-Bhj6ONc40gRmaqCC5UufYBoTROE/s320/epiphany.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Contained in the womb of Mary is the One whom the heavens cannot contain. He empties himself of the privileges of his divinity in order to enter another world, the world where human beings dwell. The Son of Mary is a stranger in a strange land. He comes from another world, the world of the divine Trinity. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Eternal Word of God leaps down from his heavenly home to pitch his tent among humankind here on earth. He crosses the border between the eternal and the temporal to become forever a part of human history.Thus, the Son of God is THE Outsider, the one who comes from a place beyond our understanding. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He is the Ultimate Stranger, an immigrant from a land so foreign that no one alive on this earth has yet seen His eternal home. The strangers from the east are the ones who recognize the presence of the Stranger from another world whose star rises brightly in the night sky. Outsiders who live beyond the borders of Israel are the ones who see how the Outsider has gotten inside our human flesh, how the radiant glory of the Divine shines forth in a little child. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The magi come to adore the newborn King, while King Herod plots to destroy him. Feeling his throne threatened, Herod’s fear grows like a gathering storm. In fact, King Herod embodies the normal human reaction to the stranger, which is fear. Herod feels threatened by the newborn King and is deeply troubled by what this helpless child might do to Herod’s position of power. Thus, he slyly tries to use the magi to obtain information on the whereabouts of the child. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When the magi go home by another way, Herod, full of fury, sends soldiers to slaughter the children in Bethlehem. Fear is the driving force behind Herod’s cruel slaughter of helpless babes. Herod is so full of fear that he cannot see what the strangers from the east see—that the Son of God has taken flesh as the Son of Mary, that the radiance of God’s eternal love is now embodied in Jesus. However, before the soldiers can kill the newborn King, Joseph, warned in a dream of the impending danger, takes Mary and the child and they flee to a foreign land, Egypt. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Holy Family then experience what many families today experience in our country and throughout the world—what it is like to be strangers in a strange land, to start life over in a place far from home where language and culture are different, to be looked upon with suspicion because of being an outsider. The Holy Family survive their sojourn in a foreign land because some Egyptians recognized in the face of this refugee child the face of God’s son and gave him and his parents welcome. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The most potent divisive force the early Church faced was how to welcome the stranger. The first Christians were Jewish-Christians, and they thought everyone who wanted to join the early Church should become Jewish first before becoming Christian. In fact, the leaders of the early Church in Jerusalem feared the Gentiles from other countries whom the apostle Paul was bringing into the Church. The Jewish Pharisee Paul had to first be knocked off his high horse before he could ever begin to recognize Christ longing to be born in the Gentile people. But once Paul had the scales removed from his eyes, he saw clearly what God was doing in and through Christ His Son. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In Christ, Paul began to see that the Gentiles are now co-heirs of the kingdom, members of the same body of Christ. In Christ, the strangers who are Gentiles are also co-partners in spreading the Gospel. This revelation rocked the early Church to its core. However, because Peter, James, and the other leaders of the first Church Council in Jerusalem were converted and accepted Paul’s teaching on this matter, the early Church grew and flourished. Otherwise the Church most likely would have folded up and died. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">St. Paul saw how all people are estranged from God because of sin. But because Christ chose to become one with us and die for us, we are strangers and aliens no longer. We are now fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. Paul patiently and wisely worked at uniting a Church made up of people who were strangers to one another because of language and culture. Paul preached this truth—there is something stronger than our differences, and that is our unity in Christ: Whether Jew or Greek, woman or man, slave or free, all are one in Christ. In today’s world where so many Americans are fearful of strangers from other lands, this feast of Epiphany shows us a way out of the darkness of this fear. We can choose to walk in the darkness of this fear, and like Herod, try to get rid of those who we feel threatened by, or shut the doors of our hearts to them. Or we can walk in the radiant light of Christ the Stranger, of recognizing him present in the strangers who come to our parish, our city, and our country.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">These strangers from other lands come bearing gifts for the living body of Christ here. Not gold, frankincense, and myrrh but other kinds of gifts. The gift of Faith—a confident, humble trust in God. The gift of Family—rejoicing in the gift of new life and in the God who gives life. The gift of Joy—celebrating the many gifts of God and thus remembering that God is in charge, so the crushing weight of worry and anxiety is lifted. When we welcome the stranger and receive the gifts they bring, we allow the light of Christ’s love to shine through us and lead us to our heavenly home.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Fr. Joseph A. Jacobi</i></span></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-30964957270962957662016-01-01T19:00:00.000-08:002016-01-08T15:05:19.736-08:00SOLEMNITY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY, MOTHER OF GOD<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/010116.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Numbers 6:22-27 + Psalm 67:2-3, 5-6,8 + Galatians 4:4-7 + Luke 2:16-21</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to this homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">St. Paul packs so much into a few short verses from his letter to the Galatians. The living word of God passed on to us through the ages from the hand of Paul is so rich and full we can hardly take it all in, much less understand completely what it means.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the fullness of time, Paul says—in other words, at the “right time”, or in “God’s time,” God sent His Son, born of a woman. How can this be, we wonder, the Eternal Son of God, the One through whom all things were made, becoming part and parcel of his own Creation? How can this be, we ask, the One whom the entire universe cannot contain now being limited to Mary’s womb, dependent upon her for his very life?</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiBcP9ps2FVMfUs_en5d_UYXV96OXOZW2tl_wR9NqFfHxdZJgYfDUosAGakBP4PXtnPxnLXWqqMi2uCgo5Xi0x19PCu7fTw8bsZLkosolB8iRn1s9x9nb0Gi4rzgABr1tleJKFEMCj1GY/s1600/Mary.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiBcP9ps2FVMfUs_en5d_UYXV96OXOZW2tl_wR9NqFfHxdZJgYfDUosAGakBP4PXtnPxnLXWqqMi2uCgo5Xi0x19PCu7fTw8bsZLkosolB8iRn1s9x9nb0Gi4rzgABr1tleJKFEMCj1GY/s320/Mary.jpg" width="226" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">St. Paul does not tell us how this can be but does tell us why, why the 2nd Person of the Divine Trinity would humble himself to become human like us. So that we might be made into members of the family of God, so that through Him we might become adopted sons and daughters of God. The Son of God becomes the Son of Mary so we might become sons and daughters of God. What a marvelous exchange! What an incredible mystery of faith!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The proof of our dignity as God adopted children, as St. Paul puts it, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">is that the Spirit of the Son has been poured into our hearts. The same Spirit that overshadowed Mary at the Annunciation and made the miracle of His conception in the womb of Mary possible; the same Spirit that descended upon the adult Jesus in the waters of the Jordan and propelled him into his ministry of teaching and healing and casting out demons; the same Spirit which raised Jesus from death to new life; the same Spirit breathed by the Risen Jesus upon his terrified followers cowering in a locked room after his death. This Spirit brings the powerful presence of the Crucified and Risen Jesus into our small lives, so we can relate to the almighty God as His Beloved Son does, by addressing Him as “Abba, Father.” </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Imagine being invited, even empowered by the Spirit to be one with the Son </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">in order to relate to the Father as Jesus did—in absolute confidence and trust. How can this be? We creatures made of dust now vessels of the eternal God, impregnated with the Spirit of the Risen Lord, empowered </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to have the same relationship of intimacy and trust with God the Father as Jesus did. It is a mystery beyond our ability to understand completely, beyond our grasp.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Paul does not stop there—because the Spirit of the Risen Jesus has transformed us into adopted children of God, joined us forever to the Son of God, we share in the Son’s inheritance—the fullness of life, eternal life. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is our inheritance, this is our destiny.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Wow! Talk about packing a lot into a few short verses. It’s like the eternal God coming to us in something as small as a newborn babe. How to take all this in? How to understand it all? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Mary, the Mother of God and our mother in faith, teaches us how to respond</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to the Word of God which goes beyond what we can initially understand or comprehend. Mary, the Mother of the Eternal Word made Flesh, shows us how to allow God’s living word to take our flesh and to come to life in and through us.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the Gospel of Luke, whenever Mary receives the word of God, she never understands it completely upon first hearing, but rather surrenders to is and reflects upon it in her heart. She takes a stance toward God’s word which is the way faith-filled Jews do: God’s word is to be received even if it cannot be understood in the moment. Then slowly, with time and reflection, pondering this word in one’s heart, the full meaning will unfold. This is what faith looks like…..</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is exactly what Mary did upon receiving the Archangel Gabriel’s incredible message that she was to become the Mother of the Son of God. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She had questions about what this meant and how it was to come to pass—</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“How can this be”—but she eventually surrendered in trust, not understanding in the moment completely what was being asked of her, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but trusting that God will reveal to her over time the meaning.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At the birth of Jesus again she receives the word of God from a different sort of messenger—shepherds coming to adore her child—who inform her that indeed he is the promised Savior of the world. Once again, she does not understand completely what this means or how it will come about, but she does not reject the message of the shepherds. Instead, she reflects on these things in her heart—she holds their words in her heart and ponders them.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When Joseph and she finally find the 12 year-old Jesus in the temple, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">after a frantic 3-day search throughout Jerusalem, and he tells them: </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”, the Scriptures tell us that they (Joseph and Mary) did not understand what he said to them, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but that his mother kept all these things in her heart.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As our mother in faith, the Blessed Virgin Mary teaches us a life-giving way to respond to the Word of God when we do not understand it. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Her example goes beyond the American way of understanding before committing. We Americans are so pragmatic, which can be a good thing, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">as we try to understand what is being asked of us before acting. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But that is not the way of faith, not the way of the Gospel, as our mother teaches us. Rather, trusting the One who speaks to us his saving word, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we surrender our lives into his hands in faith, with her, trusting that He will reveal in the future more clearly what is being asked of us.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That the living word of God, which may not make sense to us today, will unfold its meaning in our lives if we will but be patient and reflect upon this life-giving word.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What might Mary, our mother in faith and Mother of Mercy, be inviting us to reflect upon in our hearts, during this Jubilee of Mercy? How would she want us to receive Her Son, who comes to us in hidden and mysterious ways which may not initially understand?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Perhaps, with Mary’s help, we are being called to ponder the following words of her Son, to hold these words as a treasure in our heart throughout this New Year…..</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you welcome the stranger, the King of Kings says, you welcome me.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When you visit the prisoner, the Crucified Lord says, you visit me.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Forgive and you will be forgiven….give and gifts will be given to you.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Be merciful just as your Father is merciful.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fr. Joseph A. Jacobi</span><br />
<br />Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-85271207005468245902015-12-25T15:31:00.000-08:002015-12-30T17:14:35.163-08:00Christmas Mass<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/122515-midnight.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal;">Isaiah 9:1-6, 14 + Psalm 96:1-3,
11-13 + Titus 2:11-14 + Luke 2:1-14</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal; text-align: center;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small; font-weight: normal; text-align: center;">Mustang, Oklahoma</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The coming of the Son of God
into the world seems to be so small, so little. This is not how God had to come
into the world to save humanity, but how God chose to come. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Son of God is born as an
infant like any other infant, a baby boy born into a world </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">so rough and so cruel, a
child utterly dependent up his parents for care and sustenance. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He was so small, so little.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No wonder a people who had
long awaited his coming, who had kept their hope alive over centuries awaiting
the coming of the promised Messiah, did not even notice him when he came. There
is not even room for him, no one will make room for him. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Only those living on the
margins of society, shepherds sleeping with their sheep in the field, shepherds
who smell like their sheep, are tipped off by angels that the Savior of the
world has been born. The sign given them is hardly a sign of greatness—you will
find an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. A manger of
all places, an animal’s feeding trough.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From the human point of view,
the Incarnation, the Son of God taking our flesh, is a crazy plan, choosing
people too little and too vulnerable. But the result, in God’s wisdom, is what
is best for us: being born among us, being raised among us, he came as one of
us, as our brother. As God with us, Jesus shone a light on our <b><u>true dignity</u></b> and God’s might in
humility.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Savior of the world was
entrusted to the natural processes of human life, in the most vulnerable of
hands, in the most vulnerable of ways, so that God’s glory and salvation would <u>not
overwhelm</u> <u>us</u>, <b>but accompany
us. </b>So that God’s glory would accompany us in solidarity with the suffering
of all of us small and little people, in order to teach us the value of human
life and the greatness of each life. <u>No one is too little, too small, too
insignificant</u> to share in God’s plan.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As the Savior’s birth teaches
us, <u>God is often closer and smaller</u> than we think. So God uses people
who are not in the spotlight, who hardly anyone sees, seemingly insignificant
people, to bring the greatness of his Son’s life and love into the darkest
corners of the world.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A number of years ago when I
was stationed at another parish, one of the daily Mass attendees, a local
baker, would weekly bring me a box of cookies. She was shocked when I told her
one day to stop bringing me cookies, that I was giving them up for a
while. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I told her that the daughter
of some long-time friends of mine had been stationed in Afghanistan, thru her
work with the Department of Defense, and that her parents were very concerned about
her safety. I told the parents of this young woman that I would pray for her, and
to make sure I would remember to pray for her on a regular basis, I would give
up all sweets during her 6-month tour of duty in Afghanistan. Each time I felt
a craving for something sweet, I would automatically be reminded to pray for
her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I told the baker of the
cookies this story, she thoughtfully replied: “<i>Then I should send the cookies I usually bring to you to this young
service woman in Afghanistan.” </i></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And so she did, and thus
began something truly remarkable. The gift of homemade cookies, still delicious
even after a couple of weeks travel by mail, would arrive at a remote outpost
in Afghanistan, and my friends’ daughter would then share them with everyone
else in her company. </span><u style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Soldiers and Department of Defense workers</u><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> would
feast on treats from halfway round the world and feel connected with their
homeland. In doing so, they came to know if a very real way they </span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u>were not alone</u></b><u style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> <b><i>nor
were they forgotten.</i></b></u></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My friends’ daughter shared
with me upon her safe return from Afghanistan that those monthly boxes of
cookies were a powerful <u>sign of God’s presence</u> in a place <u>where God
seemed to be absent.<o:p></o:p></u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Such are the <u>small yet
powerful ways that God chooses</u> to communicate God’s bottomless love to us. My
parishioner the baker with her cookies wanted to show my friends’ daughter and
those stationed with her what God wanted them to know in those anxious days—<i>You are loved. You are not forgotten. Feast on the sweet tenderness of my love. </i>God
did not use a thunderbolt from heaven to tell them that, but a far subtler,
sweeter means of communication that could risk being overlooked altogether as
something as ordinary as, well, some extraordinarily delicious cookies.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">St. Ignatius of Loyola has a
memorable phrase for thinking about God’s presence </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">all around us. Ignatius
said:</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“</span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>God</i> <i>labors and works for me in all the creatures </i></b><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>on the face of the earth</i></b><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.” </b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">His point was that one of the most </span><u style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">common ways God
comes to us</u><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">is through other people.</b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because the Son of God left
the safety and security of his heavenly home to forever make his home with
humanity on this earth, we know this to be true: One of the most common ways
God comes to us is through other people. Ignatius invites us to see how our
daily experiences of receiving love, even in the <u>smallest acts of human
kindness</u>, <b>reveal God’s deep, abiding
care for us. </b>For like a <b><i>secret admirer</i></b>, God employs
incredible creativity in filling our lives with <u>seemingly unsigned love
notes.<o:p></o:p></u></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">God not only comes to us in
the smallest of ways but also in the smallest of people. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For Jesus teaches us that he
comes to visit us through the most vulnerable ones, the ones who go unseen by
many because they live on the fringes of society—the most marginalized of our
sisters and brothers, the least ones. Our eyes are not well trained to see the
Son of God coming to us in those around us, especially those people the world
pushes to the margins, those people the world chooses to not even see nor
acknowledge that they exist.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus clearly teaches in
chapter 25 of Matthew’s Gospel that whatever we do for the least of our sisters
and brothers—those who are hungry or thirst or naked or a stranger or sick or
in prison—we do for him. When we welcome and love them, we are welcoming and
loving and serving him. It is no small thing to recognize Jesus coming to us
through the most vulnerable people on this planet, for Jesus assures us that
our salvation depends upon it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">During this Extraordinary
Jubilee Year, which will last until the end of November next year, Pope Francis
challenges us to practice the Corporal works of Mercy. Not just to do these
good deeds, but to “<i>encounter Christ living
in the poor</i>.” Knowing things about Christ is different from knowing Christ.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The same holds true for
Christ living in those who are the least of our brothers and sisters. Knowing
things about them, statistics about hunger, or statistics stating that there
are more people in prison per capita in Oklahoma than almost any other State, is
very different from coming to know the people behind the statistics.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b>In other words, get to know</b> the person who is hungry, or get to know the family who
are refugees on the run from terror, or hear the life story of a prisoner
behind bars. And in coming to know them, to encounter Christ in his littleness,
in his smallness, coming to us through them.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We come to this table to be
nourished by the Real Presence of Christ, the greatest gift Jesus gave us—his
body and his blood. His presence to us here gives us the grace to be present to
Him coming to us in our daily lives in the most ordinary of ways, in hidden,
small ways.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What looks like something so
small here—a little bread, a cup of wine—is transformed by the power of God
into a divine gift—the Gift of God’s Son being born in us once again, coming to
life in and through us.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So that strengthened by such
a gift, we can welcome him coming to us each day in the most surprising of
ways, longing to find room in our lives to welcome Him.</span></div>
<br />
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fr. Joseph A.
Jacobi</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-22408761318468878242015-12-13T17:11:00.000-08:002015-12-30T17:11:54.841-08:003rd Sunday of Advent<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/121315.cfm" target="_blank">Link to Today's Readings</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Zephaniah 3:14-18A + Isaiah 12:2-3,4,5-6 + Philippians 4:4-7 + Luke 3:10-18</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to this homily</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If the prophet Jeremiah speaks of Justice and the prophet
Baruch speaks of how Mercy is the companion to Justice, then the prophet
Zephaniah is the prophet of Joy. Joy is not necessarily happiness. We know that
all too well. They are not the same thing. Happiness is a feeling and, with all
feelings, can come and go, be here today and gone tomorrow, like kids who
unwrap gifts and then the next day, gifts are no longer the source of happiness.
But Joy is something different. It is something that predures, that endures,
that lasts, it is that spirit which sustains and lifts us up right in the middle
of unhappy times. Joy is that quality of life, that vision of creation that the
loving hand of God is in all things and providing for all God’s creatures, even
during times of loneliness and boredom, misery, or despair.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGszBusdWSe-6ACycRrMnLSTm5KlT6UzG4xOX5yPRYM9cXFRiu1JfEgnXKM4qM3_n-6BYMN8TnqrRlEm9QM3rrEHb2tNr31kfh7U4Zrv6eC__CYiXz7lqXnGMyN-ENTdgyeEPS2mLViQk/s1600/joy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGszBusdWSe-6ACycRrMnLSTm5KlT6UzG4xOX5yPRYM9cXFRiu1JfEgnXKM4qM3_n-6BYMN8TnqrRlEm9QM3rrEHb2tNr31kfh7U4Zrv6eC__CYiXz7lqXnGMyN-ENTdgyeEPS2mLViQk/s320/joy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Joy, therefore, shines forth in a people of faith who
believe in the resurrection of Christ, who know the power of God in Christ to
transform even death into new life. Therefore, Joy flows from the gift of the
Risen Christ, which is the gift of His Spirit, and in fact, the Church names
one of the Fruits of the Spirit as Joy itself. One of the signs of the Holy
Spirit working in our lives is Joy itself. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So during this Advent season, as we prepare to receive more
fully the Son of God into those parts of our lives where perhaps we have not
given Him entrance before, we do so by recognizing the lies we live by that can
suck Joy right out of our life. Because Jesus is the Savior, the One who comes
to set us free from the lies that keep us in darkness, He wants to bring us the
fullness of His Joy. We can only receive that gift and live out that gift if we
first bring into the light the lies that keep us in darkness. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the lies we live by in our culture is that we are
created to possess things and the more things we possess, the more joy-filled
we’ll be. We are led to believe that if I can hold in my hand this thing—the
newest best gadget, a new car, a new house, whatever it may be—then I will be
full of Joy. And this lie, which the tempter tempts us to live by therefore
leads us to take a bite out of the fruit, a deadly fruit, called envy, which
means we look at what other people have and we never notice all the gifts we
have. We want or desire what that person has, never grateful for all that we
have been given. Envy sucks Joy right out of one’s life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another lie we live by: If I can possess this person, if I
can have a relationship with this particular person, they will satisfy all my
needs, and then I will know Joy. This lie leads to the deadly fruit, the deadly
sin of jealousy—a sin that blinds us to the truth that no one is the possession
of anyone else. Actually, God has created every single human being for Himself,
not to be possessed or owned by another human being, but ultimately as someone
made to return to the One who made them, who created them, who belongs to Him,
the Creator of All. You know, when we try to hold on to another person as “mine”,
try to limit their freedom, what happens is jealousy displaces all the Joy that
resides in a relationship with another. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So the Savior of the World, the One who is constantly coming
into the world and trying to break into our lives, He wants to set us free from
the lies we live by. As the Light of the World, He also sheds light on the
darkness of language that keeps us bound up, keeps us really limited in our
Joy—language like “my” or “mine”—that kind of language has the capacity to
drain us of Joy itself. Because the Redeemer of the World, the One whose birth
fills the Angels and Christmas with Joy—resounding Joy—teaches us that our
Heavenly Father did not create us to possess things or to possess others but
created us to be possessed by Joy, to be possessed by the One who is Joy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is why Saint Paul can speak those powerful words that
some people scratch their head at, you know? “Rejoice in the Lord always.”
Always? You’ve got to be kidding me! But notice the key words: “Rejoice <u>in
the Lord</u> always.” It’s only in this ongoing relationship between us and the
Savior of the World, allowing Him to come to us and set us free from the lies
we live by, that we can truly be filled with Joy. And have you ever noticed
that the most joyful people to walk the face of the earth are the ones who have
surrendered themselves completely to the Lord of Joy?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Think about Francis of Assisi, an Italian who lived way back
in the 13<sup>th</sup> century, who literally gave everything his father had
given him back to his father and embraced Lady Poverty and is recognized as perhaps
the most joyful person to ever walk the face of the earth, who found delight in
the gifts of God each day, the simple gifts that many don’t notice: Brother Sun
giving him warmth, Sister Moon lighting the way in the dark of night, the
creatures of God who brought him much Joy, and the relationships he had with
his brothers and others that sustained him throughout his life. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Or, think of Mother Theresa who went and left everything she
knew behind to go to the poorest place on earth, the slums of Calcutta, who
served the poorest of the poor there, who on her last visit to the United States—I
can still remember seeing her face on T.V.—this old woman bent over by age and
arthritis. If you looked in her face—radiated Joy, just was permeated with Joy.
This woman who had surrendered her entire life to the Lord of Joy and had surrendered
to Him present in his broken body, the poor whom she reached out to touch in
Joy and whom she recognized was His presence in her midst.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Both Francis of Assisi and Theresa of Calcutta teach us the way
to Joy. The way to encounter the source of Joy, and to be nourished by Joy, is
to love Christ Jesus, to surrender to Him, and to especially allow Him to come
to us, present in the poor. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It’s always fascinating to me to listen to the stories of
American youth who go off to third world countries to serve the poor on mission
trips. They come back and one of the first things I hear them say is they are just
blown away by the joyful spirit of the people they went to serve and who have
nothing compared to all that we have materially, but who have <u>everything</u>
because they recognize each day that the hand of the Lord feeds them and that
they have to trust that somehow the Lord will provide for all they need. It is
out of this trust, this surrender to the Lord in His goodness that they are
able to be full of gratitude for even the smallest of gifts, the tiniest of
things. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, what shall we do, we who have so much? What shall we do
to rejoice always in the Lord? Saint John the Baptist, the one who prepares the
way for the coming of the Lord, he tells us. It’s pretty simple. Someone’s
hungry? Give him bread. Someone is in need of one of your cloaks and you have
two of them? Give it away. In other words, to share what we have, to recognize
it is a gift given to be given away. And in giving the gifts we have away to
others who need them, to recognize that in fact we are receiving as we give the
Lord who comes to us in His need, in the faces of the poor. And then Joy is
multiplied! In the giving away of what we have, we are more ready to receive
more gifts from the Lord and in the one who receives—gratitude for all that is
given from the kindness of hearts that overflow in love. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You and I come here Sunday after Sunday to encounter the God
who has made us for Joy and out of Joy, to encounter a God who rejoices in His
people, a God who through His son Jesus Christ, has expressed His delight in
all that He has made, especially in human beings created in His image, a God
who comes to us in this celebration and in the simplest of ways: a little
bread, a sip of wine that we recognize as the greatest gift of all, the living
presence of the Risen Lord, nourishing us, strengthening us, filling us with
Joy, so that we might always be people of gratitude for even the smallest
gifts. Because, people who are grateful, who are thankful, are people who are
full of Joy. And, Joy is the surest sign of God’s presence in the world. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Father Joseph Jacobi</span><o:p></o:p></i></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-52572608731319763622015-12-06T14:32:00.000-08:002015-12-08T14:33:13.471-08:002nd Sunday of Advent<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/120615.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Baruch 5:1-9 + Psalm 126:1-6 +
Philippians 1:4-6, 8-11 + Luke 3:1-6</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsekVAyCDspzLyLmLTlF36_z1YIu34eR97IGjTTHJGx9yWL10Ipdy7XXIY0TcUwhvgnCEsWcxyYSuUUsTNiDmjMVJc7IwEHB_vWU279CjQvmGvq5qxlTJ2mSykRKDdYcr03IRNG6vjbgw/s1600/Pope+Justice.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsekVAyCDspzLyLmLTlF36_z1YIu34eR97IGjTTHJGx9yWL10Ipdy7XXIY0TcUwhvgnCEsWcxyYSuUUsTNiDmjMVJc7IwEHB_vWU279CjQvmGvq5qxlTJ2mSykRKDdYcr03IRNG6vjbgw/s400/Pope+Justice.jpg" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the first Sunday of Advent,
the prophet Jeremiah spoke of the coming </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">of the long awaited Messiah,
the hoped for Savior, naming him the “</span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>Lord our Justice</i></b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Throughout our lives of faith
as we daily prepare for the advent of the Lord, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we wait actively for the
coming of the “</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Lord our Justice</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">” by
making right </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">what has gone wrong in our
relationships with one another, with God, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and as well by living in
right relationship with our common home, the Earth, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">as God’s gift to us. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By doing so, we hasten the
coming of the Lord Jesus, the Just One.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But if we are honest with
ourselves, we recognize that not only personally as individuals but
collectively as a people we have made a mess of justice <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">over the generations and
centuries. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So much so that we can fear
the coming of God into our lives because we know </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we have not totally righted
the wrongs done. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">However, on this 2</span><sup style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">nd</sup><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">
Sunday of Advent, the prophet Baruch reminds us</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">that Justice’s companion is
Mercy, and this truth fans the flame of hope in our soul. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In God, Justice and Mercy go
together, and so the coming of God for which we actively await does not bring
us fear of condemnation but the hope of consolation.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When we look back upon our
lives, we see how God has leveled the mountainous wrongs we have done, or
filled in the valleys of our failures to step up and do the right thing, making a road for us to to come home to the merciful
embrace of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Like the people of Israel in
Baruch’s time, who live in exile and long to return home, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we are a people who have
experienced being cut off from our home in the heart of God. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We have all felt malaise, a
certain “</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">blahness</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">” in our life,</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">where because of our sinful
choices we have distanced ourselves from God <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and our truest self as made
in the image and likeness of God. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But the mercy of God, a </span><u style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">special
attribute of God’s love</u><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, finds a way to bring us home,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">re-energizing us to move
forward toward our eternal home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even when we fail to keep
God’s Law, when we stumble and fall into a deep valley of despair because of
our sin, God’s mercy fills in this valley </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and God the Good Shepherd
comes running to carry us home. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Or when we face the
insurmountable mountain of “perfecting” our life, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">God’s mercy levels this
mountain so that God comes running to meet us </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">with unabated Joy, like the
Prodigal Father welcoming his lost child home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes we experience this
undeserved mercy of God in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, and other times we
experience it in the generous love of others, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">especially when tragedy suddenly
cripples us. </span><u style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Two softball teams play a
championship game</u><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The game is tied going into the bottom of the
very last inning, when with 2 outs, the home team’s best hitter smashes a home
run.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She sprints around first base
with great joy, only to realize she has missed touching first base, and as she
suddenly plants her foot to turn back to touch first in order to proceed on her
victory dash on around the bases, <u>her leg gives out completely</u> as she
rips apart the ligaments supporting her knee. What had been a victory dash full of joy now becomes cries of complete
agony. <u>Her teammates rush out from
the dugout to carry her</u> around the bases, but the umpire stops them stating
that the rules of the game do not allow this and that if they try to do so the
home run will be turned into the 3<sup>rd</sup> out of the inning.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As the heroine lies writhing
on the ground in pain, <u>the first baseman from the other team asks the ump if
she can assist the home run hitter, </u>who has suddenly become crippled. The ump states that there is nothing in the
law of the game that prevents her from doing so. So the first baseman from the other team, and
then the pitcher, and then the 2<sup>nd</sup> baseman and 3<sup>rd</sup>
baseman join together to <u>carry their opponent to 2<sup>nd</sup> base and
then to 3<sup>rd</sup></u> <u>base</u> and <b><i><u>finally home</u></i></b>. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is what the mercy of God
looks like, where others are willing to “lose” themselves in order to bring us
home to experience the victory of God’s redeeming love in Christ.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Most often we encounter the
great gift of God’s mercy in the simple yet profound gift of another
opportunity, another day to move forward again, another season to begin anew, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to start afresh. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This fresh start, this
beginning with a clean slate, is what a Jubilee Year is all about. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This coming Tuesday, December
8</span><sup style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">th</sup><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, the Church throughout the world </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">begins the Extraordinary
Jubilee of Mercy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the history of the people
of Israel, every 50 years was celebrated as a Jubilee, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">a special year of the Lord’s
favor as expressed by the actions of His Chosen People. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every 50 years, debts were completely
forgiven and all God’s people started over </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">with their financial slates
wiped clean and the crushing burden of debt </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">removed from their shoulders. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every 50 years, land that had
been lost to another was given back to its original owner. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Jubilee for Israel was
always a concrete reminder of how God’s mercy made everything new again and
brought them back home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This super-abundance of God’s
love that helps one to “come home” </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">and to start one’s life anew
is expressed in the most powerful way </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">in the person of Jesus
Christ, the Savior of the World. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the 15 page document “</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Misercordia Vultus</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">,”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">issued by Pope Francis this
past April announcing this Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy, the Pope opens his
remarks by stating something simple yet profound about our faith: </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">“Jesus Christ is the face of the
Father’s mercy.”</u> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When we look at Jesus, when
we gaze upon him, we see Mercy enfleshed. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When we listen to his words
and rejoice in his saving deeds, we see Mercy in action, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the “always more” of God the
Father’s love for all of God’s creation!</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pope Francis point out in
this document on the Jubilee Year of Mercy, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">that Jesus’ mission is a
mission of mercy, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">saving the lost ones and
healing the hurting ones, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">bringing all to a knowledge
of God’s redeeming love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus does not look upon us
with pity as if he is standing over us, separated from us, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">or act from the attitude of
pity (“</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You poor thing</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">”), but rather
acts out of compassion </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by suffering with us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This mission of mercy propels
the 2<sup>nd</sup> Person of the Divine Trinity </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to empty himself </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">of all divine rights and privileges to become
little like us, to embrace </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the fullness of our humanity,
to walk among us as one like us in all things but sin. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He calls his disciples who
have experienced the saving power of His merciful love </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to embrace His mission of mercy
by seeking out the lost and bringing them home </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to His Father.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To create the world anew by the power of His merciful
love.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pope Francis not only spells
out our mission in this special year of divine favor, <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but he also gives us a very
practical way to live out this mission by practicing <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the corporal and spiritual
works of mercy. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Pope’s “</span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>burning
desire</i></b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">” is that we reflect upon and act upon </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the corporal and spiritual
works of mercy.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pope Francis believes this
will awaken our consciences, which have often grown dull in the face of poverty,
and allow us to enter more deeply into the heart of the Gospel </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">where the poor have a special
experience of God’s mercy.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jesus himself speaks about
almost all of the <b><u>corporal works of
mercy</u></b> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">when he paints a picture of
the Final Judgment in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 25: </span><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the
naked, welcome the stranger, </span></i><i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">visit the sick and the imprisoned. </span></i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The final corporal work of
mercy</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">—</span><u style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">bury the dead</u><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">—is not included in Matthew 25 but has long been
practiced as one of the corporal works of mercy. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The </span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u>spiritual works of mercy</u></b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> have been practiced by disciples
throughout the centuries: </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Counsel the doubtful,
instruct the ignorant, admonish sinners, comfort the afflicted, forgive
offences, bear patiently those who do us ill, and pray for the living and the
dead.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Pope Francis reminds us that
when we reach out to help others </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">through the corporal or
spiritual works of mercy, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">we are actually serving and
loving the broken body of Christ living in them. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Christ who longs to come
to us this Advent, to set us free from our anxieties and fears, comes to us in
these “</span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">little ones</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">,” whom we are
called to serve in merciful love. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By doing so, we prepare the
way for the Lord of mercy </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to not only come through us
to them but to come to us through these little ones.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We mistakenly think that
whenever we help the poor or visit the imprisoned <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">or care for the forgotten
ones of this world that we are saving them, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">but actually, as Pope Francis
teaches us over and over again, we are being saved by them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We think we are saving them
from despair, but they are saving us from the<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">heart-numbing daily despair
of modern life which has turned people in on themselves.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fr. Joseph A.
Jacobi</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-45893836876100880592015-11-29T14:10:00.000-08:002015-12-08T14:10:49.356-08:001st Sunday of Advent<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/112915.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Jeremiah 33:14-16 + Psalm 25: 4-5, 8-9, 10, 14 + 1 Thessalonians 3:12-4:2 + Luke 21:25-28, 34-36</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvgMQICHZZd9Pvbw5VR7BUih6vd0LhD0q7kOQPUQNqt8suJ_q181Dr8Y7c4M4_Bq6wxo6_PR2_-SEmHmMt0mnLdTKA2Xd-a3KncJSDRywrQZ5srmDiSfULUXy7sxHPzmGMa7rImv7RTmM/s1600/justice.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvgMQICHZZd9Pvbw5VR7BUih6vd0LhD0q7kOQPUQNqt8suJ_q181Dr8Y7c4M4_Bq6wxo6_PR2_-SEmHmMt0mnLdTKA2Xd-a3KncJSDRywrQZ5srmDiSfULUXy7sxHPzmGMa7rImv7RTmM/s200/justice.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">During this Advent season we find ourselves in an in-between
time. Between the coming of the infant Savior born in Bethlehem and the Son of
Man returning in glory to judge all creation. Between those lullabies away in a
manger and the storm of the day of the returning Lord.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Advent therefore causes us to look back, to look back and to
see how God fulfills God’s promises — how God is always faithful to what God
says God will do. Promising to the prophet and through the prophet Jeremiah
that He would raise up a “Just Shoot” for Israel and so He does in the Lord Our
Justice, the Savior of the World. Looking forward into the future, knowing that
the God who is faithful will remain so in the days and years ahead. And so,
looking forward with hope, hope-filled hearts, knowing that history itself is
not meaningless. Our lives are not meaningless, that rather, we are all heading
somewhere toward and ultimate goal, toward this end point who is Jesus, the
Christ, the King of Glory and King of the Universe. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, filled with trust, overflowing with hope, how can we not
be an Advent people who live in joy, expectant joy, knowing that the Lord who
has come and who will come, continues to come? In fact, we are an Advent people
always because the Lord continues to come to us. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The question is: Do we welcome Him as He comes? What
prevents us from opening the door of our hearts and our lives to receiving Him
today? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The Jesus in Luke describes twin threats to receiving Him as
He comes. Carousing and drunkenness? I look at this crowd and say you probably
wouldn’t be here this morning if you were under that threat. Maybe too many
Christmas parties in the days ahead, but not that threat. But the second
threat: The anxieties of daily life. Anxieties that are birthed in the womb of fear,
anxieties that cause us to focus solely on today, to protecting what is ours,
to hunkering down in our bunkers. In fact, it seems at times that our world
runs on the fuel of fear. And that we tend to, therefore, run around and run
around in circles trying to anxiously hold on to what we have and always
fearful that it will be taken from us.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This kind of fear flows from a lie. It is no accident we
call the Evil One “The Father of Lies” and the lie that he wants us to believe:
This is all there is. This is all there is. What we can see and touch – that’s
all there is. And so, when we lose our possessions or some of the stuff we
have, fear paralyses our hearts. When we lose our health in thinking “This is
all there is”, fear closes out the joy that should be the mark of our
days. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We can in fact become like trees weighed down with ice. You
know, trees as trees are meant to be, they reach to the Heavens. They stretch
to the Infinite. Rooted in the earth, they are made to reach to God. The same
for us, but when we are bowed down by the frozen nature of our fears, it is
hard to stand erect and to reach toward the One who has made us not for fear
but to live rooted in joy and to recognize the truth that Jesus comes to
proclaim: This is not all there is. There is something much, much more than
what we can see and touch. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And so it is every year on the first Sunday of Advent, the
Church focuses us on the end time, on the eternal call of God to dwell with Him
in glory for all eternity. To recognize, yes, what we do on this earth counts
and we will all stand before the Son of Man to be judged on how we have lived,
but this is not all there is! That even if we lose it all, even if we lose
these frail, fragile lives of ours, whatever we place in God’s hands, that we
will possess forever. It is never lost to us. And thus, we can be people of joy
even when fear weighs us down, even when we are tempted to embrace fear instead
of the trust that God has made us to live from, instead of the very fountain of
hope that we are called to drink from.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The challenge therefore for us also is to help others who
are bowed down by fear, who are stooped over because of the daily anxieties
that weigh them down, to help them to stand erect, to raise up their heads and
to see the One coming to them to set them free by the warmth of God’s love and
light, the One who comes to them in and through us, the living Body of Christ.
We do this in a very special way as Jeremiah reminds us of that title he gives
to the Savior by working for justice. He calls the Savior “The Lord of Justice”
— that where we see something that has gone awry, we make it right; where
something is wrong, we make it right. Where human dignity is bowed down by
injustice, we break those bonds and lift people up so that they may see, and
only see, the God-given dignity of every human person. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Minoru Yasui understood this truth. Minoru lived during a
time of great fear, after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in the early 1940’s in
our country. Minoru was a Japanese-American, who lived in the northwest, a
bright young man, a lawyer by trade who believed in the founding principles of
this country – liberty and equality and justice for all. And so, when a law was
passed, a curfew was demanded of all Japanese-Americans — “be in your homes by a
certain time” — He said, “This is not right, this is not just. And so, he broke
the law. He broke the curfew. He even went to the local police station and
said, “Here I am breaking the law, put me away.” Because he wanted to bring to
the courts, to the court’s attention, the injustice of such a fear-filled law.
And so, as he was put in solitary confinement, Mr. Yasui held on to the hope
that his case would prevail. As he spent months upon months all alone in his
little cell, he was fueled by this hope that somehow the principles of this
country would be lived out by its people. And even when his case failed before
the Supreme Court, and he was sent away with other Japanese-Americans to those
internment camps on the West Coast, he never gave up his hope that as Americans
we would live by what we say we believe — liberty and justice for all. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For his tireless work, for his hope that sustained him to
work for the dignity of those who were so discriminated against, this past week
he was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest recognition any
civilian can receive in our land. And he reminds us, as do all people who lift
up others who are bowed down, that indeed, working for justice in whatever way
we do so, working to make right what has gone wrong, requires this kind of
hopefulness, this kind of courage, knowing that that kind of work is the work
really of the Lord, Our Justice. The Lord who comes and who continues to come in
order to bring God’s justice to the world, in order that all people, especially
those who are bowed down by injustice, may be lifted up, may stand erect, raise
their heads and know that they, too, have a God-given dignity that no one and
no thing can take away.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, as we move forward on our Advent journey, which really
is the journey of our lives, as we pray to the Lord to reveal to us more
clearly the fears which dominate our hearts, as we prepare for His coming to us
in surprising and mysterious ways during these sacred days, we do so in a
spirit of love that fuels our work for justice. Because as Saint Paul said to
the community at Thessalonica, and he says to us today, the way forward:
Increase and abound in love, day by day, increase and abound in love. And it is
basically what our Pope challenges us to do as well. By reaching out to see and
touch those that the world has forgotten, and to lift them up, to lift them up
by the warmth of the Coming One’s love that surges through us to them, that
strengthens them to stand erect in their God-given dignity, to lift their
burdens so that they no longer are weighed down. That they might know, as we
do, this incredible joy that comes from knowing the Lord who keeps coming to
us, as we welcome Him, and as we touch Him broken in the bodies of those around
us, with love. We hasten the day of his return, we quicken His coming in glory.</span><o:p></o:p></div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-44164122538125668582015-11-15T13:30:00.000-08:002015-11-21T14:33:22.257-08:0033rd Sunday in Ordinary Time<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/111515.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Daniel 12:1-3 + Psalm 16:5, 8, 9-10, 11 + Hebrews 10:11-14, 18 + Mark 13:24-32</span></div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9BRXgzZIP2wekFYMlhvQXJ5Z1RHQ01neWYxdHNncDJUY1dB" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a><span id="goog_1336833775"></span><span id="goog_1336833776"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="text-align: start;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8RnRVL2DdQbv5nf2jjTvRThG7XsYhdoicw4PFxJRgfu55qSxxWC8ujPE4UfePU9AOBWL_51OavICeaDXWlAtQ1Qh3oaA-R2-FMdkjApPfzdOh8vnz_TKaRcLqSYjKeqF42KDoZp7R55Q/s1600/pearl-of-great-price1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="248" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8RnRVL2DdQbv5nf2jjTvRThG7XsYhdoicw4PFxJRgfu55qSxxWC8ujPE4UfePU9AOBWL_51OavICeaDXWlAtQ1Qh3oaA-R2-FMdkjApPfzdOh8vnz_TKaRcLqSYjKeqF42KDoZp7R55Q/s320/pearl-of-great-price1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">When listening to Mark’s Gospel, you must always remember
the people to whom this life-giving Word of God was first addressed. Mark
writes for the Christian community in Rome in the 1</span><sup style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">st</sup><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> Century during
a time of great persecution, during a reign of terror. Because of the violent
persecution of the Christians in Rome, they feel like the world as they know it
is coming to an end. The day seems to be as dark as night. The stars no longer
seem to shine in the sky. The Emperor Nero and his soldiers make sport of the
Christians in the Coliseum. They become food for the lions to the blood-thirsty
cries of the crowd.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">During this darkest of times for Christians in and around
Rome, Mark shares the Good News of Jesus Christ, reminding them of the
centrality of the Cross. For those who would question, “Why is this happening?”
the Evangelist, through the words of Christ, would remind his community: They
are asking the wrong question. The real question goes much deeper — “What does
it mean? What does it mean?” And the suffering and dying of Jesus, the Son of
God, sheds light, gives an answer that brings meaning to a time of seeming
meaninglessness. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Because in His love for the world the Son of God gives His
life completely on the Cross so that the Cross no longer becomes an instrument
of terror, but a sign of hope; because death does not have the last word, life
does, as the darkness of the Cross gives way to the never-ending day of the
Resurrection. And so Jesus teaches His followers: Only in losing one’s life
does one find it, only in giving it away does one receive it back more full
than ever before.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The question also those first Christians had to answer, and
every Christian community since that time who walked through dark days: “Who are we going to become? Who are we going
to become because of this suffering, this trial, this terror, this seeming
darkness?”, which again is why the Cross
is at the very center of Mark’s Gospel. We’ve heard it during this year of Mark:
Chapter 8, Chapter 9, and Chapter 10—three predictions of the Passion, the
dying of Christ and His Resurrection. Three times those very first disciples,
Peter, James, John, the rest—they struggle to understand, they wrestle to comprehend
what this means, what the mystery of the Cross means. And Jesus continues to
patiently teach them and us that it’s only in following Him along the Way of
the Cross, this suffering, self-giving love, that we become something more,
that our lives become something more. For the temptation whenever the world
seems to be crumbling around us, whenever we think what was certain as sunlight
or starlight has vanished from sight, the temptation is to become a people
swallowed up by fear and in this darkness to go even deeper into a more
profound darkness of violence and despair. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The words of Jesus, spoken first to Peter, James, John,
Andrew and the rest, and to those first Christians in Rome suffering and dying,
and to all Christians since, the words of Jesus give us strength today to
become something more than we ever thought we could be, so that we do not give
up this Pearl of Great Price—hope itself—and give in to despair. So that we do
not lose the hidden treasure of faith and give in fear, so that we do not give
in to fear so that we will not abandon the way of love to walk in the never-ending
darkness of hatred.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Because those first Christians persevered in faith, hope and
love, even though the world was anew, it seemed to be coming to an end. A new
world was born, so that 2,000 years later on the very ground on which they
spilled their blood, Popes have walked the Way of the Cross during Holy Week as
the way of life, so that the very city that tried to swallow them alive is now
the headquarters to the largest Christian church in the world, over 1 billion
strong.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">We can relate to the Christians in Rome who first heard this
word of the Lord passed on to them by the Evangelist Mark. Since the dawn of
the millennium fifteen years ago and the promise of a whole new world, what we
have experienced instead at times is the darkness of terror and everything we
thought to be solid, to no longer be so. From 9/11 on our own American soil to
the terrible evil perpetrated in Paris this past Friday, we have lived through
some very dark days. In Paris, the City of Light, many people now feel like darkness
has enveloped them. They fear to go out to eat at their favorite restaurant, or
to their stadiums to cheer on their favorite soccer team, or even just to go to
a concert and delight in the sheer pleasure of music. The City of Light now
seems to be swallowed by the power of darkness. But that is what the enemy
wants us to believe: The temptation that the Great Tempter of humankind wants
us to fall into, the temptation to believe that the powers of evil have won the
day is great.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Even in our own land, where senseless violence at times
seems to make no place safe—workplace or home or even churches. But it is not
only terror and violence out there that shakes our world, that tempts us to
despair—it is also in our own personal lives whenever the darkness of loss
overshadows our day. Not just the loss of someone deeply loved to death, but whenever
we lose our job, our very life’s work that we enjoy, or a person close to us whom
we have loved for many years betrays our trust, or when a parent strong and
sure for many years loses all their strength or even their ability to recognize
us anymore. At those times, we can feel like we walk in never-ending night,
that we have lost our way and everything which was now solid seems to be as shifting
as sand. Everything that was once certain, now shot through with uncertainty.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Yes, we can relate to those first disciples at the center of
Mark’s Gospel, that first Christian community in Rome as well, and Christians
of all ages who have struggled with the darkness of suffering and sorrow and
wonder how the Good News of the Gospel sheds light on all of that. That is why week
after week after week, we come here to remember, to remember, to remember a
whole new world has already begun with the Resurrection of Christ—the world as
we know it and all its troubles truly passing away. The powers of this world destroyed
forever by the power of the Resurrection of the Lord. In fact, on that Good
Friday when sun went dark at noon, those powers ended and the day a tomb broke
open and the Risen Jesus appeared with a life that no one could ever take from
Him again, a new age was born. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This one who is the living Word of God, the Word of God in
flesh, reminds us that all that we think has passed away is really in God’s
hands, and all those who thought that He had passed away forever from their
lives, to know that He lives forever and by the power of the Spirit, He walks
at our side every day, encouraging us and enlightening us in times of darkness
and the temptation to despair, because He knows in the depths of His bones,
fully human like us, what it means to feel like one’s life is enveloped by darkness.
Even the deepest darkness of all, to feel like one has been abandoned by God.
Why else the words from the Cross, in Mark’s Gospel, “My God, my God, why have
you abandoned me?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">He who was sustained by the life-giving words of God, who
perhaps prayed this very Psalm that sustains us today in our worship, trusting
that His Father would indeed show Him the path to life even though in the midst
of suffering and dying, struggling to find the way; to trust that somehow the
Father would provide fullness of joy in His presence to His faithful ones—a joy
that could never, ever be taken away. And in doing so to delight forever at the
right hand of the Father, for He is there in glory. And He summons us there to
be with Him, not only interceding for us every day when our world seems to
crumble around us, but drawing us to Himself by the power of His love and
reminding us that there is always more than what we can see in front of us, that
by the light of faith, knowing that He walks with us, drawing us every day more
into a more abundant life, a more profound peace, and a deeper joy—for He is
the Living Word who will never pass away.</span><o:p></o:p><br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Father Joseph Jacobi</i></span></div>
</div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-59735975440096638672015-11-08T13:10:00.000-08:002015-11-21T14:33:06.312-08:0032nd Sunday in Ordinary Time<div class="MsoNormal">
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/110815.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">1 Kings 17:10-16 + Psalm 146:7, 8-9, 9-10 + Hebrews 9:24-28, 18 + Mark 12:38-44</span></div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9BRXgzZIP2wclFBLVdLQVBXdVBxcGdDdTNjenlMYzJzRHFV" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a><span id="goog_1336833775"></span><span id="goog_1336833776"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="text-align: justify;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC911WClFuP-n7KSZbOH6G95uVjWobFiq_txjLCgkeURHxB9uu49fP-f3ytXUWcKu8QYPKc493HUn5M0Xb2AwjjkeeTD_cDFlydRNhkvn5Sm9R0PoAT0WHeb03znMu-xfLMKyOpFg7Ubc/s1600/mite.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="196" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC911WClFuP-n7KSZbOH6G95uVjWobFiq_txjLCgkeURHxB9uu49fP-f3ytXUWcKu8QYPKc493HUn5M0Xb2AwjjkeeTD_cDFlydRNhkvn5Sm9R0PoAT0WHeb03znMu-xfLMKyOpFg7Ubc/s200/mite.png" width="200" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Last Sunday on the Solemnity of All Saints, I talked about
how the saints encourage us by their example of life. They show us that it is
possible to love God with all that we are and to love our neighbor as our self.
Now because of the Solemnity of All Saints, we did not have the usual reading
from Mark’s Gospel last Sunday, but if we would have, it was that famous
reading about the scribe asking Jesus which is the most important Commandment.
And you know His response, it is actually two that go together: To love the
Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and to love your
neighbor as yourself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In today’s Gospel passage, we see someone who fulfills those
Commandments of love, who gives herself fully—fully to God and on behalf of
others. And in fact, she would have gone unnoticed that day in the Temple
except Jesus sees her. Everybody else is focusing on the wealthy folks and
their fine clothes and their big sums of money that come up and deposit those
in the Temple treasury. No one sees this widow except Jesus and He points her
out to His disciples. And as He does so, He says that her gift is greater than
all the rest because she is not giving something from her surplus, she is
giving really the gift of herself to God, the gift of herself to God. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Often, this story is called “The Widow’s Mite” reflecting
the smallness of her gift, but I think it should be renamed “The Widow’s Might”,
because she who had no power in her society, had incredible power to influence
others by this sacrifice of love. In fact, she, I believe, is a source of
encouragement to Jesus as He goes forward to the Cross. Because in the context
of Mark’s Gospel, this is the last time Jesus will be in the Temple. He is in
Jerusalem, a few days away from offering His life completely to God. And seeing
how this widow does this so freely and generously, I am sure it was able to
spur him on to take that very challenging step of giving Himself completely to
God on the Cross, on our behalf and out of love of neighbor as well. She is a
source of encouragement to Him. She has that power to influence others by her gift.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There are these kinds of generous gifts going on all around
us if we but have eyes of faith to see them. People are giving not of their
surplus, but giving really gifts that symbolize the gift of themselves completely
to God and in service and love of their neighbor. My first week here at [Holy
Spirit] back in January 2014, I remember opening my mail in my office and there
was an envelope from a family at St. Eugene’s that I knew fairly well. The parents,
the two parents, working six days a week at a low-paying job, making great sacrifices
so that their children could obtain a Catholic education. And as I opened the
envelope, a note fell out with a $10 check saying “Father, please put this in
your new church building fund.” I was taken aback, I mean, they don’t have that
to give but they gave it. And then it came the next month, and the next month,
and every month since—an incredible gift of generosity from this family who is not
even connected to us but through Christ and through His sacrificial love.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Or I think about the recent celebration of Oktoberfest when
for the first time we threw open the doors of our parish and welcomed others
from outside our community to come and to celebrate with us in order to raise
money for our new church fund and it was about something much more than just raising
money. I remember when the committee told me earlier this year that they were
planning for 500 people. I didn’t tell them this but the thought passed my mind,
“This is the first year: I think 500 might be a little high.” But you know, 500
showed up that night. Even though there were some kinks the first time around
that will be worked out next year, those who came had a great time, a great
time, and there was much joy and celebration that night, and people from other
parishes and even people who weren’t Catholic were here to enjoy the generosity
of our hospitality. And there were those who worked alongside each other:
newcomers and people who have been here a long time, you know, Hispanics and
Anglos and Asian and African-Americans, all with one goal: Just to give
themselves fully to this important project on behalf of the Church but
ultimately for the Glory of God. And I remember one “couple of advanced wisdom”—another
way for saying they are a little older than most of us—who here until midnight
helping to clean up after that celebration—such generosity, such generosity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Or, I think about the recent project of enclosing our pavilion,
making it into a new classroom building. Such commitment on behalf of the leadership
team and vision to really direct that project. And the core group of people who
were here on most Saturdays, giving of themselves, more than just nails and
building a physical building, but really building up a community of faith. Hearing
Spanish being spoken next to English as Christians worked side-by-side, on a project
together, encouraging each other. And there was even one unlikely source of
encouragement to all of us who persevered in that project. It came from a
teenager who was here practically every Saturday for four months, usually the
first one here and the last one to go in the afternoon, and he came during the
week as well. He just poured his heart and soul into the project. For him it
was more than building a building, it was just an expression of love for God
and love for his neighbors here in our parish. That kind of sacrificial giving
was a real inspiration to others who came to give of themselves to the project
as well.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I think of our new candidates and catechumens here who
become before us this day to enter into a whole-hearted commitment to become one
with us in our Catholic faith and who reveal to us something we often forget: We
have such an abundance in our church, blessings through the sacraments and the
saints, and our moral teaching, and just all the riches of our faith that we
often take for granted but that others have to point out to us by their
offering of themselves, saying that they want to be part of this living Body of
Christ. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There are all sorts of signs of generosity and sacrificial
love all around us if we but put on the eyes of Jesus and see as He sees all
these incredible acts of the “Widow’s Mite”. I think of couples who are by each
other’s side in good and difficult times, times of sickness and health, times
when things are going really well and times when it is very challenging, who
are faithful and true, and continue to pour out their lives for each other. I think
of parents who give so much to their children and even on those days when they don’t
find their children likable, they still love them, they still give themselves
to their children, they still make those daily sacrifices of love that enable
their children to know that they are loved. Or, adult children who are caring
for their aging parents, parents who sometimes have lost their mind, who can no
longer remember what is going on or perhaps have lost their physical capability
to even move or go anywhere on their own—adult children there by their side,
walking with them, supporting them, strengthening them, loving them. Or,
friends who care for friends in times of great loss, sorrow, for those in this
parish who have reached out to welcome others who perhaps have been away or
just coming for the first time.</span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">There are all sorts of people giving of themselves in love
to others who are actually encouraging others to do the same. And all of this
gift-giving, all this generosity, all this sacrificial love really flows from
one gift that we celebrate every time we come to this altar of praise. It is
the gift of the life of the Son of God who holds nothing back, who gives
Himself fully and freely to us. And who simply yet powerfully says, “This is My
Body given for you, this is My Blood poured out for you.” So that we might have
the strength, the energy, the courage to do the same, to say to others “This is
my body, my life that’s broken open for you” and find that there’s so much more
of ourselves to give away. “This is My Blood, My Very Life that I pour out for
you” and to discover there is so much more to share. And slowly but surely we
discover the truth that all widows of faith know: That with God, the jar of
flour, it never goes empty – the jug of oil, it will never go dry.</span><o:p></o:p><br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Father Joseph Jacobi</i></span></div>
</div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-62014065946613090642015-11-01T14:28:00.000-08:002015-11-21T14:32:47.408-08:00Solemnity of All Saints<div class="MsoNormal">
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/110115.cfm" target="_blank">Link to today's readings</a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Revelations 4:2-4, 9-14 + Psalm 24 1BC-2, 3-4AB, 5-6 + 1 John 3:1-3 + Matthew 5:1-12A</span></div>
<div style="text-align: start;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9BRXgzZIP2wdnRfVzNFTlQ2UDVwWGNOcEh0NjFOaHMtamRr" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a><span id="goog_1336833775"></span><span id="goog_1336833776"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="text-align: justify;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4wn4NGe3VdwVWz6aC8RVmmi4aZN6s87cb7GOL4TAHWCtVrDUNiDbCMv05YcBvS7XfnD9VxoBNnLE3027tkw01SN_sajhD89Zs_aWp7Vr2_qttbmhDEhYaIngGHhdXkB2hLWqWiUFMaQ8/s1600/Children-of-God.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4wn4NGe3VdwVWz6aC8RVmmi4aZN6s87cb7GOL4TAHWCtVrDUNiDbCMv05YcBvS7XfnD9VxoBNnLE3027tkw01SN_sajhD89Zs_aWp7Vr2_qttbmhDEhYaIngGHhdXkB2hLWqWiUFMaQ8/s400/Children-of-God.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">By the marvelous power of God’s love we have been made into
Children of God. Who are we right now? Beloved Children of our Heavenly Father.
Baptism makes this truth clear, it makes it an indelible reality in our lives.
God, the Father of All Creation, has claimed us as His own beloved sons and
daughters. In those water of baptism, we are forever joined to <u>the</u>
beloved Child of God, Jesus himself. He reveals to us what our beloved Father
is like by teaching us to pray “Abba!” (“Father!”) Yes, remarkable as it may
seem, we are to understand our relationship with the God who has created the universe
out of nothing, who has power and might beyond belief, we are to relate to this
God as a child does in tenderness to his “Papa”, to his “Daddy”, whatever term
of tenderness a child may use for his or her father who they know will provide
them whatever they need.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And then, by the gift of the Holy Spirit poured into our
lives as love and baptism, the very love of God, we have been strengthened to
live out of this identity as Children of God. It is by this gift of the Spirit that
we can cry out “Abba!” (“Father!”) and, as Jesus does, trust that in God, His
Father, all things will be provided to us, all good things will be provided to
us. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So our Heavenly Father rejoices whenever we turn to Him with
whatever need we have, no matter how big nor how small. It is something like
this: My dad is a carpenter. I grew up not having much interest in carpentry,
very active in sports in school, extracurricular activities. I never really
learned much about making things or fixing things. But, any time I needed something
fixed or needed help with making something I would go to my Daddy, my father. And
he would drop what he was doing, and he would help me, joyful, excited to do
so. It is just a small smidgen of what God’s love for us as father is like: Always
ready, always ready to respond to His children’s needs. But we so quickly
forget who we are: Beloved children of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The key to sanctity, the key to growth in holiness, and the
saints teach us this: To grow into our identity as God’s Beloved Children and
to recognize everything we have comes from the hand of God. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So, the Father claims us as His own Beloved Children. He
sends us His Beloved Son, Jesus, to teach us how to live as a Child of God and
they gift us with their life-giving Spirit as divine energy to live in this
way. The Divine Trinity – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – does everything to
make our way home to God easy. The Tempter wants to tempt us to believe that it
is very difficult, that sanctity – holiness of life – it’s impossible. But the
Trinity, out of love for us, makes it easy and always gives us more and more to
lead us on our journey home. In fact, with God, there is always more – more joy,
more peace, more love. It is the very nature of God to keep giving gifts. And today,
we celebrate some of the greatest gifts of God – those men and women of every
age and race and background who are with God, who we believe and know are with
God and enjoying right now the fullness of life and glory – the saints of God,
human like us in all things, who struggled in life as we do with trusting in
God’s goodness, and somehow lived out of their identity as beloved Children of
God and were able to grow in love of God and of their neighbor in all things.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And they want to help us. They want to help us to be where
they are. And so, they assist us at every moment with their prayers. And they
delight when we turn to them, as our brother or sister on this earth, that’s
when we turn to them and ask for their help in prayer. And so, when we are looking
for a parking place, and there is not one single space in sight, we pray, “Mother
Cabrini, Mother Cabrini, find me a space for my little machiney.” It works! I
was just at OU Medical Center this past week, needing to see someone quickly,
not a space in sight, turned to Mother Cabrini and immediately the car right in
front of me pulls out, so thank you. Or perhaps one more common to many
Catholics who lose their keys or other things: “Tony, Tony, come around.
Something’s lost, gotta be found.” Saint Anthony, always there to aid us in our
time of need. Or, perhaps, in more serious times, a saint for impossible
causes, a saint I know from working with the Latino people of our land who are
far from home, who face such challenging situations, Saint Jude. To turn to
Jude and to ask him in the face of something seemingly impossible for the help
of God. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">All the saints go before our God on behalf of us, praying
that we might know God’s love and God’s help, and they assist us with their prayers
on our journey home to Heaven. So, their prayers give us strength and the example
of their life gives us courage. Their lives encourage us that the life of
holiness is possible for they were sinners, broken and weak, just like us. But
they understood that in their simpleness, in their brokenness, in their
weakness, they could always turn to God, who would make them whole, who would
strengthen them, and who would aid them in their time of need. And they show
us, these holy men and women of God, how to live out the blueprint of holiness
which is the Beatitudes. In fact, that first Beatitude, “Blessed are the poor
in spirit theirs is the Kingdom of God”, it’s the foundation for all the other
Beatitudes. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Every saint in his or her unique way shows us what it means
to be poor in spirit, what it means to understand that life and the source of
life does not come from us, it comes from outside of us as a gift, and Divine
Life comes from outside of us as a gift through the power of the Spirit. They
show us what it means to depend upon God in all things and to trust that God
will provide. And so, they could live out those other Beatitudes as well –
injustice causing them to mourn, and then to turn to find consolation in the
God of All Hope, their desire for righteousness, to make right their
relationship with God and right their relationship with others, as strong as a deep
hunger or an aching thirst, hearts fully devoted to God, leading them to act
with mercy and sow the seeds of peace. And their way of living like that of Jesus
himself, challenging those in power, and thus like the preacher of the
Beatitudes, they, too, will suffer because of it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The saints by their lives poured out in love of God and others,
they show us holiness is not complicated, it’s not just something out there for
men and women in monasteries or convents, but holiness is rooted in the very
stuff of our daily lives, in the messiness of our lives, as we struggle to love
more fully our neighbor, to give our lives more fully to God, it is right there
that we are being fired, shaped into who we truly are—saints of God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">At each and every Eucharist the saints join us in singing
praise to God, or rather, more correctly, we join them in their endless hymn of
praise to God. It is as if Earth is joined to Heaven and a veil is removed and
we see how around this table we are joined to the saints in these songs of joy
and gratitude to God.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I was this past week at a clergy education day at the Pastoral
Center and we had Mass in the chapel there. If you have every been there, you’ve
noticed the beautiful stained glass windows along each side and they are
arranged so that as Mass is being celebrated, the reflections of those saints
are kind of carved into the marble behind the altar so that you can see them
right there around the altar praying with us. And so it is that the eyes of
faith recognize the presence of the saints here joining us in prayer and with
the eyes of faith, we recognize that we are never alone, that they are with us
every day, urging us on in this journey of faith, cheering us on in this race
of faith, reminding us our destiny—every one of us!—our destiny is life with God
forever.</span><o:p></o:p><br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><i>Father Joseph Jacobi</i></span></div>
</div>
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7510000897497697543.post-25466655376698080892015-09-27T14:21:00.000-07:002015-12-08T14:21:27.589-08:0026th Sunday in Ordinary Time<div style="text-align: right;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<a href="http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/092715.cfm" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Link to today's readings</span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Numbers 11 25-29
+ Psalm 19 + James 5:1-6 + Mark 9:38-48</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B9BRXgzZIP2wSThLQkl4b2RZd1k" target="_blank">Click here to listen to today's homily</a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Delivered at Holy Spirit Catholic Church in Mustang, Oklahoma</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What a remarkable week this
has been and what an incredible time to be Catholic! </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This weekend our Holy Father,
Pope Francis, wraps up his visit to the United States </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">by participating in the World
Meeting of Families in Philadelphia.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
He has spoken throughout this
week on the importance of the family. But in an even larger
context, Pope Francis has challenged us to reflect upon what it means to be a member
of the human family.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
He has done so by preaching
the Gospel with joy, in a way which many people</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
have not heard the Gospel
message before. In a very clear and engaging
manner, the Pope wraps his flesh around the Mercy of God; he embodies this
attribute of God, he extending the merciful touch of the Lord Jesus to those who are broken,
forgotten, and considered disposable by the world. Where others only focus on
statistics about poverty or mass migration, Pope Francis always sees the
human faces behind the numbers, each one with their only
particular hopes and dreams, joys and sorrows.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
Reporters try to label Pope
Francis, to put him into a certain political category,</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
but his loving service to Christ
suffering in the broken ones transcends all labels and
categories. What he preaches, he
does. What he says flows into
action, whether by breaking bread with the homeless of our nation’s capital, or
visiting those who are forgotten because they are locked up behind iron bars,
or driving about town in a little Fiat instead of a grand limousine. Our Pope preaches the Gospel
not only with his encouraging and challenging words, but also by humbly pouring
out his life in service to all humanity, especially the forgotten ones
who live outside the mainstream.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
One of the striking images from
his visit took place when he welcomed little 5-year old Sofie Cruz to his Pope-mobile
while on the parade route through D.C.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
Sofie had broken through the
security barrier, and was making her way toward the Pope, and the security
detail thought to prevent her, but like Jesus, the Pope made clear that no one should hinder a
child from coming to him.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
In that one image, a thousand
powerful words were spoken, and something beyond words
happened---the Vicar of Christ showing us what it means</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
to welcome and receive the
little ones, those without power or prestige,</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
those who have no standing in
our land.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
Francis is a Pope who
includes the excluded; who teaches us, like Christ,</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
that the way to greatness is
to serve the least ones; who is more at home in a
humble abode of a poor family than in the Vatican Palace, and who would rather rub
elbows with the forgotten of this world than with the famous.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
One of the more formal titles
for the leader of the Roman Catholic Church is</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
“Pontifex Maximus,” or the
great bridge-builder. We have seen in this short
window of time how this Pope has built bridges, bringing people together of
all faiths, races, ethnicities, backgrounds, and way of life. From the chamber of the joint
session of Congress to the great hall of the United Nations, this Pope not only
brought people who are very different from one another together, but also challenged them to
end divisions and find new ways to strengthen their ties.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
In his recent encyclical,
“Laudato Si” and by his strong words this week, Pope Francis reminds us that
we need to care not only for one another but also for our common home,
the Earth, which is God’s good gift to us.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
The very inclusive nature of
Jesus, as seen in Pope Francis, confronts attitudes of
division and privilege For there can be no coming of
the Kingdom of God while we insist on being separate, different, or special,
expecting privilege or power or positions of influence over others. God our Creator has made us
to be “for” each other, not “over” or “against.” To be “for life for all”, as
Thomas Groome would say.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
So the challenge becomes
cutting out of our lives those attitudes and behaviors</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
which pit us against one
another. The rub of the Gospel comes
in removing those things from our lives which divide us and work
against being for others and for life.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
Jesus talks about
self-mutilation not in a literal sense, but speaks in hyperbole</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
to wake us up to those attitudes
and behaviors which have to be removed from our lives if we want to enjoy the reign
of God. Those things that we consider
to be as important as a hand or foot.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
We as Catholics have to cut
out the attitude that we have all the answers,</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
and enter into dialogue, along
with our Holy Father, with all the children of this world, to discover the way forward
together. We are to cut off our absolute
allegiance to a political party and its platform, and cut out demonizing those who
are not members of our particular party. There is something more
important than being a Republican or a Democrat, and that is being an American
who works for liberty and justice for all. We have to cut out the
attitude that our country is always right and that we have the right to do
whatever we want to advance our agenda, and accept the truth that we are citizens of the
world, and that we as a nation must work together with other nations to further
peace and prosperity for all people in corner of our common home. We are more than one nation
under God—we are one human family under God.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
Christ’s teaching is not
easy, for it is a radical call to change the way we think</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
in order to change the way we
act. It is a call for a change of
heart in order to love as He loves. We have to cut off the feet
that lead us away from others</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
and instead walk together and
work together “for all for life.” We cut off the hands that are
grabbing everything we can get, and instead give all we have
for the betterment of others and this planet. We cut out eyes which look
only inward in self-absorption and instead look outward toward the needs of
others and see the face of Christ, especially in those who are hurting.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
We must move beyond the
comfort of our own groups, move beyond thinking in terms of insiders and outsiders,
and see that we are all in this great adventure of life together. Jesus would have us his
disciples always “thinking outside the box”:
always ready and willing to embrace new ways and new partners in the
work of the Reign of God. The Spirit of the living God
blows where it will and it blows upon everyone.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
We are called to strive for a
higher goal than only what’s best for me, or for my group, or for my party, or
for my nation---for the goal for which we strive is the Kingdom of God. Our Pope and the social
teachings of our Church challenge us to go beyond the borders we place on our
lives, and realize that just as Jesus is for all, so we shall be. So we serve and help and lift
up other people, not because they are Catholic, or because they profess to
believe in Christ or because they have an ID card, but we serve and help and
lift up others because we are Catholic.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
The theme for the gathering
of the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia is,</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
“Love is Our Mission: The Family Fully Alive!” Love was Jesus’ mission, and
it is our mission as well. We are most fully alive when
we reach out over the gaps</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
that separate us from one
another to grasp another’s hand in friendship. We are most fully alive when
compassion breaks down the barriers which separate us.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
When we love one another, we
are fully alive; when we are truly concerned
about the well-being of others and give ourselves on their behalf, we are
filled with peace and joy.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
So we might have the strength
to build bridges between peoples, we are reminded at every Mass that God in
Christ has bridged the distance between heaven and earth. So we might have the strength
to live for others, the Crucified and Risen Christ gives us a share in divine
life at this Eucharist. He gives himself to us so we
can give ourselves for all for life.</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: left;">
Listen carefully to the words
of Jesus and vow to make them your own:</div>
</span><br />
<div style="display: inline !important; text-align: left;">
<i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">“This is my body, given up for you. This is my blood poured out for you.”</span></i></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<i style="text-align: right;"></i></div>
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><div style="text-align: right;">
<i>Fr. Joseph A. Jacobi</i></div>
</span><br />
Father Joseph Jacobihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15042519908106271191noreply@blogger.com