The Eucharist is not a prize for the perfect; it is medicine for us who are very imperfect.

If you were given the responsibility of choosing our next pope, what qualities of leadership would you be looking for?  What kind of leadership does the Church need to carry on the message and mission of Jesus?

I ask you this question to invite you to consider how Jesus chose our first pope.  What kind of leadership was Jesus looking in the apostle Peter?

In today’s Gospel, Jesus was giving his apostles a gut check.  He asked his disciples:  “Who do you say that I am?”  Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Christ, the son of the living God.”  Jesus said to him:  “Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah…And so, I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church.”  In Peter’s answer, he was saying that his relationship with Jesus was the commitment that defined his life.

St. Peter is a paradoxical leader of the Church in that he exhibits both strength and weakness in his faith journey.  In next Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus is saying to Peter:  “Get behind me, Satan!  You are an obstacle to me.  You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do.”

And yet, Peter was chosen to be the first pope not by accident, but rather by divine design.  His very failure became his credential to be the foremost preacher of God’s limitless mercy.  Can you resonate with that powerful statement?   I know for myself when dealing with the death of family members, when coping with surgeries in my life, when dealing with a ministry given to me that was very unexpected, these moments were moments of faith when I was challenged to trust in the limitless mercy of Jesus.

Going back to Peter, people would see in the face of Peter the look of one who knows the giving and forgiving God.  Peter would speak from his own experience:  “Do not be afraid.”  God’s love has pursued  Peter in his sin and found him  and gave him a  new life.  Peter was a sinner saved by the love of Jesus.   The Good News Peter would fearlessly proclaim is God’s love will pursue you in your sin and find you and give you new life. 

We Catholics boldly speak of the primacy of the pope.  What of the primacy of our first Pope?  Peter has primacy because he is first in failure, first in suffering, first in his need for God’s mercy to serve the Church.  Somehow Jesus understands that Peter can only preach God’s reconciling love if he first experiences it himself.  It is because Peter will fail so completely and weep so bitterly over his denial of Jesus that, when he is finally reconciled with Jesus at the Sea of Tiberius, he will truly understand God’s message of mercy.

Pope Francis began his time as pope by acknowledging that he was a sinner and that God had first “mercied” him before choosing him.  His papal motto, miserando atque eligendo.  He was chosen to be pope because he was well acquainted with the mercy and forgiveness of God.

In the penitential rite at the beginning of the celebration of the Eucharist, we acknowledge and celebrate our need for God’s merciful forgiveness.  Before receiving Communion, we say, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should come under my roof; say but the word and my soul shall be healed.”  The Eucharist is not a reward for the perfect.  The Eucharist is God’s gift of love to us who are not worthy, who are sinners, but are grateful for the merciful love of Jesus that is shared with us.

What qualifies you to receive Communion during this liturgy?  Perhaps it is your experience of dealing with a divorce or an addiction or a relationship that has gone South or unemployment or downsizing or some disillusionment from a person you have previously trusted that qualifies you to be in need of the merciful love of Jesus that is shared with you in the mystery of the Eucharist.  Again, the Eucharist is not a prize for the perfect; it is medicine for us who are very imperfect.

In the Gospel, Jesus said to Peter:  “I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.”  The first and the most important power that was given to Peter and his successors was the forgiveness of sins.

As you pray over this beautiful Gospel, may we discern that certain keys have been entrusted to each of us.   What keys has the Lord entrusted to you?  Part of the take-home message of today’s gospel is that certain keys have been entrusted to each of us.  With the keys that have been given to us, we are to open the way to Jesus for others instead of locking those doors.  We should welcome more people that we turn away and serve more people than we refuse.  Jesus comes to give us Good News that we are to share with others.

You who are parents, look no further than the sacred responsibility you have with your precious children.  You are to be the teachers of your children in the ways of faith.  How do you teach?  By the example of your life.  Your family is a little Church.  God’s love is in your family life.  May you help all in your family to recognize God moments in the beauty and struggle of family life.  As parents, what an incredible gift and responsibility you have to be beacons of hope and love in the life of your family.  I know the craziness that is going on in the world.  I regret that.  I regret that our children have to be raised in an environment of fear  -- of stranger, danger—nonetheless, may we in our family, may all of us be gifts of love and hope to all in our family and in our parish family.

As we look to receive the Eucharist in our liturgy, may the grace of Communion encourage us in those moments when we recognize and tend to the presence of Jesus in the poor.  The grace of Communion will enable us to speak out against injustice and translate our words into actions.  The grace of Communion will be there on those days when we give of ourselves to help, to listen, to serve, and to befriend.  Grace will inspire us to quiet ourselves, to pray and to allow the presence of God a place in our lives.  Grace will move us to put others and their need ahead of our own.

May the struggles of our life lead us to trust in Jesus as the source of our inner strength.    Deep within is the person God our Father dreams we can be.  May all of us commit ourselves to do what the Lord asks of us in the building of the Church.  We are to be merciful  for God has shown us mercy.

As Jesus gazes across the centuries to today, how might you respond to the question:  “Who do you say that I am?”

Have a Blessed Day.

As God places no restrictions on the love He has for us, so too, may we issue no restrictions on God's love for all of His people.

In today’s Gospel passage, this is not a nice conversation; not one you want to hear your children overhear.  You wonder how it ever got recorded in our family Bible.  It is less a conversation and more an argument.  In no other miracle account has a petitioner been treated so harshly.

In the Gospel, the Canaanite woman cried out:  “Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David.  My daughter is tormented by a demon.”  But Jesus did not say a word in answer to her.  Jesus’ disciples said:  “Send her away.”  Jesus then said to the disciples:  “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”  (Members Only Club)

The persistent woman came and did Jesus homage, saying, “Lord, help me.”  He said:  “It is not right to take food of the children and throw it to the dogs.”  (A rather harsh reply)  She responded with courageous faith:  “Please Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.”  Jesus finally affirms the woman:  “Woman, great is your faith.  Let it be done for you as you wish.  Your daughter is healed.”

Reflecting on the disciples’ encounter with the Canaanite woman, are their people who we attempt to exclude from God’s presence today?

Let’s face it:  the inclusive work of the Church is hard work, and it goes against the way the world is organized, the way our worldly hearts want to behave.  We would rather hang out with people like us -- people who speak our language, vote for our political party, share our skin color, live in our zip codes.  But that is not the way of God, and, please God, not the way of the Church.  We see in our Gospel story for today, where Jesus met a Gentile woman, who begged him to heal her daughter.  This posed a problem for Jesus, not because he did not care for this woman and her daughter, but because the plan of God was to begin the spread of Christianity from the center of Israel.    Jesus wanted to honor God’s chosen people, the Israelites.  Yet, human need and this woman’s great faith “converts” (in parenthesis) Jesus to reveal more fully that everyone is welcome, everyone belongs in the kingdom of God.

The Canaanite woman becomes a sign of the Gospel universality.  No one belongs under the table, much less away from it.  As we come to the table of the Lord to celebrate Eucharist at the Lord’s altar table, is it not true in the plan of God that no one belongs under the Eucharistic table, no one is to be excluded.  All are welcome.

A way of looking at the welcome of Jesus is to ask ourselves:  if Jesus will welcome even us, who are we to issue restrictions?  In the words of Pope Francis:  “Who am I to judge?”  May we never lose touch with our own craziness, our own messiness, our own sinfulness, and yet know, at the same time, we are God’s beloved.  As God issues no restrictions on the love he has for us, so too, may we issue no restrictions on God’s love for all of His people.

Please God, in this house of God, everyone belongs.  There are no restrictions with gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender children of God.  There are no restrictions with people of other faiths, of other zip codes, of other skin color.  All are welcome.  All of us are recipients of the generous, unconditional love of God.

The Canaanite woman of the Gospel and her daughter in need of much love and healing stand for all the folks in Charlottesville, VA today.  The message of Jesus stands against all forms of hatred, racism, and bigotry that can be called America’s original sin.  The Bishops of our country issued a statement saying:  “We stand against the evil of racism, white supremacy and neo-nazism.  We stand against every form of oppression.”

On this day, in which we welcome into our faith community our newly baptized, the precious gift and grace they enjoy is that receive the life of Christ Jesus.  Plain and simple, they ae God’s beloved.  We pray that the Church and the community they live in will inspire these newly baptized to come to know the merciful love of Jesus.

May the world they live in all the days of our life be not a world of racism and hatred and war.  No child in all of God’s creation deserves to be raised in an environment of hatred.  This is not God’s plan for any child.

May the hope we have for our newly baptized and for all children on the face of the earth inspire us to live lives where forgiveness, joy, respect, and love characterize how we are with one another.

In the words of Martin Luther King, “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.  He then goes on to say:   I have decided to stick with love.  Hate is too great a burden to bear.”

I would add:  “We have a dream that we will pray and live in a Church where everyone belongs, where we celebrate that all of us are the recipients of the merciful love of Jesus.

Have a blessed day.

When we focus on how wet and cold we are, we panic and we sink, When we turn our life over to the Lord, we are saved. Grace conquers fear.

Today’s Scripture readings invite us to pray over the ways we encounter the Lord in our lives  -- the ways we become in touch with God’s presence.  There is much to be learned from the first disciples on the Sea of Galilee and the prophet Elijah in the first Scripture reading.

As we engage today’s Gospel of the disciples on the Sea of Galilee, we’re in the midst of an angry sea, in a boat that seems fragile and there are howling winds and enormous waves that threaten to capsize the disciples.

At some point in time, the storminess on the Sea of Galilee may describe anyone’s life –  as our employer tells us that our job is downsized or outsourced, or our doctor explains our test results.  This storminess has been the life of the community of the Church many times since Jesus walked on water, and it is what today’s Gospel account is all about.

When we focus on the power of the winds and the depths of the waves and how wet and cold we are, then we panic and grasp and clutch and…sink.  When we give our life over to Jesus, when we trust in Jesus as Lord and Savior, we save our life.

This message is straightforward and easy to understand but so hard to live out when we are gripped by our fears.    The grace we seek from today’s Scriptures is to cultivate faith in Jesus that is greater than our fears.  The words of Jesus that are spoken to us again and again are:  “It is I; do not be afraid.”  We aren’t being asked to walk on water, but to act like we believe that God’s love for us is more powerful than chaos, evil and apathy.  The Gospel challenges us to take on the storms of our day with a love and hope that will risk going overboard as did Peter.  The headwinds are fierce, but the force of God’s Spirit is greater still.

In the Gospel account of the storm of Sea of Galilee, the evangelist Matthew tells us that Jesus came to the disciples during the fourth watch of the night.  That is 3:00 am.

If you are awake at 3:00 am, often it is a sign of something wrong.  If you are unable to sleep tossing and turning, if you are waiting for someone to come home at 3:00 am, if the phone rings or there’s a knock on the door, if people are out on the streets at 3:00 am, it often is not a very good sign.

For some people, it’s 3:00 am emotionally.  Whatever problems we experience, whatever hurt or guilt or grief, it’s always worse in the middle of the night.  In the life of the Church, we may think it is 3:00 am if the numbers in our parish community are dwindling.

When in your life do you experience the turbulence of the sea and your fears and anxiety get the best of you?  Are there times when you panic there is too much to do and not enough time to do it?  As a parent or grandparent, what happens when you do not approve of the choices your children are making?  As a teen or young adult, what happens when your heart is broken from a relationship that falls apart?  How is it for you when you are disillusioned by those in authority – in the government, in the Church, or in your place of business?  Personally when loneliness or depression gets the best of you, where do you turn?  Too often we let the storm drown out the summons of the merciful love of Jesus.

Despite the fears and struggles of our life that make it seem like it is 3:00 am, no matter what time it is, exactly when it seems that things couldn’t get any worse, Jesus comes to us walking on the sea of our sadness and discontent.  With love and assurance, Jesus says:  “Take courage.  It is I.  Do not be afraid.”  Like the disciples, we will draw courage from His presence – so much courage that like Peter, we dare to venture out into the deep.  Plain and simple, the Gospel challenges to have a deep trust in Jesus.  Grace conquers fear.

There is a remarkable similarity between the situation Elijah found himself in today’s first Scripture reading and the disciples’ predicament in today’s Gospel.  The similarity is to be found in that the disciples and the prophet were invited to encounter the Lord in times of great fear.

Elijah had incurred the wrath of Jezebel, wife of Ahab, the King of Israel, and, as a result, the prophet had to flee into the desert and to the mountaintop.   There, he began to despair.  Although he felt alone and helpless, he was soon to learn that the God for whom he had fearlessly prophesied had not abandoned him.  God was near, providing food for the journey and an experience of God’s presence in his life.

The Lord said to Elijah:  “Go outside and stand on the mountain before the Lord; the Lord will be passing by.”    As Elijah waited, the Lord was not to be found in the wind, or the earthquake or the fire.  Elijah was puzzled because he had expected to experience God in the dramatic elements of life.  Early in his ministry, he raised a widow’s son from the dead. But then after the fire, there was a tiny whispering sound, this is where Elijah experienced God’s presence. Elijah allowed God to speak to him in the silence of his heart. 

And so we ask the question, where do we experience the Lord in our lives?  What is our tiny whispering sound?  Where is our sheer silence that speaks of God’s presence in our life?  God is to be found in the small gestures, in the gentle breezes of life, in the sound of sheer silence.  You never know how deeply a small gesture touches someone.    Elijah was able to tune out the noise of the world to hear the voice of God from within.  Do you not find it true that the more faithfully you listen to the voice of God within you, the better you will be able to recognize the presence in the people of your life.    Yes, we need to be able to pray without words.  Be still and know that I am God, says the psalmist.

After encountering God in silence, the prophet then was empowered to speak aloud the message of God’s truth to all who would listen.

Like Elijah, the disciples of Jesus found themselves in peril, as wind and waves tossed them about.  Their anxiety increased when they did not recognize Jesus and thought that it was a ghost that was approaching.  Jesus insisted they have courage.  He said:  “Do not be afraid.”

There is a take-home message from the experience Elijah and the experience disciples on the Sea of Galilee.   As we pray over today’s Scripture readings, the grace that was given to the prophet Elijah was to recognize God in the “tiny whisperings sounds” in life – in the silence and the gentle breezes.  May we seek the awareness of discovering God’s presence in the ordinary events of our day, even in the quiet moments of the day.  As the disciples did on the Sea of Galilee,  may we also recognize God’s presence in the storminess of our life.   The Lord is speaking to us:  “Take courage. It is I.  Do not be afraid.”   We are called to leave security behind.  To follow Christ, we must venture out into the full fury of life’s storms and leave our fantasies of security behind.  We know we can do this because the same Jesus who summoned Peter to leave the boat remains with us today, challenging us to do the same.   

Have a blessed day.

For Jesus the Transfiguration was a turning point in his life and ministry.

For Jesus the Transfiguration was a turning point in his life.  Till now, the attraction and the ministry of Jesus was gaining momentum.  His preaching and teaching and miracles and the way he accompanied his disciples was inspiring and life-giving.  Now the Transfiguration was a climax to the initial stage of the ministry.  The apostles Peter, James, and John were given a glimpse of the Resurrection as Jesus was transfigured in glory on the mountaintop.  For the apostles it was an awe-inspiring experience.  Overcome with joy, Peter exclaimed, "Lord, it is good for us to be here."

However, this was a turning point in the ministry of Jesus as the mountaintop  experience lasted for but a moment; now Jesus and the apostles were to descend from the mountain and go into the valley and begin the journey to Gethsemane and Calvary.  The apostles were now to experience the challenges of discipleship.  The apostles needed now to embrace suffering and the cross as necessary components of their discipleship of the Lord Jesus.

As the Transfiguration was an affirmation  to Jesus of the Father's love, so too, it gave  the apostles a preview of sharing in the joy of the risen Lord.  On Mount Tabor, the mountain of the Transfiguration, the apostles didn't want to leave.  But in the challenge of discipleship that led to Jerusalem, in the Garden of Gethsemane, they didn't want to stay.  When Jesus was arrested they all fled.

Can we not all identify with the apostles?  In the mountain-top experiences of joy, we want to stay. We want them to go on forever.  But then in the moments of trial we want to flee.  May we pray over the cost of discipleship:  "If anyone wishes to come after me, let him take up his cross daily and follow me."

The Transfiguration was the mountain-top experience of the apostles which prepared them for future trials.  May the mystery of the Eucharist be a mountain-top experience that prepares us for the challenges of this day.  The Mass is not a transfiguration but a transubstantiation, in which bread and wine are transformed into the glorious Risen Jesus.  The mystery of the Eucharist leads us to the sending words:  "Go in peace and glorify the Lord by your lives."  We are missioned to go forth into the valleys and the mountain-top experiences of the day.  But having been nourished at the Table of the Lord, we know that "nothing can separate us from the love of God made visible in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Have a Blessed day.