Like the first disciples, we sometimes have a hard time listening to God's plan for our lives.

“Jesus took Peter, James, and John and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves.  And he was transfigured before them…Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him...From a cloud came a voice, ‘This is my beloved Son.  Listen to him.’”

In the Transfiguration account, Jesus appeared with the law giver, Moses, and the great prophet, Elijah, of the Old Testament.  Moses and Elijah represented the best of the Old Testament.  But the clear message is that Jesus is more than a lawgiver and a prophet.  He is the Beloved Son. 

To this point, the disciples have not been able to grasp his predictions about his upcoming suffering, death, and resurrection.  They have not listened.  The voice of the Father to the disciples was to listen to Jesus.  They have balked at the future Jesus is insisting on. 

The Transfiguration account affirms Jesus as the Father’s beloved Son, and he is to be listened to.  The privilege of witnessing Jesus’ transfiguration was for the purpose of confirming Him as someone to whom they must listen.  They must open themselves to what Jesus is saying about His suffering and death.

Although at the center of this story will be a transfigured Jesus, it is more a story about what it means to be a disciple that it is a statement about the Jesus’ identity.  May we ponder the wisdom of this statement:  Say not, “I’ve been to the mountain.” Say, “I’ve returned to the earth and am walking toward Jerusalem.”

The real action of discipleship is not to be experienced on the mountaintop.  They were there but a brief moment.  The real commitment to discipleship happens on the journey to Jerusalem in which the disciples are to share in the suffering and the cross on the road to resurrection and new life.

The grace of the Transfiguration encourages the disciples in the struggle to allow Jesus to show them the way.  The disciples value the Transfiguration glimpse of the Lord’s risen glory of Jesus so that they can better understand the teaching of Jesus upon His upcoming suffering, death, and resurrection.

We too need to acknowledge that we have a hard time listening to the voice of God in life when the cross and suffering are involved.  As the first disciples, we sometimes balk at the plan of God for for lives.  Indeed, we need precious transfiguration moments in which God's love is revealed to us in ways that enable us to persevere in the journey when we are called upon to be disciples of the crucified Lord.

In the Lenten fast that we choose as well as the struggles of life that are not of our choosing, we are guided by the Holy Spirit.

I have a cabin out in Wayne County right on Lake Ontario where I try to go each Thursday for a little R&R.  It’s a beautiful spot – in the summer.  This past Thursday I almost lost my life getting to the place tracking through considerable drifts of snow.

This is where I prepare the Sunday homily and enjoy God’s sense of humor.  As I looked out on Lake Ontario that was pretty much frozen, as I listened to the howling wind, as I viewed mounds of snow everywhere, I prayed over the Gospel:  “The Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert, and he remained in the desert for forty days, tempted by Satan.”

From where I was sitting surrounded by the brutal elements of winter, the desert that Jesus was in seemed like a desirable vacation spot to be – surrounded by warmth and sunshine.

Be that as it is, trusting that the desert is meant to be a place of wilderness and struggle, “The Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert, and he remained in the desert for 40 days, tempted by Satan.”

We see in the Gospel that the Holy Spirit is now the energy of Jesus’ life.  Jesus is filled with the Spirit, and the Spirit leads him into the desert to be tempted by the devil.  This seems to be a strange activity for the Holy Spirit.

In this passage the Spirit seems to be arranging for Jesus to have an introduction with the devil.  What can be made of this?  One would think that the Holy Spirit would protect Jesus from the temptations of the devil.

How about for yourself?  Do you see the Holy Spirit as the source of the temptations of your life and, as in the Lord’s Prayer, we pray “that we not be led into temptation but deliver us from evil.”

As we reflect on the movement of the Spirit in the life of Jesus, it is important to remember that the temptation of Jesus in the desert takes place immediately after he was baptized by John the Baptist in the River Jordan.  There was a voice from heaven which declared:  “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”  This was a profound moment of faith. 

Life, as we know, is not always filled with mountaintop experiences. We all need to play the hand we have been dealt.  This means over the years we need to deal with the dark valleys as well as the green pastures.  None of us get a free pass on dealing with the challenges of life.   Who of us has not dealt with illness for our self or someone we love, with death, with brokenness in relationships?

The grace of Jesus’ Baptism, as well as our own, restructures our identity, reshapes our desires, and redirects our emotions and actions.  As did Jesus, we need to test our Baptismal identity as God’s beloved sons and daughters.

The reason for the Lord’s meeting with the devil in the desert was to clarify the identity of Jesus as God’s beloved Son.  We become clearer about who we are when we refuse certain actions and endorse others.  The identity of Jesus is more clearly witnessed to when Jesus refuses to be seduced by the devil and He re-affirms his relationship to His Father.

We too need desert experiences in life; the Spirit of God, the energy of our lives as well, leads us into the desert to make us more aware of the deepest truth of our life.  We stand in need of the grace of God to be our best selves, to be the people we are called to be, to put us in touch with our baptismal identity that we are God’s beloved sons and daughters.

Yes, without spiritual testing that comes from dealing with the struggles of life as people of faith, we can too easily live with the illusion that our will power, that our talents and giftedness can sustain on our spiritual journey.  We are in the grips of Satan when too much emphasis is placed on how well we manage our spiritual journey.  This is a recipe for disaster.

Strange as it may seem, the Spirit of God leads us into the desert so that we will know that it is only with God’s grace that we can turn and be faithful to God.  It is only with God’s grace that we experience conversion in our lives.

The Baptism of Jesus did not lead Him into a permanent state of peaceful contemplation; rather Jesus experienced spiritual testing and a lifelong self-sacrificing ministry.  As we journey to our Easter Baptism as is true of our RCIA catechumens or to the renewal of our Baptismal promises on Easter, we are called to journey with Jesus to a time of spiritual testing and ultimately to a life of self-sacrificing giving of self.

In the Lenten fast that we choose as well as the struggles of life that are not of our choosing – such as illness or job loss or a relationship that has gone south – the Spirit of God goes with us to enable us to see ourselves as God’s beloved even in the midst of our deepest fears and anxieties.  The Lenten journey is a place of struggle – both the spiritual disciplines and the struggles of life that are not of our choosing.  The conversion we seek is the awareness that our places of struggles are also the places of conversion, our places of encountering God whose love for us is unending. 

"What are you looking for?" These are the first words of Jesus in John's Gospel.

What are you looking for?  Who are you  looking for?  These are the first spoken by Jesus in John’s Gospel.  This is such an important life question.  It gives a focus to the priorities of our life.

The disciples respond:  “Rabbi,  where are you staying?”

Jesus answers:  “Come and See.”

Jesus is inviting the first disciples to follow him, to Come and See, to join the company of the first disciples, to be in relationship with Him.

As we pray over this invitation of Jesus to the first disciples, we also know at the core of our being this invitation is given to us as well.  We need to wrestle with the question:  “What are we looking for in life?”  The best way to answer that question is to accept the invitation to Come and See.

Come and See what life will be like when lived in relationship with Jesus and in relationship with the all the disciples of Jesus.  Come and See if the Gospel stories connect with your spirit and your way of looking at life.  Come and See if your relationships in the Church – the disciples of Jesus – allow you to love and be loved in life-giving ways.  Come and See if your participation in the Church leads you to come to know Jesus more deeply in your life.  

The words of Jesus are not intended harshly as:  “Shape up or you are going to hell.”  Or “You are expected to carry the weight of the world on your shoulders and never smile again.”  Or “No, no, no, this is wrong and you will be big trouble if you get involved.”

Rather the words of Jesus to “Come and See” mean come and experience yourself as a person loved by the Lord.  In the words of Pope Francis, my life is deepened when I experience the Joy of the Gospel.  As your pastor, my hope is that we love and serve and enjoy each other’s friendship in our parish community.  Life is much too short to be bogged down by negativity and judgments we can make about one another.

The Scripture reading invite us to reflect on the call of God in our lives.  The Gospel is the dialogue of Jesus with his first disciples.  The call is given in the invitation to Come and See.  In the first Scripture reading, the prophet Samuel was having trouble recognizing God’s call in His life.  At first Samuel thought that it was his mentor Eli who was calling him.  But then through the sage wisdom of Eli, Samuel was able to recognize God’s call and responded:  “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.”  The wisdom of Eli to Samuel was to listen.  And so, listening became Samuel’s way of life in prayer.

In your prayer today,  I commend to you the prayerfulness of the prophet Samuel:  “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.  Part of the beauty of Eucharistic Adoration is the prayer of quiet in the presence of the Lord.  We simply listen to the voice of God in our lives.  God is present to us.  May we prayerfully listen to the voice of God both in the joys and in the struggles and difficulties of life.

Like Samuel, we often are confused and have trouble what the call of God in life is for us.  We need to be patient as was Samuel.

What is the connection between the call of God in today’s Scriptures and our own spirituality?  We are called by God to be disciples.  We are called by God to be stewards.  We are called by God to build the Body of Christ in our parish.

Our parish participation is not a call from the pastor Father Jim.  It is not a call from the parish council.  It is a call from Jesus.  We are called not just to be pious individual Catholics.  We are to be a parish community invested in each other as the Body of Christ.

COME AND SEE.  Jesus invites us to be in relationship with him.  Jesus invites to experience our ourselves as God's beloved.  Jesus invites to connect our story with the Gospel story.  Jesus invites us to love and be loved in the community of the baptized.

Is our spirituality public or private?

Today’s feast celebrates the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River by John the Baptist.  The Lord’s baptism inaugurates his public ministry.  As Jesus was baptized, the Spirit, like a dove, descended upon Him.  And a voice came from the heavens, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.

On the day he was baptized, Jesus went down into the muddy Jordan River a private person.  He came up out of the water ready to begin His life of ministry.  He became a public person.  In Baptism, he was missioned by His heavenly Father to teach, to heal, to forgive, to love, to save us from our sins, and to give us share in His Risen Life.  In Baptism, Jesus began his journey to Jerusalem – the place where he was to suffer, to die, and to rise to new life.

As we think the public ministry of Jesus as beginning with His baptism, who do we think of when we think of public people?  Probably the people in the headlines or are on television – leaders of nations, CEO’s, actors, sports heroes.  Or on a more local level, the town supervisor, business leaders, pastor, teachers, and coaches.

Part of what goes with being a public person is accountability and leadership.  It’s taking responsibility when one sees a task that needs doing, a niche that needs filling

Please note:  the event that marked the beginning of Jesus’ public life was baptism.

On this feast, we are also invited to reflect on the meaning of our own baptism.  The message is we baptized are public people.   We receive the life of Christ Jesus in Baptism.  We become members of the community of the baptism, members of the Catholic Church, specifically members of the Church of the Holy Spirit St. Joseph's.  And we are missioned to witness to the love of Jesus in the way we live our lives.  We are the Body of Christ.  We are no longer private persons with a private spirituality between myself and God.  We become a member of the Church whose responsibility is to be the visible presence of Jesus in the world.

In Baptism, we are missioned to continue the public ministry of Jesus.  Yes, all the baptized are to be transparent, accountable, and take leadership in witnessing to the love of Jesus in our parish community.

An important connection I would like to make for you is our spirituality of stewardship in our parish life is our participation in the public ministry of the community of the baptized.  As stewards of the Church of the Holy Spirit, we are all to be transparent, accountable, and embrace leadership in the life of the parish.

I ask you to resist the temptation of thinking I am not going to get involved in the Church until the Church gets its act together – regardless of whether you think the Church is doing too much or too little.  If we take that attitude, then we are not accepting the grace given to us at Baptism.  We are the leaders of the Church.  The grace of God is given to all the baptized to be leaders in bearing witness to the love of Jesus in our community.

In a spirituality of stewardship, we are missioned as the disciples of Jesus to witness to the love of Jesus.  As we all know, love is the first requirement of the disciples of Jesus.  That love is expressed in action – the stewardship action of the gift of our time, talent, and treasure. 

The gift of time is our prayer life.  Do I make time for prayer in the course of the day?  May I share the wisdom of my mother taught to me about 65 years ago:  “If you are too busy, you are too busy.”  I wish you could have all meant my Irish mother:  There were no excuses for not making a little time in the course of the day for prayer.

The gift of talent is sharing a bit of your God-given talent in the service of your parish community.  The stewardship commitment card lists a variety of ways for you to participate.  It is inspiring to me to see so many parishioners involved in the liturgical ministries, in the catechetical ministries, in the social life of the parish, in youth ministry, in our service ministries, in our parish council, finance council, leadership teams and so forth.  Thank you, thank you for what you do.   I would also want to give you a nudge there is plenty of room for more parishioners to be involved.

The gift of our treasure is also very much part of our spirituality of stewardship.  What we do with our finances is very much part of our spirituality.  We are called to be generous givers in support of our parish and of our diocese in the CMA.  

Most of us were baptized as infants many moons ago.  But as is true in the sacrament of marriage, the grace of the sacrament of marriage is not just for the one hour ceremony at the beginning of your married life;   rather the grace of the sacrament of marriage is for better and for worse for all the days of your life.

So too, the grace of baptism is lifelong.  We are always and forever the community of the baptized.  We are always and forever public persons missioned to give witness to the love of Jesus in our lives.  A sobering, accountability question to be asked of each of us is:  Would we be convicted in a court of law for being Christian?  Is it obvious by the way we live our lives that we are the disciples of Jesus?  Is it obvious by how we live that we believe that love is the first requirement of being a Christian?

In today’s Gospel, after the baptism of Jesus, a voice came from the heavens, “You are my beloved Son: with you I am well pleased.”    As we pray over these words, may we ask ourselves:  What actions of ours this past week is our heavenly Father well pleased with?

What gifts do you bring to the Christ child?

The Epiphany account describes the magi recognizing and discovering the star that was discovered in the dark of night.  That star led them to the Christ child.  The magi were overjoyed at arriving at the
Bethlehem crib and offered their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

The Epiphany journey of the magi is a beautiful description of the spiritual journey of each one of us.  I invite for your prayerful reflection to consider several components of the Epiphany account which can easily mirror the spiritual journey of each one of us,

1.       Like the magi, we are seekers for an encounter with the Lord, a deeper relationship with Jesus.

The magi symbolize what is restless in the human spirt seeking for a greater depth of meaning and purpose in life.  They left behind what was comfortable and safe and took considerable risk in traveling to another country in search of the Lord.  The magi speak to our restless human spirit seeking to discover the spiritual meaning and longing for that which ultimately satisfies us.

In 2015, we too are magi; we are seekers of a deeper awareness of the spiritual dimension of life – a deeper relationship with the Lord Jesus.

2.       The magi followed the star discovered in the dark of night to assist them in their journey to Jesus.  Who or what are the stars in your life that assist in your journey to Jesus?  The stars of life are not just to be found in the sky.  Often, it is the soul friends of your life that are the stars for you that lead you to Jesus.  Often enough, those stars are discovered in the darkness that comes from the struggles and challenges of life.

I give thanks to God for the stars in my life that have loved and supported me and witnessed to me the love of Jesus.  Without any doubt, the first stars in my life were my mom and dad who first led me to discover the Lord in my life.

I give thanks to people in our parish community who have witnessed to me the presence of God in my life.  For sure, some people do this by just by being themselves without any fanfare.  They simply do little things with great love in their hearts.  The stars of my life often enough don’t see they themselves as stars.  They just are who they are.

3.       The role of King Herod in the Epiphany story symbolizes for us is that we need to expect opposition in the spiritual journey at times.  We see the hostility of King Herod to the notion that he would have a rival to his kingship.  Moved by jealousy, he hatched a murderous plot that was foiled by the non-cooperation of the magi.

Before we simply reject the treachery of Herod, we need to acknowledge that there is a Herod within each of us that keeps from following Christ more fully.  What are the demons within us that make more self-centered than Christ-centered?  How radically do I share with those in need?  What keeps me from listening more fully to another’s point of view?  Do I make time for God in the way that I live?

4.       The magi presented gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh to the Christ child.  What gifts do we offer to the Christ child?  Our gifts are not gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Rather, our gifts are our time, talent, and treasure that we offer as good stewards of the giftedness that God has blessed us with.

This week and next weekend we are focusing on the spirituality of stewardship in our parish life.  Hopefully this week you have received a parish mailing on stewardship.  Prayerfully we ask you to place your filled out stewardship commitment card in the collection basket next weekend.

I invite you to see the connection between stewardship and the meaning of the epiphany event.  The magi were overjoyed at arriving at the Bethlehem crib and offered their gifts.  So too, for us, when we are overjoyed in encountering the Lord, we are led to share from our giftedness in the service of one another.

How much and how often are we to give?  As long as our God continues to share his unending love with us, that is how long we are to continue to give in the service of one another.  What is asked of us as the disciples of the Lord Jesus?  We all know that love is the first requirement of the disciples of Jesus.  Our love is to be expressed in the gifts of time, talent, and treasure.  Further, we are to give with grateful and joy-filled hearts.

Yes, we are called to share from our giftedness as did the magi.  But know in the Christmas mystery, it not just the magi who are seekers.  God is a seeker.  We are sought by a God who has become one of us and who hunts us down with His love.  In the Epiphany mystery, we need to allow ourselves to be found by the love of the Christ child.

5.       Notice well, the magi were warned in a dream not to return to Herod, and they departed for their country by another way.  Of course, they would return by another route.  Their lives have been changed by their encounter with Jesus.  May we too with God’s grace have our lives changed by our encounter with Jesus.  We cannot go back to our old way of living -- with our fears, our anxieties, our addictions, our grudges, our pettiness.  We are to put on the Lord Jesus Christ.

The spirituality of stewardship is all contained in the beautiful Epiphany account.  As you fill your stewardship commitment card this week and place it in the collection next weekend.  See yourself as the magi who are seeking a deeper relationship with Jesus.  As you are touched by our loving God, we gratefully share of our giftedness in the service of others.  In so doing, we are putting on the Lord Jesus Christ.

There is an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes in the family life of each of us.

In this beautiful Christmas season, we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.  The power of God was revealed as a tiny infant -- the Bethlehem infant born of Mary and Joseph.  God was revealed in the life of this Holy Family.

As we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family, we give thanks to God for the families of each one of us.  As we discover the mystery of God's love in the midst of our family life, we affirm that indeed our family is holy as well.  We first come to know the mystery of God's love  from our family.   Even though there is a considerable distinctiveness in the family life of each of us, God is present in each of our families.  And thus, may we fully embrace the holiness of our family life.

Families are the school of love.  We have the capacity to love and be loved because we have been loved into  life by our parents and all in our families who love us.  It is in all the ways we love that we are known as the disciples of Jesus.

May we always be grateful for our families.  Yes, there are some green pastures and dark valleys in the family life of us all.  There is some messiness, but there also much love.  For that we give thanks for all the ways our family life has been blessed.

There is an infant wrapped in swaddling clothes in each of our families.  We are missioned to be the bearers of the mystery of Christmas.  May this light that is within our families shine forth to make a Christ-like difference in our community.

Mary is our best Advent guide to discover Jesus in the inn of our hearts.

FIAT  -- May it be done.  Fiat is a simple and powerful Biblical word.  From the first pages of the Bible in the creation account from the Book of Genesis, God said:  “Fiat Lux.”   Let there be light.  And there was light.  In the act of creation, God said:  “Fiat.”  Fiat Lux.  And the sun was created, and there was light to rule the day.

In the Gospel account today of Mary’s Annunciation, Mary spoke that creative word of God:  “FIAT."    Let it done to me according to your word.  Here we have Mary echoing the creating word of God.  When Mary said Fiat to the will of God in her life, she was not speaking of her ability, but rather her openness, her availability to the plan of God for her life.

From the moment Mary spoke these words:  “I’m the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to your word.”  Her life was changed.  She had given herself over to God’s designs for her life.

This past Wednesday Evening I was visiting a parishioner in the surgical intensive care of Strong Hospital.  A week ago she had serious cancer surgery and was now experiencing complications in the recovering process.  She was on a respirator fighting for her life.  I was praying with her husband and her daughter and anointed her once again.   With much faith and a heavy heart, her daughter Laura simply said:  “Let God’s will be done.”  FIAT.  Such a courageous word spoken by this 20-some year old as she stood by the bedside of her mom holding her mom’s hands.

Laura was taking ownership of Mary’s prayer.  In so doing, Laura was entrusting to God the person she loved the most.

This prayer of Mary in the Annunciation has been known as the world’s greatest prayer.  It is the prayer that brought God down from heaven to dwell in the soul and body of a lowly young woman.  It is the prayer that brought about the greatest event in human history, God becoming human in Jesus.  It is a prayer that changed forever the course of human history some 2000 years ago. 

The prayer of Mary is so very different from what has been called the world’s most common prayer, the prayer in which we try to get God to do our will.  The world’s most common prayer says:  “My will be done,” whereas the world’s greatest prayer says, “Thy will be done.”

What does the Annunciation say to us as we prepare for Christmas?  The Gospel reminds us of God’s desire to dwell in the midst of humanity.  As Christmas draws near, Mary reminds us that the best Christmas, in fact the only true Christmas, is that Christ be born not in the little town of Bethlehem but in the inner sanctuary of our hearts.

The best possible Christmas gift to us and to all is God’s continual promise that I will be with you.  God’s presence in our life is the meaning of the mystery of Christmas.  God is with us.

Throughout the Old Testament, God said to Isaac:  “I am with you…I will not desert you."

To Jacob:  “Go back to the land of your forefathers, and I will be with you.”

God said to Moses when he objected to God’s plan:  “I will be with you.”

To Mary the angel Gabriel said:  “the Lord is with you.”

Surely this is the secret of the celebration of Christmas, that in the birth of Jesus in the stable of Bethlehem, God comes to us.

Do you remember what Jesus told us on the 1^st Sunday of Advent:  “Stay awake.”

Do you remember the words of John the Baptist on the 2^nd Sunday of Advent:  “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.”

On the third Sunday of Advent, Jesus said:  “Happy is the person who does not lose faith in me.”

What we know and deeply believe is that God is with us.  The important questions that remains is:  “Where are we with God?”  Are we awake?  Have we repented with the Sacrament of Reconciliation?  Have we kept the faith?

The message for us, as for Mary, is that God continues to want to do with us what has never been done before.   Of course, Mary didn’t understand what she was doing.  She couldn’t possibly imagine the implications of her assent. 

As we enter the prayer of the church in Advent, how inspiring it is to contemplate that the Word of God is also coming to us. 

Advent is our time to ponder the promise that God is among us, that the Word is asking our consent to become flesh in our lives.  Mary invites us to share in the mystery she carried and bore in her human life.  The angel Gabriel invites us to say yes and to entrust ourselves to God’s plan for our life.

And our answer will be….