As disciples, we are to have the heart of God. In God's eyes, everyone is deserving of love, This means each and every immigrant on the face of the earth.

Nativity of St John the Baptist 2018

At Baptism, the first question the Church asks the parents of a newborn is:  “What name do you give your child?”  There’s more to the question than what they plan to call their newborn?  We might think of it in terms of hope for the future.  What dreams do your parents have for you?  What are the dreams you have for your children?  How do these plans align with God’s plan for your children?

As we celebrate the Feast of the Birth of John the Baptist, his parents were asked:  “What name do you give to your child?”  They responded “John.”  The name John reflected God’s plan for John the Baptist.  His parents Zachariah and Elizabeth named him John, rather than after his father Zachariah, because they knew even from his birth that God has a plan for John.  He was to prepare the way for the coming of Jesus.  Zachariah and Elizabeth wanted their son John to be faithful to God’s call and God’s plan for his life.

In the first Scripture reading from the prophet Isaiah, the prophet says:  “The Lord called me from birth.  From my mother’s womb he gave me my name.”  The Christian calling is a high expectation.  Long before our parents started looking through books for baby names, we are named as children of God.

Zechariah and Elizabeth were committed to name their child John even though it meant  going against family traditions and community expectation.  They trusted God’s Word to them about this child.

John was to prepare the way for the coming of Jesus.  John the Baptist is the mentor for all the baptized.  Following the example of John and seeking his intercession, we too are to make the Lord known and help others prepare their hearts for the coming of Jesus into their lives.

As we celebrate the Feast of John the Baptist, we need to pay attention both to the preaching of John and his mission.  His preaching needs to take hold in our hearts and his mission is to become our mission.  We too are called to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord.

We need to listen to the first words of the preaching of John: “Repent.  For the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”  For John, repentance was critical.  For us to be a disciple of Jesus, we need to repent in all the ways we have been flawed by our sinfulness.

For what do we need to repent?

Do I need to repent from being judgmental?  Many of us are too quick to make judgments about people who think differently than ourselves.  Can we love others as God loves them or do we get bogged down in our judgments?

Do I need to repent from needing to control everyone and every situation?    Many of us have our goals and plans for our life but are we able to trust in God’s plan for our lives?  This is what the parents of John the Baptist prayed for as they named their son John.

Do I need to repent from lust?  Do I get caught up in pornography and use the gift of sexuality for selfish pleasure?

Do I need to repent from my way of life in which I am too busy to pray each day?  As we week to develop a daily pattern of personal prayer, am I able to give 1% of each day over to God in prayer.  1% of each day is 15 minutes.  Am I able to set aside 15 minutes each day for prayer?  Or am I too busy to surrender to God 1% of each day?

Like John the Baptist, we need to spend time in the desert to repent, to experience metanoia, to have a change of heart.  On this Feast of John the Baptist, I invite you to name one area of your life which you need to repent?

John the Baptist preached the need for repentance and John’s mission was to evangelize, to proclaim the Good News of Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and to prepare for the coming of Jesus into our lives.  We too are missioned to evangelize, to encounter the love of Jesus in our lives and to bear witness to others the love God has for them.

What does it mean for me to be a good Catholic?   For sure I need to repent and ask myself:  is God the center of my life?  We are all sinners under construction.  We need to repent of our sinfulness.

Our discipleship of the Lord Jesus does not stop there in the same way that the mission of John the Baptist did not stop there.  We are called to evangelize?  We are called to encounter the Lord, to develop a personal relationship with Jesus, and we are called to share and to bear witness to the love of God in our world.

In the words of Pope Francis, we are called to be missionary disciples.  Am I my brother’s keeper?  Absolutely.  By Baptism we are missioned to be for others, to be a community of disciples of Jesus.  We are to be for one another.

How am I called to witness to the love of God?  This doesn’t mean waving a Bible in the face of others.  It means having the heart of God.  It means sharing the Father’s love for each and every person on the face of the earth.  This means sharing the love of God with each member of your family, with each immigrant, with each gay person, with someone who is very different from you.  In God’s eyes everyone is deserving of love.  For us to evangelize, we need to receive the heart of God the Father.  When we evangelize, we share what we have been given.  Each of us is deeply loved by God.  In our prayer, may we encounter the God who loves us.  When we evangelize, we are to share the Good News with others that they too are recipients of the tireless love of God.

For us to be evangelizers of God’s love, I invite you to pray the prayer I seek to begin each day.  It’s a very simple prayer.  I say:  “Holy Spirit, what are we going to do today?”  Holy Spirit, what are we going to do today?

Have a Blessed day.

What is the North Star of your life that keeps you focused on the significant priorities of your life?

Life is filled with challenges and often consumed with activities, whether at home or work or school or at Church.  Many struggle to find time to even share a meal with their families.  Time is at such a premium that often the important relationships in our lives take a back seat to the pressures of the day.

Can you identify with this challenge at least at times?  It was no different for Jesus and his followers.  In today’s Gospel, Jesus’ young ministry is faced with many of the same challenges that face us.  Jesus had just appointed his apostles, 12 men of varying backgrounds and life experiences – men who will soon understand the demands of discipleship, the sacrifices they will be called to make.  Jesus and his apostles are challenged with a growing group of people putting great demands on their time.  The scene in today’s Gospel is one of chaos, of crowds so demanding the disciples find it impossible “even to eat.”  Listen again to the beginning of today’s Gospel:  “Jesus came home with his disciples.  Again the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat.”

We like the original apostles seek to fine the balance in our use of time – making time for work, for our commitment to service in our Church, for the activities that give us energy, but also time for prayer to deepen our relationship with the Lord and making time for the significant relationships of our life.

As I now celebrate my 50^th anniversary of my ordination to the priesthood, I am filled with much joy and gratitude.   The Lord has blessed me in so many ways.  I live life with an attitude of gratitude.  As Pope Francis has witnessed to so beautifully, I am filled with the joy of the Gospel.

In all truth, even after 50 blessed years as a priest, I still wrestle with finding the balance among the competing demands on my time.  As the pastor of two parishes that have many beautiful ministries, as a person who seeks to empower our wonderful staff, as a person blessed with a large family of a brother and two sisters and 19 nieces and nephews and 28 grandnieces and grandnephews whom I deeply love, with a commitment to my brother priests, with a desire to continue to deep my prayer life, like yourself, I wrestle with balance in my life of prayer and ministry and valuing the important relationships of my life.

There isn’t enough time to all we want to do, right?

So, what is the anchor for my life and your life that keeps us centered, what is our North Star that keeps us focused on the significant priorities of our life?

For me, the North Star of my life is the Mass.  It is what we are doing just now.  In this mystery of the Eucharist, we gather to give thanks to the Lord.  We gather to be fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord.\

In the depth of my heart, I thank you for the privilege of being your pastor.  I thank you for the privilege of praying with you in this mystery of the Eucharist.  I pray for the ongoing, faith-filled awareness that I and all of us claim God’s unending love for each and every one of us.  In the words of my ordaining Bishop, Fulton Sheen, “the greatest love story ever told is contained in the tiny white host.”

It’s like it’s too good to be true.  So we too easily take the mystery of the Eucharist for granted.  Please God we always have the awareness and claim the love that God has for us in the Mass.  It is the North Star of our lives.

What I have said before and probably will say again, as we get older, we sometimes repeat ourselves, don’t you know.  As I am filled with gratitude on my anniversary of priesthood, I am conscious of how my dad shared his faith with me in such a life defining way.  So, as a ten year old at Our Lady of Good Counsel School and Church, my dad was helping me to prepare to become an altar boy.  This was back in the day when the Mass was in Latin and there were the Prayers at the Foot of the Altar that began the liturgy.  The altar boy needed to know the Latin responses to the prayer of the priest.  My dad, the faith-filled man that he was, wanted me not only to memorize the Latin responses but also to know the meaning of the prayers I was saying.  So, my dad would take the part of the priest.  This came easily for my dad as his brother, one of his sons, and one of his grandsons are priests.  So the prayer began:   Introibo ad altare Dei.  Translation:  I will go to the altar of God.  Then my dad taught me the response:  Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.  To God who gives joy to my youth.

What my dad taught me 66 years ago continues to be the center of my prayer life.  It is the center and the North Star of my ministry as a priest.  I will go the altar of God…to God who gives joy to my youth.  Introibo ad altare Dei…Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.

Circling back to today’s Gospel, when the apostles dealing with the demands placed on their time in the young ministry of the Church, they did not even have time to eat.  They had to wrestle with finding the balance among ministry, prayer, and family.  I too wrestle with finding the right balance.  I suspect many of you as well are seeking the right balance in the use of your valued time.

I invite you to share in the wisdom that my dad taught me 66 years ago.  May I and you never be never too busy to go to the altar of God…To God who gives joy to my youth.  Introibo ad altare Dei…Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.  May your North Star in finding the right balance for your life be the Sunday Eucharist in giving thanks to the Lord our God and being fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord.

Have a Blessed Day.

As I celebrate my 50th anniversary as a priest, the center of my prayer continues to be what my dad taught me 66 years ago training to be an altar boy: Introibo ad altare Dei.

The feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, the feast of Corpus Christi, proclaims the faith of why we gather Sunday after Sunday after Sunday to give thanks to the Lord our God.  The mystery of the Eucharist is at the centerpiece of our Catholic Christian faith.  With the proclamation of our Bishop, Bishop Matano, we have been celebrating the Year of the Eucharist this past year, and we officially conclude the Year of the Eucharist with this Feast Day.  Please God and with the Blessing of our Bishop, may we continue to celebrate for the rest of our lives placing the Eucharist at the very center of our prayer lives.  May our first prayer be the prayer that Jesus asked us to do when He said:  “Do this in memory of me.”

As I celebrate my 50^th anniversary as a priest with much joy and gratitude, I personally go back 66 years to when I was a fifth grader at Our Lady of Good Counsel School and I was preparing to becoming an altar boy.   A very treasured memory I have was being with my dad in my parent’s bed room, and my dad was teaching me not only to memorize but also  to learn the meaning of the prayers at the Foot of the Altar back in the days when Mass was celebrated in Latin.  My dad would take the part of the priest  (My dad came by the priest’s part quite naturally as his brother and one of his sons and one of his grandsons are priests).  My dad said:  “Introibo ad altare Dei.”  Translation:  “I will go to the altar of God.”  Then my dad would make sure I had the response spot on:  “Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.”  To God who gives joy to my youth.

Now as I celebrate my 50^th anniversary as a Priest, what my dad taught me 66 years ago continues to be the center of my faith life:  I will go to the altar of God – to God who gives joy to my youth.  Thank you dad for sharing your faith with me. 

If you permit to be a bit personal for just a moment, I wish to thank Bishop Matano for your presence at this liturgy.  Quite simply, it means the world to me and I thank you.  I am grateful for my brother John and my sisters Anne and Jean for your love and support over these many, many years.  While my brother and my sisters and myself were never fully understand why in the plan of God our older brother Bill and our sister Susie had significant neurological disease that ultimately shortened their lives, we are believers that my brother Bill and sister Sue are present in us in this liturgy.  I am also most grateful to my nephews and nieces, my grandnephews and grandnieces, my brother priests, the wonderful, wonderful staff of St Joseph’s and Holy Spirit.  I can’t say often enough the joy I experience in your love and affirmation of me.  I’m grateful to see my grandnephews Dane and Grant as altar servers and all my nieces and nephews participating in this liturgy.

Lest I go too far down memory lane, I wish to focus on the  mystery of the Sunday Eucharist.  As we participate in this Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, we are reflecting on the central prayer of our faith tradition.  We are part of a tradition that is nearly 2000 years old.  The Sunday Eucharist is our participation in the paschal mystery of Christ Jesus.  The Sunday Eucharist satisfies the deepest hungers of the human heart.  I remember the words of my ordaining Bishop, Fulton Sheen, who said:  “The greatest love story of all time is contained in a tiny white host.”

I suggest our deepest spiritual hungers are for Jesus’ power to love and forgive his enemies rather than embarrass and crush them.  What we hunger for is Jesus’ power to be bighearted; to love beyond his own family, and to love poor and rich alike; to live inside of charity, joy, peace, patience, goodness, despite everything in life that militates against these virtues.

Left to our own will power and our own desires, we get too easily trapped in self-centeredness.  The truth of the life of all of us is that we are deeply flawed by sin.

 The way we are wired is that for us to satisfy the deepest hunger of our human hearts, we need to be connected to the mystery of God’s love that is within us.  It is as a Eucharistic people, we are in to touch with the source of grace that enables us to be our best selves, the person we are called to be. 

As a Eucharistic community, we gather with an attitude of gratitude.  We gather to give, to give thanks to the Lord our God.  We give thanks because we have been fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord with a food that enables to live as Jesus lives, to love as Jesus loves, to forgive as Jesus forgives.

As we approach the altar and receive Communion, it is as if the Church is filling up with Christ.  We are not only in union with Christ; we are in communion with all those who receive him.    This is the meaning of Church.  The Church is a People  of God who are in union with Christ in the mystery of the Eucharist.  We are also a people in communion with all those who receive Christ Jesus in the Eucharist.

At the Last Supper, Jesus gathers his disciples with the context of something very old – the Passover meal – to give them something very new  -- the Eucharist.  He creates for them a new covenant. 

The Mass is our greatest prayer; we gather to give thanks to the Lord our God.  Yet it is what we do outside the Mass that also determines the genuineness of the offering we make at the altar each Sunday.  By our mutual love and, in particular, by our concern for those in need we will be recognized as true followers of Christ.  Go in peace glorifying the Lord by our lives in all that we say and do this day and every day.

As we transition now into the Liturgy of the Eucharist, it is with considerable joy for me as a priest to preside over this Eucharistic mystery in which we are fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord.  We gather to give thanks to the Lord our God.

The words taught to me by dad, whether in Latin or in English, continue to be lifegiving for me and for us:  “I will go to the altar of God.  To God who gives joy to my youth.”  Introibe ad altare Dei…Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam.

The Solemnity of the Blessed Trinity is not a feast for scholars; rather, it is a celebration for lovers.

This past week from Tuesday to Thursday, my St.  Bernard’s Seminary classmates from several dioceses – Syracuse, Hartford, Ct., Rockville Center, Providence, RI, Jacksonville, FL, along with my classmates from Rochester—got together for our 50th year reunion.  It was a joy re-connecting with some classmates whom I have not seen for many, many years.  What did we share and talk about?  The conversation did not revolve around the theology of the priesthood.  We did not focus on the important truths of our Catholic Catechism.  Rather, we talked about the people who have touched us and whom we have touched -- the joys and the challenges of sharing our lives with so many people.  Our priestly ministry has been a love story of the many people we have shared the merciful love of Jesus with.  Priestly ministry is about relationships – our relationships with God and with one another.

I use our conversations at our 50th year reunion as a way of introducing this Feast of the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity.   Embedded within us is a Trinitarian Spirituality.   We believe in God the Father who is our creator and life-giver.  All is a gift of God.  We believe that God sent his only begotten Son, Christ Jesus, into the world to reveal God’s love for us and to be our Savior and Lord.  We believe in God the Holy Spirit who, on the great feast of Pentecost which we celebrated last Sunday, was sent to us as the Breath and the Spirit of God who will be with us all days until the end of time.  We are the recipients of the gifts of the Spirit that are to be used and shared in the service of one another and the building up of our faith community.

There have been many books written on the dogma, the doctrine of the Trinity – of three persons in one God.  Yet, just as our 50^th year reunion did not focus on doctrine and dogma; rather it was all about the relationships that have been so life-giving for all of us.  So too, a summary of the great mystery of the Trinity is that God is love.  God is revealed as a communion of persons.  The love that is within the union of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is shared with us.  As the Gospel proclaims:  “God so loved the world that He gave us His only Son so that everyone who believes in Him may not be lost, but may have eternal life.”

Our participation in the life of God is seen in the liturgical greeting that the priest gives immediately following the sign of the cross in every Mass.  “May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you.” 

This feast day of the Blessed Trinity is not a feast for scholars; it is a celebration for lovers.  We celebrate the mystery of the inner life of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,  The inner life of God is communal, is relational; it is family,  In contemplating the Trinity, we reflect on the family of God.  Today is feast of God’s love and mercy.  Pope Francis Writes that mercy reveals the very nature of the Most Holy Trinity.

Moses is the first person to address us in today’s Liturgy of the Word.  We get to eavesdrop on a homily he preached to inspire his people to strengthen their commitment.  If we listen as heirs of his tradition, we hear him call us to remember our own experience of God.  He took his people through their memories of the Exodus and hearing God’s voice.  That suggests that we too might recall how and when we have been aware of God’s presence, of God’s love, of God’s grandeur.  He’s recommending that we allow this Day of the Lord to claim some of our time so that we can remember and appreciate the ways we have come to know God in our individual and communal lives. 

On this Memorial Day weekend, may we remember those who have given their lives in the service of our country.  We gather in prayer as a grateful nation and a grateful people.  This leads us into the Eucharistic mystery as we gather to give thanks to the Lord our God.

Today’s Gospel describes Jesus’ final appearance to the disciples and his commissioning of them to carry on the work of evangelization.  Jesus said to his disciples:  “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing time in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” This is a much expanded vision than the earlier mandate to go only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

One of Pope Francis’s favorite themes is the commission given to us by the Lord himself is for us to be missionary disciples.  This call demands that we meet people where they are; we accompany people in the journey of life wherever we find people; and we proclaim to them their God-given dignity as God’s beloved sons and daughters.  As missionary disciples we don’t wait for people to come to us, we are commissioned and sent forth to raise people up wherever they are and help them to claim the love that God has for them.

As we celebrate and seek to understand the mystery of the Trinity, we try to explain the meaning of the Trinity in words, but it must be known in the experience of God that goes beyond words.  As we participate in the divine life of God in the sacraments, we share in the love of God.

And so, we begin our liturgy and most often we begin our prayer and we were baptized:  “In the name of the Father and of the son and of the Holy Spirit.”  We profess our faith and trust in the God who is love.  

The final sentence of today’s Gospel are the words of Jesus; “I am with you always, until the end of the age.”  The divine presence will remain with the disciples perpetually.  As the disciples of the Lord, may we hear those words of Jesus spoken to us:  “I am with you.”

Have a Blessed Day.

At the first Pentecost, Jesus chooses the very ones who abandoned and betrayed Him -- to be the wounded, forgiven healers that are to preach the Good News of God's gracious love and mercy.

I’m a big time Boston Celtics basketball fan.  One of the strengths of the Celtics is that they are a good defensive team.  They pride themselves on their ability to play a solid defense.

I give you the example of the Celtics as to illustrate the posture of the first apostles in the time before the Pentecost event.  They were huddled in the upper room behind locked doors out of fear.   They were clearly in a defensive posture, but unlike the Celtics, this was not a good place to be.   They were in a place of fear.

Defensive Christianity is not a biblical idea.  The posture of Christian disciples is not hiding in fear to protect themselves.  No, the disciples are sent.  To be a follower of Christ after his resurrection is to be sent.  In fact, our word “apostle” means “one who is sent.”

Personally when I worry about parish finances or pastoring in the face of criticism, it’s so easy to be defensive.  The grace all of us seek as Christian disciples is to be sent forth proactively to proclaim the Lord’s hope and joy in our midst.

 Jesus promised to send the Advocate, the Spirit that will guide us to all truth.  Jesus said to his first followers and to us:  “Receive the Holy Spirit.”  “Receive the Breath of God.”  In that moment, the Risen Christ raised those fearful, faithless disciples to newness of life.

This is what Pentecost is: the giving of the Spirit, the giving of new life, from the Father through the Son. The Holy Spirit is what makes it possible for people to go when they are sent. The Spirit is God's active, personal presence that accompanies those who are sent. Jesus says, "Receive the Holy Spirit. Go and forgive sins." That's what being gathered is all about: that the followers may be forgiven and renewed, sent and equipped, in order that all people may be reconciled to God by having their sins forgiven.

What would it like for you to possess the gift of forgiveness – the gift to forgive even those people in your life right now who don’t deserve it, even people who act unlovably?  This is the Gospel the Spirit impels the disciples to preach.  They can preach forgiveness because they have experienced it.

The Spirit-filled gift of forgiveness leads us to possess the gift of welcome – so much so that in our faith community there are no strangers or enemies.  Even more in our world, there are no strangers or enemies.

The Pentecost grace leads us to experience the gift of joy – all of life is a gift of God for which we are to be thankful.  Pope Francis calls to experience to experience the joy of the Gospel and to encounter the Lord and then to be missionary disciples who proclaim the joy of God’s love to one and all.

Now it may seem that the gifts of forgiveness, welcome, and joy seem too good to be true.   For all of us have been a little battle-scarred by the realities and fears of life.  Yet, we seek to experience Pentecost as the feast of locked doors.  Where are the locked doors in our lives?  Where do I find myself isolated in fear, living behind emotionally doors, and hanging on to anger and refusing to come out of hiding?

What are the fears, the insecurities, and the anxieties of your life that keep you behind emotional or spiritual locked doors?  Will I be accepted and loved if I step out of my comfort zone?  What keeps me from reaching out in service of a person in need?

With the grace of Pentecost, locked doors are blown open.  At the first Pentecost, Jesus chooses the very ones who abandoned and betrayed him – to be the wounded, forgiven healers that are to preach the Good News of God’s gracious love and mercy.  The strategy of Jesus is that the disciples were forgiven forgivers.

Jesus hasn’t changed his strategy with us.  Who are we as the faith community of Holy Spirit?  We are God’s forgiven sons and daughters.  In the feast of Pentecost, we receive the gift of forgiveness so that we will be sent forth to share the forgiveness and mercy of God with one another and with all.  Pentecost promises that the Holy Spirit can be released in each one of us so that we experience an inner peace of forgiveness and love.

How blest are we to be the Church of the Holy Spirit   -- the Church of the Pentecost event.  We are an Easter people and Alleluia is our song.  And yes, we are a Pentecostal people.  That is not to give us a cardiac arrest to think we are Pentecostal.  Rather, we are a faith community that is to claim the gifts and the charisms of the Holy Spirit that we were given on the Day of Pentecost.

The great truth of Pentecost – for the first disciples and us as well – is that the Holy Spirit has the power to enlarge and expand the human heart if we allow the Spirit of Jesus within us to grow and enliven us with the power to live, with the power to forgive, with the power to welcome and receive all others in Jesus’ name.  That power, the power of Pentecost becomes our own.

Today’s first Scripture reading tells the story of Pentecost for the first Christian disciples.  They experienced conversion.  Their lives were transformed.  They proclaimed the good news of the love of Jesus.  There was a fire in their bellies that shaped their entire lives.

On this day of Pentecost, as we now come to the Table of the Lord, may we reflect and claim our God-given giftedness.  Allow yourself to be loved by the Spirit of the Risen Christ.  I assure you if we allow ourselves to be loved by the Spirit of Jesus, our lives will be transformed with an inner peace and joy.  Then we will be energized in a Spirit-filled way to commit ourselves to using our God-given giftedness in the service of one another.

Have a Blessed Day.

Jesus tells us to look for Christ in one another and to be Christ for one another.

Today at St Joseph’s,  it is the Seventh Sunday of the Easter Season; it is Mother’s Day; and it is First Communion Sunday.  This is the Day the Lord has made; let us be glad and rejoice in it.

Mothers, thank you for the love you share with your children, with your family, and with your parish family.  We thank God for our own mothers – living and deceased.  Our moms are most often the first people who have taught us to pray.  May we never forget to pray in the way and the manner that our moms have taught us to pray.

We celebrate First Communion another time at St. Joseph’s.  Thanks be to God.  Our precious First Communicants are a gift to our parish community; and in the sharing of the Eucharist together, we are more closely united to each other in the sharing of the Eucharist.  We ask God’s many blessings to be with our First Communicants this day and every day.

In the Upper Room on the Eve of His Passion, the Lord prayed for his disciples gathered around him in today’s Gospel’s account.  At the same time, he looked ahead to the community of disciples of all centuries.  In his prayer for all disciples of all time, he saw us too, and he prayed for us.  He prayed that we be consecrated in truth.

In today’s Gospel, we are listening to the prayer of Jesus to His heavenly Father. 

This takes place on the Last Supper with Jesus very conscious of His impending death on the cross.  Jesus does not see his death as an ending, but rather his going home to His heavenly Father.

Overhearing Jesus at prayer is our way of understanding the identity of Jesus and our participation in the divine plan.  The mission of Jesus is to become our mission.  What is this mission – to release divine love into the world.

May the prayer of Jesus be our prayer as well.  May we make the Lord’s name known; may we do the work the Lord has given to do; may we witness to the joy that is God’s gift to us; and may we be consecrated in truth.

To consecrate someone means to give that person to God.    We are set apart for God.  It is the journey of turning away from the world and a giving over of ourselves to the living God.   Being given over to God means being missioned to witness to divine love.  We must be available for others, for everyone.

Jesus does not pray that the Father take us out of this world, although he recognized the world can be a dangerous place to be.  Jesus prayed that we be protected from the evil, and that we live with joy, and that we be consecrated in truth.

Jesus tells us to look for Christ in one another and to be Christ for one another.

Have a blessed day.

If we truly :"get" this one statement -- "As the Father loves me, so I also love you." --then we have understood a primary Gospel message.

For some time now in the world of Great Britain, the headlines have been abuzz:  Prince Harry will wed Megan Markle at St. George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle on May 19th.  All the pageantry and pomp and splendor of this great spectacle are certain to be watched by millions.  There will be a horse-drawn, gold-lined carriage, the beauty of Megan’s wedding gown, the historic beauty of the Windsor Castle, and the inspiration of the ancient liturgy.

All of it will be scrutinized in a riveting fashion by people from every walk of life.  Why?  Because it’s a love story.  We can’t get enough of love stories.

There are the cherished love words of the apostle Paul describing both the mystery of human love and divine love:  Love is patient; Love is kind…Love believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things…the greatest of these is love.

Jesus loved love stories too.

The heart of this Sunday Gospel addresses the issue of love head on:  “As the Father loves me, so I also love you.”  If we truly “get” this one statement –“As the Father loves me, so I also love you” – then we have understood a primary Gospel message.

Look back in the Gospels and see for yourself.  All of the great stories Jesus ever told – the prodigal son, the Good Samaritan, the woman caught in adultery, the washing of the feet, the cleansing of the lepers, the curing of the blind and the lame – all of these tell the same single tale:  Each of us is graciously, eternally and infinitely loved.

As a result of this boundless love relationship that Jesus offers to each of us, he makes only one single request – the very same one he gave to his disciples:  “This I command you:  love one another.”

What are the love stories of your life?  In your family life, with the love you share with your spouse, with the love you share with your children and grandchildren, does this not make you more aware of how your life is blessed?  The love you receive in your family life is a precious, precious gift.  Equally the love you give to your family makes you a better person. 

For myself, I have had so many opportunities to experience the love story of my priestly ministry.  Recently, I presided at the funeral liturgy of my brother-in-law Larry Hill – a brother-in-law who was a brother to me.  During this liturgy, I could feel the love of my sister Anne for her husband of so many years;  my heart went to my sister in her grieving.  Their sons, Matthew, Kevin, and Justin, shared beautifully their love for their dad; my brother and sister proclaimed the Scripture readings; grandnephews were the altar servers; and Larry’s granddaughters led us in the intercessions.   As I reflected on this liturgy, I was very much in touch with the love that I experience in our family life.

Going back to the words of Jesus, “As the Father loves, so I also love you.”  How do you experience the love of Jesus in the ordinary moments of your day?   As I walk down the corridor of St Joseph’s School at the beginning of the school day, I am moved by the precious gift of our school children -- their simple enthusiasm and love of life is such a beautiful God moment for me.

I so invite you to be grateful for the God moments that are a regular part of your day  --  the sunshine of the day, a friendly smile from someone you hardly know, or someone expressing gratitude for your help and thoughtfulness.

In today’s Gospel, you are given a sitting at the Last Supper as the Gospel is taken from the conversation Jesus had with the apostles on the night before He died.  I remind you of three actions of Jesus at the Last Supper that reveal the entirety of the Gospel.

           

--the institution of the Eucharist in which bread and wine became the Body and Blood of Christ Himself.  We are a Eucharistic community who give thanks to the Lord our God and are fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord.

            --Jesus washed the feet of his disciples to give us an example that we are to do likewise.  We are to wash the feet of God’s poor and we are to serve one another following the example of Jesus who came to serve and not to be served.

            --Thirdly, Jesus spoke those words to us:  “As the Father loves me, so I love you.”  Plain and simple, we are God’s beloved.  May we know and experience the love of God each and every day.  As God’s beloved sons and daughters, we are told in the commandment given to us  is that we are to share what we have been given.

My prayerful question for you is:  what loving words can you speak to help others understand God's presence?   In talking recently to a dad and his son, dad wanted his son to experience the love of Jesus in the sacrament of the Eucharist.  In his own way, the son was motivating his dad to make the Eucharist more a part of his life as well.  What was so beautiful was that dad and son were speaking words of love to each other.

What words of love can we speak to the needy and the poor in their midst?  Do the poor in our midst hear words of love being spoken to them by the faith community of St Joseph’s?

Will the members of your family hear words of love that you speak today?

Will I speak words of love to the parishioners in need on this day?

As a result of this boundless love relationship that Jesus offers to each of us, he makes only one single request – the very same one he gave to his disciples:  “This I command you:  love one another.”

Have a Blessed Day.