Jesus gives us a window into the heart of God who gives us not always what we want but always what we need.

 

Seventeenth Sunday in OT  C  2022

 

In the gospel, Jesus was praying by himself.  The disciples observing Jesus at prayer then asked Jesus to teach them to pray. 

 

Jesus is a much better teacher on prayer than I am.  I was teaching a group of first graders on prayer this past week in our summer intensive faith formation sessions this past week.  After I finished my talk on prayer, one young girl raised her hand, and I was delighted that she wanted to engage on her prayer life.  So, when I called on her, she simply said:  “I need to go to the bathroom.”

 

Back to Jesus, of all the things the disciples saw Jesus do, the one thing they ask about is prayer.  “Lord, teach us to pray.”        

 

Now the disciples had noticed that Jesus often prayed.  Jesus prays before his baptism; he prays before the Transfiguration; he prays after the seventy return from their mission.  Jesus prays all the time.

 

And the disciples see this.  They notice that prayer is an essential part of Jesus’ life, and that if they want to follow Jesus, if they want to be like Jesus, if they want to imitate Jesus, then they must pray.

 

 

Now, in the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us how to pray.  Most important, he teaches to whom we pray – a loving and caring Father into whom we entrust our concerns and our lives.  Father, into your hands, I commend my spirit. 

 

We begin the Lord’s Prayer by addressing God as Father.  All who offer this prayer are children of one Father, thus brothers and sisters to one another.  We the faith community of the Church of the St. Joseph’s are brothers and sisters to one another.  There are to be no strangers among us -- only friends who perhaps have not yet met.

 

Before we petition God with our human needs, we say “hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done.”  We first unite ourselves with the being and the activity of God.  God invites us into an intimate relationship in which we see ourselves, and then we can feel free to boldly ask for what we need.

 

In the first Scripture reading from the Book of Genesis, we see the intimate relationship that Abraham enjoys with God.  In his prayer, he is bargaining with God to save the people of Sodom.  In this prayer, God promises Abraham, I will spare the city of Sodom if only ten innocent people can be found.

 

In our prayer life, can we speak with the kind of trust and confidence that characterized the prayer of Abraham.

 

 

 

In our prayer life, what would you describe as your greatest temptation?  What keeps from being focused on the priority of prayer?    It’s not that we are atheists or agnostics.  It’s not that we have actively rejected God and defied God by sinning.   Often it seems we simply are indifferent or too busy about many other things.

 

The Mass we celebrate is in itself a prayer.  Not to pray is to show God our indifference.  What does it mean when we turn Sunday Mass into something that is only optional?  For sure, we would not say that God is optional in the way we profess our faith in words, but we need to challenge ourselves and ask if the way we live our life matches the words we say.

 

As you reflect on your prayer life, what keeps us from deepening our relationship with God?   Do our deeds reflect that prayer works when we can fit it into our busy schedule, or do we say that prayer is the first requirement of a disciple of Jesus?  The rest of the day then is structured around our times of prayer.

 

Trust me as I present this challenge to you, I present this challenge to myself.  I know I need to be challenged as where I place the priority of prayer in my life.  May we all ask ourselves the honest question of whether our actions confirm that God is the lead priority of our lives.

 

The disciples have been taught the words of prayer in the Lord’s Prayer but more is needed.  We need to have the proper inner disposition.  We must open our hearts to our giving and forgiving God.  We need to trust that we are in the hands of God, and that all will be well for those who trust in the immensity of God’s love for us.

 

 

Jesus teaches to pray.   He also teaches us for what we pray:  not just for immediate needs, but, more important, for ultimate needs:  the furthering of God’s kingdom, the gift of forgiveness, and protection from anything that would take us from God.

 

Jesus teaches us not only the words to pray, but what deeds must match authentic prayer.  So, we are given three important truths about prayer.  The first comes from the parable of the persistent friend.  A pesky neighbor disturbs a sleeping friend and disrupts the household. In this parable, Jesus teaches us the need for persistence in our prayer life.

    

Then Jesus invites to be bold in asking for what we need – no need to be timid about our prayers of petition.  “Ask and you will receive; seek and you will find.”  The Lord invites to present our needs before Him confident that our prayers will be heard.

 

Finally Jesus says:  “What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish?...How much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?”

Prayer then, for the disciple, is not imposing our will on God, but opening ourselves to God’s will for us.  For this to happen, within us and within the community, the Holy Spirit is indeed the gift that is needed.

 

In this Gospel, Jesus not only teaches us the words to say in the Lord’s prayer, but Jesus gives us also a window into the heart of God who can give be trusted to give us His beloved children always not what we want but always what we need.

 

Have  a Blessed Day.

 

 

 

Do people feel welcome in our parish or are they greeted as obstacles to our private Eucharistic encounter?

 

Sixteenth Sunday in OT  C 2022

The scriptures are about welcoming - about hospitality. It is about noticing the other and being attentive to the other. 

We all need to ask ourselves the question where are we on the giving and the receiving of hospitality and friendship in our parish community?

Tell me what you think of this story:

A man attending a crowded Sunday Mass refused to take off his hat when asked to do so by the ushers. Others also asked him to remove his hat, but he remained obstinate. The priest was perturbed, too, and waited for the man after the service.

He told the man that the church was quite happy to have him as a guest, and invited him to join the church, but he explained the traditional decorum regarding men's hats and said, "I hope you will conform to that practice in the future."

"Thank you, Father," said the man. "And thank you for taking time to talk to me. It is good of you to invite me to join the congregation. In fact, I joined it three years ago and have been coming regularly ever since, but today is the first time that anyone paid attention to me. After being an unknown for three years, today, by simply keeping on my hat on, I have had the pleasure of talking with the ushers, several of the congregants and you. Thanks!"

I invite you to consider this important question:    Do people feel welcome in our parish, or are they greeted as obstacles to our private Eucharistic encounter that we hope to enjoy all by ourselves?  Even at our sign of peace, even given the Covid restraints from sharing, do we seek to engage the people next to us in a eucharistic sign of peace?

Today’s readings tell us two very different meal stories that relate to hospitality.

In the first Scripture reading, Father Abraham is the host who spares absolutely nothing in welcoming strangers to his home.   Abraham looking up saw three men standing nearby.  When he saw them, he ran from the entrance to greet them, to welcome them, to provide extravagant hospitality and a warm meal for them.

Abraham’s story reminds us that we never know in what guise God will show up.  Luckily, he did not live in a gated community.  Abraham’s servants were tasked with hospitality rather than security.

The first reading is about strangers being entertained and the people didn’t know that the Lord was visiting them.  When we open our heart and home to the stranger and the neighbor, we are receiving God into our lives.  The Indian poet Tagore writes – “and when you left, I saw God’s footprints on the floor.

As with Abraham in the first reading, God may be coming to us as the one in need.  If our hearts are not generous and welcoming, how often have we turned God away and in turn failed to experience the generosity He wants to bestow on us.  Abraham shows us that the welcome we offer to the stranger is the welcome we offer to God.  Christ is received in every guest.

Offering hospitality always brings a gift from God.  Abraham and Sarah’s hospitality to the three mysterious visitors leads to the revelation that they will have a son.

In the Gospel account, Jesus, going along a road, came to a village and was welcomed into a house.  There one sister, having to get the meal, complained that the other sister just sat and listened to Jesus; and Jesus says that this second sister, named Mary, had chosen the better part, and it is not to be taken from her.

 

The traditional interpretation of this passage points to the distinction between an active service spirituality and the more prayerful listening spirituality.  In our discipleship of the Lord Jesus, there is a place for service, and there is a place for prayerfulness.  We spend a lifetime seeking the balance between the two ways of discipleship.

Lord, there is a Martha and Mary within each of us.

            -a part of ourselves which is busy and active,

            -another part which sits at your feet and listens trustingly to your word.

We need our active side to accomplish your will, but the listening is the best part, and we must not allow it to be taken from us.

Martha’s major error was to let the menu overshadow the encounter with Jesus.     Martha let agitation about the kitchen cancel out the nourishment that comes from being in Jesus’ presence.  We need the nourishment that comes from the kitchen table; we also need the spiritual nourishment that comes from the Lord Himself.  Isn’t it true that hospitality’s most important dimension is listening attentively to your guests?

As we reflect on our spiritual side, remember the truth that we can do many holy things without ever becoming holy.  There may be much action in our lives, very worthwhile action, but we need first to listen to the Lord in prayer before we can be people of action.  Is our active life leading us to deepen our encounter, our relationship with the Lord Jesus?

Jesus is not telling Martha that her work is not important, nor is he commending Mary for doing nothing.  He is simply reminding his followers that if we want to serve Him, we must first listen to Him.  We need to be people of prayer before we are people of action.

 May we come to the Eucharistic Table of the Lord: ready to serve those in need, those who come hungry and thirsty. But we come ready to be served from this great banquet.  We come together with Abraham and Sarah, and we come with Martha and Mary receiving the Lord in our hearts and in our lives.  We are sent to be just and live in the present of the Lord, to be Christ to one another, especially to those we have pushed to the margins or feel rejected from this Table.  We are invited to be eucharist for one another, to witness to the self-giving love in the lives of our neighbors…Would we accept this invitation?

 

 

Have a Blessed Day.

 

The motivation of the Good Samaritan was that he lived with the mercy of God he didn't deserve and was the recipient of the generosity of others he didn't merit.

 

Fifteenth Sunday in OT  C  2022

Today’s gospel is the very familiar and much loved parable  of the good Samaritan.  The gospel clearly calls  us to be missionaries of mercy in the lives of people in need.  We are to be witnesses to the mercy of God to each other.  The mercy of God means sharing with one another acts of undeserved kindness.

 

As you pray over this gospel parable, I have two questions for you:

 

n  What is your view from the ditch.

n  Secondly, the scholar of the law asked Jesus:  Who is my neighbor?  My question for you is:  Who is not your neighbor?

Going back  to the first question, what is your view from the ditch?  In the parable, the view from the ditch for the man who fell among the robbers, he was beaten and left for being half dead.  His view from the ditch was one of desperation and in need of help?

I invite you to recall a life situation when you were in need of help and suggest that that is your view from the ditch.

For the people in Ukraine, their view from the ditch is overwhelming in their war devastated country?

For the family members of far too many grieving families as a result of gun violence on our streets, their view from the ditch is one of outrage and questions what can be done to stop this gun violence.

For me a view from the ditch is reflecting on the leadership  of our church with the extreme shortage of priests,  where are we headed?

 

Your view from the ditch is the place of the cross, the place of struggle in your life?

Be assured that God is present to you in the place of darkness in your life, be assured this place in the ditch can be part of God’s plan for your life.  o time of darkness can be motivation for  you to share your love and the mercy with someone whom you encounter in the ditch.

I suggest to you that what motivated the Samaritan traveler to help the person who fell among the robbers was that he too had previously been in his own ditch and this experience moved him to be the Good Samaritan to the person in need.

The Good Samaritan lived with the mercy of God that he didn’t deserve and was the recipient of the generosity of people that he didn’t merit.  This was his motivation to share his love with the person in the ditch.

 

What of the priest and the levite who simply by on the other side of the road?  They may have been on  the journey to pray in the synagogue and to lift themselves up to God in prayer.

 

Perhaps what was missing in the spirituality of the priest and the levite was Pope Francis’ profound insight that the church is to be a field hospital.  The mission of the church is to reach out and support and love all those who are in the ditches of their lives.

Perhaps the motivation we need to see the Church as a field hospital is to be very touch with our own experiences of the struggles and the crosses of our lives and when we have the recipients of the undeserved kindness of another.

 

Even in the joy of the Easter Vigil liturgy, we sign in the beautiful Easter hymn of the exulted, O Beata Culpa – o blessed fault.  Our sins, our shortcomings, our struggles, our places in the ditch lead us to experience the unending love of God in our lives and motivates us to share this love and mercy with one another.

 

To the second question, which is introduced in the parable, when the scholar of the law asked Jesus:   Who is my neighbor?  My question for you is:  Who is not your neighbor.

 

The theme of our most recent Adult formation sessions was:  Love your neighbor, no exception.

 

Love your neigbor, who doesn’t look like you.

                                    Who doesn’t think like  you.

                                    Who doesn’t love like you.

                                    Who doesn’t speak like you.

                                    Who doesn’t pray like you.

                                    Who doesn’t vote like you.

Love your neighbor, no  exceptions.

Yes, we live in a divided, polarized world.  Yes, in some ways, we live in a divided, polarized Church.

But I always go back to the last words that Jesus spoke to his disciples at the Last Supper on the night before he died:  By this all shall know you are my disciples, by your love for one another.

 

In the message that Jesus lived and in the message he taught in his parables:  the prodigal son and in this parable of the Good Samaritan.  The first priority  of the disciple of Jesus is to love.

Today we kick off in our parish life a two week summer intensive for our younger parishioners as we seek to form and fashion after the mind and heart of Jesus.

It is our goal that our parishioners come to know Jesus more deeply in their life.  We wish for them to experience God’s unending love for them, and they are God’s beloved sons and daughters.

 

It is our strong conviction that in experiencing God’s love for them, they in turn will be motivated to be Good Samaritans in their family and in their neighborhood.

 

 

                                   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The lens Jesus used was the lens of love, and He saw love in every person on the face of the earth.

 

Thirteenth Sunday in  OT  C  2022

 

The great journey begins.  Jesus resolutely determined to journey to Jerusalem.  Jesus has already set Jerusalem as the heart of the Gospel story.  In going to Jerusalem, Jesus was walking the road to his death and resurrection.  Jesus knew full well that in going to Jerusalem, he was opening himself up to the plan of His heavenly Father.

Those who journey with Jesus in every generation must make Jerusalem their goal.  For us to journey to Jerusalem is no simple travelogue but a vocation to discipleship and mission that will indeed take the rest of our lives. I have had the privilege of visiting the Holy Land a couple of times.   These have been most memorable and very inspiring for me.  But the Gospel imperative is even more than that.   For you and I to set our faces toward Jerusalem is the surrender we must make when we choose to follow God’s call in our lives – wherever that may lead us.  In other words, the Gospel invites us to reflect on the cost of discipleship.

To be honest, many of us, myself included, have a way of bargaining with God over the terms of our discipleship.  At various times, we give the Lord different responses to the Lord’s call to be a disciple.  Sometimes our actions suggest we are saying:  “No thanks.”  Sometimes our response is:  “Maybe later.”  Hopefully our response at other times is: “Be it done to me according to your Word.” – the response of Mary at the Annunciation.

But well before we examine our own whole or half-hearted response to Jesus’ invitation to discipleship, he sets us straight on how we are to judge others’ response to God’s call.   From the Gospel account, Jesus sent his messengers ahead of him.  On the way they entered a Samaritan village to prepare for his reception there, but they would not welcome him because the destination of his journey was Jerusalem.  When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven to consume them?”  Jesus turned and rebuked them and they journeyed to another village. 

Jesus is saying to James and John:  “It’s none of your business how others respond.”

 

 

Jesus’ decisive command to James and John that they express commitment to him through compassion for others.   St. Paul writes that we must abandon the violence of biting and devouring one another, choosing instead to serve one another through love.

You and I need to do an inventory of the judgements, the gossip, the stereotyping, and the negativity we have toward all those who get under our skin.  The message of Jesus is very clear:   Let go of your judgments about others; rather make the commitment to serve one another with love.

Our focus needs to be on ourselves.  How do we respond to our call to discipleship of the Lord Jesus?  Our Gospel question of the week was and is:  What stands in the way of you following Jesus more completely?  This is such an important question because from the Gospel perspective we must be “all in” our discipleship of Jesus.

True discipleship is a full-time job.  We   can’t be disciples at certain times but not at others.    It’s not like a project we can set aside and resume later.

To be a disciple of Jesus to live as Jesus, to love as Jesus, and to forgive as Jesus forgives us.  The heart of Jesus is filled with love and because the heart of Jesus was filled with the love of His heavenly Father, Jesus loved everyone because he saw the Father’s love in each and every person.

The lens Jesus used was the lens of love and he saw love in every person on the face of the earth.

There is such an important truth to be learned by the disciples of Jesus.  The world is as your heart sees it, not just as it is out there.  What do I mean by that?  When we look at life through the lens of love, we see God’s love in all of life.

What my life gets overwhelmed by fear, by anxiety, when I have trouble forgiving someone, when I get too stuck on myself, when my ministry seems like I’m

 

 

 

rearranging the furniture on the Titanic, when my view of the world is filled only with dark clouds, I am not looking at life through the lens of love.  My heart is not filled with the love of Jesus.  For when my heart is filled with the faith and love of Jesus, I see my future as full of hope and I see the love of God in all the people of my life.

What does it mean to be “all in” in our discipleship of Jesus?

To be a disciple of Jesus means discovering the way of love.   Disciples must learn how to love.  To be a disciple you must forgive one and all.  There can be no exceptions.  If you’re going to be a disciple of Jesus, you must be detached from everything but one thing and that is Jesus Himself.

How is it for you when your family isn’t all you want it to be; how is it when your job situation isn’t what you would like; how is it when the Church we live in and the world we are part of is all mixed up?

The world is as your heart sees it, not so much as it is out there[FJS1] .  If your heart is filled with the love of your heavenly Father, what you see will be filled with love.  I believe in the basic truth that we see life through the lens of our heart.  When our hearts are filled with the love of Jesus, we will see in the people of our lives the love that is in our hearts.   Jesus’ heart was filled with love for all people because he saw the love of God in all people.

Who in your life do you find most difficult to reach out to and love?  Perhaps it is the person who has hurt you deeply -- even a family member; or person whose views on life are completely different than yours.  The discipleship question for all of us is can we love as Jesus loves?  Can we forgive as Jesus forgives us?an undocumented immigrant; a person whose sexual orientation is different that yours; a fellow Catholic who lives out their spirituality in a way you disagree with;  and so on and so on.

If we have the heart of Je

As we transition to the Liturgy of the Eucharist, as we prepare to receive the Eucharist,s

Each time we receive Communion,  may we testify to the reality of our Catholic faith.  We are being nourished with the life and the love of Jesus.  Our discipleship of the Lord Jesus is sharing with others the love we have received from the Lord himself.

 

Have a Blessed Day.

 

---

 [FJS1]

Pope Francis: The Eucharist is not a prize for the perfect; it is medicine for all of us who stand in need.

 

Body and Blood of Christ  C 2022

 

Today we celebrate the Feast of the Eucharist; the Feast of Corpus Christi; the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ.  At the in initiative of our National Conference of Catholic Bishops, we are beginning a three-year process of Eucharistic Renewal in which we seek to deepen our relationship with Christ Jesus by being fed and nourished at the Table of the Lord and continuously giving thanks to the Lord our God for the many blessings we enjoy.

May we ponder in faith and in awe the mystery that we celebrate.

Today as we receive Communion, as we receive the host in our hands at Communion, we are holding the Body of Christ.  We are holding Jesus who taught us his parables of love and forgiveness for one and all.  We are holding in our hands Jesus who walked on the water.  We are holding in our hands Jesus who died on the cross to save us from our sins.

What a profound privilege we have to receive the Body and Blood of Christ!

Regrettably we too easily take for granted this mystery of the Eucharist.

Sad to say, it is easy to neglect spiritual food.  It’s too easy to skip daily prayer and the weekly celebration of the Eucharist.  We often don’t seem any worse for the wear and tear.  But over the long haul, we can get out of touch with our deepest spiritual hungers.

The thing of it is with spiritual hungers; we can be spiritually hungry without being in touch with our deep hunger.  As the great St. Augustine, you have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in thee.

Far from being a pit stop for fast food and entertainment in the journey of life, the gift of the Body and Blood of Christ is the necessary sustenance for the spiritual growth of each member of the community and for the community itself.

As we reflect on the mystery of the Sunday Eucharist, 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.

Today is Father’s Day.  We congratulate and bless all the fathers of our faith community.  You are a blessing to us all.

May the fathers of our parish community keep us in touch with the 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 one’s 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.

With great joy, we have recently celebrated two First Communion weekends in the parish.  The spiritual joy experienced in our First Communicants and in their families is so very precious.  The ritual of our First Communion celebrations is so inspiring.  It is a moment of joy for me as a priest to give First Communion to one of our younger parishioners.  In age-appropriate ways, they celebrate the life-giving presence of Jesus within them.  Thanks be to God.   

The challenge we have as a parish community is to sustain our Eucharistic faith and joy continuously throughout the year.  Even though our First Communicants won’t be wearing their communion dresses and suits Sunday after Sunday after Sunday, nonetheless the God whose love for us is unending continues to offer to us the Bread of Life and the Cup of salvation always.

As the congregation approaches the altar and receives communion, it is as if the Church is filling up with Christ.  We are not only in union with Christ, but we are also in communion with all those who receive him.  The Eucharist is a community affair, not simply Jesus and me.  We are not only in union with Christ; we are in communion with all those who receive Christ.  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.

There are some who want us to judge whether a person is worthy or eligible to receive Communion.  I am clearly not in that lane.  I believe that none of us are worthy to receive Communion as we pray before receiving Communion:  Lord, I am not worthy that you should come under my roof but say but the word and my soul shall be healed.”  This is a profound truth that it is the love and mercy of Jesus that enables us to approach the altar.

As Pope Francis, the Eucharist is not a prize for the perfect; it is medicine for the sick.

The Eucharist is our bond of communion with Christ who cleanses us our sins and unites in marvelous communion with God and gives our dignity to be God’s beloved sons and daughters.  Further, the Eucharist binds us together with each other as brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus.  We are called to the Body of Christ – the bearers of hope and love to people who are sick in body and spirit.

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 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 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.  Amen

 

Have a Blessed Day.

 

 

 

Defensive Christianity is not a Biblical idea.

 

PENTECOST  C  2022

Pentecost arrived for the disciples after fifty days of uncertainty.  True, Jesus had risen.  Overjoyed, they had seen him, listened to his words and even shared a meal with him.  Yet they had not overcome their doubts and fears.  They still met behind locked doors.

This leads us to ask what fears do we have that we have not overcome and that keep us behind locked doors?  A fear I have is that parishioners who have been faithful members of Holy Spirit and St Joseph’s before the pandemic now have just gotten used to not coming to Church and no longer have a need or a desire to participate in our weekly celebration of the Eucharist. I wish to try to understand the spiritual journey of another but I fear we can lose sight that the heart and soul of our parish life is the weekly celebration of the Eucharist.  There is no substitute in the spiritual life to replace encountering the Lord in the Sacrament of the Eucharist.  In Eucharist we allow, we welcome the Lord deep within our spirit.

What makes the Church of the Holy Spirit our spiritual home is our sacramental life and most especially the Sacrament of the Eucharist.  It is the presence of Jesus within us that gives life to our parish community.  To lose sight of this reality is my fear I wrestle with.

But thanks be to God, In the great Feast of Pentecost, God is born again not in one body that was Jesus but in a body of believers that is the Church.  Pentecost is the Feast of the birth of the Church.  The Spirit of the Risen Christ is in the Body of believers, in the community of the baptized, in the whole Church.

The feast of Pentecost brings to a close the season of Easter because the gift of the Spirit is the inevitable outcome of the death and resurrection of Jesus. The church understood clearly that what happened to Jesus on Easter Sunday was not just an amazing miracle to prove that he really was the Son of God. It was rather the next step in God’s desire to heal, once and for all, the relationship between himself and a broken humanity. Now the outpouring of the Spirit of Jesus means that our relationship with God is fundamentally transformed. So, let’s celebrate of our new life in the Spirit and the birthday of the church as the new people of God.

Initially the disciples were locked in the upper room out of fear.  On the Day of Pentecost those locked doors were thrown open; the fear in the disciples was replaced with a Spirit-filled courage and enthusiasm.  They were now fearless proclaimers of the Word of God.

What had changed for the disciples?  They received the Holy Spirit.

The great truth of Pentecost – for the first disciples and for 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 to grow and enliven us from within.

In today’s first Scripture reading, we hear how the Holy Spirit was given to the followers of Jesus.   Listen again: “When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together.  And suddenly there came from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind, and it filled the entire house in which they were.  Then there appeared to them tongues of fire, which parted and came to rest on each of them.  And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in different tongues, as the Spirit enabled to proclaim.”

The great meaning of Pentecost is that it was time for God to be born again not in one body that was Jesus but this time in a body of believers who would receive the breath of life from their Lord and pass it to others.  We see how the growth of the Church took place with the influence of the Holy Spirit in the Acts of the Apostles.  The Book of Acts is the story of the incredible growth of the first Christian communities.  The Acts of the Apostles is kind of like a Gospel of the Holy Spirit.  In the first four books of the New Testament, we learn the Good News of what God did through Jesus Christ in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.  In the Book of Acts of the Apostles, we learn the Good News of what God did through the Holy Spirit.

The first and foremost attribute of the servant church is its daring openness to the Spirit.  It is our prayer that the Church make room for the release of the Spirit in the life of the community and the courage to act when it does.  We are not to fall back into being the safe and self-absorbed church, but rather a place of miraculous hope and extravagant hospitality.

God chose a young virgin named Mary to bear God’s Son, and Jesus chose a bunch of Galilean fishermen to share in His ministry.   God chooses you and me to hear his message of hope and promise and love in this place and in our world this day.

 Defensive Christianity is not a Biblical idea.  The posture of Christian disciples is not hiding in fear to protect ourselves.   No, the disciples are sent to proclaim the Good News of the love of Jesus to one and all.  St. Joseph’s and Holy Spirit are called to be sister parishes who help and serve and love one another.

In receiving the Holy Spirit, the first disciples received the gift of forgiveness.  They also were able to speak in tongues and so were understood by those listening.  There is a universal language in which everyone understands and embracing all difference: a language of forgiveness.  I think if we can forgive each other that action crosses all cultures and invites whoever is the Other to see us as brothers and sisters.

Now more than ever, we invoke the Holy Spirit to wipe away the darkness of anxiety allowing us to be guided by the light of Christ and to trust in God’s promise of new life.

Our Gospel today takes place on Easter evening.  On that first evening they were gathered in a house with the doors locked, because they were afraid – afraid of being killed, just as Jesus had been killed three days before.  But Jesus was among them, and He said: “Peace be with you.”  To this scared group of former followers, the Risen Christ begins by bringing the peace of God.

Filled with inner peace that only God can give, our hearts are like a deep sea, which remains peaceful, even when its surface is swept by waves.

On this day of Pentecost, may we pray for healing and unity for our Church and our nation as we now come to the Table of the Lord.  May we all commit ourselves to using our God-given giftedness in the service of one another. 

Have a Blessed Day.

 

Life itself is our best school. God is our teacher. Your present assignment is dealing with the challenges of life and trusting Jesus is accompanying.you.

 

Seventh Sunday of Easter  C   2022

 

The scriptures invite us to reflect the sadness we sometimes experience in having to say goodbye.  I invite you to reflect on the saddest goodbyes you have experienced.  How have you dealt with the grieving you experienced?

For me as a priest, some of my saddest goodbyes have involved in my change of assignments as a priest.  I can tell you 17 years ago when I came as the pastor of St Joseph’s, this has been a great blessing for my life. But it meant saying to the parishioners of St. Louis Church in Pittsford where I had been the pastor for 12 years.  I had grown to know and love this wonderful parish community, and in leaving at the time, it seemed like a forced divorce.

Even more so, is the sadness of saying goodbye to someone you love as the one love goes home to God.  I have to say goodbye to my mom and dad and my older brother and sister.  In this grieving, we are invited to trust in the peace that only God can give.

Today between the Feasts of the Ascension and Pentecost, we are marking Jesus’ leave taking from the disciples.  There is sadness for the disciples of Jesus on the Feast of the Ascension.  What the first disciples had to learn is a lesson for all of us -- many, many times we have to let go and say good-bye and trust that with each letting go, God promises that he will not leave us orphans.  We have to change many times in our discipleship journey.  We choose some of the good-byes of life; other times our good-byes are not of our own choosing.  With each transition, we are called to trust in God’s continuous presence in our life.

With each goodbye we experience, we are called to trust more fully in
God’s continuous presence in our life.  God never says goodbye but always us to trust more fully in his unending love for us.

The Gospel is taken from the end of Jesus’ prayer at the Last Supper.  We are privileged to eavesdrop on Jesus’ intimate prayer with his heavenly Father.  In the Upper Room on the Eve of his Passion, the Lord prayed for his disciples gathered around him.  At the same time, Jesus looked ahead to community of disciples of all centuries.  In his prayer for all disciples of all time, he saw us too, and 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 at the Last Supper with Jesus being conscious of His impending death on the cross.  Jesus does not see his death as ending, but rather his going home to his heavenly Father and a new way of being with us who are in the world.

Overhearing Jesus at prayer is our way of understanding the identity of Jesus and our participation in the divine plan.  The mission of Jesus to be become our mission.  What is this mission – to release divine love into the world. This is such an awesome mission for us as a parish community.

 May the prayer of Jesus be our prayer as well.  The prayer of Jesus is that we all may be one.  Jesus prayed for us to experience a unity based on our love for one another.  We needn’t be reminded for its need.  We often witness breakdowns of communication in families, enmity among members of the same faith community, dissension in civil society.  Jesus’ unity

 is to overcome all such divisions, especially those within the fold.  Jesus wants a unity like that between himself and the Father – a unity that preserves individuality, but which is close and intimate.  That union of the Father and the Son is our model.  It is a unity in which people will love and serve each other because they love and serve him; it is heart speaking to heart.  Its key is love.

Like Jesus, we find our glory in doing not what we will but what God wills.  What would it take for all of us to be committed to the petition we make in the Our Father: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” 

I invite you to hold on to this truth:  Life itself is the best school.  God is our teacher.  The problems we are facing right now are our best assignment from God.  In your present challenge, whatever it is, you may have to let go; you may have to take a risk; but please God this challenge may invite you to place even more trust in the plan of God for your life.  We are facing the challenge of senseless gun violence in our schools and in the streets of our cities; we are facing the diocesan bankruptcy caused by clergy sexual abuse; we are facing the devastation of the war in Ukraine.

 

As I say, life itself is our best school.  God is our teacher.  In the problems we are facing just now, what are we called to let go up and take the risk of faith and to trust even more deeply in the plan of God for our lives.

 

In the first Scripture reading today, Stephen was beautifully releasing divine love into the world by offering forgiveness to those who were stoning him to death.  Forgiveness is an essential element for achieving the unity that Jesus prayed for.

 

At the end of the day, may we claim the prayer of Jesus to be our own prayer.  Jesus prayed: “I made known to them your name and I will make it known, that the love with which you loved me may be in them and I in them.”  We are missioned to make the Lord’s name known in our parish and in our community. We make the Lord’s name known best when we release divine love into our world.

Lord, make us instruments of your peace.

 

Have a Blessed Day.