Homily - First Communion 20170521 (wriiten; not delivered)

This weekend, we celebrate with these young people something very new to them.  Something very precious to them.  When we are young, we have a sense of wonder and awe.  As a young person watches mom and dad or older brothers and sisters approach the priest or extraordinary minister of Holy Communion, don’t they often marvel at all of us receiving what appears to be bread and wine.

Over the years, I get a smile on my face each time I see a youngster who walks beside mom or dad in the communion line and they reach for the communion host.  And, they really want it.  I doubt that most have a clear idea of what it is that we are receiving.  Or, let me correct myself, I doubt that the youngster understands “who” we are receiving.  But they want!  Why do they want?  Because they see us receiving and isn’t it human to want what others receive?

So, I turn my words for a moment to these young people who will approach the Lord’s table for the first time today to receive.

Kids, can you tell all these adults around you who it is who you will receive in the Eucharist for the first time in a few minutes?  (Wait)...  Who is He?  (JESUS!!!!)  And, what have you felt in the weeks leading up to now as you waited for your turn to receive Jesus?  (Nervous, anxious, envious)!

My friends, these children do know WHO they seek to receive and they are filled with wonder and awe at the very idea of receiving GOD into themselves through the gifts He gives to us.  They have journeyed through formation classes to better understand these special gifts.  They may have heard why Jesus chose bread and wine as the elements for this Eucharistic celebration.

Bread because of the process it goes through to become what it is.  We don’t just say poof and there’s bread.  No we take wheat that is dried (the stalk is dead).  We grind it up (it is broken).

And the wine?  Wine typically comes from grapes.  But what must happen to these grapes before we have wine?  That’s right, they must be stomped or smashed to collect the sweet juice from the fruit.

But these aren’t just simple symbols for us, are they?  Please, all of you, at this very moment.  Think of what we are about to do.  Do you “know”, do you “believe” that what still appears to be bread and wine, are really and truly changed?  Do you believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist we share?  Do you?

When we each approach in the communion line, we are presented with a gift and a statement is presented to us…”The Body of Christ”...and we make a decision in that moment!  We decide that we truly believe in the Real Presence of Christ in that small wafer.  And we say “Amen”.  Amen...I believe.  OR, do we simply go through the motions and walk up in the line because everyone else does?

And then a second statement is offered to us…”The Blood of Christ”...Again, we make a decision, a decision that, like the first, makes all the difference in the world.  We say “Amen”.  Amen, I believe.

I said at the beginning, that children are filled with wonder and awe.  And, as they prepare for their First Communion, they WANT Him.

Do you WANT Him?  Do you NEED Him?

Or is this some game, some obligation?

Whether today is your First Communion or if you have received His Body and His Blood for many years, I pray that you will again be filled with wonder and awe.  That you might tremble with excitement and anticipation as you prepare to receive the Word made flesh into your self.  This Word which created the entire world and This Word who saved this world through giving Himself up on the Cross.
My friends, we are all children.  Children of a loving God!  Oh, that we might be like our Jewish brothers and sisters who are in such awe of our Creator that they will not speak His name.  As you approach the Eucharist today, I wonder if any of you might be filled with that wonder and awe from when you first received!  I wonder if any of you might be moved to tears as you realize the great gift which Christ and His Church give to you today in His Body and His Blood!

After you receive Him today, please quietly return to your pew and spend a few minutes with Christ.  Christ within you!  Allow Him to permeate every cell of your body.  Your “Amen” changes everything!  Jesus Christ changes everything!

Homily 13Sun of OT Yr A - Baptized into Christ's Death

In case you're interested, below is my homily from this weekend (13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A)

When you walked into the Church this morning, you probably dipped your fingers into the waters of the Baptismal font.  Do we do this so much out of habit that we forget?  Maybe, you still have the drops of water on your shirt or blouse!

Do you ever think of the babies and young children who were just baptized in the last week and months at this very font?  Do you think of the newly baptized who came into the Church this past Easter?  It wasn’t but 2 months ago or so!

We make such a spectacle, and I don’t mean it’s a bad thing, but we make a big deal around the celebrations of Baptism and the other Sacraments.  But, do we remember?  Do you and I treasure the graces that we receive and that other members of our Church family receive at this font and in this Church?

St. Paul wrote in his letter to the Romans, “Are you not aware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death”?

Does going to Church make a difference in your life?  Or, is it still making a difference in your life?  When you fall down in sinful ways, does your faith and your baptism help you to rise again?  Have you taken the Bible in your hands recently and allowed God to form your heart by His Word?

St. Paul knew his Jewish faith well as a Pharisee!  He knew his scriptures and practiced his faith so well that he was willing to defend his faith against what he believed was blasphemy!

He killed early Christians to protect the faith he knew.  But he was wrong!  And, Christ knocked him down and rebuilt him.

St. Paul, who wrote to the Romans, “We were indeed buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead, by the glory of the Father, we too might live in the newness of life,” he was himself raised from the death of hatred and misunderstanding of God’s plan.

St. Paul, in the newness of his own life after baptism, spread the Gospel and helped others and he helps us to know Christ through his letters to the early Church communities.

As you reflect on how your life might be influenced by today’s society of social media, music, pornography, gossip, and more, know that you need to die to the ways of the world and rise again.  I encourage you to open your Bible to Paul’s letters during Ordinary Time this summer and into the fall to learn what St. Paul wants to share with you about the life of Christ.

In all the wonders of this world and amongst the entertainment and distractions, have you and I allowed these things to change us?  We are formed by all that we read, we are formed by all that we see, and we are formed by all that we experience.  For better or for worse!

Can you, like St. Paul did throughout his life, look at how you are experiencing life and see where Christ is working and where you might need to allow Him to work?  Or, do you have it all figured out?  Do you recognize sin in your life?  Are you willing to call sin SIN and offer it up to Him?

If you are like me and often get caught in the routine of life and even in the Church don’t live in the moment of the beauty of each action, each symbol, each word, might you be willing to focus today as you go out into the world!

Like Christ, we have died through the waters of Baptism!  And, like Christ we have risen.  Let us not take our Faith for granted, let us not take our community for granted, rather let us invest our whole selves into our families, our faith community and our roles in this society!  “So that, just as Christ was raised from the dead, by the glory of the Father, we too might live in the newness of life”.   Amen.

Homily - Raising of the Widows' Sons (20160605) - Yr C

Thank you to all for your prayers.  Some expressed interest in getting a copy of my first homily from today's celebration of the Mass.
Video link to Homily
It was the summer of 1982 (just 34 years ago) and a young boy aged 12 walked into the center bedroom in grandma and grandpa’s house in a little Missouri town.  This 12 year old knew that his mother had been sick, but he didn’t really get what this all would mean for he, his father and his 4 older brothers.  His mother had given her family everything she had within her and now she lay dying from cancer in her own parents’ home.

I was that 12 year old and as I walked to the side of my mother’s bed, she asked me why I wasn’t in school.  She wanted the best for me even as she had no idea that I was on summer break.  I only spent a few minutes in her room that day, but my mother was leaving me that day. Why her?

And over the last 10-15 years as I’ve matured, I thought about what her death must have meant to my 4 older brothers and my aunts and uncles.  What must my father (who sits here listening to me today), Daddy, what must you have been thinking?  I look at my own wife and think that although you must have felt lost in a cruel world, asking God why he took your wife so soon, you went on, you continued on with your life.

To my brothers, my aunts and uncles and especially to my Daddy, “I LOVE YOU!”  And now, as I begin serving our Church in the ministry of deacon, Iwant to say something to each and every one of you here today from the bottom of my heart… “I LOVE YOU!”


12. As I was reflecting on today’s readings and the shared character of a WIDOW in both the 1st reading and Gospel, I could not help but think of the beginnings of the diaconate, the order to which I was graced by God to be ordained just yesterday.
13. The Apostles chose the first deacons to care for the needs of the widows and orphans who felt neglected.
14. But what to say of these 2 widows? Both experienced the death of a husband who they loved.
15. At some point in our own lives, we know the struggles that they experienced.
16. Since the primary provider at that time would have been her husband, the widow was faced with uncertainty as she was shunned; she was a no body on her own.
17. She would surely need the help of her sons, her family and her community.
18. In the 1st Book of Kings, the widow encounters the prophet Elijah.
19. And, she is faced with death once again, the death of her son! What devastation she must have been experiencing!
20. All of us have or will experience the death of loved ones, some after a long life, some taken way too soon.
21. We search for meaning and many of us know the experience of asking God, “WHY??? Why now?”
22. And, hopefully, we’re surrounded by a loving community of friends and family who comfort us as we experience feeling lost and alone; this meaningful person who we have shared many a times “I LOVE YOU” with, is now separated from us in a way that we’ve never known before.
23. Truth be told, we know the raw feeling as we can no longer hold their hand, feel their embrace, or hear their voice.
24. Now, we aren’t likely to experience the physical rising from the dead like in these stories of the widows’ sons until we are all raised at the end of time, but we do seek HOPE…
25. Hope that our own loved one will be raised to be with Christ and spend all eternity in the face-to-face presence of our loving God.
26. What a powerful thing for us to remember in the midst of this suffering!
27. So, I’d like us to consider how we as a Christian community, especially this Catholic community here at Christ the King, are to
experience and support one another in the times of suffering and death, mourning and living?
28. Our Church shows us such love in its Funeral Rites which seek to comfort us in so many different circumstances of death be it young or old, expected or unexpected.
29. The confusion, pain and sorrow may differ in type and severity, but the reality is no different and we, the CHURCH, are called to comfort those who are experiencing the death of the one who they no longer hear “I LOVE YOU” from.
30. We are called to help them recognize their love is an everlasting one, just as Christ’s love is.
31. We need to trust and know that Christ’s mercy is with us always as He was with Mary and Martha during the death of their brother Lazarus. 32. He was with the widow in today’s Gospel as Elijah was with the widow in our 1st reading.
33. We can be assured of His presence even if no one else is with us.
34. I have been touched seeing members of our Christ the King community reach out to those who are dying and comfort them and their families.
35. I have experienced the great love offered immediately following the death of my father-in-law and in the days which followed.
36. I tried my best to help my dear wife as she and our three children said goodbye for now to our dear “Papi”.
37. And many of you were and are around us as we move forward.
38. Especially in this Jubilee Year of Mercy, we heed the corporal works of mercy, to “Bury the dead.”
39. This means that we try to be present at the funeral when any member of our community has died and during the days and weeks and
months ahead to be present to the family beyond the funeral.
40. I believe, we ought to be present to the wife or husband, the children, the parents of the deceased.
41. Perhaps, in silent comfort or a hand to hold, a gentle embrace, a promise to pray for and check on them to see how they’re doing in the
hours, days and months to come; to offer them a soft “I LOVE YOU”.
42. We need to be there for each other as I’ve seen us do as a woman struggles to come into our very own Christ the King Catholic Church as it reminds her of her husband who died not very long ago.
43. May we be the community to help her to know that this is her home with God’s love and mercy.
44. In our readings today, the sons of the widows are returned to them. 45. For us, we have HOPE and FAITH that our loved ones will be with our all-loving God.
46. I ask you to reflect upon how you can offer the mercy of Christ especially to those who are faced with the death of a loved one, those who are struggling with family, the poor, the neglected and the unwanted.
47. Ultimately, to whom can you offer God’s mercy?
48. As Christ was present to the widow in the Gospel, His mercy is present to us in the Eucharist that we will share at this Altar.
49. In taking the Eucharist, we become Christ!
50. I ask you to close your eyes now and listen to this prayer offered to God in the Funeral Rite for a child who died before baptism:

"You are the author and sustainer of our lives, O God, you are our final home. We commend to you, this child.

Trusting in your mercy, and in your all-embracing love, we pray that you give him/her happiness forever.

Turn also to us who have suffered this loss.

Strengthen the bonds of this family and our community.

Confirm us in faith, in hope, and in love, so that we may bear your peace to one another and one day stand together with all the saints who praise you for your saving help.

We ask this in the name of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.  Amen.”

51. I encourage you to extend God’s mercy this week especially to those who most need it and maybe you’ll find the opportunity to share with them a simple “I LOVE YOU”.