Tag: reconciliation

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Are You Ready?

A blurry photo of colorful lights reflected in water with the caption keep your lamps burning Luke 12:34

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Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Mass Readings

First Reading: Wisdom 18:6-9
Psalm: Psalm 33:1, 12, 18-19, 20-22
Second Reading: Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-19
Gospel: Luke 12:32-48

Are you ready? The servants Jesus tells us about in today’s parable are. The lamps are lit, their loins girt and they are waiting for their master to knock on the door. They don’t know when he is coming, but they know he will come at some point. What a great example of faith, right?

What is faith? I’d like to share an example from one of our family’s favorite movies – the 1994 movie Santa Claus with Tim Allen. I know this is a secular example, but hang with me a minute, okay?

Let me set the scene a little. Neil, played by Judge Reinhold, is Charlie’s stepfather. Charlie, played by Eric Lloyd, is Scott Calvin’s son. Scott Calvin is played by Tim Allen who of course becomes Santa Claus, only, shhh because it’s a secret!

In the movie, there’s a scene where Neil challenges Charlie’s belief that his dad is Santa Claus. He says, “What about Santa’s reindeer? Have you ever seen a reindeer fly?” Charlie answers, “Yes,” to which Neil responds, “Well, I haven’t.” And here’s Charlie’s faith-filled response. He asks Neil, “Have you ever seen a million dollars?” Neil says, “No.” Then Charlie says, “Just because you can’t see something, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.” Absolutely brilliant!

Okay, let’s come back to our readings today. We know Jesus exits, and we know he will return as he promised, but we don’t know when. To believe, to accept this belief and more importantly to live out this belief in our everyday lives requires faith.

The Israelites in today’s first reading listened to God and prepared the Passover as they waited for deliverance. In the second reading, Abraham left his homeland for the Promised Land even though he didn’t know where it was. They believed that God would be true to his promises. We can do that too!

But faith isn’t just believing. Faith is about acting on what you believe. It’s about taking the steps necessary that flow from your belief. The servants in today’s parable didn’t just believe their master would return. They prepared for his return by lighting the lamps, etc. How can we take steps that flow from our belief in Jesus Christ?

Well, there’s a number of things we can do to be ready. We can go to confession. Now, I know you might say, “Whoa there, deacon! Slow your roll! I don’t need to confess my sins to a man.” Okay, I get it. I live in the shadow of Zwingli and Luther, so I am familiar with the concern. But confession isn’t for the Church and it isn’t about the man – the priest. No, confession, or the Sacrament of Reconciliation, is about you and I consciously, mindfully setting aside time to be honest – brutally honest with ourselves about the sin in our lives – the sins that cause us to turn our backs on God and on other people. These are big sins that rupture our relationships. We call these mortal sins. During confession, we take responsibility for those sins. During confession we verbalize our sins – we say it! We own it! And we ask God to forgive us. Why? So that we can get back on a level playing field – so that we can be healed. In the language of the Church, it’s so that we can be in right relation with God and his creation. That’s why we call it reconciliation. Through the grace of confession, we are reconciled with God and one another.

What else can I do? Go to mass! We are social beings created for one another. So, we need to step out of the comfort of our individual lives and join the community in worship of the God who saves. Through our participation in the mass, we ask God to forgive us for little sins in our lives. We call these venial sins, things like I bit my sister and kicked the cat, or maybe I bit the cat and kicked my sister. Isn’t that awesome? Not the biting or the kicking, but just coming to mass can help me clean the slate.

But God is so generous that the mass – our praise and worship – is not all about him. He sends us home with gifts. In the mass, he feeds us through his Word, through the Scriptures, and then he feeds again, this time with the Word made flesh, that is, Jesus Christ who is made present to us through the Eucharist. The Eucharist is not a symbol.

Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 11:27-29, “Therefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will have to answer for the body and blood of the Lord. A person should examine himself, and so eat the bread and drink the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body, eats and drinks judgment on himself.” We believe the Eucharist is the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus.

Jesus says to us in John’s Gospel 6:54, “…whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” Now that’s just awesome! And these are just a few examples of the myriad of ways we can come to experience God.

But that’s not all! No, through the Sacraments, Jesus offers to heal our wounds and nourish us while we wait for his return. We are not called to be pew potatoes! No! God has blessed us all with gifts – gifts that must be shared. Just like eating bon bons while binge-watching a show, if we don’t use the gifts God gives us, then our spiritual gluttony can leave us feeling like sloths. We need to be active. In today’s parable, the servants didn’t just sit around. They actively prepared for their master’s return so that they would be ready for when ever he might come. The same is true for us.

We are showered with gifts, like talents and abilities, and we are nourished with Scripture and the Eucharist, and our wounds are mended through the grace offered to us in the sacramental life of the Church, like Reconciliation and Anointing, so that we can go out into the world and bring the Good News of Jesus Christ to those who can’t come to church, don’t come to church, or won’t come to church. That’s what discipleship is all about.

Jesus offers us salvation. He offers us eternal life. He offers us a chance to be healed, to learn our true purpose and to live our purpose in this world. So, our task as disciples is to reach out to those who don’t know him, and to invite them to meet Jesus. Sometimes that means talking with our family and our friends and indeed strangers and ask them if they’d like to meet Jesus. Are ready to come to the waters of baptism to be cleansed – to be healed – to be united with God through Christ by the grace of the Holy Spirit, now and forever. All it takes is faith.

Homework!

  1. I suggest we ask ourselves, “Am I practicing active waiting? For example, when was the last time I went to Reconciliation or when was the last time I went to mass?”
  2. We can ask ourselves, “How do I practice active waiting? Do I reach out to share my love for Jesus with others? Or am I a pew potato?”

I think by doing our homework, we can practice our faith as the disciples we are all called to be. Do you got it? Do you get it? Good! May Almighty God bless you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit! +Amen!

Resources:

  1. What is the Holy Eucharist? EWTN Q&A on the Eucharist
  2. Bishop Barron on Catholics Misunderstanding the Eucharist
  3. Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers – My Encounter – Eucharist
  4. Why We Have to Attend Mass and Receive Communion in a State of Grace
  5. Why Non-Catholics Can’t Receive Communion
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The Woman Caught in Adultery

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Fifth Sunday of Lent Readings
First Reading: Isaiah 43:16-21
Psalm: Psalm 126: 1-6
Second Reading: Philippians 3:8-14
Gospel: John 8:1-11

In today’s gospel we hear that familiar story about the woman caught in adultery. They bring her to Jesus while he is in the temple and they demand to know what he thinks should be done with her. Like we briefly discussed last week, today’s Gospel presents a couple of the big kahuna of sins, like adultery. In the language of the Church, we call these mortal sins. Brief side note, why are they called mortal sins? They are mortal sins because they can destroy our relationship with the Lord and His community, like adultery, a mortal sin can shatter a family.

In 1 John 5:16-17, for example, we learn the distinction between sins. John says all sin is bad, but there are some sins that are deadly. Smaller sins or what we Catholics call venial sins wound our relationship with the Lord. Mortal sins ruin or can kill our relationship with God and with His community. To be a mortal sin, the sin must be a grave matter, aka a big kahuna sin. Second, I have to know that it’s a serious sin. Sin is not an accident. Finally, I need to freely chose to do it even though I know it’s a sin. Those are the three characteristics of mortal sins. I have a few links at the bottom of notes that give more information about sins including the Catechism of the Catholic Church and a couple of excellent YouTube videos.

Ok, back to our Gospel today. As usual, there are so many things going on – there is so much texture in this reading alone, not to mention the other two readings and the psalm, that it’s difficult to know where to begin and how much to discuss. So, think about today’s Gospel, let’s start with this: it’s a trap!

The scribes and Pharisees tried to trap Jesus. On one hand, if he in any way refutes the Law, then they could accuse him in front of the Jews as lacking authenticity. How can he be a prophet let alone the Messiah if rejects the Law of Moses – to Law of God? On the other hand, if he affirms the Law and says that indeed, she should be stoned to death, then they can hand him over to the Romans and accuse him of trying to undermine Roman authority by advocating vigilante law. You see, it was against Roman law to kill another person.

Jesus doesn’t buy it.

Instead, he squats down and begins to write in the dirt. Wouldn’t you like to have been a fly on the wall to see what he was doing? Was he just doodling? Or was he writing something? Or was he drawing images that correspond to sins? We don’t know. But instead of falling into the trap, he brilliantly says, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” According to the Gospel, what happens next is that one by one, the crowd starts to dissolve. Then later, he asks her, “‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She replied, ‘No one, sir.’ Then Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more.’”

Now, does this mean that adultery isn’t that big a deal? No, I don’t think that’s what Jesus is saying at all. I think what he is trying to illustrate is that there is another mortal sin going on – the sin of pride. Now pride is said to be the first and most deadly of all sin. Why? Pride as a sin is the irrational belief that you are better than, superior to and more important than others. C.S. Lewis tells us that, “…it was through pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice…” (Mere Christianity, 121). So, perhaps Jesus is teaching us we can’t sin to expose sin. Two wrongs don’t make a right.

But Jesus doesn’t let the woman off the hook. First, he demonstrates God’s mercy by saying he doesn’t condemn her. If she is repentant, then she will be spared. But, he tells her to sin no more. Now this is what repentance is all about. The goal is not just to admit to ourselves, to our family and friends, and to God that we sinned. We need to try not to repeat the same sin.

That’s the point of the Catholic understanding of reconciliation. First, we go to confession to say our sins. Why? Because there is something powerful about admitting out loud that we did something wrong. We take ownership of what we did wrong. Second, we make amends, which is to say we try to make it up to God, our families and our friends. Third, and this is key, we commit to try not to repeat the same sin.

The great lure of sin is that it traps us in a never-ending cycle of sin. How many of find that we keep repeating the same sins over and over and over again? So, the goal of reconciliation is to try to commit to sin no more. Lent is wonderful time to come to terms with the things we’ve done wrong in our lives that have damaged our relationship with God, or family and our friends. In the Catholic tradition, this is an excellent time to experience the Sacrament of Reconciliation and experience the grace of God’s mercy and forgiveness.

Homework! Reflecting on the Gospel today, I encourage you to consider the following two questions in this week as we make our way to Palm Sunday:

  1. Have you ever experienced the feeling that were so right and someone else was so wrong that it didn’t matter to you what you did to prove it? What does today’s Gospel tell us about that?
  2. When was the last time you experienced the healing grace of God’s mercy and forgiveness? Maybe it’s time to go to Reconciliation.

I hope that doing our homework this week will help us take the focus off ourselves and open us to God’s mercy and love. May Almighty God bless you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. +Amen!

Resources:
• Catechism of the Catholic Church 1846-1876 on sin
• Bishop Robert Barron: “Seven Deadly Sins; Seven Lively Virtues”
• Fr. Mike Schmitz: “Mortal vs. Venial Sin”

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Witnessing to the Authority of Jesus

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Image of Jesus driving out demons. A scared person is seen leaning over in struggle as a demon is forced out of him

Mass Readings

Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time
January 28, 2018
Reading 1 – Deuteronomy 18:15-20
Psalm – Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 7-9
Reading 2 – 1 Corinthians 7:32-35
Gospel – Mark 1:21-28

If you were to enter into your search browser today’s gospel, Mark 1:21-28 and the word “authority”, you would see a whole list of commentaries on Scripture from all kinds of different preachers. You’d see one written by a Baptist preacher. You would probably see several from evangelical preachers. You’d find Anglican and Catholic commentaries. If you were to survey those commentaries, they would agree on this point: that today’s Gospel tells us that all authority and power has been given to Jesus Christ. Well duh! Right?

I am a disciple of Jesus. We are all disciples of Jesus. That means we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. We want to learn more about Jesus, and we want to go out into the world to share the Good News – to be what Pope Francis describes as missionary disciples. So I believe it! I believe Jesus has authority. I believe that Jesus is the fulfillment of our first reading in Deuteronomy about one who would come after Moses.

So why, if we all believe Jesus has authority, does Holy Mother Church give us these readings today? They aren’t trying to fill up pages between Christmas and Lent. No! Holy Mother Church is challenging us with today’s readings. How do we live a life in witness to the faith?

What are some of the reasons they do that? I’m overwhelmed by stories from my own children and in stories I’ve heard from other youth here are St. John Vianney over the last several years, about the number of aggressively atheist teachers they encounter. They’re aggressive because they don’t keep their opinions to themselves. NO. They try to work their idea that God does not exist into any lesson – it could be math, science, language arts, Spanish – it doesn’t matter. They are going to work that in.

That plus social media, the content we get through television and streaming services, and pornography bombard people in an effort to desensitize us and to confuse our understanding of right from wrong. They do that by making the individual the center of the universe. You can do anything you want as long as it doesn’t bother me, right? The culture trains us to harden our hearts, like we heard in the Psalm. What’s a parent to do? How do we keep our children engaged. I think there are many things we could try. Let’s talk about three.

First, we need to remind ourselves that we are not alone. Our faith teaches us that we are a community, so we should be able to share with each other and to lean on one another for help. “Have you gone through this before?” “How did you handle that?” “Let me bounce this idea off of you.” We need to be comfortable to share with one another. Don’t be nervous and think you’re the only one going through it. Don’t think someone is going to say, “I knew you were weird!” No one is going to say that and if they do, shame on them! If you’re new to the parish, that’s ok. Come to one of our social events like the upcoming Mardi Gras casino night or the Knights of Columbus Fish Fry. Those are great opportunities to start to build relationships within the parish so we can share with one another.

We can also look to the wisdom in our own families. So many families are blessed to have grandparents and even great grandparents with them still. We need to turn to our family and ask their opinions and at a minimum ask them to pray for us. I can’t tell you how many times when my grandmother was alive and I would call her and say, “Welita! Would you light a candle for me or would you light a candle for my family?” Remember, you are not alone.

Catholic schools also give us an opportunity to bridge the gap between confirmation and adulthood. I’m not saying that Catholic school children don’t get into mischief. As a kid, I got into quite a bit of mischief while attending Catholic schools. So that’s not what I’m saying. What’s the difference then One of the difference is that our Catholic schools do a really good job at exposing our youth to the radical love of God and they remind our children that no matter what they do, or whatever is going on in their lives or at home, they-are-loved. That’s a powerful, countercultural message. Maybe if some of the youth involved in the shootings this week had had that connection to the love and hope of Jesus, maybe some tragedies could have been avoided.

This week we celebrate Catholic schools week and it’s a great opportunity for families to reassess the role Catholic education plays in the lives of our families. Go out in the Narthex, get some information and maybe sign up for a campus tour. This is a good time to not only compare the academics, but also the non-academic benefits of a Catholic education.

The third thing we can do and this is perhaps more challenging is to reflect on our own discipleship. Do I live a life in witness to the authority of Jesus? Do my family and friends see me come to church, but behave completely different outside? For example, do I come here and say, “all are welcome”, but at lunch or dinner, do I disparage the poor, the immigrant or the refugee? If there’s one strength our youth have its sniffing out hypocrisy – especially in the parents – never among their friends – but especially in the parents. Right? So we need to challenge ourselves. How do I live my faith?

Do my family and friends hear me talk about the struggle of living my everyday life with my faith? Do I let them see me fall down and by the grace of God pick myself back up? Do my kids hear me say to my wife, “I’m sorry,” even when I’m not sure what I did wrong this time? Do my family and friends see me go to confession because in confession I don’t just glibly say, “I’m sorry.” I have list my sins. I say it! I have to own it! Then I ask for forgiveness. A friend of mine reminded me just this week about the healing power of the Act of Contrition. The next time you go, I encourage you to pray that prayer mindfully, especially that first line: O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended you. Do my family and friends see me avail myself of the great healing power in the sacrament of reconciliation? Do they see me come to mass where I am nourished by the Word of God and then I come to receive the body, the blood, the soul and the divinity of Jesus in the Eucharist so that after mass I go out into the world that denies the authority of Jesus?

Maybe if I live my life of discipleship better, people might have an encounter with Jesus Christ. That’s the challenge of today’s Gospel. If I live my life that way, maybe some family and friends will say, “What’s going on over there? You’ve got a lot on your plate, but you don’t seemed stressed or unhappy. Tell me what that’s about.” That’s your opportunity to share. You can say, look, authority out there is all about me. It’s about my power, my money. If I want more money, then I need get more authority and more power. That’s the rat race. But the rat race will never satisfy you. That only creates anxiety, the anxiety we heard about in First Corinthians. How do I treat that anxiety? Maybe after work one day I just go out with my buddies and get hammered. If that doesn’t work, maybe I’ll buy some pot. If that doesn’t work, maybe I’ll watch pornography to help me relax. But it’s a lie! None of those things can fill the hole inside! Only the radical love of Jesus Christ can fill that hole! We want to help people have an experience of God’s love so that they realize that God says to us, “I love you so much and want you to be with me forever that I allowed my son to sacrifice himself for you.” That’s how Jesus exercises his authority – not for himself, but for you and for me. That’s the challenge of our Gospel today. Do I live my life in witness to the authority of Jesus so that others might have an encounter; an encounter that leads to transformation; transformation that might bring our babies home.

That has to be the way that I start preaching to my family, not on my authority – not because I’m Deacon Rudy – but by the authority of Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior I live of a life of faith and love. Amen? Amen! That’s how we start facilitating an encounter with Jesus. Because the world offers them a different image. Do whatever you want now. But it’s an empty promise that leads to anxiety – That’s my opportunity. You see, the way authority is exercised in the world out there – all too often it’s about wealth and power. How do I get ahead in the world? But the authority of Jesus is based on radical love.

Homework! There are two things I ask of us to consider as we prepare for Lent. Perhaps we can try these exercises from now through the end of Lent. Maybe come here for the Stations of the Cross on Friday night, then go the Knights of Columbus fish fry, and add these two exercises to your prayer.

  1. First, ask yourself in your prayer, “How do I live my faith? Do my family and friends see me live out my faith or is my faith life the best kept secret in the house?” If it’s a secret, then part two of that is to ask for the grace to share your faith.
  2. Second, lift up in prayer by name any of your family and friends who have fallen away from the faith. Maybe say something like, “Loving Father, I lift up to you my son X, my goddaughter Y and my uncle Z. Wash them in the blood of Jesus. Protect them and bring them home.”

Maybe if we do these two exercises, they might help us hone our discipleship so that we can witness to the authority of Jesus in our everyday life.

Do you got it? Do you get it? Are you going to do it? Good! Through the intercession of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, may we all come to know and to serve Jesus. In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen!

To listen to the homily recorded during mass, click here. If for some reason the link does not work or stops working, in your browser search for St. John Vianney Catholic Church in Round Rock, Texas, and click the link. Once there, in the search bar type “homilies” which should take you to a list of all the homily recordings archived on our website. Peace!