Thirteenth Sunday - 2019

"As they were going along the road, someone said to Jesus,  “I will follow you wherever you go.”  It’s true to say fewer and fewer are saying that today. Our being here today suggest we are trying to say I will follow you Lord, but do we fully appreciate the implications of what we are saying? Jesus wants us to come and follow – but also to understand the implications of saying I will – there will be a cost and it’s important that we understand what that cost entails. So in the gospel passage today Jesus gives us three lessons on what “following Jesus” really means. LESSON #1:  As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” This world is not our true home – we are just passing through to somewhere else – we’re going home. True we need shelter, food and clothing, and other necessities of life – but we must not over pack. If we make these things the centre of our heart’s desire; bigger and better houses, more and more wealth to purchase things to make us happy; in short, to make here and now the goal of our hearts, Jesus and time and eternity will pass us by and we end up being left behind come eternity. LESSON #2. To another Jesus said, “Follow me.” But he replied, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” But Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” The culture we live in and the expectations and demands it places upon its own must always take second place to what our true vocation in life really is; living a holy life and being a witness to a higher calling, God’s Kingdom of heaven. Our culture is now dominated by a secular world view – secular culture makes the rules – but our lives must always challenge these secular values by the way we live by the Word of God, not the worlds. LESSON #3.  Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts a hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”  Simply put, half a Catholic just won’t do. Today’s society champions the right to choose, to choose what you like, what attracts you, what you say is right for you. To each his own. More and more we see religious people apply this way of thinking to their religious life. “I like to go to Mass once and a while, but not every Sunday, it’s a busy world, I have so much to do – family, friends, obligations others expect of me.” “And the Church has some good suggestions for living but there are too many doctrines and dogmas to accept. After all, I have the right to choose what I will do with my life.” This is the way of thinking of a divided heart. "No one can serve two masters, because either he will hate one and love the other or be loyal to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and (the world) riches!" Mtt. 6:24.  Let us take these three lessons to heart today – let us ask how well we understand their implications for our lives.

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Corpus Christi

Two months ago, in the liturgy of Holy Thursday we celebrated the institution of the Sacred Eucharist, the Mass. Today’s feast of Corpus Christi, was established to create a feast focused solely on the Holy Eucharist emphasizing the joy of the Eucharist being the body and blood of Jesus Christ through the mystery of Transubstantiation. The origins of this feast began in Liège, a Belgium city, toward the end of the 12thcentury. In the city there were groups of women, known as the Norbertine canonesses, who lived together and devoted their lives to prayer and to charitable works. One of them, Juliana of Liège, had a vision of Christ in which she was instructed to plead for the institution of the feast of Corpus Christi. The vision was repeated for the next 20 years but she kept it a secret. When she eventually relayed it to her confessor, he relayed it to the bishop. So in 1246 the Bishop ordered a celebration of Corpus Christi to be held in the diocese each year thereafter on the Thursday after Trinity Sunday. Pope Pius V revised the General Roman Calendar and Corpus Christi was one of only two "feasts of devotion" that he kept, the other being Trinity Sunday and it remains to this day. This feast is all about the real and true presences of Jesus, body, soul, and divinity in the elements of the Eucharist. This has been a part of the Church’s belief beginning from the Last Supper but understanding just how this happens has been a developing work over time.  The Fourth Council of the Lateran in 1215 spoke of the bread and wine as "transubstantiated" into the body and blood of Christ and this was later elaborated on by St. Thomas Aquinas, as well as other medieval theologians. In the end in remains a Divine mystery to our understanding. Martin Luther was not a fan of the Feast of corpus Christi. He wrote: "I am to no festival more hostile ... than this one. Because it is the most shameful festival. At no festival are God and his Christ more blasphemed, than on this day, and particularly by the procession. For then people are treating the Blessed Sacrament with such ignominy that it becomes only play-acting and is just vain idolatry." He also rejected the theology of transubstantiation. So what of this mystery of the real presence today and devotions to the Blessed Sacrament? Many remember the time when Mass could not be said after 12 noon. So during Lent, on Wed. Fri. and Sun. evenings devotions with benediction of the blessed sacrament was norm. Exceptions to this restriction began with Pope Pius XII, and with the new liturgy of the 60’s evening mass was common. So in Lent Mass replaced devotions in most parishes. The Mass and the reception Holy Communion rightfully hold the highest place in our devotion, but other forms of Eucharistic devotion have an important place in deepening our communion with Christ. At the heart of today’s feast of Corpus Christi is the wondrous mystery of Jesus’ real presence, body, soul, and divinity in the elements of the Eucharist. May we never lose sight of this. May our devotion to this mystery grow ever stronger.

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St. Cyprian On the Our Father

St. Cyprian, a Church Father was bishop of Carthage and a notable Early Christian writer of Berber descent, many of whose Latin works are extant. He was born around the beginning of the 3rd century in North Africa, perhaps at Carthage, where he received a classical education. Martyred September 14, 258 AD, Carthage, Tunisia The following is a link to St. Cyprian's treatise on the Our Father. This treatise is read in the Office of Readings this week. Here is the ***LINK***

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Trinity Sunday

When you look back on the history of the human race you find that in every age people understood well that everything that exists must have had a creator; every age that is except this age. Within the scientism of our age there are those who insist that everything in the universe just spontaneously happened on its own. However, knowing who the creator of all things, who is called God, truly is has been a long work in progress. History is full of gods that man put forward to describe who God is; some of whom are still today thought of as true gods. Knowing who God is, is impossible for mere humans to discover on their own. As his first letter, John points out “that no one can see God”. God, who is beyond sight, must reveal Himself to us. And so, our Jewish-Christian tradition has been that long historical experience of God revealing who he is to us. First God is seen as having the nature of a father, the giver and protector of all life. Then in the New Testament, Jesus is revealed as the Son of God. Finally, Jesus reveals that there is a third person, the Holy Spirit, who comes to take us up into the very life of God. In the early generations of the Church, these revelations were pondered and studied, not without conflicting opinions. Then, in the year 325 AD, that is Anno Domini, the year of the Lord, not of the Common Era; the bishops of the Church gathered in the City of Nicaea to discuss and define who God truly is. From this Council of Nicaea we now have the Nicaean Creed in which we profess our faith. In 1 John 4: we read: Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you will know the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming, and is already in the world at this time. Today the big problem facing Christianity has more to do with whether God exists at all. Atheism is strong today. John continues: Little children, let no one deceive you: The one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as Christ is righteous. The one who practices sin is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the very start. This is why the Son of God was revealed, to destroy the works of the devil. vs. 7-8 Little children, let us love not in word and speech, but in action and truth. And by this we will know that we belong to the truth, and will assure our hearts in His presence: If our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our hearts, and He knows all things. vs. 18-19

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Pentecost - 2019

Through  the sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation we are given the gift of the Holy Spirit. Unlike the tongues of flame of Pentecost, the sacramental signs that indicate to us that the graces have been given are: +Laying On of Hands +Water +Anointing with Oil. For many people these sacraments are separated in time; such as baptism as infants and confirmation in the teen years. As Pope John Paul II taught in his  APOSTOLIC EXHORTATION, ON CATECHESIS IN OUR TIME (#19), the graces of the sacraments remain with us, as it were, in potential, awaiting our response and cooperation. I have seen many people, myself included, experience the awakening of the grace of the sacraments while participating in special circumstances like retreats, renewal movements etc. In the case of the Charismatic Renewal movement, this awakening was often accompanied by the classic manifestations referred to in the scriptures. The Feast of Pentecost is a most appropriate opportunity for us to seek such renewal and the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. Pope John XXIII opened the Second Vatican Council with a prayer interceding for a [ "New Pentecost within the Church" ]. The renewal movements that followed in the 70's, often referred to their experience as receiving the "Grace of Renewal". Baptism of the Holy Spirit is a major feature in many of the Posts in this blog. Use [ Search This Blog ] on the side panel to get links to these earlier references. The Page: [ Special Series Index Page ] links to a thirteen post series on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.  The Page [ Prayer for the Baptism of the Holy Spirit ] addresses this directly. The focus of the feast of Pentecost is often centred on the gifts of the Holy Spirit: the 7 gifts enumerated in Isaiah Ch. 11 or the 9 Gifts listed in 1 Cor. 12:  – and there are the fruits of the Spirit. But our first focus of Pentecost is on the person of the Holy Spirit and the radical transformation that happens to us when we receive the Holy Spirit into our beings. In Gal. 2: Paul describes it in this way.  “I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. And that which I now live in the flesh, I live through faith from the Son of God, the One having loved me and having given up Himself for me.” A new Spirit has taken over as the living principle animating what was once my doing alone. This is what is called “the Life of the Spirit” – the spiritual life. St. Paul lays out the nature of this new Life in the Spirit for us in Romans 8. “Before the indwelling of the Holy Spirit it was my bodily needs and worldly desire that are controlling my life.” But with the coming of the Spirit that all changes. In verse 9: Paul tells us.  “You, however, are controlled not by the flesh, but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet the Spirit gives you life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you." Rom. 8: In Gal. 5:16 Paul describes this in more detail: “So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh craves what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are opposed to each other, so that you do not do what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery; idolatry and sorcery; hatred, discord, jealousy, and rage; rivalries, divisions, factions, and envy; drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”  “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us walk in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying one another.” The following are some prayers of the liturgies for Pentecost. Vigil Mass Grant, we pray, almighty God, that the splendor of your glory may shine forth upon us and that, by the bright rays of the Holy Spirit, the light of your light may confirm the hearts of those born again by your grace. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Prayer after Communion May these gifts we have consumed benefit us, O Lord, that we may always be aflame with the same Spirit, whom you wondrously poured out on your Apostles. Through Christ our Lord. Pentecost Day, Prayer O God, who by the mystery of today’s great feast sanctify your whole Church in every people and nation, pour out, we pray, the gifts of the Holy Spirit across the face of the earth and, with the divine grace that was at work when the Gospel was first proclaimed, fill now once more the hearts of believers. Preface It is truly right and just, our duty and our salvation, always and everywhere to give you thanks, Lord, holy Father, almighty and eternal God. For, bringing your Paschal Mystery to completion, you bestowed the Holy Spirit today on those you made your adopted children by uniting them to your Only Begotten Son. This same Spirit, as the Church came to birth, opened to all peoples the knowledge of God and brought together the many languages of the earth in profession of the one faith. Therefore, overcome with paschal joy, every land, every people exults in your praise and even the heavenly Powers, with the angelic hosts, sing together the unending hymn of your glory, as they acclaim: Prayer after Communion O God, who bestow heavenly gifts upon your Church, safeguard, we pray, the grace you have given, that the gift of the Holy Spirit poured out upon her may retain all its force and that this spiritual food may gain her abundance of eternal redemption.

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Pentecost Novena

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