Category: homilies

When I was in Israel many years ago, I stood among the ruins of the city of Megiddo, looking over the Valley of Jezreel.  The town had been there since 7000 BC, strategically placed on a hill that overlooked the opening of a narrow pass on the ancient routes connecting Egypt to the south and […]

“Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, “You lack one thing;  go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.” [Gospel – 28th Sunday Ordinary Time, Year B] What must I do to inherit eternal life? The young man’s question is […]

Is there a lesson hidden in the readings today? In our Gospel, we hear about John coming up to Jesus and saying to him, “Lord, we found somebody using your name, the name of the Messiah, to cast out demons, and we told him not to do it. You must tell him not to do it.” Well, you can understand John, because […]

When the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the […]

John 6:24-35 So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum looking for Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?” Jesus answered them, “Very truly, I tell […]

When we look up at the sky and see the sun, we don’t really see the sun.  We see the sun as it existed about 8 minutes ago.  It takes the light that long to reach us. When we look up at the heavens and see the lights of the stars, we are not really […]

This weekend we celebrate Father’s Day.  If truth be told, Father’s day is for me a day of reflections.  Some of that is about my own father, who died when I was only 22.  Some of the reflections are about the people who have been models of fatherhood for me in my journey through life.  But mostly, it […]

Sixth Sunday of Easter (B) | Acts 10.25-26,34-35,44-48 | Psalm 98 | 1John 4.7-10 | John 15.9-17 One of the things that has helped me get through this past year, and its times of seclusion and separation, has been to rediscover some of the simpler joys in my life.  One of those is music.  At a time […]

One week ago, we celebrated an event that rivals the creation of the entire universe. For just as the infinite vastness we know as creation grew from tiniest speck, just as all of the forms of matter and energy came into being from nothing…. Just as all of the physical, chemical, and biological elements had their […]

The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle.  He also poured out […]

The word of the Lord came to Jonah, saying,  Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.”  So Jonah set out and went to Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly large city, a three days’ walk across.  Jonah began to […]

I wasn’t a cradle-Catholic.   Growing up, Christmas for me was a time to give and receive presents, and spend time with family. See the nephews play with new toys.  Enjoy a family Christmas dinner. There wasn’t much of Christ or church in the day.  That religious stuff was what religious folk did.  And that was OK […]

This Sunday is called Gaudette Sunday ….. from the latin meaning rejoice. Our theme for this third week of advent is Joy. Its why the candle is pink.  As are our vestments. This theme of Joy may however, seem a bit strange. The last two weeks we’ve heard some pretty stark words from John the baptist about end […]

July came to visit us this week. It was a short visit … just a couple of days, and to celebrate her arrival, I went on a walk in the Rouge forest. Not just any walk. It was a special walk. A prayer walk. A slow sauntering, with senses alive to see, smell, hear, and […]

Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God, what is God’s. I think many of us think about this passage in two ways.  The first is that Jesus was a pretty smart guy.  He saw the trap that was being laid for him, and skillfully, brilliantly, he not only answered the pharisees question, but created in it an […]

Who do you say that I am? In every age since the first followers of Jesus made their profession of faith in him, men and women of faith have had to come to terms with who Jesus is and what Jesus means to them.  Christians of every age have had to answer the question: “Who do you say I am?” and each generation […]

Jesus put before them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the […]

Sometimes when we look at night into the vastness of the stars in the sky, we can get a sense that the universe we live in is so immense that we can’t help but feel small and insignificant. Even our solar system, as vast as it is, is but a grain of sand in an […]