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homily – January 27

Sunday, January 27th, 2008

Matthew 4:12-23

In today’s gospel Matthew tells of how Jesus began His public life. From the very beginning it was troubled. Herod had beheaded John. Nazareth was not a safe place so Jesus went beyond the Jordan to Capernaum and made his home there. As usual Matthew sees in this decision a fulfillment of the words of Isaiah about people who walked in darkness seeing the great light.

Matthew’s description of how Jesus called Peter and Andrew, John and James seems a bit unreal. Can’t you just hear Peter’s wife saying, “What do you mean you’re going to join a wandering rabbi? You get back in that fishing boat; you have a family to feed.” I can imagine Zebedee saying the same things to John and Andrew, ‘there’s no way you’re taking off and leaving me alone, get back to mending these nets.’ These were all practical people living with practical people. These men weren’t with Jesus 24/7.

But it was from Capernaum Jesus began his long journey to Jerusalem. He travelled from town to town, city to city teaching in synagogues, proclaiming the good news of God’s love for all people, calling people back to God, giving them the encouraging news God’s kingdom was near, even in their midst.

We’ve heard many times before about the expectations of the people about a liberating Messiah who would expel the occupying Romans and establish a new kingdom. They would be ruled by their own. We’ve heard of how disappointed many people were when they realized this was not what Jesus was about. As Jesus told Pilate, “my kingdom is not of this world”. I’m not about power and force and domination. In the end the Roman soldiers made a joke of this kingdom by crowning Jesus with thorns, dressing him in mock purple and offering Him an empty reed as His scepter.

What is this kingdom of God? We pray every day ‘thy kingdom come’ but what are we praying for? I think the kingdom Christ came to establish is best described in the preface of the Mass of Christ the King. It is to be an eternal and universal kingdom, a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace.

Looking at the world around us, beginning with our own city and country we can see how far removed we are from such a kingdom. We see the ravages of useless wars, we hear of millions upon millions of uprooted peoples. We know that poverty, injustice and exploitation are part and parcel of people’s lives.

Remember the song, ‘let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me’? We can apply that same thought to our prayer, ‘thy kingdom come’. When we pray the Our Father and pray those words, could we mean to say – thy kingdom come to that part of me which has yet to be redeemed – thy kingdom come to that part of my life, my relationships, my family life, my work situation, my social involvement – which is lacking in justice, love and peace. Could we mean, Thy kingdom come to that part of my relationship with God, which hesitates or fears the holiness and grace to which God calls me. Could we mean thy kingdom come to anything in my life which holds me back following Christ with the same willingness and generosity of Andrew and Peter, James and John?

As we continue to celebrate this Mass we pray for ourselves and for each other that every time we pray the Our Father we will have the willingness to mean what we say when we pray, ‘thy kingdom come”. May the truth and life, the holiness and grace, the justice love and peace of thy kingdom come – and let it begin with me.



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homily – January 20

Sunday, January 20th, 2008

John 1:29-34

John’s gospel begins and ends with the image of a lamb. Why a lamb? A lamb is a soft and cuddling image. For Jewish people a lamb was a symbol of sacrifice. Lambs were sacrificed in the temple as expiation for sins. John the Baptist points to Jesus as ‘the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” At every Passover thousands of lambs were slaughtered in the temple to expiate, atone for the sins of the people. Near the end of John’s gospel he tells of the real Lamb of God being sacrificed on the altar of the cross even while lambs were being sacrificed in the temple. All the lambs sacrificed in the temple had no effect while the lamb sacrificed on Calvary was the saving sacrifice that took away the sins of the world – on Him was laid the chastisement of us all and by his wounds we are healed. Just as the Jews, while slaves in Egypt, were saved by the blood of the lamb splashed on their doorposts, so we are saved by the blood of the human lamb of God, Jesus the Christ.

There was a book out a number of years ago titled, “Whatever Happened to Sin?” The seniors among us can remember the days when everything was sin – miss Mass on a Sunday, we were hell bound. Eat meat on Friday, we were hell bound. Any violation of the church’s teaching on sexual matters, we were hell bound.

I remember years ago a father was after his teenage son about missing Mass on a Sunday. To the teenager it was not big deal; to the father it was a mortal sin. The son asked the father, ‘what’s a mortal sin’? People around my age knew what a mortal sin was; everything seemed to be a mortal sin.

St. Paul tells us that where sin abounded grace did more abound. Hopefully today we are more aware of and open to the grace of God that surrounds us – we have a more positive attitude toward God and our relationship with God.

That doesn’t mean we can close our eyes to the reality of sin in our lives and in the society that shapes our lives. In the United Church they have a prayer that would be something like our act of contrition. It prays, ‘for the sins we know, for the sins we do not know and for the sins that do not bother us.’ These are the ones to watch out for, the sins that do not bother us. Our ways of living, ways of speaking to others, ways of relating to family members and others that have become so much a part of us that we loose the sense of how far they are removed from the way Christ would have us live and love.

Every one of us has some form of bigotry or prejudice in us, though we don’t want to admit it. We feel resentment, we are annoyed by ‘these people’ from other lands, other cultures, other faiths that come to Canada and won’t fit in, won’t be assimilated into Canadian ways. We find ourselves thinking, if not saying, ‘if they don’t like the way things are here, let them go back to where they came from.’ We fail to see that this is a sin that does not bother us.

As citizens of Toronto we are caught in a sin that does not bother us when we are not bothered by the men, women and children who live in poverty in this city, when we are not bothered by the homeless of this city, when we are not bothered by the working poor in this city. We are caught in a sin that does not bother us when we find ourselves blaming the victims of poverty and homelessness. If they weren’t so lazy they’d find jobs.

We may find ourselves caught in a sin that does not bother us when we come face to face with our latent racism; our inability or our unwillingness to accept and respect men and women of other races. We fail to see them as our brothers and sisters in Christ.

I was at a talk with some other priests this past Thursday given by a woman from Catholic Family Services. She talked about family violence, violence toward wives and mothers, violence toward children, violence toward seniors. The statistics were shocking. In too many families verbal, physical and psychological abuse is a sin that does not bother the abuser while it destroys the abused. Another form of family violence in which we are all involved is the abuse we heap on Mother Earth by our consumerism, wastefulness and our exploitation of the limited resources of Earth. What we do to the earth we do to ourselves.

This is all heavy stuff. I must sound like the old time missionary bounding the pulpit and telling you, you are all going to hell.

But sin is a fact in all our lives. St. John says, ‘if anyone says they have no sin, they are a liar and the truth is not in them.’ We all have to face the sins we know, the sins we do not know and face the sins that do not bother us. Then we open our lives to the Lamb of God who takes away our sins. We trust the truth, by his wounds we are healed, his is the chastisement that makes us whole. We trust the truth, that for all our sins and failings, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ.

As we continue to celebrate this Mass, and prepare to receive the Lamb of God Who we trust He will take away our sins, the sins we know, and the sins we do not know. We pray too He will help us discover and face the sins that do not bother us.



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homily – January 13

Sunday, January 13th, 2008

Matthew 3:13-17

Pope John 23rd died on November 23rd, 1961. At his funeral a few days later, Cardinal Suenens of Belgium preached the homily. He told the hundreds of thousands who watched that funeral, “the most important day of this man’s life was not the day he was elected pope, nor was it the day he was named a cardinal, nor was it the day he was ordained a bishop, nor was it the day he was ordained a priest. The most important day of this good man’s life was the day he was baptized.”

Baptism is the foundation of our lives as Christians. It empowers us to receive all the other sacraments. Our baptism is our birthing in our life with God. When talking about baptism some people will say, ‘we’ve got to get the kid done.’ Something like, ‘stamped for the dance’. Our baptism was not a one shot deal, it was the beginning of our life long process of growing in grace before God and others. Our baptism was the beginning of our life time process of growing to full maturity in Christ. We live our baptism every day of our lives.

As St. Paul tells us, at our baptism the Spirit of God was poured into our hearts and in that Spirit we have the boldness to call God, Father/Mother. In that Spirit we have the boldness to approach the throne of grace with confidence, trusting that our Father/Mother loves us more than we love ourselves, knows us better than we know ourselves and will be with us through all the joys and sorrows of our lives.

In the gospel we see Jesus waiting in line to be baptized by John. John is shocked when he sees Jesus and tries to prevent the ritual. “I need to be baptized by you and you come to me.” But Jesus didn’t want special treatment; He was one of many waiting His turn. Matthew tells of what happened when Jesus came up out of the water, “the heavens were open to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And this voice from heaven saying, “This is my son, the beloved, with whom I am well pleased.”

This voice was for Jesus only. It was His epiphany, His coming to a consciousness He never had before, a deep consciousness of His relationship with the Father. He is the beloved son with whom the Father is well pleased. In a way these same words were said over us at our baptisms – this is my beloved daughter, my beloved son with whom I am well please.

If we are in any way conscious of how deeply we are loved by God, then God’s love evokes our mutual love for God. Jesus heard this voice of love ‘this is my beloved son’ and then left for the desert to prepare Himself to give His whole life to God in gratitude. If we could truly appreciate God’s love for each of us, a love proven beyond doubt in the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus – we would do our best to live our lives in thankfulness to the God Who loves us.

Just a word about our second reading and the words of Peter,’ I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to God.’ There are three forms of baptism; baptism by water, baptism by blood, and baptism of desire. We were all baptized by water. In the early years of the church people who were under instruction for baptism but who died for their faith were considered to have been baptized in their own blood. Anyone who fears God, not fear as we usually think of it, but fear as a reverence and an awe of God as he/she knows God, and does what is right, receives the baptism of desire. The fact is the most common form of baptism is that of desire given to good people of all faiths as they do their best to love and serve God as they know God.

As we continue to celebrate this feast of the baptism of Jesus we are brought back to our own baptisms – which most of us don’t even remember. St. Paul tells us that before the world began God chose us in Christ to be His adopted sons and daughters, to be God’s own. As Jesus had His own epiphany at His baptism when He became deeply conscious of His relationship with Father, may each of us be blest to have our own epiphany of knowing that we are loved by God, we are God’s own. May each of us live our lives in such a way that the Father may say of us; this is my beloved daughter, my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased.



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homily – January 6

Sunday, January 6th, 2008

Matthew 2:1-12

A number of years ago a young fellow I know came home from school on his 16th birthday carrying all his text books. He went to the trash can, kicked it open and dropped all the books into it. Then he announced to his parents his schooling days were over. Legally he could leave school – he was never going back, it was a waste of time. Needless to say there was a family discussion with a lot of shouting. In the end he won out. His mother and father could not convince him of his need to finish high school

For the next couple of years he worked at a number of Joe jobs. He didn’t make enough to pay a reasonable rent. One job, in a warehouse, lasted for a year and a half. One day during lunch break he looked around at men much older than himself. He looked at them, good men all, and it dawned on him, this is my future. Many of his high school friends had gone on to college or university; he was still working in a warehouse.

He got up, walked into the office and told his boss he was quitting. Then he went up to the Finch Campus of Seneca College and asked to see a student counselor. Hours later when he left the counselor’s office he had a whole course of studies lined up and he started classes the next day. Of course he went home from Seneca and asked his mother and father why they didn’t make him stay in high school. It was their entire fault.

On that day, on that lunch break, in that warehouse this young man had an epiphany – an insight, a revelation about himself and the value of education for him. He’s never looked back.

Today we celebrate the feast of the Epiphany – the feast of the Maritimers because as Matthew tells us, the wise ones came from the East.

As you’ve heard before, the communities for whom Matthew wrote his gospel were basically Jewish men and women who believed Jesus was the Messiah. They were seen by family and friends as traitors to their ancient faith. They were persecuted for their faith. As these communities grew and as the teaching of Jesus spread from country to country, non Jews came to believe in Jesus and became members of the community. For many Jewish Christians this was a problem. They, the Jews, were God’s people. Time and time again they read in their scriptures, “I will be your God and you will be My people.” They believed this promise was for themselves alone. They resented these Gentiles, these intruders. Years after the death and resurrection of Jesus these communities had their epiphany, their insight into the mercy and love of God. That epiphany is described in the story of these holy and searching strangers from the east, looking for this new born king of the Jews, wanting to pay him homage. They represented all those non Jews who searched for the life and the love of God, made visible in Jesus the Christ and experienced in these Christian communities.

This epiphany that God’s love embraced all people spread throughout the Christian communities everywhere. St. Peter, after his encounter with the Roman Cornelius, expressed it when he wrote, “the truth I have come to realize is this, that any person of any nationality who does what is right, is acceptable to God.’ In one of the earliest pieces of scripture we have, Paul’s letter to the Christian community of Ephesus, we read his way of expressing this epiphany, “in former generations, namely, in our past history, this mystery was not made known to humanity as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; that is, the Gentiles, all non Jews, have become fellow heirs, members of the same body and sharers in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel” – through the telling of the good news.

This insight, this revelation that God’s love embraces any person of any nationality is an insight Christian communities often lost sight of throughout history. Outside the church there is no salvation – which church, the Roman Catholic Church, the Orthodox Churches, the Anglican Church, and the Protestant Churches. We have a sad history of religious wars, of forced conversions. We have failed to see the faith, love and goodness that vitalize non Christian religions. Thank God, in our time, we are more in touch with the real meaning of this feast of the epiphany – that any person of any nationality, who does what is right, is acceptable to God.

The tragic example of the Taliban and their fanatic, limited understanding of Islam and the teachings of the Prophet show the world how disastrous and evil religious fanaticism can become. But throughout our own history we’ve had our own versions of the Taliban.

Prejudices such as racism, sexism, homophobia, are proofs that as an individual or as a community we still need an epiphany – an embracing of the truth that we are all brothers and sisters before God, that any person of any nationality who does what is right is acceptable to God.

I’ve mentioned before that this ‘green church’ is meant to make green people. We all need an epiphany that opens our minds and hearts to the truth – earth does not belong to us, we belong to the earth and what we do to the earth we do to ourselves. In the book of Genesis and the story of Noah and the ark we read that when the flood subsided and Noah stood once again on solid ground, God showed him a rainbow in the sky and told Noah, “Here is the sign of the covenant I make between myself and you and every living creature to be found with you for all generations to come. I set my bow in the sky and it will be sign of the Covenant between me and the earth.” This is an ancient covenant the human family has failed to keep. Every day we read in the papers or hear on TV of the crisis conditions which our life styles, our consumerism, our wastefulness have inflicted on the planet. As members of the human family we need an epiphany, an awakening, which brings us to a critical mass of consciousness which convinces us of our need to change if the planet is to be healed.

As we continue to celebrate this great feast may we be blessed to enter into the wonder of this epiphany which teaches that God’s love and salvation are for all people – that any person of any nationality who does what is right is acceptable to God – and should be acceptable to us. May we be blessed with an epiphany that helps us understand our oneness with all God’s creation and live our rainbow covenant with the earth community with deep respect for all God’s good creation.



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homily – December 30

Sunday, December 30th, 2007

Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23

Today we celebrate the beautiful feast of the Holy Family. I mention this every year that religious, pious art has really distorted the harsh reality of the life of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. In today’s gospel we see them as a refugee family, fleeing for their very lives into a strange country. We know that when they eventually returned to Nazareth Joseph struggled to make a living as a carpenter, teaching Jesus the trade. We all know the story of Jesus disappearing for three days in Jerusalem, driving his parents to distraction – talking to them about having to be about his father’s business. Mary must have been distraught many times as she heard reports of Jesus and what he was preaching and how he was alienating the powers that be. Good Friday had to be the low point in the life of Mary as she saw her son betrayed, denied, rejected and finally put to death as a common criminal. We know there has been only one Holy Family and we know too they had their problems.

Family life is not what it used to be. Stability and permanency are hard to find. Just recently it was reported almost half the families in the country are single parent families and there was an article in the Star recently about the poverty of single mothers as they struggle to raise a family. We have the reality today of same sex couples raising families.

We can romanticize the family, thinking back of the good old days when divorce was a rarity. But as someone mentioned one time, in those days there were all kinds of marriage breakdowns, financial circumstance would not allow marriage break ups. Wives and mothers were at the mercy of their husbands.

No matter what form a marriage or family life may take, the advice of Paul to Colossians is so important for sustaining any relationships – if a relationship between husband and wife, parent and child, brothers and sisters is to be sound and healthy then there must be compassion, kindness, humility, meekness and patience. We have to be willing to bear with one another’s foibles and weakness – none of us is perfect – we have to be willing to forgive another as we have been forgiven. Every day we try to keep the great commandment, “love one another as I have loved you”. It is not easy but with God’s grace and our willingness, families can be holy and healthy.

We belong to different families – we all belong to the family of the Church, the family of God’s people. But there is one family and our membership that I’d like to think about today. It is our membership in the family of all the living species on earth. We are part of the family of life that inhabits planet earth. For too long we have been out of sync with this family. We’ve presumed upon this family, ignored it, imperiled it by our treatment of its other members. We’ve divorced ourselves from our family – we imagine we don’t need the other members of this family of life; in fact we’ve become unaware of our belonging to this family.

Our ventures into space gave us a whole new image of planet earth and scientists have helped us to recover an ancient truth of which we lost sight. We are not over and above other life forms; we are one with them in the circle of life, inter-dependent on them for our own survival. As I’ve mentioned before – we did not weave the web of life, we are a strand in the web and what we do to the web we do to ourselves.

Someone has described our human species as being autistic in our relationship with the earth family, we are abnormally self absorbed, and we lost our ability to be responsive to the life forms that surround us. We fail to see and respond to our relationship with the rest of life. We are unmoved by the extinction of other species of life. I think we catch a glimpse of this with the failure of the nations of the world to really do anything substantial about global warming at the recent congress in Bali – we are unwilling to give up our sense of ownership or superiority of the earth and it limited resources. We are deaf to the cry of the wounded earth.

All this heavy stuff, frightening stuff but it is our reality, a reality we deny at our peril and the peril of future generations.

As we continue to celebrate this Mass on this feast of the Holy Family we pray that God’s blessings be on all families, the strong ones and the wounded ones, the happy ones and the unhappy ones. We pray too for a more expanded awareness of our belonging to the family life that is sustained by Earth. May we all be graced to do what we can, by the choice of our life styles and the curbing of our consumerism, to heal the woundedness we’ve inflicted on our family and come to find the compassion, the kindness, the humility and meekness we need so that we can live in harmony with all the other species of life that share this home with us, as family.



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