Have you ever had the experience of waiting and waiting for a doctor’s appointment and finally you meet the doctor and it seems like the appointment is over in a flash, you are out of the office in no time. You’re not too happy, you found your appointment unsatisfactory. You feel your doctor should have spent more time with you, asked you more questions about how you felt and how things are with your family, maybe questioned you about stress on your job. But no, he took your blood pressure, checked your heart and lungs, checked you medication. The check up centered on you, you physically but not you as a person, you as an anxious, depressed or stressed person. You feel cheated, resentful that your doctor was too busy to spend a bit more time with you as a person. He’s not a bad doctor, just a very busy doctor, as most are. (more…)
Archive for the ‘Homily’ Category
Homily – February 5
Sunday, February 5th, 2012Homily – January 29
Saturday, January 28th, 2012Just a few words on our strange second reading and Paul’s advice to those who were thinking of getting married. Can you remember what it was like planning your own wedding? Remember the chaos. There was the date, the hall, the church, the dress, the tux, the wedding party, the guests; the list goes on and on. These are the anxieties Paul is writing about. For Paul, in the big scheme of things these were non issues. He wanted people to be focused. The unmarried person is focused on God and the things of God whereas the married person is scattered, how to please his wife, how deal with the world around him.
We really have to put all this in the context of the times. Paul and most of the early Christians expected the world as they knew it to end soon. Paul expected to welcome the returning Jesus in his own life time. It was this firm expectation that made him caution people from entering into long-term relationships that might distract them from developing the most important relationship of their lives, their unhindered devotion to Christ. Paul was not against marriage or family life but because of his conviction of the immanent t return of Jesus, marriage or planning for marriage was not a primary concern.
But let’s go back to the opening words of our second reading; “I want you to be free from anxieties.” The dictionary defines anxiety as a state of tension or uneasiness caused by apprehension of possible future misfortune. Does that sound familiar?
These are anxious times for just about everybody. The collapse of the economy in Europe has its repercussion around the world. We hear dire economic predictions just about every day of the week. The market is up, the market is down. Downsizing is just the norm. As I’ve said so many times, “I’m the only one in the parish with job security –nobody wants this job.”
Imagine the anxiety of retired men and women as they see their investments dwindle in value or see their pensions diminished. Imagine the anxiety of young couples with mortgages they may not able to carry. Imagine the anxiety of men and women who know their companies are planning lay offs. Imagine the anxiety of university students who’ve put in years of hard work and are faced with the fact that the jobs are just not there.
The financial melt down that impacts just about every country on the planet has united people of every land in one common reality; anxiety – a state of tension or uneasiness caused by apprehension of possible future misfortune. We can add to the definition, apprehension about present misfortune.
Paul’s wish for the church in Corinth would be the same wish he would have for each of us;” I want you to be free from anxieties.” Can we ever be? After we say the Our Father we pray; “protect us from all anxieties,” but can we ever live a day without being anxious about something; our health, our job, our family, our relationships?
I have a friend called Anxious Annie. If she didn’t have something to worry about, she’d worry.
“I want you to be free from anxieties.” Paul wants us to stay focused on what is really important. Paul expected his world would end soon and for many people today that is exactly what is happening, their world is coming to an end, things are falling apart, their old securities are gone, and we all face an uncertain future.
It’s happening in our Passionist religious community. We’re all getting old, there is no new blood, and we have to close down once vital retreat centres because we can’t staff them. Our busiest community is our infirmary. I wonder if there will be anyone around to bury me when I die.
Let’s go back in our imagination to a night long ago when Jesus shared his last meal with his closest friends. It was a happy Passover meal but it was an anxious meal. There was a sense of foreboding in the air. Jesus knew what the next hours would bring, He would be betrayed, denied, abandoned and He would die. There must have been tension in the air. What does Jesus say to them, “Do not let not your hearts be troubled, trust in God, trust in me.” Time and again Jesus promises us He will be with us to see us through our anxious times. He will be with us to help us find our way. He promised us we would never be alone.
That’s what we have to hold on to, that trust. We will face these troubled times, we will face our disappointments, and with the presence and help of God we will see our way through. We will find strength and wisdom to do our own downsizing in our personal lifestyles and set for ourselves new priorities, new values and maybe live more lightly upon the earth.
To deny these are anxious times would be an insult, but these are not hopeless times. As we continue the Mass we pray for ourselves and for each other that we be free from anxieties and filled with trust in the Christ Who spoke these encouraging words to all us – do not let your hearts be troubled –trust in God – trust in me.
Homily – January 22
Saturday, January 21st, 2012Jonah was an unwilling messenger of God’s mercy. God sent Jonah to Nineveh to show God was concerned for the well being of all God’s people. Jonah was caught up in the narrow nationalism that believed God was only concerned about the well being of the Israelites and he was disappointed that the people listened to his call to repentance and the city was spared.
God threatened to destroy the city and in a way that is what happened. Through the preaching of Jonah the people did repent and ceased to be the Ninevites that they were. The old Nineveh became a renewed Nineveh. A Nineveh with which God was pleased but Jonah was not.
We can imagine God was displeased with the people of Nineveh because of the way they lived their lives. We can imagine they were caught up in extravagant and wasteful life styles. We can imagine there was a rift between the haves and the have nots. We can imagine that the poor, hungry and homeless of the city were neglected. We can imagine that the citizens of Nineveh had no sense of the common good. We can be grateful that through the preaching of Jonah all this changed
The message of Jonah and Jesus was the same: repent. But what does it mean to repent? Basically it means we are determined change the values that govern our lives. The Greek word for repent is metanoiein – which means to change one’s mind. People who are willing to repent are people who take an honest look at their life styles and know they are meant for better things. They are people who face the fact that over-eating, over-drinking and smoking – just to use a few examples – shorten a person’s life and they are determined to change the ways they are living their lives.
The call to repent can also challenge our ways of thinking, our attitudes toward other people, our attitudes toward the way life is lived around us. Remember the old idea of the examination of conscience? At the end of the day we were to look back over the day and remember the good things we did and admit the things we failed to do. The deeper understanding of this practice was that it was meant to be an examination of our consciousness. How conscious are we about what was going on around us in the course of the day. How conscious are we about an atmosphere of prejudice in our work place or how conscious are we about the stress our fellow workers are under. How conscious are we about the social issues that are alive in our city. How awake and aware are we to what is going on around us.
We are not bad people but sometimes we allow ourselves to get sucked into values and mind sets that are not of the gospel – we’ve seen some of this in the battle of the budget- some of the cuts called for were cuts that some members of the council knew to be wrong and they stopped them because they touched the lives of the have nots, the most needy of citizens. They blamed the victims, good people who are suffering the most in these harsh economic times. Good people, who through no fault of their own do not know how to manage their lives, much less manage their money, limited people who need help. The debate wasn’t all that impressive especially in light of our gospel teaching on how we are to respond to the hungry, the thirsty, the homeless and the helpless.
With the call to repent in both our first reading and the gospel maybe it would be good for all of us to examine our consciousness of the problems and the issues that affect our city and be willing to do what we can to make our city a more humane and kinder place to live.
Homily – January 15
Sunday, January 15th, 2012I would imagine that John the Baptist was a very popular person. We are told that people came from all over to hear his preaching and his call to repentance. Many men and women accepted his invitation to be baptized and turn their lives around and live as God would have them live. As time went on certain men aligned themselves to John the Baptist. They became his disciples, his companions, his confidants. The same thing happened to Jesus when he began his own ministry. (more…)
Homily – January 8
Sunday, January 8th, 2012A few years ago I received a Christmas card from a friend of mine who lives in Derry in Ireland. She is very politically active and was on the streets of Derry on Bloody Sunday, Jan 30, 1972 when British soldiers shot and killed 13 unarmed protesters and wounded 13 others. She was then and is now a pacifist and still works for peace and justice around the world. (more…)
Founded by St. Paul of the Cross, every Passionist takes a special vow to spend his or her energies in promoting remembrance of the sufferings of Jesus, the memory of the Cross, and reflection of the meaning of the Cross for the world.
