WEEKDAY 26 04 – Year I A Six-Pack for Discipleship: Memorial of St. Jerome (Nehemiah 8:1-12; Ps 19; Lk 10:1-12) **************************************************** Was there ever a moment when a passage of scripture brought tears to your eyes? That was the experience of the exiles who returned to Jerusalem and assembled around the priest Ezra to hear […]

HOMILY WEEK 26 03 – Year I Known and Loved – Like Nathanael: Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel and Raphael (Rev 12:7-12; Ps 138; Jn 1:47-51) ******************************************************* Have you ever wondered what it must have been like to be one of the apostles and meet Jesus in person? Today’s feast of the Archangels and the […]

HOMILY WEEKDAY 26 02 – Year I Attraction, Not Promotion: Optional Memorial of St. Lawrence Ruiz & Companions (Zech 8:20-23; Ps 87; Lk 9:51-56) ****************************************** While I was in the Holy Land taking a course at Tantur Ecumenical Institute, we were privileged to visit a Samaritan community and a Samaritan priest. He was adamant they […]

HOMILY WEEK 26 01 – Year I Love, and Live the Word of God with Humble Faith and Childlike Simplicity: Memorial of St. Vincent de Paul (Zech 8:1-8; Ps 102; Lk 9:46-50) ************************************************************** Have you ever heard God speaking to you? Would you like to have a more intimate relationship with God? Then love, and […]

HOMILY SUNDAY 26 – B Entering the Kingdom of God (Num 11:16-17, 25-29; Psalm 19; James 5:1-6; Mark 9:38-43, 45, 47-48) ************************************************************ If your eye causes you to sin, tear it out! If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off! My brothers and sisters, seek first the Kingdom of God. In the gospel […]

HOMILY WEEK 25 06 – Year I The Paradox of Presence, Suffering and Persecution: Optional Memorial of Saints Cosmas and Damian [Adapted from The Word Among Us] (Zech 2:1-11; Jer 31; Lk 9:43-45) **************************************************** Have you ever heard of a chancel lamp? It is that lantern or candle in a church that tells us that […]

HOMILY WEEK 25 05 – Year I Living Out Our Identity in Christ: Optional Memorial of Blessed Émilie Tavernier-Gamelin (Haggai 2:1-9; Ps 43; Lk 9:18-22) ********************************************** The gospel today highlights the identity of Jesus as the Messiah, the importance of finding our identity in him, and living it out through the Paschal Mystery. Bishop Robert […]

HOMILY WEEK 25 04 – Year I God at Work in our World: Memorial of St. Pius of Pietrelcina (Haggai 1:1-8; Ps 149; Lk 9:7-9) *************************************** “The Lord takes delight in God’s people.” What a wonderful responsorial psalm antiphon! But do we really believe that God takes delight in us? There is an invitation here […]

HOMILY WEEK 25 03 – Year I Temple and Second Chance, or Kingdom of God and New Creation? (Ezra 9:5-9; Tob 13:3-6; Lk 9:1-6) ********************************************************* During a retreat he conducted for Oblates and Oblate associates, Fr. Bonga OMI from Aix-en-Provence in France shared how for him the honeymoon of ordination was over after a year, […]

HOMILY WEEK 25 01 – Year I Unity, Community and a Spirituality of Letting Go: Feast of St. Matthew (Eph 4:1-7, 11-13; Ps 19; Mt 9:9-13) ***************************************** How have you responded to the words of Jesus, “Come, follow me,” addressed to you? The readings today, on this feast of St. Matthew, offers us three interrelated […]