Pentecost

Dominica Pentecostes
23 & 24 May 2026

 The Easter Season concludes today with one of the greatest solemnities of our faith, the Solemnity of Pentecost. As a term, “Pentecost” refers to the “fiftieth day”. There is a Jewish feast of Pentecost, more commonly called Shavuot (or the Feast of Weeks), that falls fifty days after the Jewish Passover.  Our Christian observance of Pentecost does not celebrate the same thing as the Jewish Pentecost, but it falls roughly around the same time in the calendar since our Pentecost is the fiftieth day after Easter. Pentecost celebrates the descent of the promised Holy Spirit filling the Church and disciples, both in ancient times and now, with God’s gifts for mission. The practical implication for us is that Jesus gives us the Holy Spirit to dwell within us in order to make us alive as disciples and to give us a responsibility for the mission of sharing the Good News of salvation and a shared responsibility for the Church, especially as lived here at our parish.

Grasping the presence of the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, and grasping how one describes the Holy Spirit is rather elusive. When it comes to God the Father, we at least have some personal images that come to mind, even though we would have to admit those are not entirely accurate since the Father is not an old man with a white beard. When it comes to God the Son, we know that by the Son’s incarnation, Jesus is the visible image of God. For this reason, Jesus is referred to as the sacrament of God the Father. That is, Jesus makes God visible just like a sacrament makes God’s grace present and visible or, more properly speaking, perceptible to our senses. But the Holy Spirit? That’s more challenging. The Scriptures and the Church’s Tradition use various symbols to attempt to describe the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is described as water or living water as is employed in the Gospel of the Vigil Mass. He is symbolized by anointing in the Scriptures, most especially with oil. Fire is a symbol that points to the presence of God’s Spirit as when the covenant was formed with Israel on Mt. Sinai or the fire that rested over the apostles and disciples on that first Pentecost. Cloud and light are images that accompany the presence of the Holy Spirit in the Scriptures. Breath accompanies the presence of the Holy Spirit as in today’s Gospel whereby Jesus imparts the Holy Spirit to the apostles by breathing on them when he appeared after his Resurrection. A dove is a symbol. Even the symbol of a finger, as in the finger of the Father’s right hand, is invoked in the beautiful hymn the Veni, Creator Spiritus. Yes, elusive is one way to describe the dilemma of how we might grasp the idea of this Third Person of the Blessed Trinity.

I want to focus only on the symbol of water as an image of the Holy Spirit. To do that, I want to point you to Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well from St. John’s Gospel chapter 4, which is a particularly poignant passage. In that passage the image of thirsting for a drink is prominent. The obvious and first meaning of that thirst is the physical water from the well. But as the passage unfolds we can see that the Lord is really thirsting for the woman’s faith. It becomes clear that the Lord is not referring to the water in the well. He says to the woman, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him and he would have given you living water” (Jn. 4:10). Jesus goes on to say that those who drink physical water will thirst again, “but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst; the water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (Jn. 4:14). This living water within a person and welling up is considered in the Church’s Tradition to be an image of God’s Spirit dwelling within a person. God’s Spirit and the life and gifts He imparts is not a stagnant reality but a water that is fresh and vibrant and stirred up, active. In other words, the Holy Spirit within us is not simply something we receive or take in a passive way. Filled with the Holy Spirit we are to share in the Church’s mission and to take responsibility for the life, the care and the progress of the Church as a place of encounter with the Risen Lord.

Next, still focusing on the symbol of water, consider the Gospel of St. John chapter 7 (used at the Vigil Mass last evening). Jesus makes explicit reference to water and the Holy Spirit, connecting the two. He says, “Let anyone who thirsts come to me and drink. As Scripture says; Rivers of living water will flow from within him who believes in me”. St. John goes on to write that Jesus “said this in reference to the Spirit that those who came to believe in him were to receive” (Jn. 7:38-39). Considering this image and symbol for the Holy Spirit, and considering how we are born into salvation by water consecrated by the power of the Holy Spirit and how this same water is sprinkled upon us at various moments of faith, especially in the Easter Season, we should understand that we are called to be alive and vibrant, active in sharing the mission of the Church, and sturdy and strong as disciples if we quench not merely our physical thirst but that deeper thirst for communion with God. By committing to serious prayer, by the sacramental life, separating ourselves from sin and worthily partaking of Holy Communion, by serving and caring for the mission of the Church, especially at our parish, we are seeking that living water that wells up within us by God’s generosity.

I’ll leave you with a final image that I hope captures some of the idea of a mysterious water. A few years ago, while at a conference in San Francisco I took some time to tour the California Redwood Forests. You know that redwood trees are incredibly tall and large. Walking in the redwood forests feels like you are inside a naturally made cathedral with soaring ceilings. Of all the interesting facts and statistics about those large trees, one fact surprised me most. Redwood trees take a surprising percentage of the water they need from the moisture of the very atmosphere itself. During the dry summer months when there is little rain, redwoods take some 30-40% of their water from the coastal fog that washes over their leaves high above. While fog is composed of tiny, microscopic droplets of water, we don’t often think of fog as ‘water’ in the sense of water that we drink. Perhaps that image of a strong and sturdy tree drinking a mysterious water can serve us who are called to be strong and sturdy by drinking the mysterious living water of the Holy Spirit.

We need to be made strong and alive as members of Christ. The Lord tells us to recognize our deeper thirst. He tells us that we would be mistaken to satisfy our physical thirst only, for if we do we will thirst again. Rather, we need to attend to the needs of our soul and to attend to nourishing our spiritual life. The Holy Spirit is given to us like water, like a river of living water within. Don’t be fooled by the water you can see. Don’t be fooled by making your life’s pursuit the satisfaction of only pleasures or bodily goods. Rather, open yourself to what the Lord gives, seek to develop the gifts given to you by the Holy Spirit, and drink deeply of God’s generous love of you.

Fifth Sunday of Easter

Dominica V Paschae A
3 May 2026

 The Gospel passage today takes us back to Jesus’ extended remarks to his apostles at the Last Supper where he was preparing them for their life and mission when he would no longer be with them in the same way. He had just informed the group of his own imminent departure (Jn. 13:33).  The apostles are stirred up, maybe even confused and hurt.  And so, in response to their likely state of mind, we can appreciate the context for why Jesus says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled.”

   Jesus prepares the Apostles for his departure.  In an immediate sense, he is preparing them for his suffering and death, about to take place in the moments after the Last Supper.  But in a larger more remote context he is preparing them for after his resurrection and ascension when he will return to his rightful place in Heaven with the promise to return again in glory.  While Jesus indicates he will go away, his departure is not without a promised return.  A rich layer of meaning comes to the surface when we understand what is evoked when the Lord says about his departure, “I am going to prepare a place for you”. He is going to the Father, to the Father’s house, where there are many dwelling places. And after a time of preparation he says, “I will come back again and take you to myself”.  The type of departure and return that Jesus indicates evokes the image of Jewish betrothal and wedding ceremonies.  A bride and groom in ancient Jewish practice, once betrothed were legally married and already husband and wife, yet they did not immediately live together.  That’s why if you think with me in a different context, when Joseph plans to leave Mary after discovering she’s pregnant, the angel can appeal to him and say “Do not be afraid to take Mary, your wife, into your home.”  That’s because upon betrothal they are already legally married yet not living together.  Upon betrothal the groom would “go away” to prepare a dwelling place for his wife and new family.  He would often do so on familial land, “in his father’s house” in other words.  And once a suitable dwelling place was prepared he would return and a joyful wedding procession would take place to the new home where the bride and groom would begin only then their common life living together.

   This is the language employed by Jesus in today’s selection. This imagery might help us understand why his departure is not to cause trouble in the hearts of disciples. Yes, he is going away. But it is a going away that implies a return, as he himself says.  And his return is intended to gather his faithful to take them to the Father’s house. This imagery of ancient Jewish betrothal and marriage helps us understand the Lord’s words and helps us place his departure and return into the context of the rich nuptial imagery throughout the Sacred Scriptures. God’s relationship with His people is described in spousal, nuptial terms. At the very beginning of this Easter Season, in the fourth reading of the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday night, we heard the following from the Prophet Isaiah, “The One who has become your husband is your Maker; his name is the Lord of hosts” (Is. 54:5). If the relationship is nuptial, then we can understand why adultery is the language of Scripture to describe infidelity and the great offense that sin is to God. Yet His fidelity and His covenant are everlasting and so the Prophet Isaiah goes on to say, “The Lord calls you back…. For a brief moment I abandoned you, but with great tenderness I will take you back…. With enduring love I take pity on you, says the Lord, your redeemer” (Is. 54:6, 7, 8b). Furthering this spousal, nuptial imagery, Jesus, God Incarnate, is identified by John the Baptist as the bridegroom when he says, “I am not the Messiah, but… I was sent before him. The one who has the bride is the bridegroom; the best man, who stands and listens for him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice” (Jn. 3:28-29).

   Do not see the Lord’s departure as a cause to have a troubled heart. While we await the Lord’s return and while we await the joyful procession of full entrance into the Father’s house, do not see this life as a time of being abandoned by God. God has wed Himself to us in the Incarnation. In the Cross He has consummated His sacrificial love for us. In this time of awaiting the Lord’s return, we, the Church, have already begun our nuptial life with the Lord. Like a Jewish betrothal, we have been united to the Lord by faith, baptism and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. By sacramental life in the Church we are nourished by the love of the Lord. We are called now and until he returns to live this spousal relationship by seeking to respond to Jesus’ love ever more fully. In the Sacred Liturgy, by adopting the ancient posture of priest and people facing the same direction at the altar together (ad orientem as we do here at our parish) we are training ourselves in the discipline of looking for the Lord and preparing for his return in all aspects of our daily living. And thus, as the Lord said, we do not let our hearts be troubled and we do not view this life of awaiting his return as if we have somehow been abandoned by the Lord. We do not live this life as if we are without purpose or opportunities to grow in relationship with the Lord. No, for we the baptized, our spousal union with God our Maker and Redeemer has already begun. By conversion and grace we seek to grow in that union, trusting that the Lord has gone to prepare a place for us in His Father’s house. And we look forward in hope to the day of the Lord’s return in glory when, we pray, we may be found ready for him to come and to take us to himself.

Second Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday)

Dominica II Paschae A
12 April 2026
Divine Mercy Sunday

 We Catholics follow a different pattern or rhythm of life. We would each do well to arrange our personal and family life around these same patterns of observances of the faith. We have Advent as a time of preparation such that Christmas has not begun as soon as the Thanksgiving Dinner table is cleared. And when the world is ready to toss the Christmas Tree to the curb on December 26, we celebrate Christmas Day as an octave, and we continue celebrating Christ’s birth for a season of about three weeks. When it comes to Easter we observe Easter Day as an Octave, meaning that for eight calendar days we are observing Easter Sunday. That Octave Day of Easter concludes with this Sunday. But we continue celebrating Easter as a season for seven weeks, that concludes with Pentecost.

So, why do we catholics observe Easter for seven weeks? Because it is the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus, our Savior and, as St. Paul says, “[I]f Christ has not been raised, then … your faith is in vain…. If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins” (1 Cor. 15:14, 17). And what are we catholics observing for seven weeks of Easter? We are celebrating newness. We are celebrating new life! We observe the new life of Jesus who, by his power as God, could not be kept bound by death. His victory over death and the tomb gives us hope and joy. It is a great reason to observe Easter for so many weeks. In this holy season we celebrate the new life given to the newly baptized and to those received into the sacramental life of the Church. By extension we are celebrating the new life that began in the rest of us at baptism however many years ago. New life is worth celebrating!

You and I will die in the body, barring some unique intervention from God. But, while bodily death is our common lot one day, we need not die a second time. That is, we need not die in the soul; the death that is called “eternal”. That’s the promise of the Lord’s Resurrection. That’s the promise of Easter. That’s worth celebrating! By conformity and union with Christ we have the hope of participating in his victory. It is a victory we already have pledged to us at baptism. It is a victory into which we are called to continuously mature so that one day we have that victory’s full fruit – eternal life in Heaven!

Brothers and sisters, for as much as we are tied to sin we are not living in newness. We are not living new life in Christ. For as much as we are tied to sin, we are living the old life and we are tied to the eternal threat of the tomb. We don’t have the new life of the Lord for as much as we are dwelling in sin. I don’t mean that we won’t struggle with sin. Rather, when I say “being tied to sin” and “dwelling in sin”, what I mean is settling for sin. I mean, cooperating with sin and failing to treat it seriously. That’s when we aren’t living the new life of the Risen Lord.

This Gospel passage shows us two resurrection appearances of the Lord in the same place, one week apart. The first appearance was in the evening of the day of the Resurrection itself, that first Easter Sunday. The Lord appeared in the locked upper room where just days before he had eaten the Last Supper with the Apostles. The Risen Lord’s actions in that appearance show us his deepest desire, what is of prime importance to him. It shows us what is on his mind as his plan is unfolding to commission his apostles to continue his work in the Church. What is evident among his deepest desires and concerns? To forgive sins. He speaks peace to the Apostles in their fears and in the way they had sinned by abandoning him. The Lord continues his work of re-creation, harkening back to creation in Genesis, when he breathes on the Apostles giving them new life in the Holy Spirit and, at the same time, giving them his authority to impart new life to others by the forgiveness of sins.

The Risen Lord’s desire to give new life in place of sin and in place of its consequence of condemnation comes as no surprise. It was the Father’s plan from the beginning to heal what Original Sin inserted into the blessing of His creation. In the fullness of time, as God the Son was gestating in the womb of Mary, it was revealed to St. Joseph in a dream that “you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins” (Mt. 1:21). St. John the Baptist pointed out the Lord by saying, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (Jn. 1:29). Jesus began his own preaching by saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mt. 4:17). You can think of examples of miraculous healings – like the paralytic – who, when he is brought to the Lord, the Lord’s first interest is not the physical healing, but he says instead, “your sins are forgiven” (Mt. 9:2). No surprise that when the disciples are sent they preach repentance. And no surprise that when the One whose name means “God saves”, when he shows himself risen and victorious over death, his first order of business in that locked upper room is to establish that gift that we call confession for the forgiveness of sins. The Apostles receive the authority to forgive sins so that the Lord’s power and mission to save us from sin is accessible to us in every age. “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained” (Jn. 20:23).

We celebrate resurrection and the hope of new life in this season. For as much as we settle for sin, ignore it, or make excuses for it, we are tied to sin, tied to old ways, tied to the grave. We are only locked in the tomb and tied to eternal death for as much as we stay away from repentance and from the Lord’s gift of confession. But by our regular practice of confession we receive the peace of forgiveness. Confession restores our baptismal dignity. We grow in greater maturity in the new life begun in us in baptism. Confession breathes the new life of the Holy Spirit into our places of illness and spiritual death. And we share in the victory of the Risen Lord and the hope of eternal life in Heaven!

Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday

Easter Vigil & Easter Sunday
4 & 5 April 2026
Gospel: Matthew 28:1-10

 On this holy [night/day] the Church ushers in the greatest of solemn feasts, the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. This great feast comes after the long preparation of penance in Lent. In Lent, by the means of penance and more serious striving, we seek to die to the things that weigh us down and that keep us bound to the fallen nature of this world. We seek to die to those things, to our sins, so that we, too, might celebrate a rising to new and deeper life in Christ. By his resurrection, our Lord is ushering in a new creation. We are invited to be part of that new creation. He “makes all things new” (cf. Rev. 21:5), the Scriptures say. In fact, we need to be part of that renewing work in Christ if we are to ultimately rise in the only way that matters: rising after our own bodily death and rising such that we are rescued from that death that is called eternal. This participation in the new creation of the Risen Lord is the foundation for the serious opportunity and obligation that we have for Sunday worship each week. What the Lord did on the day of his resurrection is the reason we gather each and every Sunday.

I think Mary Magdalene can serve as a model for what should be taking place in the life of a Christian who commits himself to participating in the Lord’s work and in his new creation. The scene of the arrest of Jesus, his torture, his crucifixion and his burial – which we have meditated upon in these holy days – were not very proud moments for the men who followed the Lord. There was betrayal and denial among the apostles. All of them were absent or had fled and so did not even witness the crucifixion, except for John who is recorded as being there. But Mary Magdalene appears several times in the scenes of Jesus’ crucifixion, his burial where she stayed watching the tomb after it had been sealed, and in the resurrection passage we hear today, where she is the first to see the empty tomb, to hear the message of the resurrection, and to encounter the Risen Lord as she went to announce that good news.

 The Gospel tells us that “[A]fter the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning” Mary Magdalene came again to see the tomb. She had been quite focused on the reality of the torture and death of the Lord. She had been quite focused on staying near the sign of his death, the sealed-up tomb. But something happens on this visit to the tomb after the sabbath, very early on the first day of the week. That timing is significant for us and for our participation in this mystery. The Lord rose from the dead on the day after the sabbath. The Jewish sabbath is a reflection of the seventh day of creation where God rested from His work. The sabbath is observed on Saturday. To celebrate faith in the new thing that was accomplished in the resurrection, in time Christians naturally focused on the day after the sabbath and transferred sabbath disciplines and obligations to Sunday. Now that does not mean that the sabbath has moved or is now Sunday. No, the sabbath remains Saturday but our Christian obligations to observe the sabbath commands have been transferred to Sunday. When the Gospel tells us that the resurrection happened early on the first day of the week, we have confirmation of that day being Sunday. The Gospel tells us the first day of the week is the day after the sabbath. So, if you count backward from the sabbath (Saturday) as the seventh day, you get Sunday as the first day.

  This is important for us who know ourselves as Christians to have significant opportunity for blessings on Sundays. The Book of Genesis [the Vigil’s first reading] with its familiar account of creation gives us an important clue not only about what God was doing then (in the original creation), but about what He is doing now on Sunday, the first day of the week. As we know in the Genesis account, God rested from all His work on the seventh day, the sabbath. When you count back to the first day, that means God began creation on a Sunday. In that work of creation, we are told that a mighty wind swept over the waters. That word translated as “wind” is the same Hebrew word for “spirit” or “breath”. As the Spirit of God, the mighty wind, moved over the waters in that formless chaos at the beginning of creation, light was created and broke through darkness on that first day. When we consider that Jesus rose from the dead on the first day of the week after a sabbath, we have something new taking place on a Sunday. Jesus described his own departure, his crucifixion and death as his baptism, his immersion as if in waters (cf. Mk. 10:38-39). The Holy Spirit, the breath of God, brought new life and light from darkness after the Lord Jesus was immersed in the consequences (chaos) of our sin. This Gospel passage of the resurrection gives us allusions to the beginning of creation. In so doing, we see that Sunday of the Resurrection is the beginning of a new creation that is ushered in by the Lord after he takes his sabbath rest in the silence of the tomb, in the sleep of death. He is victorious over sin and death. He does so to invite us to participate in his fullness of life.

 In this we can understand what Sunday is for us and how Mary Magdalene can be a model for us. If we want to be renewed and refashioned, to rise from our defects and all that is old in us, we are called to participate in the recreation brought about by the Lord. We begin that participation by faith and baptism, our own being covered by the waters made holy by God’s Spirit. But our recreation, while accomplished once for all in baptism, needs to develop into fullness and maturity. And thus, time and time again, fulfilling the Lord’s Day, we come here on the first day of the week. If your life is like mine, days are packed, weeks go by so very fast, and – sadly – it doesn’t take long after being in church, to go outside these walls and to lose grasp on a spiritual focus and to fail to keep our eyes fixed on the Lord. In some sense, perhaps we are like Mary Magdalene, focused so much and so easily on the tomb, unaware that we might even expect anything different from it. Like her, perhaps we have generally good motivations and we desire to honor the Lord, but with the pace of life we can find ourselves revisiting tombs, familiar places, but places where we are not fully alive. Like Mary in the Gospel, perhaps we seek “Jesus the crucified”, meaning we aren’t expecting more from the situations of life than what they have already given us, a finality, an end, the death of a crucifixion. But God in His faithfulness and love, in His work of ushering in a new creation, can work even with our failure of vision and can break through the darkness and chaos of life such that new life breaks through the darkness. Our fidelity to our Christian duty and opportunity on Sundays creates the possibility that we will be where the Lord is active in making us new and revealing himself as very much alive in the fast pace of our days. As easy as it is to lose our focus and trust in the Lord’s recreating work, we come time and time again on the first day of the week so that we can be renewed in the Lord’s new creation. Receiving such grace and growing to the maturity begun in us in baptism, we, like Mary Magdalene, are called to announce the good news to others. And when we do, we not only have an empty tomb or a dark past of our own to serve as proof of the Lord’s redeeming work; rather, we have a living and active encounter with the Risen Lord himself who tells us not to fear, to go out to others, and ultimately to have the grace of new life in him.

Holy Thursday

Holy Thursday
2 April 2026

On this holy night, with the beginning of this Holy Mass, Lent has concluded and the Sacred Triduum, a brief privileged time from now until Easter Sunday evening finds us commemorating some of the most important events of our faith, the events by which the Lord Jesus accomplished his saving mission for us. Though we have been in an extended period of penance during Lent, and while we are called to observe penance tomorrow (on Good Friday) until the first Mass of Easter, our penance is put on pause with the Holy Thursday Mass. This Mass is a Mass of joy and thanksgiving marked by the festive color of white because we are celebrating the love of the Lord for us, evidenced by his establishment of the Holy Eucharist on this night, a sacrifice and a sacrament, the perpetual memorial of His Passion by which we are saved. That sacrament is made present to us day by day and in every time and place through the ministry of the Church’s priests in Holy Orders, the second sacrament the Lord established on this night. Finally, after the Holy Eucharist and the Holy Priesthood, the third focus of this night is what is called the “mandatum”, the command of fraternal charity, to love one another as the Lord loves us. Because of the Latin word “mandatum” this day has also become known as Maundy Thursday.

I imagine most people would say that the foot washing is a distinctive part of this Mass, though it might be surprising to learn that it is an optional rite. In fact, well before it was ever known as a ritual of the Holy Thursday Mass in parish churches, the foot washing had a long history of being done usually outside of the Mass as a service to the poor or as a ritual done in religious houses. Eventually it made its way into Masses with a bishop in cathedral churches only. And finally in 1955, after some liturgical adaptations made by Pope Pius XII, the foot washing was copied in parish churches but remained entirely optional. In the year 2020, due to a global event whose name shall not be said, the Church around the world omitted the foot washing. I, and many of my brother priests, found that omission to be a happy opportunity to simply let the Holy Thursday Mass focus on the two intimately connected sacraments of the Holy Eucharist and Holy Orders that the Lord established on this night. Frankly – just trust me – the optional foot washing ritual had suffered under the burden of becoming politicized or simply reduced to a call to generic service. In addition, it required more effort and planning time than you can even imagine. You would not believe the complications in finding 12 parishioners who can commit to attending the Mass, who will also agree to have their feet washed, and who – at least among the women – can manage to have enough time to schedule a pedicure before the foot washing! Ever since 2020, I indicated that we would do the rite from time to time and omit it on other years. Tonight we will include that rite again, but after a pause of some years, my hope is that this evening we can commemorate the rite and be impacted by it in a way that draws out some of the imagery and power of that first foot washing at the Last Supper. Primarily, what I hope we experience this evening is some appreciation of what the Lord was doing at the Last Supper and how he was preparing his apostles to carry on his mission.

The Gospel tells us that “Jesus knew that his hour had come to pass from this world” (Jn. 13:1). This creates a clear context for everything the Lord was doing at the Last Supper. His personal fulfillment of his mission was at hand. Though he never abandoned his Church after “his hour”; he would not remain with her in the same way. And so, at the Last Supper the Lord was preparing his apostles to continue his mission in the Church as his instruments. In fact, we can look to later in John’s Gospel when, after the Resurrection, the Lord appeared in the locked upper room and said to the apostles “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you” (Jn. 20:21). The Resurrected Jesus spoke those words just three days after the Supper and in the same Upper Room. He made explicit what had already surfaced at the Last Supper, namely that since his hour to pass from this world had come, his mission from the Father would need to be continued by the ones he in turn was sending out. The Last Supper was clearly not simply a normal Passover meal. The Lord was doing something new with it. He was revealing that the Passover refers to himself, for he is the one true and perfect Lamb who takes aways the sins of the world. He was giving the gift of his Body and Blood as food that would sustain his soon-to-be-born Church until he would come again. Since it would make no sense to promise a gift that cannot be made available, and since he himself was passing from this world, the Lord was transforming his apostles at the Last Supper, making them his first priests, such that by receiving his authority they would be able to make his Body and Blood present when they were in turn sent out. For this reason, the Church believes that Holy Thursday is the night that the Lord established the two sacraments of the Holy Eucharist and Holy Orders.

At the Last Supper something very unique and intimate took place for the apostles. The supper was not a large or open gathering meant for the public. It was an intense time shared between Jesus and his closest followers. The apostles were transformed over the course of that Last Supper to be priests. They weren’t ordained in the same way that we have a developed ritual of ordination now in the Church. But the Lord gave them a share of his sacred authority with the command to them, “do this in memory of me” (Lk. 22:19). The Catholic Church has continued to pass down that same authority in the line of valid apostolic succession through her ordination rites. When you consider how the Lord was transforming his apostles at the Last Supper, how they were being made his first priests, it is interesting to note that foot washing is evocative of the ordination of Levitical priests and evocative of preparation to offer sacrifice, which we see in the Old Testament. This adds still more force to the Church’s belief that the Lord established Holy Orders at the Last Supper and by means of the foot washing. In Leviticus chapter 8, Moses washed Aaron and his sons as part of the ordination rite for their temple service. Levitical priests would wash both their hands and their feet just before offering sacrifice in the temple. Leviticus 16 describes the ritual of the day of atonement. Once in the holy place, the high priest takes off his garments, washes his body in water, puts on his garments, and then goes to offer sacrifice. There is a similar pattern in the Gospel of this Holy Mass, creating strong allusions to the pattern of the high priest: At the Supper Jesus took off his garments; he washed the feet of the apostles; he then put his garments back on; and he would soon go out to offer the one perfect sacrifice of himself on the Cross. In Leviticus the high priest washes himself before offering sacrifice; in the Gospel Jesus washes the feet of the apostles because they must have their inheritance with him, they must have a part in him, if they are to be able to be sent out to carry on his mission. In this we can appreciate the force of the foot washing, making the apostles priests. As the Lord said, “Unless I wash you, you will have no inheritance with me” (Jn. 13:8).

At the Last Supper and by means of the foot washing, with its allusion to old covenant ordination and preparation to offer sacrifice, Jesus transformed the apostles to be his first priests as he knew that his hour had come and that he would be sending them out to continue his mission. Jesus washed the feet of those seated around him at the table of the Last Supper. He washed the feet of those closely associated with his action of offering sacrifice. He washed the feet of those who could be sent to be his priests. He washed their feet to show that the authority he was sharing with them was to be exercised in humility.

This evening, hoping to capture the imagery from the Last Supper and the primary meaning of the foot washing, by which the apostles were made priests, I have asked twelve of the more senior altar boys to have their feet washed. Like the imagery of the Last Supper, they are seated nearest around the table of the sacred altar. They are closely associated with the action of offering the sacrifice of the Holy Mass. They have the capacity to be sent as future priests, and perhaps there are future priests among them. At the same time, I want to be clear about what our ritual here this evening does NOT mean. I am not saying that these young men definitely are called to be priests. The ones chosen were not chosen as some type of prediction on my part of who might be a priest. They will not be priests after tonight. [If I had that kind of power, that would be one incredible retirement plan!] Pray for them, yes, but don’t hound them or act like they are already going to seminary. [Believe me, I’ll keep that idea in front of their eyes for us all!] Instead, see in them a representation of the larger group of youth in our parish who are being transformed into their vocation and whom the Lord is preparing bit by bit to be sent out into some calling. What I hope to communicate in the ritual this evening is that these young men serve as an image of what the Lord was doing in providing priests for his Church. They can evoke for us that primary meaning of the foot washing, so often obscured or lost when the foot washing is politicized or made to be only about generalized service open to all disciples. More than the humility and fraternal charity that the foot washing teaches as a broad requirement of all disciples, the Lord was specifically transforming the apostles and getting them ready to be sent. Many of these young men are open to the priesthood and some are thinking and praying about it quite seriously. They are an image of how the Lord’s call is working among many, many more than simply the twelve young people you will see. As the foot washing is taking place, I ask you to pray for this petition: Pray that the grace of the priesthood will be poured out generously on our parish community so that the men who are being called by God may receive that grace, may notice the stirrings of a call, and may be willing to give it attention. Pray that the men who are called may respond generously to the way in which Jesus wants to give them a share in his inheritance. Whether it is these young men or others, may the Lord stir up his calling in the hearts of more from our parish.

Fourth Sunday of Lent

Dominica IV in Quadragesima A
15 March 2026

 This weekend’s shift to a lighter liturgical color fits well with the prominent scriptural themes of darkness versus light and blindness versus sight. The Gospel passages in late Lent raise themes of recognizing our deeper thirst for meaning and for deeper life, the life of the soul (like the woman of Samaria thirsting at the well last Sunday). There is this Sunday’s theme of darkness to light, meaning the journey of faith from the darkness of godlessness to re-creation in the Lord accomplished principally by faith and baptism. There is an application of blindness versus sight when we recognize the darkness of our ongoing struggle with sin and the need to be washed and renewed by the Lord in confession. And next Sunday’s passage on the raising of Lazarus from the dead gives us the theme of illness versus death, highlighting that even physical, bodily death is temporary when compared to the spiritual illness and death that is eternal. In that passage Jesus reveals himself, and the life he gives, as the very resurrection itself, a life that never ends.

The Scriptures today call each of us to admit our need for purification of our sight.  St. John’s Gospel says about the Word of God, who is Jesus, “The true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world…. yet the world knew him not…. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God” (Jn. 1:9-12).  Will we receive Jesus the Light of the World and see by his light, or will we choose our own light and worldly ways of sight, a secular vision?  That is the question for each of us.  These readings have an application both for our catechumens in OCIA who have not yet been illuminated by baptism and for we the baptized who must constantly purify our sight, battling sin so as to live in the light.  For all of us, growing in faith, being illuminated, and responding to better spiritual vision is evidenced when we, like the man born blind, profess faith in Jesus and worship him.

There is a distinct difference between a person born blind versus a person who could once see but who later becomes blind.  The person who once could see at least has some notions and memories of sight, even if they fade.  But the person born blind has no such concepts.  Imagine if you had never been able to see.  You could touch an object and sense its size, shape, and weight.  But how would you ever have a visual concept for its color and appearance?  You could tell such a person that the grass is green or the sky is blue.  But how would they know what that means?  Our catechumens, that is the unbaptized, have this type of spiritual blindness.  That’s not an insult.  Rather, it’s to say that there is something entirely new and illuminating when one is enlightened by Christ in baptism.  For as much as a person can study and learn about faith (like a blind person trying to learn about how things appear), the unbaptized lack a fundamental sight until they are given the illumination of baptism in Christ Jesus.  The man born blind serves as a model for this transition from darkness to light and blindness to sight.

In the Scriptures darkness is an image for sin.  Being born in darkness, being born blind, serves as an image of Original Sin.  We inherit that darkness from conception.  And so how is the man born blind healed?  It is no coincidence that Jesus restores his sight by using clay from the ground to smear on the man’s eyes, just as in the Book of Genesis God made man from the dust of the earth.  It is impossible to form dust without some moisture, and so we can imagine that some moisture was needed in the Book of Genesis.  In fact, Genesis says so (cf. Gn. 2:6-7).  Likewise in the Gospel passage, Jesus uses the moisture of his own saliva to show that he is doing the very works of God Himself.  To be re-created anew in light and in sight, Jesus tells the man to go and wash in the pool.  The man’s darkness and blindness is removed by this washing, just as by the Lord’s command in baptism water is used to wash away the darkness of Original Sin and personal sins, thus giving the sight of faith.

And what about those of us already baptized and given the sight of faith?  What do these readings show us?  Sin continues to darken our sight and to cause blindness.  We are likely more blind than we admit.  About four to five years ago I got reading glasses for the first time when I admitted that I was less able to focus on the small print in the prayer book that I use multiple times daily.  But since I have used that book since 1992 my mind could recognize the general shape of the words on the page and it was as if I was reading them.  When I used reading glasses for the first time and saw how those shapes came into focus, I was quite honestly shocked at just how much more clear the print was.  Why do I share that?  It’s to say that for as much as we sin, and don’t take action against it, we are like a person who could once see but who is going blind.  Sin diminishes our proper vision and needs to be healed.  Thanks be to God for confession!

In the gospel, people who can see are revealed as actually being blind.  The neighbors of the man born blind say, “Isn’t this the one who used to sit and beg?  Some said, ‘It is,’ but others said, ‘No, he just looks like him’.”  They don’t recognize their neighbor?  Blindness.  The Pharisees suffer blindness because they reject God’s action in Jesus since he healed on a Sabbath.  Though they are people of faith, they are so blind that they even say about Jesus, “This man is not from God,” and “We know that this man is a sinner.”  There is a lesson here for all of us whether baptized or soon-to-be-baptized.  Sin blinds us and can find us working against God’s inspirations, even though we may appear religious.  We must seek to constantly purify our vision.  We must seek constantly the love of Jesus.  We must desire transformation of our limited sight.  Like he did with the man born blind, Jesus seeks us out and finds us.  Again, like the man born blind, our faith and spiritual vision is shown to be reaching perfection when we too say, “I do believe, Lord” and we worship him. 

Second Sunday of Lent

Dominica II in Quadragesima A
1 March 2026

 Lent is a privileged season of renewal in our life as disciples. It is not renewal in the sense that we might renew a membership in a club or renew a streaming service. The best focus for our Lent is to see this season as a blessed opportunity for renewal in our relationship with Jesus the Lord. Relationships need ongoing work and they require effort. If we don’t communicate in a relationship, you can bet that relationship will suffer. If one person does all the talking, you are probably setting yourself up for something that is one-sided and less like a mutual exchange. If we treat our relationships as transactional, meaning we have time for the other mainly when we want or need something, then things are heading south. When it is more about “getting” than about “giving”, things go awry. If one party rarely listens… well, one day that will end and you’ll get an earful.

We can apply much of this to our life with the Lord. Lent is about placing an intense focus on the redeeming actions of the Lord by which we are saved. We recall the historical events of the Lord going up to Jerusalem and the Mount of Calvary as we gradually ascend, throughout Lent, “the holy mountain of Easter” (Ceremonial of Bishops, 249). For the baptized, Lenten renewal is an invitation to recommit ourselves to our baptismal promises. For those in adult formation in OCIA, Lent is the final intense preparation for being received into the Church and being admitted to the Easter Sacraments, where they, too, are called to join all of us in deeper life with the Lord and deeper union with the Church the Lord established. Lent is a season that has some happy coincidences with things like spring training and spring cleaning. And so, we pray more intensely. We take on mortifications and penances, like freely taking up fasting and abstaining from meat. We seek to have a heart for others, for service in charity, as we give alms. We confess. We commit ourselves to more regular confession to more worthily present ourselves for Holy Communion. We pray with the Passion of the Lord at Stations of the Cross.

But there is something much more simple, yet critical, that I want to focus on this weekend. I think the Transfiguration has a spiritual application to how we approach this Lenten time of renewal with the Lord, the renewal of better relationship practices with the Lord. Now you might be tempted to say, “Father, we are a week and a half into Lent already. You are a little late with this lesson for our relationship with the Lord”. Fair enough. But the good news is that Lenten renewal is not just for Lent but is intended to foster better spiritual life all year. Even if you didn’t start Lent this way, you can still adopt the spiritual lesson I am about to describe.

So, before Lent started, how did you prepare? How did you decide how you would observe Lent this year? If you are like me and how I prepare for Lent, then you are like Peter in the Gospel. By which I mean, like Peter, my Lent preparation goes something like this: “Okay, Lord, here we are. It’s Lent. It’s a privileged opportunity for renewal. Let’s do something. I’m going to do more fasting. I’m going to choose more days for fasting and abstaining from meat. I am going to say these certain prayers. I’m going to accomplish these spiritual practices that I have been missing. Let’s go. Let’s do this”! Can you see how that sounds like Peter in the Gospel: “Lord, it is good that we are here… I will make three tents here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah”. And, like Peter, I am busy speaking… and planning… and doing. The spiritual lesson and the relationship lesson for our life with Jesus is much more simple, but challenging. As good as all those spiritual practices we might plan are – and, to be clear, they are! Please do those practices and penances. – let’s not forget a simple reality about relationship: if we don’t communicate with the Lord well; if we do all the talking; if we go to the Lord mostly in a more transactional way when we need or want something; if it is more about “getting” than “giving”; if one party to the relationship is slow to listen… Ah, there it is! There is our simple lesson for Lent. For all the true lessons we can learn from the Transfiguration, there is that simple lesson for Lent and for the whole year and for our entire life as disciples. We practice this lesson in prayer. It happens in giving of my time to the Lord. It happens in making use of the Scriptures for meditation. It happens in noticing how much noise and activity is in my life, from all of my plans and all of my “doing”, including the airpods that feed my ears and mind with what I want and determine ahead of time. The Transfiguration gives Peter… and me… and maybe you a simple lesson: “This is my beloved Son…. Listen to him”!

Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dominica II per Annum A
18 January 2026

 In the context of this Gospel selection, Jesus has already been baptized, such that John is reporting to the crowds what he saw when he baptized the Lord.  John reports, “I saw the Spirit come down like a dove from heaven and remain upon him”.  Given what John knows, and given the signs that accompanied the baptism, John is able to point to Jesus and say, “Behold, the Lamb of God”.

 That’s a phrase I get to say each and every day.  I get to say that phrase as, just before Holy Communion, I hold up and present the Lamb of God in his Real Presence, given for his people.  I say that phrase daily, as does Fr. Bali, and any good priest.  I say it before large crowds and in smaller chapels.  I say it in my prayer room at home when, on some occasions, I am offering Mass privately by myself.  I say it in a hotel room when traveling.  I have said it sitting on the floor of a tent in the Alaska wilderness while on a salmon fishing trip in the backwoods.  Every day!  Behold, the Lamb of God!

The vocation, life and ministry of the priest became my focus as I reflected on this Gospel in preparation for the homily.  In part, the priesthood came to my mind because of the particular way that priests are privileged to do something like what St. John the Baptist did.  Priests are called to point out the Lord.  Priests are called to point people to an encounter with the Lord.  We are called to present the Lord’s teaching and to remind people what it means to follow the Lord by turning away from sin, repenting, and living a new life of commitment in discipleship.  Like the other words of St. John the Baptist in today’s passage, priests minister so that the Lord might be made known, and they testify that Jesus is the Son of God.  Priests make the Lord Jesus present in our midst because of that sacred power given to priests in the Catholic Church to consecrate and change bread and wine into the Body and Blood of the Lord.  Priests make the Lord’s mercy present because of that sacred power given to them to grant absolution for the forgiveness of sins.

I imagine that another reason that priesthood came to my mind for this weekend is because I have just returned from annual time with a good number of my seminary classmates.  Quite a few of you know this, but each early January around 15 of my seminary class come together from across the country and we gather on an Alabama tree farm, where we spend a week together.  It’s an unlikely spot for a priest gathering.  The reason we gather there is because it is owned by the family of one of my classmates.  It has plenty of space to accommodate all of us.  And frankly, we like the quiet of the woods where cell phones don’t work so well.  We spend our week together with a daily holy hour followed by Mass in the chapel built on the site.  We go on hikes.  Some of us hunt.  We have great meals.  We sit around a bonfire and enjoy carrying on.  We have spirited discussions on all manner of topics.  We joke and tease one another.  We seek advice on pastoral decisions we need to make at our parishes.  In short, we are brothers and we are blessed and renewed each year to begin the year with this time set aside for our fraternity.

Maybe I shouldn’t make a homily so personal.  But, I want you to have an idea of the deep sense of mission that priests have.  And the joy that we have in the unique privilege of standing where we stand and pointing out Christ to the world.  We know ourselves to be ordinary men.  We know ourselves to be sinners who need confession just like you.  We have our own set of characteristics, personality traits, talents and defects.  In all the sacraments the Lord takes ordinary things and sets them aside for a sacred purpose.  Likewise in the Sacrament of Holy Orders the Lord chooses and calls ordinary men to be committed to ongoing conversion, even while we minister to the flock and call you to ongoing conversion.

Each of the four Scripture readings, including the psalm, can be said to show us something about calling and vocation.  The first reading gives us some insight into the Prophet Isaiah’s awareness of his call to service, that he was formed from the womb to be the Lord’s servant.  The psalm provides that response that we can hope is on the lips of any person called by the Lord: “Here am I, Lord; I come to do your will.”  The second reading shows us St. Paul’s awareness that he is called to be an apostle.  And, of course, in the Gospel, St. John the Baptist baptizes, and makes known, and testifies that he is called to serve the one who ranks ahead of him: “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.”

I think all of this (the Scripture readings and my recent time with brother priests) comes together in a way that should motivate us to pray for future vocations to priesthood and religious life.  We should pray and have Masses said for vocations.  But we need to be still more proactive and direct, like St. John the Baptist.  The readings should motivate us to point to our young people who may have a calling; to make that calling known to them.  Like St. John the Baptist we should give testimony to the Son of God and call other servants into his mission.  This proactive and direct effort should take place in our families with parents pointing out priesthood and religious life to their children.  It should happen in our parish when you who occupy these pews see a young person and are attentive that perhaps the Lord is calling YOU to help that person hear an invitation to priesthood and religious life.

We talk a lot in our day about person’s discerning a religious vocation.  There is a certain truth and value in that.  But I heard a priest say something once that struck me as a message that we don’t hear enough of.  He said, our constant talk about discerning can sound more like all the emphasis is placed on a person deciding and figuring out a call to priesthood and religious life.  Yes, he said, a person has to discern.  But we need to remember that the first focus and emphasis should be on God who calls.  This priest said, rather than only talking about discerning, we should start with encouraging people to first pray to receive the grace of their vocation.  That the Lord would make it known to them.  We begin by praying to God and giving Him permission in a certain sense to give to us the gift of our vocation.  Then we take time, yes, and with much help, to discern God’s will.  So, girls and young ladies, listen up!  Make a simple prayer yours: God, IF you have formed me in the womb and called me to spiritual motherhood in consecrated religious life, then give me the grace of that calling and help me to hear it and to be willing to listen.  Boys and young men, listen up!  Whether you are more visible in service at the altar, or maybe you are sitting in the pews today: Make a simple prayer yours: God, IF you have formed me and called me to spiritual fatherhood as a future priest, then give me the grace of the priesthood; help me to hear that call and to be willing to listen, and seek answers.  You won’t regret praying to receive God’s call, seeking to know it, and following in the mission of service.  We all need others, like a John the Baptist, to point out the presence and the action of the Lord in our lives.  Speaking for myself, there is a deep sense of mission and purpose in priestly life.  Some of the most unique experiences and blessings come to me, not because I deserve them, but simply because I am a priest called to make the Lord present.  And, as I just enjoyed in my time away, some of the best friendships of your life will be found in the camaraderie of formation in seminary or religious life where you can share a unique bond with others who have the mission to testify to the Lord and to make him known:  Behold, the Lamb of God!

Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God

Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God
1 January 2026

The major solemnities of our faith are observed liturgically for an eight-day period, called an octave.  Christmas, the birth of our Savior, is one such octave.  Having an octave is a way to encourage us to enter more deeply into the mystery of the faith being observed, to deepen our appreciation of it by sticking with it rather than quickly letting it pass by.  In the case of Christmas, each day of the octave gives us the opportunity to reflect upon different facets of the Lord’s nativity and its meaning for us.  Liturgically, the close of an octave is a major observance and so it is for us with this close of the octave of Christmas by celebrating the Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God.

This solemnity of the octave causes us to consider how God chose to enter human history and chose to take on our flesh for our salvation through the cooperation of the feminine, specifically the maternity of that woman chosen by God to be the one who bore God in her womb and delivered him into the world.  It is no surprise that in celebrating the birth of a baby we are mindful of the role of the woman.  Jesus’ birth requires, by necessity, the motherhood of Mary.  And so, we revere and honor her for this fundamental privilege granted to her by God, that she was chosen to be the Mother of the Son, who is God incarnate and our Savior.

The collect, the first prayer of the Mass, gives us an image to ponder.  That prayer had us speaking to God that we would experience the intercession of Mary whose “fruitful virginity… bestowed on the human race the grace of eternal salvation”.  We believe that Mary was perpetually a virgin, meaning that before, during and after giving birth to the Lord, she remained a virgin as a type of consecration to God due to the special mission that was hers in salvation history.  But, that curious phrase, “fruitful virginity”, reminds us that Mary was no less fruitful due to her virginal life.  She bore great fruit in issuing forth the greatest fruit of all, the God-man Himself, Jesus Christ.  This is certainly worth celebrating and a great source of why we honor Mary.  However, I think her fruitful virginity extends still further.  The Scriptures tell us that Mary is not only the mother of the Lord, but she is also the mother all who believe in Christ.  The Book of Revelation, in describing the woman who is seen as an image of Mary, the fulfillment of the New Eve, speaks of the offspring, the other children of the woman, “who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus” (Rev. 12:17).  This means that we disciples are part of the fruit that is attributed to Mary’s fruitful virginity.  St. Paul in the second reading of this Mass describes this mystery in this way, “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, … so that we might receive adoption as sons” and so having received the Spirit of the Son into our hearts we cry out “Abba, Father”!  By faith and baptism we are joined to the life of the Son, Jesus Christ, and so we are likewise children who issue forth from the fruitful virginity of Mary, whose motherhood we celebrate as the conclusion of the Christmas Octave.

 Quite simply, in the beauty of this holy season, we acknowledge the role of Mary in fulfilling the words of the first reading, from the Book of Numbers.  God’s instruction for how Aaron and the Old Covenant priests were to bless included these words, “The Lord let his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you!  The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace”!  Through the faith and cooperation of Mary with God’s plan, her virginal consecration bore great fruit in that God Himself indeed has a face that in the fullness of time has shined upon His people.  Indeed, He has a face by which He can look upon us kindly.  He has looked upon us kindly in being lifted up as our Savior.  We are most fully alive when we dwell in His gaze, when we dwell where He looks upon us.  And by our faith and cooperation with God, we likewise become fruit of Mary’s virgin motherhood for we are adopted as God’s children, and we strive to keep the commandments and to give testimony to the Lord.  May Mary’s intercession for us help us to live a deeper union with the author of our life and our Savior, the one who shows us the face of God in human form, the Lord Jesus Christ!

Christmas Vigil and Midnight Masses

Nativitas D.N.I.C.
Vigil & Midnight Mass
24-25 December 2025

 Tonight we usher in our celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ!  This arrival of the One who is the long-awaited Messiah and who is also God Himself is the fulfillment of centuries of promise.  The sin of Adam and Eve created a rupture such that they could no longer be in God’s presence.  The result for them, and for all who share fallen human nature, is that they were alienated from the blessings God had provided in the garden and they were alienated from one another.  Perhaps the most damning alienation of all is that after the fall, Adam and Eve were not able to walk in communion with God, for when He comes into the garden, the Book of Genesis tells us that when they heard the sound of God walking in the garden, they “hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God” (Gn. 3:8).  In the moments after the Fall, God first began His promises of a plan to save mankind from this alienation.

Adam and Eve, and all of us in this fallen human nature, tend to hide ourselves from our proper dignity.  We hide ourselves from communion with God.  That’s another definition of sin.  We are estranged from that beautiful image of walking with God, of communion with God, as we tend to listen to the voice of the one who slithers his way in, placing doubts in our hearts and minds, and causing us to ruin God’s blessings because we trust more in what we can grasp for ourselves.  The One whose birth we celebrate this night is the answer to so many centuries of promises that God would save us and make it possible again for us to walk with Him and to have communion of life with Him in that harmony first made for mankind in the Garden of Eden.  At Christmas we celebrate Emmanuel, God-with-us, who abandons his majesty and all that would intimidate us by coming as a small, helpless infant who needs to be carried and held close.

If you have now, or if you ever have had an infant in your life at this time of year, you perhaps have the blessing of a special insight into the mystery of the Incarnation of God and his birth among us.  Anytime we are greeted with the news of a birth, we want to know when we can come and look and see the baby.  One of the most tender practices at Christmas is how we can ponder the birth of Jesus by making visits to the Nativity Scene at home or at church.  Don’t we all naturally want to look upon the Baby Jesus in the Nativity Scene?  In my prayer this Advent, the recollection of a family photo has been on my mind.  It’s really served for me to draw to mind the msytery of the incarnation.  I haven’t thought of that photo for decades, so I consider it a gift that God brought it to my mind.  The photo was taken at home when my younger brother was only two months old.  In the photo, the room is rather dark, and the prominent light is coming from a nearby lamp that gives the photo a warm glow, with light reflecting of our faces.  In the photo, my 8-year old self is holding up my two-month old infant brother and we are both looking at each other face-to-face, just inches apart.  As a novice big brother at that time, it’s not too hard to imagine what was going through my mind as I looked into his eyes.  Questions like: Who is he?  Where did he come from?  How do I understand him?  What is he thinking?  What will he sound like when he eventually talks?  What will he be like?  What will he become?

 The gift of recalling that photo has become a meditation in my prayer of the reality of what we celebrate tonight, a reality that our Nativity Scenes can only communicate in a static way.  Namely, that God has come near.  Mankind was made able to look upon Him.  And He was made able to look upon us.  Now to be clear, He was always able to see us by His power as God.  But in the Incarnation, God was made able to see us with human eyes and to show us divine love in human form.  The human face of godly love.  Psalm 123 says, “Our eyes [are] on the Lord our God” (Ps. 123:2c).  And so, they are.  And so, we recall this as we naturally gravitate toward our nativity scenes at Christmas.  And by this, it is possible for us to walk in harmony with God, to have communion with Him, and to resist hiding from him like Adam and Eve.

 I want to leave you with the fruit of my prayer as I have meditated on the Incarnation, and recalled how we hide from God, and recalled the mystery of a baby brother, and the tender attraction to the Nativity Scene.  Our nativity scenes will be taken down and packed away for another year – and all too soon.   That reminder – albeit a static one – that we can look upon God who has come near will be stored away until next Christmas.  But a lesson to take into each day forward, no matter the time of year, is that God can and does look upon us.  When we look upon God and have our eyes on Him, figuratively in our mental prayer, or quite literally in adoration or at Holy Mass, we might tend to fill the silence with our questions, and our needs, and our agenda, much like 8-year old me wondering about a baby brother with many questions.  I bet it would do us well in our spiritual life to foster the recollection that God looks at us and that prayer is, at least in one respect, simply letting Him look upon us and see us as we are.  No hiding!  Prayer is, at least in one respect, making sure that our questions and agenda aren’t the script that gets all the focus or fills all the time we spend in prayer.  Rather, let’s consider the reality of that other Face and the other set of eyes looking back at us, like that family photo served to remind me.  And let’s train ourselves in the peace of silence to ponder what questions might be on His mind as He looks upon us: What will you become?  What will you do with your life?  What are you thinking?  Where are you going?  Will you transfer some of that time spent looking into your phone and look at me as I look at you?  Will you walk in harmony with me?

  In our reading of Scripture, in our mental prayer, in our nativity scenes, in adoration, at Holy Mass, our eyes are on the Lord our God.  The blessing of Christmas lives well beyond one day and well beyond the season when we foster deeper communion with God Emmanuel and recall that the One we look upon has made the first move to come near and to lay His eyes upon us!

Third Sunday of Advent

Dominica III Adventus A
14 December 2025

 Within the season of Advent this Mass of the Third Sunday stands out with a unique character.  The character of this Sunday stands out by the shift in color from purple to the liturgical color rose and the permission to decorate the sanctuary with flowers.  With these visual clues, it should be obvious to anyone following from day to day in Advent that something is different at this moment in the season.  Coming from the Latin first word of the entrance antiphon of the Mass, this Mass is known as Gaudete – or Rejoice! – Sunday.  The entrance antiphon of the Mass had us pray, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice.”  And why do we rejoice?  What is the cause of our rejoicing?  The antiphon goes on to tell us, for “the Lord is near.”

 The term “Lord” refers to God.  That God has come near to His people – to us! – is the cause of joy and rejoicing.  That God has come near is what is revealed in the Gospel selection today.  So, let’s take a look at what is happening in the Gospel.

  St. John the Baptist is in prison.  He is awaiting execution.  He is not going to get out of there alive.  And he knows it.  Faced with such stark realities, it would be natural for John to consider his life and his work.  He knew himself to be the voice crying out in the wilderness.  He knew himself to be preparing the way for someone greater.  And he knew himself to be lesser than the one who is coming, so much less that he was not worthy to untie the strap of his sandal.  In prison, in a place of such finality, knowing that his own life’s work of prophecy to prepare the way was coming to an end, John hears that Jesus is doing “the works of the Christ,” the passage says.  And so, St. John sends his disciples to Jesus to inquire about what this means.

  St. John’s question is, “Are you the one who is to come?”  You and I hear that question as St. John asking if Jesus is the promised Messiah.  That is part of the question but notice that St. John doesn’t actually use that title.  And that is because there is something more going on here that is being revealed.  There is something more here than just the signs of the Messiah, the Christ.  To answer St. John, Jesus makes reference to the selection from the prophet Isaiah that is chosen as our first reading.  In that selection from Isaiah, the prophet speaks of a future day of salvation when all creation will be made new, will exult and rejoice with new life.  These things will happen because God, not just the Messiah, but Himself will come.  In his response to St. John, Jesus attributes to himself those signs of God’s action.  You can compare the Gospel to the first reading.  Jesus says because of what he is doing, “the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, … the deaf hear”.  If you compare those two readings, you can also notice that Jesus adds to the list from Isaiah.  He says that his works mean “lepers are cleansed… [and] the dead are raised”.  These additions can be seen to be a way to emphasize that he is doing the things that only God can do.  That’s why Jesus adds, “And blessed is the one who takes no offense at me”.  Why would he need to say that?  Because the works that Jesus is doing reveal him to be more than just the Christ, the Messiah.  His works reveal him to be God Himself.  In fact, it is his claim to be not only the Messiah, but actually God… this is what eventually gets him arrested and crucified for being a blasphemer.

  The revelation that God has come near and is doing His works of renewal that bring rejoicing, was not a private revelation for St. John alone.  The next part of the Gospel selection shows that the answer to St. John’s question, “are you the one who is to come”, is a revelation meant for everyone.  Jesus goes on to ask the crowd about St. John and his identity.  The crowds didn’t come out to see and to listen to St. John because he was a people pleaser, like a reed swayed by the wind.  They didn’t come out to see someone dressed in fine clothing.  No, St. John dressed rather wildly like Elijah.  Jesus tells the crowd that they came out to see and to listen to St. John because he was a prophet.  And the Lord tells them that he was more than a prophet.  He was the greatest of the prophets.  And for this, Jesus quotes the Book of the Prophet Malachi.  This quote gives still more emphasis that Jesus is doing not only the works of the Christ, the Messiah, but he is actually doing the works of God.  This is punctuated by the quote from Malachi, because in the Book of Malachi the messenger that goes ahead and prepares the way is preparing the way, not for the Messiah, but for the arrival of the Lord God Himself.

  The arrival of God Himself to refresh and bring life, in fact to save, is the cause of the joy of Jesus’ listeners.  They hear that for as great as St. John is, even “the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he”.  Imagine what joy and rejoicing this revelation must have been for St. John when word got back to him in such a place of misery and hopelessness awaiting execution.  The Church invites all of us to rejoice this Sunday as we get ever closer to celebrating the birth of God who has come to save us.  We can each find ourselves in some way represented in the Scriptures.  Maybe we are like the crowds, going through life, seeking the Lord and looking for meaning.  Perhaps we have our own places of dark imprisonment that seem hopeless.  Or, more likely than not for the vast majority, we go through the ups and downs of the daily routine, and like the image from the second reading, we have to have the patience of a farmer who plants but does not immediately see the return.  As St. James said, “You too must be patient.  Make your hearts firm, because the coming of the Lord is at hand”.

 The revelation, not only of the Messiah, but of God Himself, has taken place.  This is the cause of our rejoicing today.  We must work to cultivate the awareness of this joy each day.  God has come to save us and He has made it possible to enter the kingdom of heaven.  He is the one who is to come, as ancient prophets foretold.  He is the one who has already come.  He is the one who will come again.  And in this time, in which we must patiently await entrance into fullness of life, He is the one who comes most powerfully to us in the Holy Eucharist.  And for this reason, just before Holy Communion, with the Holy Eucharist held before us, do we hear the words of the messenger St. John preparing the way, not only for the Messiah, but preparing the way for God Himself: “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world”.