God went to the cross for us – Jas 5:1-6.

Preaching on the second reading from today's Mass; Sunday Vespers, Moreau Seminary.

Thanks be to God?  Do you see God in this reading? Because I have to admit that when I first looked at the text I’d been assigned to preach on tonight, the happiest thought that came to me was that at least I wasn’t being asked to tell you to cut body parts off.  But we have to find God in this reading from James, because the people we minister to are relying on us to help them point to and name the action of God in their lives and if we can’t do that with sacred scripture, we’re in trouble.

God forges community from the cross – Jn 19:25-27

Continuing my Old College series on the the Seven Sorrows of Mary with the Crucifixion.

There stood by the cross of Jesus his mother and his mother’s sister, Maria the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalen.

Then Jesus, seeing his mother and the disciple he loved standing by, said to his mother:

“Women, behold your son!”

Then, he said to the disciple:

“Behold your mother!”

And from that hour, the disciple received her as his own.

~~

Goudou Goudou: that’s the word in Haitian Creole for ‘earthquake.’  Prior to January 2010, there was no Haitian Creole word for earthquake.  Language was not the only thing that changed on that day that knocked Haiti down.  Haiti was not doing well before the goudou goudou and it’s not doing well now, but things have changed.  This summer I spent some time there and met some amazing groups of Haitians that, with outside support, have come together in the face of horrific disaster to work together to improve their community.  I met people that never realized they were a community, with deep responsibilities to each other, until disaster hit.  I would never want in any way to romanticize, sugar-coat or over-spiritualize what happened when the earth shook in Haiti.  But from that very real cross, God forged community.

God commands life – Luke 7:11-17.

The Widow of Nain; Sunday-length homily for preaching class.

What are you carrying? … Is it heavy?  Is it in your arms, or on your back, or is a friend holding it for you right now?  What are you carrying?  I’m not asking you to answer out loud, because I want you to think of something you wouldn’t want to tell this whole group.  Because most of us have something that weighs us down.  A memory, a fear, an injustice suffered or inflicted, an incompetence or a deception. 

Jesus expands our vision – Lk 23:26-31

Continuing the OC series on the Seven Sorrows of Mary.  This week, the Way of the Cross.

As they led Jesus away, they seized a certain Cyrenean, Simon, who was coming from the countryside and they imposed on him the cross to carry behind Jesus.

A great crowd of the people was following him including some women who were mourning and lamenting over him. 

Turning to them, Jesus said: “Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me.

“Weep rather for yourselves and for your children,

“for, behold, the days are coming in which they will say,

“‘Blessed are the barren and the wombs that have not born children and the breasts that have not nursed.’

“Then they will start to say to the mountains, ‘fall on us,’ and to the hills, ‘cover us.’

“For if these things happen when the trees are green, what will come to pass when they are dry?”

~~

It wasn’t the first time Jesus had heard a woman cry out as he walked.  Near the start of the great journey to Jerusalem he undertook, a woman cried out, “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts at which you nursed!”  Jesus certainly does not deny the blessedness of his Mother Mary, but his response expands that woman’s vision: “Blessed are those who hear the word of God and do it.”  The blessing of having the Word of God be born in you is great, but Mary’s motherhood does not compete with or eclipse, but begets the Church’s motherhood, and who is the Church but all who hear the word of God and do it?  Thus, the word of God is born in us. 

Jesus waits with us before walking with us – Lk 2:41-49

Continuing the Old College Holy Hour Series on Our Lady of Sorrows

Jesus’ parents used to go each year to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. 

When he was twelve years old, he had gone up to Jerusalem according to the custom of the feast, and when the days of the feast were completed and the people were going away, Jesus remained, the boy in Jerusalem, and his parents did not know.

Thinking that he was amongst the fellow travelers on the way, they went a day’s journey and were seeking him out among their relatives and acquaintances.  When they did not find him, they turned around and returned to Jerusalem to search for him.

After three days, they found him in the Temple, sat in the middle of the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions.  All those who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his responses.

Upon seeing him, his parents were astounded and his mother said to him: “My child, why have you done this to us?  Look, your father and I have been seeking you in such grief.”

And he said to them: “Why did you seek me?  Did you not know that it is necessary for me to be amongst the things of my Father?”

~~

There was an ad that aired on British television in the run up to last Christmas.  It featured a young boy who longed for Christmas to come sooner.  We would see him gazing listlessly out of a window as the leaves slowly changed; we saw him mark off the days with tally marks on his wall; we saw him dress up in a wizard costume and zap the clock with his wand to try to make it go faster.  Finally, we see him wake up, way too early for his parents, on Christmas Day morning, eyes a-glimmer with excitement.  He takes a clumsily wrapped box from under his bed, walks into his parents’ room, and offers it to them.  The caption comes up: “Lewis’s – for gifts you can’t wait to give.” 

God has a loving plan for us – Matt 2:13-15

Continuing the Old College Holy Hour series on Our Lady of Sorrows.

When the Magi had left, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph, saying:

“Arise and take the child and his mother

and flee to Egypt and stay there until I tell you,

for Herod is about to seek the child out in order to kill him.”

When he had arisen, he took the child and his mother by night

and they went away into Egypt and were there until the death of Herod,

in order that what the Lord said through the prophet might be fulfilled:

“Out of Egypt I have called my son.”

~~

God calls Joseph to become a refugee, to undertake a perilous journey to a strange land and experience the alienation and marginalization of life on the edge of society in Egypt.  God calls him to rise from death to life, but not to an easy life, and He doesn’t give him an easy road to tread to get there.  God doesn’t promise us an easy life either; He promises eternal life.

God promises to raise us if we trust enough to fall – Lk 2:27-35a

This is the first in a series of reflections I'm giving at the Old College Saturday morning Holy Hour on the Seven Sorrows of Mary.

Simeon came in the Spirit to the temple grounds and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do to him what is customary according to the Law, he took him in his arms and praised God, saying:

“Now you release your servant in peace, Master, according to your word.

“For my eyes have seen your salvation that you prepared in the sight of all peoples,

“A light for the revelation to the nations and the glory of your people Israel.”

His mother and father were amazed at what was said about him.  And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, his mother: “Behold, he is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel and for a sign of opposition; and a sword will pierce your soul.”

~~

“It was the scariest day of my life.”  That’s not what I expected my friend to say after the baptism of her first child.  So, I probed a little.  She explained that as little Julie passed through the waters of rebirth, she had a profound sense that she was giving her daughter up for adoption.  She was; that’s true.  Now, the way God parents us does not in any way compete with our earthly parents, it doesn’t take them off the scene, the domestic church is where we hope people first experience God’s fatherly love even if that doesn’t always happen.  But, at the end of the day, God is first.  We’re all adopted, and I’d never really stopped to consider how that affects some parents.