There is nothing more important in life than who we love, yet it has been well said that we cannot explain why we love someone. If a husband were to say that he loved his wife because she was beautiful, she might indignantly answer “What happens if I lost my beauty?” “Would you still love me?” If she however told her husband that she loved him because he was a good provider he could well respond, “Would you still love me if I lost my job?” Why we love is a mystery because there is simply too much meaning to express in questions and answers. It is the stuff of poetry and drama not philosophy and science and the best even the most subline literature can accomplish is the hinting at the fullness.
Continue reading “7th Sunday of Easter – Homily (Fr. Smith)”Category: Homilies
6th Sunday of Easter – Homily (Msgr. LoPinto)
As we mentioned at the beginning of today’s liturgy, it is the sixth Sunday of Easter.
And so for six, seven weeks we have been singing alleluia, yes.
And I wonder sometimes since we do these things almost out of practice or what you might say habit.
Whether we ever really stop to think.
Why are we using this one word so frequently?
Continue reading “6th Sunday of Easter – Homily (Msgr. LoPinto)”5th Sunday of Easter – Homily (Fr. Smith)
Jesus walked before he talked. By this I mean that he saw his world up close and slow before he began his preaching and teaching. His use of biblical imagery is particularly effective because he knew the physical realities of growth and rot, care and neglect, competence and incompetence from personal experience. This is particularly important for understanding today’s gospel.
Jesus lived in Nazareth but as a general contractor – a better choice for the Greek word we usually translate as carpenter – he would have worked mostly in the Greek speaking town of Sepphoris It was about a 4 mile walk and there were many fields with sheep and many vineyards with grapes and olives. When he calls himself the good shepherd, he has seen the dedication of good shepherds but understands why the scriptures use bad, self-serving, shepherds as the most potent image of corrupt leadership. He brings his experience to give this image greater effect. So too today with the vineyard.
Jesus saw vineyards grow or decline on his walk to and from work. After an evening storm he would have seen branches that were separated from the trunk of the tree looking good and healthy on the morning walk to Sepphoris but they would have been obviously decaying on the way back to Nazareth and dead the next day. They were fit only to burn.
Fourth Sunday of Easter – Homily (Msgr. LoPinto)
The first reading today comes from the Acts of the Apostles. That’s that story, that lengthy story that Luke records of the experience of the early church.
And one of the things that is very much noted in that presentation is transformation.
You have, as we see in the first reading today, the transformation of Peter.
The one who was so fearful that he denied the Lord three times, rather than acknowledge that he had awareness or knowledge or relationship with him.
Continue reading “Fourth Sunday of Easter – Homily (Msgr. LoPinto)”Third Sunday of Easter – Homily (Fr. Smith)
This is the third Sunday of Easter, and the Gospel is always a resurrection appearance of Jesus. The author shows that Jesus was neither a Ghost nor a Zombie and that this is important for how we live as Christians. We need to hear this just as much as the original audience.
This year St Luke continues the story of the disciples on the way to Emmaus. This is Easter day. Mary Magdelene and other women went to the tomb and found it empty. Two angels told them that he was raised. They told the disciples in the upper room, Peter investigated and returned dazed and confused. Two disciples left Jerusalem for a small-town named Emmaus and Jesus joined them, but they did not know that it was him. The roads were dangerous, and the disciples assumed that this stranger wanted to join them for safety. They discussed Jesus, his death, and the mysterious disappearance of his body. Jesus explains these events from the perspective of scripture, their hearts burned within them, and they invited Jesus to eat with them. At it he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them, they recognized him, and he disappeared.
Thus far his risen body is human enough that no one comments on it but different enough from the one that the disciples were used to that they did not recognize him. He was also able to appear and disappear at will. Obviously, Jesus was not simply resuscitated.
Continue reading “Third Sunday of Easter – Homily (Fr. Smith)”Easter Sunday – Homily (Fr. Smith)
A poet wrote that it is not where I breathe but where I love, I live. The risen Jesus has brought us to a world where everything revolves around God’s love and we can live life to the full.
This world begins at the tomb. Jesus had been placed in it hurriedly and now for him to be buried as a Jew he must be anointed with oil. Three women come to do this, but they know that a stone has been rolled over the entrance to prevent animals from defiling a corpse and they will not be able to move it.
They loved Jesus so much that they would risk the wrath of the authorities by tending to his body. This is true love they did not think that he was alive and could no longer do anything for them. Yet although four times in Marks’s gospel Jesus says that he will rise from the dead his disciples, even these brave women and women are the superior disciples in Mark, do not understand, they expected to find a corpse.
Continue reading “Easter Sunday – Homily (Fr. Smith)”Good Friday – Homily (Msgr. LoPinto)
After this, aware everything was now finished in order that the scripture might be fulfilled, Jesus said I thirst. There are many phrases that are contained in the different accounts of the passion,
but perhaps this one stands out because it really reflects what Jesus was intent upon.
It’s a phrase that became part of the writings in her daily in her daily diary of the sainted Mother Teresa.
She often wrote that the feeling that she had was a thirst.
Continue reading “Good Friday – Homily (Msgr. LoPinto)”