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Fr. Bryan Howard
Good Friday Solemn Service of the Lord – 30 March 2018 Why do we do all of this every year? Why do we gather together during Holy Week? We believe that these rituals, these celebrations, remember something that happened in the past, and prepare us for something that’s going to happen in the future. On Good Friday we remember and celebrate the suffering and death of Jesus, and we prepare ourselves for the crosses that we have to bear in our lives, and especially for the end of our lives. We learned this from the Jews, because they did the same things. All of these things happened during the ancient feast of Passover. In Passover the Jewish people remember when God delivered them from slavery in Egypt. Moses told the people that God was going to send one final plague on Egypt. Because Pharaoh had ordered the murder of the sons of the Israelites, so God would send the angel of death to take the firstborn son of every family. The Israelites were told to each offer a year old male lamb, without spot or blemish, and to spread the blood on the door posts, so the angel of death would know to pass over their houses. Then they would roast the lamb and eat it with bitter herbs, wine, and unleavened bread. To remember this, the Jewish people would all gather in Jerusalem for the feast of Passover. They would go to the temple and offer the lamb, then they would roast the lamb and eat it with bitter herbs, wine, and unleavened bread. It was on the feast of passover that Jesus was crucified. Remember what St. John the Baptist said when He first saw Jesus, which we say in every Mass, “Behold the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.” And latter in the Mass, “Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us.” Jesus is the lamb of God. As Jesus was stretching His arms out on the Cross, the lambs were being offered in the Temple. When they prepared them to be roasted, they would take two sticks, one they would tie down the back of the lamb, and the other would be tied to its front legs, holding them out to the side, in the shape of a cross. And what time was it when this was happening? The lambs were offered in the middle of the afternoon. The Bible tells us when Jesus took His last breath, about 3:00 in the afternoon. At the same time. None of this is an accident. In God there are no coincidences. Everything has a meaning and a person. From the very beginning God knew how He was going to save us. In the Exodus, the Israelites were saved from slavery to Pharaoh, but Jesus saves us from slavery to sin. The passover lamb saved the people from physical death, but Jesus, the Lamb of God, saves us from spiritual death. We are not now being prepared to enter some promised land, like the Israelites were, we are being prepared to enter heaven. Now, you probably thought that was all of the connections, but I want to point out one more. On Passover, after the day was over and all the offering done, they had to clean up, so they would get buckets of water, and splash them all through the Temple area and on the altar, and it would drain through the side of the Temple, through the right side, and form a stream of blood and water. After His death, to prove that Jesus was dead, the soldier took his lance and stabbed Jesus through His right side, and from the would came a stream of blood and water, signifying the saving waters of baptism and the Precious Blood of the New Covenant. The Bible says, “The life is in the blood.” We receive the life of Christ into our own souls every time we draw near to the Cross.
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Fr. Bryan Howard
Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord’s Supper – 29 March 2018 The ancient Israelites had many different kinds of sacrifices. They had thank offerings, given to thank God for some great blessing, and sin offering, in reparation for a sin committed, and holocaust offerings. They had offerings of bread and of grain, of grapes, libations of wine and milk, offerings of lambs, goats, bulls, and oxen. Some were offered every day and some only once a year, but they all had two thing in common. Every offering and sacrifice had to be offered in the Temple in Jerusalem, and it had to be offered by a priest. By the law of God, that was the only place where a sacrifice could be made, because it was the house of God. So, why do we call the death of Jesus on the Cross a sacrifice. First, human sacrifice was forbidden in ancient Israel. Second, it happened outside of the Temple, and outside of Jerusalem. Third, there was no Jewish priest. An ancient Jew would have called the death of Jesus an execution, or maybe even a martyrdom, but they never would have called it a sacrifice. So, how did the apostles, who were Jewish, come to consider the death of Jesus a sacrifice, and not just any sacrifice, but the one perfect sacrifice through which our sins are forgiven and we are united to God for eternity? Well, it has to do with what we’re celebrating today, the Last Supper. You see, the Last Supper was a seder meal, a ritual meal, and it followed a very strict order. It began with the sacrifice of a lamb in the Temple, and continued with a meal at home. When you ate, when you drank, and the prayers to be said was all laid out. So, the apostles must have been very confused when Jesus, at the Last Supper, began to change things. During a traditional seder meal, you eat roasted lamb, bitter herbs, and drink 4 glasses of wine a certain times. The third cup of wine is called the cup of blessing, and it was this cup that Jesus took, and said the blessing, and gave it to His disciples saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” Then He said that He would not drink again from the fruit of the vine until He would drink it new in the kingdom of God. The disciples must have been thinking, “But Jesus, what do you mean you won’t drink again the fruit of the vine? There’s another cup of wine in this very meal.” But Jesus left for the Garden of Gethsemane before the end of the meal, before the fourth cup, which is called the Cup of Acceptance, or, sometimes, the Cup of Consummation. Do you remember what Jesus said in the Garden, when He went forward to pray? “Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me; still, not my will but yours be done.” The cup is the cup of suffering that is in store for Him, but perhaps He’s also referring to the last cup of the Seder meal. What were the last words that Jesus spoke from the Cross, before He surrendered His Spirit? “It is finished.” Which, in Latin, is Consummatum Est, “It is consummated.” Jesus accepts the cup of suffering from that He had to bear, and, through it, consummates, or completes, His mission. By reflecting on the Last Supper and the Cross of the Lord, the apostles saw the connection between the two. The Last Supper was preparing them for the memorial of the Cross, and we can remember and celebrate the Cross of the Lord by reliving the Last Supper, which is what we do in the Mass. We listen to the history of salvation in the readings of the mass, we speak the words that Jesus spoke, we offer the sacrificial Lamb, the Lamb of God, and we share a meal, the bread that becomes the Body of Christ and the wine that becomes His blood. In the John, chapter 6, we read the words of Jesus, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you will not have life in you.” So, stay close to the Mass, because it is through the Mass that you stay close to the Cross, God’s great act of love for us, and receive His life in your soul. ![]()
Fr. Bryan Howard
Palm Sunday – 25 March 2018 Holy Week is the holiest week of the Christian year. During this week we set aside our normal routine to offer special praise and worship to God, to remember His Passion and death, and to ask for the grace to grow closer to Jesus in our daily lives. Even with all of the extra prayers, devotions, and rites, all of the extra time that we spend in Church during this week, remember that it’s not holy because of what we do for God, but because of what God did, and still does, for us. We don’t make things holy, God makes things holy. In fact, that’s what holiness is, closeness to God. On Holy Thursday, with the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, we remember the Last Supper of Jesus with His disciples, and how He told them, “Do this in memory of me.” On Holy Thursday night, the night before His Passion, Christ gave us the Mass, He gave us His very body and blood. On Good Friday, we remember the Passion and crucifixion of our Lord, and how He gave His life for us. We remember that He died for love of us and to draw us closer to Himself. On Easter Sunday, we remember His resurrection and how, in rising to new life, He has invited us to receive the new life of the Holy Spirit, just as He appeared to the disciples on this day and, breathing on them, gave them the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ may have been God made flesh, but He was also fully human. During this week, remember how much Jesus struggled. Remember how, after the Last Supper, He took the disciples out to the Garden of Gethsemane and asked Peter, James, and John, “Could you not keep watch for one hour?” They couldn’t. They kept falling asleep. This is what Jesus is asking of us during this week, “Could you not keep watch for one hour?” He is asking us to sit and pray with Him. Remember how, during the time when He needed them most, all of the apostles except John abandoned Him. At that point in their lives they weren’t ready to embrace the Cross of Christ. Jesus is asking us, during this Holy Week, not to run from the Cross, but to learn from it, and to let the Cross of Christ bring us closer to Christ. Jesus gave us the Mass, the memorial of His suffering and death, He gave us the Cross, His victory over sin and death, and He gave us the Resurrection, the new life of the Holy Spirit, but the path to the Resurrection always goes through the Way of the Cross. St. Frances de Sales said, “If you contemplate Him frequently in meditation, your whole soul will be filled with Him, you will grow in His Likeness, and your actions will be molded on His.” Spend time this week in prayer, sitting with Jesus, keeping watch with Him, thinking about His life, His Passion, His death, and His resurrection, and letting Jesus fill your soul with grace and help you grow to be more like Him in imitating His faith, compassion, charity, courage, and perseverance. ![]()
Fr. Bryan Howard
5th Sunday of Lent – Year B – 18 March 2018 In a world of cyber bullying, safe spaces, and school shootings, two words that you probably hear over and over are self confidence. Self confidence and self esteem are very important concepts in a world where posting the wrong thing on twitter or instagram can see you fired from you job, black listed, and ostracized from society, at least until people forget about you. As the song says, “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.” So, the first time we really pay attention to today’s Gospel, it may seem odd that Jesus says, “Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life.” Is Jesus really telling us to hate our lives? To hate ourselves? Talking about this specific line, St. Augustine gives us two possible interpretations of it, and I thing that both of them are very good to reflect on during this second to last week of Lent. First, “If you would preserve your life in Christ, fear not death for Christ.” If you love your life, and want to keep it, then you need to understand that the only way to do that is to live for Christ and die for Christ. Put more simply, you are going to die. Maybe not today, and maybe not tomorrow, but someday you are going to die. We can’t choose whether we’re going to die, only how we’re going to live. Will you live for Christ? Will you die for Christ, it you are called upon to do so? Second, St. Augustine tells us, “Do not love your life here, left you lose it hereafter.” Have you ever heard the song, “If heaven ain’t a lot like Texas, I don’t want to go,” or Billy Joel, “I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.” Have you ever heard someone say, “If they don’t have such and such in heaven, then I don’t want to go. If that’s just a way of saying that you really like something a lot, then that’s fine, it’s just a figure of speech, but sometimes people mean it. What they’re basically saying is that they love that thing or person more than God. “I would rather be separated from God for all eternity, than be separated from my favorite this.” Think about what the season of Lent is all about. God loved us so much that he created the universe, even though He didn’t get anything out of it. Think about it. You can give something back to your parents because they have needs outside of themselves, food, water, shelter, affection, respect, friendship. But, God doesn’t need anything that He doesn’t already have, and if He did need something, He couldn’t create it because He doesn’t have it. So why did God create us? He simply wanted to share His love with us. He shared His love with us by sending us the prophets of the Old Testament, by choosing a people, the Jewish people, to share His way of life with the world, and by revealing His truth to us. Finally, Jesus Christ the Son of God, God Himself, came down to become one of us. Even if I could, I wouldn’t become an ant, just to share my love with the ants. But that’s basically what God did. And if that wasn’t enough, then He died for us, and not just any death, but the death of the Cross. So, how can we love Jesus more? How can we love God more than we love even our own lives. Are we willing to die for Jesus, and even to live for Jesus, so that we can live with Jesus for eternity. What are we willing to sacrifice, to put aside, so that we can live with Him? Our pride? Our greed? Our anger? Our unforgiveness? Over that last couple of weeks you may have noticed a theme running through my homilies: baby steps, a little bit at a time. And this week is no different. The way that we grow to love God more, is by giving up things that we like and that we don’t really need for Him. That’s what we’re doing in Lent. When you pass by a Burger King and really want to stop in for a chicken sandwich, but then you remember that it’s Friday, and you keep driving. You’re saying, Jesus, I love you more than I love chicken sandwiches. When you’re praying and you get distracted, maybe by work or what’s coming on TV later, but you pull yourself away from that and turn your attention back to Jesus, you’re saying, “Jesus, I love you more than I love TV.” When you come to the Church to volunteer, or go help out at the food bank or battered women’s shelter, when you could be going fishing. You’re saying, “Jesus, “I love you more than I love fishing.” And that’s really saying something. So, when Lent ends, don’t stop making little sacrifices for Jesus, because, each time you do you’re saying, “Jesus, I love you more than I love even myself.” ![]()
Fr. Bryan Howard
4th Sunday of Lent – Year B – 11 March 2018 Today is Laetare Sunday, or “Rejoice Sunday.” It’s the fourth Sunday of Lent, meaning that we’re halfway through Lent and that much closer to Easter and to the celebration of the Paschal Mystery, the death and resurrection of the Lord. And we have a lot of reasons to rejoice. God has given us immeasurable blessings. We’re blessed to be born in this great land of freedom and opportunity, the United States. We’re blessed in our family and friends. We’re blessed to be Catholic, to know about God and His love for us, and to be members of His people. We shouldn’t take these blessings for granted, because there are people in the world today who don’t have them. There are people who don’t have any family or friends. There are people who struggle just to get enough to eat and drink and some sort of shelter. There are places in the world where people don’t have the freedoms that we do where you might be arrested or killed just for being Christian or disagreeing with the government. There are people who’ve never even heard of Jesus. We are Christians and Catholics, but what does that mean to us? Does it make a difference in how we live our lives? St. Paul wrote in our 2nd reading, “because of the great love he had for us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, brought us to life with Christ…, raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the immeasurable riches of his grace.” This is really why we rejoice. We have been called to salvation, to the grace of God, and to the life of Christ. If we have such great blessings and graces from God, then why is there so much sin in the world? As we read in the Gospel, “And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil.” People preferred darkness to light. If you attended the Mission this past week with Fr. Kurt Young, one of the things you heard on the first night of the Mission, Monday night, was that our own sins can keep us from deepening our relationship with God. In fact, sin is one of the main things that make it harder to grow closer to God. God is light. He brings light into the darkness and reveals what is in our hearts. We all have those places in our hearts that we prefer to keep in darkness. Things that we don’t want anyone to know about. When we sin, if we’re not actively trying to overcome that sin, it starts to affect the way we think. First, it gets harder to fight that temptation. That’s called concupiscence, the tendency to fall into sin. Second, it becomes easier to justify that sin and convince ourselves that it’s not really wrong at all. 75 years ago, almost everyone agreed that sex outside of marriage was wrong, now most people think that it’s normal. 25 years ago, most people agreed that euthanasia (physician assisted suicide) was wrong, now it’s legal in 5 states and Washington, DC. You see, it causes us a lot of stress when we’re acting in a way that we believe is wrong. So, we can either change our behavior or change our mind. It’s often easier to change our minds. As Jesus said in the Gospel, “For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light, so that his works might not be exposed. But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.” At the Easter Vigil, as I carry the paschal candle, which represents the resurrected Christ, into the darkened Church, I’ll sing, “The light of Christ,” and then everyone’s candles will be lit from that candle. Christ is the one who brings light into the dark places. We have to bring the light of Christ into the dark places in our own lives, so that He can burn away our sins. Here are three tips to help you do that. First, frequent confession. When we wait 6 months or a year between going to confession, it’s easy to forget some of our sins, or to start thinking that they’re not a big deal. If we go each month, it helps us to face them directly and bring them to God. Then, with God’s help, we can start to break their power over us. Second, use an examination of conscience. Find a good examination of conscience. I have several good ones linked on our website in the resources section, and we keep a stack of them next to the confessional. Use it regularly to examine your life. Then you’ll be better prepared for confession and it’ll get easier to go to confession. Finally, the one percent rule. This comes from World War II. When the US entered the war, we had to get our factories changed from peace time to war production quickly, so the government send a pamphlet out giving advice on how to get changed over. They suggested that factories not try to go full out right away, but aim to improve production 1% every day. After the war, when they were taking stock, they found that the factories that listened outproduced the ones that tried to go 100% right away. Aim to improve yourself 1% each day. We can’t do everything, right away. It’s just not possible and if we try we’ll burn ourselves out. But if you try to improve 1% each day, you might do more than you could have imagined. Remember, you’re not alone. God wants to share with you the immeasurable riches of His grace, so walk in the light. ![]()
Fr. Bryan Howard
3rd Sunday in Lent – Year B – 4 March 2018 Actions speak louder than words. Put your money where your mouth is. All that glitters is not gold. These are all ways of saying that sometimes, what something appears to be, isn’t what it really is. We value honesty and integrity because, when someone lives their life by those principles, you always know what you’re going to get. They’re consistent and dependable. This is true in our families. Children need to know that the rules aren’t going to change from one day to the next, and spouses need to be able to rely on one another. It’s true in friendships. A faithful friend is one that you can count one to be there when you need them. It’s true in business. When you get a reputation for being unreliable, then only unreliable people will do business with you. So, it shouldn’t be surprising that it’s also true in the spiritual life. Many people say that they’re spiritual or religious, but they don’t put in the work to grow in the spiritual virtues, faith, hope, charity, temperance, justice, prudence, and courage. Our first reading is the Ten Commandment, which is the basic guide to the spiritual life, to strengthening your relationship with God. Everything else, the beatitudes, the virtue, the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit, builds on this foundation. That’s why we make children memorize the 10 Commandments, but we need to keep going back to them. It’s like basketball. You need to start with the fundamentals, with dribbling, shooting, and passing, in order to get anywhere. Eventually, you’ll get to more advanced plays and strategies, but if you forget the fundamental everything else is useless. When we teach the 10 Commandments, especially in the teenage years, we get lots of questions like, “Is this okay? Is that a sin? What about this?” Always trying to push the boundaries, to know how far they can go before it becomes a sin. We do this as adults too, we’re just better and sneakier about it. We’re very good at justifying the things that we want, at twisting the law just enough, or convincing ourselves that it’s really not so bad. This is what’s happening in the cleansing of the Temple in today’s Gospel. All Israelites were required to offer sacrifice in the Temple twice a year, but some of them lived a long way away, and it was difficult to bring sheep and cattle all the way there. So, in the book of Deuteronomy Moses gave them permission to sell the animals, bring the money to Jerusalem, and then buy animals there to sacrifice in the Temple. By the time of Jesus, however, the chief priests’ family was in charge of selling these animals, so he made a law that you can’t use Roman coins to buy sacrificial animals. You could only use Temple coins, and you can only get Temple coins by going to the money changers in the Temple. They charged a large fee to change your money. This was not specifically against any law, but it was basically theft. Christ, outraged that they’re using His Father’s House, the Temple, to enrich themselves, makes a whip out of cords and drives out the animals, overturns the money changes tables, and tells them, “Stop making my Father’s House a marketplace.” Instead of asking ourselves, “How can I get away with doing what I want?” We should be asking, “Is what I want really good?” Remember, God can look into the heart. It’s not enough to follow the letter of the law, we also have to have good intentions. Do we want to grow in holiness? Do we want to grow closer to God? Do we want to be better neighbors to one another? This is not about rules and regulations. It’s about relationships. During this coming week, look through the Ten Commandments again, and really think about them. The first three are about our relationship with God. Do I put God first in my life, or do I put other things ahead of Him? Have I made something else more important than God? Do I take the name of the Lord in vain? Remember, most other sins that we commit indirectly offend God, but when we use His name to curse, we directly insult God. Do I keep Holy the Sabbath? Do I go to Mass on Sunday? Do I use Sunday to focus on God and family instead of work? The last seven commandments are about our relationships with one another. Do I honor my father and mother? Do I wish harm on others? Am I faithful to my spouse? Or, if I’m not married, to my future spouse? Do I steal? Do I lie? Do I covet my neighbor’s spouse or goods? Do I focus on everyone else’s blessings in life instead of my own blessings? Am I ungrateful? Remember that God’s mercy is always available in the Sacrament of Confession. This week confession is available at every Church in the Archdiocese of New Orleans from 5:00 pm to 6:30 pm. Our mission preacher, Fr. Kurt, will also be available after the Mission on Wednesday night to hear confessions. ![]()
Fr. Bryan Howard
2nd Sunday of Lent – Year B – 25 February 2018 In the ancient pagan religions of the world, the gods are constantly at war with each other. The world teaches us that this is the only way to gain true power, to take it from others. However, Christ teaches us that the greatest glory is to be found not in conquering others, but in sacrificial love. Our first reading is the famous account of the binding of Isaac. Abraham has waited decades for God to fulfill His promise to send Him descendants, and that promise is going to be fulfilled through Isaac. But then, God tells Abraham to take Isaac and bring Him to a place that He will show him, and offer him as a sacrifice. Many people find this to be a deeply disturbing story, and it may cause them to question everything they thought they knew about God. But what is really happening here. In paintings of this event, Isaac is always depicted as a fairly young boy, about 8 or 10, but in the story Isaac is the one who carries the wood for the sacrifice up the mountain, while Abraham only carries the knife and fire, because the wood is the heavier burden. Isaac isn’t a young boy, but a young man, while Abraham is over 100 years old. There is no way that Abraham could force Isaac to do anything. He does not resist. Who else went to His death, silently, “as a lamb to the slaughter,” when He could have stopped it at any time? Jesus. Then, on the way up the mountain, Isaac asks where the lamb for the offering is, and Abraham says, “God Himself will provide the lamb.” But the animal that is found is not a lamb, but a ram. What is it that Jesus is called over and over again? “Lamb of God.” Finally, When God stops Abraham, he says to him, “I know now how devoted you are to God, since you did not withhold from me your own beloved son.” And what does the Father say on Mt. Tabor, at the time of the Transfiguration? “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.” And in the second reading, “He who did not spare his own Son but handed him over for us all, how will he not also give us everything else along with him?” The Binding of Isaac is meant to foreshadow the sacrifice of Christ. Isaac is called Abraham’s “only beloved Son,” and Jesus is the only begotten Son of God. Isaac goes to His death willingly out of reverence for His father, and Jesus goes to His death willingly out of love for His father and love for us. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. On Mt. Tabor, when Jesus is transfigured before Peter, James, and John, He reveals His glory to strengthen their faith. However, after He is betrayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, He says, “Now is the Son of man glorified, and in him God is glorified; if God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once.” God’s glory is truly revealed, not just on Mt. Tabor, but on Mt. Calvary, on the Cross. The glory of God is that He is willing to give His very life to save us, and He calls us to do the same. We naturally desire glory, but we usually look for it in the wrong places. Jesus Christ found glory in humbling Himself. He humbled Himself by becoming human, becoming one of us. He humbled Himself by living in obedience to Mary and Joseph, even though He’s God. He humbled Himself by going before King Herod and Pontius Pilate, even though their power is nothing next to His. Finally, He humbled Himself on the Cross. Humility isn’t the greatest virtue, that’s love, but it is the foundation of all virtues. We need humility in order to have any of the other virtues. First, we have to realize that everything we have and are comes from God. Our lives, our existence, and every blessing that we have comes from God. Yes, we worked for the things we have, but we wouldn’t have any of it if not for God. We also need to realize how much we need God. We have an absolute need for God. We need God in order to grow in holiness and virtue and become the best people we can be. Pray for an increase in the virtue of humility, especially during this Mass. As you come forward to receive the Body and Blood of Christ, ask God help you grow in humility, and be prepared for Him to give you an opportunity to be humbled. ![]()
Welcome to the experimental new feature of our website, the Pastor's Blog. I'll use the blog to post my weekly bulletin article, my homilies for Sunday's and solemnities, and other posts. Look out for a series of posts discussing the book that we gave out on the first Sunday of Lent, Equipped: Smart Catholic Parenting in a Sexualized Culture.
When I post my homilies, I'll post an audio recording, if one is available, and the text. These won't watch exactly, because I don't usually preach directly from the text, but they're usually only a little bit different. Below is the text of my homily: Fr. Bryan Howard 1st Sunday of Lent – Year B – 18 February 2018 Have you ever heard the Church referred to as the bark of Peter? Well, that’s not only because St. Peter was a fisherman and the first Pope. It has a deeper, Biblical meaning as well, and it comes from the Old Testament. The earliest Christians saw a connection between Noah’s Ark and the Church. Noah and His family were saved from the flood by the ark, and we are saved by entering the Church. The Church is the vessel of salvation. It is God who saves us, but He does it through the Church. The water is the key here. In the Old Testament, water always means an end of something and a new beginning. In the Exodus, when the Jewish people are freed from slavery in Egypt, they have to pass through the Red Sea. This marks the end of their slavery to Pharaoh and a new beginning as God’s chosen people. Then after 40 years in the desert, the Israelites, once again, cross a river, but this time the cross the Jordan River, ending their time in the desert and entering the Promised Land. In the time of Noah, there was great violence everywhere, and that was why God caused the flood, to wash away the murder and violence of the people. However, he choose one righteous man, Noah, and his family to save and make a new beginning of humanity. The waters of the flood symbolized a death to sin and violence and a new life for humanity through the family of Noah. And in the New Testament Christ Himself, spent 30 years living with Mary and Joseph in secrecy. He ended that time and began His public ministry by going down to the Jordan River, where He was baptized by John the Baptist. In the second reading we heard the words of St. Paul, “while God patiently waited in the days of Noah during the building of the ark, in which a few persons, eight in all, were saved through water. This prefigured baptism, which saves you now. It is not a removal of dirt from the body but an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” Baptism is a new beginning for us. In baptism we, or our parents and godparents if we’re too young, reject Satan, his works, and his empty promises and profess our faith in God the Father, in His Son Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Spirit. We end our old life of sin, burying it in the waters of baptism, and begin a new life of righteousness through the resurrection of Christ. Through Baptism we enter the Church. If we stay in the Church we are saved, but if we leave the Church we die, just as surely as Noah or his family would have died if they jumped off the ark into the flood waters. A few weeks ago I pointed out that we can’t judge someone else’s soul, because only God knows that. It’s not as simply as whether someone comes to Church on Sunday’s. But, how does someone leave the Church? First, through apostasy, which is explicitly rejecting the Christian faith and Jesus Christ. That one’s pretty obvious, but most of us don’t have to worry about that. Second, we cut ourselves off from the Church and from the grace of God when we commit a mortal sin. That’s a serious sin that we commit knowingly and deliberately. You can’t commit and mortal sin on accident. You have to know what you’re doing, know that it’s a serious sin, and do it anyway. Sins like blasphemy (insulting God and holy things), murder and abortion, taking advantage of the poor, lying under oath or with malice against another person, and the sexual sins (which our society has a particular problem with), like pornography, sex outside of marriage, and homosexual acts. Our sins can seem to enslave us, making it harder and harder to fight off temptation every time we fall into sin. God wants to free us from this vicious cycle, but we have to want to be set free and put in the work to change our lives, to make a new beginning. During this Mass, ask God for the special grace to know which sins you struggle with the most and to have His help in overcoming them. |
AuthorFr. Bryan was pastor of Our Lady of Lourdes from July 3, 2017 to June 2022. Categories
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