Author: admin

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Gospel: Matthew 17: 22-27

As Jesus and his disciples were gathering in Galilee,
Jesus said to them,
“The Son of Man is to be handed over to men,
and they will kill him, and he will be raised on the third day.”
And they were overwhelmed with grief.

When they came to Capernaum,
the collectors of the temple tax approached Peter and said,
“Does not your teacher pay the temple tax?”
“Yes,” he said.
When he came into the house, before he had time to speak,
Jesus asked him, “What is your opinion, Simon?
From whom do the kings of the earth take tolls or census tax?
From their subjects or from foreigners?”
When he said, “From foreigners,” Jesus said to him,
“Then the subjects are exempt.
But that we may not offend them, go to the sea, drop in a hook,
and take the first fish that comes up.
Open its mouth and you will find a coin worth twice the temple tax.
Give that to them for me and for you.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

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Who do you know more about, Saint Francis of Assisi or Saint Clare?

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Most of us would probably say, “Saint Francis of Assisi.”

He was a lover of animals; he started the Franciscans; he was an itinerant preacher; he lived in Italy; and he wrote that fabulous prayer, “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.”

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But what about Saint Clare, whose feast day we celebrate today? 

Both Francis and Clare were born into wealthy Italian families. Both jettisoned their fortunes to follow the Lord. Both are considered Saints. They were also best friends.

Clare was drawn to Francis’ deep spirit and jovial nature. In fact, they became so close that she founded a second order of the Franciscans, the Poor Clares.

To this day, both religious orders remain active around the world, some 800 years later.

What draws me to Saint Clare is the fact that she’s the lesser known of the two. Although both she and Francis helped to rebuild and reform the Church; although they both left everything behind to follow Jesus, Francis receives most of the recognition.

And for Clare, that was okay. She didn’t need the spotlight; she was content playing a supportive role, seeking only to glorify God. In the words of John the Baptist, “He must increase, and I must decrease.”

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Clare’s life leaves us several questions to ponder.

Like Clare, do I seek to glorify God with my life? Am I content with being unnoticed, or do I need recognition for doing good?

Do I have a holy friend like Francis of Assisi, someone who points me closer to God? Am I that friend for others?

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Saint Clare of Assisi, pray for us.

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Image credits: (1) Home of the Mother Youth (2) Renovaré (3) iStock

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Gospel: Luke 12: 35-40

Jesus said to his disciples:
“Gird your loins and light your lamps
and be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding,
ready to open immediately when he comes and knocks.
Blessed are those servants
whom the master finds vigilant on his arrival.
Amen, I say to you, he will gird himself,
have the servants recline at table, and proceed to wait on them.
And should he come in the second or third watch
and find them prepared in this way,
blessed are those servants.
Be sure of this:
if the master of the house had known the hour
when the thief was coming,
he would not have let his house be broken into.
You also must be prepared, for at an hour you do not expect,
the Son of Man will come.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

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“What time is it?”

This is a question people ask throughout the day. “Am I early?” … “Am I late?” … “Did you read my email?” … “When is dinner?” … “When will this sermon end?”

“What time is it?”

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Time is a curious thing. 

In our youth, time feels like it drags on forever. For example, children not only count their birthdays, but also their half-birthdays. 

“How old are you?” One might ask. 

“I’m three and a half!”

Teenagers count down their time to getting their driver’s license, to their next date, to graduating from high school. 

Young adults dream about their futures, plotting the time it’ll take to make their next career move. Middle-agers often reflect on time-gone-by, how life did – or didn’t – go according to plan… and what to do now.

The elderly often walk down memory lane, lauding the days of long ago, when life wasn’t moving at breakneck speed.

Time is fast and slow. It drags on, while slipping through our fingers.

We never have enough of it, yet we sleep 1/3 of it away. And none of us knows just how much time we have left.

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The Greeks had two different notions of time. There was chronos, the tick-tock type of time that we focus on throughout our day. And kairos, an appointed time, a moment of unique consequence when a person’s entire life changes.

Think of winning the lottery; a marriage proposal; a pregnancy; a health-scare; or, in the Gospels, the invitation from Jesus to, “Follow me.” When a kairos moment like this emerges, we must act.

Imagine Saint Peter standing along the Sea of Galilee, mending his fishing nets on an otherwise ordinary day. Suddenly, Jesus of Nazareth approaches him and invites Peter to become his disciple. 

In terms of tick-tock time, this encounter may have taken a matter of minutes… or less.

But Peter’s “yes” forever changes the direction of his life, as well as the course of world – and salvation – history. 

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In today’s Gospel, Jesus challenges the way we think of time through a parable. 

“Gird your loins and light your lamps,” he says, “and be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding, ready to open immediately when he comes and knocks.”

I’d imagine the faithful servants spent their time tending to their master’s estate, while the unfaithful servants took their time for granted, breaking into the master’s cabinets, taking what wasn’t theirs, indulging in selfish pleasures.

For each servant, the master’s return was a kairos moment, forever changing the direction of their lives. 

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So, what might this mean for us?

God places a claim on our time, expecting us to use it well. As Pope John XXIII wrote in his diary as a young priest, “Everything God has given me to do, I intend to do it all.”

How do we spend our time? Do we use it in ways that glorify God? Do we take it for granted?

Is this Gospel passage a kairos moment, where the Lord is urging us to take a risk, to follow him in a new direction, a call to change our ways?

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Think of the barn builder from last week’s Gospel. He believed that he had so much wealth and time on his hands that the only thing he could imagine doing was building larger barns for himself. Once they were built, he planned to, “Rest, eat, drink, and be merry!”

But God called him a “fool,” demanding his life back that very night. 

I’d imagine this man might’ve had a host of excuses while standing before the Lord about how he used his time, but the reality is that he lived his life as a practical atheist, not thinking about God or his neighbor’s wellbeing once, only himself.

If the Lord came for us tonight, would we welcome him like the joyful servants awaiting their master’s return? Or, like the barn builder, would we feel cheated, as if a “thief” had broken into our lives, taking what was not his?

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Time is a curious thing. 

We often ask, “Am I early?” … “Am I late?” …

“When will this sermon end?”

Jesus encourages us to also consider how we use our time here on earth. “Is it time to double-down? Or time to change our ways?”

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Image credits: (1) BBC (2) National Institute of Standards and Technology (3) ppt Online

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Gospel: Matthew 16: 24-28

Jesus said to his disciples,
“Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself,
take up his cross, and follow me.
For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world
and forfeit his life?
Or what can one give in exchange for his life?
For the Son of Man will come with his angels in his Father’s glory,
and then he will repay each according to his conduct.
Amen, I say to you, there are some standing here
who will not taste death
until they see the Son of Man coming in his Kingdom.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

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When Robert Francis Prevost was elected pope in May of this year, he took the name of Leo. I was surprised to learn that Leo spent a good portion of his priestly ministry as a missionary in Peru.

He first arrived there the year I was born – back in 1985, landing on the heels of devastating El Niño rains that washed away a number of locals and their poorly constructed homes. 

Leo’s first task was to minister in a disaster area. Life for him didn’t get much better, at least in terms of worldly comforts, as a few years thereafter, Peru endured a bloody civil war with separatists. Yet, in the face of floods and violence, he stayed the path; Leo loved and served his flock.

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When we hear about stories like his – people who do heroic things with their lives, often over many years – it’s easy to not only admire their courage, but also to wonder, “Why?”

Why be ordained a priest? Why leave the comforts of America to live among the poorest of the poor? Why stay in a war zone when you have a way out? 

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Such are the feelings of Saint Peter when Jesus tells him that they are headed to Jerusalem in order for the Son of Man to suffer, die, and be raised. Peter forgets that last part of the plan; he focuses on the suffering and death part, instead.

Peter wants a safe Jesus; a comfortable Jesus; a way for Christ to be his Lord – and for Peter to be his disciple – without having to walk the road of suffering. 

This initiates Christ’s response in today’s Gospel: “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.”

The Lord does not want us to die. He wants us to live! 

But fear of death always turns into a fear of life. 

Fear can freeze us into a comfortable existence whereby we can lose meaning and opportunities that God has in store for us – think no further than Pope Leo. Had he succumbed to fear, then he never would’ve become a priest, a missionary, or now pope!

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Perhaps taking up our cross means letting go of our fears, too – the fear of losing control; the fear of suffering; the fear of death, so that God can strengthen us to truly live – not only in the here and now, but also in the life to come.

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Image credits: (1) Faith Radio (2) Pope Leo, Wikipedia (3) Isabella Mader, X