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THE DEDICATION OF THE LATERAN BASILICA

This weekend we celebrate the dedication of the Popes cathedral, St. John the Lateran. Although the basilica of St. John Lateran is the cathedral of the Holy Father as Bishop of Rome, today’s liturgy focuses not on the Petrine ministry but on the place of God’s house, the temple.

We no longer look upon stone edifices is see God’s presence on earth, but upon the broken body of Jesus on the cross. He is both the high priest and the acceptable offering to God.Paul’s message continues this truth. We are living stones forming a building. This building is of living stones: it is built of our lives and in our relationships.  God’s presence according to Paul is through us. We are built on the foundation of Jesus’ message but we must be careful as to how we build. As we live out our lives we grow individually energized either by the Spirit of God or by the spirit of the world. The Spirit of God unites, forms us into a single building. The spirit of the world destroys unity and forms warring camps where each competes with other for power, wealth, influence and pleasure. So we must be careful how we build our life. The image reminds us that we are not the total building in ourselves. In connection with others we form an edifice that is more expansive, of greater beauty and majesty than one person can attain.  We are the presence of God to one another through the Spirit that dwells in us and energizes and directs us.

So, what is the answer to why we celebrate the dedication of a building in Rome? The building becomes for us a sign and a symbol.  It is a sign of God’s presence in the world, housing its peoples, providing shelter in storms and coolness in the heat. It is high on a hill that is visible for all to see and for all to take hope for its strength.  It is a symbol of those who believe and work to grow in faith and in hope and in care and concern for God’s creation, especially humankind. It rejects no one, opening its arms to embrace not only the privileged but also the ordinary persons.  Even the miserable beggar, the leper, the ones ignored and forgotten, the drunkard, the prostitute, the thief and the murderer are welcomed here and find a place where they might be healed and find life.

So today we should be able to say that we reject no one and embrace everyone as we live out our lives we grow individually energized by the Spirit of God instead of the spirit of the world.

THE FEAST OF ALL SAINTS & ALL SOULS

This weekend we have the two feasts the feast of All Saints on Saturday and the feast of All Souls on the Sunday. On November 1st the Church celebrates all the saints: and the multitude of those who are in heaven enjoying the beatific vision that are only known to God. During the early centuries the Saints venerated by the Church were all martyrs. Later the  1^st  November was set  as the day for commemorating all the Saints. We all have this “universal call to holiness.” What must we to do in order to join the company of the saints in heaven? We “must follow in Jesus footsteps and try to conform ourselves to His image as we seek  to do  the will of the Father in all things In this way, the holiness of the People of God will grow into an abundant harvest of good, as is admirably shown by the life of so many saints in Church history” (Lumen Gentium)

The feast of All Saints should inspire us with tremendous hope. Among the saints in heaven are some  people whom we have known such as Pope Saint John Paul or Padre Pio who both lived in the last 100 years.  Padre Pio died in 1968 and of course John Paul died in 2005. But there are so many ordinary people who show us how to be saints by the way they lead their lives.

After rejoicing  with the saints on the 1st of November then on the next day we  pray for all those who, in the purifying suffering of purgatory await the day when they will join the company of saints. Daily in a special Memento in the Eucharistic prayer of the Mass, the priest remembers all those who have fallen asleep in the Lord, the priest implores God to grant them a place of happiness, light and peace.

So this weekend we pray with and remember the saints in heaven and we remember all who have died. Many parishes will have a special remembrance Mass for the parishioners who have died over the past year and their families. We remember our families and friends in a special way and we remember all those who have died whoever they are throughout the whole month of November which is known as the month of the Holy Souls.

May all our dead relations and friends rest in the peace of God.

30th SUNDAY OF ORDINARY TIME

Well here we are at the 30^th Sunday of ordinary time as we are fast approaching the feast of Christ the King (34^th Sunday) and then we begin all over again with the Advent Season.

The Pharisees in the Gospel Reading for this Sunday are all out to get Jesus because he had silenced the saducees. In an attempt to do this they asked him this question Master, which is the greatest commandment of the Law?’ Jesus said, ‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. Many people say that as they grow older their relationship with God becomes much more central in their life. There is a sense in which we could say that it takes a lifetime of practice to love God with all our heart, soul and mind, to live the first commandment, putting God before all else. To direct us all our lives to love God with our heart soul and mind, God has given us guidelines, the Ten Commandments.

So many people in the modern world have decided to turn away from God and from spiritual things. The Church has to face up to this fact it also has to face up to the fact that the Church of yesterday is now seen for what a bit of it was and that was a sham! Having said that tribute has to be paid to all those who remain despite the horrible things that were done in the  Church of the past those who stand by and are with the Church and that is the vast majority they are the Church of the future.

How do we love God with all our heart, soul and mind is the question for today as is was in the past and I think will be the question for the future. Is it possible to love God above all else? Well this question isn’t so easy to answer. Instead like so many other Faith based  questions we are simply asked to try to love God and he will do the rest.

Mission Sunday 19th October 2014

This Sunday we celebrate the international day that remembers the missionary effort of the Church throughout the world. Today we celebrate Mission Sunday. Here in Ireland for many centuries there have been many great Irishmen and women  who have gone to foreign lands to bring the faith of our fathers to those who might not have got the faith otherwise. This Sunday celebrates the great missionary spirit that has brought the faith to all corners of the world over so many years.

The Pontifical Mission Societies (The Society for the Propagation of the Faith) have chosen this year to focus on the words from St. Matthew’s Gospel, “I Will Build My Church” (Matthew 16:18) by highlighting the outreach of local churches through priests, religious, and laity among the poor and marginalized.

Today we remember all those who have gone into the mission fields members of the religious orders such as the Columbans, Mill Hill Fathers, St. Patricks  Fathers the Medical Missionaries of Mary and all the other religious orders with the Lay Missionary movements who have brought Christ and his message to the far flung corners of the world.

We too are called to be missionary people bringing the Joy of the Gospel to those around us and this is not always easy. We have in our parish a welcome group which lets mew people coming into the parish who we are and where we are and this is a particular and much needed missionary activity in our modern church on 2014. We see missionary action taking place in  the world through  lay led organizations such as the Apostolic Work and the Viatores Christi movements these are just 2 of the many lay missionary movements that I can think of.

We must pray to the Lord of the harvest for the strength to persevere in our missionary activities whether they are led by Lay people or Religious here  at home or abroad. In a special and particular way, we commend the priests, brothers and sisters who are often engaged in extremely difficult missions all over the world to the prayers of everyone. May they find the strength to carry on in spite of the odds being stacked against them in so many places. Mission Sunday gives all of us a chance to reflect on the Mission of the Church locally and throughout the world and it is my hope that as missionaries  lay and religious we will be able to bring the Joy of the Gospel into the hearts and minds of the people who live in the places where we live.

A REFLECTION ON FAMILY ON THE FAMILY

THE HOLY FAMILY

Over the last few days in Rome there has been a meeting of the synod of Bishops of the Catholic Church. This meeting has been called by Pope Francis to look at the all  aspects of Catholic Family Life.  All of us belong to a Family be it the family that we were born into, the family of Faith or the family which is the community where we live. All of us have ties to a family  of brothers and sisters with mum and dad at the head or at least that was the way it was when I was growing up. These days the idea of the family as a specific unit has changed beyond all recognition. In many cases the idea of having a Mother and a Father that is a  husband and wife committed to one another in the sacramental bond of marriage has given way to people living together and in recent times we have seen the whole idea of Civil partnerships taking root. But if we look to the Holy Family for our inspiration as Catholic people we won’t go far wrong. The Holy Family was a family with special grace but yet a family with trials. Every family has particular graces and blessings and every family also has  many difficulties and crosses. As a matter of fact many families have more than their fair share of crosses to bear and it is as a result of the family members supporting each other the crosses are much easier to bear.

On the day he left Ireland on October 1^st 1979 Pope John Paul II much of his homily in Limerick was giving encouragement to families and in particular to parents and at this point in time with the Family unit being under continuing attack it is worth reminding ourselves about what he said  in October 1979.The Pope reminded us that the family is primary and has been our greatest resource and due to the particular  challenges of today the family unit is more important than ever  before.

The Holy Father said the following among many other things:

“To all I say, revere and protect your family and your family life, for the family is the primary field of Christian action for the Irish laity, the place where your ‘royal priesthood’ is chiefly exercised. The Christian family has been in the past Ireland’s greatest spiritual resource. Modern conditions and social changes have created new patterns and new difficulties for family life and for Christian marriage. I want to say to you: do not be discouraged, do not follow the trends where a close-knit family is seen as outdated; the Christian family is more important for the Church and for society today than ever before.”

 Ireland must choose. You the present generation of Irish people must decide; your choice must be clear and your decision firm. Let the voice of your forefathers, who suffered so much to maintain their faith in Christ and thus to preserve Ireland’s soul, resound today in your ears through the voice of the Pope when he repeats the words of Christ:

 “What will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and forfeits his life?” (Mt 16 :26). What would it profit Ireland to go the easy way of the world and suffer the loss of her own soul?

Your country seems in a sense to be living again the temptations of Christ: Ireland is being asked to prefer the “kingdoms of the world and their splendour” to the Kingdom of God (cf. Mt4 :8). Satan, the Tempter, the Adversary of Christ, will use all his might and all his deceptions to win Ireland for the way of the world. Above all, hold high the esteem for the wonderful dignity and grace of the Sacrament of marriage. Prepare earnestly for it. Believe in the spiritual power which this Sacrament of Jesus Christ gives to strengthen the marriage union, and to overcome all the crises and problems of life together. Married people must believe in the power of the Sacrament to make them holy ; they must believe in their vocation to witness through their marriage to the power of Christ’s love. True love and the grace of God can never let marriage become a self-centred relationship of two individuals, living side by side for their own interests.

(Homily of Pope John Paul II in Limerick, Monday October 1st, 1979)

Today the choice is so very clear for us as Catholics we need to re-establish Family life in its most honest and true  form with a father and mother at its head. The Christian family is the world’s greatest spiritual resource. Modern conditions and social changes have created new patterns of life and living  and as a result of this new difficulties for family life and for Christian marriage have arisen. All of these problems  have to be dealt with head on; the Christian family is more important for the Church and for society today than ever before.” The idea of a family without a mother and a father runs as opposite to what I and so many others believe in. But to believe in something means that you have to stand up and be counted and above all else we need to pray that Family life will be restored.

27 TH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

This week saw the beginning of the month of October and there are two aspects to this month. It is the month of the rosary and the feast of the Holy Rosary is celebrated on Tuesday 7^th  and it is also the month when we celebrate the missionary effort of the Church throughout the world with World Mission Sunday on the 19^th .

Well here we are again this weekend back in the vineyard and our first reading and the Gospel are all about the grapes and of course the wine that comes as we all know from the grapes. But of course it isn’t really about the grapes or the wine. The parable is also the story of the “tenants” and here again we are invited to feel with them. We must however understand their frame of mind correctly. In many cultures today “tenants” are poor people who are harshly treated by their landowners – the historical Jesus would have been on their side. The tenants in the parable are quite different. In the original context the tenants represent “the chief priests and elders of the people”.

In the parable the “tenants” become angry when they are reminded that the vineyard has been leased to them and they must be accountable for what they have done or not done with it. Their anger grows ever more violent as the story develops, the root of their anger is revealed – they want to own the vineyard rather than to work there and help the vines grow and produce grapes that aren’t sour but sweet.

Through the parable of the vineyard Jesus reprimands the “chief priests and elders of the people” gathered around him.  He focused on the unfaithful people who, by their sin and failure to listen to the prophets, had brought God’s anger down on them. Jesus’ reference to the killing of the King’s only Son was not lost on the Pharisees. They had already decided to kill this Jesus who claimed to be the Son of God. Jesus’ words enraged them, and their hearts were further hardened against Him and it all ended up at the Cross of Calvary on Good Friday. So today we too are called to go out into the vineyard to be the workers rather than the owners to nourish the vines of other people’s faith by our words and deeds so that as a result of our efforts they may produce much good sweet wine.

25th Sunday In Ordinary Time

In this weekend’s gospel story  we hear about the Labourers in the vineyard. As unskilled workers, they lived day to day at a subsistence level, just above the homeless and destitute. In areas where such workers can got employment, they got   together in a common area known to employers. (In the time of Jesus, the marketplace acted as their gathering area). The employers sought the workers out, hired them only for the day, and paid them the same night . Day laborers in the vineyard objected to the amount of pay the owner gave them as the first was paid exactly the same as the last one denarius. This tense image rode against the popular view of the Kingdom as a peaceful feast of the faithful in paradise. Jesus told this story to emphasize how the Kingdom differed from people’s  ideas and expectations what people expected and the actual kingdom of God were two very different things. According to Jesus, the faithful, even those who practiced faith all life long, did not earn the Kingdom. The Father gave his children the Kingdom as a gift. The pay issue scandalized Jesus’ followers the most, however. Imagine the most dedicated and hard working were paid the same as the others. And they were paid last! Beyond the question of money lie the question of social treatment. The owner treated those who worked for only an hour as he would treat his own family. Those hired at dawn were treated as mere workers. The owner gave greater honor to those who worked the least by paying them well and paying them first. The owner belittled those who worked all day long by paying them so little and paying them last. And, when the workers grumbled, the owner rebuked them in public. No wonder they gave him the “evil eye.” [20:11-15]

If our  ways of thinking and judging are truly far from the Lord’s way, then we have some adjusting to do! Perhaps we  need to work harder in the areas of forgiveness, mercy, and generosity, to mention a few To think as God thinks requires openness and a broad vision, free of self-pity and selfish brooding. It takes a habit of gratitude. It means sitting down and reflecting, “What does God want me to do in this  or that situation?” It takes courage and humility and grace to act this way. It helps if we just ask ourselves a simple question: What would Jesus do we will act in the right way.

The parable of the  workers in the vineyard is the Lord’s call to all of us  who have received Him in word and sacrament to share generously with all people  what we  have received and that means sharing our resources and our time. All of us share equally in the task, whether called early in the morning or late in the evening of the day, we are called  to build up the kingdom of God in this  unjust and often times hard world. When we focus upon the needs of others, even if they encroach upon our rights, we give  ourselves for the Kingdom. Our work  becomes more honest and our leadership will then lead others to Christ. Ultimately, service means sacrifice. What are we willing to give up for the Kingdom of God as we proclaim the good news in word and deed?

EXALTATION OF THE HOLY CROSS

This weekend we celebrate the feast of the exaltation of the cross. The cross can be seen an instrument of torture and death as well as being a sign of great hope and joy. What does the cross of Christ say to you? For me it is a sign of contradiction because it is an implement of death and yet in the spiritual sense it gives life, Jesus went to the cross so that we would have life and have it in its fullness. There are so many people in our world who are asked to take up a cross of one sort or another perhaps ill health or whatever. I know a family that is having a wedding this Saturday without the mother of the house being with them. This particular lady died of Cancer a year or so ago and that is a cross the extended family circle will find particularly hard this weekend. We all have a cross that we are asked to carry with us at various times and we get the strength to carry on by prayer and the knowledge that we won’t be asked to carry a cross that we can’t handle.

The cross reminds us that God is in charge and has a plan for our ultimate well-being. We trust God who has made a promise to be faithful to us, and through the cross, he guarantees to see that promise come to completion. We sign ourselves with the cross as we enter and leave church and as we begin and end our prayers. Each time we do that we remember the God of the Promise the god who was who is and will be the one who will always be part of our journey. Signing ourselves with the cross also “reminds” God of God’s promise to be faithful to us.

Many people find the various crosses that they carry a very heavy weight. Over the years I have come across so many who have carried their cross which were very heavy burdens. Jesus carried all our crosses on his shoulders on that first Good Friday and no matter how hard life may seem we should remember this. In so doing, we will find healing, often a sense of joy, and a new ability to love ourselves and others and gain  greater strength to carry our crosses big and small.

6TH SUNDAY OF EASTER

This weekend we celebrate the 6^th Sunday of Easter. It seems no time since we began Holy Week on Palm Sunday and now we are heading into Ascension and then Pentecost Sundays and then we resume  the Sundays of Ordinary Time. The readings this Sunday contain many comparisons of those “in the world” and those who have life “in the Spirit”.  The truth is that we all live in the world and are constantly influenced by other people, places, and events good and bad.   In this Sundays  Gospel Jesus promises us that “I will not leave you orphaned; I will come back to you and you will have life.” Our faith, nurtured in this great paschal season, tells us that God-made-flesh is God-with-us, never abandoning us and always filling us with life.Today many live without belief in the existence of truth. Some use the word without understanding its authentic meaning, as if it can denote only a personal opinion, a thing that is “true” only for the individual who holds that idea. This widespread relativism, has crept with increasing power like an infection into the body of the Church.

The members of Christ’s Body are ever affected by the same forces and currents as is every human person. For the Catholic Christian, however, there can never be any confusion as to the existence of truth. There can be no Catholic faith without truth, for Christ founded the Church for the purpose of teaching the truth, endowing her with the gift of the Holy Spirit by which the truth is taught infallibly in matters of faith and morals in every age. Reverence the Lord in your hearts,” Peter tells us in today’s reading. If God is not revered as sacred nothing is sacred anymore. This is so true in many aspects of today’s culture Maybe this accounts for the growing break-down in families and many other things as well. And in a timely warning to those of us  engaged in religious debate, Peter urges them  and ultimately you and me to make our arguments “with courtesy and respect.” Peter makes deep moral demands on us. As a Christian how fitted am I to give an account of my faith? Is my understanding of the Christian message a few’ do’s and don’ts’ and some scraps of information remembered from school?

Do I appreciate there is a Christian manner of action? Am I conscious of how others are persecuted for their beliefs, or feel a sense of solidarity with Christians who suffer elsewhere? As a member of a body which was born in persecution and whose head suffered on the cross, am I sensitive to the pain of all who are oppressed, and seek to alleviate their persecution? Is a document such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights something that I consider should interest me as a Christian? Do I support those who support human rights? Painful questions, but can we be true to our origin if we shy away from them? May we go forward in faith with one another and more importantly with God realising that god is with us through all that life throws at us.