Dear Followers of the Risen One,

We celebrate the Fifth Sunday of Easter today. The season unfolds with some beautiful images of Christ and what his Resurrection means for our daily lives. Every year, this season of seven weeks helps us enter into the core of what it means to be Christian. This jubilee of hope, love and peace brings us to celebrate our own baptism and the initiation sacraments for our new members of the Church as well.

Our gospel today, John 13:31-33a, 34-35, gives us a central image in which we are to find in our lives with Jesus. LOVE. This word of course is over used, and so often misinterpreted. This word is not flimsy or plastic. This word is not an excuse to not follow Jesus further or not to learn Church teaching. This word is not an excuse to enter more deeply into mystery. We cannot dismiss this word because we think we know what it means.

Jesus gave his life for us. Jesus becomes the Messiah, the Risen Christ. This foundation of love is overwhelming when we pray with intention. He healed, forgave, and raised the dead when he walked the earth, but through his resurrection, he becomes our way to feel, to understand, and know intimately the love of the Father. Jesus is the source of love, integrity, justice and peace for every human on earth and every soul in heaven.

We are connected to Jesus Christ and love itself, through our baptism. In this love, we learn to live in our world. We work diligently for justice because people deserve to have food, shelter, clean water and jobs. We work to correct the essential wrongs of people’s situations because God has first loved us. Love is not a pious bandage or a word to dismiss people’s problems. Love is meant to flow from our lives in Christ in order to heal the world and bring all people into wholeness and into the Kingdom of Heaven reflected on earth.

Love is a lifetime commitment. Love is not held for safekeeping. Love is reaching out to the sick because Jesus heals us first. Love is about justice because we capture a glimpse of heaven in the Eucharist. Love reaches out to the hopeless because we find the miracle of Jesus’ presence in our hearts. Love commands change. Love rouses humility and removes pride. Love does not build up falsehood. Love brings peace.

As Christians and Catholics, the love we possess is not meant to build us up, but to lower our gaze toward the poor and forgotten. Love is not about self-importance, but a life of spiritual self-stripping in order to discover the healing, satisfaction and tenderness of Christ Jesus.

Gracious God, help us find our way toward the love you have left us on earth in Christ Jesus. May our lives be broken open so to live our baptismal commitments toward the poor, with unbelievers, and among those who ache for justice and peace on earth. Amen

Easter Blessings,
Fr. Ron

This 60-Second Homily was from Holy Thursday, 2019. The blog, PrayTell, posted this during Holy Week.

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May 12, 2019 Fourth Sunday of Easter

Prayers of the Faithful

Let us pray that our Good Shepherd may wipe away every tear from our eyes and guide us into green pastures of kindness and fidelity in his name. May our Church proclaim the glory of God.

We pray to the Lord.

Let us pray for our children who receive Holy Communion for the first time and for our students who will receive the sacrament of Confirmation this week. May the Good Shepherd guide them for a lifetime of love and service within the Church.

We pray to the Lord.

Let us listen carefully to the voice of Christ Jesus and imitate his compassionate expressions, especially in times of violence, hatred and uncertainty. May we be in union with divine integrity.

We pray to the Lord.

Let us pray for our mothers, living and deceased, and women who have shepherded our spirits as teachers, mentors, and friends. We pray for single moms, foster and grand mothers and mothers who have lost their children.

We pray to the Lord.

Let us pray for people who face destructive floods and storms especially in our farmlands throughout our nation. May the Good Shepherd bring green pastures and hope for those who plant and harvest our food.

We pray to the Lord.

Let us pray for our beloved dead. We pray our loved ones may now find home in a new land where God’s face and voice are fully revealed. In this Mass…

We pray to the Lord

Dear Followers of the Risen Christ,

Our Easter season continues on this Fourth Sunday of Easter. This Sunday is traditionally called, “Good Shepherd Sunday.” This comforting image of the Risen Christ goes well beyond the Shepherd as leader. This image is further reaching than just our vocations in the Church.

In today’s gospel, John 10:27-36, Jesus says, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them and they follow me…” This intimate notion of hearing Jesus’ voice is key to our entire spiritual life. Through our baptism we are given the gift of knowing Jesus and being in an intimate relationship with him for our entire lives. If we are attentive, prayerfully silent, reflective and willing, we will still hear the voice of the Master. We will still prevail in our own discipleship. We will still give our hearts over to the one who has re-created us. We will still be drawn to the voice of Jesus when we are lost, lonely or feel forgotten.

Our connection to the Risen Christ is one of intimacy. This healing relationship is for every Christian, not just for leaders, priests and professed religious. This union of souls with Christ is the foundation of our lives, and the hope for our Church. In our daily prayer, we need to not only speak our needs, but we also need time, space and emptiness to listen to Jesus.

We are called and challenged to hear Christ within the scriptures. Christ longs to be in union with our souls. His story is our story. His story of love, tenderness and hope through his passion, death and resurrection is played out in our stories of spiritual growth and maturity. We do not just listen to God’s Word at Mass on Sunday and think those words remain stuck in the past or printed in a dusty old book and then walk away. The Word of God, especially the gospel, is a river of grace that is offered to our souls every week. It is a place of refreshment and renewal.

We listen to God in our daily prayer, in our common worship and in the events of our daily lives. The Easter season reminds us that we continually belong to Christ. We are seekers of his voice and we proclaim his presence when we finally understand that he is our Shepherd and Keeper. Our ears are naturally attentive to hearing God, far beyond the noise of our daily lives and the whispers of insecurity, doubt and failure that we possess within our hearts. We ache to listen to the Good Shepherd who bends down to listen to and speak to his people.

I believe with my entire being that God cares about each of us. This care, his Shepherding, is ongoing no matter where we find pain, anguish and loneliness. His care is before us if we can truly listen to his voice, be transformed by his forgiveness and be willing to follow him with love and understanding.

Blessings in this Easter Season,

Fr. Ron

Jean Vanier

Article from the BBC on the death of Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier was the founder of L’Arche in France. He was a holy man who devoted his life to Jesus by living among people with disabilities. He was a spiritual mentor of mine even at such a distance. Today, I hold him in my heart as he views the face of Jesus.

Check out this video of the founding of L’Arche

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AIM Magazine is published by World Library Publications, Chicago, IL.

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HOMILY: LISTEN NOW: CLICK HERE

Dear Believers in the Risen Christ,

In our liturgy today in this Easter season we listen to John 21:1-19. Jesus reveals his very self at the seashore amid the meal that is shared. We are back with the disciples who are fishing and trying to make a living. Jesus is among them and invites them to cast a net from the other side of the boat. They catch one hundred fifty-three fish in their large net. They share breakfast. And then even more things are revealed.

Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?” Of course Peter says that he does. Jesus does not stop with one asking. Not twice, but three times he says, “Do you love me?” Peter is getting a little annoyed because he knows that he denied Jesus three times. Now is his opportunity to be healed by Jesus.

However, the questions do not stop with only admitting love. Jesus then commands him, “Feed my lambs.” Peter is to invite the love he has for Jesus into reality. He is to live what he professes. Peter must be the model of service and fidelity. Peter must reveal within the lost, the forgotten and the lonely that the love of Jesus is real and inviting.

Jesus is calling Peter in a new depth of love and commitment. Jesus tells Peter that when he was young he used to dress and go where he pleased. Now, something new is happening. He must stretch out this hand and be lead by grace, by his call into service, justice and living the message of love for all people. He is now a servant. His discipleship must mature.

This gospel invites us into such a maturity of being a follower of Jesus. First of all, the meal is the place where we are not only fed, but where we learn how to receive the love of Jesus. For our meal today is his Real Presence. The Mass is our invitation to learn how to be loved and how to love. In this meal of Christ’s Body and Blood, we learn how to feed the sheep of Jesus and how to reach out to our fragile, our poor and our broken. We are to become what we eat, the Body of Christ in our world. Here is the depth of our commitments. This depth is seldom explored because we are reluctant to accept such a command from Jesus, “Do you love me? Then feed my sheep.”

Food brings us together. Food creates community. In fact, Aristotle said that friends should share a bag of salt together. This means that real friends should spend many meals together. The Mass is the same. God feeds us and we become Christ’s mission in the world precisely because Jesus is our friend. In this meal, we take to our hearts the very mission of feeding others because we are fed and nourished with love and tenderness.

As we continue this Easter season, let us take to heart that we are challenged by Jesus to be led and to lead. We listen with grace and tenderness to his words:

“Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.”

Blessings,

Fr. Ron