Your Sunday Sermon Notes

Was there are good point from the sermon you heard while fulfilling your Sunday obligation?

Share it here and help out those who did not hear a good sermon.

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36 Comments

  1. Matt R says:

    Our priest talked about the culture, and how it tries to dismiss sin. He pointed out how we must work to release ourselves from whatever it is that draws us into sin.

  2. wanda says:

    I can hardly believe what I heard from the pulpit. HELL, Purgatory and the Beatific Vision. Also there was mention of Vatican II and some things that went off the rails such as ‘God loves everyone, I’m ok you’re ok and we’ll see you in Heaven.’

    I listened in shock and gratitude. Young priest, only with us temporarily, may God bless him and strenthen him to keep on teaching the Truth in Charity.

  3. LadyMedievalist says:

    We had one of the Priests for Life visiting and he talked about the inherent dignity and uniqueness of every human being, how we’re bound by ethics because we have the capacity to reason, how it’s difficult to vote as a Catholic because you can’t just vote party, you have to look at the issues, and closed with saying that we don’t condemn people, we condemn actions, and God can forgive any past action.

  4. Charivari Rob says:

    One point that caught my attention was Father mentioning jealousy as a particularly empty sin.

  5. Henry Belton says:

    Tough one today.

    A professor priest from our notoriously liberal diocese seminary visited to ask for donations in the second collection. First, although at an EF mass, he decided to read the NO readings for today. He explained that he prepared his homily based on these readings – ok, I guess – the celebrant priest had read the correct readings in Latin.

    So, the homilist explained that we (us Latin Mass folks) must follow the gospel and recognize that those not against us are with us (Mk 9:38-43). That sounds ok. He then went on to say that we must realize that protestants are like us living the gospel and are with us – kind of a stretch but sure. Then he taught us that the atheist on our street is also living the gospel and he is with us and not against us, because, he said, maybe he’s really good and protects the neighborhood children. Really?…riiiight…..

    He then informed us that yes the seminary is quite modern, but they still do traditional things like pray the rosary. Good grief…

    Awkward…

  6. asperges says:

    Dominican, 18th after Pent. In the epistle St Paul tells us that we have all the graces we require – ‘nulla vobis desit in ulla gratia’ (1 Cor 1) and we should be sure to gain those graces and not lose them. Then the closeness of sin and sickness: how there would have been no sickness but for the fall, and the way that Christ forgave the cripple his sins first, which upset the Pharisees (Matth 9). Sickness as sin fled in the presence of God. How afflictions in life can be a source of grace and will not last forever, especially when death intervenes. This life is not all there is. [More to it that this summary of course.] Fascinating.

  7. solemncharge says:

    Father did a great job of relating the gospel reading to the current political environment. Those who are not against us are for us. Is our government for us? Of course he brought in the mention of the millstone as well. Is a candidate for us or against us? He also mentioned the 5 non-negotiables and quoted Bp. Paprocki’s comments on this election. It was a great homily.

  8. beckymozart says:

    Blah, blah, “tolerance”…blah, blah, “diversity”… Mahatma Gandhi is sorta baptized too…sheesh.

  9. Sorbonnetoga says:

    Announcement of NO HOMILIES for the year of faith but sermons, rather! A course in the faith starting on Sunday evenings too. And then a wonderful Catechesis on Angels, their nature, the nine choirs, the fallen angels, and how beneficial devotion to ones guardian angel is. Oh and lastly, how a small child who dies in the state of grace is not an angel but is certainly a saint! It was wonderful!

  10. This is in the OF mind you…Father in a sarcastic tone “What a challenging and uplifting Gospel passage for today”…to which he then said, “I don’t think I’m going to talk about that one.” ….that ought to summarize how the rest of it went.

  11. EXCHIEF says:

    The homily given by the Rector at our Cathedral parish was noteworthy for what he didn’t say. He used the Gospel reading to talk about Catholics giving scandal. However, the examples he used were so trivial as to not meet the definition of scandal as contained in the Cathechism of the Catholic Church. What he did not use as examples of scandal were such things as prominent “c”atholics (including some well known ones in our parish) who advocate birth control, abortion, sterilization, the homosexual lifestyle, and openly supporting the party of death.

    I was so perturbed by this failure to seize the opportunity to talk about the biggest threats to the Church in the USA today that I e-mailed the homilist afterwards. Of course I would be shocked to get a response. Like too many clerics today all he wants is to be popular. He will go to almost any extent to avoid “offending” anyone. That is why orthodox Catholics have little respect for him and why CINOS use what he refuses to say as a justification for their sins—and THAT is scandal in itself.

  12. frjim4321 says:

    “CINOS” – Exchief

    To me it is the height of both arrogance and abusiveness for a person to self-entitle to permitting/prohibiting what other people may call themselves. This is not only a problem among the laity and lower clergy.

    That being said, I would have to admit that after putting quite a bit of time into it I didn’t really have a very good homily this weekend.

    There seemed to be quite a parallel between Moses’ experience with the 72 and Jesus with the Apostles . . . also quite a bit about jealousy/envy . . . themes around sharing gifts, welcoming the gifts of others. I couldn’t get past first base this weekend and I’ll be the first to admit it.

  13. a catechist says:

    I visited another parish today, in the Ordinary Form. The priest preached evangelization–that Moses’ prayer that all the people of God be prophets happened in our baptism. Each of us is called to announce the Good News of Jesus: the forgiveness of our sins. Better to cut off the things that make us sin than be damned. If you have sinned, go to Confession. The need to repent our sins and the reality of forgiveness in Confession is also part of the Good News we must announce to the culture. At the end, he spoke of the importance of encountering Jesus in Scripture as well as the sacraments before going out to announce the Good News.

    He’s only been with this parish a few months, and for this parish it’s probably the closest to brimstone theyv’e heard in a long time.

  14. FaithfulCatechist says:

    The priest preached in a very Augustinian manner on “if your right hand causes you to sin…” reminding us that the things of this world are to lead us to God and not to be ends in and of themselves.

    In catechism this morning we were talking about the Abrahamic covenant and I asked the group if God would ever break a promise. The answer was a resounding NO! You gotta love fourth graders.

  15. PhilipNeri says:

    I picked up on what it means to belong. . .to others, teams, parties, etc. and then hammered away at the necessity of belonging to Christ first before and above any other sort of belonging. Also sneaked in some stuff about Moses giving us a foretaste of Pentecost in his prayer for more prophets!

    http://hancaquam.blogspot.com/2012/09/belonging-to-christ-first.html

    Fr. Philip Neri, OP

  16. RichR says:

    Our priest gave a good explanation of eternal destiny and where you choose to spend it. He talked about materialism and selfishness and how that leads us away from Heaven, and how sin leads us to Hell. Seemed basic, but it was clear and useful. Not too hard to grasp for the average pew sitter. I’m sure many souls benefitted. I did.

  17. Suburbanbanshee says:

    Father preached about people being sometimes too picky about Mass, ministry, etc (he might possibly have been looking at me, heh!) and how we should be concerned with our own obligations to evangelize, etc., in re: letting other people get on with their portion of the Holy Spirit and “those not against us are for us.” Which I’m certainly not going to argue with, because obviously we do have to worry about that. We also got a bit on the James reading about the rich having to watch out, as Father pointed out that even US kids deep in student debt (this was at a university chapel) are still richer than the poor in grindingly poor countries. Which is also true.

    However, it’s possible that I’ve been spending way too much time reading patristics blogs, because I was actually thinking about how pagan occult folks in Greco-Roman times often relied on the names of Solomon and Jesus to drive out demons, although frequently mixing them with other “magic words” and “names of power,” including names of pagan gods and heroes. I’d never thought of this Gospel passage as a reason why the Church was a tiny bit permissive about this kind of syncretism, but I bet it is. (And then of course there’s St. Athanasius’ practically challenging pagans to experimentally use the name of Jesus near magic ceremonies or pagan religious ceremonies to see its power to wreak havoc and drive out demons, which is both amazing and funny to think about.)

  18. Joy says:

    Our retired priest came over, and gave us an unexpected treat: He talked about the 7 deadly sins and the sins that cry to Heaven; discussed the sin of scandal; said it is not being “rich” that is a problem, for that is relative to so many things, but rather what we do with our riches – that we should be careful where our ambition is aimed (ie, be ambitious for the right things); and he explained that Gehenna was the garbage dump outside of ancient Jerusalem, and a former location of pagan sacrifices. It was refreshing to hear an orthodox homily at this liberal parish, with a bit of history thrown in for good measure.

  19. Jim Dorchak says:

    Thank God for the Old Mass.
    My wife, kids and I made the 40 min drive to get our minds right by assisting at the EF Mass at Prince of Peace in Taylors SC. Father Richard Tomlinson, STD – Parochial Vicar preached about the origins of the word MASS and how it is important to our lives today. This was a very educational and informative sermon. We were very please with the sermon and the reverent Mass.
    Our home parish only has the new mass and after about 3 Sundays of trying to concentrate throught the distractions of the girl servers, the people talking and assisting in the pews in the orens stance, the gum chewing, the comunion in the hand thingey… we just have to bite the bullit and go drive to the Old Mass. It is kind of like getting your spiritual oil changed.

  20. EXCHIEF says:

    Well frjim what would YOU call someone who identifies him/her self as Catholic but whose positions on multiple key tenants of the Faith are counter to what Holy Mother Church teaches? They define themselves by their beliefs and actions. I don’t define them.

  21. Marie Teresa says:

    The only part I remember is that Father will be blessing animals next weekend.

    Is it sinful to intentionally not focus on the Homily?

  22. jeffreyquick says:

    Offend children/millstone as anchor for a pretty fierce pro-life homily. If 0.1% of aborted had lived to discern a religious vocation, that’s 50,000 vocations. People complain to God about how their loved one died horribly of cancer, and maybe God had heard their prayers, but the person meant to find the cure got aborted. Suitable trial of Purgatory for those who didn’t speak up or enabled abortion might be to have to say something to each of the 50m aborted…”I think I’d take the millstone” .

  23. Chris Garton-Zavesky says:

    Extraordinary Form

    On his last Sunday among us, before returning to St. Louis — from where he has been on extended loan — Father taught about the Sacrament of Penance, and its institution on the evening after the Resurrection. He pointed out that Christ intended us to confess our sins to a priest, the claims of Protestants and weak Catholics notwithstanding. In this context he taught us about the definition of a sacrament and that the Council of Trent defined formally both what a sacrament is and how many there are.

    I have this thought every time I hear a Gospel about the Pharisees: Christ loves everyone, especially sinners, so his treatment of the Pharisees and his working this miracle before their eyes is intended to show His love for them, and to bring them to conversion.

    I suppose my mind might be on this now because His Grace Salvatore Cordileone is about to be installed as Archbishop of San Francisco, and then — in the same week– to bestow confirmation on a group of young people, in the Extraordinary Form. No, I don’t mean anything against the archbishop, but rather, given where he’s going, that he will need the grace to persuade others of their sins before he can get them to repent of them.

    Some day I would like to hear in a sermon the reality that the Pharisees were concerned about Blasphemy only seems pharisaical to us, because we know Who was healing, teaching, and so on. He doesn’t fault them for their love of the law, only for their inability to draw logical conclusions from what was before their eyes.

  24. Skeinster says:

    Father used the recent feast of O.L. of Ransom and the story of St. Raymond Nonnatus for some Islam 101, particularly discussing taqqyia, abrogation and the three levels of lower jihad. Was already aware of most of this, but did not realize how many slaves there still are in Islamic controlled countries/territories.
    Not a homily- but we had the nephew of the late Ignatius Cardinal Kung for a lecture last night about the underground Church in China, his uncle’s white martyrdom under the Communist regime and how we can aid our fellow Catholics there. He drew no specific parallels with our present political situation, but we could see a possible future for ourselves in what he described.

  25. capchoirgirl says:

    Dominican parish.
    Great homily, sort of a two-parter. First part, about the voter registration drive/religious freedom in America and how important it is for us as Catholics to protect our religious freedom.
    Second–about the gospel. Not literally cutting off hands, arms, eyes, but rooting out sin from our lives. If it’s TV that causes us to sin, get rid of the TV. If it’s friends, get rid of those friends, because real friends want what is best for you, and that’s God and Heaven. If it’s magazines/newspapers, cancel subscriptions. If watching the nightly news makes you angry, don’t watch, etc., etc.

  26. eiggam says:

    At the EF mass, Father preached on the sacrament of Penance in the context of the man with a palsy who was healed and described in the Gospel. It’s good to get encouragement to go to confession.

    One of the cars in the parking lot had 2 of the We Love our Priests bumper stickers displayed.

  27. frjim4321 says:

    Well frjim what would YOU call someone who identifies him/her self as Catholic but whose positions on multiple key tenants of the Faith are counter to what Holy Mother Church teaches?

    I would probably call them by their given name. It’s not my prerogative to put labels on people nor is it yours.

    The “woman of ‘faith'” host on ETWN (Benk0vick?) on either this past Thursday or Friday was FAR from orthodoxy with regard to Catholic teaching on capital punishment, but I’m not going say that she’s not Catholic. She’s baptized, confirmed and has made First Eucharist. Not matter how daft I think she is, she is still Catholic and it’s not my prerogative to say otherwise.

  28. thoscole says:

    Don’t we call those Catholics that publically and stubbornly deny the doctrines of the Church, whether of faith or morals, heretics?

    St. Thomas Aquinas notes in his Summa Theologiae (II-II, Q. 64, A.2): “Therefore if a man be dangerous and infectious to the community, on account of some sin, it is praiseworthy and advantageous that he be killed in order to safeguard the common good, since “a little leaven corrupteth the whole lump” (1 Corinthians 5:6). ” Frjim4321, I doubt someone on EWTN is far from orthodoxy on the issue of capital punishment, unless she denied the right of the state to make use of it. We ought not confuse the prudential call of whether such punishment is necessary with doctrine. On the other hand, there are no prudential calls with intrinsic evils like abortion and on doctrines like the Divinity of Christ.

    My homily today echoed the recent remarks of the Bishop of Springfield in Illinois: we have a grave moral responsibility when it comes to voting. Father also noted the reality of hell, which tied well to both his excellency’s reminder this week, and Sunday’s Gospel.

  29. Lori says:

    Father spoke about the seven precepts of the Church. Beautiful.

  30. Matt R says:

    “Don’t we call those Catholics that publically and stubbornly deny the doctrines of the Church, whether of faith or morals, heretics?” Actually, I believe it is in the judgment of the local ordinary to declare this, considering that heresy is a canonical crime, and one that I understand to be the prerogative of the bishop . Most of the time, it’s not really heresy under the law. BUT defiance on teachings such as abortion is nonetheless scandalous and needs to be stopped. I wish we would be more prudential in the application of the word heretic. It’s a very serious thing.

  31. Gail F says:

    Thanks for all these replies. I did not get to hear a good homily today so it is inspiring to hear what can be made from the readings other than what I made in my own head.

  32. Darren says:

    Our Deacon (as is the case on the 3rd Sunday of the month, and whenever there is a 5th Sunday) gave the homily… and it was actually quite good!

    He talked about the upcoming election… and challenged us all to practive our civic duty and vote… vote as Catholics. He talked about the HHS mandate and the attack on freedom of religion… the attack on life, the attack on the elderly, the attack on marriage and the family, etc… …he challenged everyone to live their faith, not just on Sunday but all week, using language stronger than we typically hear. It was a pleasant break from the normal mediocracy.

  33. pappy says:

    We too had one of our Deacons give the homily. In MN, there is a marriage amendment on the ballot, and the fight is begin to get heated. His sermon focused on the spiritual warfare going on around us (picking up the theme of the man expelling demons in Jesus’ name), exhorting us
    to exercise our civil duty to fight the good fight, as well as to pray, to fast and to do good works.

    One, that I thought was very well done was pointing out, that our “human enemies” (jihadist’s, abortionists, etc.) are really victims of the true enemy, and that we have a duty not only to
    preserve the truth, but to win back the souls of these people.

  34. I contrasted the worldly money we work for with the “money of heaven”: grace, and explored what grace is: it’s not “free,” Christ paid a high price; and I talked about we spend this gold of heaven on worthless things, i.e., sin. But we get to exchange our worthless “purchases” and get grace back, in the sacrament of penance. I did mention hell. I got a good response.

    Click my name to access my blog to see it.

  35. BLB Oregon says:

    He said that those who ask whether it is better to have faith or works, orthodoxy or care of the poor, and so on are posing a false dichotomies….having one good thing does not make up for a deficiency in something else that is vital. You should recognize the good in other people without disqualifying one particular area of faithfulness on account of their failure at another, BUT you should not let yourself off the hook when it is you yourself who is only attending to part of what you’re obliged to do.

  36. beez says:

    I re-envisioned Cardinal Bernadin’s “seamless garment.”

    First, I granted that the garment is real, and important. But, i said, before there is the garment…

    1) Life is the thread out of which the garment is made. If we destroy the thread, there can be no garment,

    2) Parents is a sacramental marriage are the hands that weave the thread of life into the seamless garment of a just society.

    3) Religious liberty is the loom on which the fabric is made.

    Without these three, non-negotiable aspects of the Christian faith, questions of social justice are merely academic exercises.

    NO party, NO platform, NO policy and NO politician can oppose these bedrock, non-negotiable truths. No Catholic can, in good conscience support a candidate or party who opposes them.

    Without Life, Marriage and Liberty, there can be no social justice. Without them, there can’t be a society. If we eliminate the loom, if the tie the hands or if we pull the thread, society simply unravels.

    At one Mass, five people walked out. To my horror, most of the rest applauded.

    Fr. C

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