Your Sunday Sermon Notes

12 Comments

1. Joe of St Thérèse says:

   8 July 2013 at 9:38 AM

   Do we have faith that Jesus can forgive sins, go to confession…
2. iPadre says:

   8 July 2013 at 10:20 AM

   Talked about the first reading from Isaiah. Jerusalem as an image of the new Jerusalem, the Church our Mother and teacher. She nourishes, teaches and guides us to the heavenly Jerusalem, where we long to be with the Church in glory, gathered around our Lord.
3. Gratias says:

   8 July 2013 at 10:24 AM

   Novus Ordo this week. In the gospel of Luke Jesus sends 72 to preach his word. Why 72? Because at that time there were 72 nations known, explains father.

   Father was surprised to learn after mass that 72 is 6 dozens. The ancients used dozens rather than tens because 12 is a number divisible by 2, 3, 4, and 6. Very useful.
4. Basher says:

   8 July 2013 at 10:27 AM

   At our diocesan Cathedral this week. Rector knocked one out of the park, homily about vocations to the priesthood. He stressed that the priesthood is a vocation for normal, healthy men, not for the strange. He said “We’ve had quite enough of that.” I wanted to stand and applaud, but I’m Catholic, so I didn’t. I’ll instead write him a note later this week and tell him how great it was.
5. Joel says:

   8 July 2013 at 11:00 AM

   I was privileged to meet and hear Fr. Welzbacher for the first time.
   We had a bit of a history lesson, reminding us that though the Constitution of the U.S. does not call out God specifically, the preamble, if you will, to the constitution, the Declaration of Independence, does clearly call on and refer to God. Not the Triune God per say but the God of all men’s faith, the Creator.
   Also a reminder that within our Declaration we have absolute truths called out, quite the contrary to what we might hear from Obama or society in general.
6. dholwell says:

   8 July 2013 at 11:24 AM

   Here in Monterey, our Sunday homily at Ft. Ord was on the heroic life of Blessed Junipero Serra, and the still-present need to evangelize California, just as he did.

   The 300th anniversary of his birth was celebrated at the Carmel Mission on Saturday, with 17 bishops co-celebrating the Mass. It followed a nine-day Novena for his canonization.
7. lgreen515 says:

   8 July 2013 at 12:36 PM

   To explain Jesus’ comment that “It will go better with the town of Sodom that it will for that place” (that rejects Jesus’ message) Father said, “This sounds like a threat, but it is not. Imagine that you are in a house that is on fire, and you hear someone saying, ‘follow the sound of my voice, and I will lead you out. You have to trust me.’ And you follow the sound of that voice and are saved from the flames. But you also had the choice not to trust…”
8. fichtnerbass says:

   8 July 2013 at 2:19 PM

   That “choice” is a wolf of a word in sheep’s clothing, as is “equality.”
9. MAJ Tony says:

   8 July 2013 at 3:19 PM

   Our new pastor at Holy Rosary, Indianapolis, Fr. McCarthy, made it short and sweet, due to jet lag from defending his doctoral dissertation in Rome that week. First, and most importantly, he promised to do everything he could to give everyone what they NEED to gain salvation. If he got them some of what they WANT, consider it icing on the cake, especially as he’s a one-man show at the moment. He asked us specifically to pray for two things: HIM, and vocations. Note that as of July 3, we have lost our FSSP apostolate ,at least for the time being, as I think the FSSP is understandably a bit gunshy, being that the Indianapolis apostolate has been a black hole for FSSP priests, not having a stand-alone parish. Fr. will be covering AU, OF, and EF masses more often than not. That’s three on Sunday alone, plus Sat night. Having sung for all three this Sun, I can attest he’s going to be worn out by 1 PM. As for the FSSP, I’m of a mind that we will not suffer in this diocese, as our environment has been pretty positive, and more than a few young priests are taking advantage of the provisions of SP. Fr. Byrd, who is from a Baptist background, celebrated the EF mass this time, giving Fr. McCarthy a breather after two morning masses.
10. Lin says:

    8 July 2013 at 8:45 PM

    Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed due to lack of hospitality! You cannot make this stuff up!?! Oops, you asked for good points,
11. Rouxfus says:

    8 July 2013 at 10:42 PM

    I was treated to an especially stirring homily on Sunday in the Extraordinary Form of the Mass, in reference to the reading for the Seventh Sunday after Pentecost, that is, Matthew 7:15-21. The sermon was titled “The Prerogatives And Responsibilities Of Moral Freedom” and it was perfectly suited for the closing day of the Fortnight for Freedom. Fortunately the author provided me an electronic copy of the text. Here is an excerpt:

    … The next kind of liberty is moral freedom, by virtue of which you can select between good and evil, virtue and vice. You can blaspheme or praise your Creator, keep the commandments or violate them. It is of this last form of liberty that I shall speak today. How sublime is the faculty of free will! It is a gift which distinguishes you from the brute creation; for man is the only creature on earth that enjoys moral freedom.

    What a tremendous responsibility is attached to this perilous gift! If righteously employed, it becomes an instrument of unending bliss. If abused, it becomes an engine of endless destruction. If kept within the bounds of the moral law, it is a heavenly stream, enriching the kingdom of the soul with fruits of grace and benediction. If it leaps its legitimate barriers, it covers the earth with ruin and desolation.

    It is the exercise of the will that distinguishes the saint from the sinner, the martyr from the apostate, the hero from the coward, the benevolent ruler from the capricious tyrant. The names of Nero and Diocletian, of Achab and Jezebel, of Judas and Herod, are execrated by mankind because they abused their free will in gratifying their passions and in inflicting sorrow and misery on their fellow-beings. The names of an Alfred the Great and a Vincent de Paul are held in veneration, because they consecrated their will to their personal sanctification, and to the welfare of their fellow-beings.

    And it is so with us. If we are destined to be of the number of the elect, we shall owe our salvation under God, to the right use of our moral freedom. If we are to incur the vengeance of heaven, it will be due to the abuse of our liberty: “Thy destruction is thine own, O Israel.” In a word, our liberty is a weapon with which, like Saul, we may inflict a deadly wound upon ourselves; or it is a sword with which, like Michael the Archangel, we can conquer the infernal enemy and win our way to Heaven.

    How are we to exercise our moral freedom? We should employ it, first, in resisting temptations and our vicious inclinations. We should be “as free,” says Saint Peter, “and not as making liberty a cloak for malice, but as the servants of God,” whom to serve is to reign. And Saint Paul says that we are the servants of Him whom we obey, whether it be God or Satan. “Whosoever,” says our Lord, “committeth sin, is the slave of sin.” (John viii.) What a degradation to fall from the sublime estate of free-born children of God to become the slaves of Satan! What a humiliation to cease to be heirs in our heavenly Father’s house, and to become like the Prodigal Son, the hirelings of a heartless taskmaster! “Man, when he was in honor, did not understand. He is compared to senseless beasts, and is become like unto them.” (Psalm xlviii. (xlix.))

    Our Savior told the Jews that the knowledge and practice of His precepts would secure for them true freedom. The Jews were indignant that their freedom should be called in question: “We are the seed of Abraham,” they exclaimed, “and have never been slaves to any man.” But our Lord replied that, though children of Abraham, they were in bondage as long as they were in sin: “Amen, I say to you: whosoever committeth sin is the slave of sin.”

    Do not Americans sometimes talk in this way? We are free-born citizens and yield to no despotic power. But what will it profit us to enjoy the blessings of civil freedom if we do not enjoy the glorious liberty of children of God by which we are rescued from ignorance and can trample on sin? What will it avail us to be recognized in the public walks of life as free-born and independent citizens, if, in the circle of our own family and in the sanctuary of our own hearts, we are lashed as slaves by the demon of passion; if we are slaves to a petulant temper, slaves to lust, to intemperance, pride and vainglory, slaves to public opinion, the most capricious of all tyrants?
    …

    [James Cardinal Gibbons]

    Stirring, sublime stuff.
12. dylanmichaelholmes says:

    9 July 2013 at 8:49 PM

    It was about how true freedom is not doing whatever we want, but in being obedient to God. (It was by Fr. Fryar, the priest in the Campion Missal FWIW.)

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