Was there a good point made in the sermon you heard during your Mass of Sunday Obligation?
Let us know.
I didn’t preach today, since I was the deacon for the Mass and I didn’t have another scheduled Mass. Had I preached today, I think I would have spoken about the dignity of work, especially the menial tasks we perform. I would have tied together the parable of the man who hires workers at different times of the day and also the Epistle in which Paul uses sports imagery. It takes menial, repetitious, boring work to become proficient in a sport, so that you can finish the race or match and win the prize. Some come by their prizes more easily than others, but we can all get to the finish line. God does not offer challenges that we can’t attain. It takes work. We can make progress toward the finish line even in our boring, menial tasks. By offering brief prayers while working and by offering the work itself as a sacrifice, we ready ourselves for the trial which we face in our desire for heaven.
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I wish I could recall where I read that we should “never look down upon those who keep in repair the fabric of the world”.
The quotation is not in the book about work by Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski, published in English as “All You Who Labor” and later as “Working Your Way into Heaven: How to Make Work, Stress, and Drudgery a Means to Your Sanctity”.
Fr. Vincent noted that many people view the Old Testament as very harsh, but in fact it was only Our Lord who revealed the reality of eternal punishment for sin and moreover he made the commandments more stringent. However, unlike the scholars of the law who lay heavy burdens on people, but do not lift a finger to help them, Our Lord does help us by his grace to keep the commandments. That is where His mercy is. So while there is today a school of thought that God is so merciful that he does not really expect us to keep the commandments, His mercy really consists in His helping us to keep them. And we are all sinners. We all need this help. He is our savior in our day to day struggle with sin.
He noted that yesterday, the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes is one of his favorite feasts and many of us would like to go to Lourdes, but it is so far away. At Lourdes there is a healing spring, but here at the altar is opened up for us a healing spring of grace that flows from the pierced heart of Jesus Christ, a spring of grace that wells up within us because of our reception of the Eucharist.
There was more, much more in the same vein
The Reverend Deacon essentially repeated the message of Sirach. God gives us a choice between good and evil, we need to choose wisely. To build upon this, he added “Following the Commandments is a matter of choice. What never changes, however, is the binding power of the Law. It still applies to us even if we choose to ignore it.”
Father reminded us that we build holiness day by day, that we are all on a march to calvary. We should wake up every morning and be reminded of our call to holiness.
Dominica VI Per Annum (Ann. A.): Jesus did not abolish the laws: the moral laws or the laws of worship. We can’t be white-washed sepulchers, but that doesn’t mean that externals don’t matter, especially the externals of Liturgy. Jesus want’s the whole package: we can neither be Gnostics nor Pharisees. It is not just enough to simply believe intellectually or in our hearts: we need to manifest that belief in the way we act, particularly around the Blessed Sacrament and during Liturgical worship. Reverence, proper manner of reception of holy communion (referring to our altar rail), ceremonial and decorum, all of this matters and speaks volumes, as they convey the message of the Truth of Who the Blessed Sacrament is more than words alone ever could.
Jesus’s words in the Gospel reading (Matt 5:17-37) denotes that we are meant to follow God’s law out of love and not necessarily out of fear. Treating the commandments like traffic violations misses the point in that it is about relationship…about where our hearts are. That is why Jesus said that those who look lustfully at a woman have already committed adultery in their hearts.
Father also mentioned that most people don’t know why they are unhappy but it is because they don’t keep the commandments. Conversely, those who follow the commandments are some of the happiest people. Of course, we need Divine love/grace and we access that through the sacraments and prayer.
As an aside, when in the Gospel reading, Jesus said this:
“It was also said, Whoever divorces his wife must give her a bill of divorce. But I say to you, whoever divorces his wife – unless the marriage is unlawful – causes her to commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.”
~and this~
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place. Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever obeys and teaches these commandments will be called greatest in the kingdom of heaven. I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.”
The logic of the Gospel seems not to permit adulterers at the marriage supper of the Lamb.
My notes on Father Kirby’s homily at Our Lady of Grace in Lancaster, SC:
http://prognosticis.blogspot.com/2017/02/sacramentum-matrimonii-sancti.html
The denarius given to each of the vineyard workers (i.e. The faithful) , whether first or last into the vineyard (the church), is eternal life in heaven.
I presented a plan, two years in the making, for the parish to grow in our relationship with Jesus Christ. We will focus on five priorities: devout worship, more disciples, being more welcoming, seeking out those who are inactive or not Catholic or Christian, and of course, paying for all we do.
At the NO, Bishop Nickless of Sioux City, IA, preached clearly on the permanence of marriage and on WHY a divorced person lacking a decree of nullity who then has a civil marriage cannot receive Holy Communion. Full stop. This was an elaboration, with his typical gentle clarity, on his letter in the diocesan paper published on Thursday. In the process of his explanation, he also taught clearly that contraception is a sin.
In your kindness, please pray for this faithful bishop!
At the EF, our beloved pastor was not feeling well at all today, and he decided not to preach a homily. He presented us with two facts. First, that we had entered the season of Septuagesima. Second, that our ability to have an EF Mass at our parish tenuously hinges on one man alone, asking prayers that our bishop will send another priest to our parish that has a love for the EF Mass. He then had us sit in silence for several minutes to dwell on that fact. A very sobering moment, indeed.
@Charles E Flynn: I quite enjoy your quote: “never look down upon those who keep in repair the fabric of the world”. It is good to say hello again! The last time that we crossed paths was on the NLM website. God be with you!
Regarding the post, we did not hear a sermon today, from one of our two good priests. We had, instead, a CD promoting an important diocesan campaign.
In Septuagesima we go from the incarnation to what seems to be a more gloomy period, a time of penance. The incarnation hearkens back to the creation, the “in the beginning” of Genesis is repeated in John 1:1 where the Word is made flesh. However the first man Adam fell. Our restoration is a new creation where Jesus empties himself, that is becomes nothing, in order to become the new Adam. Through his sacrifice we go from death to life. We have to follow Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, and bring our bodies and our entire being into subjection to Him. Lent is a time for us to prepare to do just that.
Starting with a brief story of the lives of Sts. Louis and Zélie Martin, that the permanence of marriage is God’s law as Jesus tells us in the Sermon on the Mount, and that if we keep God truly in our marriages it is quite possible.
St. Linus in Oak Lawn, IL, Archdiocese of Chicago:
Father opened by telling us of the young man who had just gotten his driver license and asked his dad about using the family car. Dad said, “If keep your grades up, do your chores, read the bible and get your hair cut, I will let you use the car.” The son worked hard at school, at home and read the bible, but did not get his hair cut. When he asked for the car, his Dad said no. The son said, “In reading the bible I noted that Abraham has long hair, Moses had long hair and even Our Lord, Jesus has long hair. ” His Dad responded, “Did you also note that wherever they went, they walked?” Father noted that if will listen and do what the Father asks, we will be rewarded.
We went to a Parish in a different town and were so thankful to find Father celebrating the Ordinary form Ad Orientem! He used the complete reading and gave a fantastic homily about Jesus completing the law and raising the requirements on behavior that is pleasing to God. He also mentioned that God supplies the graces necessary to enable us to live as Jesus taught.
Septuagesima was the occasion for a sermon on the First Commandment. The values of the so called Enlightenment, which has brought darkness not light, giving birth to the outrages and sacrileges of the French Revolution.