Homily for Sunday, 24 December 2023– The Nativity of the Lord, Mass during the Night

Readings of the day: Isaiah 9:1-6; Psalm 96:1-2, 2-3, 11-12, 13; Titus 2:11-14; Luke 2:10-14

Once again, sisters and brothers, a blessed and Merry Christmas to all of us, our families, friends, and loved ones!

In our Opening Prayer for this celebration of the Nativity of our Lord, we praised God who has “made this most sacred night radiant with the splendor of the true light.”

God has made “this night,” not some other night far from our experience, “radiant with the splendor of the true light.” Yes, it is right for us to say, God made a night over two thousand years ago over Bethlehem especially “radiant with the splendor of the true light.” That was the night when Jesus was born of the blessed Virgin Mary, “wrapped… in swaddling clothes and laid… in a manger.” That night was greeted by an angel, sent with a message of “the true light” to “shepherds living in the fields.”

“The true light” would reach from Bethlehem to the ends of the earth! Shepherds were about as marginal as could be in Jesus’ time. They lived outside the cities and villages. Experts on Luke’s Gospel often speak of shepherds as people with a somewhat poor reputation. They did not regularly participate in social and religious ritual. They probably smelled a little off, like their sheep. But Luke’s Gospel says that they are the first to hear the message of our Saviour’s birth. And then that one angel sent to tell the shepherds of Jesus’ birth joins “a multitude of the heavenly host.”

The light, the sound of joyous song spreads from there: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours”! And it all starts with the message of one angel to a group of shepherds. Those shepherds have nothing to lose, so they set out “with haste and [find] Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger.”

Already within our Gospel account of Jesus’ birth, the focus of the action has shifted, from an angel’s encounter with shepherds in their fields to those shepherds, heeding the invitation by the angel, encountering the Saviour of the world in a manger in Bethlehem. And this, sisters and brothers, the manger scene—we might say Act One, Scene Two of the Nativity event, if Act One, Scene One is the shepherds’ fields—is not the last scene of the birth of our Lord on earth, robed in our human flesh.

Today, here and now, we are experiencing another scene of the birth of our Lord into our world, sisters and brothers. “The splendor of the true light” that was first made known by an angel to shepherds, and then made manifest to the shepherds in their encounter with the Christ Child in a manger alongside Mary and Joseph, continues to grow in our present time. “The splendor of the true light,” the sound of joyous song, the encounter with the world’s peace and salvation in our human flesh continues to grow brighter, clearer, and closer in and through us.

How is this so? Is it not a little presumptuous to put ourselves in the Nativity story, so to speak, as if we should imagine ourselves as somehow important enough to be among the first to encounter God in our human flesh! But remember who was first to encounter the Christ Child, after Mary and Joseph: Shepherds were first. But, then, we might ask, was Jesus’ birth not a one-and-done event in history? This event could not still be happening; that is absurd!

In a way this is true: Jesus was born once for all into our world as a human being, there, done, over two thousand years ago in Bethlehem. And some (maybe many) of us may not feel very comfortable—we may feel unworthy—to imagine ourselves “on scene” with the first people to encounter the newborn Son of God.

Some (if not many) of us here tonight may not exactly be comfortable or feel worthy to be here. Some (if not many) of us may not have been to church for a long time. Some (if not many) of us may be conscious of some serious wrong, or have been wronged seriously by somebody else, or may be experiencing broken relationships, divisions within our households and our friendships.

If you are one of these people, I want you to know you are welcome here. Your presence here to celebrate this night of Jesus’ birth, “this most sacred night [made] radiant with the splendor of the true light,” has nothing to do with worthiness: Yours, mine, that of anybody celebrating this Christmas night anywhere in the world. It has nothing to do with whether this is your first time in a church in a long time, a short time, or ever. It had nothing to do with worthiness—of the shepherds, or even of Mary and Joseph—the night Jesus was born. Besides, the shepherds were first on scene at Jesus’ birth, after Mary and Joseph. Let us remember this.

From the shepherds the joyous song, “the splendor of the true light” could only grow. And it continues to grow in and through us. If this were not true, there would be no point in us gathering here to celebrate Christmas. God wants to grow the light in and through us.

This has been God’s desire from the very first moment of creation, when God spoke over the darkness, the primordial chaos and nothingness: “Let there be light.” And, from then on, the light has only grown. Sure, there have been and continue to be moments in our world, its history, our own lives when the light that is God’s presence in our world, in us, has been obscured. There have been moments when people have—when we have—tried to extinguish the light. That is what sin is and does. But our sin is no match for God, who this night takes on our human nature; who this night comes to dwell as one like us in all but sin; who this night invited shepherds through an angel to be the first after Mary and Joseph at the newborn Jesus’ bedside.

If we reflect on when God has intervened in our world, when God has reignited the light of God’s presence in our world, this tends to be when the light has become dimmest to our eyes, when we are most deeply mired in the darkness of sin. The word of God speaks to that this night. When the people of Israel in Old Testament times were at their most sinful, when they had nearly forgotten God in favour of the false gods of militarily and politically powerful nations around Israel, and when Israel had forgotten its responsibility of justice especially toward the most marginalized among themselves, God’s prophet Isaiah spoke to them. Isaiah said to Israel, in the depths of darkness and sin, “The people who have walked in darkness have seen a great light.”

And that light would only grow brighter. The joyous song would only resound more clearly: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favours”! The people of Israel and then the people of the whole world would see, would encounter, would experience the mercy of “a child… born for us, a son given to us… Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” That child would be “born for us” into a world, once again, “in deep darkness.” Israel of Jesus’ time was ruled by the Romans, just the latest in a succession of brutal foreign powers to rule the Holy Land.

We can point out many instances of “deep darkness” in our world still today: Wars, poverty, homelessness, other injustices, broken relationships. Yet, once again, God enters our world: Sure, not as God did just over two thousand years ago, as a baby in the womb of the Virgin Mary, born and laid in a manger in Bethlehem. Sure, God may not be entering the world in our own time through the words of a prophet like Isaiah or through the mighty acts of creation that set this universe in motion at the beginning of time: “Let there be light.”

But now God ignites the light anew, on “this most sacred night radiant with the splendor of the true light.” And God entrusts us, no matter how unworthy we might think we are, with this light. Our Gospels say in another instance that we “are the light of the world.” Each of us, and the Church communally, is “another Christ,” another focus point of God’s light and joyous song in our world.

Christ continues to make his dwelling in our human flesh, the human presence of everybody who celebrates his Nativity throughout the world on this night. Here we welcome and we celebrate the rekindling of the light, God’s entrusting us with the light so that, by our words and deeds of kindness, of justice, of mercy, of peace, of joy, each of us may be a first point of encounter with the light of the Lord. Each of us may become ever more “radiant with the splendor of the true light.” And that true light, that song of true joy, that closeness of encounter with Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world, will only grow brighter and clearer in and through us.

Homily for Sunday, 8 July 2018

Sunday of the 14th Week in Ordinary Time


Readings of the day: Ezekiel 2:2-5; Psalm 123:1-2ab, 2cd, 3-4; 2 Corinthians 12:7-10; Mark 6: 1-6

This homily was given at St. Margaret Mary Church,  St. Kateri Tekakwitha Parish, Rochester, NY, USA. 

How many of us have experienced being rejected at one time or another? I do not want to dismiss my experiences of being bullied at school as a child and teenager as insignificant, because this experience continues to play a role in forming the person I have become, and even played a role in my having become a Basilian priest. And yet, the more I think about my experiences of having been accepted or rejected, I realize how fortunate I have been, with some important exceptions, to have been, for the most part, accepted wherever I have been, from my home city of Edmonton, Canada to Paris, France, where I live now for most of the year, and beyond.

Coincidentally, this is the second year in a row I have visited Rochester, and St. Kateri Parish, during the Fourth of July holiday. Some of us who attended or walked with us during the Irondequoit Fourth of July parade may have noticed Fr. Joe Trovato riding in a Chevy Corvair convertible. From where Fr. Joe was in the parade, he was ideally placed to notice and be deeply moved by (as he said to me later that afternoon) how often I was called to either side of the parade route to greet St. Kateri parishioners and families, and often children I have known from St. Kateri School. To be called and welcomed along the Fourth of July parade route is delightful to me, too, although it has become somewhat second nature to me because I know how genuinely welcoming we are here at St. Kateri. And yet to hear from Fr. Joe how much joy seeing this gave him in turn reinforces my joy in and thanksgiving for you; for this parish community of St. Kateri.

I have lost track of the number of times people of St. Kateri have greeted me during my last ten days here with, “Welcome home, Father.” Almost as often, people who have greeted me in this way have then paused and then added something like, “Welcome to one of your many homes, Father”!

Truth be told, I always and will always feel at home here at St. Kateri. I will always feel at home because you, my sisters and brothers of St. Kateri, have made this such a welcoming place, for me and many other people. And, with this, I would like to extend a word of welcome to everybody who may be visiting St. Kateri Parish this weekend and for this Mass.

As I thank you and welcome us together as officially as I can through this act of preaching, though, I cannot help but wonder why Jesus was made to feel so unwelcome, not only in places he visited but in his hometown. In our Gospel reading today from Mark, Jesus laments that “a prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.” We hear that Jesus is unable “to perform any mighty deed” in his hometown, “apart from curing a few sick people,” which is still significant enough that Mark would mention Jesus’ few healings in his hometown.

In Mark’s Gospel especially, this is not the first time and would not be the last when Jesus would be rejected. From the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, his family believes “he is out of his mind.” Today, we hear how Jesus is rejected in his hometown. And then, as Jesus is betrayed, arrested, beaten, mocked, and crucified, his most trusted friends and disciples flee from him. When Jesus is on the cross, “even God seems to have abandoned” him, and so Jesus cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me”?

When I contrast Jesus’ repeated and constant rejection and abandonment to death on a cross alone with the welcome I and so many people receive in a place like St. Kateri Parish, I cannot help but feel horribly for Jesus. Our Lord’s rejection throughout the Gospel of Mark by his family, the people of his hometown, his best friends, and seemingly even God, also reminds me of a 1989 French Canadian film by Denys Arcand called Jésus de Montréal (Jesus of Montreal). In this film, actors stage a Passion play in a church in Montreal. Parishioners of the church become increasingly unhappy about the direction of the play, and so they turn against the actor who plays Jesus, who is the same person who has written the play. The plot parallels the Gospels’ telling of the increasing rejection of Jesus himself.

At the Vincentian Motherhouse’s St. Vincent de Paul Chapel, where I usually go to Mass when I am in Paris, one of the Vincentian brothers, who knows I am Canadian but is either confused about the distance (a five-hour flight) between Montreal and my hometown of Edmonton, or pretends to be confused about Canada’s expanse, for humorous effect, enjoys greeting me after Mass with, “How is Jesus of Montreal today”?

Suffice it to say that I feel precisely the opposite of rejected; precisely the opposite experience of Jesus of Montreal— or Jesus of Nazareth— when I am greeted as generously and joyfully as I am around the world, from Paris to Irondequoit to Edmonton. These greetings are also deeply humbling, especially if we think of other times in our Gospels in which Jesus warns against the pride and vanity that can result from our adulation by the people we serve as Christian disciples. If we are received well, sisters and brothers, may we pray for the grace to serve God’s glory and one another’s well-being before our own. And if we have ever been rejected for our faith and not for our own fault, may we take solace in that Jesus, in becoming fully human like us, has entered into solidarity with our rejection. He has put our rejection to death on the cross with him in order to accept; to receive; to greet us one day into eternal life with him.

And so all this leads me into an important question for us: If Jesus were to appear among us here and now— if Jesus of Nazareth, or at least Jesus of Montreal, were to show himself among us as Jesus of Irondequoit— as Jesus of St. Kateri Parish, how would we receive him? If your greeting, every time I visit St. Kateri, of this humble(d) priest-servant-brother in Christ of yours, is any indication, I have no doubt that you would greet and receive Jesus with your characteristic generous, warm St. Kateri welcome. You would make our beloved Fr. Joe, whether riding in a Corvair in the Fourth of July parade or pausing the Mass as he does so beautifully and often to greet our cooing youngest members of St. Kateri Parish, proud. But, most of all, you would be giving Jesus Christ the welcome befitting our God who became human like and for us; who put himself at the mercy of our welcome in this world to save us.

How well, then, would we receive our Lord, Jesus of Nazareth, if he were Jesus of St. Kateri;

if he were Jesus of the House of Mercy or of St. Joseph’s House of Hospitality, Jesus of Rochester’s poor and those who serve the poor here and everywhere,

If he were Jesus of the U.S.-Mexico border

If he were Jesus of Rochester General, Unity, Strong, or Monroe Community Hospital,

If he were Jesus of the vulnerable elderly and homebound,

If he were Jesus of those not yet born,

If he were Jesus of the crisis pregnancy,

If he were Jesus of the abused,

If he were Jesus of the imprisoned,

If he were Jesus of those affected by war and violence?

For Jesus is all these. Jesus, who lived, who experienced rejection, suffered, died, and rose again, will return again at the end of time and, once again, he will put himself at the mercy of our welcome.

Homily for Friday, 25 December 2015– Nativity of the Lord

Readings of the day (for Christmas Mass at Night): Isaiah 9:1-6; Psalm 96:1-2, 2-3, 11-12, 13; Titus 2:11-14; Luke 2:1-14

This homily was given at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Parish, Sherwood Park, AB, Canada.

From the prophet Isaiah we hear tonight [this morning]: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness‒ on them light has shone.” And from Luke’s Gospel we hear of shepherds, about to travel to Bethlehem to meet our newborn Saviour, Jesus Christ. These shepherds are “keeping watch over their flocks by night” when their night watch is interrupted by “an angel of the Lord” who announces Jesus’ birth in Bethlehem, “City of David.” Their night watch is interrupted by “the glory of the Lord” that shines “around them.” And we hear from Luke that these shepherds “were terrified” at this light breaking into the darkness surrounding them.

And yet is this not what our celebration of Christmas is all about: light breaking into; interrupting our darkness? Yet, unlike the shepherds outside Bethlehem on the night of Jesus’ birth or the people of Israel of Isaiah’s time, I imagine not many of us are terrified at light taking the place of darkness. In fact we celebrate it; we celebrate him, Jesus Christ, with a joyous song of thanksgiving: “Today is born our Saviour, Christ the Lord”… “A child has been born to us, a son given to us… He is named Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

We celebrate the Birth of “our Saviour, Christ the Lord,” in many ways. We celebrate by gathering together with family and friends. We celebrate by decorating our homes and often our workplaces and public spaces. We celebrate by exchanging gifts. Very importantly we celebrate by gathering here as a community of faith; a People of God to worship. Most of us here are anything but terrified.

But how many of us have experienced darkness as a reality deeper than physical, literal darkness? I think that here, in the centre of Alberta, we are somewhat privileged. We live far enough north to experience Christmas as near the shortest day of the year. I am now living and studying in Paris, France, and so on my way home to visit family here I have been keeping a close eye on the weather in the Edmonton area over the last few days, maybe like those shepherds near Bethlehem so many years ago, but for more selfish reasons: I wanted to be prepared for any extreme weather on my way here. Now, I expect cold weather in Alberta at this time of year. But in the corner of my computer screen, a reminder of the shortness of late December days here would stare me back in the face: Sunrise 8:50 am; sunset 4:15 pm. I love you, Alberta; even at your darkest and coldest you are my home; our home!

And still, amid not even seven and a half hours of sunlight each day this time of year, at Christmas we celebrate. The sun is unconquered by darkness. The unconquered Son of God, Jesus Christ, also promises to return. Christ promises once again to break into and interrupt our darkness, as he did more than two thousand years ago, to complete God’s work of our salvation at the end of time.

We celebrate, even though Christmas brings many of us face-to-face not with joy and light, but with our world’s darkness and, for some of us, the darkness in our families and among our loved ones and in our own experiences. Our world faces an unprecedented number of refugees and of people displaced within their own countries by violence and persecution: A record sixty million people worldwide who have been forced to flee their homes! More wars begin than end in our world today. The dignity of all human life; of creation is so often disregarded. This has led even the ever-joyful Pope Francis to lament recently that our world’s violence threatens to reduce our celebration of Christmas to a kind of charade!

But this does not need to be. Our celebration of Christmas, of Christ’s Nativity, has meaning if we renew here and now the Biblical call to welcome refugees and migrants; people who experience physical, mental, or spiritual illness; people who have lost family members or loved ones; people living in poverty; the unemployed; people with disabilities; people who are alone, without family or loved ones with whom to celebrate Christmas; people who are estranged from our Church... This parish, Our Lady of Perpetual Help, is a place where all these people are supported and given dignity. OLPH has sponsored refugee families. Through a wide variety of ministries OLPH supports the economically disadvantaged; the bereaved; those who are alone; those who are searching in their lives of faith. Here the heart of the Christmas message is lived out.

And our celebration of Christmas is meaningful as long as we do our best, knowing our imperfections; even our sin; our darkness, but also the light of God’s grace and mercy, “to live lives that are self-controlled, upright, and godly,” in St. Paul’s words to Titus. Our Christmas celebration finds meaning in our response to God’s call to welcome all who are on the same pilgrim’s path that we are all on, back to a manger scene in Bethlehem and forward to Christ’s return in glory.

Luke’s Gospel renews this call to us today by the simple remark that, when Jesus was born into our world, Mary and Joseph “laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.” There was no place amid the darkness of our world for our Saviour. In fact our world would reject its Saviour. Life that began in a manger would be nailed to a cross, in the greatest act of darkness and sin ever known. Yet even death would not stop Jesus Christ, the Light of our world. The manger, a place beneath human dignity where animals fed, would be transformed into a place where our God entered our world in human flesh from the Virgin Mary’s womb. The cross, a place beneath human dignity where common criminals were publicly tortured and killed, would be transformed into a place where our God gave his very life to save us. Likewise, are we allowing our lives, our experiences of light, goodness, and peace but also of darkness and sin, any experiences we have that are beneath our human dignity, to be places into which Christ is welcome? Are our hearts the “inns” into which Christ enters to transform; to redeem us?

Sure, our lives; our hearts probably are not, even by some of our own standards, fit to welcome the King of the Universe; our God. Fear not! Jesus is not asking us for a five-star hotel. After all, he first entered our world “wrapped… in swaddling clothes,” lying “in a manger.” Even there, in the darkness and stench of a manger, Jesus brought light. Even there, Jesus brought peace. Even there, Jesus calmed the fears of the shepherds who left their flocks and fields at the invitation of an angel, an invitation that left them “terrified” at first, to welcome Jesus into our world. Even there, from a manger, Jesus brought heaven and earth, angels and all “people of good will” to joyful song, a song we still hear in our world today; a song we still hear from the beginning of today’s celebration of our Eucharist: “Glory to God in the highest”!

Glory to Jesus Christ, Light of our world! Do we dare to join in this song of joy? Is our song too much of an interruption; a breaking into our world’s violence, hostility, and darkness for it to bear? Are we in need from time to time for Jesus to interrupt our own darkness with his light; his mercy? Is Jesus Christ; is his Gospel proclaimed and authentically lived in ways that are “self-controlled, upright, and godly” a danger to the security and comfort of some who would prefer to bar his way into our countries; our public spaces; our hearts; our relationships; our lives?

Yes, but this has yet to stop God in Christ. If Jesus must, he will enter as he has already entered our world in the deepest of darkness to bring us God’s own light. This is why Isaiah proclaims so boldly that  “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light”; that “those who lived in a land of deep darkness‒ on them light has shone.”

And this is why today, on this Christmas night [morning], we sing just as boldly as of old to welcome the Light that interrupts and breaks through our world’s darkness: “Today is born our Saviour, Christ the Lord”… “A child has been born to us, a son given to us… He is named Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”

Homily for Wednesday, 25 February 2015‒ Wednesday of the First Week of Lent

Readings of the day: Jonah 3:1-10; Psalm 51:3-4, 12-13, 18-19; Luke 11:29-32

This homily was given at Bethany House, Rochester, NY, a shelter for homeless women and children. 

What is the “sign of Jonah” of which Jesus speaks in our reading today from Luke’s Gospel? What or, better yet, who is the “something greater than Solomon here”? The “sign of Jonah”; the “something” or somebody greater than King Solomon in all his wisdom is Jesus Christ, our Savior, the Son of God.

We know this. But how well do we really recognize Jesus as “sign of Jonah”; as all that wise Solomon was and more? This is Jesus Christ who calls us to repentance; to renewal. And yet here we stand, in one of the poorest neighborhoods in one of the poorest cities in these United States. This is a scandal that cries out to us, “Repent,” much as Jonah and Jesus once cried, “Repent! Turn your hearts to God! Believe in the Gospel”!

Today’s Gospel reading has always troubled me. I stand before us here at Bethany House, never having suffered from substance abuse and addiction; never having been homeless, let alone in this frigid climate; never having been a refugee or forced migrant.

I recently read a reflection from the Jesuits at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska on today’s Gospel reading,[1] which always evokes in me a deep sorrow for how some people suffer unnecessarily, while others stockpile goods with greed. Even so, the reflection I read seemed somewhat cynical to me at first. It spoke of how Jonah’s preaching, with “the threat of total destruction” of Nineveh, was enough “motivation” for them to repent immediately; to proclaim “a fast” and “put on sackcloth,” in the words of our first reading.

And then the same reflection spoke of our society: Today “the threat of the approaching end times, or any threat of catastrophe, doesn’t seem to change minds and hearts. These threats only increase the numbers of ‘preppers’‒ folks who are stockpiling supplies, food and water, and preparing for self-sufficiency.”

Is this our society, beyond a greedy few that, yes, are the “preppers”? I would like to hope not. But, if not, why the grinding poverty we see around us; right here in this nation; in this city? Why the high and rising number of working poor? I realize that I do not speak to most if any of us here. I speak to those who oppress by greed; who stockpile resources beyond what is necessary to live comfortably. I speak to my own heart; I examine my own conscience. One “prepper” is too many!

But where is the good news in all this? The good news is that it is not too late to repent. It is not too late to turn to God and away from sin wholeheartedly. It is not too late to seek help if we are mired in addiction or otherwise not helping ourselves to grow and nurture mind, body, and spirit. It is not too late for those who have stockpiled and not helped those in need. It is not too late to welcome. Here at Bethany House, we find welcome: One another’s welcome; God’s welcome. It is a welcome that, I pray, is transforming us; is renewing us. It is the welcome of Jesus Christ, the “sign of Jonah,” or the sign of Solomon, and greater still.

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[1] Diane Jorgensen. “Daily Reflection: February 25, 2015.” http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/022515.html. Accessed 24 February 2015.