October 31, 2010
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Thirty-First Sunday, Year C, October 31st, 2010 – By Father Tim McCauley
Do you want to see Jesus as Zaccheus did, and experience His presence, His power, His love? You can. Because Jesus is seeking you out. He came to seek and to save the lost. That’s us. We can see him if we
1) stand above the crowd
2) pray in the Spirit, using our imagination,
3) belong to the community of believers.
To experience Jesus, we obviously need to spend more time with Jesus and less time with the devil. I am willing to bet that many Christians, the week before last, spent more time with the devil than with Jesus. How is that so, you might ask? Because the newspapers and TV were saturated with images of the horrific and diabolical crimes of Russell Williams. John Robson in The Citizen mentioned that these used to be called, literally, “unspeakable” crimes, meaning we didn’t speak about them. But now, we speak of them in great detail. How much time did Christians spend that week following the trial, reading about perversion, watching images of violence, literally contemplating the works of the devil? And how much time did they spend following Jesus, reading the Bible, and meditating on the glory of God?
There’s an expression “tell me who your friends are, and I will tell you who you are.” Tell me whom you spend time with, and I will tell you who you are. Tell me what you spend your time thinking about and talking about, and I will tell you who you are.
In today’s Gospel, we heard that Zaccheus “was trying to see who Jesus was, but on account of the crowd, he could not, because he was short in stature” (Luke 19: 3). But at least the crowd was carrying Zaccheus toward Jesus; if he followed the crowd, he would find Jesus. Today it is the opposite. If we follow the crowd, we will be carried along the wide and easy path that leads to destruction (Mt 7:13-14). Today, we need to stand above the crowd, go against the grain, swim against the tide; today, Christians need to be radically counter-cultural just to survive, let alone, be saints. Sunday is Hallowe’en – All Hallow’s Eve, and Monday is All Saints Day, the day on which the Church remembers and celebrates every soul in heaven, and reminds us of our own call to holiness.
The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost. Jesus is seeking us out. He wants to come and stay with us today – today through Holy Communion, and every day through His Word and our prayer in the Spirit, using our imagination.
The other day, when I was trying to go to sleep, I started thinking about someone beside Jesus. Do you want to know who that person was? . . . It was Mark Zuckerberg! Why would I be thinking about Mark Zuckerberg (the creator of Facebook)? Because I had just seen the critically-acclaimed movie about his life, which was an interesting commentary on our high-tech culture. There’s nothing wrong with watching a quality movie, but this one had some disturbing scenes, and filled my mind, memory, and imagination with Mark Zuckerberg, not Jesus Christ!
Tell me who your friends are and who you spend your time with, and I will tell you who you are. Do we spend time with Jesus Christ, meditating on his life? Or is all our time each day, our memory and our imagination, consumed with everything and everyone but Jesus Christ?
There is a way of praying with Scripture that is like watching a movie, that uses our imagination, and plants positive images and feelings in our memory. I am hoping that we will develop, out of the Life in the Spirit seminars, various small Christian communities where we can learn and practice this lectio divina or praying with Scripture.
For example, you sit down with today’s Gospel, read it and re-read it slowly. You imagine that you are there in there in Jericho. Perhaps you are Zaccheus. You see the crowd rushing through the dusty streets toward the gate, crying out with wild enthusiasm, “It’s the prophet Jesus!” You are a rich man, very well-dressed. But suddenly, a feeling of childlike joy surges through your heart and you find yourself running and climbing a tree – this is crazy! You see movement in the crowd. His disciples are trying to make a way for him. You are straining to try to see the man – there He is! So calm, so dignified and peaceful in the midst of such madness!
He is going to pass right in front of you . . . All of a sudden he stops . . .the crowd pauses . . . He looks up and gazes right into your eyes (He knows you!), “Zaccheus (insert your name), hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house today” (Lk ). You get the picture? Using your own imagination, you continue the story. He comes to your house. Well, what do you talk about? What does Jesus say to you? . . . I don’t know. You have to pray and find out how the scene ends.
I want to emphasize that this is not a game, a mental trick; this is real prayer guided by the Holy Spirit. By thinking about God, He becomes really present to us. The media can manipulate our imagination, drawing us farther away from God, along with the crowd. But we can baptize our imagination, re-awaken its slumbering power, and unleash its creative potential. We can let the Holy Spirit direct the scene and paint the picture. We can have a real encounter with Jesus.
Today’s Gospel reports that Zaccheus was trying to “see” who Jesus was. In the New Testament, there is not really a word for “experience”. The notion of “see” includes what we would call “experience.” We too can “see” Jesus and experience His presence, love and conversation, through the power of His Word and the Holy Spirit.
Finally, we also need to be belong to a community. After Zaccheus met Jesus and was converted, Jesus said, “Today salvation has come to this house” (Lk 19:9). Jesus did not say that salvation had come to Zaccheus individually, but to his whole house, his whole family. We can presume that henceforth, Zaccheus and his family became Christians, and formed part of the early community of the disciples of Jesus which became the Church.
Jesus does not save us only as individuals, but as a people, as members of a family, a community, a Church. Last Saturday I attended “Brain Matters” the fundraising dinner for Justin McKenna. I was very inspired by Justin’s speech and the words of the other presenters, such as Dr. Menard and Richard James, who spoke of God and the true miracle of Justin’s recovery. Justin himself is a man of great faith and prayer, a witness to others. At the same time, he is not ashamed of his need for the support of family, friends and community, to assist him in his on-going recovery and in living a full life.
What is true for Justin is true for every Christian. To be a Christian and Catholic in today’s world, we need the support of family, friends, and the community of believers. We cannot simply follow the crowd, nor live as isolated individuals. It is only as part of a Christian community that we can resist the power of the media over our imagination, our morals, and our lifestyle and learn to see, experience and follow Jesus. After Life in the Spirit seminar finishes on November 3rd, we are planning to continue with small Christian communities open to everyone in the parish! So that all of us can respond to the universal call to holiness, and truly celebrate All Hallow’s Eve and All Saints’ Day by becoming saints ourselves.
Permalink
October 28, 2010
Posted in Homilies
at 11:54 am
Thirtieth Sunday, Year C, October 24th, 2010 – By Father Tim McCauley
Do you like this church? By “church” I mean specifically this church building. Do you like it? I know I do. First of all, because it looks like a church; it has a traditional design that is conducive to prayer and worship.
I would like to talk about our church’s building, recalling Jesus’ reference to the temple in today’s Gospel. The main point of Jesus’ parable is the importance of humility both in our prayer to God and our relationship with others. But the background of this parable told by Jesus is also significant. Jesus has placed the Pharisee and tax collector in the context of prayer in the Temple, where He and His apostles frequently went to pray.
Why did the Pharisee and tax collector go to the Temple to pray? Because God was present there. In the Jewish understanding, God was present in the Holy of Holies; they imagined the Spirit of God somehow dwelling or resting on the Ark of the Covenant. This presence of God is fulfilled for us in the New Testament in our Holy of Holies, the Tabernacle, where Jesus Christ is truly present in His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity.
Jesus takes it for granted that people should go to the Temple to pray before the presence of God, but for their prayers to be heard, they must have a humble heart, and the right dispositions; they must also come to worship in the temple in the Spirit. St. Luke makes that very clear in his Gospel. Simeon is one of the models of prayer in the Temple, and we read that he “came in the Spirit into the temple” (Lk 2:27).
And so do we at every Mass: we come in Spirit to the temple; we come to this Church to worship God in Spirit and truth (Jn 4:23-24), not only those who were baptized in the Holy Spirit Wednesday night, but all of us Catholics who have been baptized and confirmed – we come in the Spirit to worship God in this holy place.
When people say it “looks” or “feels” like a church, what does that mean? Have you ever been in a church that did not “look” or “feel” like a church? What is the difference? Is it all subjective?
Well, what about our church? It has a steeple. It is rectangular shaped, with a nave and a sanctuary. It has pews and kneelers. There is an altar, a crucifix, a tabernacle with a vigil light. There is an icon of Mary and a statue of Joseph with devotional candles. OK.
There are actually objective standards to measure Church architecture. Do you all agree that there are right and wrong beliefs? For example, if someone were to say, “I believe that Jesus only became aware that He was God after He rose from the dead,” you would say, in the most polite Canadian way, “No. You’re wrong. Scripture and the Church are clear in stating that Jesus knew He was God all along.” There are right and wrong beliefs.
It’s the same with church architecture. There are right ways and wrong ways to build churches. Architecture is the built form of ideas (cf. Catholic Church Architecture and the Spirit of the Liturgy by Denis McNamara, Chapter 1). The right ideas and beliefs produce a church that looks like a church; the wrong ideas and beliefs produce a church that looks like a factory or a house, a place that does not help people contemplate the things of heaven.
Our church was built in 1961 according to the right idea and a traditional model of a church. Why is our church shaped like a rectangle instead of a triangle, or a circle or a square? Does anyone know?
Because this traditional model of the church is based on the temple in Jerusalem, which in turn is a copy of the heavenly sanctuary, as mentioned in the letter to the Hebrewsi (Catholic Church Architecture, 55). The church on earth is a reflection of the temple in heaven. The worship of Catholics at Mass is a participation in the worship of Christ our High Priest in heaven. A church “looks” and “feels” like a church when it gives us a foretaste of heaven.
When I was in Jerusalem last year, I had the opportunity to see the Temple mount, where Herod’s temple once stood, where Jesus Christ and His apostles once worshiped. The original temple consisted of a rectangle area called the Holy Place, represented by the nave (the main body) of the church. At the end of the Holy Place, behind a curtain, was the Holy of Holies which contained . . . what? Right in the center, the Ark of the Covenant, the “real” Presence of God. The Holy of Holies of the temple corresponds to the sanctuary and the tabernacle.
You notice steps here at the edge of the sanctuary. There used to be altar rails here as well, marking it off as a holy place. We also have a small veil around the tabernacle, from the tradition of the veil in the temple in Jerusalem, reminding us that it “conceals” one of the great mysteries of our faith, the real Presence of God on earth in the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ.
Churches are built with the right ideas and beliefs when the reflect the ancient temple which is in turn a copy of God’s temple in heaven. Just as the altar and the Holy of Holies were privileged places in the old temple, so are they in the church. We also add the Cross. These are the three key elements in the sanctuary that directly relate to the mystery of the Mass we are celebrating: Cross, tabernacle and altar.
Do you like the “corpus” the body of Christ on the crucifix? I do. It’s not original, though; it’s a later addition to our church. Marcel Vaillancourt was explaining to me that he and Fr. Lafleur picked that up in the late 1980′s. People must have been used to the plain Cross, and change is sometimes difficult for some people, but I think it was a change for the better. The Body of Christ on the Cross brings the Scripture to life – look at Him and consider “Christ died for our sins” (1 Cor 15:3), and Christ “loved me and gave Himself for me” (Gal 2:20).
The Body on the Cross is a powerful visual reminder that the sacrifice of the Mass on the altar makes present the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross. There is also a direct link between the altar and the tabernacle. Can anyone tell me what that is? The tabernacle contains the fruit of the Mass, the completion of the Sacrifice, the real Presence of Christ.
There have been several changes in our sanctuary since our church was built in 1961. For example, the choir was moved from the balcony into the sanctuary. Now I’m not suggesting that we move the choir, but the fact remains that when the choir was in the balcony, there was less traffic and more of an aura of stillness and silence surrounding the Holy of Holies, the tabernacle. No one is to blame for this traffic; it is a simple fact of the cramped space in our church.
I propose we study the logistics of moving the tabernacle to the center in order to restore a greater sense of reverence for Christ in the sanctuary, to move the priest off to the side, and the ambry to the current location of the tabernacle. This change in our sanctuary would accomplish three things:
1) less traffic around the tabernacle and thus more reverence
2) visually it would communicate more clearly the link between the Cross, the altar and the tabernacle
3) it would give pride of place in the sanctuary to Christ rather than the priest.
I think that this would be a positive change in the set-up of our sanctuary. Just like the change made in the 1980′s of adding a corpus to the crucifix has helped us to pray, I believe that putting Christ in the tabernacle visually at the center will also help us to pray.
One of the joys of a priest is to see the Holy Spirit move in the hearts and lives of the people. I see it in you who love God and who come to worship Him every Sunday (or Saturday); I have seen it in the women who organized the Life in the Spirit seminar, in the men who organized the 24-hour adoration, (with another one coming at the end of November). These initiatives, I believe, are part of the movement of the Holy Spirit, to deepen our worship, so that by coming to this temple in the Spirit, and entering this Church, we will more and more become the Church, those living stones that make up the living, breathing, Mystical Body of Christ that shines with a spiritual radiance, leading all people to come to know, love and adore God.
Permalink
Posted in pastor
at 11:51 am
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
With the secular celebration of Hallowe’en on this Sunday night, we Catholics remind ourselves of the religious significance of All Hallow’s Day or All Saints’ Day on which we remember all the saints in heaven, and the universal call to holiness – God calls all of us to be saints.
I share with you this quote from St. Faustina, about the shortest road to sanctity:
“My Jesus, it is truly easy to become holy; it just takes a little good will! And if He finds this minimum of good will in a soul, He quickly gives Himself to her. And nothing can stop Him, neither our faults nor our falls, absolutely nothing. Jesus hurries to help that soul; and if the soul is faithful to this grace from God, she can in a short time reach the highest level of holiness that a created being can attain here below. God is very generous and does not refuse His grace to anyone. He gives even more than we ask for. The shortest road is faithfulness to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit”(In The School of the Holy Spirit by Jacques Philippe, p. 9).
In Christ, Fr. Tim
Permalink
October 22, 2010
Posted in pastor
at 10:00 am
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
On October 18th, Pope Benedict released a letter to seminarians, which includes a beautiful reflection on CONFESSION that can inspire all of us. He writes,
“The sacrament of Penance is also important. It teaches me to see myself as God sees me, and it forces me to be honest with myself. It leads me to humility. The Curé of Ars once said: “You think it makes no sense to be absolved today, because you know that tomorrow you will commit the same sins over again. Yet,” he continues, “God instantly forgets tomorrow’s sins in order to give you his grace today.”
Even when we have to struggle continually with the same failings, it is important to resist the coarsening of our souls and the indifference which would simply accept that this is the way we are. It is important to keep pressing forward, without scrupulosity, in the grateful awareness that God forgives us ever anew – yet also without the indifference that might lead us to abandon altogether the struggle for holiness and self-improvement.
Moreover, by letting myself be forgiven, I learn to forgive others. In recognizing my own weakness, I grow more tolerant and understanding of the failings of my neighbour.”
In Christ, Fr. Tim
Permalink
October 17, 2010
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Twenty-ninth Sunday, Year C, October 17th, 2010 – By Father Tim McCauley
At six years old, Brother Jacques Berthiaume was miraculously cured by Brother Andre (or rather, God working through Brother Andre). Tomorrow/today (Oct 17th) in Rome, Brother Andre will be declared a saint, our first Canadian-born male saint! Brother Jacques’ parents took their son to see Brother Andre in 1932; the doctors had told them that their little Jacques would certainly die. Among other health problems, he had open, suppurating wounds on his back. Brother Andre told his parents to rub his wounds in dishwater, which his mother did for nine days of a novena. On the last day, the wounds sealed up.
But he still was not totally healed. So his mother persevered, filled with the Holy Spirit, who taught her to pray without losing heart, like the persistent widow in today’s Gospel. She continued to bring her son to Brother Andre and to pester him, saying, “your job isn’t finished. He still walks with crutches.” Four years later, Brother Andre was passing through the town where Jacques lived. He told little Jacques, “Go ask your mother if she would like me to bring your crutches to the Oratory.” He ran home to ask her. His mother looked at him and started to cry and said, “You haven’t noticed that you’re walking without crutches?” He hadn’t (The Catholic Register, October 3rd, 2010). Now that’s a miracle! Saint Andre of Montreal, pray for us!
The Holy Spirit inspires us to pray with persistence that pays off. That’s one lesson that Jesus wants to teach us in today’s Gospel. Another is our need to pray and work for justice. Jesus understands our human nature, how we sometimes get discouraged, lose heart, grow weary. We doubt God’s goodness, His power, His love for us.
Accordingly, Jesus Himself teaches us to pray with confidence and perseverance, by telling us this parable of the unjust judge and the persistent widow. She was also filled with the Holy Spirit, who gave her the strength to keep coming back and demanding justice in a seemingly impossible situation, where an unjust judge had all the power and she, a poor, disenfranchised widow, had nothing. But she had the power of the Holy Spirit and she won her case.
I have witnessed many heroic widows and single mothers in places like El Salvador and Honduras (Mark Lalonde will be speaking after Communion about our sponsorship program of the children in Honduras). Many of these women literally do not have enough money today to feed their children tomorrow. But they pray, persevere and survive, saying things like, “La vida es una lucha” – “Life is a struggle.” In developing countries, they know that. For some reason, in 21st century Canada, we think life should be easy. Why? Life is beautiful, but it is a struggle; yet, if we pray and fight, with the strength the Holy Spirit gives, we win!
In today’s Gospel, Jesus re-assures us that if even an unjust judge will grant justice to a widow because she keeps pestering him, how much more will God our loving Father answer the prayers of his children! Jacques Berthiaume’s mother had to pray for four years before her son was completely healed. God has a reason for seeming to delay in answering our prayers. He might be teaching us humility, trust, patience – many things. We must trust in Him and continue praying.
Our persistent prayer can include our personal needs and those of our family, but they must also include justice in our world. Jesus specifically says that this widow was demanding justice from a judge (Lk 18:3), which involved her in the legal system which affects all of society. Good or bad decisions of judges can and do affect all of society.
Twenty-first century Canadians live in a time of wildly arbitrary judicial activism, in which our judges overstep their God-given mandate to interpret and apply laws; instead, there are judges who strike down laws that have been voted on by democratically elected representatives of the people.
Abortion is only one example of many. Canada used to have a law that it was illegal to murder innocent children before they were born. But our judges deemed those laws to be an unjust limitation on the right to choose of the mother, so they struck down our abortion laws, opening the door to the horror of over 100 000 murders per year of innocent children.
We must pray and fight for justice, as surely as Israel had to both pray and fight to defeat Amalek, as we heard in the first reading (Ex 17:8-13). One practical thing you can do is join the 40 days for life campaign, a silent pro-life witness downtown. Our parish has signed up for 12 hours on Saturday, October 30th. I can’t go then, but I will be going another day. You can sign up in the foyer after Mass.
Every few months in our culture there seems to be a new case of judicial activism. Consider the recent example of a judge in Ontario striking down our province’s anti-prostitution laws. Justice Susan Himel struck down three of Ontario’s anti-prostitution laws that used to prohibit brothels, soliciting and pimping. She “reasoned” that such prohibitions “put the lives of sex workers at risk by forcing them to ply their trade in the shady underground world” (Ottawa Citizen, September 30th, 2010).
Does everyone follow the “reasoned” argument of Justice Himel? Since the lives of some prostitutes are at risk, we should help them not by strengthening the family, not by promoting the dignity of women, not by calling men to be good husbands and fathers rather than exploiters and abusers of women. No. That would be too difficult. Instead, let’s just totally capitulate to our lower nature, be ruled by instinct, enslaved to our lusts. That would be easier.
For me, one of the most telling “arguments” against this position was the tears of former prostitutes protesting this decision. Like the widow who came before the unjust judge, these heroic former prostitutes came before the Ontario Superior Court demanding justice. They know by personal experience that legalizing prostitution will only empower men to further harass, degrade, victimize and abuse women.
My brothers and sisters, how far we will allow the moral decay of society to proceed before we begin to stand up to fight and pray for justice, for the right to life of unborn children, for the dignity of women, of the elderly and the sick, and so on?
In the first reading we heard of the battle between Israel and Amalek. It reminds us that we are living in a time of spiritual warfare between the culture of life and the culture of death. But instead of fighting or praying, we prefer to watch TV.
Why? Because we lack the Holy Spirit, that inspired Jacques Berthiaume’s mother to pray for four years, that animated and energized the poor widow. We need the same Holy Spirit to inspire us, our parish, our culture, our world, and I ask your prayers especially for all those in the Life in the Spirit seminar, who will be baptized in the Holy Spirit this Wednesday.
I began with the “feel good” story of the healing of Jacques Berthiaume through Brother Andre, partly to honour St. Andre on this day, and partly as a story of the power of persistence in prayer. Jesus tells another “feel good” story in the Gospel. But these happy endings do not come instantly without effort, prayer, struggle. In what kind of society will we live in the future? Much of that depends on us, on our willingness to cooperate with the Holy Spirit, to pray and fight for justice, for a new culture of life, a new civilization of love.
Permalink
October 16, 2010
Posted in pastor
at 3:10 pm
This weekend in Rome, BROTHER ANDRE will be canonized by Pope Benedict – the first Canadian-born male saint. Brother Andre’s mortal remains are still venerated today at St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montreal – the largest shrine to St. Joseph in the world. Miracles still happen there today! If you have never been on pilgrimage to the Oratory, don’t delay. It’s only 2 hours east of here, a short day-trip. Bring your intentions to St. Joseph and Saint Andre of Montreal. And don’t forget to check out our little parish shrine to St. Joseph (and St. Andre) at the back of the Church.
Brother Andre is popularly known for his devotion to St. Joseph, to whom he attributed the thousands of miraculous cures that happened during Brother Andre’s lifetime. But his greatest devotion was to Jesus Christ, specifically, Jesus Christ in His Passion. Brother Andre’s love for the suffering Jesus overflowed in Andre’s love for the sick and suffering, to whom he personally ministered. Brother Andre reminds us that all great miracles begin with God’s love for us, and our response to His love, and the compassion we show to others. Saint Andre of Montreal, pray for us! In Christ, Fr. Tim
Permalink
October 10, 2010
Posted in Homilies
at 9:00 am
Twenty-eighth Sunday of Ordinary Time
October 10, 2010 – By Deacon Thomas Stephenson
It’s interesting that, this year, Thanksgiving weekend coincides with the 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time, as giving thanks and praise is certainly a predominant theme in today’s readings. We only hear these readings once every three years, and in 2007 this Sunday fell on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Although Thanksgiving currently seems to be promoted mostly as a secular celebration, the origins of this holiday are distinctly religious. The history of Thanksgiving in Canada goes back a long ways; the first one is attributed to the explorer Martin Frobisher in 1578, in Newfoundland, thanking God for the safe return of his expedition. This had been a dangerous journey in search of the Northwest Passage, and it really was only by the grace of God that they returned safely. The present date for Thanksgiving in Canada was established by a proclamation of Parliament in 1957, which reads in part: “A Day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed … (is) to be observed on the 2nd Monday in October.” Even as little as 53 years ago, this nation recognized God as the real source for all the blessings we enjoy.
Now, this morning, as Christians, as Catholics, we are not here to celebrate the holiday of Thanksgiving. Our Sunday worship always takes precedence over any civil observance. We are however, always called to give thanks to God for what He has done for us – which is to say, for everything we have, and everything we are. So for us, everyday should be one of thanksgiving.
When we say “Thank You” to God, certain things usually come to mind. Our material blessings, the food that we eat, the roof over our heads, even the luxuries many of us enjoy – it’s easy to thank the Lord for all of those things that support our lifestyle and make us comfortable. And we can readily count the blessings we have of other people in our lives, our families and our friends, those relationships that strengthen us and make us happy. As Father Tim says at the end of this weeks Pastor’s Corner message, the list of our blessings goes on and on. He also mentions some blessings that we tend to overlook, probably because they are less tangible than others; the gift of Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, the gift of the Church, and the gift of our faith.
Looking at Naaman in the first reading, and the one leper who came back to praise Jesus in the Gospel, we can understand their gratitude. People with leprosy in those times were literally outcasts – they couldn’t even come close to a healthy person, or live within the village. They had to call out to Jesus from a distance because they were not allowed to approach Him. For them, nothing could be a greater blessing than to be healed. But in the end, they did receive something even more powerful: Naaman received recognition of the one true God; the leper who returned received confirmation of his faith, directly from Jesus. Not only were they physically cured, their souls were healed as well. And they demonstrated their thanks by their praise of God.
There are a variety of ways in which we express our appreciation, our thanks to God for His gifts. We do that when we come to Mass, to worship Him and give Him praise. Perhaps we say grace before meals, or thank Him in other prayers. Yet, the greatest expression of our gratitude is through the way we live our lives, according to the faith God has given us. Both the Archbishop, in establishing the theme for the Pastoral Year (Called to Holiness – the Saints among Us), and Father Tim, in his homily last week, encourage us to strive to answer our own call to holiness. Among other reasons for being holy, there is this: Since God has blessed us so abundantly, should we not show our thanks for His gifts by leading a holy life? What better response could we have to the Lord’s generosity than to follow His teachings? But, some of us may actually be reluctant to seriously work toward increasing in holiness. We may think that we would prefer not to be too holy, or that it is too difficult. And it is work – it takes strength, perseverance, and courage.
Regarding holiness, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church states: “In order to reach this perfection, the faithful should use the strength dealt out to them by Christ’s gift, so that following in His footsteps and conformed to His image, doing the will of the Father in everything, they may wholeheartedly devote themselves to the glory of God and to the service of their neighbour. Thus the holiness of the people of God will grow in fruitful abundance, as is clearly shown in the history of the Church by the lives of so many saints.”
So, the Church recognizes that strength is important; we need to rely on Christ if we are to succeed. We can find examples of holiness in the lives of the saints to help us. We also need to be part of the Church, benefitting from and giving to others, being part of the communion of saints. Thomas Merton says: “We see that personal faith and fidelity are not enough to make us perfect Christians. We do not go by ourselves to Him, as isolated individuals. We go to Him as members of His mystical body, the Church. It can be said that our holiness is proportion(ate) to our capacity to serve as instruments of His love in establishing His kingdom.” So, leading a holy life does not mean you have to spend most of your time in contemplative prayer. Prayer is absolutely essential, but so is our service to those in our society who need our care and support, who need someone to be the presence of Christ in their lives. This includes not just the materially poor, but also the increasing numbers who are spiritually impoverished. Our acts of charity and service, in addition to being requirements of a holy life, are also manifestations of our gratitude to God.
He has given us His son to save us, the Church to teach us, and the faith to guide us. God does not demand that we thank Him, but He must be delighted when we do. As we go through the busyness of this weekend, with the gatherings of family and friends, and perhaps taking advantage of the opportunity to enjoy some outdoor activities in this beautiful weather the Lord has given us, let us consider all the blessings we enjoy, the great and the small, the material and the spiritual. And let us continue to give thanks and praise to the Lord through our growth in holiness.
Permalink
October 8, 2010
Posted in pastor
at 9:21 am
PASTOR’S CORNER
On this THANKSGIVING WEEKEND, we do well to call to mind gratitude for all God’s gifts. In each Eucharist, we say, “It is right to give Him thanks and praise.” Yes! We do well always and everywhere to give thanks to God. Sometimes in life, everything seems difficult; each day is a struggle. The last thing we feel like doing is thanking God. But at such times we need to rouse ourselves to thanksgiving! It liberates us from our self-centeredness, and any tendency toward self-pity. In every effort we make to thank and praise God (especially when we don’t feel like it), the Holy Spirit will assist us and we will experience an increase in God’s grace and His life in us.
I recently heard a talk to all the youth participating in NET this year (National Evangelization Teams). The speaker reminded everyone to cultivate an “attitude of gratitude” and even to write one’s own “litany of thanksgiving,” a personal list in which we write, “I am grateful for ______ .” It’s a simple practice that can deepen our gratitude this Thanksgiving.
As we enjoy the fruits of the harvest – our Thanksgiving food – let us thank our Creator who shows us such love in blessing our land with sun and rain to provide a good harvest (and bless our farmers too!). And we thank Him for sending us His Son Jesus Christ, for the Church, for our faith, for our family and friends – the list goes on and on! In Christ, Fr. Tim
Permalink
October 3, 2010
Posted in Homilies
at 9:16 am
27th Sunday, Year C, October 3rd, 2010 – By Father Tim McCauley
When St. Marguerite D’Youville was about 18 years old, she fell in love
with a young man from a distinguished family, whom she hoped to marry. But her widowed mother re-married below her social class, thereby making her daughter an inappropriate match for the other family’s son. Any young lady would be heartbroken by such hopes for happiness being dashed. But Marguerite was destined to be a saint, Canada’s first native-born saint! In her great faith – “the righteous person lives by their faith” (Habakkuk 2:4) – she must have known that this heart-break was part of God’s loving plan to train her heart in perfect love and detachment from all creatures. So it must have been easier for her than for us, since she was called to be a saint and all that.
You see in the bulletin insert the letter the bishop has written to us on this pastoral year’s theme: “Called to Holiness: The Saints Among Us.” I believe he is proposing a different saint for each month. This month, on October 17th, Brother Andre will be canonized in Rome. However, his feast day is on January 6th, whereas St. Marguerite D’Youville’s feast is in October, on the 16th. (So she’s the saint for October and you can see her portrait there at the back, along with some prayer cards)
As a young lady, she fell in love yet again, with the handsome, dashing, and wealthy Francois d’Youville, and was married at Notre Dame Church in Montreal in 1722 at the age of 20. But it was not a happy marriage. It turned out that her husband was an unscrupulous business man, involved in the illegal liquor trade with the native Canadians. One of her contemporaries testified that “her husband was unconcerned and indifferent, and had no more sensitivity for her than he would have for a complete stranger” (The Woman I Loved, p. 20). But since she was destined to be a saint, and she had such great faith, she must have known that this loveless marriage was part of God’s loving plan for her, so it must have been much easier for her than it would be for us, right?
I could go on and on with examples from her life-story, which is amazing and inspiring. Her first son Francois died after three months, her daughter Ursule after a year, her other daughter Louise, died after three months, and another son, Ignace, after 5 months; only two sons lived to adulthood, both of whom became priests. Her husband died while she was pregnant with their last child, leaving her to pay off his debts and raise her boys alone. Through all this, she continued to believe, to pray, to love, to forgive. But it must have been easier for her, destined as she was to be a saint, and all that!
You get the point? A life of faith was not any easier for her than for us. And all of us are all called to be saints! If it was possible for Marguerite D’Youville, it is possible for us. In the midst of all the anguish in her marriage, I can imagine Marguerite crying out to God in the words of the prophet Habbakkuk from the first reading: “O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not listen? . . . Why do you make me see wrongdoing and look at trouble?” (Habakkuk 1:2-3). After the prophet’s complaint to God, he wrote, “I will stand at my guard post . . . and keep watch to see what he will say to me” (Habakkuk 2:1); in other words, after praying, the prophet listened to God.
After the apostles prayed to Christ, “Increase out faith!” (Luke 17:5), they listened to Him. Faith comes from listening. As St. Paul wrote to the Romans,
“Faith comes from what is heard/from the act of hearing/listening (ek akoes) and what is heard comes through the word of Christ” (Rom 10:17). And we also heard in today’s Psalm refrain, “O that today you would listen to the voice of the Lord!”
On the first Sunday of each month, we are making a special effort to really listen to the Lord speak to us through His Word with introduction to the readings. (We are also making an effort to welcome new people in our midst, to invite friends and neighbours to Mass and to socialize afterwards at Coffee Sunday).
I would also like to emphasize to all readers that they please practice their readings at home and pray over their readings. There is all the difference in the world between reading the Word of God and proclaiming it. I am not speaking to anyone in particular, but to all you lectors, readers: you are instruments of the Holy Spirit, if you pray, then proclaim. Whether or not one of your brothers and sisters here at Mass actually hear the Word of God, the voice of God speaking personally to them, can depend on the quality of your prayer and proclamation! All the readers here, you understand?
Now to everyone here: do you want to grow in faith? God is offering it to you right now. You could change your life today, at this moment, by simply telling God right now in your heart, “Increase my faith”, “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening”and by making the resolution to spend 5, 10, 15 minutes each day to listen, and to read the Word of God, especially the Gospels.
Pope Benedict has been promoting the re-discovery of the Word of God, of praying with Scripture, through lectio divina or sacred reading. The Holy Father convened a synod or international meeting on the Word of God 2 years ago, in which our very own Cardinal Ouellette gave the opening address. In a statement that I personally found very helpful, the Cardinal asked, “what exactly is the Word of God?” It is, very simply God who speaks.
God loves us and He wants a personal relationship with us, to teach us to recognize His voice speaking in our hearts. One way we do this is by praying with Scripture. As I have said before, we learn to recognize that the same voice that speaks in the Bible also speaks in our hearts. What a joy to recognize that the Creator of the universe actually speaks in our hearts!
Take the second reading as an example. You could let these words of God just pass you by on a Sunday morning (or Saturday afternoon). Or you could pray with them and really listen. Some of you might find yourselves in times of crisis, anguish, or tragedy such as those faced by St. Marguerite D’Youville in her marriage, in losing her children, in her financial difficulties. She listened to the Word of God, prayed through her difficulties, and grew in faith. Imagine listening to God speak to you in the second reading, and you hear him say to you, “My son, my daughter, I did not give you ‘a spirit of cowardice, but of power and of love and of self-discipline’ (2 Timothy 1: 7). Do not be afraid! I am with you!
All of a sudden a tragedy in life, in which we might be tempted to weaken in faith, is transformed into an encounter with God, from which we emerge with renewed hope, courage, strength, and an increase in faith. The prayer to Christ, “increase our faith!” is not answered on the couch but in the crucible. Look at the kind of parable that Jesus recounts to the disciples immediately after their request for an increase in faith. What do the servants or slaves do? They are faithful to their duty. They work hard in the field; they come in at the end of the day hungry, dirty, tired, but are not immediately rewarded with food and rest; there is still more to be done.
And so it is with us. It is by being faithful that the Lord will, over time, increase our faith – through our faithfulness in all the finer points of love in marriage and family, in all our duties at work or school. And by bringing our sufferings and challenges to God in prayer, and listening to His Word – it is there, in the daily reality of our lives – that God will indeed increase our faith.
On a small side street in Old Montreal, you can visit the house where St. Marguerite D’Youville lived for over 20 years, and walk through the very room in which she received the poor, sat them down at table, and served them.
Marguerite did not plan on becoming a saint. But she had been inspired to found a religious order to serve the poor because she had received an overwhelming experience of God’s love for her, and she wanted to share this love with others.
And she received much of her training in holiness and love not by living in splendid and secure isolation in a monastery, but through the joys and sufferings of every day life in marriage and family. If we also learn to listen to God, to follow Him daily and persevere in love, we too will become the people God created us to be, find true joy and eternal life, and become saints!
Permalink
October 2, 2010
Posted in pastor
at 6:05 am
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
The month of OCTOBER is the month of the ROSARY (Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary October 7th), so I would like to share with you some quotes by John Paul II from his letter on the Rosary from 2002. He writes, “With the Rosary, the Christian people sits at the school of Mary and is led to contemplate the beauty on the face of Christ and to experience the depths of his love. Through the Rosary the faithful receive abundant grace, as though from the very hands of the Mother of the Redeemer” (#1)
He encourages families with children to pray the Rosary. “Training (children) from their earliest years to experience this daily “pause for prayer” with the family . . . is a spiritual aid which should not be underestimated.”(#42). Even if it is not practical to pray five decades, families could find time to pray even one decade together.
I pray the Rosary every day, though rarely sitting in one spot the whole time. Driving, biking, jogging, walking, even doing chores – all are acceptable times in which to pray the Rosary. But I must admit that a truly contemplative Rosary, prayed with others in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, is the most powerful. Any way we pray it, I encourage all of you to re-discover this beautiful prayer, based on Scripture, given to us by Jesus through Mary. O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee! In Christ, Fr. Tim
Permalink
Homilies