What Recompense can I give to the Lord?
Ordination to the Diaconate
Friday, March 12, 2010
Monday, March 8, 2010
Suffering and the Purifying Fire of God's Love
Homily for the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time Yr C
given at St. Patrick' Church in Wareham, MA
by Rev. Fr. Ronnie P. Floyd, STL
Whenever there is a natural or man made disaster there is always a chorus of people, often Christians, but also Muslims, and Jews, declaring as if inspired that the the evil is a result of the victim's sins.
In the Gospel today Jesus definitively rejects this sentiment, saying, do you think that it was because they were greater sinners that you that they suffered?
Suffering is a result of sin, but my suffering, or prosperity for that matter, is not a direct result of my sins or merits.
It teaches us that by forsaking my will, my desires, my dreams and plans, for the objectively better divine plan that promises eternal happiness and life, our sufferings will be like a fire that purifies precious gold. This is why Jesus went to the cross for us, not as a trade: one perfect good deed in exchange for all the bad we have done, but to show us both how much God loves us and wants to forgive us and how we, once forgiven, can truly become God’s sons and daughters.
Jesus shows us on the cross that true love is giving completely of yourself by accepting our life as a gift together with it the sufferings it entails and giving it all back to the Father in gratitude.
It’s like we are playing ball with Our Father who art in Heaven. Except the ball is our life, our very existence. God gives us the ball, and at first like a small child we are cautious, we don't want to throw it back to Him, but when we do, He takes that simple ball and enlivens it with the joy of His love, His continuing presence and interest in our life.
We suffer because we don’t want to give up the gift of our life. This gift is precious to us and we worry that by giving up all or even some of our life, we might lose it forever It hurts to sacrifice because we are afraid to trust God, afraid to lose that little piece of existence that we have. But as we read today in the scriptures God’s love is so gentle and good to us. The more we give, the more we suffer, the more we love the more our good God give us in return.
We believe that suffering is necessary for love and that what we lack in suffering in this life,
must be made up when we die, because just like exercise, suffering is a natural part of getting our supernatural muscles strong!
Many do not understand this Catholic doctrine of suffering and the doctrine of purgatory that logically stems from it, They don’t understand how a loving God, could ask His chosen people,
to undergo suffering and purification. But this is like asking a loving parent how they could take the risk of letting their tender baby to grow up! You do it, you take the risk, not in spite of your concern but because you love them!
I think the origin of the idea of the need for suffering and purgation comes from the very nature of our God, revealed in splendor in the Book of Exodus today. How does God reveal Himself to Moses? A burning bush! At first thought we all think, so what, Moses needs to get out more. But Moses tells us that this bush was unique because while it burned it was not scorched nor destroyed. The burning bush, along with the mysterious name of God, a name which to this day observant Jews will not utter, reveals one of the key mysteries of our Catholic faith.
Who should I tell the Israelites has sent me, Moses asks? Not about to go and tell them a burning bush made me do it.
God replies, I am the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob. But for Moses this is not enough, he didn’t want to know who God was in relationship to his people, Moses wanted to know who God is in Himself!
And so Moses presses the Lord, daring to ask God His Holy Name.
For God to reveal His name to us, was an unthinkable act of love for the Jewish people and yet He does, opening up the mystery of His very being to the heart and mind of man.
The passage in Exodus that we read today is so important because this is one of the very first announcements of the of eternal life which God had planned for us, foreshadowing the Christian faith.
In Exodus today, man, who until now had no access to the mystery of God and knew him only as a mysterious voice is introduced to the unknowable God and invited to contemplate His very being.
I am who am! Tell the people that “I am” sent you, God says to Moses.
This statement, which we don’t understand because in fact it is ultimately an unknowable mystery, shocked the ancient world and tells us that God is not like us.
Why do we exist? Because of …. For a reason… We are caused.
Why does God exist? Because He is pure existence itself.
What is so shocking about this Revelation is how close it comes to the definition of the true God reached by the Greek Philosophers, an yet how different.
Aristotle defined God as the first mover and subsistent being, but posits that unlike the pagan gods of Greece the true perfect God could never be interested in us, imperfect as we are.
The God of the burning bush reveals Himself as perfect being, but also as perfect love, completely interested in His creation and gentle with it! Thus St. Paul says (Heb 12:29); “Our god is a consuming fire.” God consumes the bush with the fire of His Spirit and yet does not harm His creature. The image of the burning bush makes me thing of a strong and roughed Father who is so uncharacteristically gently with his newborn child.
And so we return to the idea of suffering and purgatory.
Friends before the Revelation of the Living God all of us shared the destiny of all created things. As we heard at the beginning of Lent: Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,but by revealing His name to us God changed our destiny and gave us the promise that the ultimate futility of mortal life was not for us the end.
Only perfect being, goodness, truth and love last forever every partial love fails in the moment of trial; all lies eventually fall apart in the light of truth; a partially good thing is also partially evil; and something that exists because of another thing or being also contains within it the seeds of its own destruction, of non-being and annihilation. All creation is subject by nature to decay and corruption. Our existence is on loan and eventually that loan will come due. However, by telling us His name God gave us an eternal project and the promise that like the bush we too will be consumed by the fire of the spirit and yet left unburnt! God wants to purify all that leads to decay in us with fire! That is the task of Lent; really it’s the purpose of our whole life!
The good God allows us to suffer in this world and undergo the purifying flames of purgatory because He wants us to be perfect so that we can enjoy eternity consumed but unharmed by the flames of God’s love. Praying, fasting, and almsgiving are ways of speeding up that refining process because they are freely chosen ways of suffering because of our love for God
We don’t know what heaven will be like, St. John tells us, but we do know that we will be like God, for we will see Him as He is!
Use this time of Lent to strive for perfection by honestly evaluating your life, confessing your sins,and getting back on the road to holiness.
Jesus says in the Gospel: I came to bring fire down on the earth, and how I wish it were now kindled.
We must all be consumed by the fire of God’s love for us, suffering the pain of loosing our false self so that our true glory may shine. The question is will we embrace the fires of purgation in this life or suffer in them in the life to come?
Monday, March 1, 2010
Why do we Fast?
Why do we fast? Why do we mortify our flesh to prepare for the joy of Easter?
If your like me, you grew up in a family where fish Friday’s and Lenten fasting were the norm;
A norm that was never really explained just accepted as a fact of life. It is perfectly logical after all: Catholics fast—I’m a Catholic—I fast
But if this answer doesn't satisfy you then maybe the true answer to why we fast, and perform other penitential practices seems to be at the center of today’s psalm:
A clean heart create for me, O God,
and a steadfast spirit renew within me.
Cast me not out from your presence,
and your Holy Spirit take not from me.
We fast, give, alms, and pray, we endure patiently sufferings and even choose to take on extra sufferings because we realize that we have sinned. That there is something wrong with our heart, and so we pray to God create a clean heart in me. give me back the joy of salvation.
You see Jesus is not just warning about pride in the Gospel rather he is warning us about going through the motions without internalizing the deeper meaning contained in our actions
This is why he says:
when you pray, go to your inner room,
close the door, and pray to your Father in secret.
And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.
Not because He doesn’t want us to pray in public, but because He desires that our prayer take effect primarily in the secret inner room of our heart. because it is our heart that needs to be healed! We pray, fast, give alms, and in reality do all that we do as Catholics not to pay God back, buy Him off, or keep Him happy but so as to dispose ourselves to receiving all the healing Grace
He desires to give us. We train our bodies and wills, using the spiritual fitness plan designed by God and perfectly revealed in Jesus. All the things we do, Jesus did, to show us the Way for He is the Way. And when we do what he did, in the way he did it, out of love, slowly our wish comes true. Our father who sees in secret repays us in the secret of our heart by giving us a new heart, and with it an entirely new perspective on life.
So as we enter this time of penance, realize that what you are giving to God in your added prayer, fasting, and almsgiving is really permission for Him to heal you from the inside out
Behold, now is a very acceptable time; behold, now is the day of salvation!
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Let those who have ears hear and be transformed by the Word.
Homily by Fr. Ron Floyd
given at St. Francis Xavier Church in Hyannis
on Sexagesima Sunday, February 7th, 2010
Those who have ears, let them hear! But we all have ears, most all of us can hear, can't we?
In the Gospel today Jesus proclaims to His Apostles to them it is given in parables,
but to you it is given to know the mystery of the Kingdom.
Why is it so often that Jesus speaks to the people in parables and mysterious ways.
Why does Jesus often seem so extreme, and other times overly timid. At one point in the Gospel Jesus speak of the poor and the peacemakers. At another point He tells His disciples that He came to create division and call down fire upon the earth. Jesus tells us not to judge and to forgive our neighbor and yet He makes a whip and drives the money changers out of the temple. Is Jesus a hypocrite just like the Pharisees who He condemns for their hardened hearts? Or is there something else at work?
Many people read the Sacred Scriptures and take many different messages from it because the Scriptures are an imperfect means of communication. God speaks the message of truth heart to heart, whispering to the in most core of our being, and yet we are charged with the almost impossible task of putting God's perfect communication into fallible human language. If you ever learned a foreign language you know that until you master the language even if you understand the basics of what is being said you can't always capture the nuances. How much more difficult must it be to capture the nuances of God's word spoken directly to our heart.
Human language is an abstraction, a stepping away from the real thing to signify a reality with a symbol. But God's Word, which has the power to create all things from nothing is not an abstraction but reality. If God speaks to man of Happiness or Love, we experience not just cheap overused words but the very essence of happiness and love. Imagine you were given an ice cream cone--the ice cream is, like God's word, a reality but what if I asked you to communicate an ice cream cone to someone else, could you do it? This is the task that the Prophets are given, this is the task that all of us who hear God's voice are given, to communicate the reality of God's message with the symbols of human language.
This is why St. Paul says at the beginning of the letter to the Hebrews: God, who, in ancient times, spoke in times past to our fathers by the prophets and in varied ways. In these days, hath spoken to us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the world. Who being the brightness of his glory and the figure of his substance and upholding all things by the word of his power, making purgation of sins, sitteth on the right hand of the majesty on high.
Jesus is the REALITY of the WORD of GOD incarnate and Jesus' message is primarily Himself His REAL PRESENCE--Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity who dwells among us. Jesus speaks to the people in hidden and mysterious ways because He knows their hearts. He knows that people will always try to take the word of God and twist it to their own devices. So to the crowds Jesus speaks in strange parables or extreme injunctions because Jesus wants the strangeness and radicalness of His message to open up their ears to the REALITY OF HIS PERSON. Friends we can't take scripture in lifeless bite size pieces we must consume the whole Word the whole living Christ if that Word is going to change us into the Saints God wants us to be.
Let those who have ears hear and be transformed by the Word.
given at St. Francis Xavier Church in Hyannis
on Sexagesima Sunday, February 7th, 2010
Those who have ears, let them hear! But we all have ears, most all of us can hear, can't we?
In the Gospel today Jesus proclaims to His Apostles to them it is given in parables,
but to you it is given to know the mystery of the Kingdom.
Why is it so often that Jesus speaks to the people in parables and mysterious ways.
Why does Jesus often seem so extreme, and other times overly timid. At one point in the Gospel Jesus speak of the poor and the peacemakers. At another point He tells His disciples that He came to create division and call down fire upon the earth. Jesus tells us not to judge and to forgive our neighbor and yet He makes a whip and drives the money changers out of the temple. Is Jesus a hypocrite just like the Pharisees who He condemns for their hardened hearts? Or is there something else at work?
Many people read the Sacred Scriptures and take many different messages from it because the Scriptures are an imperfect means of communication. God speaks the message of truth heart to heart, whispering to the in most core of our being, and yet we are charged with the almost impossible task of putting God's perfect communication into fallible human language. If you ever learned a foreign language you know that until you master the language even if you understand the basics of what is being said you can't always capture the nuances. How much more difficult must it be to capture the nuances of God's word spoken directly to our heart.
Human language is an abstraction, a stepping away from the real thing to signify a reality with a symbol. But God's Word, which has the power to create all things from nothing is not an abstraction but reality. If God speaks to man of Happiness or Love, we experience not just cheap overused words but the very essence of happiness and love. Imagine you were given an ice cream cone--the ice cream is, like God's word, a reality but what if I asked you to communicate an ice cream cone to someone else, could you do it? This is the task that the Prophets are given, this is the task that all of us who hear God's voice are given, to communicate the reality of God's message with the symbols of human language.
This is why St. Paul says at the beginning of the letter to the Hebrews: God, who, in ancient times, spoke in times past to our fathers by the prophets and in varied ways. In these days, hath spoken to us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the world. Who being the brightness of his glory and the figure of his substance and upholding all things by the word of his power, making purgation of sins, sitteth on the right hand of the majesty on high.
Jesus is the REALITY of the WORD of GOD incarnate and Jesus' message is primarily Himself His REAL PRESENCE--Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity who dwells among us. Jesus speaks to the people in hidden and mysterious ways because He knows their hearts. He knows that people will always try to take the word of God and twist it to their own devices. So to the crowds Jesus speaks in strange parables or extreme injunctions because Jesus wants the strangeness and radicalness of His message to open up their ears to the REALITY OF HIS PERSON. Friends we can't take scripture in lifeless bite size pieces we must consume the whole Word the whole living Christ if that Word is going to change us into the Saints God wants us to be.
Let those who have ears hear and be transformed by the Word.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Confirmation & Hapiness
Homily Given at St. Margaret's Retreat Center
On the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
to the 9th Grade Confirmation students from St. Christine's in Marshfield
By: Rev. Ronnie P. Floyd, STL
Friends in Christ, There is a lie that we have been told since our youth a lie about what human life is about and about what will truly make us happy.
When you turn on the TV or look at the internet we are bombarded by images of excitement and glamor. Whether its Jack Bauer saving the world ever 24 hours and doing more in an hour than most people do in a life time or the fabulous cribs of famous celebrities or the made for TV drama of reality TV, if we are not careful, just because of the sheer volume of these images, we might get the idea that what we see in the media is normal and that our lives are boring in comparison.
So often in my parish I hear teens in my youth group complain about how boring Wareham is, maybe you feel the same, but the fact of the matter is that if you are bored with your life it's because you are looking for happiness in all the wrong places.
Before entering seminary I lived in Washington, DC and worked for the US government,
and having spent five years after that living in the Vatican while doing my studies, I have had the chance to do all sorts of neat things, and to meet and get to know many interesting people, who live the lives that TV teaches us to envy.
I've met Admirals and Generals, spies and millionaires, Princesses, Senators, Cardinals, and Popes, I've met fighter pilots and soldiers, gypsies, and monks,
comedians, actors, and even a deposed Emperor or two.
I've been airlifted from the US Capitol in Marine Helicopter, fired machine guns and grenade launchers, eaten dinner with Ambassadors, worked with the Secret Service and the Swiss Guard, and even met Dick Cheney when he wasn't in an undisclosed location.
God blessed me with so many opportunities in my life, but none of it brought me happiness. I think its because, whether it's the first time you drive a car or the first time you ride in a limo or a helicopter or the first time you meet a president, rock star, or Pope your first time is always the most exciting. The feeling of Euphoria, of a type of happiness, that comes from doing something you have only dreamed about for the first time, often can deceive you into thinking that the next time will be as good as the first, but it's not so! The excitement of a rare first,
quickly becomes common place the second and third and fourth time you do something.
I remember when I first met the Pope I could barely bring myself to speak to him, I was so excited, and while I never became a close confident with the Holy Father
living in Rome, attending so many Papal events, and seeing the Pope so often I lost that nervous joy that I had the first time I met John Paul or the first time I served Mass for Pope Benedict.
I wouldn't know from personal experience, but I am told that it's the same between married people. That first time, especially when you have saved yourself for your spouse--is awesome--a true gift that you can only give to one person, but soon the martial act becomes less exciting, more common place, and yet when done with love also more rewarding, or so I'm told.
The world lies to us when it tells us that sex, or wealth, fame or power will make us happy. They can't because they all become old, tired, boring, almost as soon as we experience them.
Our God reveals the truth about what makes us happy in the life of Jesus Christ--
Jesus teaches that the stuff of life, the things and situations we experience that some people think will make us happy are really only a pretext, a stage, on which we have the opportunity to love.
As the Catechism teaches: we are made to know God, so that we can love Him, and because we love Him, serve Him. This Love of God is discovered, and learnt, and practiced, and perfected in and through the created world, most especially by our love for our fellow man.
True happiness comes from true love, because true love is never boring but always new. AND I am not talking about smoochie smoochie love but the type of love that makes two people want to be friends for life. When you love a person, human or divine
you are always interested in them, always discovering new things about them, always seeking new ways to help and care for them, because of this every situation of life whether it's your wedding night or the day you watch your beloved dies of old age
becomes an adventure and an opportunity to mine the depths of the mystery of love.
Jesus shows us that we can be happy even hanging on the cross because even there we can love, this is why St. Paul points to the Jesus on the Cross when trying to explain what true love is to married Christians. Love makes the boring everyday life that we all live an opportunity to love deeper, harder, and more faithfully.
The events of life are of secondary importance to the people because while every experience no matter how exciting eventually becomes common place, becomes boring, it's the people we love and who love us that gives even a boring experience joy.
Most especially, Jesus tells us, it's our God's loving presence in all the moments of our life that gives life meaning.
In His Baptism in the Jordan, Jesus shows us that God is willing to go down even into the waters of sin, into the darkest parts of the human experience and even enter into the death and suffering that sin causes. And by doing so he shows us what it means to truly love and He frees us from Sin, giving us the possibility to love selflessly.
In Baptism, Jesus shares in the repercussions of sin so that we can share in His love, His sonship, and His Spirit, which is the spirit of Love.
When Jesus was baptized the Heavens opened and a voice from heaven proclaimed: This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. God says this also about each of us because of our Baptism. We are His beloved sons and daughters and it is this love that makes life worth living. Our job, our vocation, is to respond to this love
each in our own unique way. But, Love is not easy and so our loving Father gives us the Spirit of His Son the Holy Spirit to strengthen us so that the Love of God which comes to dwell in our hearts in Baptism can blossom in our lives.
My friends I tell you from personal experience that no experience or material thing can make you happy. Your happiness doesn't even depend directly on a person. Happiness comes from within, when we accept the gift of God's life in us when we accept the gift of Love and live in the Spirit of God who is Love.
I hope you believe me now, but even if you don't, remember what I am telling you, because eventually we all realize that without true Love the world is boring. Sooner or later we all realize that nothing in the world can bring us true happiness, and it's in that moment that we are faced with a choice take the risk of loving God or despair.
The world is good, and there is nothing that exists that is totally evil, but only by living in total goodness, in the presence of our God who is Love, can we see and appreciate the goodness of the world.
Through the Sacraments given to the Church by Christ God is constantly entering into our lives, cleansing us from our sins and giving us the power to love. This is the power that He wants to give you in confirmation the power to be a heroic lover--the power to bear witness to love--the power to be a Saint.
God loves you--no matter what you do--no matter how you look--no matter what you own, or who you are, or what you can do for Him. God really does love you, just the way you are.
The world lies to us trying to convince us that we need something or someone else to be Happy. God wants you to know today, that happiness is simply accepting His Love and responding to it by choosing to live in the Spirit--by choosing to Love.
AS we go to God's altar today we pray that all those who are preparing to receive the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Love don't listen to the lies the world tells us about happiness but find true happiness by living their life in the spirit, the spirit of Love.
On the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
to the 9th Grade Confirmation students from St. Christine's in Marshfield
By: Rev. Ronnie P. Floyd, STL
Friends in Christ, There is a lie that we have been told since our youth a lie about what human life is about and about what will truly make us happy.
When you turn on the TV or look at the internet we are bombarded by images of excitement and glamor. Whether its Jack Bauer saving the world ever 24 hours and doing more in an hour than most people do in a life time or the fabulous cribs of famous celebrities or the made for TV drama of reality TV, if we are not careful, just because of the sheer volume of these images, we might get the idea that what we see in the media is normal and that our lives are boring in comparison.
So often in my parish I hear teens in my youth group complain about how boring Wareham is, maybe you feel the same, but the fact of the matter is that if you are bored with your life it's because you are looking for happiness in all the wrong places.
Before entering seminary I lived in Washington, DC and worked for the US government,
and having spent five years after that living in the Vatican while doing my studies, I have had the chance to do all sorts of neat things, and to meet and get to know many interesting people, who live the lives that TV teaches us to envy.
I've met Admirals and Generals, spies and millionaires, Princesses, Senators, Cardinals, and Popes, I've met fighter pilots and soldiers, gypsies, and monks,
comedians, actors, and even a deposed Emperor or two.
I've been airlifted from the US Capitol in Marine Helicopter, fired machine guns and grenade launchers, eaten dinner with Ambassadors, worked with the Secret Service and the Swiss Guard, and even met Dick Cheney when he wasn't in an undisclosed location.
God blessed me with so many opportunities in my life, but none of it brought me happiness. I think its because, whether it's the first time you drive a car or the first time you ride in a limo or a helicopter or the first time you meet a president, rock star, or Pope your first time is always the most exciting. The feeling of Euphoria, of a type of happiness, that comes from doing something you have only dreamed about for the first time, often can deceive you into thinking that the next time will be as good as the first, but it's not so! The excitement of a rare first,
quickly becomes common place the second and third and fourth time you do something.
I remember when I first met the Pope I could barely bring myself to speak to him, I was so excited, and while I never became a close confident with the Holy Father
living in Rome, attending so many Papal events, and seeing the Pope so often I lost that nervous joy that I had the first time I met John Paul or the first time I served Mass for Pope Benedict.
I wouldn't know from personal experience, but I am told that it's the same between married people. That first time, especially when you have saved yourself for your spouse--is awesome--a true gift that you can only give to one person, but soon the martial act becomes less exciting, more common place, and yet when done with love also more rewarding, or so I'm told.
The world lies to us when it tells us that sex, or wealth, fame or power will make us happy. They can't because they all become old, tired, boring, almost as soon as we experience them.
Our God reveals the truth about what makes us happy in the life of Jesus Christ--
Jesus teaches that the stuff of life, the things and situations we experience that some people think will make us happy are really only a pretext, a stage, on which we have the opportunity to love.
As the Catechism teaches: we are made to know God, so that we can love Him, and because we love Him, serve Him. This Love of God is discovered, and learnt, and practiced, and perfected in and through the created world, most especially by our love for our fellow man.
True happiness comes from true love, because true love is never boring but always new. AND I am not talking about smoochie smoochie love but the type of love that makes two people want to be friends for life. When you love a person, human or divine
you are always interested in them, always discovering new things about them, always seeking new ways to help and care for them, because of this every situation of life whether it's your wedding night or the day you watch your beloved dies of old age
becomes an adventure and an opportunity to mine the depths of the mystery of love.
Jesus shows us that we can be happy even hanging on the cross because even there we can love, this is why St. Paul points to the Jesus on the Cross when trying to explain what true love is to married Christians. Love makes the boring everyday life that we all live an opportunity to love deeper, harder, and more faithfully.
The events of life are of secondary importance to the people because while every experience no matter how exciting eventually becomes common place, becomes boring, it's the people we love and who love us that gives even a boring experience joy.
Most especially, Jesus tells us, it's our God's loving presence in all the moments of our life that gives life meaning.
In His Baptism in the Jordan, Jesus shows us that God is willing to go down even into the waters of sin, into the darkest parts of the human experience and even enter into the death and suffering that sin causes. And by doing so he shows us what it means to truly love and He frees us from Sin, giving us the possibility to love selflessly.
In Baptism, Jesus shares in the repercussions of sin so that we can share in His love, His sonship, and His Spirit, which is the spirit of Love.
When Jesus was baptized the Heavens opened and a voice from heaven proclaimed: This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. God says this also about each of us because of our Baptism. We are His beloved sons and daughters and it is this love that makes life worth living. Our job, our vocation, is to respond to this love
each in our own unique way. But, Love is not easy and so our loving Father gives us the Spirit of His Son the Holy Spirit to strengthen us so that the Love of God which comes to dwell in our hearts in Baptism can blossom in our lives.
My friends I tell you from personal experience that no experience or material thing can make you happy. Your happiness doesn't even depend directly on a person. Happiness comes from within, when we accept the gift of God's life in us when we accept the gift of Love and live in the Spirit of God who is Love.
I hope you believe me now, but even if you don't, remember what I am telling you, because eventually we all realize that without true Love the world is boring. Sooner or later we all realize that nothing in the world can bring us true happiness, and it's in that moment that we are faced with a choice take the risk of loving God or despair.
The world is good, and there is nothing that exists that is totally evil, but only by living in total goodness, in the presence of our God who is Love, can we see and appreciate the goodness of the world.
Through the Sacraments given to the Church by Christ God is constantly entering into our lives, cleansing us from our sins and giving us the power to love. This is the power that He wants to give you in confirmation the power to be a heroic lover--the power to bear witness to love--the power to be a Saint.
God loves you--no matter what you do--no matter how you look--no matter what you own, or who you are, or what you can do for Him. God really does love you, just the way you are.
The world lies to us trying to convince us that we need something or someone else to be Happy. God wants you to know today, that happiness is simply accepting His Love and responding to it by choosing to live in the Spirit--by choosing to Love.
AS we go to God's altar today we pray that all those who are preparing to receive the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Love don't listen to the lies the world tells us about happiness but find true happiness by living their life in the spirit, the spirit of Love.
The Baptismal Priesthood and the the Vocation Shortage
Homily Given at St. Patrick's in Wareham
On the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
The 1st Sunday in Ordinary Time
By: Fr. Ron Floyd
My friends there is a vocation crisis going on in the Church today I am sure you all know about it. We need more priests in the Church to spread the gospel, and lead the people, and sanctify the world.
Ask a dozen faithful Catholics what the solution to the problem is and you will get a dozen answers ranging from prayer, to advertisements, to ordaining married men.
But the true answer to the problem is that we all have to realize that the shortage of ordained priests stems from a shortage of baptismal priests, Or at least, from a shortage of Christians living up to the vocation that we all receive from Christ in Baptism.
I remember a funny little story I once heard:
After the Baptism of his baby brother in church,
little Johnny sobbed all the way home in the back seat of the car.
His father asked him three times what was wrong.
Finally, the boy replied, "That priest said
he wanted us brought up in a Christian home,
but I want to stay with you guys."
In the Gospel today Jesus went down into the waters of Baptism to share in totally in the human condition. In my version of the Gospel it says nothing about Jesus getting into the clergy baptism line. Rather he went down into the waters with all of us with the multitudes of men women and children there to take on our guilt and the repercussions of our sins but also to give us a share in His life and destiny.
In the waters of Baptism Jesus ordain to share in our sufferings so that we could share in His mission on Earth and His glory in Heaven.
As baptized Christians we are called a prophetic, royal and priestly people because to us is given the commission and command to spread the good news, by governing our lives, our families, and our world according to God's Law and by sanctifying the world by the sacrifices this requires.
Friends we are all priests in Jesus Christ, all of us called to offer sacrifice, to live sacrificially, which simply means to live lives of selfless LOVE. As an ordained priest my vocation is to help you by preaching God's word and offering up the Sacrifice of the Altar which is the same sacrifice of Calvary the Cross of Jesus Christ by which Jesus washes us of our sins and leaves us a model for how to love, and how to live in love.
But your vocation is just as awesome, and just as necessary!
All baptized Christians--having received the gift of faith, and heard the word of God, having been washed clean of our sins in the waters of Baptism and through the Blood and Water that pour forth from the heart of Jesus as He hung on the cross, and having seen the example and model of perfect charity in Jesus' sacrifice for us on the Cross--
All baptized Christians are invited to go and do the same.
The Crisis in the priesthood began, and will end, if and only if Christians begin to live their baptismal priesthood. The day that Catholic Christians begin to see the difficulties of life whether marriage, or family, or children, or work, or illness, or poverty not as something to be loathed and avoided but as an opportunity to Love God and offer our lives as a sacrifice to Him, is the day that our children will again begin to consider in large numbers, the possibility of sacrificing the human happiness of a family, for the spiritual happiness of religious life or the priesthood.
As a culture we have become selfish, that's not to say we make no sacrifices for each other, but how often when we do make a sacrifice for our children or a neighbor
do we do it half-heartily, how often do we complain about it, how often do we fail to risk everything and give all we are and have not just to a stranger, but to our wives and children and families?
One used to hear people talk about offering up their sacrifices to the Lord, today it seems we simply try to run from difficulty and pain! Thats not to say that God wants our suffering, but that He wants and we need to loving hearts in the face of suffering. He wants us to be thankful for our life even when we don't understand why we are suffering!
Jesus our High priest shows us that priesthood is about self-giving which, of course, is simply another name for thanksgiving, love and sacrifice.
And true priest ends at the cross with the total gift of what we hold most dear
As Jesus' priesthood shows us, eventually any authentic priesthood demands that ultimate sacrifice--the total gift of self.
That's what we signed up for at baptism, that's the deal that will get us into heaven
and if it sounds scary it should, because we can't do it alone! With the help of the Holy Spirit, however, we are all capable of this sort of heroic love.
We are all called by our baptism to save souls, by living our life as a heroic self sacrifice. God doesn't ask anything extra-ordinary of most of us He simply asks that we do whatever we normally do extra-ordinarily.
Today as we contemplate the baptism of the Lord I will leave you with a last little story:
A priest and a bus driver both died and went to Heaven .
They get to the pearly gates where Pope St. Peter greets them.
Motioning to the priest, he points to 50 acres in heaven of rolling hills
with a little cottage on the knoll.
St. Peter turns to the priest and says "This will be yours for eternity.
A perfect little cottage, right next to lovely pond, a lush little garden,
and a library full of books."
The priest says, "Thank you so much. This I shall enjoy!"
Next, St. Peter motions to the bus driver.
Pointing to a castles on a mountain in the distance he says,
there are about 500 acres of land,
with mountains and lakes and rivers for you here.
St. Peter says "This will be yours for eternity.
You can live in that castle with servants to wait on you hand and foot,
and you can have everything you want."
The bus driver looks and St. Peter and says
"Well, now, don't think I'm not grateful,
but why am I getting so much more than the priest?"
St. Peter just laughs and says "You brought more souls to Heaven!
When the priest preached, everyone fell asleep.
When you drove your bus, people prayed!"
As the body of Christ we are all responsible for helping each other
get to heaven, will you take this responsibility seriously this year?
On the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
The 1st Sunday in Ordinary Time
By: Fr. Ron Floyd
My friends there is a vocation crisis going on in the Church today I am sure you all know about it. We need more priests in the Church to spread the gospel, and lead the people, and sanctify the world.
Ask a dozen faithful Catholics what the solution to the problem is and you will get a dozen answers ranging from prayer, to advertisements, to ordaining married men.
But the true answer to the problem is that we all have to realize that the shortage of ordained priests stems from a shortage of baptismal priests, Or at least, from a shortage of Christians living up to the vocation that we all receive from Christ in Baptism.
I remember a funny little story I once heard:
After the Baptism of his baby brother in church,
little Johnny sobbed all the way home in the back seat of the car.
His father asked him three times what was wrong.
Finally, the boy replied, "That priest said
he wanted us brought up in a Christian home,
but I want to stay with you guys."
In the Gospel today Jesus went down into the waters of Baptism to share in totally in the human condition. In my version of the Gospel it says nothing about Jesus getting into the clergy baptism line. Rather he went down into the waters with all of us with the multitudes of men women and children there to take on our guilt and the repercussions of our sins but also to give us a share in His life and destiny.
In the waters of Baptism Jesus ordain to share in our sufferings so that we could share in His mission on Earth and His glory in Heaven.
As baptized Christians we are called a prophetic, royal and priestly people because to us is given the commission and command to spread the good news, by governing our lives, our families, and our world according to God's Law and by sanctifying the world by the sacrifices this requires.
Friends we are all priests in Jesus Christ, all of us called to offer sacrifice, to live sacrificially, which simply means to live lives of selfless LOVE. As an ordained priest my vocation is to help you by preaching God's word and offering up the Sacrifice of the Altar which is the same sacrifice of Calvary the Cross of Jesus Christ by which Jesus washes us of our sins and leaves us a model for how to love, and how to live in love.
But your vocation is just as awesome, and just as necessary!
All baptized Christians--having received the gift of faith, and heard the word of God, having been washed clean of our sins in the waters of Baptism and through the Blood and Water that pour forth from the heart of Jesus as He hung on the cross, and having seen the example and model of perfect charity in Jesus' sacrifice for us on the Cross--
All baptized Christians are invited to go and do the same.
The Crisis in the priesthood began, and will end, if and only if Christians begin to live their baptismal priesthood. The day that Catholic Christians begin to see the difficulties of life whether marriage, or family, or children, or work, or illness, or poverty not as something to be loathed and avoided but as an opportunity to Love God and offer our lives as a sacrifice to Him, is the day that our children will again begin to consider in large numbers, the possibility of sacrificing the human happiness of a family, for the spiritual happiness of religious life or the priesthood.
As a culture we have become selfish, that's not to say we make no sacrifices for each other, but how often when we do make a sacrifice for our children or a neighbor
do we do it half-heartily, how often do we complain about it, how often do we fail to risk everything and give all we are and have not just to a stranger, but to our wives and children and families?
One used to hear people talk about offering up their sacrifices to the Lord, today it seems we simply try to run from difficulty and pain! Thats not to say that God wants our suffering, but that He wants and we need to loving hearts in the face of suffering. He wants us to be thankful for our life even when we don't understand why we are suffering!
Jesus our High priest shows us that priesthood is about self-giving which, of course, is simply another name for thanksgiving, love and sacrifice.
And true priest ends at the cross with the total gift of what we hold most dear
As Jesus' priesthood shows us, eventually any authentic priesthood demands that ultimate sacrifice--the total gift of self.
That's what we signed up for at baptism, that's the deal that will get us into heaven
and if it sounds scary it should, because we can't do it alone! With the help of the Holy Spirit, however, we are all capable of this sort of heroic love.
We are all called by our baptism to save souls, by living our life as a heroic self sacrifice. God doesn't ask anything extra-ordinary of most of us He simply asks that we do whatever we normally do extra-ordinarily.
Today as we contemplate the baptism of the Lord I will leave you with a last little story:
A priest and a bus driver both died and went to Heaven .
They get to the pearly gates where Pope St. Peter greets them.
Motioning to the priest, he points to 50 acres in heaven of rolling hills
with a little cottage on the knoll.
St. Peter turns to the priest and says "This will be yours for eternity.
A perfect little cottage, right next to lovely pond, a lush little garden,
and a library full of books."
The priest says, "Thank you so much. This I shall enjoy!"
Next, St. Peter motions to the bus driver.
Pointing to a castles on a mountain in the distance he says,
there are about 500 acres of land,
with mountains and lakes and rivers for you here.
St. Peter says "This will be yours for eternity.
You can live in that castle with servants to wait on you hand and foot,
and you can have everything you want."
The bus driver looks and St. Peter and says
"Well, now, don't think I'm not grateful,
but why am I getting so much more than the priest?"
St. Peter just laughs and says "You brought more souls to Heaven!
When the priest preached, everyone fell asleep.
When you drove your bus, people prayed!"
As the body of Christ we are all responsible for helping each other
get to heaven, will you take this responsibility seriously this year?
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