Pentecost Sunday
On this the Feast of Pentecost, if there is a fact that today’s readings are suggesting, it is this: that Christianity is dependent upon the presence of the Holy Spirit. In today’s second reading from the letter to the Corinthians Paul says, “No one can say, “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit.” (1 Cor 12:3b). In today’s gospel passage, Jesus breathes the Holy Spirit on the apostles and gives them the authority both to forgive or retain sins. (Jn 20:20). In other words, forgiveness of sin is impossible without the power of the Holy Spirit. There are other instances of absolute reliance on the Holy Spirit for Christian living. In Romans 8:26 Paul would say, “…for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit itself intercedes with inexpressible groanings.” Paul is suggesting that the very desire to pray is itself a work of the Holy Spirit. It is possible, then, that the our desire to be in church for worship today is the work of the Holy Spirit. In the New Testament the very first stirrings of what would finally become Christianity, originated with the power of the Spirit in the womb of a virgin. We can compile a long list of other instances in the Bible where the role of the Holy Spirit is crucial to a life of faith.
Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord
(Fr. Satish is on visiting home in India. This homily was preached three years ago on the Feast of the Ascension)On some tired nights I go to Caribou Cafe and sip a latte. Of late, I have noticed that the glass windows at caribou Cafe have writings on them. The company has discovered a neat way to advertise – it has put rather noble sayings along with statements that promote their products on these glass windows. Last week, I picked up this paper napkin. It says, ‘Life is too short: for grudges, fake anything, putting profits before people, over-roasted coffee, waiting for a change to happen, crabby people and wifi you have to pay for!’ On the walls there are other suggestions – ‘Adopt an animal; donate blood’. This is a very clever advertising strategy. If a company puts moral statements along with its advertising, people are inclined to have a positive image of the company. But I think that something even deeper is happening on these glass windows and napkins. Either intentionally or unintentionally, the company is also proposing a particular world-view. It is a world without grudges, dishonesty, and unethical business; it is a world where people are good to animals and stay away from bad people. There is only one problem with this world view as I see it – you don’t need God in this world view. Spirituality, in this world-view, has nothing to do with the divine. Rather, God who created the world, has no place in the Caribou world. In fact, there is whole generation of people out there – people disenchanted with the church, those that dislike religious restrictions, young people disillusioned with the establishment – who find this world-view very attractive and liberating.
Sixth Sunday of Easter
Just before Easter we saw the election of a new Pope. I watched it with much interest and nervousness. The election was not simply about who would be the next Pope. It was also about how the cardinals think as the successors of the apostles. It was also about the future direction the church would take. And then, lo and behold, for the first time in the history of the Papacy came a pope from Latin America. He took the name Francis and his first messages seem to indicate a commitment for the poor and a desire for internal reform of the church. Benedict XVI, we know from his writings, was clearly enamored with the person of Christ. He expressed it in a stunningly intellectual manner. Francis’ emphasis is clearly more pastoral. Pope Francis created a flutter when on Holy Thursday he celebrated mass in a juvenile facility and washed the feet of the inmates two of whom were woman and non-Catholic. The entire Catholic and secular world was stunned. What should the world make of his very public action? I begin the homily by talking about the papal elections because today’s readings talk about the early church, apostolic succession and the advocate, the Holy Spirit who helps the church.
Fifth Sunday of Easter
In my homily last week I offered a reflection on the death and devastation at the Boston Marathon. In one of the points in my homily I said, “… that we respond to this gruesome event in the way Christ teaches us to. It means that I do not allow my anger to turn into hate. It means that my desire for justice does not turn into revenge. It means that we do not find relief in triumphalism but rather administer justice with humility. It means that I do not become prejudiced, bigoted and xenophobic. It means that I still believe in love.” However, in the past week the media also exposed us to those who were injured in the terrorist attacks. The stories of those who lost their limbs in amputations are truly gut-wrenching. Among them is 32 year old dancer Adrianne Haslet. Her left foot and part of the leg had to be amputated. She is not letting this hold her back. She is soon to make an appearance on Dancing With The Stars. I tried to imagine what it would mean for me to lose a limb. And then I began to feel the struggle inside me. Yes, I still believe in what I preached last week, but I am also struggling to remain positive, to still believe in love, to refrain from resentment and destructive emotions.
Fourth Sunday of Easter
The events related to the gruesome bomb blasts at the Boston Marathon have just wound up. But the horror, the painful memories and the grief of those that were killed and injured will remain etched in the minds of the people of this nation for a very long time. No motive can justify the killing and harming of innocent people. To know that one of the three people killed in the bomb blasts was eight year old Martin Richard, and then to see him with a poster that said ‘No more hurting people. Peace,” is truly heart wrenching. Little Martin had come to see his mother finish the marathon. There is no appropriate way to describe the tragedy of this event. Over the past few months our nation has seen more blood, more sadness and more tears than we ever want to see.
Third Sunday of Easter
Here is to all you Justin Bieber fans. The last I checked, he has more than 51 million likes on his facebook page and close to a million friends as well. How it is possible to have some many ‘likes’ and ‘friends’ on Facebook? Well we now know that there are companies, who for about five dollars, can find you hundreds of Facebook friends. And Justin Bieber has done just that. I cannot wrap my mind around why someone so talented and popular would do that… but I guess these days you are not known by the kind of friends you have but how many friends you have. And thanks to social media we can have as many friends as we want.
Second Sunday of Easter
Think about this for a moment. Just before Jesus finally breathed his last what if his nails came loose, his wounds were healed and a triumphant Jesus stood in the midst of all his oppressors and crucifiers? God could still claim that Christ endured suffering for us up until the very end and Christ’s suffering could have still atonement for sin. Or, what if Christ, after his resurrection, first appeared to Pilate, then to Herod, then to the chief priests and the elders and then to all the Roman soldiers? I think that world history would have been written very differently if that were the case. Why did Jesus only appear to his disciples and few friends after his resurrection?
The Resurrection of the Lord
For those of us who continue to be intrigued about how the universe came about, there was fabulous news last week. Physicists employing the $900 million Planck space telescope mapped background radiation from the early universe. They were able to study sound echoes and fossilized light going back billions of years. Physicists now say that the universe is 13.8 billion years old – 80 million years older than we had originally thought it to be. The new discovery also bolstered the belief that the universe was smaller than an atom in the beginning when, in a split second, it exploded (Big Bang Theory), cooled and expanded faster than the speed of light. Here, however is the most intriguing thing. 68.3% of the universe is dark energy – dark, not meaning bad but that we do not understand what it is. It is a mysterious energy that is spread smoothly throughout the universe. Physicists have not identified what this energy is. Imagine the possibilities! The material world is only 5% of the universe. The universe almost offers us unlimited possibilities.
Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord
We Catholics are a little crazy. After all, we eat and drink the body and blood a guy who died two thousand years back but believe that he is alive. We are so crazy that we think that when we read his words that he is actually talking to us. We even think that when we gather in his name he is in our midst even though we do not see him. It is a little spooky but without him being with us there would no reason to get together. And then we break bread and drink wine in his memory but then, it is not just ordinary remembering; rather, we believe that we are actually reliving his death and resurrection. If this has not freaked you out yet, we also believe that those who are yet to come into the world, those who are here and those who have gone before us are all connected in an ‘eternal NOW.” I told you we Catholics are a little crazy!
Fifth Sunday of Lent
Just this last week, I celebrated the last sacraments with six different families and presided at three funerals. So when at the Theology on Tap session last Thursday the young adults asked me to share the best part of my life as a priest, it did not take me too long to answer. The most meaningful aspect of my ministry is also the hardest – praying with those nearing death and their families. Funerals take their toll on me but funerals are also the most hope-filled experience. In spite of the grief, the lifelessness, and the absence that death causes, thanks be to our faith in Jesus Christ, there is a meaning and blessedness in death that cannot be compared to any other experience.
Fourth Sunday of Lent
(I have chosen to depart from my regular style of homilies to adopt a more Ignatian imaginative reflection method. I have tried to put myself in place of the blind man to experience what it must have meant for him to be set free. Please be sure the read the gospel reading before you continue to read.)
I remember this as clearly as the day I first saw light – my parents had taken me to a wise man in my village. I was so nervous. Even my parents were afraid. His voice was gruff. He did not even ask my name. He seemed distant. I could feel the coldness of his hands… and his heart. He touched my eyes and mumbled. His touch felt like dry wood. “It a punishment for sin,” he said. “But we are good people,” my parents protested. “We follow the law and the prophets.” “Go your way, now!” he said, dismissing us. “God does not do this to righteous people. If you did not sin then your ancestors probably did. Don’t waste your time over this blind boy. Sit him down in the market place to beg. May be someone will have mercy on him. And remember to make him look more miserable than he is. He will have a better chance.”
Third Sunday of Lent
The story of the Samaritan woman is so dramatic and powerful that we could draw multiple themes from it. Add to it the very powerful story of the water from the rock in the first reading, these readings give us the possibility of an entire day’s retreat. I have chosen to focus on the second half of the story of the Samaritan woman as the theme of today’s homily. The common word that unites my homily is the word ‘story.”
Second Sunday of Lent
There are two spectacular events in today’s scripture readings – the miraculous fiery consummation of Abrahams sacrifice and the transfiguration of Jesus. I reflected upon these passages both from God’s perspective and from the perspective of the characters in the story. And I found great contrasts in these perspectives. For the God who created the entire universe what does it take to get a flaming torch pass through Abraham’s sacrifice? I think it was child’s play for God. For that matter, what does it take God to have Abraham and Sarah have a baby in their old age? For the God who created the universe it really was not a big deal. On the contrary, for Abraham and Sarah this was a BIG DEAL. Similarly, in the transfiguration event, what does it take God to create that divine experience for the disciples? Not much! God merely revealed who God really is! But for Peter, James and John this was a BIG DEAL. They wanted to stay there forever.
Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Last December we had a very special parish council meeting. We invited three people who left the Catholic Church and three people who joined the Catholic Church to share their experience. We wanted to know why people make the decisions they make about belonging to a particular faith tradition. I soon realized that discussion like these are complex as well. I received two letters apart from the people who were present at the meeting; one from a young lesbian who feels unwelcomed in a Catholic environment and the other from a young mother who recently became Catholic but then could not reconcile her conscience with the church’s teaching on contraception. Those who were present at the meeting also shared their stories. Later when the parish council reflected on all their stories there were common strands we could identify. For one, we realized that those who had left the Catholic Church and those who joined her, were all very sincere people. Their choice was made out of a genuine conviction. But then, there is one trend that I found directly related to the three scripture readings today – a powerful experience of God. The Catholics who left the church did so because the Church could not give them what they were searching for – a God who was close and real. They found the church too rigid and ritualistic. On the other hand, each one of those people who joined the church did so because it was in the Church, particularly in the Eucharist, that they experienced God in a tangible way.
Third Sunday in Ordinary Time
Last Monday was the presidential inauguration. In these divided times, there were those who were thrilled and others who were completely disillusioned. Over the years, the elected leader lays out his vision for the nation at the inauguration. I read the significance of the inauguration from a different perspective. Here was a white chief justice John Roberts administering the oath of office to an African-American president and a Latino woman chief justice Sonia Sotomayor administering the oath of office to a white vice-president. All this on Martin Luther King Day. America has come a long way since the “I have a dream,” speech of Aug 28, 1963. Ironically, the day after the inauguration was observed by the Church as the Day of Prayer for the Legal Protection of Unborn Children. It just goes to show that the dream has not yet reached everybody. This week the church has prayed that it will. Also, as the Catholic Bishop’s website says, January is also “poverty awareness month.” Yes, the American dream is still only a dream for many people.
Second Sunday in Ordinary Time
Today’s gospel reading is from the gospel of John. It is important for us to know that John does not have an infancy narrative or the genealogy of Jesus. Instead, John begins his story with the real origin of Jesus – “In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, the Word was God.” John’s Christmas is described in the simple words, “The Word became flesh and dwelt amongst us.” Since John does not have an infancy narrative, he does not have the traditional story of the epiphany with the three magi. Today’s gospel reading of the miracle of turning water into wine is John’s epiphany story. That is why this gospel account ends with the words, “Jesus did this as the beginning of his signs at Cana in Galilee and so revealed his glory, and his disciples began to believe in him.”
Feast of the Baptism of the Lord
How about I begin my homily with some Trivia Questions?
Jesus did not baptize anyone – True or False?
Jesus’ disciples did not baptize before Jesus resurrection – True or False?
Jesus was baptized because before his ministry he needed his sins forgiven – True or False?
Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord
Those who were here for the Christmas Eve mass saw a spectacle unfold during the preparation of gifts. A middle-aged man we have never seen before came to the ushers and insisted that he be allowed to come up the altar and give a gift to Jesus. I am very grateful that our ushers were very accommodative and then one of them accompanied him to the altar. Honestly, with the shootings in in Connecticut so fresh in the mind, I was a little scared. He came up with an object wrapped in a piece of angry-birds wrapping paper. Again, he insisted that I open the gift right then and there. I did. It was his brother’s picture. Tears flowing down his cheeks, he told me that his brother had died and that he wanted to give this picture as a gift to Jesus. I merely gave him a hug, may be even two, and soon he was gone. I put the picture at the foot of the altar and continued with the mass, relieved that everybody was safe. I did not see him later at that mass or have not seen him since.
Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
Today is the feast of the Holy family. Since we are commemorating the year of being church at home and home and church, it is crucial for us to reflect deeply upon both the Holy Family and our own families.
We have just celebrated Christmas. When we think of God’s plan and all the ways in which God could have come to us, is it not truly amazing that Christ came into a home? Just as Christ’s coming as a human person gives dignity to the human race, God’s coming into a home bring dignity to every family. A family in itself is a holy thing but by God coming into our home makes a home a sacrament. In other words, the home is a place where we can encounter God in a deep way. I am sure that marriage, the birth of a child, anniversaries, birthdays and even death are already sacred moments for us. But we are also being invited to reflect upon our day-to-day living and make it an opportunity for encounters with God.