A homily for the First Sunday of Lent, February 26, 2023
Gn 2:7-9; 3:1-7, Rom 5:12-19 , Mt 4:1-11
Out in the backyard of my boyhood home in Lincroft, my brothers and I built a treehouse. Not just any treehouse. This was a classic, enough to make the Swiss Family Robinson jealous.
A homily, sort of, for the Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, February 19, 2023
Lv 19:1-2, 17-18, 1 Cor 3:16-23, Mt 5:38-48
To gild refined gold, to paint the lily /
To throw a perfume on the violet …/
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.
If you haven’t heard this week’s selections from Scripture proclaimed in a house of worship, or if you haven’t used the links above to read them, please do.
There’s absolutely nothing I can add to make them more understandable or clearer. There’s no call to action I can write or shout from the rooftops that these passages don’t deliver.
A homily for the Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, February 12, 2023
Sir 15:15-20, 1 Cor 2:6-10, Mt 5:17-37
Oh, well, a young man
Ain’t got nothin’ in the world these days
…
But you know, nowadays
It’s the old man
He’s got all the money
And a young man ain’t got nothin’ in the world these days
My Nana Zapcic, who lived downriver from Harrisburg and thus not far from Lancaster County Amish country, had a cheesy old refrigerator magnet that opined, “Ve get too soon oldt undt too late shmart.”
Well, I thought it was cheesy when I was 17 or younger. Now, not so much.
A homily for the Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, February 5, 2023
Is 58:7-10, 1 Cor 2:1-5, Mt 5:13-16
There are three little bins on a shelf in our basement with batteries in them: double-A, triple-A, and some random C, D and 9-volt types. We go through the double-As fairly often, and I reload the bin whenever it gets low, whenever a couple of them leak, or whenever Costco puts the 40-pack on sale.
There’s another, smaller bin on a shelf built into my desk at home, and it has a bunch of rechargeable double-As and a four-battery charger. They’re collecting dust.
They shouldn’t be.
They are, however, symbolic.
