Tag: Jesus

Milling and paving

A homily for the Second Sunday of Advent, Dec. 6, 2020

Is. 40:1-5, 9-11, 2 Pt 3:8-14, Mk 1:1-8

If you live in New Jersey or nearby, you know about highways and highway construction. Except in the coldest and snowiest months, a road somewhere in New Jersey is being built from scratch or rehabilitated.

We in New Jersey like our roads. We like them wide, we like them smooth, and we like them fast.

(The only thing we would like better than our roads is a “Star Trek” transporter to get us from Point A to Point B almost instantaneously, and that’s not happening in this lifetime, as far as I know.)

So the notion of “Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths” is right up our alley. 

Or is it?

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It’s not cod-liver oil

A homily for The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, Nov. 22, 2020

Ez 34:11-12, 15-17, 1 Cor 15:20-26, 28, Mt 25:31-46

My mom grew up in a row house in the Logan section of Philadelphia, where everyone had a front porch and there was no separation among them except for a three-foot-tall brick divider.

On one hand, back in the first half of the 20th Century, it engendered a sense of neighborliness we’re missing in the suburbs these days. On the other hand, privacy was in short supply.

Which meant that everybody knew when her neighbors three houses down got their nightly outdoor checkups on their porch and had to choke down their foul, fishy-tasting medicine.

All because it was good for them.

Continue reading It’s not cod-liver oil

When bigger is better

A homily for the Thirty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Nov. 15, 2020

Prv 31:10-13, 19-20, 30-31, 1 Thes 5:1-6, Mt 25:14-30

The best way to check if something — or someone, or you — is alive is to make sure it’s growing.

If it is, it’s alive.

But if someone is already 6-foot-7, and that’s the tallest they’re going to get, are they still growing?

If someone is truly alive, the answer is yes, because people have the God-given ability to grow intellectually, emotionally and spiritually every day of their lives. Which means, of course, that someone needs to grow in these areas to be more than merely existing.

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It’s a virtue

A homily for the Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Nov. 8, 2020

Wis 6:12-16, 1 Thes 4:13-18, Mt 25:1-13

Imagine, if you will, that you’re standing at the train station waiting for the 5:14 to New York, and it’s 5:12 p.m. Where are you looking? At your watch or smartphone? Randomly, all around?

Maybe.

But the odds are good that you’re looking up the tracks in the direction your train will be coming from. You want to see the train coming. You want to be ready when it arrives … as if you weren’t already ready to climb aboard.

Continue reading It’s a virtue

Holier than whom?

A homily for the Solemnity of All Saints, Nov. 1, 2020

Rv 7:2-4, 9-14, 1 Jn 3:1-3, Mt 5:1-12A

The notion of “holy” gets some people all knotted up, because to some folks, “holy” is the first two syllables of a phrase that ends with “er than thou,” and like almost everything else in American culture, achieving a level of holiness can become a competition, cynical or otherwise.

It’s not.

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Build the wall? Absolutely not

A homily for the Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Oct. 25, 2020

Ex 22:20-26, 1 Thes 1:5C-10, Mt 22:34-40

Sorry, Robert Frost. In the crusty, taciturn New England of your era, good fences may have made good neighbors, but in today’s social climate, we can’t afford any more walls between ourselves.

Six feet, masks and plexiglass are intense enough as it is. We don’t need stone or steel. We definitely don’t need hearts of stone steeled against charity and justice.

We need Love.

Continue reading Build the wall? Absolutely not

Fork in the road? Take it

A homily for the Twenty-Ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Oct. 18, 2020

Is 45:1, 4-6, 1 Thes 1:1-5B, Mt 22:15-21

Today’s Gospel is well-known, most likely among the Top 5 for people of faith to cite when they list WWJD.

And because of its familiarity, this passage is usually interpreted as an either-or.

Choose the things of the world or choose the Ways of God.

But that arguably barely scrapes the surface.

Continue reading Fork in the road? Take it

Red-carpet couture

A homily for the Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Oct. 11, 2020

Is 25:6-10A, Phil 4:12-14, 19-20, Mt. 22:1-14

Every so often, the Lectionary — the book we use at Mass with selections from the Law and the Prophets, the Letters of Peter and Paul, the Gospels of the Four Evangelists, and other New Testament books — gives us a short version and a longer version of a reading, usually the Gospel. This is one of those occasions.

It’s notable this weekend because the impact of each of the versions can be felt in opposite ways, and that makes choosing between the two a head-scratcher.

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Interstate 80 at 80 mph

A homily for the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Sept. 27, 2020

Ez 18:25-28, Phil 2:1-11, Mt 21:28-32

As you may or may not know, I was a deadline editor at newspapers for 40 years, and several times during my career I was part of a team whose task was to (a) transform the look and feel of the newspaper, (b) add the news to websites and apps, (c) revise the look and feel of the newspaper again, and so on. And on and on.

Also, as you likely know, the news never stops. So all of these transformations had to be engineered and accomplished while we reported, fact-checked, re-reported, re-fact-checked, edited, illustrated, designed and published the newspaper and website.

We did not get to stop what we were doing to rip apart, tear down, gather materials and rebuild.

We realized we had to work as if we were changing the tires on Interstate 80 at 80 miles per hour.

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Fair’s fair

A homily for the Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Sept. 20, 2020

Is 55:6-9, Phil 1:20C-24, 27A, Mt 20:1-16A

For some people steeped in timeclocks, hourly wages, collective bargaining and labor law, this Gospel has always been a head-scratcher.

If the worker who was employed from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. gets, let’s say, 75 bucks but then the worker who started at 6 a.m. also gets 75 bucks, how is that remotely fair? The late-starter is getting $75 an hour while the guy from the Dawn Patrol is getting $6.25. What should the hourly rate be? Shouldn’t it be the same for everybody?

Continue reading Fair’s fair