Catholic Preaching

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Leonine Forum Lenten Day of Recollection

Church of the Holy Family, Manhattan

400th Anniversary of the Canonization of

Saints Isidore the Farmer, Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, Teresa of Avila and Philip Neri

March 12, 2022

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Fr. Roger J. Landry

Leonine Forum Lenten Day of Recollection

Church of the Holy Family, Manhattan

400th Anniversary of the Canonization of

Saints Isidore the Farmer, Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, Teresa of Avila and Philip Neri

March 12, 2022

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.12.22_Praying_Like_the_Saints_1.mp3

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Leonine Forum Lenten Day of Recollection

Church of the Holy Family, Manhattan

First Saturday of Lent

400th Anniversary of the Canonization of

Saints Isidore the Farmer, Ignatius Loyola, Francis Xavier, Teresa of Avila and Philip Neri

March 12, 2022

Dt 26:16-19, Ps 119, Mt 5:43-48

 

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below: 

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.12.22_Homily_1.mp3

 

The following text guided the homily: 

* The whole purpose of Lent is to bring us back to who we are, made in the image and likeness of God who is holy, holy, holy. We are reminded on Ash Wednesday of our beginning and our end, not just that we are dust and unto dust we shall return, but also that God breathed into us the breath of life, gave us an immortal soul, and wants us to use our freedom, will and relational nature to choose to live in a communion of love with him and others forever.

* Today’s readings drive the point home. Jesus calls us in the Gospel to “be perfect as our heavenly father is perfect,” which means ultimately to be holy as the Lord our God is holy. To be holy is to live as the Book of Deuteronomy summons us in the first reading. It means to observe the Lord’s commandments with all our heart and soul, to walk in God’s ways, to hearken to his voice, to be a people peculiarly his own. It means, as we prayed in the Psalm, to walk in the law of the Lord, to observe his decrees, to seek him with all their heart, to follow a blameless way.

* To be holy, Jesus intimates in the Gospel, is simply to live up to our identity as chips off the old divine block, to be like our heavenly Father. Before Jesus calls us to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect, he gives us specific exhortations so that we “may be children of [our] Father in heaven, who makes his sun rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.” Jesus implies that we will not really become children of God until we start behaving like God, that he can be our Father without our being his children unless we experience the inner revolution to which Jesus is calling us and unless we seek to act as his children, to behave like Jesus who shows us how to live as a Son of God. Just as God the Father loves everyone and does good to everyone, including those who curse him, including those who make themselves his enemy through sin and an evil life, including those who try to use him whenever they need him, Jesus calls us to do the same, to love our enemies, to pray for those who persecute us, to walk the second mile, to give our cloak as well as our tunic, to give generously to all those who need to borrow. We’re called to be good — to let our sun or life-giving rain fall — not just on those who are good to us but even on those who are not good to us, just like the Father does. This is the path to true holiness, this is the means by which we become, in action, sons and daughters of our heavenly Father, by behaving as he behaves.

* Today during this day of recollection we’re going to be focused on holiness through the lives of five men and women who sought to be perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect, to love as Jesus has loved us, to be merciful as the Father is merciful, to be holy as the Lord our God is holy. They are five who were canonized 400 years ago today by Pope Gregory XV: Saint Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits; Saint Francis Xavier, his former roommate, fellow Jesuit and, after St. Paul, the greatest missionary in Church history; Saint Teresa of Avila, the first female doctor of the Church and great reformer of the Carmelites; St. Philip Neri, the 16thcentury founder of the Oratorians and reevangelizer of Rome; and St. Isidore the Farmer,

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Conversations with Consequences Podcast

Homily for the Second Sunday of Lent, C, Vigil

March 12, 2022

 

To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below: 

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The following text guided the homily:

* This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a privilege for me to be with you as we enter into the consequential conversation Jesus wants to have with us in this Sunday’s Gospel, as together with Peter, James and John and the whole Church, we behold Jesus transfigured among us. It’s a pilgrimage the Church has us make every year with Jesus up the Mount of Transfiguration to strengthen us for the journey of Lent and of human life. This year, as we continue to pray, fast and sacrifice for the people in Ukraine, as we begin to suffer the inevitable financial consequences here at home like higher gas prices, and as some wonder whether we are witnessing the first lethal stages of what could develop into World War III, the lessons we learn take on even greater relevance.

* The first lesson is about exertion, about the effort that a holy Lent and true Christian life entails. Jesus leads Peter, James and John on a hike up what St. Matthew calls an “exceedingly high mountain.” Christian tradition associates the mountain where Jesus was transfigured as Mount Tabor, which towers over Galilee and the Plains of Megiddo, and takes over ten minutes to climb in vans zig-zagging up narrow paths. It would take vigorous climbers at least a couple of hours to ascend on foot. They needed to leave civilization behind, they needed to leave their comfort zones behind, and climb with Jesus, sweating, probably gasping for air, to pray with Jesus. This Lent the Lord is likewise asking of us to make an exertion. He’s calling us to hard work. He’s calling us to be on the move. And the pilgrimage he seeks to have us make with him isn’t in a van. This annual spiritual altitude training, however, is meant to strengthen us for the uphill marathon of life and the inevitable vicissitudes that arise.

* The second Lenten lesson is the help God wants to give us as we make that spiritual and often physical climb. When they reach the top of the mountain, Saints Peter, James and John see something extraordinary. Jesus is transfigured. He and his clothes become radiant. St. Luke tells us that he speaks with Moses and Elijah, the greatest figures in Jewish history who symbolize the law and the prophets, about the “exodus” he was to accomplish in Jerusalem, when Jesus would lead us through the waters of Baptism through the desert of Lent to the Promised Land not flowing with milk and honey but the Living Water that wells up to eternal life. The experience of the various theophanies at the top of the mountain are so powerful they don’t know what to say, but it leads Peter immediately to want to get into real estate, building booths for Jesus, Moses and Elijah, to keep the experience going for as long as possible.

* Why did Jesus want them to have this experience? The reason was ultimately to strengthen them to remain strong in faith even when they would descend the Mount of Transfiguration to ascend Mount Calvary. When they would see Jesus transfigured in blood, they would be able to remember Jesus in glory, when they got a glimpse of his divinity. The Church helps us to capture the reason for Jesus’ transfiguration in the Eucharistic Preface for Mass, in which the priest prays, “For after [Jesus] had told the disciples of his coming Death, on the holy mountain he manifested to them his glory, to show, even by the testimony of the law and the prophets, that the Passion leads to the glory of the Res...

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Leonine Forum Monthly Mass, IESE, New York

Thursday of the First Week in Lent

March 10, 2022

Esther 14:12.14-16.23-25, Ps 138, Mt 7:7-12

 

To listen to an audio version of this homily, please click below: 

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The following points were attempted in the homily: 

* Today in the Gospel Jesus continues his lessons for us our prayer that he began on Ash Wednesday and built on two days ago at daily Mass. On Ash Wednesday he told us to pray differently from those who pray for show. He told us to go to our inner room, the place symbolized by the locked location in the house where where we hold our treasures, and pray to our Father in secret, because prayer is supposed to bring us into a loving, filial Communion with the Father. Two days ago, Jesus built on that lesson when he taught us how to pray, giving us the words of the Our Father, and forming us to seek the hallowing of the Father’s name, the coming of his kingdom, the doing of his will, and the daily natural and supernatural nourishment, the mercy, the strengthening in temptation and the deliverance from evil we need to do so.

* Today he speaks to us about the filial confidence we should have in prayer as he urges us to bring our needs and desires to God. Jesus wants us to seek God in our prayer, to knock on his door, to ask for what we need and desire. And he gives us a promise that no infomercial or used car salesman would ever be so bold as to make: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” That’s an almost incredible guarantee, that our prayers will always be heard. Notice that he doesn’t tell us, “Ask and you’ll get whatever you ask for.” He instructs us to seek but he doesn’t tell us exactly what we’ll find. He tells us to knock but he doesn’t say what will be waiting for us on the other side of the opened door. But he promises us that our prayers will be heard and God will respond. The reason why God will respond is precisely because God is a loving Father. Jesus says, “Which one of you would hand his son a stone when he asked for a loaf of bread, or a snake when he asked for a fish? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him.” He will always give us what is good for us. In St. Luke’s version of an almost identical discourse, Jesus promises that the Father will always respond to our prayers by giving us the Holy Spirit. God responds to our petitions first and foremost by giving himself, because the greatest gift is the Giver himself. Jesus says all of this so that we will have no fear at all in praying but a great boldness, a boldness that translates into asking with filial confidence. And he wants us to ask!

We see this prayer of fearless petition exemplified for us in the first reading. Queen Esther, a Jew living in Babylon, risks her life to try to save the Jewish people from one of King Ahasuerus’ assistants, Haman, who was seeking to have all the Jews executed by decree of the deceived King. Before, however, she would risk her life going into the King’s presence unbidden, she and all the Jews prayed and fasted for three days. Today we have the bold prayer she makes in the presence of God the Father as she lay prostrate with all her attendants from morning to evening: “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, and God of Jacob, blessed are you. Help me, who am alone and have no help but you, for I am taking my life in my hand. As a child I used to hear from the books of my forefathers that you, O Lord,

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Retreat for the Carmelite Monastery of Our Mother of Mercy and Saint Joseph

Alexandria, South Dakota

March 1-8, 2022

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Fr. Roger J. Landry

Carmelite Monastery of Our Mother of Mercy and Saint Joseph

Alexandria, South Dakota

Tuesday of the First Week of Lent, Extraordinary Form

March 8, 2022

Is 55:6-11, Mt 21:10-17

 

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below: 

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The following text guided the homily: 

* In today’s first reading from the Prophet Isaiah, we hear a powerful Lenten summons: “Seek the Lord while he may be found, call him while he is near.” The Lord has not only drawn near waiting for us to discover him, he’s not just listening waiting for us to call, but’s himself very active. He who is generous in forgiving wants us to turn to him for mercy. He whose thoughts are not our thoughts and ways are not our ways wanted to help us lift our thoughts and improve our ways. That’s what he says in the second half of today’s reading. Just as rain and snow come down from heaven to irrigate the earth and make it fertile and fruitful, so does God word, which accomplishes God’s will and achieves the end God intends. God through his word will help us to purify our thoughts by his thoughts and align our ways to his. His word shows us the way and his promise gives us hope.

* We see this truth at work in the Gospel, when Jesus, the Word made flesh, cleanses the Temple area of moneychangers and animal sellers. He reminds us of the purpose of the temple. God wants it to be a “house of prayer.” It had not only become a commercial setting where people were paying the temple tax in temple currency for which every other currency needed to be exchanged, and where people were buying the animals they needed to sacrifice rather than trying to bring them unblemished from wherever their home was, but where, because of the demand in that particular spot, the sellers had the buyers right where they wanted them and were charging exorbitant exchange rates and prices, a greed that was particularly injurious to the poor. Jesus was outraged that instead of the Temple being the place where people’s thoughts became more and more like God’s and where their ways were strengthened to follow the divine, they were neck deep in the morass of worldly corruption. So Jesus helped the scoundrel forsake his way and the wicked man his thoughts. He cleansed the temple of the den of thieves. It was the anticipation of the way that he would seek to cleanse each of us from our worldly desires and practices to align them to his will and ways. We see in St. John’s Gospel that when he was asked by what authority he was cleansing this temple and what sign he could give for that authority, he said, “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up,” talking about the temple of his body. He was the definitive meeting place of God and humanity, the true house of prayer for all peoples. When he would be raised up, he would make it possible for all of us to become temples, too, through the mystery of the Holy Eucharist, by which he comes to abide in us and make it possible for us to be true houses of prayer, filled with his thoughts, who serve him in all our ways. But each Lent he comes to cleanse us, like he cleansed the Temple in Jerusalem, of the times in which we don’t seek him while he may be found, we don’t call him when he is near, we’re not soil thirsting for the rain and snow of the word coming from his mouth to make us fertile and fruitful. We turn to him for mercy, as Isaiah beckons us, because he is generous in forgiving.

* We see in the Gospel those who were seeking him when he could be found. As soon as he was done cleansing the temple, the blind and lame approached him, and he cured them. Likewise the children came to him, shouting out, “Hosanna to the Son of David,

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Retreat for the Carmelite Monastery of Our Mother of Mercy and Saint Joseph

Alexandria, South Dakota

March 1-8, 2022

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.7.22_Conference_13_Ezekiel_Isaiah_1.mp3

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Retreat for the Carmelite Monastery of Our Mother of Mercy and Saint Joseph

Alexandria, South Dakota

March 1-8, 2022

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.7.22_Conference_12_Good_Shepherd_Suffering_Servant_1.mp3

Fr. Roger J. Landry

Carmelite Monastery of Our Mother of Mercy and Saint Joseph

Alexandria, South Dakota

Monday of the First Week of Lent, Extraordinary Form

March 7, 2022

Ez 34:11-16, Mt 25:31-46

 

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below: 

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.7.22_EF_Mass_1.mp3

 

The following text guided the homily: 

* The ultimate purpose of Lent is conversion, turning away from sin, turning toward God, and ultimately and literally turning with him. It’s to be restored in the image and likeness of God, to receive more fruitfully God’s love and help to become holy as he is holy, merciful as he is merciful, and striving to love others as he has loved us first.

* In today’s first reading from the Prophet Ezekiel, we see how God loves. He loves us as a shepherd loves his sheep. He looks after us, tends us, protects us, seeks us out, gathers us and brings us back, leads us out among the people, rescues us, binds our wounds, heals our illnesses, pastures us in rich pastures, gives us rest, and shepherds us rightly. Jesus would at last put a human and divine face to this prophetic description, as he identified himself as the Good Shepherd and showed his care to know his sheep, call each of them by name with his trustworthy, recognizable voice, walk ahead of them so that they might follow him, leave the 99 to go out after the lost, give them eternal life so that they may never perish, and ultimately lay down his life for them.

* The first thing we need to do in Lent and in life is to allow Jesus, the Good Shepherd, to shepherd us, to hear his voice, to follow him, to graze in the pastures to which he leads us. But he also seeks to make us shepherds after his own heart, to assist him in his shepherdly care, to take responsibility for others and share in his feeding, guiding and protecting of others. We see this transformation clearly in the life of St. Peter. After the Resurrection, when Jesus appeared to the disciples on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, Jesus asked Peter three times: “Simon, Son of John, do you love me more than these?” After each of the three times Peter responded, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you,” Jesus gave him a commission: “Feed my lambs,” telling him in particular to take care of his young people; “Tend my sheep,” which in the Greek means to guard and guide; and “Feed my sheep.” Jesus, the Good Shepherd, was entrusting the care and nourishment of his flock, young and old, to Peter’s loving solicitude. They would always remain Christ’s sheep — feed mylambs, tend mysheep, Jesus said — but they would be guided by a sheep like themselves, chosen, formed and commissioned. While there is obviously unique aspect to the shepherdly vocation of Peter and his successors, each of us, in having been called to love others as Christ has loved us first, is called to shepherd others as Christ has shepherded us first.

* That brings us to today’s powerful Gospel in which the Good Shepherd makes plain the type of shepherdly care he expects. He tells us that at the General Judgment, he will be like a shepherd separating sheep from goats. Those who have proven to be his good sheep, he will place on his right, and those who have been goats — confused often with sheep at first glance but who have hair instead of wool, tails that point down instead of up, who browse instead of graze, who like to do their own thing rather than stick together, and who have 60 chromosomes instead of 54 — on his left. The sheep will have distinguished themselves by how they shepherded with love those in need, when they found someone hungry, thirsty, a stranger, naked, sick or imprisoned. The goats, Jesus says in the image, will be those who did nothing.