This Sunday is all about joy and hope and the question I ask rather simple and straight forward – in what or in whom is your joy and hope founded.

Do you run the race to finish it? To win? To prove something?

For Christians, its not about the finish line, its about the one who stands on the other side waiting for us.

We hope and have joy because of Christ… not the race. Listen to the homily to hear why…

 

First of all, I don’t pretend to be an expert on repentance because I keep having to do it. If I had perfectly nailed this whole repentance thing, you’d think that I wouldn’t keep making laps on this sinful merry-go-round. Yet round and round it I go. Like everyone else I go to confession and each time I aspire to be better. While I can clearly see the signs and works of grace in my life, wounds healed and the fruits of grace blossoming, like many, I nevertheless still have a lot to learn.

That’s the work of this homily – lessons I’ve learned from each failed attempt. In particular, a hard lesson I’ve learned about my own repentance bias.

I pray that this honest homily helps.

 

Advent is a season of waiting but do we wait well? How do we wait? How are we called to wait? In this weeks homily you’ll find a discussion of what it means to wait and how we can take a few practical tips from the past on how we should wait for the future.

 

 

Many of us suffer from FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) but in today’s Gospel the good thief shows us a way to Christ that is patterned after his own love, a love that truly transform hearts away from fear and into freedom. Near the end of the homily I tell a true story of how Christ will use this same dynamic to transform one of the hardest hearts in modern history.

 

In today’s Gospel we hear about a tax collector and a pharisee, both of whom prayer to God, yet one walks away justified. How can we follow the humble example of the tax collector who is honest enough with God that he accepts his help? Can we be honest enough in prayer that we stop hiding in shadows of our own making and start living? Today’s homily is all about putting our own rationalizations, self-talk, and “spin” to the side and to make room for a new narrative.

Will we listen?

Hope is perhaps one of the most misunderstood virtues. In fact, most of the time we don’t even think of it as a virtue. We use phrases like fools hope, gamblers hope, and in everyday language we could easily replace it with the word “wish” and our meaning would remain the same. This is not hope.

As we near the middle of the semester I think its time we talked about Hope and it’s place in our lives.

 

At its simplest, faith means acknowledging our gifts and being grateful for them. Today we talk about two examples of gratitude – one who shows his gratitude by utilizing his gifts and another by remembering.

 

Are we men and women of action? Is our faith lived?

Christ elicits commitment but any commitment or promise must be based on action, because we can’t promise or commit ourselves to emotions. We can only commit to actions. But how?

It can be helpful to look at a few realistic examples. While there are literally a never ending supply of good examples I wanted to look at someone who is often over looked and yet beautifully profound.

 

 

Its time to stop being nice and start being real. Its time to love Christ and to actually follow what we believe.

 

Why do we keep becoming the prodigal son? Why do we sin even though we know its wrong? Why do we leave the father again and again?

I cant answer for everyone but here’s three reasons I constantly stray from love’s embrace.

Listen to the Homily Below