Homily for the Feast of Saints Simon and Jude, Apostles (Friday in Thirtiet  Week in Ordinary Time), delivered at Our Lady Star of the Sea Church, Gladstone, Qld.

"Jesus spoke the following parable to some people who prided themselves on being virtuous and despised everyone else: ‘Two men went up to the Temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood there and said this prayer to himself, “I thank you, God, that I am not grasping, unjust, adulterous like the rest of mankind, and particularly that I am not like this tax collector here. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes on all I get.” The tax collector stood some distance away, not daring even to raise his eyes to heaven; but he beat his breast and said, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” This man, I tell you, went home again at rights with God; the other did not. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the man who humbles himself will be exalted.’..." (Eph 2:19-22).

"Jesus went out into the hills to pray; and he spent the whole night in prayer to God. When day came he summoned his disciples and picked out twelve of them; he called them ‘apostles’." (cf. Luke 6:12-19).

Artwork: "The Martyrdom of Saints Simon and Jude", (c. 1370-75).