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Here is a recording of the homily for the Fifth Sunday of Lent, year C, at the 9 AM Mass on March 22, 2010.

Homily for Sunday V of Lent https://didobonaparte.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/10-03-22-lent_5_9am.mp3

Here is a written summary of this homily:

Since the Second Vatican Council, there has been and increase in people receiving Holy Communion.  It seems that almost everyone in the congregation who has made their first Holy Communion comes forward to receive.  However, since the mid-sixties, there has been a decline in those going to the sacrament of Confession.  This seems odd, since going to Confession makes us better prepared to receive Holy Communion.  Therefore, if people are receiving Holy Communion more often, they should also be going the the sacrament of Confession more often.  Sadly, this is not the case.  Why is there a decline in the use of this sacrament?

There can be many reasons for this.  Are our consciences becoming dulled?  Are we becoming complacent regarding sin.  Are we less sensitive toward God, taking his mercy and forgiveness for granted?   Or do we think that we cannot possibly offend God since we are not doing the terribly bad things that others do like stealing, cheating, lying, committing adultery, etc.

Fr. Larre, in speaking to the priests of our diocese, thinks one of the reasons for fewer people going to Confession is that they do not know the difference between the act of contrition and the sacrament of Confession.  An act of contrition is a prayer to God in which we tell Him we are sorry for our sins out of love for Him, and that we promise, with the help of his grace, to do our best not to sin again.  It is a good prayer and one that we should pray every night before we go to sleep.  However, as good a prayer as it is, making an act of contrition is not the same as going to Confession, nor does it have the same effects.

First let us recall what is a sacrament.  There are seven of them, and they all have three things in common.  They include an outward sign, they were instituted by Christ himself, and through them we receive from Christ his grace.  This grace makes us share in the very life of God.  Now the reason there are seven sacraments, and not just one, is that each of them are geared toward a special aspect of our life and the life of the Church.   For instance, the grace received in the sacrament of Marriage not only unites the man and the woman, but it also enables them to be good husbands and wives, fathers and mothers.  In the sacrament of Holy Orders, a man becomes a priest and the grace he receives make it possible for him be a good priest.

Of what special help is the grace received in the sacrament of Confession.  We know that in the sacrament our sins are forgiven.  The grace received deepens our relationship with God.  It brings peace between the penitent and God and the penitent and the Church, the Body of Christ.  This grace also heals the damage to the soul left behind by sins.   It also strengthens us to resist temptation in the future.  And, if we a guilty of mortal sin, whereby we lose sanctifying grace, and are no longer in the state of grace, the grace received in Confession restore us to life so that we once again share in God’s own life and are brought back into the state of grace.

One of the consequences of falling from the state of grace, is that we cannot receive Holy Communion again until we have confessed our mortal sins in Confession.   If we do receive Our Lord in this state, Holy Communion will do us no good, In fact, not being in the state of grace and receiving the Sacred Host is worse since it would be s sacrilege.  Saint Paul, in writing to the Corinthians, among whom there was a serious problem in this regard, says: “Whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord.  Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup.  For any one who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself (1 Corinthians 11.27-29).

Some people have stopped going to Confession because of an unpleasant experience in the past.  The priest could have been too harsh or blunt.  However, we cannot let that make us abandon this great sacrament.  There are plenty of other priests that we can go to who will show us the compassion of Christ.

Sometimes people stop going to the sacrament because they feel that they have not, or cannot, forgive someone from their past.  They want to forgive, but they still feel ill will towards that person, and think that they cannot go to Confession until they have no more bad feelings towards the offending person.  However, we have to remember that forgiveness is primarily an act of the will.  If in your mind you desire and decide to forgive someone, you have indeed forgiven them, even if you still have in your heart bad feeling towards them, feelings you wish were not there.  Those unwanted bad feelings against the forgiven person are part of the wounds left behind by sin.  Just as physical wounds don’t heal instantly, so too, these spiritual wounds take time to heal.  If the Lord allows these to remain, it could be that He wants us to continue praying for healing.  We need to also remember that Confession is a sacrament of healing — spiritual healing — and it also has a role to play in helping us overcome the wounds left behind even by sins already forgiven.

Let us ask the Holy Spirit to increase within us the desire for a deeper union with God.  May He inspire us to use the sacrament of Confession more frequently.  Once an month is not too often.  Let Him continue working our ongoing transformation in Christ  that he works in Confession as He prepares us to receive Our Lord in Holy Communion ever more worthily.

G O S P E L     A N D      H O M I L Y   —    S U N D A Y     III      O F      L E N T   – –    M A R C H   3,  2 0 1 0

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From the holy Gospel according to Luke

At that time, there were some present who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices.  He asked them, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans?  No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.  Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them—do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem?  No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”  Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none.  So he said to the gardener, ‘See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?’  He replied, ‘Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it.  If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”   (Luke 13:1-9)

A   H O M I L Y

Some people were telling Jesus about the Galileans, whose blood Pontius Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices (Luke 13.1).  What were they talking about?  Every year at Passover time, many Jews from all over would gather in Jerusalem for the festival.  Just as today during the Olympics, or any large international gathering of people, security was a concern.  It was especially a concern in Jerusalem around the time of Our Lord.  Palestine was occupied by a foreign power, the Romans, and as you can imagine, the Jews suffered from their overbearing, tax-extracting oppressors.  There were Jewish factions that we would call terrorists or freedom fighters, who would cause trouble for the Romans.  Every time there was a great gathering of Jews in Jerusalem, the Romans were nervous.  Potius Pilate, the Roman governor, was responsible for the security, and he was known to be heavy-handed when dealing with resistance.  It is thought that probably these Galileans were suspected of being trouble-makers, and Pilate dealt with it by ordering the Roman soldiers to cut them down, probably in the Temple area itself, maybe even while they were about to, or preparing to offer their sacrifices.  The presence of foreign soldiers in the temple, and the bloodshed in their most holy place would have been an outrage for the Jews.

The horrible things that happen today also raise many issues.  In fact, some people even use these tragic events as proof that either God does not care, or even that He does not exist.  If there was a good God, how could he allow this to happen?  This was not the issue in the ancient world.  Generally nobody doubted the existence of God or gods.  The issue brought to Jesus would have been, what evil those Galileans must have been guilty of in order for God to allow them to die in such a terrible way.

Jesus, however, wants them to look at the event differently.  Were those Galileans sinners?  Of course they were.  We all are.  In fact they were probably no worse sinners than you or I.  He was challenging them to ask themselves these questions.  When you hear of awful misfortune happening to others, do you think that you are not a sinner or less of a sinner because it did not happen to you?  Are you so special that God cannot do without you in the life, that somehow he owes you a place in this world?  Do you think that your place here is safe because you are not as bad as other people?

Jesus takes the point even further.  Let’s forget about the evil Romans.  What about the other headline—the one about the eighteen people who were buried alive when the tower at Siloam fell on them.  Today we would ask, who’s responsible for this—the engineers, the builders?  Who can we sue?  Back then, the question would have been, what could those victims have done that would urge God either to make the tower fall, or at least, allow it to.  They clung to the idea that God makes bad things happen to bad people and good things happen to good people.  Therefore, if bad things are not happening to you, you must be in God’s good books, and so you cannot be all that bad after all.  In our Lord’s time, and even today, when tragedy strikes, our first reaction is to point the finger either at God, evil doers, or the victims themselves.  Jesus wants us to focus not so much on others, but to consider this.  There is no good reason why I could not have been one of the victims in these tragic events.  All that would be needed is me to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.  What if I were vacationing in Haiti, or Chile, or the coast of Western Europe, or on a ferry boat, or in a plane when tragedy all of a sudden.  Would I be ready to come before God face to face?  The Gospel solution is that we need to be always ready.

Many think that the world will last for a very long time, if not forever (as long as man does not destroy it himself).  Some Buddhists believe that the earth will be around for over 5 billion years.  If that is the case, then we should make our life last as long as possible in this world.  The Christian attitude, however, is very different.  Although we seek to live healthy lives, yet our overriding concern is not to live the longest life possible, but to be ready to meet God whenever we are called from this life.  In fact, unlike some Buddhist who are confident that the world will last a very long time, we Christians profess that we have no idea when the end of the world will come.  It could be in the next five minutes, for all we know.  We actually want the end of the world to be soon because that is when Christ will come again.  A careful reading of the New Testament shows that the first Christians expected Christ to return in glory to judge the living and the dead during their very own lifetime.  In fact, every time we pray the Our Father and say “thy kingdom come” we are praying for the Second Coming of Christ, when the kingdom that Jesus began and proclaimed will come to its complete fulfillment.  Also, at Mass we pray the words “…as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of Our Saviour, Jesus Christ.”  Here is a test of how deeply I have taken to heart the Christian way.  If the thought of Christ coming in the next five minutes fills me with dread, fear, and regret, then that is a sign that I still have a ways to go in my conversion process.  What does this resistance to the Second Coming and the end of the world say about me?  Am I so attached to the things of this world that I prefer them to entering Heaven?  Is there some attitude or something ongoing in my life, or some unrepented sin that worries me when I think about coming before Christ my Judge and Saviour?

What should be my reaction to news of tragedy?  I should think of the poor victims and survivors and how I can help them.   However, I should also think of how patient God is with me.  In today’s Gospel passage, Jesus tells the parable of the fig tree.  The owner of the tree is fed up with waiting for it to produce fruit and wants to cut it down.  The gardener, who stands for Christ, wants to wait.   He asks for a little more time to do the special things that will encourage the tree to bear fruit.  Only after this extra effort and time, if there is no fruit, then cut it down.     In his mercy God has given us this these days to change for the better and to do the good.  If we are spared misfortune, it is not so that we can sit back and relax.  In Luke chapter twelve, we find another parable on the topic of delay.  Jesus says: “Blessed is that servant whom his master when he comes will find him at work.  But if that slave says in his heart, ‘My master is delayed in coming,’ and if he begins to beat the menservants and maidservants, and to eat and drink and get drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour that he does not know, and will cut him in two, and put him with the unfaithful.” (Luke  12:43, 45-46).

Do not delay.  Now is the time to repent. Today is day to act.  Pray that the Holy Spirit, which has been given to us, will change our hearts so that we will look forward with joyful, hopeful heart to the coming of our Blessed Lord in all his glory.

This is a summary of a homily given at the funeral of a long-time parishioner of mine.  I have included the readings, 1 Thessalonians 4.13-18 and and John 11.17-27, upon which the homily was based.  Click on the underlined text to listen to the podcast of the homily summary.

Do not grieve as others who have no hope