Homily: September 4, 2022, Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time

-

Chapter 9 in the Book of Wisdom is titled ‘Prayer for Wisdom’. The pages of this chapter are the most well used in my Bible, because my mother used to tell me when I was younger, that by reading this chapter every day, I will become wise in life.

And so I did, I read this chapter every day, I could even memorise every word of the Malayalam version, but did I grow wiser. I didn’t think so because simply reading it will not make me wise, only God can.

Today’s first reading began, “Who can know God’s counsel, or who can conceive what the Lord Intends?”

And it ended with, “Who ever knew your counsel, except you had given wisdom and sent your holy spirit from on high?”

Yes, we can pray for it and ask God to grant us wisdom. God’s plan for humankind is great and wonderful, yet we can never fully understand His intentions and plans, unless we have wisdom from the Holy Spirit. 

What is God’s intention for us? What is His plan?

The words of Jesus in today’s Gospel struck me much, “if anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple”.  

Is Jesus telling us to hate our loved ones, our family and to abandon them, if we want to follow Jesus?

Somewhere in the other Gospel texts, didn’t Jesus tell us to love our enemies?

Didn’t Jesus love His mother so much that even as He was dying on the cross, He made sure His beloved disciple took care of her?

We need wisdom to understand this.

We must never forget and never ever doubt that God is love. He is the source of true, perfect, eternal love. So, our loving God will never tell us to hate anyone.

But no human person fully understands love. On our own, we do not know love. The love that we have between human to human is imperfect, twisted and self-centred. The only way for us to truly know love, is to first, receive the love from God, and then to love Him with our heart, our mind, our soul.

When we are filled with God’s love, the perfect love, and when we know how to love Him, we will know how to love others.

That is why Jesus’ commandment of love is that we love one another as He has loved us. We must love others, the way He loves. To be His disciple is to follow the way He loves.

How does He love?

By laying down His life for others, by giving Himself totally and unconditionally, by dying to self.

In Mathew chapter 5, we read, “Why should God reward you if you love only the people who love you?” (Mathew 5: 47) That is our human way of loving.

Dying to self means to surrender what I desire for myself, to let go what is precious to me, to give up what I love… so that I desire only what God desires, I hold precious only what is precious to God, I love only what God loves.

And then, we will truly know how to love our mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, no longer with our own imperfect love, but with the perfect love that comes from God.

To love in our own way, there is always a limit to how much we are willing and able to give of self for the good of the other.

To love in God’s way, there is no limit, there is no condition, there is no stop, there is always the extra mile, always more to give, until we empty ourselves.

So you think that since you go to church, you are involved in ministries, you help the poor, you avoid sin, and that is loving God, loving others?

Sister Agnes was already leading a holy life, she was obedient to her superiors and doing a good job teaching the young believers, but when God called her to give up her comfortable convent life and to go the extra mile, to embrace the poorest of the poor, to die to her self, she went. She became Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

All the saints we know, did the same. They did not lead a holy life as they wished, their lives were holy because they lived as God wished.

That is the wisdom of true love.

Are you ready to go the extra mile for God?

Amen.

Fr. Nivin Scaria 

Comments

Post a Comment

Read

Homily: April 6, 2024, Saturday in the octave of Easter (First five saturday devotion.)

-
Thank you all for continuing to come for Saturday morning Mass. When I was little, my family used to attend Saturday morning Mass together and will always end with the Novena to Our Lady of Perpetual Help. To me, that is a beautiful devotion for the whole family. I have wanted to start Saturday morning Mass when I first came to SAC but didn’t know if it will catch on with the parishioners. Last year, I attended an evening talk about Our Lady of Fatima at St. Augustine Parish and came to know about the First Five Saturday devotion, and I was again motivated. Finally, today being the first Saturday of the month, we can begin. Let me share a bit more about this devotion. Sr. Lucia was one of the three shepherd children visionaries to whom our Blessed Mother appeared for six months in 1917 in Fatima. Later when Lucia grew up and joined the convent in Spain, our Blessed Mother appeared to her again on December 10, 1925, with this message, “Behold, my daughter, my Heart encircled with thorns
Read more

Homily: August 20, 2022, Saturday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time

-
“The angel led me to the gate which faces the east, and there I saw the glory of the God of Israel coming from the east”.  These words in the first reading remind of the Orthodox and Oriental Churches. When they construct their churches, they would set their church altars to face the east, so that, when the priests celebrate Mass, they will be looking towards that direction. In India, especially in Kerala where I came from, all our church altars face the east. The concept is based on the expectation that Christ would come again, arriving from the east, and the priest is leading the community to the heavenly Jerusalem.  Interestingly, the Hindu temples also face eastwards.  And do you know, the houses in my village are built with the kitchens facing the east also. Why? It has nothing related to the coming of Christ. It has to do with the sunrise. The mothers of the households start cooking when they wake up, and the kitchens are open concept, so the rising sun will provide the much need
Read more

Homily: February 27, 2022, Eight Sunday in the Ordinary Time

-
For readings: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/022722.cfm There were two brothers who lived debauched lives engaging in terrible deeds. They were notorious yet not at all ashamed. Then one brother died. The surviving brother asked the local pastor to preach at his brother’s funeral. The pastor, aware of the brothers’ background, was reluctant to do it. The brother then promised to donate a big sum of money to the church and begged the pastor to preach with a special request. “Father, in your homily, you just have to say that my brother was a saint.” The pastor thought about it and agreed. The funeral day came. The pastor began his homily, “The man laid in the casket was a rotter; he led a horrible and debauched life. He was truly rotten to the bone. But compared to his brother, he was a saint.” Saintly life or shoddy living – Would the priest at our own funeral have to be paid to tell a lie? It all depends on what kind of fruit we produce from the way we live. Usually, we cannot
Read more

Homily: April 23, 2024, Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Easter (Exciting news).

-
Those who had been scattered by the persecution that arose because of Stephen went as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch. Antioch is approximately 300 miles from Jerusalem. So it seems that the good news of Christ had spread out far and wide very fast since the death of Stephen. Look at these early converted believers, how excited they are to receive and share the good news. When was the last time you were super excited about something and had to share it with everyone you know? A few days ago, a young friend of mine got enlisted into the US military, he called eagerly to tell me, "Father, I am a soldier." And in a few hours, he came to my office and told me again the same news. He was so excited, it was the best news he had been waiting for, and he went around telling all his friends about it within that morning. Little children are not good at containing their excitement. Often when my young nephews and nieces got new toys, they would immediately FaceTime with me to show
Read more

Homily Third Sunday in Ordinary time: 1/23/22

-
 “…Because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor”. Jesus declared His mission in the Gospel text today by reading from the scroll of Isaiah. Glad tidings are good news, news that will gladden the hearts of the recipients and cause them to rejoice. And prophet Ezra encouraged the Israelites who returned from exile in the first reading, “Do not be sad, and do not weep…for rejoicing in the LORD must be your strength!” So, what news is good news? What will truly gladden the heart and cause rejoicing? Today my homily will be short, is that good news? My family have always been average, we have always had what we needed, through God’s providence in our hard work. We just did not have comfort or extras, so we seldom go on vacations or travels. But we had simple fun and joy in daily life. My mommy died in 2012 and my papa died in 2018, both due to cancer. Papa had always been a very prayerful, humble and mild-mannered person. I saw him fast and pray consistently throughout his l
Read more

Homily: June 19, 2023, Monday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time (parish Treasure)

-
Image
"As unrecognized and yet acknowledged; as dying and behold we live; as chastised and yet not put to death; as sorrowful yet always rejoicing; as poor yet enriching many; as having nothing and yet possessing all things." In today’s first reading, we see St. Paul’s wisdom as he writes to the faith community in Corinth. He is teaching them to see positivity in every hardship, every problem, every suffering. To him, every situation, seemingly good or bad, is a blessing, if we have eyes of faith to see it. A good example is our St. Ambrose parish. In the diocese, we are one of the poorest parishes, despite being the Cathedral. Seventy percent of our parishioners are refugees, living every day in survival mode, working hard to build a basic home, to educate their children, simply to live in peace. They left their war-torn country to find a new home, starting from zero. They brought nothing with them, only faith and hope. Materially, they have next to nothing, so they are not able t
Read more

Homily: April 30, 2024, Tuesday of the fifth week of Easter (Power over Satan)

-
"I will no longer speak much with you, for the ruler of the world is coming. He has no power over me..."  Jesus is comforting His disciples before His passion and death. The disciples’ greatest fear was losing Jesus to the enemies. They needed Jesus to save them from Roman power and the abuse of the Jewish authorities. But Jesus knew His time with His disciples was limited, yet He assured them that the ‘ruler of the world’ had no power over Him. Jesus was speaking about Satan and his power. When Satan was an angel of God, he enjoyed power given to him to serve God. When he turned against God, God did not take back that gift. So, Satan retained power, but which can never overpower God who gave it to him originally. He has no power over Jesus. When we look around, we see a lot of evil committed by people, and which seem to spread more evil around. We see even believers, Christians, falling away, continuing in repetitive sin, giving in to addiction, giving up their faith.  Why i
Read more

Homily, March 22, 2022, Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent.

-
 “Do not let us be put to shame, but deal with us in your kindness and great mercy.” This is the prayer by prophet Azaria, pleading to God on behalf of the people. How do you discipline your children when they do something wrong? In India, caning is the norm. My parents did the same. Whenever we did something wrong, my mommy would grab the cane to give us a good beating. Of course, we knew what was coming and would run away fast. Mommy would then chase us around the house, trying to get us. Where could we go? The best trick was to run to grandpa. If we reached him before mommy got us, we will be safe! He would always protect us and plead on our behalf, “don’t cane them, just forgive this time”. How many times have we been saved by grandpa? I don’t know, maybe more than seventy-seven times. Peter asks in the Gospel, “Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive him?” He is referring to offences between two persons. If seventy-seven times is how often we should forgive o
Read more

Homily: March 10, 2022, Thursday of the First Week in Lent

-
 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” When I was much younger, I wanted to become very rich, to have lots of money, a nice car, a big house etc.… It was a common village boy’s dream. I don’t think I actually prayed for it, but I surely dreamt about it often. What happened thereafter? Well, I am still dreaming about it. And I even pray for it now! Not for myself but for the parish. When I first moved to this parish, I was shocked by the financial situation, so I did wish and pray for this parish to be rich.  Money is indeed helpful in life but not the most important. Money solves a lot of problems only when it is used wisely. Being poor helps me learn to depend on God’s providence. So, my dream for the parish now is to be rich in God’s word, in community life, in prayerful spirit, in loving and caring for one another. I dream of hearing our prayers and singing rise-up strong and joyful to the heavens when we gather to prais
Read more

Homily: June 26, 2023, Monday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time (Father of faith)

-
"Go forth from the land of your kinsfolk and from your father's house to a land that I will show you…I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you.” Some many years ago, I attended a parish renewal program. One takeaway from that program which impacted me was just a simple phrase: "money follows mission". It speaks volumes about having faith in God’s providence. When I read today's first reading, I was inspired to coin this phrase: "Blessings follow struggles". This says a lot about trusting in God’s plan above our plans. In the coming two weeks, we will be reading from the book of Genesis. Today, we read from chapter 12, which narrates the call of Abram. This chapter marks the beginning of salvation history. Abram was a very wealthy man. He was leading a very comfortable, luxurious life with servants in wait and plentiful livestock. Which meant he had more than enough for himself and his household to live very long. Abram was already 75 years
Read more