Homily: February 15, 2023, Wednesday of the Sixth week in Ordinary time

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(Holy Family School Mass) 

First, I have some questions for you.

1. Do you know how old was Noah when he started building the Ark?

a) 30 years old

b) 100 years old

c) 500 years old

Yes, the correct answer is c) 500 years old.

2. Who knows how old was Noah when he finished the Ark? Any guesses? Yes, he was 600 years old.

3. Now the math question, so how many years did he take to build that huge ark?

Yes, 100 years!

Today’s first reading says when Noah came out of Ark after the floods went down, he was 6 hundred and 1 years old. That means he, his family and the animals lived in the Ark for one year!

Imagine that, no sun, no moon, no beach, no biking, no trees, no outdoors and no other human beings for one whole year. Only rain and rain. How would you feel?

I experienced that for one week last year when I had the covid infection. I had to be isolated from the rest of the world. But thankfully, I had social media, my phone and the internet, so that helped me pass the time easier.

Imagine someone going through that isolation for many months, one year or many years. Terrible, isn’t it?

That was how the blind man in the Gospel lived his life. He saw nothing for many years.

So what did Jesus do for him?

Jesus healed him, that means Jesus helped him to see again. With some actions and a prayer, Jesus healed his blindness. No surgery, no eye transplants, no medicine, no big treatments, but Jesus did it easily.

Jesus is a healer, He is the good master, He can turn the bad into good. God sent Jesus to heal and help us so that we know God loves every one of us and wants us to live our life in its fullness.

What God wants is not just to heal our bodies, which is not meant to last very long anyway. What He really wants is to heal our souls, so that we become clean and healthy inside, and our souls are made to last forever. When our souls are clean and well, we will be very happy people.

But so many people do not believe that, and many people continue to live in sin, doing wrong and evil, refusing to change or be better. Like the people in Noah’s time, who were all evil and sinful, no one believed him that a huge flood was coming, no one came with him into the ark and so they were all washed away in the floods.

Some of you may have visited Noah’s ark in Kentucky, did you? Was it super huge? That is just a replica, not the original ark but it helps us understand why Noah took so long to build it, and Noah was not even a boat builder, but he trusted God, obeyed His plan and followed His instructions carefully. So he and his family were saved.

We too are called to believe in Jesus, follow Him and obey God. Our souls will be healed and made clean, and will enter into God’s kingdom to be with Him forever. Amen.


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

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

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

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