Homily: December 8, 2023, Solemnity of the immaculate conception of B.V. Mary.

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Holy Family Shcool Mass: 

After the man, Adam, had eaten from the tree, the LORD God called to the man and asked him, "Where are you?" 

Has anyone called out to you like that before? Do your parents call you on the phone and ask you “Where are you”?

When I was a little boy about age 4 or 5, I used to enjoy wandering about on our small family farm with my siblings. Just walking around, looking at the crops and the trees, the animals and the insects. We could take hours and sometimes walked to the far end of the farm.

Then when dinner was ready, my mommy would call out to us loudly and ask, "Where are you?"

Mommy knew we were on the farm, so her question was not to ask us for our location, but it was more questioning why we were not yet home for dinner.

When God was calling out to Adam, he too knew where Adam was hiding. He is God, of course He knows. So why was He asking that question?

Back to the story of my childhood at the farm. When I grew a little older, I used to bully my younger sisters, then I would always run away from home to the farm to avoid getting punished. I always knew what I did was wrong and would hide on the farm in fear and in shame.

After many hours, Mommy and Papa’s anger would have simmered down and they would come in search of me. And they would call out to me also with the same question, “Nivin, where are you?”

They were concerned and the question was not asking for my whereabouts, but more an invitation to encourage me to show myself and go home.

In the first reading, Adam and Eve were hiding from God because of guilt and shame. They ate the fruit which they were told not to eat. They knew they did wrong and so they hid from God for fear of punishment.

They wanted to stay away from God, but God did not want His beloved children to keep away from Him, so He went to the garden to call them out, to invite them to show themselves, to encourage them to go back to Him.

This is what happens every time we sin. We feel sorry, we feel shame, and many times we feel we are not worthy of God’s love. And we run away from God, we stay away from him, we stop praying, we don’t go to church.

But is that what God wants?

No. Our God loves us, and His love never changes; He is always reaching out to us, He wants us to go back to Him even if we have sinned. He does not want us to stay away.

Many of you would have experienced God’s love during your reconciliation the day before yesterday. God has been waiting for you to reconcile with Him.

Today we celebrate the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, that means Mother Mary was born without original sin. All of us are born with original sin but not Mary, because God had prepared her to be the Mother of Jesus.

So, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception is a celebration of the grace that God gave to Mother Mary, so that Jesus could be born into our world to be with us.

And so, we can always go to Mother Mary whenever we sin and are afraid to go back to God for reconciliation. She too would be calling out to us, “Where are you, my child?”, to invite us and encourage us to go back to God, to say sorry to Him and be united with Him again.

So, we ask Mother Mary, blessed virgin born without original sin, pray for us. Amen.


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