Homilies

Homily for the Second Sunday in Ordinal Time, January 16th, 2022

The most common word found in birthday cards is “special.” Happy Birthday to a special girl, a special boy, a special (fill in the blank). It is up to the person sending the birthday card to make the person celebrating his/her birthday feel special. This is done by accompanying the card with the gift of something that the recipient was dreaming of getting, but could not afford or by surprising him/her in unusual fashion or by splurging on him/her in a manner that is as far removed from the ordinary as possible. Nobody wants to be considered ordinary. We all need c

Homilies

Homily for the Baptism of The Lord, January 9th, 2022

Modern technology has developed amazing and, alas, at times also unsettling ways of identifying individuals by whatever is unique to each one, such as fingerprints, eye pupils and facial traits. However, when it comes to Baptism, there is no outward sign to tell a disciple of Christ apart from any other person. On an airplane, a bus, in a stadium, even in a church, there is no way of telling who is a Christian and who is not. Such is the lofty and mysterious realm of God’s calling. Today’s readings set us on the unfamiliar path of grace. In human affairs w

Homilies

Homily for the Solemnity of the Epiphany, January 2nd, 2022

  Even though today’s solemnity is one of the most ancient feasts of the Church, it is one of the hardest ones to understand. As soon as we hear the word Epiphany, the picture of the three kings from the East pops up in our mind and we get sidetracked away from the real significance of what we are called to celebrate, and to relive. To avoid this, I thought of simplifying its significance as much as possible. We all know that “Epiphany” means manifestation. But what is manifested? What is revealed to us?  What is its significance for us? It i

Homilies

Homily for the Holy Family of Nazareth, December 26th 2021

The size of the solemnity of Christmas should not dwarf the significance of the Feast of the Holy Family of Nazareth. And the reason is not a politically incorrect exaggeration but a simple reality check: our future as a Church and as a Nation hangs in the balance. The number of religious institutions that cling to this somber realization is dwindling: conservative Christian groups and the Catholic Church. That’s about it! For decades we had suspected that there were covert efforts to undermine the traditional family unit and replace it with new “progressive,”

Homilies

Homily for the Fourth Sunday of Advent, December 19th, 2021

Blessed are you among women.  Blessed is the fruit of your womb. Elizabeth said this to her young engaged but yet to be married cousin Mary. She said it to a thirteen, fourteen-year-old girl, pregnant out of wedlock and with her fiancé Joseph not being the baby’s father. At that time the incarnation of our God in our midst was hanging in the balance. If, for a variety of reasons, the Fruit of Mary’s womb had not grown to full gestation and be born, we would not be here celebrating the most astonishing fact in the history of humankind: God in human flesh like

Homilies

Homily for the Third Sunday of Advent, December 12th, 2021

Brace yourselves for a huge understatement: every single human being who ever existed, exists or will exist has happiness as his/her ultimate aspiration. After a moment of reflection, some might wonder: “What about those who kill themselves; those who are self-destructive? What about those enslaved by addictions such as alcohol, drugs, pornography, gambling, greed, lust for power, violence and any other enslavement that removes or reduces freedom considerably? What about those who wallow in self-pity and seek commiseration?” Those who reach the point of ending the

Homilies

Homily for the Second Sunday of Advent, December 5th, 2021

What St. Paul encourages us to reflect on in today’s 2nd reading (Philippians 1:4-6, 8-11),  could be a wonderful way of capitalizing on the holy season of Advent and it could be also a profitable program to carry out the rest of our life.   I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus…. that your love may increase ever more and more in knowledge and every kind of perception, to discern what is of value, so that you may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ… Wow!

Homilies

Homily for the First Sunday of Advent, November 28th, 2021

Let me start by stating what is painfully obvious: we are living in a very difficult, trying, unsettling time. To the seasonal surges of the Covid-19 add the barbaric and violent behavior of different splinter groups of Islam jihadists especially in Nigeria and Cameroun; add the forced conversions to Islam of  kidnapped Christian girls and loss of property and/or of life due to the “blasphemy law” in Pakistan; add the continuous threat of terrorism; add senseless violence; add concerted efforts to divide our Country, pitting one race against another;

Homilies

Homily for the 33rd Sunday in Ordinal Time, November 14th, 2021

This is what we heard from the 1st reading: It shall be a time unsurpassed in distress…Daniel: 12:1. And from the gospel: "But in those days after that tribulation the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, 25 and the stars will be falling from the sky, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken. Mark 13:24-25 Once we make the chances in terminology required by modern astronomy, what we have here predicted is the end of the world through a cosmic catastrophe. From time unmemorable, human beings have been forced occasionally to think about th

Homilies

Homily for the 32nd Sunday in Ordinal Time, November 7th, 2021

Today’s 1st reading (1 Kings 17:10-16) and Gospel passage (Mark 12:38-44)  force us to determine the degree of genuine dependency that we have on God. In other words, they show which concrete facts prove or discredit our claim of trusting in God with our very life, with our whole life, in all its facets. Extreme cases are offered to our consideration so that we are denied any wiggling room and any rationalization to claim that our dependency on God doesn’t have to be more than nominal. "As the LORD, your God, lives," she answered, "I have nothing baked; th