12/8/2014 – Immaculate Conception – Thursday - Luke 1:26 - 38; Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12

Tomorrow, on the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, I am celebrating two masses - one in English and the other bilingual (Spanish and English). Below is the homily in Spanish/English.   

      Even though today’s celebration of the Immaculate Conception is designated a holy day of obligation, even though it goes back to a belief developed in the early Church, some faithful Catholics today would have a difficult time explaining what this solemnity is all about.  When many of us hear the phrase “immaculate conception” in the midst of the Advent season as we are preparing the arrival of Christ into the world at Christmastime, we might think that this celebration is all about how Jesus was conceived in Mary’s womb miraculously and without sin.  This is even more true when we hear the Gospel reading of the Annunciation from Luke today.  Yet, today’s celebration is all about how Mary herself was conceived in her mother’s womb without sin.

        During the Advent season, we are on a journey of hope and joy as we prepare a place for the Lord in the our heart. Different prophets and signposts help us on that journey.  The Immaculate Conception is one of those signs, as our focus in the Gospel today is on the motherhood of Mary. As a priest, I cannot state too many times how important it is for us to remember that we don’t honor Mary for her own sake.  Rather Mary always points us in the direction of her Son.  She always is there to help us increase our faith in him, to develop our relationship with him. 

          Today’s solemnity of the Immaculate Conception honors Mary’s unique role in the history of salvation, for the redemption that is accomplished through the Son of God. In today’s Gospel, the Angel of the Lord greets Mary with these simple words: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you.” We pray these very words again and again each time we pray the rosary. C. Through our understanding that Mary herself was conceived without sin, through the dogma of the Immaculate Conception that was declared by Pope Pius IX in 1854, we are able to understand that even before the actual conception of our Savior Jesus Christ in his mother Mary’s womb, Mary is proclaimed full of grace by our Lord. 

           Today, we honor Mary as our Mother in our celebration of the Immaculate Conception.  As we strive to grow in our life of discipleship during this holy season of Advent, may we pray for ourselves and for our brothers and sisters, that we may all grow in our devotion to Mary and in our love for her.

               En nuestra celebración de la Inmaculada Concepción, escuchamos el Evangelio de San Lucas donde la Virgen María cooperó con Dios y ella aceptó la voluntad de Dios en su vida, a pesar de que las palabras que el ángel dijo fueron muy preocupante para ella al inicio.  Ella podría haber rechazado el mensaje traído por el ángel.  Ella podría haber seguido su propia voluntad y sus propios deseos.  Por María contestó afirmativamente a Dios y se convirtió en la primera discípulo de nuestro Señor Jesucristo.  María se sometió a la voluntad de Dios a pesar de que ella no entiende totalmente el mensaje del ángel.

            En la carta a los Efesios, Pablo nos llama a vivir en una vida de santidad, para vivir de una manera que alaba y glorifica a Dios.  María es un gran modelo para nosotros en cómo debemos vivir una vida de santidad, en la forma en que nosotros mismos debemos vivir como discípulos de Cristo. María no huyó de Dios en miedo - ella no buscó una solución rápida para tener una vida más fácil y con mas placer. Ella misma se sometió a Dios, para seguir su voluntad y para mirar las bendiciones que Dios le ha dado en su vida.  María decidió a dar a Dios gracias y alabanza.

        Hoy honramos a María como nuestra Madre en nuestra celebración de la Inmaculada Concepción.  En nuestro camino en este tiempo santo de Adviento, podamos orar por nosotros mismos y por nuestros hermanos, para que todos podamos crecer en nuestra devoción a María y en nuestro ternura por ella.

        En nuestra celebración de la Inmaculada Concepción, escuchamos el Evangelio de San Lucas donde la Virgen María cooperó con Dios y ella aceptó la voluntad de Dios en su vida, a pesar de que las palabras que el ángel dijo fueron muy preocupante para ella al inicio.  Ella podría haber rechazado el mensaje traído por el ángel.  Ella podría haber seguido su propia voluntad y sus propios deseos.  Por María contestó afirmativamente a Dios y se convirtió en la primera discípulo de nuestro Señor Jesucristo.  María se sometió a la voluntad de Dios a pesar de que ella no entiende totalmente el mensaje del ángel.

            En la carta a los Efesios, Pablo nos llama a vivir en una vida de santidad, para vivir de una manera que alaba y glorifica a Dios.  María es un gran modelo para nosotros en cómo debemos vivir una vida de santidad, en la forma en que nosotros mismos debemos vivir como discípulos de Cristo. María no huyó de Dios en miedo - ella no buscó una solución rápida para tener una vida más fácil y con mas placer. Ella misma se sometió a Dios, para seguir su voluntad y para mirar las bendiciones que Dios le ha dado en su vida.  María decidió a dar a Dios gracias y alabanza.

        Hoy honramos a María como nuestra Madre en nuestra celebración de la Inmaculada Concepción.  En nuestro camino en este tiempo santo de Adviento, podamos orar por nosotros mismos y por nuestros hermanos, para que todos podamos crecer en nuestra devoción a María y en nuestro ternura por ella.

12/8/2014 – Immaculate Conception – Thursday - Luke 1:26 - 38; Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12

       Even though today’s celebration of the Immaculate Conception is designated a holy day of obligation, even though it goes back to a belief developed in the early Church, some faithful Catholics today would have a difficult time explaining what this solemnity is all about.  When many of us hear the phrase “immaculate conception” in the midst of the Advent season as we are preparing the arrival of Christ into the world at Christmastime, we might think that this celebration is all about how Jesus was conceived in Mary’s womb miraculously and without sin.  This is even more true when we hear the Gospel reading of the Annunciation from Luke today.  Yet, today’s celebration is all about how Mary herself was conceived in her mother’s womb without sin.

        During the Advent season, we are on a journey of hope and joy as we prepare a place for the Lord in the our heart.  Different prophets and signposts help us on that journey.  The Immaculate Conception is one of those signs, as our focus in the Gospel today is on the motherhood of Mary.  As a priest, I cannot state too many times how important it is for us to remember that we don’t honor Mary for her own sake. Rather, Mary always points us in the direction of her Son.  She always is there to help us increase our faith in him, to develop our relationship with him. 

         Today’s solemnity of the Immaculate Conception honors Mary’s unique role in the history of salvation, for the redemption that is accomplished through the Son of God.  In today’s Gospel, the Angel of the Lord greets Mary with these simple words: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you.”  We pray these very words again and again each time we pray the rosary. Through our understanding that Mary herself was conceived without sin, through the dogma of the Immaculate Conception that was declared by Pope Pius IX in 1854, we are able to understand that even before the actual conception of our Savior Jesus Christ in his mother Mary’s womb, Mary is proclaimed full of grace by our Lord. 

           Mary cooperated with God and she accepted His will in her life, even though the words the Angel spoke were very troubling to her at first.  She could have rejected the message brought by the angel.  She could have followed her own will and her own desires.  By Mary saying yes to God and becoming a handmaid of the Lord, Jesus as the Word of God was made incarnate and brought into the world.  Mary submits herself to God’s will even though she doesn’t fully understand how this can be happening to her. 

           In the letter to the Ephesians, Paul calls us to live a life of holiness, to live in a way that praises and glorifies God.  Mary as truly the first disciple is a great model for us in how we should live a life of holiness, in how we ourselves should live as disciples of Christ. Mary does not run away from God in fear – she doesn’t look for a quick fix that would make her life easier and more full of earthly pleasures.  She submits herself to God, choosing to do his will and to look at the blessings that God has given her in her life.  Mary chooses to give God thanks and praise.  

           Today, we honor Mary as our Mother in our celebration of the Immaculate Conception.   As we strive to grow in our life of discipleship during this holy season of Advent, may we pray for ourselves and for our brothers and sisters, that we may all grow in our devotion to Mary and in our love for her.

12/9/2014 – Juan Diego – Tuesday of 2nd week of Advent – Isaiah 48:17-19;

        Sometimes God presents us with situations or tasks that seem to be just about impossible – we might not know how we'll ever get through them.  Imagine the task that was calling the prophet Isaiah.  He was called to provide hope to the people of Israel in the midst of gloom & doubt: to announce to those in exile in Babylon that God was on his way to deliver them. We hear Isaiah today trying to bring comfort to the people, telling them of a God that is tender and just.  In the midst of their suffering, Isaiah was telling them that they needed to prepare a path for the Lord in the midst of the desert wilderness.  What a tough message to bring in the midst of such misery: the people probably doubted that God had any power at all. How could the Israelites see themselves as God’s people, how could they see God’s love, compassion, and justice when they were demoralized & in exile?

         And we can imagine the context in which Juan Diego found himself as well. He is the saint we celebrate today.  In 1519, Hernan Cortes and the Spanish conquistadors had invaded the Aztec empire in present-day Mexico, declaring their victory over the native population in 1521.  We can only imagine how devastated and demoralized the native Azects were at that time.  Just 10 years later, in 1531, a 57 year-old native Mexican man named Juan Diego was making the 15-mile trek through the wilderness to attend mass.  A woman's voice called out to him in the midst of beautiful music from atop Tepeyac Hill.  This started the chain of events that led to the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  Juan Diego is said to have told the Virgin Mary in his humility: “I am a nobody.  I am a small rope, a tiny ladder, the tail end, a leaf.”  Yet God chose Juan Diego for a special task. Thanks to him, Our Lady of Guadalupe is one of just a handful of  confirmed apparitions of the Virgin Mary validated and recognized by the Catholic Church. 

         Even today, Our Lady of Guadalupe is the image of hope & liberation in the Mexican & Latin American psyche.  Go through a poor Mexican American neighborhood in Los Angeles, Albuquerque or other big cities in the United States you will see the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe everywhere. The image that Juan Diego brought into the world has so much meaning on so many levels even for us today. 
         Today, let us look to Juan Diego and Our Lady of Guadalupe as examples of faith, speaking out to us from a time & place so different from modern America, but the message they bring to us still resonates so clearly today, especially in the midst of our Advent journey when we ourselves are called to prepare a place in our hearts for the coming of the Lord.

12/7/2014 – Homilía del segundo domingo de adviento – ciclo B – Marcos 1, 1 – 18

       Estamos en el segundo domingo del adviento – cuatro semanas de preparación y espera antes de la navidad.  Hoy, escuchamos las primeras palabras del Evangelio de San Marcos.  Con las palabras del profeta de Isaías, el Evangelio empieza con una buena noticia para nosotros, con la buena noticia de Jesucristo, el Hijo de Dios.  Isaías nos dice que hay una voz que está gritando en el desierto, una voz que nos dice que necesitamos preparar un camino para la llegada de nuestro Señor, un camino recto.

        Muchos años después de las palabras de Isaías, Juan el Bautista llega en el desierto.  Juan el Bautista prepara un camino para nosotros.  En el tiempo de adviento, estamos en el desierto con nuestro Señor.  El desierto es un lugar donde los seres humanos tuvieron mucha experiencia con Dios, donde Dios estaba con su pueblo, donde Dios estaba con nosotros.  Dios estaba en el desierto con el pueblo de Israel cuando su pueblo estaba pasando por el desierto en su viaje después de su esclavitud en Egipto.  El desierto es un lugar de vida también - la vida que tenemos con Dios. 

         Tal vez, pensamos que estamos abandonados en el desierto, que estamos desolados.  Pero, no es la verdad, no es toda la historia.  Podemos encontrar Dios en el desierto en una nueva manera, en la soledad de este tiempo, en la palabra de Dios que está presente con nosotros en una manera especial. Juan estaba en el desierto bautizando la gente.  En verdad, no hay mucho agua en el desierto.  En el desierto, el agua tiene una identidad muy preciosa.  Para nosotros, en nuestra vida de fe, el agua es el símbolo de la vida nueva que tenemos en Cristo, en la buena noticia que nos da vida, en nuestra vida de fe que puede crecer y florecer en el desierto de adviento, en este tiempo de espera y esperanza.  Hay otros momentos de dificultad que tenemos en nuestra vida y en nuestro camino fe.  Hay enfermedades, hay momentos muy secos, hay sufrimientos y desafíos y problemas y luchas.  En estos momentos, podemos recordar con mucha ternura el desierto de Juan el Bautista, de su camino recto que el proclamó en su mensaje.   Juan proclamó al muchedumbre en Israel. Hoy, el proclama un mensaje para nosotros: que debemos convertirnos a Dios, que debemos cambiar nuestra manera de pensar, que debemos cambiar de actitud. 

       En la superficie, Juan el Bautista es alguien muy extraño.  El iba vestido de ropa hecha de pelo de camello y con un cinturón de cuero.  El comía langosta y miel del monte.  Pero, Juan hablaba la verdad; él predicaba el mensaje de Dios.  El preparaba el camino para la llegada de Jesús.  Y nosotros debemos predicar este camino en el desierto en nuestra vida también. 

12/7/2014 – 2nd Sunday of Advent – Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11, Mark 1:1-8

       The prophets cry out to us today on the 2^nd Sunday of Advent.  Yet, we have to make space for the voices of John the Baptist and Isaiah in our lives in order to truly hear their call.  In the midst of all the cell phone calls and text messages and emails we get each day, in the midst of the noise of the televisions and radios that are blaring everywhere, in the midst of the thoughts and ideas that are fillings our minds, we need to make space for this Advent message that the prophets bring.  Our modern world is full of many voices, many messages, a lot of noise.  There are many prophets out there, there are many messages.  We choose what message we are going to hear and believe. 

       The voice of John the Baptist cries out each year crying during our Advent journey.  Today, his cry comes from the very beginning of the Gospel of Mark.   John is considered the last of the great prophets of the nation of Israel.  As God’s messenger, he foreshadows the coming of Jesus into the world.   He cries out to us in the middle of the desert wilderness, a strange figure wearing clothing made out of camels hair, eating locusts and wild honey.    John calls out to the people to repent, to be baptized in the river Jordan in acknowledgement of their sinful ways.  If we met John the Baptist coming down Gloster Street here in Tupelo, we would probably label him a crazy person.  We probably wouldn’t want to listen to his message at all.

       Yes, as we hear John the Baptist, we recognize that Advent is a time of the year that is very different for us.  The purple/blue color that characterizes this season tells us that it is a time of repentance and renewal, that we are no longer in Ordinary Time.  While we hear Christmas carols on the radio already this time of the year, while we see the glimmer of garland and tinsel and Christmas lights all over the place, we don’t see a lot of decorations up yet in our church.  Our Advent journey recalls the very real encounter that the Israelites had with God as they journeyed through the wilderness to the promised land.  The wilderness recalls the brokenness and the lack of faith that the Israelites had along their journey.  But John the Baptist is not trying to lead us into a place that will cause fear to grow in our hearts, that will break us or destroy us. It’s quite the opposite. We are being led into our Advent journey as a place of renewal, hope, and joy, as a cleansing place where reflection and conversion can take place.  As Isaiah tells us, God sends out to us is a message of comfort.  Isaiah announces: “Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God.”  We are to be comforted in the midst of any struggles or confusion or frustration we have in our lives.

         Yes, there are a lot of hollow words and false prophets crying out in our world today.  However, God is still here in our land as well.  Christ is still alive. The true prophets of God are still trying to get God’s message across to us. Many in our world are not hearing the message of the prophets, the message of Advent, so we need to bring that message to them.  We need to testify to the world that we are preparing our hearts, that we are preparing a path to the Lord in the midst of the all the commercialism and materialism that has taken over the Advent message.

          As we listen to the voices of the prophets John the Baptist and Isaiah this morning, we need to listen to the voices of the prophets that God sends to our modern world.  I recently read an article I had gotten out of the Wall Street Journal a couple of years ago telling the story of a nun in the country of India named Sister Valsa John.   She had been working in a small community in India where a coal mining company forced the poor off their land and gave them very little compensation in return.  The government was so eager to have jobs and income that it gave little heed to rights of the people who were trampled in this process.  This sister in fact helped fight for compensation for the poor who were fighting for the rights, but the company failed to adhere to the agreement that was reached.  She removed herself from this community for several years due to death threats that were made against her, and when she finally went to visit this village again, she was beaten and hacked to death by a group of men who invaded the place where she was staying.  For me, Sister Valsa John is a true prophet in our time, someone who proclaimed the Gospel of Jesus Christ with her life and her work, making a path for the Lord in the world.   We are called to listen to the prophets that God sends to the world, to heed their call for justice and peace, to practice the values that they teach us in our own lives. 

         Just how are we making a path for the Lord in our own lives, in the midst of this busy season of preparation?  How and we listening to the prophets?  And how are we being prophets ourselves?

12/5/2014 – Friday of the First Week in Advent – Isaiah 29:17-24

        The prophet Isaiah contains a lot of prophecies that alter the reality of the world.  Earlier in the week, we heard a prophecy of peace, in which the lamb and the lion, mortal enemies in the world of nature, would lie down with each other in peace.  Today, we hear that the deaf will hear, the blind will see, and the poor will rejoice.   We know that this prophecy today found fulfillment in the healings and miracles that Jesus performed time and again in the Gospel. Isaiah ends today’s reading by saying that those who err in spirit will gain understanding, that those who find fault will receive instruction.  We can point fingers to those who fall under those categories, but that can describe all of us on occasion, can’t it?  All of God’s creation deserves to be treated with respect, doesn’t it?  All of us are called to seek greater understanding in the ways of the faith, aren’t we?  And we all be blind and deaf to certain things around us, to the truth that God calls us to seek.  Jesus healed two men in today’s Gospel.  They believed. They received healing.   During this Advent season, may we recognize the ways we need to have our eyes and ears opened.   May we believe. May we be healed. 
           I will close my homily with this Advent prayer: Loving God, I don't have the right words. I'm not sure where to begin, but I know you are the hope and promise of the peace to come in my life. Be with me this day. Let me look at my life and my day today and open my heart completely: "Come, Lord Jesus. Come into my heart." 

12/4/2014 – Thursday of the first week of Advent – Matthew 7:21, 24-27

      When I was in Rome a few years ago, I heard an interesting story.  St Paul’s Basilica is one of the 4 major basilicas in Rome.  Nicknamed – St Paul’s Outside the Walls – because it is located outside the walls of the ancient city of Rome.  Tradition had it that St Paul was buried there where the basilica was built – but over time this became a legend and no one remembered exactly where he was buried on the grounds. Tradition had it that he was buried right beneath the altar. However, when they tried to excavate there, it seemed like they hit a hard layer of rock, so they abandoned their efforts to dig under the altar.  They searched other places on the grounds of the basilica, but could not find his remains.  Finally, they went back to right below the altar, realizing that what they thought was a layer of rock was really just very hard soil.  They excavated their, finding the remains of St Paul.  They are on display today in the basilica. 

     We can build our lives in different ways, can't we?  There are different messages and values that cry out to us in this world – and we can build our lives on those things.  However, we are called to build our lives on the Gospel – on our relationship with Christ – that is the solid ground that Jesus talks about in the Gospel.  That is what we are called to examine during our journey during Advent: to look at the ground on which our lives are built and to renew the foundation that is built on Christ.