Catholic Homilies by Fr Linus Clovis: Recent Episodes
Fr Linus Clovis
Podcasts from Family Life International including Catholic Homilies from Fr Linus Clovis (Spiritual Director).
In Part 2 Anthony continues on the general theme on the parallels of the holocaust and Abortion. We now see in society that there is an intolerance for the support of the pro-life view. Politicians and ordinary people shy away from expressing any positive view in defending the child in the womb should the mother not want it. Further the pro-life advocate is regarded as an extremist with views that cannot be supported by populist politicians
Anthony, comments on the parallels between the Holocaust of the 1930's and the current killing of children in the womb throughout the world by Abortion. He shows that the abortion industry is by its very nature equivalent to the holocaust, the context may be different but the aggregate act is the same but far more numerous. The systematic mass slaughter of innocent human beings today through abortion in most Western society is regarded as a right.
Marxists gradually realized they could dismantle Western, Christian, Civilization from within by destroying the father of the intact married family --- the “Patriarch”--- through “sex gone wild”. The key to rebuilding is for each father to take charge of his sons’ formation in the fullness of sexuality.
Having presented to us the three eminent good works, fasting, alms giving and prayer, our Lord goes on to tell us the manner by which we should pray. Namely the things that we should pray for and the way in which we should make our pray. The first thing He says is do not babble like the pagans. How do pagans pray? Well pagans who basically are polytheist, they believe in many gods, and they presume that these gods need to be placated, they need to be enticed, they need to be encouraged, to be favourable. The gods of the pagans are not gods of love, they do not care for their people, they certainly will assist them but often they expect to be served by them. It doesn’t really matter which pagan society we look at. Whereas the God of Abraham, in the eyes of the Jews, someone remote, a master who cared for them, who was interested in what they did, but who also demanded from them, obedience. Whereas Christ has revealed to us that the God whom we serve is a Father, and will and wants our greatest good. Namely because He is our Father He wants us to be in His home and He’s presented to us the various means by which we can travel to His home… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Four times our Lord calls Himself the bread from heaven. The forth time He said I am the living bread which has come down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever and the bread I shall give is My flesh for the life of the world. As long as He called Himself the bread, whilst it was difficult to accept nonetheless the Jews didn’t grumble. They still hoped that somehow there was a metaphor, there was some symbolism, some figurative speech and that He would give them the manna. They came to Him for the manna. They wanted to be fed again as He did on the other side of the lake. Our Lord indeed wants to feed them as He wants to feed us. But He wants to give us not bread that perishes but the bread that gives eternal life which is Himself… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
So far our Lord is speaking of His divinity; He’s now in the second part of His discourse going to speak about His humanity. In the beginning of St. John’s gospel we heard ‘…in the beginning was the word, the word was with God and the word was God…’, we read that ‘…the word was life and the word was the light of men, and that he enlightens all those who come to him…’. We read that ‘…the word was made flesh and he dwelt amongst us…’. Then we read whilst Moses gave us the law, it is Christ who gives us truth and grace. Our Lord is speaking to the crowds and He insists they believe in Him, which is really a claim to divinity, because the only person we can truly believe in without fear is God… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
We recall that the miracle of the loaves occurred just before the feast of the Passover. That’s why there were so many people around because they were making their way up to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. So the only way to get there was by foot and so they were walking and they encountered our Lord who taught them at some length. He fed them with the five loaves and the two fish, He cross the sea on foot, He came to Capernaum, the crowd followed Him. They hungered for the bread that He had given. They had eaten as much as they wanted. But our Lord was offering them something more than bread for the belly. So begins the great discourse about the Eucharist.… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
There is a reference to St. Mark whose feast we celebrate today and St. Paul who associates him with his first missionary journey. We know very little about the lives of the apostles beyond what is related in the gospels and certainly the same for the Evangelists. What information we have, we depend upon the tradition to give us most of it. We know that Mark was closely associated with St. Peter and in some places St Irenaeus calls him St. Peter’s secretary. St. Peter preached and it’s interesting for the fact that St. Peter was the prince of the apostles; we only have 2 letters from him. He preached extensively in Antioch and then later in Rome, then according to St Irenaeus the people of Rome begged Peter to put down something, to write a gospel about the life of Our Lord, which Peter didn’t do. Mark did and so Mark expresses the life of Christ as seen by St. Peter.
Our Lord, according to St. Johns Gospel had gone up to Jerusalem and there He cleansed the temple. This was the first cleansing of the temple, He cleansed it twice. That is He cast out the traders from the temple precinct on two occasions, once at the very beginning of His ministry and this is the one St. John records and at the end which the other three Evangelists record. When He did it the first time, the authorities said, what sign will You give for what You have done. We have given the permission for the sale of animals in the temple precinct. What sign will you give to show this is wrong… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
We are obliged to believe that the Holy Scriptures written by the Holy Spirit are true. And even though they have been written by the Holy Spirit or perhaps especially because they have been written by the Holy Spirit they need someone to interpret them. Just as with great literature Shakespeare, Dante or even Caesar, they have written works but they need to be interpreted, they need to be explained. We can easily pick up Shakespeare read it and get nothing from it, because we have not been trained either to interpret or because the difficulty of the language or because we just don’t have that ability or gift. So we have scholars who spend years just examining human works, how much more so must it be for the Scriptures. But the Lord has made things very easy for us in as much as he has given us the interpreter of the Scriptures namely the Church which speaks with the Holy Spirit… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Today there are many sceptics who doubt the resurrection of Blessed Lord. In fact there was a few years ago, when the bishop of Durham the Anglican denied the resurrection and even among Catholics Bishops there some have expressed doubt about the reality of the resurrection. Well they are not original because the Apostles doubted the resurrection of our Lord. The Holy women, who were blessed to see Him first even before the Apostles, doubted the resurrection of our Lord. When Peter at Pentecost Sunday stood up and preached to the Jews, he had great difficulty in convincing them of the reality of the resurrection. In fact we heard as he was preaching, he spoke to them for a long time using many arguments and he urged them to save themselves from this perverse generation… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
A crisis is a moment of decision, a time of testing. That the Church is currently in a state of crisis is clear for all to see. The daily unfolding scandals of clerical sexual immorality from priests to cardinals, the financial chicanery enveloping the Vatican Bank, the institutional cover-ups, the shrinking congregations, the open opposition between bishops, the undermining of settled doctrine all point to a time of testing and of answering the question “Why be Catholic”.
Our Lord worked His first miracle in Cana, Galilee that was the changing of water into wine. He works His last miracle in Galilee, the miraculous catch of fish. Of course there is a connection because in Cana, He was told they had no wine and here in the sea of Tiberius they have no fish. And so we learn that Christ is the only one who can provide for our needs, whatever we lack. Simon Peter, with the other apostles weren’t sure when they would next see our Lord… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Christ has truly risen as he said He would. St. Paul in the letter to the Colossians, tells us we should keep our eyes fixed on heaven where Christ is. Christ is our head, and one thing we know about the Head is that it has a body and in particular we speak about the mystical body of Christ, of which we are members. We are the branches that have been grafted onto the vine. What the head suffers the body likewise suffers. What the body suffers the head also suffers. We have our Lord’s own word for this in the case of the latter He says what the body suffers the head suffers and the classic example of this is Saul on the way to Damascus… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
In the sequence there’s that little verse ‘death and life fight they contended a combat strangely ended. Life itself is slain yet lives to reign.’ Always when we celebrate the sacred mysteries we need to recall all these realities. That’s what they are, they maybe mysterious but none the less they are realities, constantly to mind. In this way our own spirits will remain buoyant and full of hope. The disciples of our Lord didn’t expect His resurrection though He had spoken of it on many occasions. Even though it had been prophesised by the prophets of old and we heard St. Peter speaking of this on Pentecost Sunday, he says David had prophesised… ... For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
The first sorrowful mystery describes the agony of our Lord in the garden and it’s interesting that the three of the evangelists speak about the agony of our Lord. First of all he takes a journey down to the garden which St. John describes. Arriving at the garden He leaves eight of the apostles at the entrance to the garden He takes the other three to the inner most part of the garden. The three that He took were privy to several of His miracles in particular the resurrection of the girl from the dead; secondly they were privy to the transfiguration which was to strengthen them for the scandal of the cross... For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Rediscovering our Eucharistic faith is key to evangelisation. The Sacred Host is God present among us, without Whom we can do nothing, let alone evangelise. The deeper our Eucharistic faith, the more fruitful our witness to the world. The Church grows from the Eucharistic Sacrifice, Presence and Communion. Committed Eucharistic adorers will foster lasting evangelisation.
Our Lord has taken the disciples to Caesarea Philippi and He asked them the question, who do people say the son of man is? The Apostles gave varying answers; some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, Jeremiah, one of the Prophets. But you, He said, who do you say I am? You who have been with me these past few years, you who have seen the miracles, you who have been present at the multiplication of the loaves, the healing of the sick, the restoration of the sight to the blind, the healing of paralytics, the raising of the dead. Who do you say I am?... For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
“The gates of hell shall not prevail” against the church, not even the hell of sexual abuse. How did we get there? How do we get out? By inspiration, conversion and purification. The beautiful plan of God for man and woman, sex, marriage and family is the answer to the longing in every human heart.
As we celebrate Mass we begin by thinking what we are about to do namely to celebrate the sacred mysteries. In the opening prayer this morning we prayed that, may your people exalt forever o God in renewed youthfulness of spirit. So that rejoicing now in the restored glory of our adoption we look forward in confident hope to the rejoicing of the day of the resurrection. So we have the restored glory of our adoption. We haven’t had anything new, but rather what was new, what we had originally… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Our Blessed Lord had fed the multitude. They saw the miracle of the five loaves with 5000 men not counting women and children. There were scraps left over. Immediately they said this is the Prophet and they wanted to come and make Him king. To which the Lord's response was to tell the disciples to go across the lake and He Himself disappeared into the hills, by Himself. As we heard after Jesus had fed the five thousand the disciples had saw Him walking on the water… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Our Lord speaking to Nicodemus said that as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness so the Son of man must be lifted up. Then immediately Nicodemus questioned the purpose of the Crucifixion. Our Lord says God loved the world so much that He gave his only Son so that anyone who believes in Him may have eternal life... For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
The people that asked our Lord, what must we do if we are to do the works of God. Jesus answered this is working for God, you must believe in the one He has sent. He didn’t say you must believe the One He has sent but you must believe in the One He has sent and there is a great difference between the two… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Our Lord speaking to the crowds said I am the Bread of Life. If we go back to the Greek, we notice that the word Our Lord used life is not as we in English understand. In Greek there are two words for life that have come into the English Language. One is biology… For more homilies from Fr. Linus Clovis please visit www.adjesum.org/homilies
Signs miracles, Saint Paul tells us are for unbelievers. And they are given to unbelievers for a warning because indeed an unbeliever might see a sign and still not repent. There are many examples of that, in history as well as of course, in the scriptures. The wise men came from the east to Jerusalem because they had seen a sign and they believed and they undertook the journey. They arrived in Jerusalem – and they spoke of this sign. “Where is the Infant king we have seen His star and we have come to do Him homage”. And yet Herod didn’t believe… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We live in an age of deception. Which tells us nothing other, of course, than that which St. Maximilian told us one hundred years ago. He said that modern times increasingly would be dominated by Satan. His influence would be so great, that not even the wisest or the strongest man would be able to resist him. Those who will be able to escape the deception are those who are particular consecrated to the Immaculate Virgin. It is to She and She alone, that God has given the power to overcome the evil one with his deception. The art, the skill, the tool that Satan uses today, is that of words. No longer are we exact and precise in our language and in our use of words. So there is increasing confusing and misunderstanding and worst no knowledge of the truth. Satan is exceedingly cunning. He will not tell us an outright lie, he knows we are intelligent enough to detect it. But what he will do, is to mix a single grain, a poisonous lie, tiny undetectable and let that lie, like yeast do its work. So when he approached our first parents, or rather our first mother. As we know, Adam was not deceived, Eve was. He said… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
In the opening chapter of Genesis at the creation we hear how the Lord God created all things; time, space, light and darkness, the globes of Heaven, the Earth, how He created the creatures. We are told at each point, each day of the creation; God looked at it and saw that it was good. In a certain sense it is a proclamation of who God is, because all of His works are good. Now if all of God’s works are good, it means He Himself is good. The essence of goodness, the source of goodness is love… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
I will put enmities between thee & the woman & thy seed and her seed by Fr Linus Clovis
St. Thomas Aquinas who is known for his wisdom but above all for his clarity of thought, says “what is first thought of is the last thing that is executed”. If you want to do something, you have to make preparations for it. For example, Our Lord speaking in the Gospels tells us, “Which one of you wanting to build a tower would not first sit down, calculate how much it would cost and then begin to build”, so the first thought is to build a tower, the last thing you do is actually build it. Equally we think of the building of the temple in Jerusalem, where David wanted to build the temple. However because his hands had shed so much blood, God did not allow him to build the temple but rather his son Solomon. So what did David do, he made the preparations; he got the gold, the silver the bronze, the metals, the lead, the wood, the stone and the craftsmen. He had them all ready. Then the building of the temple was that of Solomon. The end was a temple, glorious to be seen from the description given to it by Scripture and secular authors. So the first idea we have, we need to make preparations to complete it. Since we are made in the image and likeness of God, we should think that God also works in that way, not that He needs to, but that we might understand what He is doing. So when we read the book of Genesis, the first chapter, we see that God takes six days to build this world. Already the Angels had been created. The book of Genesis begins, “In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.” We’re not told how the Heavens were created, but we are certainly told how the Earth was created… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Blessed Lord speaks to us, Saint Matthew relates that He spoke to the crowds and to His disciples and although He did this some two thousand years ago in the flesh, none the less He speaks to us today, the crowds and His disciples in the spirit and certainly in the authentic teaching of His Church. He says the scribes and Pharisees sit on Moses chair, so practice and observe what they tell you and not what they do. For they preach but do not practise. St. Thomas would always make a distinction and what is striking is, that the scribes and Pharisees, many of them were priests, and Our Lord didn’t say the priests sit on Moses chair, but rather he made the distinction of those who separate themselves from others. At the same time, Our Lord didn’t want to speak badly of Moses and the Mosaic authority, how could He since this was delivered to us by God. In addition to this St. Paul and St. Peter both tell us, that all authority comes from God. That is essentially why we respect, we honour and we obey because this is the way in which God speaks to us. But we need always to make distinctions which Our Lord certainly does, practise and observe what they tell you. It is understood that as long as what they tell us is not contrary to Gospel, not contrary to the teachings of Christ and certainly not contrary to the teaching of the Church. But He says we have to be careful in what we see them do. How does this apply to us today? In many ways we know what the Church has always taught, throughout the centuries the Church has always taught us the things that belong to God and has defined it in the sacred Councils, in the authentic teachings of the Magisterium, by the lives and the teachings of the saints that are recognised by the Church… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio
When our Blessed Lady came to Fatima a hundred years ago, in June of that year, as she was about to depart, she showed the children her Immaculate Heart, which they described, she was holding in her hand and it was surrounded by thorns. We think of what that means, surrounded by thorns. Where do these thorns come from? We should not be surprised to find that the thorns in fact represent sin, because it is sin that wounds the heart of Our Lord and consequently necessarily it must wound the heart of his Mother. But these thorns have their origin at the very dawn of creation. The moment our forefather, Adam sinned, at that moment, the thorns began to grow. We know this from the words of the Lord God Himself, who after He had punished the serpent, on your belly you will go, after He punished the woman, your desire will be for your husband, he will lord it over you, in child birth you will bear children in pain, he turned to the man, by the sweat of your brow will you will eat bread. The earth which up to now has borne you fruit will now start to bear thorns… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We are now in the month of November, and the Churches liturgical year is winding down to its end and soon it will be a new liturgical year. So the Church, as we come to the end of the year reminds us of the four last things, namely Death, Judgment which follows it, then Hell and Heaven. It’s important that we reflect on these things at least once a year, though ideally we should do it every day since we do not know when our last day will be. So in November, the Church reminds us of the Holy Souls, those who linger in Purgatory, where they expiate temporal punishment due to their sins. Of course it’s important that we understand the meaning of this doctrine which the Church offers for us especially as this year we recall the Protestant revolution, that the doctrine of purgatory and with it Indulgences were so brutally savaged, attacked. Also in this year 2017, a hundred years ago, Our Blessed Lady came to Fatima and reminded us of the reality of that Dogma, that teaching, namely Death, Judgement, Hell and Heaven. If we start with the apparition of Our Lady, the three children of Fatima in the Cova in May the 13th… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our blessed Lord speak to us, His little flock. He tells us, we ought not to be afraid. For the simple reason that our Father has given us a Kingdom. In another place He tells us that, towards the end of His life when He speaks the parable of the Great Judgement, how the sheep and goats will be separated, He says take as your possession the Kingdom prepared for you before the foundation of the World. In another place He tells us that God’s Will is our salvation. St. Paul tells us, God does not wish anyone to be lost. He did not create Hell for us but for the devil. There are some very foolish people that believe God has made some for salvation and others for damnation. No, all of us are meant to inherit the Kingdom, but it is left all to our free choice. And knowing this we should not be afraid we should have confidence and faith in God Who wishes our salvation… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
This evening I wanted to explore the Eucharist as a sacrament and a sacrifice. We speak of the Mass as the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. There is a connection between the Eucharist and the Mass. If we begin with the examination of the two; the Eucharist is a sacrament and it is a sacrifice. These two words sacrament and sacrifice need to be explained. The sacrament and the sacrifice of the Eucharist are performed in the same consecration. When the bread and wine are consecrated at the moment we have a sacrament and sacrifice, yet they are two different concepts. The Eucharist is a sacrament, why? Because in it we receive Christ, that is, we are nourished when we eat. So it is nourishment for our souls. It is a sacrifice, because in the Eucharist we offer a gift to God… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The Eucharist is a vast topic, it is essentially about God Incarnate, Christ who dwells amongst us, God who wishes to live with us. When we read St. John’s Gospel, we hear, ‘I will come to them’, ‘he who believes me, I will come to him, My Father will come to him, We will dwell with him’. This desire for God to dwell with us, is something we cannot even begin to grasp. We want to be with God, yet when we look at God’s creation, it seems to be so much more attractive. But if so much of what we see is beautiful, how much more beautiful must be He who created it. Whilst we admire, whilst we love the creation, the visible world that we see, we must remember that there’s a creator, an author and someone who has originated it and He must be much more satisfying and beautiful to us… For Fr. Linus’ complete retreat on the Holy Eucharist please listen to the Audio.
What do we have that has not been given us? There is only one thing that is essentially our own, and that of course is our sins. Everything else is a gift to us, we begin with the gift of life. This is the most basic, this is the fundamental gift. If we do not have life, if we never existed we cannot possess any other gift. So, once God had brought us, as is said, loved us into existence; because He loves everything He creates. Once He’s loved us into existence, He then adds gifts to us. The gifts are those of the body and then He adds those of the soul. Then those of the spirit. We are meant to use these gifts as stewards, we are not lords or masters of the gifts God has given us, but we are to use them as stewards. That means we are to use them for the greater glory of God, for the assistance and the help of our neighbour, and of course for the salvation of souls. If we are to do this, we must have a clear vision of what we are and who we are. What are we? We are creatures, created by God and therefore dependent upon Him. Who are we? We are children of God, sons and daughters, brought into the very household of God, called to share the eternal banquet that the Father has prepared for us, since the foundation of the world. We can only keep this vision of what we are and who we are, we can only keep this vision in mind if we really understand ourselves. Understanding ourselves in as much as, our time here on Earth is limited and that we have to answer for each and every day that we are here. If our vision of who we are and what we are shifts to what we possess and in the Gospel our Lord speaks specifically about wealth and we start to evaluate ourselves according to what we possess, we are going to be in serious trouble. ‘What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul?’ Now we shouldn’t think that money, that tainted thing is not in itself evil, because God has created wealth. He has loaned it to us as stewards… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today we celebrate the annunciation of Our Lord. The great mystery of the union between God and man. When majesty puts on lowliness, where power puts on meekness, where eternity puts on time and immortality puts mortality. These are the words of the great pope, St. Leo the first. We are in the midst of this great mystery, the mystery of our redemption. How can we contemplate it? If we are to summarise it, we can say one thing, that humility confronted pride. Divine humility confronts human pride. We know from the scriptures, we know from the teaching of the fathers, that the greatest sin of all is pride. It is to overcome our pride that God displayed this incredible humility which we are even unable to fully grasp. What is pride? Pride is many things, yet one thing is certain it’s the root of the first sin. The first explosion of pride is found in the angel who dared to say he would be like God. This in fact gives is immediately an idea of what pride is, to be like God. But then we think about it didn’t God make us in His own image and likeness? Aren’t we commanded even by the Lord, that we should be like our Father in heaven? Yes, all of that is true, so how does pride fit into this? We have been made in the image and likeness of God and we are commanded to be like God. That was the temptation that was presented to our first parents. ‘You can be like gods knowing good and evil’ and here we have exactly what pride is. We have been made in the image and likeness of God and therefore we are to be like God in some things and in other things we cannot be like God. In any attempt to be like God in those other things is a rebellion against God. So the things we are to be like God consist of mercy, being mercy as your heavenly Father is merciful. We are to be compassionate even as our heavenly Father is compassionate… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Quite some years ago, President, Vice President at that time George Bush, represented the US government at the funeral of the recently deceased former Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. Bush was deeply moved, clearly by the behaviour at the funeral of Brezhnev widow. During the whole ceremony, she didn’t say anything at all, she stood there completely motionless, until just before they were about to close the tomb, coffin. And then this old lady did, what probably was the greatest act of civil disobedience in the history of the world. She came over to his tomb, leant over and very clearly traced the sign of the cross on his chest. Here in the citadel of atheistic communistic power, she makes a gesture to say her husband was wrong. That this so-called utopia on Earth was wrong. She showed her belief in the real utopia, the place where our Lord Jesus Christ is the President, Paradise. Why? Well in His ministry Jesus raised from the dead the daughter Jairus, “talitha kum”, she comes back to life. He raised the son of the widow of Nain. And as we have heard today He raised Lazarus after being in the tomb four days. Witnessed by, I don’t know how many witnesses. This is the crowning miracle of Jesus’ ministry. The widow of Leonid Brezhnev, believed this and believed the words Jesus said to Martha, “I Am the resurrection and the life, whoever believes in Me, even if he dies he will live”. He finished by saying, “Do you believe this Martha?” Jesus Christ asks us the same question as He asked Martha. Do you believe I’m the resurrection and the life. Do you believe I can mend your wounds and brokenness? Do you believe? Jesus promises resurrection in the new world but also fullness of life in this world. He makes not just a promise about the future, but also an invitation here in the present to resurrect, change and convert our own lives and then the lives of those around us. The lives of those around us, we can touch and change. How? St. Paul made it very clear in the letter today. If the spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you. The One who raised Him from the dead will give life to you also. Life through His spirit dwelling in you… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
A silly illustration, but one which is necessary for a difficult topic. Once upon a time the was a place called Flatland. And in Flatland, Mr Square was walking along one day. This is a two dimensional world, boring place. Mr Square met someone though that changed his life forever, Mr Sphere. Mr Sphere said he came from a different place called Spaceland, which was three dimensional. Mr Square had no experience of a three dimensional world what so ever. He couldn’t fathom what he was talking about in any way. But he believed him. Mr Sphere was a nice chap and he believed him. He was convincing. But later on, talking to other inhabitants of Flatland, Mr Square was taken to be a crazy person, because they had no experience whatsoever of a three dimensional world that he was talking about. This is a silly illustration, but it’s not that different to where we find ourselves if we think about and imagine the Holy Trinity. Because the Holy Trinity is a multi dimensional being. We have no experience of this. Human beings are one person but God is three persons. We have no experience of this. The only way we can try and conceive it is through illustrations. St. Patrick used the Shamrock, sometimes we use the triangle or other geometric shapes. But these are very basic finite illustrations attempting to explain the infinite God. There’s only so far you can go. For this reason, if we can take one step further and understand one more thing about the Holy Trinity today, this homily would have been a success. To keep it simple I would like to say what the Holy Trinity is not and something to do with what it is. First, the Holy Trinity is not what heresies claim it to be. Just remember what a heresy is. It’s when an opinion is presented which is contrary to the Holy Scripture and the Dogmas of the Church. For example, if the Scripture says in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God, and then the Word came and dwelt amongst us… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
So we’re talking about the communion of Saints today. But a silly joke first. There was a painter and decorator, called Jock. He was very dishonest, he was habituality dishonest in his work, because he thinned out his paint with turpentine. Well one day the Church was up for renovation, the parish priest offered people the chance to put in their bids. But Jock got the job, because he put in the lowest bid, because he used the cheapest paint. However, on the first day of work, he just about finished the first coat of paint on the front of the Church, when the heavens opening up the rain started to come down and not only did Jocksy, all that paint get washed off, it was so thin that it hadn’t even dried. But he also fell of the scaffolding. Landed on the lawn, but he wasn’t hurt thankfully. But he did understand that this was a message from God. So he said Lord I’m sorry, forgive me what shall I do. Hands clasped together. The heavens bellowed out through the thunder, repaint, repaint and thin no more. God has a sense of humour, God is able to forgive any sin, give a second chance. Everybody deserves a second chance, but we Catholics shouldn’t have to ask a second chance in these habitual life sins. We can fall into sin, but to be in a habitual sin like Jock there, that doesn’t correspond to a person who is in the communion of saints… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
There was a great British writer called G K Chesterton and he said, the difficulty I have in explaining why I am Catholic, is because there are ten thousand reasons, but all those reasons amount to one, Catholicism is true. Mr Chesterton believed in the Holy Catholic Church, I believe in the Holy Catholic Church and indeed we have reached this article of our faith today, which is I believe in the Holy Catholic Church. We are going to look at these three parts of this article of faith today. We’re going to start back to front. Church, what does church mean? It’s a translation of the Latin word ecclesia, which is a translation of the Greek word ekklesia, which means to call out from, to assemble to convocated, it means convocation, convocation of who? The Holy people of God, why are they Holy, because the assembly to which they belong is Holy. I believe in the Holy Catholic Church. Why is she Holy? Well, Our Lord is the fount and source of all holiness, right? But our Lord is present in the Church, like no other organisation. That’s why St. Paul calls the Church the body of Christ. His Church, His Body. This Church, this Ecclesia, this body of Christ is an instrument by which Christ sanctifies the world, by those who want to be sanctified… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
I said we were going to talk about the article of Faith, ‘I believe in the forgiveness of sins’, principally that refers to sins being forgiven, original sin, through baptism. But people sin after baptism, people need forgiveness. Jesus also came to give another type of forgiveness, the type that Zacchaeus received. Forgiveness of sins, it’s a get out of jail card for every time we commit grave sin. That’s what we’ll talk about today. Suppose one of your friends offended you, was nasty, hurt your feelings. But later on they came back and said they were sorry. You probably forgive them, because you’d probably have many different reasons to forgive them. For instances, perhaps you are a person whose of an easy going nature and you don’t want the hassle of a feud, so you forgive. Or maybe you’re a person who forgives the other one, because she moves in better circles. She’s little miss popular, and you want to stay moving in those circles so you forgive her for that reason. Or maybe you just don’t like drama, no great harm hasn’t be done… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Before we introduce a theme and we talked about virtue we mentioned that virtue is a good habit, which prepares a person, to act, to carry out other actions in accordance with right reason. To act rationally. With all moral virtues, justice, fortitude, prudence, any of these, right reason indicates to the person with regards to their actions, the right measure, the need of moderation. The virtue we focus on today is temperance, this specially measures, moderates and even teaches us to hold back the most animalistic inclinations that we have. I like to talk about today what this virtue is, why it is important and what are those vices which are contrary to it, which will diminish ouch chances of growing the virtue of temperance. So, what is it? In the wider sense, it means moderation in actions and passions – like all the virtues. But in the strict sense – temperance means – moderation in the sensual and the carnal pleasures… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
So today we want to focus on the virtue of Justice. But to make it a little bit easier for the younger ones here, a little story that highlights the main elements. There was a young price called Prince Lapio. He was making a lot of mistakes in the kingdom because he didn’t have good judgement. He used to decide cases in favour of the person who was better looking, the best dressed, who was charming. A lot of people complained to the king, so he decided to send his son off Prince Lapio, with one of his councillors to settle various disputes in the kingdom so that the Prince might learn the nature of justice. First they got to this place where there were two tribes. The Minimums and the Maximums, these guys shared with each other food stuffs. The Minimums were hunters, so they provided the meat. The Maximums were the farmers so they provided the fruits and vegetables. But they didn’t know how to make a fair sharing. So the wise men asked the Prince to think about it and then to give his judgement. The Prince said, ‘well I think it’s just that there is equality, so everybody, we divide the food up so everybody gets the same share’. But the Maximums, they were terrified by this, they were very upset, because they were going to starve. Why? The tribe of the Maximums were a small tribe, but they were big men and they used to eat an awful lot. Where as the tribe of the Minimums, they were tiny little fellers, they didn’t eat a lot but there were thousands of them. So the Prince had to think about this again. He had to take counsel from the wise man. Then he came up with this decision ‘Get the food and divide to each person according to their condition’, in other according to as much as each person needs to survive… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We’ve been studying together about virtue. Fair question though, is if we are talking about fortitude, who do we consider strong? Who do we consider courageous? The soldier who defends his country in battle, certainly. Any person who risks their life to save someone else’s life, certainly. There are also examples which are less well known, courage. Take the young lady for example, she’s pregnant. She gets pressured by family friends, boyfriend, partner, whatever, to get rid of the baby, for trivial selfish reasons. But she says no, she insists on no. Take the man in the workplace, he’s offered a promotion, more money, an easy career path if he will go against his principles. But he says no, he insists no, against what everyone else is saying to him. It takes courage, newspapers don’t write about that a lot. But this is written in our conscious and most of all, these acts of courage a written God’s book of our life. Today, I wish to pay tribute to all the unknown courageous people, who have the strength to say no to the bad and yes to the good, even when they have to pay a price. Today I wish to pay tribute to those who love truth, seek justice and righteousness, even when they had to pay the price. I want to pay tribute to all of them today by making an effort to teach about this virtue which animated all of them, Fortitude. We will hear what this virtue is. How to obtain it, how to maintain it. The impediments to it, in other words how we might loose it. But first, I think there is a nice story, a true story which illustrates why it’s such an important virtue. For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We are good people. But we all know, that just as it’s hard to become better, it’s very easy to become worse. We know that we become better by the practise of virtue, God makes us the light of the world the salt of the earth. But we become worse by the practice of vice. Over the last year and a half since I got here, I have had the occasion to talk about sin and vice. I have been very surprised at the reception with which people have accepted this topic. It takes humble people to accept humiliations. Every time we talk about sin and vice, there is an accusation for all of us because none of us are perfect. So frankly I’m a little humbled, that it’s been received so well. Difficult topics. However, as I promised a couple of weeks ago we’re going to turn that over now. Let’s put vice aside for a while and concentrate on that beautiful aspect, which is virtue, virtue. I want us to know more about it, I want us to love it, I want each and everyone of us to be more virtuous. So what will we say about virtue. We’ll say what it is, how we can obtain it, why we should obtain it, why it’s necessary. Not only for salvation in that life, but because it’s very useful in this life. Any virtue, the virtues. But first a little bit of background. All of us have habits, some good and some bad. Habits that we have acquired through routines through the repetition of certain actions. Bad actions form bad habits, and bad habits form vices. A person smokes one or two cigarettes a day, ok it’s not the end of the world. Ten years later, that grows to 10, 20 30 a day… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We enter into this new set of teachings today on the four cardinal virtues. What’s the motive? It’s quite simple really. This is the overarching point. If we do not prepare the natural terrain, God will not enrich us supernaturally. If we do not have the principle natural virtues, God will not give us the supernatural virtues. Or not enrich us with supernatural virtues which as we studied last year, faith hope and charity. Problem is if we without the supernatural virtues, we’re without salvation. So it’s very important to prepare the terrain, this is the purpose of the next five weeks of homilies. Today’s an introduction to the topic, in which we will look a little bit of the human being. The different bits of the human being, particularly focusing on the passions, because as we will see in the weeks ahead, the passions are controlled by us or they control us. The controlled by us if we have virtues, virtues are what directs the passions. So basically what I’m doing today is setting the background… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Christ has come to make us like God. There is in the heart of every human being a desire to be like God. If there were not, our first parents would never have fallen into temptation. The temptation presented to them is to disobey God, to eat the fruit and you will be like gods, knowing good and evil. Our Lord who knows of this desire in every human heart to be like God, has come to fulfil it in the case of all those who would follow him. The path that He chose, was not one of disobedience but rather of obedience. And so He tells us the way in which we can imitate God. God is by His very nature good He loves all His creatures. The scriptures themselves tells us that He hates nothing, He holds in abhorrence nothing that He has created. The nature of each creature is good, even the nature of the demons. What is wrong, is that these creatures who are free, have chosen to pervert God’s gifts and to use it not for the glory of the Creator but to bring glory to themselves, which is an act of creating darkness rather than light… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
In this the third talk on Fatima, I’m going to focus on something that two Popes have said about Fatima very succinctly. The first is Paul VI who in 1977 on the sixtieth anniversary of Fatima, he said that Fatima is a compendium of Gospel, meaning that the whole Gospel message is summed up in the events that occurred in the Cova da Iria in Fatima, Portugal in 1917. Then on the thirteenth of May 1982 when John Paul went to Fatima to thank Our Lady for the preservation of his life. He said if the Church has accepted the message of Fatima, it is above all because the message contains the Truth and a call whose basic contents is the Truth and the call of the Gospel itself. Fatima does not contradict the Gospel, quite the contrary it can be regarded as the summary of the Gospel message. This year we are not only celebrating the 100th anniversary of the apparitions of our Lady of Fatima but there is also a commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the protestant revolution, which in fact destroyed the essence of the Gospel message. I recognise it is not the politically correct thing to say but effectively that is exactly what has happened. We need to remember that the Church existed before the Gospel, that is the Church existed before a single line of the new testament was written. The Church existed, lived, it carried out its mission. It sanctified before a single Gospel, Matthew, Mark, Luke or John had been written. It existed before a single letter of St. Paul had been written. Saints Peter, James, John and Jude had not written anything, the Church existed. The Church itself is in fact the incarnation of the message of Christ Himself or as we used to say in the traditionally theology, the Church is the extension of Christ among us. We can say that with confidence because even the Gospel tells us this, ‘We are members of Christ, we are members of His body’. Our Lord says to the Apostles, ‘Those who hear you, hear Me’. We know even from the Acts of the Apostles, that when Soul was persecuting Christians, when he had arrested them and when he witnessed… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Always we begin by invoking the Holy Spirit, so that He Himself might speak to us. So that He brings to our minds the light of understanding. Come Holy Spirit fill the hearts of the faithful… Our Lady seat of Wisdom… Well welcome to this second talk on Fatima and our times, in which I first of all intended to do give a description and a meaning to many of the individual details that occurred when Our Lady came to Fatima. But there are so many and some of them are so interesting, that I decided to focus on two or three aspects of this. As I mentioned the last time, Our Lady came to Fatima in 1917 on six successive months. There was a seventh month when she came, that was twice in August. The reason, the children had been kidnapped. Then she promised she would come a seventh time, which she did, but much later. In the apparitions, the children, in May, were looking after their sheep when Our Lady came. They had resolved to say nothing about it, but Jacinta couldn’t keep quite and told her parents and news began to spread. By June, there were fifty people at the Cova with the children. Then the following month, July, there were two to three thousand. In August five, six or even seven thousand. In September, more than nine thousand. On the 13th October, the crowd was estimated at more than seventy thousand people. We are talking about a public event a public miracle and because it is public, because there are so many witnesses, it’s the main reason why we take it so seriously. It is not a case of some holy or some not so holy person having a vision and saying they had a vision even though it’s true, but rather a public miracle and a public event where there were tens of thousands of witnesses, so this gives Fatima a place of credence of its own. There were many signs associated with the arrival and departure of Our Lady. Among the signs, the first was a flash of light, the children initially thought it was lightening. Then when the crowds started to gather there was a clap of thunder. Many people saw a globe light descend from the East. This is one of the details I would like to spend some time on later. Our Lady always came from the East and returned to the East. This was seen by many people, everybody agreed that just before the apparitions the atmosphere, the air cooled. This happened in summer when it was exceedingly hot just before noon… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
I think we all would agree that we live in extraordinary times. There is a feeling in the air of uncertainty. We sense that there is, to use the words of scripture, something menacing in the world. Our governments, whatever authorities we have that rule over us no longer seem to be their own master, it’s almost as if they are puppets. The Holy Father recently complains and warns us about fake news. How are we to know what is fake and what is not? We know we can’t trust the media. And even the social media is not reliable and there’s so much information coming from so many directions that it is confusing. As Christians and in particular as Catholics we have a firm anchor. In fact the scriptures are very clear, ‘Hold fast of that which you first receive’ that’s the bottom line. Hold fast to what you first receive, it’s in every one of the epistles; St. Paul’s letters, St. Peter’s letters, St. John, St Jude, hold fast to what you first received. Because what we have received was from Christ who is the Eternal Word of Truth, He imparted it to His disciples, they in turn to their successors the Bishops. So when we see things are changing around us, we have reason to be concerned. We are living in what is called the Marian age. The Marian age began in 1830 with the apparition of our Blessed Lady at Rue du Bac in Paris. And when She appeared in that particular apparition two things are very striking. First of all She came with a globe a golden globe and she came with the rings. The Globe represented each and every soul, France and the whole world. The rings represented the graces that She mediates to us. Our Lady is not the source of graces, Christ is, Christ is the sole Redeemer. But He mediates His redemption through the saints, primarily the Church but singularly and individually through our Blessed Lady and then the other saints. Each according to their position in the hierarchy that God has established. This is the apparition in 1830 at Rue du Bac, this is followed by La Salette where again Our Lady appeared their weeping as a Mother very sorrowful and then at Lourdes of course in 1858 where She asked for the people to come in procession with penance, with the intention of making reparations of for sin, penance. Then in Knock, which was a silent apparition not a word was spoken. Again, She was there at the mass. Because at Knock, what the visionaries saw and there were some 18 of them, from little children, 2 years old to adults in their 70s and each one of those seers, saw the same thing. Just the Altar, the Lamb of God on it, Angels circling, Our Lady standing there, St. John preaching, St. Joseph by their side. … For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
So this text gives us an opportunity to talk about the second last article of faith in the creed, ‘I believe in the resurrection of the body.’ But the context here is important to have in place. You see Jesus apart from being persecuted by Herod and his political allies, He was also persecuted by the two groups; one the Pharisees and the other the Sadducees. They had a common goal, the destruction of Jesus of Nazareth. But they were different in the practices and beliefs. The Pharisees we know, were men who were extreme hypocrites, many of them. There were people who were just a religious body, whereas the Sadducees, were religious and political. The Sadducees were the nobility and most of them were priests and they were big into politics and the religious life, particularly in the temple. The Pharisees, they followed the law of Moses, the Profits and about a thousand other little, tiny, minuscule rules and regulations for everyday life. The Sadducees weren’t interested in that. They followed the written rule of Moses and that was it. Again the Pharisees, believed in spirits, in Angels in the resurrection. The Sadducees did not believe in in spirits, in Angels in the resurrection. So they were quite different in the modus operandi, but had this common goal to destroy Jesus of Nazareth. Today it was the Sadducees that confront Jesus, the Pharisees having failed. They put this question to Him. A question which is meant to make belief in the resurrection seem ridiculous. They say ‘So if a woman marries one man and he’s gone, then she marries another man and he’s gone…’ For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Ave Maria! In the beginning, at least the first third of the nineteen century, 1830, a young girl just in her early twenties entered the convent in Rue De Bac. She had joined the Daughters of Charity an order founded by St. Vincent de Paul. Her name was Zoe Laboure. Zoe was the ninth of eleven children of her parents, who were farmers and were fairly well to do. At the age of nine, her mother died and Zoe who was pious, stood on a little stool and picked up a statue of Our Lady which was kept on the mantle and said to her, ‘From now on you will be my Mother’. She began at that early age of nine to cultivate an ever growing love for the Mother of Jesus and of course our most gentle queen and Mother. She was looked after by her aunt and then she returned at about the age of sixteen where she took over the chores of the household. She would go to mass everyday, getting up from bed at four o’clock in the morning and walking to the church, where she would devoutly attend mass. And of course we shouldn’t be surprised, her devotion increased so that she felt that she herself was called to serve God in her religious life. Her father was not happy about it, who would look after the household. But she also cultivated a very practical spiritual life, it wasn’t just the matter of attending mass and praying. She also made it a point of her spiritual life to visit and look after the sick. On one occasion, she had a dream where she saw an elderly priest saying the mass very devoutly and as she watch she felt as if she had seen this priest before. But she was equally certain that she had never seen him before. And he turned to her and beckoned her, but she ran away. He said to her, ‘You run away from me now, but one day you will come to me.’ She decided finally, and with her father’s agreement to enter the convent. And so she went looking for the convent to which she had been called. Entering the parlour, she saw a picture of the priest in her dreams… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Christmas is certainly about Christians or what Christians like. We like holidays, we like eating well, we like a drink or two or three. We like presents and gifts. I love Christmas, for all these things, they are mad for it in my house. Even a lot of the time we get gifts, they are not even things we are interested in half of the time, but we like the fact that somebody cares about us enough to get us a gift. It’s nice. But Christmas, this whole holiday everything that we have here is because of His birthday. That’s where it all comes from. So yes, Christmas is about Christians, but also Christ and Mass. Seeing as we are in Mass, we’re Christians, it makes sense to talk about Christ, right? So let’s see, who is Jesus Christ? What do people say about Him? What did He say about Himself? And why did He say it? What was the point of Jesus Christ coming here? You have come here today, so I’m going to tell you why… Who is Jesus? I don’t need fancy theology and philosophy to explain this too you. Just think about the facts, a couple very simple facts. This is a person, who without ever picking up a pen, is the one who set more pens in motion, who had more works of art commissioned, more than any other person in the past or in the present. I’m not just talking about individuals, I’m talking about them put together. That’s Jesus. I can talk to you now, about just two moments of His life. I don’t have to say anything about all the things in the middle. It’s not necessary. His life was marked with two impossibilities. One at the start and one at the finish. At the start, a Virgin’s womb and an empty tomb. Jesus came into the world through a door marked no entrance and left through a door marked no exit. That’s a fact. Jesus did impossible things and people like talking about impossible things. And they have talked about it. What did they say? Let’s have two representatives here… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had just spoken about the period for His second coming and how it would be like the days of Noah, the days of Lot and then He gives the warning that those who have made the spiritual progress should not think about material things, that is those on the housetop should not come down to save the things that must perish and likewise those who are working, the field that they should not look back and that whatever we do, two in the bed or two grinding in the mill, whatever we do we must ensure that our intention is pure, that we do it to please God because without faith, it’s impossible to please God. And so the Lord says, “When the Son of Man comes, will He find any faith on earth or will there be any who are really pleasing to God”. And so by hearing how dangerous these times are, the Disciple might have reason to despair, how can we be sure that we are in fact doing what we are supposed to be doing. And so the Lord gives us the remedy for this: prayer. He spoke to parable about the need to pray continually and never lose heart, so even at the darkest, when the night is darkest, when there absolutely seems to be no hope, we must not lose heart but keep praying because as Our Lord says, “Will not your Father, will not God see justice done to His chosen” Any by Baptism we have been chosen, the parable He gives is that of the Judge… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We are in a very important period in the Church a liturgical period, Advent. Advent and Lent are what we call strong times in the liturgical calendar. They’ve got different themes. In the first week of Advent, I tried to talk about, it’s meaning, the different comings of Christ and the importance of being prepared for these comings. In the second week, we presented in a corresponding manner to the readings in the second week. The readings were focused on repentance, we tried to show that, this repentance, particularly through the sacrament of reconciliation is perhaps the best way to make that preparation for the coming of Christ, for the coming of God. Besides examining and looking at the different elements which are present in a good confession, like examination of conscience, cultivating sorrow in our heart for our sins, the act of humility when we confess those sins to a priest, the good will in carrying out the penance that he gives us, we also see that important element, resolution. Leaving the confessional with the firm decision trying not to fall into those sins again. If the second week of Advent was about what we won’t do, sin, perhaps the third week of Advent will be about what we will do. Here is where another very important resolution comes into play. Yes, the word is resolution, now I think this it’s appropriate because, very soon it’s going to be that time of year, where we make our new year’s resolutions. Now reflecting on this, I thought that if we think about them now, before, we won’t be so quick to abandon them after. If we consider them with an objective, by making them more God centred, rather than self-centred… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The reading from St. Paul’s epistle, first epistle to the Thessalonians , “Brethren we give thanks to God always for you, making remembrance of you in our prayers without ceasing, being mindful of the work of your faith and labour and charity and of the enduring of the hope of Our Lord Jesus Christ before God and Our Father. Knowing brethren beloved of God, your election for our Gospel have not be on to you in word only but in power also and in the Holy Ghost and in much fullness as you know what manner of men we have been among you for your sakes and you gave and you became followers of us, and of the Lord; receiving the word in much tribulation, with joy of the Holy Ghost so that you were made a pattern to all who believe in Macedonia and in Achaia. For from you was spread abroad the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia, and in Achaia, but also in every place, your faith which is towards God, is gone forth, so that we need not to speak anything. For they themselves relate of us, what manner of entering in we had unto you; and how you turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God. And to wait for His Son from heaven whom He raised up from the dead, Jesus, who hath delivered us from the wrath to come.” Our blessed Lord, at the beginning of His ministry spoke clearly. He also make many miracles without being asked and indeed even asking for nothing. We are told they came in their multitudes and touched Him and were healed. But after the death of John the Baptist our Lord adopted a different approach. He no longer spoke, except in parables and the reason was the death of St. John had made it very clear, that one was either for God or against God. To be for God meant to be for Christ. If one were resistant to the grace of Christ, then someone was also resistant to God’s grace, our Lord Himself makes that clear. In speaking parables, He did one of two things, first there were those who were sincere and wanted to know. They would be the ones in whom the parables would be intriguing and would grip their hearts and they would make the necessary effort to understand. We will see that when the disciples would say to our Lord… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
In todays first Sunday of Advent, I’d like to briefly in a certain context talk about the meaning of Advent. In the second point to examine what is our relationship to Advent. Advent coming from the Latin word Adventus – meaning coming, coming of our Saviour, coming of Christ, to see if we are prepared for that coming. In the sacred scripture there are clearly three comings of the Lord, traditionally we talk about two, but really there’s three. There is coming in humility, the little Baby comes to Bethlehem. There’s a coming in the Eucharist, in charity, on our altars. Thirdly, the definitive coming of our Lord in glory and majesty at the end of the world. Now the first Advent is past. The Eucharist advent is here in our present. The final coming is in our future. Let’s analyse these briefly. Our Lord came in humility as a defenceless little baby in the poor stable of Bethlehem. He didn’t come with fireworks or glory or trumpets. Why is this? I think certainly one of the answers to this question is God wanted us human beings to understand what He really values. I think it is a counter measure against the sin of Adam and Eve, the pride of Adam and Eve. The sacred scripture of the book of Sirach tells us that ‘Pride is the start of all sin’ spirituality tells us that humility is the foundation of all grace. In other words, pride turns us away from God, but humility opens us up to God, opens up above all to His grace. Christ taught us that when He entered the world as a baby, right till the end… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
This parable we just heard is similar to the parable of the talents, but different. Different in its sense and its meaning and to some extent in details. When our Lord speaks a parable we have to understand the context and to whom He is speaking. Of course He is always speaking to us but the time that He first spoke the first parable we look at those people who heard Him and what they would have drawn out of what He would have said. We heard our Lord was going to Jerusalem and that He passed through Jericho. He approached the town and then He was in the town and now He’s left and He’s continued up to Jerusalem. The crowds are following Him, many of them have seen the miracles. There is a sense of expectation, He is the Messiah, He’s finally going to get rid of the foreigners, the Romans in particular. He’s going to re-establish the House of David, the Kingdom of Israel and everything will be great because now we will finally be independent which is what God always wants for us. This is what the people are thinking. The Disciples are not that much different, they have been chosen by our Lord and they have been promised the thrones of which they will sit, they will judge the tribes of Israel and they were expecting a worldly kingdom. Although our Lord said that my Kingdom is not of this kind. Our Lord uses in this parable incidence in history, with which they would have been familiar and at the same time applies it to Himself with the application of His going to Jerusalem… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Yesterday the Church around the world is celebrated the feast of all saints. That is all of those men and women who throughout the ages were faithful to Christ. Those who overcame enemies of our salvation; the world, the flesh and the devil. They, rank upon rank are finally in the Father’s house. But there are still others on their way, those who have left us, but are still on their way. They also like us have struggled against the enemies of our souls, and they have fallen, they have been wounded. God who is merciful and desires the salvation of all, wishes to crown His gifts in them, in their efforts in cooperating with those gifts. This place of purification, where what remains of sin is purged away, is what we celebrate today, those souls who linger in purgatory. They themselves are glad to be there, the alternative is too terrible to contemplate. They know that their Father’s house is open for them. They still lack the wedding garment, they still have to be purged of their attachment to sin. A condition all of us know so well. And so in these fires of purification they linger, they have hope. They recognise that they are satisfying divine justice. They are unable to help themselves, so we pray for them on this side. We of course hope that our journey to the Father’s house, even though we need to pass their way, we hope that our stay there will be short… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
In the days in which we live, the idea of kingship is somewhat strange. It is regarded as antiquated, different kind of government and I would imagine few people would want to go back to the age of kings. But then when we look at the alternative, that of democracy, we see that even that is not exactly ideal. In fact we could even say, considering the current political landscape that democracy is not such a good idea after all, because we find that the rule of the majority is not necessarily and indeed in our time, is not exactly mesh with the law of God. Fallen human nature, seeks liberty, freedom from every law and every restrictions. Whereas that of the reign of the kings was very much different, that didn’t mean that the kings were exempt from faults as we well know, many of them were tyrants. In God’s plan, kingship had a particular purpose. The king was responsible for his people and he was to ensure that there was administration of justice and the people were lead in righteousness. This meant essentially that the king’s job was to ensure that there was sound morals in the country. In most cultures, the king was regarded as a son of god. Or some cases god incarnate. But of course as we know the kings were human just as all of us are and for some they could not handle that kind of power. What does that have to do with the feast of the kingship of our Lord Jesus Christ?… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today we celebrate the feast of all saints. On one occasion, someone asked our lord a question, “Lord will there be many saved?” and our Lord’s response was “Enter by the narrow gate.” The question of course is foolish in itself; but as we heard in the first reading there was a huge crowd impossible to count of those who are praising God. Whether many are saved or a few are saved, is not really the question to ask. The question that we have to ask is “Will I be saved?”. When we celebrate the feast of all saint or indeed when we celebrate the feast of any saint, we are not contributing anything to the saint. We cannot give the saint anything, because the saint has everything. They have Christ, they’re in heaven, their salvation is secure and the beatific vision is fully occupying them. But honouring the saint is for us, it’s for us in as much as, we are keeping our eyes on those of our brothers and sisters who have gone before us. Those who have overcome the enemies of our souls, the world the flesh and the devil. They have gone through the struggle and so when we look at their life, it gives us encouragement in our own. When we see what they have overcome, it gives us hope that we likewise can overcome. When we see their fidelity to Christ in the midst of the trials, it gives us encouragement in our own fidelity… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
God is rich in mercy, says the psalmist and this mercy of God is echoed throughout the Scriptures both in the Old Testament as well as in the New. Yet we sometimes get the impression from the Old Testament that God is vengeful, that He is a hard task master, that He is ready and eager to punish. When in fact God doesn’t punish so much that we earn the misfortune that comes our way because of our rebellion against God or because we are ignorant of what God wishes for us or because of the weakness of our nature that attracts us to sin. In the classical form, we sin either because of weakness, the concupiscence that’s in our flesh or we sin out of ignorance, that we rarely do not know what we are doing and then a few out of what is called malice, deliberate habit of sin within no desire to change. But whatever the category or the kind or the class of our sin, God is always rich in mercy, always eager to forgive us the wrong that we do, in fact He has created us for life, He has created us for Himself and He calls us constantly to the abundant life, that’s what Our Lord Himself said… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
On Sunday May 13th 1917 the children were pasturing their flock as usual at the Cova da Iria, which was about a mile from their homes. They were playing when suddenly a bright shaft of light pierced the air. They described it as a flash of lightning. Frightened by the flash, the children looked around at the sky that was clear and bright without the least spot of a cloud. No breeze stirred, the sun was strong, and there was no hint anywhere of a storm that might be responsible for a flash of lightning. The children, however, thought that they had better head home in case it might start raining. As they descended the hill. Another flash of lightning took them by surprise. Panicky with fear, they took a few steps and looked towards the right. There, standing over the foliage of a small holmoak, "a lady dressed all in white, more brilliant then the sun, shedding rays of light, clear and stronger than a crystal glass filled with the most sparkling water, pierced by the burning rays of the sun". The lady spoke to them and said: "Fear not! I will not harm you." "Where are you from?" the children asked. "I am from heaven" the beautiful lady replied, gently raising her hand towards the distant horizon. "What do you want of me?", Lucia asked. "I came to ask you to come here for six consecutive months, on the thirteenth day, at this same hour. I will tell you later who I am and what I want. And I shall return here again a seventh time."
Many people don’t describe themselves as Christians, but they say that they believe in God. We ask a fair question, what kind of God do you believe in, can you describe this God to me. And most of the time you’ll get an answer along the lines of, well I believe in a spirit, a force, an influence in the universe that manifests itself in human beings and their religious aspirations. Well these people are wittingly or knowingly believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit that we’ll talk about today. But they don’t believe in the Father and the Son. But this wouldn’t be the first error about God or the Trinity or the Holy Spirit, we’ve talked about these in the past, we’ve talked about Tritheism which says that the Holy Spirit is just one of three different god’s each operating in their own sphere of influence. We’ve heard about Subordinationism and Aryanism where the Holy Spirit and indeed the Son are inferior to God the Father subordinated to Him. We’ve heard about Modalism which states that the Holy Spirit is just one of the ways which God manifested Himself throughout history. In the Old Testament times, they say He manifested Himself as God the father, in the New Testament times they say He manifested Himself as the Son and after Christ descended into Heaven, He manifested Himself as the Holy Spirit. Wrong, wrong, three times wrong… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
When we hear the Gospel, I hope two things we should do; we should pray and we should try to apply it to ourselves, to our daily life. We should pray that we could understand what God Himself is saying to us because in the Gospel’s, it is God Himself, God Incarnate, the second person of the Blessed Trinity who is speaking to us. Our Lord had said that He is the truth; He also said that He is the only way that can approach the Father. The Scriptures also tell us that there is no salvation in any other name than that of Jesus, and therefore the words that Our Lord speaks to us are critical to our salvation because one, He is the truth, two, there is no other way, no other name by which we can be saved and three, He Himself says that to come to Him is to come to the Father, no one can approach the Father, except through Me. Now when He speaks as He has spoken to us today, if we think if we hear what He says, we will sometimes be shocked because it’s not quite what we would expect and certainly today’s Gospel is such an example. We are told that great crowds accompanied Jesus on His way and He turned to them and spoke… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had found Himself in conflict with the authorities. There was concern for His life according to Saint Mark, His brothers thought that He was beside Himself, that He was mentally ill and so they came to take charge of Him. Saint Matthew doesn’t give us that particular detail; he simply says that the mother and brothers of Jesus appear. Our Lord is in the midst of teaching the crowds and the messenger comes in saying, “Your mother and your brothers are outside and they want a word with you”. Now from this simple text, those who are less trusting of the Church will immediately say that Our Most Blessed Lady was not a virgin, that Our Lord had other children. As Christians, the first and foremost thing we must do is trust the Church because being founded on the Apostles and being the ark and pillar of truth she cannot possibly err and if she teaches us dogmatically and definitively that our Lady was a virgin before the birth, a virgin during the birth and a virgin after the birth of Christ, our first duty is to believe it. Otherwise we simply set up ourselves as an authority greater than the Church or to put it another way, we refuse to believe God, we prefer to depend on our own understanding. Which is the essence of Protestantism and the backbone of every heresy. No we believe the Church first; we even doubt ourselves rather than doubt the Church when she teaches dogmatically. The question of our Lord’s brothers is not a new one… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Jesus’ teaching today is about real Christian Discipleship. Principally the Cross or the ability to bare the Cross, to bare ones burdens for the love of our neighbour because we love our God. This is an important aspect of the faith that we’d like to talk about today using two of the very important texts or messages that Jesus gave us in the Gospel today. The first text: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, even his own life he cannot be my Disciple”. That’s super strong, right? Two things to have clear though, what Jesus does not mean by this and what Jesus does mean by this, otherwise it’s a very powerful statement. What Jesus does not mean is that we’re not meant to take this absolutely completely literally. Remember, Jesus is talking to Eastern people in an Eastern culture and they’re way of making important points was to use very, very vivid images. You remember other occasions when Jesus made other statements like this, “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. Even today, everyone who does not renounce all of their possessions cannot be my Disciple.” Friends clearly Jesus is not asking us to mutilate our bodies or become destitute over night, no. What He means by the expression He made, is that, we are never to love with the same intensity and the same level those things nearest and dearest to ourselves like family and friends in the same… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
How many of us really appreciate the gift that Our Blessed Lord has given us of Himself in the Holy Eucharist. How many of us realise that we do not receive something in the Eucharist. We do not receive bread in the Eucharist, nor do we receive wine in the Eucharist, we do not receive any created thing in the Eucharist. In the Eucharist, we receive someone. We receive a Person, the second Person of the Blessed Trinity Who said, “Whoever eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood has eternal life. Whoever eats Me lives in Me and I in him. My Flesh is real food, My Blood real drink. He who eats My Flesh and drinks My Blood lives in Me and I will raise him up on the last day as the living Father has sent me and I live because of the Father , so whoever eats Me will live because of me.” In all of this, there is no suggestion that we’re receiving something, but we are receiving Someone. Someone who has given Himself entirely to us. His body, His blood, His soul because He died for us, and His divinity because He rose from the dead. And what He promises us is not biological life, we have that already; what He is offering us is eternal life which we do not have because of Adam’s sin. But which has been restored to us in baptism. Which has been strengthen in us… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Ave Maria. As we all know, Our Lady has many titles and under each of these titles, there is only one refrain that we make, “Pray for us”. We are here in the Church, Our Lady Mother of God. Mother of God, pray for us. The first title that she has is that of Holy Mary, Saint Mary, Blessed Mary because everything else depends on this – each one of us is destined to be called Saint. All of us. The title of Saint isn’t just restricted to just a few, for we who are on the pilgrim journey to heaven; we are trying to earn that title, so that we also one day we will be a Saint; Holy. And because Our Lady is Holy and more than Holy, Holy the most Holy creature God has ever created, She has other titles added to this, but each of these other titles are only a reflection or a part of a central title, Holy Mary. She had to be Holy because She was destined Mother to God, She had to be Holy because she was to be the virgin or virgins, She had to be Holy because being Mother of God, She was also the Arc of the Covenant and it is about the Arc of the Covenant that I wish to speak today. Arc of the Covenant pray for us. What is the Arc of the Covenant? When you read the book of Exodus, God gave Moses some very clear instructions about making the Arc… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
There was a parish council, much like our own¬, made up of characters like Anna and John and company. They decided it would be important if they promoted in the parish the virtue of humility, especially in children. They said lets find an award, a prize for the most humble person in the parish. A committee was formed, names were put forward and finally they came up and agreed upon Mr. Jones, a little wee shy man who never took credit for the things he did. That Sunday, he was given a gold badge, which said – most humble man in the parish. However the same committee the following Sunday had to take the badge off him. Why? Because he turned up in the chapel that Sunday with a badge on the front of his blazer for everybody to see. He missed a little bit of the point of humility; he wanted to stay basking in that glory. I mention this, because most of us have the wrong idea about the virtue of humility. I mention this because it’s the central theme in the readings today. That’s what I want to talk about today, in three brief points first what is the virtue of humility, what is the vice opposed to it and are there any tips or means or ways we can implant the first and irradiate the second. So what is humility? If you look this up in the books of the saints, the first thing you get is, the only ones who are really meant to define humility are the humble. So that immediately puts us into trouble. None of us are really humble if we admit it. So basically I have taken a few things that the saints have said and I will present that to you now. First up, is something we know and understand, is that the humble person is someone who has a moderate estimation of there own importance. However we have to point out that it has nothing to do with humility, having no esteem of ourselves. The problem is when we go and seek to be esteemed by other people. See the difference; we can appreciate the talents that we have but… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord did not always speak in parables, and we need to remember it’s not just His words, but also His actions that are parables. So for instance when He spat on the ground and made the pace, that was a parable. A parable is essentially a sign or a story that has deeper meaning, one that goes beyond the actual action of the words that were used. So He used to speak plainly and what was the consequence? They said that He was possessed by demons that He acted on the power of the demon. They said that even when He brought people closer to God, this man is not from God. They called him a Samaritan and so on. And so to lessen the gravity of their offense, the Lord speaks in parables. So those that are well disposed, would understand and those that who were ill disposed would not and so would not be judged as seriously as if they had known. So essentially there are those who are unworthy of hearing the truth, then there are those whom are ungrateful because they’ve received the truth and do not appreciate it and of course there are those that welcome the truth and make the necessary conversion as a consequence of the truth. So the Disciples ask Him, “Why do you speak to them in parables”? The simple answer is because there were many who were not worthy and there were others who were ungrateful… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
What we’re going to address is to look at Jesus Christ, try to understand a little bit more about Him, in the context of the history of Israel. We’re going to hear a lot of names and different characters which are going to bring back lots of things to us that we’ve remembered and learned over the years about Christ and Israel. Jewish history begins with characters called Patriarchs who are basically the fathers of Israel. We’ve got Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Abraham our young friend here and the other children will remember just being a man with a long beard and a walking stick. But Abraham was a desert chief, and he had about three hundred clansmen and their families who followed him and worked for him. Abraham would have been like any other desert chief at the time. However, if you met Abraham you’d be very surprised to see that he was a man that seemed to have his head and his thoughts in the future. If you met Abraham, he would tell you “In the future all this land is going to belong to my descendants. Don’t mind all the other desert chiefs around; it’s going to belong to my descendants”. The land was Canaan. He’d also tell you that all the nations were going to Blessed by God through my descendants and he would have underlined by the one and only God. But then he really would have shocked his listeners if you would have bumped in to Abraham at this time because he would say, “My descendants will be as numerous as the sand and the seashore and the stars in the sky”. You’d be shocked! You’d think he was the greatest optimist you’d ever met in your life, because at that time, Abraham was over eighty years of age and he didn’t have any children whatsoever. But guess what in his eighties he did finally have a son… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had spoken the parable about the darnel in the field, He said, “The kingdom of Heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field and whilst everyone was asleep the enemy came and saw darnel and made off. Then when the workers went in to the field, they spoke of the darnel and said to the master, ‘Wasn’t it good seed that you sowed?’ How then does the darnel appear and He said, ‘Some enemy has done this.’ They answered, ‘Well do you want us to go and pull up the darnel?’ He said, ‘No, no, leave it till harvest time because you might pull up with the darnel the good seed as well, the good wheat as well, so leave it till harvest time then I will send the labourers and they will gather the darnel and they throw it in to the furnace and the wheat will be gathered in to my barn.’” Our Lord spoke this to the crowds and then as we heard today, leaving the crowds, He went into the house and His disciples came to Him and said, “Explain the parable about the darnel in the field to us.” So the disciples also heard the parable and yet they hadn’t grasped fully the message. But at least they were thinking about it, which is really what’s important and whenever we hear the Scriptures, we should think about it and in particular how it applies to us. What is striking is that the disciples do not question our Lord in front of the crowds. As He Himself said the mysteries of the Kingdom are revealed to you, but not to them… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Blessed Lord, having sent out the twelve. He told them after having giving them power over evil spirits, He told them He was sending them out like sheep among wolves. He told them that they would bare witness to Him but they could expect nothing but trouble and suffering from those whom to they were sent and yet at the same time, promising a reward from the one who had sent them. He had said that even brothers would betray brothers so their father, their children and that they themselves would be hated by all on the count of His name. And then to give them the model, the example they were to follow the Disciple is not superior to his teacher, nor the slave to his master and that if they call the master of the house, Baalzebub, then they would say even worse things about the servants. Yet He says everything He has taught them will be made clear in due time. And that despite the opposition they would necessarily face, they should not be afraid of those who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul. And that they were to be faithful and to witness to Him, even to the point of shedding their lives. And of course whilst Our Lord said this to the twelve, the Apostles, He says it to their successors, the Bishops and of course to us also whom are Baptised but nonetheless have been given the task of witnessing to Him before the world; so we all share in the same mission, but in varying and various degrees… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord sending His Disciples out, not only gives them the ability to preach the Gospel but He also gives them warnings against what they’re going to encounter. And He adds now, He finally promises to the completion of the task. So He says first of all to remind them that they are His Disciples, we are His Disciples and so we should not expect any better treatment than Our Master Himself received. The Disciple is not superior to His teacher, nor the slave to his master. It is enough that the Disciple should grow to be like his teacher, the slave like his master. What did the Master suffer? He suffered calumny, people ill speaking Him, a tribute in the good that He did to the power of evil, criticised Him, obstructed Him, blocked Him, constantly trying to undermine the good that He did. He sent us out as servants, more than servants; even as friends and so we should expect to receive the same treatment. The good that we attempt in Christ’s name, will be opposed by the world flesh and the devil. So He says, “Even when you see opposition, when you face opposition, when you encounter opposition, do not be discouraged because of it but rather know since you are lambs among wolves that your task is simply to convert the wolf by the virtues of meekness of humility, patience, endurance.” So He says do not be afraid of them, do not be afraid of the opposition for the reason He gives, for the reason that you should not be afraid is that everything covered will be uncovered… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Does God have favourites? And of course we know from the Scriptures which we should always quote, we know from the Scriptures, “God has no favourites”. However, the Scriptures also go on to say that, “Anyone who has a sincere heart and sincerely seeks God is acceptable to Him.” However God does choose certain people and certain groups of people to perform special functions for Him and these functions are called vocations. We should never mix up the idea of vocation with salvation. They are two quite independent things. A vocation is a calling to do a particular work for God for the salvation of ourselves but more important, of others. A vocation is given by God freely. Being acceptable to God is essentially a disposition of the heart. Are we available to Him so that we might fulfil His will and in so doing, become Holy which is what God requires of all of us, “Be Holy as I, your God am Holy”. In the case of a vocation we’re called to do something in addition to. Now if we fail to do that which we are called to do, we will be punished for it, it’s as simple as that. Saint Paul himself, says that much, “If I do not preach as I’ve been commanded to preach, I will be punished.” So we can say that the vocation in fact is a responsibility. Now God shows individuals such as Abraham. What did he choose him for? To be a father of a multitudes. All those who believe in God, would be the children of Abraham, because Abraham sets an example… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Having spoken the beatitudes, those eight propositions of which the Christian world, the Christian civilisation, the Christian life is founded. Our Lord tells us what flows from their observance, the poverty of spirits and gentleness, the grief the anguish we go on an account of our sins, those who mourn and now desire for what is right for true righteousness, which is essentially to be living the divine life, pleasing to God. Our expression of gratitude to God for what He has done by our showing of mercy to others and the purity of our intentions, the purity of heart and our desire that we be at peace with God and with our neighbour and most important the special grace of fortitude by which we’re able to endure every kind of persecution because of our deep solid attachment to the person of Christ and to follow in the path mapped out for us by His Father with the assistance of the Holy Spirit. If we are able to withstand persecution, then we are truly the salt of the earth. Enduring persecution is a special grace, it is a grace given to us by the Holy Spirit as indeed all graces are but particularly the Holy Spirit because He being the Divine fire, He fortifies us against all that will come against us because of our fidelity to Christ. And frequently we are unwilling even to face criticism for what we believe. We are afraid of what people think of us because of what we believe and who we follow and so we fall at the very first hurdle… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Blessedness means to be well spoken of, in particular to be well spoken of by God and God who is truth can only speak that which is true, and so He will speak well of us if He can see certain qualities in us and these qualities are none other than the qualities shown, practised, demonstrated by His only begotten Son to us. The first Psalm, Blessed the man that fears the Lord, is a beginning of praise of the Psalms to God by David. Our Lord, who is Holy wisdom who Himself is the heir of David, who has come begins his public life with a praise of God or rather of God’s work in us or how in fact, our being faithful to Christ will lead us to fulfil God’s work in us, so God can see Himself in us. And so He says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit” not Blessed are the poor, but the blessed the poor in spirit, which means that it is not just the matter of not having material goods that makes us blessed or well-spoken of by God, but rather the poverty of spirit which is total dependence on God. Poverty has three degrees. There are those that are materially poor, beggars - they have nothing. That is not however in itself blessedness, there’s nothing praiseworthy in it. There’s another kind of poverty where one can have the material goods and yet in spirit, be detached from them and the example is that of Abraham who was a rich man, and yet he was totally dependent on God. And then the next, this is those who are materially in fact poor and also spiritually poor, these are us, when we are willing to give up our material goods so as to cling more fervently, more passionately, more firmly to God himself… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
“The Good News I preach is not some human message that I was given by men, it is something I learned only through revelation of Jesus Christ.” Saint Paul, who speaks these words to us today reminds us that our whole own mind, all our thoughts, our desires, our aspirations should be focused on our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. He tells us also that whilst we once knew Christ according to the flesh, we know Him like this no longer. He also says to keep your eyes fixed on heaven where Christ is. Speaking about himself, I strain for what is ahead and forget everything behind. If we are engaged in a race, we will lose, if we keep our eyes fixed on the next step in front of us. For those who want to succeed, we have to look at the goal, the end and keeping our eyes fixed on the goal, we should surge, urge our bodies so that we might arrive at the goal. When Our Lord walked on the water, the Disciples had been on the boat and Peter asked, “If it is you Lord, let me come to you” and the Lord said, “Come”. Peter got out, his eyes fixed on Christ and walked on the water. The moment he took his eyes off Christ, what happened? He felt the force of the wind, he saw the height of the waves and he became afraid and he began to sink. And the Lord grabbed him and said ‘Why are you afraid?’ no He did not, He said ‘Man of little faith, why did you doubt?’ If we do not keep our eyes fixed on Christ we will doubt and we will begin to sink, because we will see all of the forces… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
That’s a very difficult Gospel, but we might understand a little bit with the talk where going to have today which is, the Creed – the part which says, “He suffered under Pontus Pilot”. Who is this Pontus Pilot? Certainly he’s a weak man and like other weak men, he always wants to keep everybody happy. Pilot wanted to keep the Priests and the Jewish mob happy, he wanted to keep his wife happy, he wanted to keep Herod and his flunkies and flatterers happy, he really wanted to keep Caesar happy and he even wanted to keep Jesus Christ happy. He wanted to set Him free, but Pilot like most weak people, who want to keep everybody happy, ended up keeping nobody happy. After he finished in Judea, Palestine the Jews went to Rome to complain about his bad governance, his career finished in shame. Us Christians – from then until now until eternity, we condemn him in the Creed. That leads me to another question though. Regards the Creed, of all the villains who were involved in the sufferings of our Lord, who made Him suffer, why is Pilot mentioned, why isn’t it Caiaphas the high Priest or Judas the traitor that’s mentioned. No, no it’s Pilate. The answer here comes from the great British priest and preacher, monsignor Ronald Knocks. He says that, by naming Pilate in the creed, the Church anchors down to a definitive moment in history the life and times of our Lord. You see Jesus Christ isn’t an imaginary person… For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Jesus Christ clearly in today’s gospel wants us to meditate upon death. He wants us to help us prepare for it. This is the point of the parable we’ve just heard. Today I’ll talk about a couple of characteristics of death and then give air to a few objections which are held by people, it’s fair enough in an optimistic manner, about talking about such a morbid topic. First though the question, are their any benefits when talking about death? Very simple, one super benefit, it discourages us from doing bad and encourages to do good. To do good while we can. You know, there was a convert to Judaism many, many years ago, a king named Moabaz. A famine entered his kingdom. He sold all the treasures that he had and he fed the poor. The young princes, his brothers, they were scandalised; they said ‘What have you done. You have not only sold all of your own treasures, but all the treasures that our fathers have gathered up before.’ Moabaz responded, ‘Our fathers gathered up treasures for here below, for this world. I have gathered up treasures for above, for that world.’ You see Moabaz had his mind fixed on the hereafter and this enabled him to good in the here and now. If we apply this to ourselves, we think about the hereafter, unfortunately the consequence is that we have to think about death, because that is what comes before. So death, what are the characteristics, very simple, easy to remember, death is certain, yet uncertain. Certain you say, yes, course it is, we’re all going to experience it. For Fr. Nicholas’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord sent out the twelve to preach the Good News of the Kingdom. The Kingdom of Heaven is close at hand. He gave them power over unclean spirits, power to cure the sick. He gave them power to cure the sick, to cast out demons and all of these powers; these gifts were given to prove the truth of what they were saying, to confirm the testimony of their witness. But the Lord also warned them that there would be opposition, in this way in telling them I’m sending you out like sheep amongst wolves, He’s telling them that danger is serious. He didn’t just say like sheep in the presence of wolf, but amongst wolves, so all around the enemies were there, ready to attack and destroy. But He says, “Since they’re sheep, they had to be as cunning as serpents, as harmless as doves”. In other words, there task were to change these wolves in to sheep, and that they themselves should not be turned in to wolves for that is where the victory lies – in the wolves becoming sheep. So how were they to do it? As cunning as serpents, and immediately our mind goes back to Eden where the serpent with great cunning deceived our first parents, promising them immortality falsely, wisdom falsely. So they, the Disciples are going out to promise not even a long life but true immortality in as much as we’re destined to… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our most Blessed Saviour sends out the twelve – the twelve who are the foundation stones of the Church, the twelve wise companions who are witnesses to all He had done and all that He had taught. And He sends them out to His own people, to the Israelites – Israelites like themselves, instructions not to go either to the pagans or to the Samaritans, but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. The Prophets had spoken about the Messiah, who would come from Israel and would be sent to Israel. Therefore Our Lord needed to certainly fulfil this prophecy, but also to give the Jews the opportunity to listen and to hear and to embrace the Gospel. Their rejection of the Gospel would not be because of anything the Lord failed to do, but on that hard heartedness that is spoken of them in so many places in the Old Testament, but the Lord also knows even as the Jews, the Israelites reject His message, the Gentiles will accept it, will embrace it, and so He will dissolve the two. The Jews were as the Gentiles so that there would be one people, one flock, one house namely built founded and guided by Christ Jesus Himself. He would be the cornerstone joining the two. But for the moment He sends the twelve out and He gives them instructions. They are to do something that no Prophet had ever done before. They are to proclaim the presence; the imminence of the kingdom of Heaven for it is close at hand. The prophets all spoke of temporal things of earthly things… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We are all, I’m sure familiar with the story of the good Samaritan; and I’m sure we could repeat it without a moment’s reflexion because it’s a story that immediately catches our imagination. But everything our Blessed Lord says, has many meanings. It can be interpreted in many different ways and in each interpretation, if done with the mind of the Church; we will discover rich fruits for our own way of living. The other thing we find is answers if He’s asked a question, on many occasions, He never answers the question in the same way; because the other occasion when He’s asked, ‘Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said, ‘Keep the Commandments.’ In that case, it was the rich young man that came to Him, ‘Good Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ Our Lord’s response, ‘Keep the Commandments.’ To which the rich, young man responded, ‘Which one?’ And the Lord said, began with certainly a very important one – the most important one as far as neighbour is concerned because He said, ‘Thou shall not kill.’ And once we have killed a person, we have literally taken away all their rights. We can no longer honour them, we can no longer steal from them, we can no longer abuse them and so on. So the Lord begins with the fundamental Commandment in regard to neighbour – ‘Thou shall not kill.’ Then He goes on to speak about the source of life, namely that Thou shall not commit adultery and to honour parents. So in this case He said to the lawyer, ‘What do you read in the law?’ and the response is to ‘Love God above all things and to love one’s neighbour as oneself.’ So is there contradiction? Why do we need to love our Neighbour?… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
St. Luke in today’s Gospel tells us of the lawyer who wished to embarrass our Lord, to disconcert Him. And he chooses to do so in a very subtle way, yet at the same time the question that he asked is of the utmost importance, not only for himself, but even for us today. What must I do to inherit eternal life? That’s the question all of us must ask. We must ask ourselves this question, and of course we must ask the Lord, who has already given us the answer. It is not the first time that our Lord was asked this question, remember the rich, young man “Good Master, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” And what did our Lord respond? “Keep the Commandments. Which one?” replied the young man “Thou shall not kill, thou shall not commit adultery, thou shall not steal, honour your father and your mother”. “But” said the young man, “I’ve kept all of these.” “Very good”. The lawyer asks the question, “What must I do to inherit eternal life.” And the Lord asks him, “What do you read in the law?” John the Baptist was also asked that question: What must I do to inherit eternal life. To which he responded, “Be content with your wages.” At least that’s what he told the soldiers. “No extortion, no abuse, no violence.” But today what must we do? Well certainly, the first thing is to keep the Commandments… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Perhaps these words, “You are Peter and on this rock, I build my Church” are best known by Catholics. It gives us that sense of security that Christ is with us. We know in the Eucharist that He is with us according to the promise that He made. But when He spoke to Peter, so many hundreds of years ago, He gives us the conviction, the certainty that He continues to speak to us even today, through the one whom we call His vicar. Our Lord had taken His Disciples away from Judea, from the region where the Jews were highly influential. Already there was opposition to Him and the authorities were looking for an occasion so that they could have Him arrested and put to death. It would be ideal if somehow He could be found to be in opposition to the emperor and certainly to claim to be the Messiah was a good enough reason. Remember they came with a coin asking whether it was lawful to pay tribute to the emperor. So away from the Jews, Our Lord could freely ask the question, “Who do people say the Son of Man is”? A valid question. Our Lord had worked many signs, He had worked many miracles. The Jews have had for some 4-500 years, not had a prophet among them. The Arc of the Covenant had been lost and there were no oracles. There was silence from heaven for over 400 years and suddenly our Lord appears on the scene, pointed out by John the Baptist. Then working many signs and wonders but above all His teaching, teaching given with authority as they freely acknowledge… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Always we read scripture in context. If we attempt to interpret any text of scripture without considering to whom it is been spoken, where it is spoken, who has spoken it etc, it will certainly go astray and we will certainly not understand what the Holy Spirit Himself is saying to us. Our Lord, having sent out the 12 then complains about the fact that the very cities in which He had performed the greater number of His miracles, refused to repent. And yet, from these same cities came nearly half of the Apostles. And so the Lord makes that remarkable distinction that salvation is not achieved by learnedness or cleverness or power or any of those human qualities, but rather by those who are mere children, little children before the Lord, and specifically before the Father in heaven. And then immediately our Lord goes on to say that He is God – “Everything has been entrusted to me by my Father”, which is a declaration of divinity because everything includes everything that the Father has. His very nature and He goes on to confirm this, to make it more explicit when He says, “No one knows the Son except the Father”. Indeed the Father knows everything, everything that is possible the Father has knowledge of it, and He knows certainly His Son with an infinite knowledge, but the declaration of divinity of the Son comes and what follows, just as in the same manner that No one knows the Father, except the Son… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We now see a change in our Lord’s approach to His ministry. Before He worked, at the beginning of His ministry, He worked many miracles and many signs and His words were for the most part were gentle and inviting. Then we’re told that after He sent the twelve out, and they came back – there was a change. The Lord Himself was not taken by surprise, in fact He had said to the Disciples, “If you enter any town that they do not make you welcome, then shake the very dust from your shoes as you leave it”. But where was the Lord Himself working – throughout Galilee, we’re told He began to reproach the towns in which most of His miracles had been worked and the reason was because of the hardness of hearts, the refusal to repent. These towns were also the place that the majority of the Apostles came from, after all Phillip had come from Bethsaida, Andrew and Simon-Peter as well as James and John, so five of them we know for sure came from Bethsaida or the region. So some certainly had believed what our Lord had said, and others rejected it. And so the Lord says, “Alas for you, woe to you. Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you Bethsaida”. And the reason is if the miracles, if the signs done in you had been done in pagan cities such as Tyre and Sidon where there was even child sacrifice, these cities would have repented long ago in ashes. So in the pagan cities, who did not have the law, that is the written law, they had the law of nature and they failed to observe the law of nature… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord in Jerusalem is confronted by several groups of people. The Pharisees come, the Herodians come, and the Sadducees come. Each one attempting to lay a trap for our Blessed Lord. So the Herodians with the coin and the Sadducees with the woman who had seven husbands – each one in turn comes and the Lord answers appropriately. In the crowd, because this is not happening in quiet or in isolation or in private, but in the crowd, we’re told one of the scribes listens and he puts a question to our Lord. It’s a question of importance and significance for there were many disputes about it, “Which is the first of all the Commandments?” The problem was that the Commandments are found in several places in Deuteronomy and Leviticus, in Numbers, Exodus and so they were scattered throughout these books and it was the job of the scribes to try to put them in to some order. Now what kind of order do we use? At least what are the principles of the order that we use? Is it age? Is it Importance? Is sacrifice more important than the acts of charity, of mercy? How do we decide which is more important especially remember, every single command of God is important for us. God is not capricious, He’s not arbitrary, but when He gives a Commandment, it’s purpose is in fact to lead us closer to Him. So how do we decide among these various commandments, some six hundred... For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The Sadducees were a heretical group of Jews who rejected the idea of spirit or angel or prophecy or the soul for that matter; and consequently they did not believe in the resurrection of the dead. They were materialists that’s how we would describe them today. Only what can be seen, felt, touch, measured exists. So denying the resurrection of the dead, they came to the Lord hoping to put Him in an impossible situation that is being logically inconsistent. They came to Jesus, obviously Our Lord preached the resurrection then otherwise they would not have come to Him with the question. They came to Jesus, Master – they acknowledged that He is a teacher, though of course they did not accept His teachings, “We have it from Moses in writing” and therefore as far as they are concerned, that is the ultimate authority. “Not only from Moses spoken”, in other words they have rejected oral tradition but specifically it is in writing; this is the only thing that they will accepted. In fact they only accepted the first five books of the Bible, since they have rejected any inspiration outside of this. “We have it from Moses in writing. If a man’s brother dies leaving a wife, but no child the man must marry the widow to raise up children for his brother.” Indeed we find this in the book of Genesis. The reason was that every Jew hoped that the messiah would come from his line, so to die childless was effectively to cut off all possibility… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Saint Mark in this twelfth chapter of his Gospel tells us our Lord began to speak to the chief priest, the elders and the scribes in parables. The purpose of a parable is to teach, it’s a story often built on a real incident or on a certain prescription of law that carries with it another message, a deeper message, in particular a spiritual message. Our Lord made His way up to Jerusalem; He had spoken about His passion to the disciples on the way. He had cleansed the temple and the authorities had challenged Him, “By what authority do you do this?” And He answered appropriately, but they are adamant that He must die and so our Lord speaks the following parables to warn them that they were in fact to the point of losing their independence, their kingdom and everything that God had given them, and even worse they were at the point in losing their relationship with God Himself. The parable is based partly on Jewish law and partly in incidence that rarely did occur. When a rich, wealthy man has property, he does not look after it himself, he would ordinarily lease it out to tenants and he would live not in the village in the area but would go off in to a town where he would enjoy his wealth in a more sophisticated way. The tenants would have the responsibility of looking after the vineyard and they would live off the produce of the vineyard but they’d also have to pay a rental, a lease to the owner… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The visitation of our Blessed Lady is the second of the Joyful Mysteries. The Angel having himself blessed the Virgin, “Hail full of Grace”, goes on to tell her, she is to become the mother of God. She is to bare a Son, she is to conceive and bare a Son in her womb. She asked the manner in which this will take place, to which the Angel instructs her that it will be by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit, so that which she conceives, will be Holy and will be called Son of God. And then as a sign, the Angel also mentions to the Virgin that her cousin who was baron for her whole life, in her old age herself conceived a son because nothing is impossible to God. And so the very mystery that had just occurred, the Incarnation of the Word, the descent of the Son of God in to the womb of the Virgin – this mystery which occurred when the Virgin said, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord that it be done to me according to thy word” animates the Virgin, she is immediately aware of the filial duty of charity that she has to her cousin. We’re told she went with haste. She went with haste to minister to her cousin, not that she doubted the Angels words, far from it; but knowing that Elizabeth would have need of her assistance but also it is necessary for the sanctification of John in his mother’s womb , as the same Angel told John’s father. Also it was an example to us that the greater we are, the more eager we should be in the service of others… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We’re told by St. Matthew that the Lord still speaking, teaching when He was interrupted by the synagogue official. We know his name is Jairus from the other Gospels and he comes to our Lord because of his daughter’s condition. The situation is desperate, the child is dying certainly when he left and he could only presume she was dead by now. He comes in faith, he had heard the signs of the miracles of the wonders that our Lord was performing, but his knowledge, his interpretation, his understanding of Christ is still very human. His faith, as you can say is mediocre. He doesn’t have that faith that the gentile, the centurion had, who didn’t even request our Lord’s presence, but knew the Lord, even at a distance could work the miracle of healing the servant. But he comes with faith, the important thing is he has faith. What God seeks from us is faith because it’s impossible to please Him without it. And so with the little faith that he has, he says “My daughter has just died, but come and lay your hand on her and her life will be saved”. Perhaps he thinks of Our Lord as one of the Prophets, particularly Elijah who raised the son of a widow, or Elisha who did likewise… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The Pharisees had complained to the Lords disciples why does your master eat with sinners and tax collectors and the Lord compared Himself to the physician. He says that the healthy do not need the doctor, but the sick do. And so since all of us are sinners and therefore spiritually sick, He has come to heal us all. In today’s passage from St. Matthew’s Gospel, we’re told that it’s John’s disciples that came to Jesus, although the other evangelists tells us the Pharisees came with them. But in either case, John’s disciples use the Pharisees as an example, “Why is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not”? This sounds like a criticism of the Lord and of course of His disciples. And John’s disciples are to be blamed for the attitude they’ve adopted towards Our Lord. They felt envious because of the fact that Our Lord was drawing disciples to Himself and the people were following Him. They complained to John, “The man you bore testimony to, He is baptising down the river and everybody is going to Him”. To which John replies, “He must increase and I decrease”. John’s disciples had great loyalty to John, but John constantly pointed them towards the one who was to come. John had been critical of the Pharisees and John had been praising Our Lord and therefore all the more reason for John’s disciples to be conscience of what they were saying. And so when they come to the Lord “Why is it that we, and the Pharisees fast but your disciples do not?”… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Blessed Lord had worked a number of miracles which were obviously the work of God. And so we notice that St. Matthew tells us soon after the Mount of the Beatitudes, the delivery of the Beatitudes, then the teaching that followed, that a leper came to Our Lord and said, “Lord, if you want to, if you will it, you can cure me.” By this he was showing that he knew the Lord had power, but what he doubted was the will. The Lord said, “Of course I want to be cured and instantly he was cured”. And then there was a centurion who came, or rather sent messengers, “My servant is sick at home, in terrible pain”. I will come and heal him Myself. The centurion said, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, say the word and my servant will be cured”. The centurion went on to profess his faith in our Lord’s divine power. Then there were the demoniacs, whom our Lord commanded and the demons left them instantly. Then there was the incident, crossing the sea with the boat about to be swamped and He got up and commanded and the sea went quiet and the wind stopped and the men in the boat marvelled, “What kind of man is this? That even the wind and the sea obey Him”. So in many of these ways, Our Lord shows His divinity, teaching us the truth of the incarnation. St. Matthew continues in today’s Gospel in chapter nine, to tell us again another incident which demonstrates our Lord’s divinity. Jesus got back in the boat, they crossed the water, they came to His home town… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We know of course that our Blessed Lord chose twelve Apostles. These Apostles, He kept with Him for three years, teaching them and training them to proclaim the message, the Good News of the presence of the Kingdom of God. He sent them out, the twelve, into Galilee as preparation, as training for what would come later, namely that He would send them out to the whole world. But now, in the last year of His life, we’re told by St. Luke, in fact we’re told by St. Matthew and St. Mark, that He appointed seventy two others. He sent them out, ahead of Him, in pairs to all the towns and places He Himself was to visit. This would be not in Galilee, but in Judea. This is because Our Lord was making His way to Jerusalem. The question we should ask ourselves is: What happened to the seventy two? Who are the seventy two? What was there task, there role, there position in regard to the twelve? Well we don’t know the names of all of the seventy two, but we do know the names of some. For instance, Matthias was one of them and Joseph called Barsabbas was one of them. These were the two names that were brought forward when the Apostles had to replace Judas. But we also know the names of others, just as for instance, Barnabas, Silas who were associates of St. Paul and we know from other sources that they were also acquainted with our Lord. So we do know the names of some of them… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
St. Mark relates how the Disciples were on the road. They were on a journey to Jerusalem. Our Lord walking ahead, the Sheppard leads the sheep. We’re told there were in a daze and those who followed were apprehensive. Why were they in a daze? Because they could not believe the things Our Lord had said along the road. He was speaking bleakly about His passion and He slowly goes to make these words, the mystery of His passion known to them more plainly. But we also get the impression that it was not just the twelve disciples, but then St. Mark brings out the twelve specifically. They were apprehensive because they knew of this conflict that existed between our Lord and the authorities and they perhaps wondering how could they, so few could be able to overcome the many. So with the disturbance of the soul, our Lord, again calls the twelve to Him, once more taking the twelve aside. He began to tell them specifically what was going to happen to Him, so they would understand that He went willingly to His passion, that it was not something that befell Him because He was unable to prevent it. But that it was providence the divine decree – working itself out, and so He says, “Now we’re going up to Jerusalem and the Son of man is about to be handed over to the chief Priest and the scribes”. A bleak warning to what Judas would do… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Fr Linus Clovis, reflects on the Church and the challenges she has faced throughout history. Highlighting the four great heresies, he then unpacks the latest heresy, that of modernism. Refocusing his investigation, Fr Linus then contemplates St. Peter's mission and reviews the current Papacy as well as previous Popes from the last century. The message of Fatima is ever relevant and is made more relevant here with regards to the recent attacks on the family. Fr. Linus closes by providing us with formula we need to stay Catholic and to survive these trials.
Our Blessed Lord had given us the beatitudes, which ended with the encouragement, rejoice and be glad when you’re persecuted for the cause of righteousness, when you’re persecuted because of His name, because you’re reward will be great. If we are able and if we do keep the instructions given to us in the beatitudes the Lord tells us then we will be like salt, and the salt of the earth. In other words, we will be able to preserve, that which is on its way to corruption. And even as there’s an encroaching darkness, if we observe the beatitudes we can be of the light that reveals God’s truth. And so this is what He offers us - to be salt and to be light for others. But what about Himself? Isn’t He the light that has come in to the world? He is the light, that the darkness can not overcome. Yes He is. And so He tells us in a way, that we have to look to Him as well. And we can imagine these are the beatitudes, He’s on mount of beatitudes, the crowds are listening and He’s going to develop what He has said in the beatitudes and to show how He himself fulfils it. Do not imagine I have come to abolish the law or the Prophets. Why would they think this? At that particular time they wouldn’t. But it would be an accusation brought against Him later on. They would accuse Him of being an opponent to Moses. That He had come to destroy that which they had received from Moses and the Prophets. But He says, “I have not come to abolish, but to complete them”. Indeed the Law of Moses was given so that it might lead us to perfection… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had said He did not come abolish the law or the Prophets, but rather to fulfill them. And the fulfilling of the law consists not only in keeping each and every part and element of it but also as Our Lord goes on to show now, the spirit of it. It is also necessary that each person observes the law in its detail. That is not just looking at what we’re not to do, but also what we are to do. The Lord says particularly if your virtue goes no deeper than that of the scribes and the Pharisees you will never get in to the kingdom of Heaven. He does not deny that the Pharisees and the scribes had some degree of virtue – they did because they were concerned about the observance of the law. But it was a case of lip service. They were interested only in observing the details, without any love and certainly without any desire of improvement in there lives. The disciples were criticised by the Pharisees for eating, picking and shelling corn because it appeared to break the Sabbath. And it did break the Sabbath, but Our Lord pointed out to them that the spirit of the law was concerned with venerating the Sabbath, that is increasing love for God. And the Commandment about picking and so on was to insure that this was not done for profit, but it could be done to save life, in particular to alleviate hunger. But what is disturbing or should be disturbing for us is the Lord says, ‘If our virtues are not greater, deeper than that of the scribes and Pharisees, we will not get in to the kingdom.’ He goes on to innumerate the various commandments and He begins with the greatest in the second tablet. Basically love of neighbour… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
To say we are living in evil days is an understatement. For these are the days of great confusion not only in the world but also in the Church, especially in regard to the question of marriage. From the passage we have heard, this is at the very beginning of Our Lord’s ministry. It’s the mount of beatitudes. He has already delivered the 8 beatitudes, one of which is Blessed of the pure of heart for they shall see God. He expands on each one of the beatitudes, He develops it. And He develops in the Gospel passage we heard the beatitude that talks about purity of heart. He begins with the commandment given by Moses. ‘You have learnt how it is said, you must not commit adultery.’ That certainly is in the commandment, but also there is another commandment, the ninth, ‘Thou shall not covert thy neighbour’s wife.’ The law, human law can only regulate external actions. Divine law regulates internal dispositions, because what Our Lord is doing is building up the new man, so He is in fact rooting out the very cause of our infidelity to God of which the external action is merely the fruit. But He’s saying that the disease, the sin begins in the intention and then when fully grown it bears fruit. St. Paul says something similar. So when does the act of adultery begin? It begins with the lustful look, lustful intention, which is what Our Lord uproots when He says, ‘If a man looks at a woman lustfully… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The people asked Him ‘What must we do if we are to do the works that God wants. Are we to keep the commandments, if the commandments, which ones.’ But our Lord does not answer keep the commandments, though, this is of course foundational as He said to the rich young man. He says ‘No, this is working for God, you must believe in the one He has sent.’ Not just believe the one he has sent, for we do believe the prophets, we do believe the apostles in their testimony, their witness. But we do not believe in them. To believe in them someone is essentially to place your whole life, the present and future into this persons hands. It is to love and to honour and to trust that person with your very being. That is opening yourself up to the possibility of injury. When our Lord says this, they respond, ‘What sign will you give to show us that we should believe in you?’ How do we know we can trust you, in other words. ‘What sign will you work?’ Then harking back to the manna, in all of this, they had been fed and they wanted to be fed again. So, they bring up the miracle of the manna, ‘Our fathers had manna to feed in the desert.’ But that was not the only miracle that had been worked for them in the desert or indeed in Egypt, there were many other miracles. But they bring up the one about food because that is ultimately what they are looking for an opportunity to eat again… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
It was late in the evening when the Lord had fed the five thousand. The people saw this great miracle and wanted to make our Lord, king. Something of course they couldn’t do because He was born a king. ‘Where is He that is born the infant king of the Jews?’ the wise men had said.
The Lord however dismissed His disciples they got into the boat and He Himself went into the hills to escape the madness of the crowd. And then in the middle of the night, at the third watch, about three in the morning, He walked across the water as we read in the other Gospels, terrifying the disciples and they arrive on the other side. In the morning now the crowds when they have got the wits together, realise that there was only one boat. The disciples had gone in the boat and crossed the sea of Tiberius, and they were certain that our Lord didn’t get in. So, not knowing what to do, they decided the best thing to do was to follow the disciples. So when the other boats came in from Tiberius, then they got into those boats. So it would not have been this vast multitude of some five thousand men for sure, the women and the children as well, who would have been part of that multitude. In these boats we have no idea of the number that crossed over. We are told when they got to Capernaum they set out to look for Jesus. When they found Him, they said ‘Rabbi when did you come here?‘ It is a strange question because the obvious question would be ‘how’, they only saw Him the night before… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
So great is this feast, that we break our Lenten penances, our fasting, our abstinence and we rejoice because of this great saint about whom we know so little and yet such a great deal. We know little because the scriptures give us little about him and about his life. Not even his words are recorded in scripture so he is the saint of silence. Yet there is a great deal to be deduced from this. St Joseph has many, many clients, many of the saints, exalted in him. Among them was St. Bernardine of Sienna. In his writings on St. Joseph, St Bernardine said ‘When God chooses a person for a particular vocation, a particular calling’, that includes all of us, ‘He gives the corresponding grace.’ So if we are called to the priesthood, there is a particular grace for it. If we are called to the married state, God will provide the graces necessary for that state. If we are called to the single life or consecrated life, God likewise will provide the graces. If we are called to government, to be the head of the nation, God provides the grace. Whatever state of life we’re called in, the corresponding life will be available. Now, our Blessed Lady was called to the highest of all states that is to conceive the eternal Son of God in her womb… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
On the 15th June '16 Catholic Voices organised a set of presentations asking the question "Are Catholic values best served by remaining in the EU?". Family Life International were on hand to document and record this event. There were a total of 4 speakers contributing to a number compelling arguments from a Catholic perspective.
On the 15th June '16 Catholic Voices organised a set of presentations asking the question "Are Catholic values best served by remaining in the EU?". Family Life International were on hand to document and record this event. There were a total of 4 speakers contributing to a number compelling arguments from a Catholic perspective.
On the 15th June '16 Catholic Voices organised a set of presentations asking the question "Are Catholic values best served by remaining in the EU?". Family Life International were on hand to document and record this event. There were a total of 4 speakers contributing to a number compelling arguments from a Catholic perspective.
On the 15th June '16 Catholic Voices organised a set of presentations asking the question "Are Catholic values best served by remaining in the EU?". Family Life International were on hand to document and record this event. There were a total of 4 speakers contributing to a number compelling arguments from a Catholic perspective.
The passion of our Blessed Lord is at many levels, certainly there is physical in the physical treatment or ill treatment or the abuse that He received. But there is also the spiritual passion, because our Lord suffered for us, for love of us, to free us from our sins and save us from death. There is also the emotion passion of our Lord that those whom He loved abandon Him. There is of course the physiological as well, because our Lord is not only God, He is also man. So all of the sufferings we go through, our Lord went through as well and to an even greater degree. He didn’t just suffer as one man, but He suffered for the whole human race, for every single human being, so all of our sufferings are really contained in His. This is true for the Church universal; we are members of the Church. So the Church also has Her own passion. Certainly in our time, we know what the passion of the Church is. We see how She is lacerated, how those who are the successors to the Apostles seem to be running away. They may not physically run away, but by their silence they have run away, at the very time when we need to hear their voice on so many issues. The world rejoices to see the Church lacerated, beaten, defeated. And so it is incumbent upon to continue to pray. And like the holy women to remain at the foot of the cross on which the Church is being crucified. We look particularly to visible head of the Church, the successor of St. Peter. And so we turn to St. Peter and see how he himself behaved on that first Good Friday... For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
On this, the Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The Gospel acclamation was ‘Blessed as the Virgin Mary who treasured the word of God and pondered it in her heart.’ The word of God is a treasure beyond all imagining and like every treasure, it’s something we discover or we are given and yet there is work to be done on it. In case of the word of God, it requires pondering, prayer, consideration, application and this is what Our Lady did and excelled in. Every word of God is a word of life and she kept this life in her heart. From her conception, she was already destined for the glory of God, to possess, to inherit the glory of God. The Prophet, Isaiah tells us, “I exhort to join the Lord, my soul, rejoices in God and my Saviour, for He has clothed me with the garments of Salvation. He was wrapped me in the cloak of integrity, like a bride dawn in her jewels.” The Lord indeed wrapped her in integrity, in as much as He created her for Himself and kept her safe for Himself, so that her heart could be in no other place than in the word of God, and the word of God could find no perfect place than in heart. The parents as we heard in the gospel of our Lord made the annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and in this case for the feast of the Passover. Our Lord is 12 years old, and as they went up to the feast, they celebrated it with the prerequisite to devotion… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today we celebrate the feast of the most Sacred Heart of Jesus. A feast that reminds us of His great love, His inexpressible love for us, a love where He was ready and willing and indeed laid down His life. ‘A man’ He says ‘can have no great love, than to lay down his life for his friends.’ But He’s done even that which is great and that which is greater and He’s done greatest of all; for He didn’t just lay down His life for His friends but even for His enemies. As St. Paul says, “While we were yet enemies, God sent His Son”. This love of Christ is something that we ought in gratitude alone, we ought to return and yet it is so difficult for us, because we still cling to things that do not lead us to Him. Who, St. Paul says can save us from this body of death. No one except Christ Jesus, so even though our inclinations and our passions and our desires belong to this world, yet we hope we have that faith in Christ’s love for us that He will draw us back to Himself even against our inclinations, desires and please God, even against our will for there is no good apart from Christ Jesus, Our Lord. He offered Himself as a victim for sin. As we heard in the gospel, He, on the cross crucified between two thieves, the Sabbath which was a great Sabbath, meaning that the feast of Passover fell on that Sabbath… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
As you heard the passion was long and I shan’t lengthen your passion with a long sermon but just a reflection. Our Lord came into the world to redeem us. His work of redemption was essentially His suffering, death on the cross. He spent thirty years of hidden life, three years of ministering publically, three hours sufferings. The most important part of His life was those three hours, because that’s where our actual redemption was worked out. St Paul tells us that we have to work out our redemption with fear and trembling. So the two things for us to work out our salvation, the two things required fear and trembling, and of course we don’t hear that very often in our world. We are told we shouldn’t be afraid of God, of course that is madness. We should be afraid of God, there are two kinds of fear; there is filial fear, fear of offending God because He is our Father. There is servile fear, fear of offending Him because He can punish us. So we need to keep these two in mind. These two kinds of fear, also kinds of love perhaps are reflected in two of the apostles, Peter and Judas. There is incredible contrast between the two. He knew what was in each of them, He knew the weakness each one has, He also knew their strengths. He warned both of them of the danger in which they stood. He continually warned Judas at the multiplication of the loaves. He said ‘Didn’t I choose you the twelve, yet one of you is a devil.’... For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Good Friday, has a very special meaning for not only Christians but every single human being. On this day, we remember the suffering of one Man in human history. This is a great mystery when we think about it, that we should commemorate the suffering, the unjust suffering, the most cruel suffering, suffering that consisted not only of physical abuse, but also of emotional trauma, of injustice, of unmitigating violence, of much indignity, insults. In short, suffering that all of us at some point has experience, not to the same depth or magnitude, but suffering which we can identify. Every single human being suffers. Suffering is not limited to any particular race, class or gender or age. Everybody suffers and so we can identify with the suffering of this Man, who is God. This is where the mystery is. That God chose to identify in the one thing we all experience, suffering, deprivation, anguish, isolation, solitude, pain, desertion, treachery and the list goes on and on. Why did He choose to suffer? Because God in His infinite wisdom had decided that this is the best way in which we can be redeemed. Now we see the purpose of suffering, it is nothing other than redemption. This is why in our world, to deny suffering, to try to escape from suffering, by choosing death, is in fact to reject God’s redemption. It is to reject salvation. It is even to reject our very humanity and with it, the possibility of sharing in the divine nature, which in fact is the crown of our redemption… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Blessed Lord watched the rich young man go away. He made no attempt to draw him back to convince him. So the Lord shows us that whilst we’re free, He doesn’t compel, He doesn’t compel us. So we’re entirely free to accept He’s invitation or not. If we do accept His invitation, we do that freely, we don’t do it for His benefits, but for our own. He said to the young rich man, “Go sell what you have, give to the poor, you will have treasure in heaven, come follow me.” But for the young man, he couldn’t even begin the first part, which was to sell what he had and to give it away, or rather to exchange it. This is what Saint Mark tells us. That he went away sad, for he was a man with great wealth, and so instead of being a possessor of what had been given to him, he became rather it’s guardian and consequently it’s slave, for for he couldn’t free himself from it… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today is the feast of Corpus Christi. We celebrate another one of those great mysteries, which Our Saviour has left us. It is the Sacrament of He’s presence among us and so fulfilling the promise that He made as He departed visibly from our world, behold I am with you always even to the end of the age. And sadly in our days we do not appreciate the greatness of this sacrament and its mystery is disappearing from our consciousness and we see the sacrament violated and treated as ordinary bread. Sadly this means in many cases, sacrilege and consequently we see its effects which is a laceration of the Church, laceration of the Body of Christ. Even as He was scourged on the very day, the night He was betrayed and the day of His crucifixion. But we shouldn’t be surprised for as the head is gone, so necessarily the body follows as well. What is a Sacrament? This is the question we need to ask and the question we need to answer, if we are to avoid this great violation, abuse of the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord. A Sacrament, as we read in the Catechism, is an outward sign, of an inward grace, inward reality that it signifies and it effects. Not only does the Sacrament signify the reality but it actually brings the reality in to existence… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Having encountered resistance in Judea, in Jerusalem, Our Lord went off to the other side of the sea of Galilee, but the crowds still followed Him. The reason, because they were impressed with the signs He gave, in curing the sick. Whilst it’s not perfect, there’s certainly nothing wrong in that, whatever reason we seek the Lord, the important thing is that we seek Him. In finding Him our faith will increase but it is not only faith, our love likewise should grow even greater. And certainly the cures that He effects would generate a sense of gratitude, spirit of gratitude on which love is founded. The Lord climbs the hillside we’re told and sat down with His disciples; the crowd do not climb the hill. Looking up when He sees them, He said to Phillip, “Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat”? In St. Matthew’s Gospel, in fact the other three Gospels, record this incident, this miracle and we’re told that they were the ones who approached the Lord and said send the people away, so they can buy food for themselves, and the Lord says, “No, why should I send them away? You give them something to eat” and St. John who relates it, says the Lord asked Philip perhaps because Philip was the one who said to send them away… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord speaking to Nicodemus declared plainly that He was from above and that He brought testimony from God. Then Our Lord went back to the region, Jordan, where He had been Baptised and John was still Baptising. The Lord was drawing people to Himself so much so, that John’s disciples prompted by jealously, complained to John, ‘The man whom you bore testimony’, they said ‘Is low down the river and everyone is going to Him?’ And again, John remonstrated with them, trying to convince them that Christ was the one whom they should follow. He said that he himself was merely the friend of the bridegroom and he, John, rejoiced to hear the voice of the bridegroom. The disciples are still reluctant, so John continues to speak to them, to admonish them and even to place a warning, telling them they risk losing eternal life and in fact the anger of God would remain on them if they refused to follow the light. So how does John argue, again from common experience, John the Baptist said to his disciples ‘He who comes from above is above all others’ as he had said about Christ, the lamb of God, He is above others in two ways. The first… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Blessed Lord speaks to Nicodemus on that mysterious night about God’s love for the world. Nicodemus came looking for a teacher, but what he found was a Saviour. The Lord at this very first encounter, speaks about He’s passion. No one, He said, has gone up to Heaven, except the One who came down from Heaven. The Son of man who is in heaven, so He calls Himself the Son of Man. As the Son of man, He says, ‘The Son of man must be lifted up, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert.’ So that everyone who believes may have eternal life in Him. So the death of the Saviour, the Son of man, is going to be the means, the vehicle, by which we receive eternal life. But what is the reason for this great sacrifice, this great mystery? It is nothing other than God’s love, which the Lord continues to explain to Nicodemus. God loved the world so much, that He gave His only Son. There are two things that come out of this. That the world is good because God loved it or better still, God loves it. What is the world but everything that He created in it, as we read in Genesis, everything God made is good. However, sin entered into the world, through the treachery of the devil and corrupted it but it did not destroy it, nor did it rob the world of its essential goodness. It was to restore this goodness to its original perfection perhaps even more to raise it even higher that God gave His only Son, which brings us to the second point. It is not as if God had many Son’s, but only one. It is not as if He gave us a creature, no matter how great, but His own Son, His own life you might say. Given this, He gave it so that everyone who believes in this Son may not be lost, but may have eternal life, which is exactly what He had said before; that the Son of man be lifted up so all that believed in Him will have eternal life… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The story of the rich young man is well known to us. It’s a story that applies to all of us, because the disciples ask this question “If this is how it is, who can be saved”, so evidently it’s not just the rich that our Lord was speaking about, but every one of us. Our Lord we’re told was setting out on a journey when this young man ran up. He shows great respect for our Lord for we are told he knelt before Him and put the question “Good master what must I do to inherit eternal life”. He had heard our Lord speak no doubt about the kingdom and how we must become little children in order to enter in. But his approach to our Lord is that of one who is a good teacher, a good master, a good man, where of course Christ is much more than this. Our Lord answers him according to the spirit with which he questions, good master, our Lord says “Why do you call me good, no one is good but God alone.” In other words we cannot judge goodness without reference to God. Only God is absolutely good. Our Lord is indeed a good master after all He called Himself the good shepherd, and the Holy Spirit He also said, is the good Spirit whom the Father sends. So goodness in its very essences belongs to God and all of us in some way participate in this goodness. Our sins merely detracts us, take us away from the goodness to which we ourselves are called… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today the Church celebrates the feast of the most holy and glorious Trinity, one of the fundamental doctrines of Christianity. In fact, if one does not believe in the Trinity, one cannot be a Christian. The very definition of a Christian is one who believes in the Trinity because it is from this mystery that all the others flow.
When we talk about the mysteries of God, it is not in the sense of something that cannot be known. But rather it is a truth that is slowly being revealed to us. Yet because we are creatures and therefore finite, we cannot grasp the full depth of the mystery. We cannot understand the full truth. If we think about it when we were children how did we learn? We didn’t learn everything all at once, but we were given truths bit by bit. We were told of the realities that exist in small amounts and it was on this that we built the foundation of our knowledge. So when we look at children, their books, usually have very large print, the words are simple and there are pictures to assist them in understanding the story. That’s where the mystery is, the mystery is in the story and as we understand the story we penetrate into the mystery. Even the story has various levels, our Lord Himself used that very method to teach, when He spoke the parables. We could grasp the story immediately, but then as we break it open we see there are other truths underlying it.
So the mystery of the Trinity is this, essentially, it is the revelation of God’s inner life… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The resurrection of our Blessed Lord, is the central, is the bedrock to our faith. In the letter to the Corinthians, the first letter St. Paul relates, if Christ has not been raised from the dead, everything we believe is uncertain is false even, if Christ is not be raised from the dead, we are the most miserable of all peoples because we are still in our sins. If Christ has not been raised from the dead, we are even guilty of blasphemy, because we have called God to witness that He has risen from the dead. But Christ has been raised from the dead, and His resurrection means our sins are forgiven. That is there is now a sacrifice by which all of our sins of which we repent are forgiven. How can we know this for sure, because Christ came into the world for sinners. That was the reason for His entry into the world, to save sinners. And more than that, we know also that God desires the salvation of all. That there is no one outside of His mercy, even the worst of sinners is included in His mercy. The problem is not with God, the problem is with us who are slow to believe who are even reluctant to believe… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The votive mass for our Blessed Lady in the Easter season from St. Johns Gospel uses the narrative of Calvary. We’re told by the cross of Jesus stood His Mother, His Mother’s sister Mary of Cleopas and Mary Magdalene. Then we’re told that Jesus, seeing His Mother and the disciple whom He loved standing next to her, said ‘Woman behold your son’ and to the disciple ‘Behold your mother’ and from that moment the disciple made a place for her in his home.
Everything our Blessed Lord did whilst on earth is full of mystery and full with innumerable teachings for our mediation and for our spiritual growth. We can never exhaust this rich wine to which He has invited us. We as Catholics have been chosen by God, not because we have done anything special, but because He wants us to do something special for the world in which we live. In other words, we are servants who have been given a responsibility. This does not, and should not make us proud. Our Lord said to His disciples ‘When you have done all the things commanded of you, say we are unprofitable servants, we have merely done our duty. Servants we are yes, but also friends, I call you friends. And because we are friends we ought to server more faithfully, more fervently’. More faithfully, more fervently. Otherwise we would be found to be unprofitable servants in truth and even worst unfaithful servants. God’s most faithful servant is non other than the Blessed Virgin Mary. God entrusted to her everything that He possessed and loves and indeed is. The Father entrusted to the Virgin His most beloved Son. So in a certain sense we can see that everything is in the hands of Mary… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Christ came into the world to save sinners. The manner in which He chose to do this which was by suffering, by dying for us. But His life didn’t end in death because His life is life, He rose from the dead. So, the Apostle tells us, since Christ suffered for us, He did so, leaving us an example, what do we need an example for? That we may follow in His steps. ‘Beloved Christ has suffered for us, leaving you an example that you may follow in His steps’. Yet when suffering comes our way, we complain and grumble. The reason of course is that we don’t look to Christ and so see the purpose to which God has put the suffering. Suffering is a consequence of sin, Adam’s sin primarily but ours also. It is something that is inescapable, but Christ in His goodness has shown us how we can use something as suffering to our own spiritual advantage. And so the Apostle continues, ‘Christ did no sin, neither was deceit found in His mouth.’ Everything He said was truth, in fact He declared Himself to be the Truth. And yet sinless as He was, He embraced it willingly, when He was insulted, when He was reviled, when He was called in an imposter, when He was accused of having a daemon, when He was accused of being a Samaritan, when He was accused of being against Moses, when He was called an enemy of God - He said nothing in His defence and He suffered… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Making His way down to the Kedron Valley to the garden, Our Lord speaks more and more clearly, openly to His disciples. They are deeply agitated, they are afraid. They sense the impending evil. Already the Lord has spoken about them being scattered. The shepherd will be struck and the sheep will be scattered. He had spoken about the betrayal. He had spoken even to Peter, saying ‘Satan had got his wish to sift them like wheat.’ He gives them some consolation as He speaks with them, some encouragement. Even though at the same time, there minds are perhaps not all there, He is speaking of His departure, and of course that would cause them much grief. But He consoles them, when speaking of the advocate, ‘When the advocate comes whom I shall send to you from the Father.’ So He is the one who will send the advocate, yet He also speaks of the Father sending the advocate as well. For the Third Person, the Spirit of Truth who issues from the Father, this Third person is being sent into the world, not that He is not in the world, for the Blessed Trinity is always in the world. In fact He is everywhere, the Father is everywhere, the Son is everywhere, the Holy Spirit is everywhere. One God is everywhere. Yet the manner in which the Persons are present differs. The Son, the Second Person was sent meaning that He had taken a new way of existing in the world. That is He took flesh from the Virgin, and this is a new way in which God is present among us. The Holy Spirit likewise is sent and He is going take a new way of existence in our world. He will do this in two ways, interiorly and exteriorly… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had called Himself the vine and we the branches. He had in many ways told us that we can only have life as long as we remain united with Him. If we fail to remain united with Him, we will loose our life and we will not only not bear fruit but would also perish. He came into the world out of love for the world. That is the world that He created. He uses the word world in several senses, inasmuch as He has created it, it is good. But when sin entered into the world, it took possession of all those who submit to it. And so the Lord calls the world, those who are opposed to Him, to His plan of redemption, to His plan of giving life, all those whose character is such that they love the darkness. Basically those who love sin. Therefore in this sense the world opposes Him, and consequently the world opposes us, and so the Lord not hiding anything from us tells us, ‘If the world hates you, know that it hated Me before you’ In this way, He shows He is the standard barer, we are to follow Him. Yet at the same time He walks with us – where His very life oozes, pulses through us, inasmuch as He is the vine and we are the branches. So we should not expect to be treated any better than He… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
If we are to gain fruit from reading the scriptures, then we must do so prayerfully. We must find a quite place into which do so prayerfully. We must invoke the Holy Spirit and of course we must read the sacred scriptures, with devotion and attention. In the scriptures it is Christ Himself who speaks to us. And every word that He says is of importance. And therefore we should even pay attention to the words that He uses. For example in today’s Gospel He tells us, ‘If anyone loves me he will keep My word.’ He puts it in the singular, no divisions, no multiplications, just my word. And the reward He promises is, ‘My Father will love Him, and We shall come to Him, Father and Son and We will make Our home with him’. So in keeping Christ’s word undivided, whole and entire, we obtain the love of the Father Himself and we obtain the communication of Father and Son inasmuch as They come to us and we in Them. Or in other words we share in the divine nature.
What about those who do not love him, He says ‘Those who do not love Me, do not keep My words.’ He puts it in the plural. Because the first sign of a lack of love is to nit pick, to divide, to make distinctions, to drift away bit by bit. And this in fact is the sad experience of our first parents in the garden… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord invites us to prayer. Prayer is the means by which we are in touch with the reality or to put it more clearly the truth. God is truth; God is the only reality that exists. We exist only because God has brought us into existence. He has not only destined us for this world, but our destiny lies in knowing Him face to face. Seeing Him as He is and being able to love Him in His essence.
How does this come about, it begins because the Son of God, entered into our world. Our Lord in the Gospel said to the disciples and of course to us that ‘You believe that I have come from God and that the Father has sent Me’ which is in fact a declaration of His divinity. I have come from God and this is what we profess in our creed, God from God, light from light, true God from true God. This is His internal generation within the blessed trinity. From all eternity the Father begets His Son, His Son is His own self knowledge. And this begetting of the Son, the perfect copy of His invisible image as St. Paul tells us that the Father loves, He loves the Son with an infinite love, the very love that is His being. And because the Son is the perfect image the Son loves the Father as Our Lord says elsewhere in St. Johns Gospel. And how does the Son love the Father, but in exactly the same manner that the Father loves the Son… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord called Himself the true vine. The true vine that brings forward sweet fruity, the vine that brings forth the blood, that inebriates and gives eternal life. And this vine, also known as His mystical body, also known as the Church, includes each and every one of us. He has called us after all, the branches of this vine. And the fruit that comes from Him passes through us, or better still, we bear that fruit. When we think about it, the sap in the vine passes through the branches, the branches themselves do not produce the sap. And when we compare it to ourselves life comes through Him, He is life. We don’t have life of our own, but rather the life we have, the true life we have comes from Him. Equally the joy He spoke about is essentially His, and He shares it with us. So when He says, I am the true vine and the Father is the vine dresser, He is telling us that in His human nature He is the vine and we because of our human nature are grafted into Him. But the one who ensures that we remain in Him is none other than the Father who is the Lord of all and the source of every good. In this grafting He tells us that there are seven benefits that we receive because we are the branches… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The Lord had gathered the disciples at the beginning of His ministry. He had chosen them, each one individually. This choice was of the divine will. Even Judas had been chosen. He had been chosen to do what was necessary. Likewise Peter was chosen. When Andrew brought his brother Peter to the Lord, saying we have found the Messiah, the One Moses had spoken about. He brought Peter to the Lord, the Lord looking at Peter, at least it was Simon as he was then, said ‘You are Simon, you are to be called Peter.’ So the Lord with His disciples spent some two years working miracles to prove the truth of what He taught. He encountered some opposition from the authorities, who refused to accept Him and more importantly to accept what He said. He pleaded with them ‘If you do not believe Me, at least accept what I say because of the signs.’
So the Lord decided the time had come now to choose the leader of the little band of the Apostles or more correctly to choose the rock on which to build His Church. So moving away from the centre of Judea into pagan or at least close to pagan territory, He asked the disciples, ‘Who do men say the son of man is?’ Our Lord had identified Himself as the son of man and He asked the question. The disciples had been with Him for a couple of years, they had heard Him, they had heard His teaching, they had seen the signs, the miracles. What’s the opinion of the crowd, who hadn’t seen everything He had done? The Apostles respond… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had said to the disciples, ‘Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God still, and trust in me’, in this way declaring His equality with the Father. For, if we trust in God as He commands and also trust in Him with that same trust, then there must be equality. He’s given peace, He says, ‘My peace I bequeath to you, My own peace I give to you.’ His peace is that divine peace, that divine harmony that exists between Father, Son and Holy Spirit and this is what He confers to us. It is evident that we cannot give something we ourselves do not have. So if He gives it, we know that its source must be from the very bosom of the Holy Trinity. This peace became manifest first of all in the holy family on the night when He entered into our world. The angels descended from Heaven singing ‘Glory to God in the highest and peace to those of good will.’ So it’s this same peace from the blessed Trinity, through the holy family, in Himself that He confers on us. He makes it clear that it’s not the kind of peace that the world gives. The best the world can give us is tranquility, but not peace. It can give us a sense of safety, more by an absence of difficulties and of war. But it cannot give us this peace that our lord speaks of. A peace which begins with first and foremost a reconciliation with God. That means freedom from sin… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord had used many images to describe Himself. In His relationship to us, He is the gate of the sheepfold, He is the good shepherd, He is the light that comes into the world, which dispels the darkness. He is the lamp, but here He calls Himself the true vine. The fact that He adds the adjective true, tells us that there is another vine. This other vine in fact Israel and about Israel the prophet complained, I planted a vine, instead of bearing fruit it bore sour grapes. But Our Lord is the true vine. He is the true vine in regard to His humanity. As Israel was to be the means by which God would redeem the world and failed, in as much as the Apostles said, our fathers were unable to observe the law. Our Lord who is the true vine obeyed His Father even unto death and therefore He is the true vine producing the fruit the Father wanted. So He is the true vine and at the same time, His Father, our Father is the vine dresser. So, in His humanity, He is the true vine, in His divinity He is the vine dresser… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord gave the Apostles the same mission that He received from His Father. ‘As the Father has sent Me, so do I send you.’ Here in St. Marks Gospel He tells the eleven, go out into the whole world. Before they were only to go to the lost sheep of the house of Isreal, but now He has won salvation for all, He sends them to proclaim the good news to all creation. That commission given to the eleven is given to the Church. Given to the Church, it is given to each and every member of the Church of which we are individual cells and therefore we have that same commission to proclaim the good news.
One who hears and believes, receiving baptism is saved. So we are instruments in the salvation of others. For those who will not believe, the Lord gives a warning, condemnation. Charity demands that we desire and work for the salvation of all. Our Lord also tells us there are signs by which believers maybe seen, detected, and then indeed believe. One of the signs is found in St. Peters first letter but throughout the scriptures as well… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Lord, as we just said, washed His disciple’s feet which had scandalised Peter. ‘Surely you’re not going to wash my feet?’ To which the Lord said ‘You do not know what I’m doing now, later you’ll understand.’ Peter said ‘You will never wash my feet.’ Our Lord said ‘If I do not wash your feet, you will have no part of me.’ The threat of being separated from Christ was so great that Peter said ‘Not only my feet, but my head and my hands as well.’ To which the Lord responded, ‘He who has washed, doesn’t need to be washed again except for his feet’, because our feet keep us in contact with this world. Our eyes, St. Paul tells us, should be in heaven where Christ is. So our hearts long to be where He is. As Peter was fearful of being separated from Him, so also we should be not fearful of being separated, as anxious to be joined to Him. But already we are joined to Him, we are disciples by His grace, we are His servants by His favour… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We live in an age, where idealism, elitism is frowned upon. It seems as if everything has been dragged down and our religion with it. So that, even the idea of saying that Christianity is different from every other religion, is regard as a kind of arrogance. Nevertheless it is true, and this is something we need to remember, that the founder of Christianity, the giver of Truth is Himself God, that He claimed to be God. There is no other founder of any religion which has every made the claim to be God. The best that they could say is that they are prophets. Even in the Old Testament which also comes from the true God. Moses made no claim to be God, he saw himself merely as a prophet, one who was entrusted with a task, one who was sent. The apostles likewise never claimed to be God, but rather they claimed to be servants. To be ones who were sent by He who came to redeem us… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
St. John the Baptist appeared at the river Jordon, unexpectedly, dressed in camel skin with a very meagre diet; locust, wild honey and water. He came preaching a gospel of repentance. He spoke about the axe which was already laid to the root of the tree. He called the Pharisees who came to the Jordon a set of vipers. To the people, his language is a little more gentle but non the less, he warned them unless they repented they would perish. He worked no signs, he just preached. When asked who he was, he said, ‘I am the voice of one crying the wilderness.’ He says he is not the Light, but only a witness to the Light. He called himself a voice, not the Word, not even the sound but the voice. Like every voice, it is heard briefly and then fades away. But what the voice carries is the word and the voice carries the word from one heart to another. In many of the hearts that heard the Baptist, the word settled and there was a change. The change is expressed in what the peoples ask John, ‘What must we do?’ And again and again there is an echo of it in the new testament. ‘What must we do?’ A rich young man came to the lord and said ‘Good Master what must I do to inherit eternal life’. Cornelius asked peter ‘What must I do?‘ All through the ages, this question rings out again and again. Today it still rings out, what must we do to inherit eternal life. It can’t be what were doing right now, just drifting along, taking each day as it comes. We hear voices that say salvation is free and God is merciful and that is all that we need to know, we need do nothing else but believe. St. James answers that position very clearly, the devils believe, but they tremble. So then what must we do? And three classes of people ask the Baptist this question…
On this the forth Sunday of Advent, the Church gives us the visitation of our Blessed Lady to Elisabeth for our meditation. As with all the scriptures, there are many threads and it’s always difficult to choose one particular or even two threads that would do justice to the nativity of our Lord. But joining the passage we’ve just heard to that, the letter to the Hebrews, we see in the Church gives us the restoration of the human race, how so? What brought about the fall of the human race? God after all had created us, and created us perfect, in as much as, all that was necessary for our existence had been given to us. In particular there was the harmony between the body and the soul and so the senses were under control. There was a clarity of intellect, so it was not possible for the man to be deceived. There was also the strengthened will, an inclination towards doing good. There was original justice, God’s grace in us. There were many other similar gifts. What was lacking? How did our first parents fall into sin? When God creates free creatures, He gives them everything that is necessary for integrity of their being, that is justice. He gave them theses gifts however, conditionally. Because being free creatures He gave us the ability to chose, to choose what? To choose how we would obtain our final destiny, our eternal happiness. And the choice was through obedience.
The man Adam was asked to obey God. ‘Do not touch the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden. Do not eat it.’ And then a clear warning, ‘The day you eat of it you will die the death.’ The commandment was given to the man, not the woman. And so the serpent, who, we are told in scripture was the most subtle of all the creatures God had created, entered the garden, because of the Man’s disobedience, because God had placed him in the garden to cultivate it and to guard it. If he was to guard it, he should have made sure that nothing evil entered into it. So failing to guard, he already laid the foundation for his downfall. The serpent being most subtle, knew it was useless to tackle the man, because his intellect was clear… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio
Our most blessed Saviour had gone into Jerusalem; this is the last year of his life on earth. Going straight to the temple, He cleansed it for the second time of those who were trading in it. Then retiring to Bethany the following day He returned to the temple and He was teaching. The chief priest and the elders were rattled by His behaviour. This up start, He does not belong to the priestly line, He is from the provinces a country bumpkin and here He is acting as someone with authority. Even to the point of cleansing the temple. They cannot stand by and watch this kind of threat to their authority. To make matters worst, the children, the little ones were praising what He had done, ‘Blessings on He who comes in the name of the Lord.’ And they tried to silence them, the children on that account. ‘What authority have you, for acting like this and who gave you this authority?’ It was an insidious remark, in as much as, when He had cast out daemons they attributed this to the work of Beelzebub. Who gave you this authority? Caesar? Herod?… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The feast of the presentation of our Blessed Lady is in commemoration of the dedication of the temple in the Jerusalem. The temple of course to our Blessed Lady was built in the year 543AD. Our Lady’s presentation of course corresponds very much to the presentation of Our Lord in the temple. The presentation of the child to God, was an acknowledgement that God had given to the parents a gift. In the case of our Blessed Lady, she was the greatest gift to the human race, in as much as she was to be the mother of the Saviour. She of all creatures was to have a unique relationship to the Blessed Trinity. In as much, she is the most excellent daughter of the Father, the mother of the Son and of course the temple of the Holy Spirit.
On one occasion, our Lord was preaching and He worked a miracle casting out daemons. Some Pharisees said that it was through the power of Beelzebub that He cast out daemons. The Lord immediately went on to warn them about blasphemy, that is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, because they were attributing a good work to the power of the evil one. He then went on to say that if satan cast out satan his kingdom is divided. And it is whilst He was saying this that some people came and said to Him, Your mother and Your relatives are outside and they wish to speak to You. The Lord immediately responds and says ‘Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?’ and stretching out His hands toward His disciples, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. Anyone who does the will of My Father in heaven is My mother and My brother’. So our Lord teaches us that it is not the relationships of the flesh that matter but those of the spirit. In other words everything we do should be referred to God and God alone. The source of all of our actions should be the intention to please God. No other creature did this more perfectly than our Blessed Lady… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today’s feast is a celebration of one of the great popes, with which Christ has blessed his Church, Leo called the great. He was of aristocratic origin and has befitted his rank at the time; he was an ambassador for many parts of the empire. He was elected a deacon of the Church and on the death of the Pope in 440 he was elected unanimously by the clergy of Rome to be the pontiff. Immediately he set himself the task of securing the Church. We are talking at a very difficult time in Church history, all times are difficult, some more than others. At that time there were many threats to the autonomy of the Church. The empire had been split, the emperor lived in Constantinople, the bishop of Constantinople claimed to be the head of the Church simply because he was the bishop of the most important city. St. Leo withstood him, maintaining in fact that the head of the Church was none other than the one Christ had selected and his successors, namely the bishop of Rome.
He spent a great deal of his pontificate writing to the various bishops and emperors correcting many errors which were creeping into the Church. There were in particular the questions of the heresies, in particular the divinity of Christ, is He God, is He Man, is He a mixture of both. Does He have a divine will? Does He have a human will? Does He have no will at all? What of His soul and all of these. St. Louis was of remarkable clarity able to clarify a lot of these issues. In particular the Council of Calceedon which made it abundantly clear that in Christ there were two wills a human will and a divine will. And on the political, he was able to resolve many of the problems which the Church was facing, in the particular the attacks of the barbarians and of course there’s the famous story of Atilla, who was marching on Rome with a huge army… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Today the sixth of December, the second Sunday of Advent. Of course we are preparing for several feasts of Our Lady, the feast of the Immaculate Conception on the 8th and then we have Our Lady of Guadalupe which will be on Saturday, and then there is the feast of the expectation of Our Lady and we’re moving slowly toward the feast of Christmas the birth of Our Saviour. So it is quite fitting that we should focus on the Mother of Our Saviour.
There are many images found in the old testament of Our Lady. They are called types, St. Paul in fact referrers to them as types in the letter to the Galatians. That is, events in the Old Testament which happened in the ordinary run of things in history. But they were very symbolic, highly symbolic of a spiritual truth which is being unveiled. And several books of the bible you could say almost exclusively concerned in bringing out this imagery ‘the type’. Among them is the book of Esther. The Story of Ester is relatively simple. King Ahasuerus had Queen Vashti, who he had ordered to come to the banquet and she refused. Now in the land of the King, the land of Persia, when the King made a decision, it was irrevocable. When he made the law it could not be changed. And so it was decreed among the Medes and the Persians that if a Queen refused the obedience of the King, that she would be disowned, thrown out and somebody else would take her place. And so this was the law that was enacted. And Esther who was a Jewess was chosen. And so became Queen in place Vashti. Now it so happened that in the court, there was a man by the name of Haman… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Christmas having passed, we’re already celebrating the feast of the holy family, on this Sunday, the octave of Christmas. At the feast of the nativity of Our Lord, which we call Christmas, the reason being that it is the Mass of Christ or the presence of Christ among us. We celebrate in that feast the incarnation, that is God who became man and dwelt among us.
God could have chosen many ways in which to redeem us. We must believe that, however, He chose the best possible way. He chose a way that would demonstrate to us, prove to us, show to us the depth of His love. And so His Son whom He love, whom He loves, whom He will always love, assumed in the womb of the virgin, human nature. Without mixing His divine nature and His human nature, the two remaining distinct and separate, yet united in one person. This person who for all eternity is the Son of God, became the son of Mary, or as the Gospels will call Him the Son of man, as He Himself would refer to Himself. He came into a family, again He could have chosen many different ways to appear among us. We must believe that He chose the most appropriate way. An so He chose as His mother a woman espoused to a man, Joseph. They were both committed to a life of virginity, in the case of the virgin we know this from scripture itself, in the case of St. Joseph we know from holy tradition. But what we know as a fact, that Christ was conceived without a human father. An so born as an infant, He is worshipped by angels, a multitude of angels, He is worshipped by shepherds, He is worshipped by wise men, which we will commemorates on the feast of the epiphany.
He has to live for a brief time in Egypt, because King Herod intends to kill Him. His parents return to Israel, to Judea. They do not go to live in Bethlehem, because Herod’s son reigns there and they are afraid. So they go and they live in Nazareth and we know very little about those 12 years… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
‘I was born for this, I came into the world for this, to bear witness to the Truth.’ What is Truth? Does truth exist? If it does, does it matter? Perhaps an easy definition of truth is reality. And if we’re talking about reality, there’s only one reality, God is, God exists. And everything that God speaks exists. ‘Let there be light’ and there was light. ‘Let the waters separate into those above and those below’, and it happened. ‘Let the earth come forth’, ‘let trees and the seeds in them spring out of the earth’ and so it was. This is reality. ‘Let the waters bring forth living creatures and the air bring forth the birds’, and these things happened. These are the realities. ‘Let the ground be filled with creeping creatures of all kinds’ and the animals came forth. And then God said, ‘let us make man in our own image and likeness. And he fashioned man out of the soil of the earth and breathed into his nostrils and man became a living being’, another reality, perhaps the greatest reality – because man, male and female are made in the image and likeness of God who alone is reality. The Lord God put the man in the garden with all things subject to him, with one commandment - ‘The tree that stands in the middle of the garden, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat it, do not touch it, on the day you eat of it, you will surely die the death’. That also was real. But then the serpent came and asked the question. ‘Did God really say really say you could not eat of any of the trees?’ and this terrible dialogue began between the serpent and the woman, which lead to the woman believing the serpent, believing a fantasy, believing a lie, unreality is what she embraced… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
We celebrate the birth of St. Steven into eternity today. Yesterday we celebrated the birth of the Saviour in our world. Today the birth of his first martyr the proto martyr. We can say birth because Steven now rejoices in the presences of God and he has eternal life. The birth of the Saviour was a consequence of His love for us. It was out of love He came into our world to save us. Steven was born as a consequence of love. That is he loved God above all things. He loved the Incarnate Word and for the sake of the Incarnate Word he loved his neighbour as himself.
How did he manifest that love? Through the practice of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. Steven was a deacon chosen by the early church, so that the apostles could continue to preach the Word. Steven was to minister to the needs of the faithful, in particular the widows. Steven was one of the seven deacons who were chosen. And so he practised the corporal works of mercy, the feeding of the hungry and giving drink to the thirsty and the naked he clothed and so on - visiting those who were in prison. At that time there were many Christians in the prisons, because they believed and they would not conform. They would not deny the Lord. So the corporal works of mercy were an integral part of his vocation. But there were also the seven spiritual works of mercy. These Steven did not shy away from. He began by instructing the ignorant, again a work of the deacon. But he was not content just with this. We can have no doubt that he counselled the doubtful. But the one that won him the crown of glory, the most difficult of the spiritual works of mercy, he admonished the sinners. He boldly stood up and spoke to the Sanhedrin and to the Jews in general, telling them that what they had done was nothing but to crucify the King of glory. The Incarnate Word… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
All Catholics worthy of the name rejoice on this, the greatest feast of our most blessed Lady. Christians naturally should rejoice, in fact Heaven itself is full of joy from that first moment that the Mother of the Lord was conceived. This great mystery has so many aspects, that it is impossible to cover them all, in a life time or indeed many lifetimes. And so all we can do is to pluck a single thread, and let us look at just one thread.
As we heard in the first reading, when the Lord God called Adam, Adam was hiding and came out and said ‘I was afraid because I was naked and I hid’. And when the Lord asked further questions, the man replied, ‘It was the woman you put with me, she gave the fruit and I ate’. So the woman gave to the first man the fruit. Fruit that brought disaster to the whole human race. The man received the fruit in the garden, the garden of paradise. A garden which contains many other kinds of fruit, all meant for the delight of the human race. That is what fruit means, to be delighted in. ‘The serpent tempted me’ she said. And so the woman confessed that yes, she had been deceived by the serpent. And so when the Lord God when He cursed the serpent, He said ‘because you have done this, be a cursed be on all cattle, all wild beasts. I will make you enemies of each other, you and the woman, your offspring and her offspring. And so this warfare, we’d even say this cosmic warfare was put between the Woman and the serpent. Between the Woman and satan. The warfare isn’t between God and satan… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The Saviour offers a universal invitation, ‘come to me’. And then He describes those in particular whom He wishes to come, ‘all you who labour and overburdened’. And He promises us a reward or a consolation for our journey to Him, ‘I will give you rest’. And so the first thing we ask is, what is this labour? What is this burden? Oh, not burden, but overburden... We work… Our works which are not the works of God - and consequently we carry a burden which does not belong to God. We carry our own burden, the talent of lead, that is spoken of by the prophet. Sin is a talent of lead, it is our work. And so the Lord tells us, because we are struggling, fighting, doing our own will and reaping a harvest of it - that we should come to Him. And what does He say that He gives us, He’s offering us a burden, but it is not the kind of burden which is overbearing, it is a light burden. And from this we learn that necessarily we have to carry a burden. The choice is who’s? Ours? Or His? But He goes even further than this because He explains what is required of us. ‘Shoulder My yoke and learn from Me, for I am meek and humble in heart’. So we need to shoulder His yoke. But, what is a yoke? A yoke is an instrument that beasts of burden are joined together – so that they may share the workload. So He is saying that He has become like one of us, that is a beast. But beasts are made to carry burdens, so He is offering us, His own burden, namely the cross. And He’s saying take your cross on your shoulders and your cross is My cross, because there is only one cross for those who serve the Lord. Christ Himself is carried it. ‘Shoulder My yoke and learn from Me’, what are we to learn? Submission to God, that is the first thing because Christ came to undo the sin of... For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
John the Baptist was in prison because he said to the King ‘it is against the law for you to live with your brother’s wife’ in other words he was condemning adultery. And so he is arrested for defending marriage. Certainly he is a prophet for our time. In prison, John knows that his days are numbered. He is concerned for the salvation of his own disciples. He wishes them to follow the Light. He himself is only a witness for the Light. And so he sends them to our Lord to ask a question, ‘Are you the one who is to come? Or must we wait for someone else?’ And the Lord well aware of John’s intention makes the response to the disciples of John “Go and tell John what you see, what you hear; the blind receive their sight, the deaf - hearing, the lame - walk, the dead are raised etc... And so John’s disciples depart with a message, and more than a message, because they now are witnesses for Christ.
Our Lord begins to praise John, ‘What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed swaying in the wind, someone dressed in fine clothing? No you went to see a prophet and something greater than a prophet. And so in conclusion, He speaks the words we heard this morning. The words of the greatest praise for John ‘Of all the children born of women, a greater than John the Baptist has never been seen.’ What does that mean? It merely means that John is among the great. Our Lord didn’t say there is non greater than John, but He says that he is among the great. ‘Greater than he has never been seen.’ So there are others who could be on the same rank as John. Yet He says this is in, this changeable world, this world as yet unredeemed, this world that does not receive the light. And so the Lord compares it to a kingdom… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
Our Saviour is teaching. We’re told that He was doing so in a house. We are also told that His audience consisted of Pharisees and doctors of the law. That is experts in scripture, experts in law, in the prophets. What was more, that they came from every village in Galilee, from Judea as well as from Jerusalem. So there is a sense that these Pharisees and doctors had come to examine our Lord, since they came from right across the country. We are told that the power of the Lord were behind His works of healing. In other words these works were divine acts, they were not just a case as in the prophets, but there were so many and they were so astounding that it was necessary the authorities examine them. There is nothing unusual in that at all. We have the same procedure, when there is some apparition, it is natural for the bishop to setup a commission to examine the circumstances and to declare whether it is from God or not. So in that sense, there is nothing unusual. What however is of concern is the attitude. Our Lord Himself said, judge, but do not judge by appearances, judge rather in Truth. But because of their bias against Him, they were not willing to judge objectively.
At that moment we are told some men appeared carrying a paralysed man on the stretcher. They wanted to bring him to the Lord but were quite unable to do so. Being determined they made a hole in the roof and lowered the man before the Lord. First of all notice, they do not ask the Lord for anything. Again there is a problem; they put it before Him, leaving Him to decide what the best solution is for the problem. And so they lower the paralysed man in the stretcher and he appears before the Lord. We are told two things, i) that the Lord saw their faith, it was great faith one because the brought the man to him, ii) because they trusted in His mercy, they didn’t ask Him for anything, they knew He would do what was best. And the Lord simply says, ‘My friend, your sins are forgiven’. The Lord did what was best… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
The rebellion of our first parents resulted in them being cast out of paradise and as a consequence, we who are destined to be in paradise were cast out with them. The gifts which God had given to our parents, the gifts of integrity; that is first and foremost the clearness of intellect, secondly, the will to do that which we wish; that is the good for which we were created, thirdly the control over our senses and our body and of course we must not forget the gift of God’s own life in our souls. These and other things are the preternatural gifts, which we lost. And so we were cast out into the world. A world that is angry with us, that is, we would have to struggle with the soil to get our daily bread. God saw us in this condition perishing. But even as He punished our first parents by casting them out of the garden, He promised them a redeemer.
The offence against God is necessarily infinite. A finite act indeed it is, but the effects are infinite because of whom we have rebelled. We have rebelled against an infinite God. It was not possible for a creature to repair such damage and so God Himself put on our humanity, taking flesh in the womb of the virgin so that He might make that reparation. So God Himself would pay the debt of our offence. And because He is God and infinite in all His perfections, using the instrumentality of our bodies, He was able to make a reparation of infinite value, for the infinite offence that had been committed. How would He do this in His human body? He will give us an example and more than that, He would instruct us so that our intellect might once more receive the light for which it had been created. He would give us His sacraments, by which our wills would be strengthened. He would give us a promise by which we would make the necessary effort to control our senses. And He would promise at the end of it, not paradise, but heaven itself… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
By Fr Linus Clovis
Every miracle that Our Lord works, carries with it a teaching, a message. The difficulty is that we do not know how to interpret, and therefore how to understand the message. Immediately before this passage we heard, Our Lord had gone down to the house of the synagogue official whose daughter had just died. On the way a woman in the crowd with a haemorrhage said “if I touch the hem of his garments I will be healed.” And she did so and immediately the ailment which she suffered for twelve years disappeared. But Our Lord didn’t leave it there; he looked around and said “Who touched Me?” She only touched his clothes, but He said “Who touched Me?”. And when she came forward trembling, He said to her daughter your faith has saved you.
And then going down to the house of the official, He found that the daughter was already dead. But He said, she is not dead, she is asleep. He was laughed at, but what did He do? He simple went and held her by the hand, “little girl I tell you get up.” Now there was a crowd, these people had seen what had happened. It is this same crowd that is following Our Lord. When we are told, when He went on His way, two blind men followed Him shouting “take pity on us son of David.” What were they asking for? They evidently have a very high respect for Him. They didn’t dare say give us back our sight. They simple said “Take pity.” They threw everything on His compassion. They knew that He would know what is best to do. But strangely Our Lord doesn’t answer. And very much like the Syrophoenician women, He walks on. And we’re told, when He reached the house, the blind men came up with Him and then He speaks to them. What does He say, “Do you believe I can do this?” They answer “Yes sir we do.” Do you believe I can do what … And that’s the secret, they had said have pity on us. There desire was in their heart, Our Lord knew what was in their heart, they did not dare present to Him what they wanted. They depended totally on His mercy. They knew that even if He had refused their prayer, He would be merciful. Even if He refused their prayer it would be the best thing for them. This is the kind of faith they had… For Fr. Linus’ complete homily please listen to the Audio.
By Fr Linus Clovis
St Paul tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God. Our Lord Himself said to the crowds, this is working for God, to believe in the One whom He has sent. So faith is necessary for our salvation. Yet faith alone is insufficient, works also are necessary, that is to live the virtuous life. And again St. Paul tells us that there are some that profess Christ with their lips but deny Him with their deeds. And so in today’s gospel Our Lord says to us His disciples “it is not those who say to me ‘Lord, Lord’ that is those who have faith, who will enter the kingdom of Heaven, but the person who does the will of my Father in Heaven”. The works are necessary. Faith alone doesn’t save, in fact St. James tells us that the devils have faith, they believe, but it is of no benefit to them.
The Lord therefore tells us how indeed we should govern our lives. Therefore everyone who listens, that is the first act to listen, to these words of Mine, the commandments and acts on them, (the deeds), follow what he tells us, observe the commandments, will be like a sensible man, a wise man, who built his house on rock. Who is this wise man who built his house on rock? You are peter and on this Rock I build my Church. He is the wise man. What did he build, His Church on? The rock of Peter. Peter had manifest that he was worthy to be the rock, in as much as he professed faith in Christ Jesus; “You are the son of the living God”. So faith, trusting in the Christ that God has sent is necessary and to build on this. So we build on this rock like Christ built His Church.
St. Paul in the letter in Corinthians tells us there is only one foundation that can be laid, that is Christ Jesus. Each one must build on this foundation. We have a choice in what we build with, we may build with gold or silver or precious stones or with wood and stubble and straw. Nonetheless the Apostles says, each mans work will be tested by fire, and so the work may be destroyed, but the man may be saved…
From the prophet Isaiah, we heard the famous prophecy, ‘on this mountain the Lord of hosts will prepare for all peoples a banquet of rich food, a banquet of fine wines. A food rich an juicy of strained vines, on this mountain He removed the mourning veil covering all peoples and the shroud wrapping all nations, he will destroy death forever.’ This prophecy as we all know has been fulfilled.
Which is this mountain of which the Lord has prepared a rich banquet for all peoples? Well from the Prophet Daniel. Remember the famous dream, where there was the great statue, with the golden head and the feet of clay and iron. We’re told that small stone was cut from the mountain and it came down and struck the feet of the statue. The small stone itself destroying the statue became a great mountain. That of course is easily interpreted to be Our Lord Jesus Christ, that small stone, that single stone which smashed the head of Goliath, which we know from the book of Samuel. That small stone became the great mountain, Christ Jesus, but how does that fulfil the prophecy? Christ is the head and His body of which we are members, His body is the Church. It is in the Church, the mystical body of Christ that this prophecy is fulfilled, namely that the Lord has prepared a banquet for all peoples, all the gentiles, all the nations of the earth, enter into the One Church. A banquet of rich food and banquet of fine wines, the Eucharist and the Sacraments that come with it.
On this mountain he removes the mourning veil that covers all peoples, namely sin, disease and death. And the shroud enwrapping all nations, He will destroy death forever. It is only in the One Church Christ founded that this happens, namely His Catholic and Apostolic Church.
The preaching of the Gospel should bring joy to all of us. The preaching of the Gospel is nothing other than the call to repentance and the conversion of the sinner. The joy of the Gospel is nothing other than the children returning to their father’s home. Of course the joy of the Gospel is nothing other than the possession of the Holy Spirit. And we’re told filled with joy by the Holy Spirit, Jesus explains, ‘I bless You Father Lord of Heaven and Earth’. Our Lord says that there is more rejoicing among the Angels of God over one repentant sinner than over multitude that have no need of repentance. That doesn’t mean it is better to be a sinner, it does mean, however, that sinners should convert; they should believe and possess the life that God is giving. It is this very sharing of life that gives joy. But Our Lord blesses His Father and He rejoices because children are being given the revelation of salvation. It is not those with ability who arrive at salvation because of their ability but rather because they’re children. So He says for hiding these things from the learned and cleaver. So the natural ability doesn’t lead us to salvation, rather it is the child like disposition that we have that leads to salvation. So the learned and clever can indeed be like children and it is because they’re children that they will accept the good news of the Gospel.
In a similar way, and this important as we approach the year of mercy - It is not poverty that saves us, because, material poverty by itself is neither good nor bad. There is no virtue in being materially poor. There is however great virtual in being spiritually poor. Which is what Our Lord spoke of ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit’, that is the little ones who have no one on who to depend except God. And for that reason we think of the Widow Our Lord spoke of, the one who put the two small coins, all that she had to live on. Not only was she showing her spiritual poverty but her total faith and dependence on God.
Our Religion, the Christian religion is rooted in human history. It is not like so many other non Christian religions that have stories of a distant past. Although even in their stories they have elements of truth, for universally every religion there was a perfect, a golden age and something went wrong.
Christianity is rooted in human history so that we do not depend only on the scriptures for historical fact, but we can compare it with secular history and see indeed that the two mesh together. And so in today’s reading in the third chapter of St. Luke’s Gospel, we hear of specific times and unique individuals being named. So we see Tiberius Caesar has been in the throne for fifteen years, this is a historical fact, there was Julius Caesar, Augustus Caesar and then Tiberius. Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea. He will be there for ten years and he was appointed in the third year of Caesar’s reign. Herod who was the son of Herod the great who attempted to put Christ to death as an infant was the Tetrarch of Galilee, that is he had been given a forth part of the kingdom of Israel, his brother Philip another son of Herod, was a Tetrarch of two other areas and Lysanias was the Tetrarch of the fourth. So the civil rulers, the Roman Emperor, the kings and the Tetrarch of Palestine are named. And now the religious leaders are named, during the pontificate of Annas and Caiaphas. All of them are named for the simple reason that all of them would be in some way be influential in bringing about the death of the Saviour.
The word of God came to John the son of Zachariah in the wilderness, so all of this happened in the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilot would be one of the judges, Herod the Tetrarch would be another of the judges and Annas and Caiaphas would be another judges of Christ. So then God has set the stage and all the actors are present and so the drama begins...
St Paul in the first letter to the Thessalonians tell us that, urges that we should make more and more progress in the kind of life we are meant to live. What kind of life? The life that God wants. How do we know the kind of life that God wants us to live? The apostle himself tells us, ‘as you learnt from us and as you are already living it.’ So St. Paul himself taught the Thessalonians what God required of them and the Thessalonians had actually began to put this into practise. He goes further and says ‘You have not forgotten the instructions we gave you on the authority of the Lord Jesus.’ So with these words the Apostles tell us that his letters and his writings are directly from God and that they contain the framework, they contain the instructions which God has given us, by which we can make spiritual progress.
Now this spiritual progress is individual each one of us, it’s singular. It’s also community, as a people. And of course it is ecclesial, the Church itself. But we all know from personal experience, we start off well, and along the way temptations come and depending on our own particular inclinations we either struggle against the temptations or we give up. Sometimes we may go very far from what God wants of us. Equally we can struggle never giving up and remain very close to what God requires of us. And there are many examples of this in the lives of the saints. So for instances; and this is very important, the work of a mother is exceedingly important for an individual in fact for children?
So we have two very good examples that of St. John Bosco and his Mother… To continue please listen to this excellent homily on spiritual progress.
And so the Church today begins a new liturgical year. When Our Lord speaks to us in the scriptures, we need to keep something in mind - namely, heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass. Therefore His words are as applicable to us today as they were when He first spoke them 2000 years ago and as He will continue to speak them in the ages yet to come. So we need to apply these words to ourselves that we might receive the benefit, that the divine words necessarily bring.
How do we digest the words of God, yes we hear them, we internalise them, perhaps, but do we understand them, have we digested them. Our Lord himself complained about his own disciples - are you too without understanding are your eyes blind, are you unable to see, why can you not understand? This is what He said to the twelve. Of course He could easily say that to us as well. Therefore it is necessary that we ponder these words and apply them to our time and ourselves….
Are our hearts truly open to the Gospel?
Our Lord reaches the shores of Galilee, we are told that He then went up into the hills. Whenever He goes into the hills it is to remind us that we cannot find satisfaction, or healing or indeed salvation in the low places, but rather we must ascend into the heights. And so we find all the great revelations of God are found in the Hills, Moses on mount Sinai, and on mount Tabor, the Lord Himself was transfigured - and He ascended from the mount of Olives. As before when He sat on the mount of beatitudes to teach, He now sits on this hill close to the Sea of Galilee and we are told that the multitudes came. Why do they come? Because of their infirmity, and here is Someone who can heal all of our infirmities. And St. Matthew describes some of the many infirmities that are brought to Our Lord - the lame, the cripple, the dumb and many others. In fact this describes us as well - spiritually, for the physical infirmities that we experience are but spurs for us to seek healing from the only One who can truly make us whole. Where as we complain and are conscious of our physical infirmities, the spiritual ones are so far from our consciousness…
Do we take a little time to reflect on our spiritual infirmities? Do we enter into dialogue with Our Blessed Lord asking for the healing balm that only he can give us?
Our Blessed Lord having been baptised, beginning His redemption of the Human race, starts off by calling the apostles so that they might be witnesses of His teaching, of His miracles and above all of His Resurrection. He chose them at the start of His mission so that they should be there from the very beginning, for this is the criteria used by St. Peter, when it was time to replace Judas who abandoned his post. St. Peter said we should choose someone who was with us from the very beginning. So after being baptised, Our Lord then having left the Jordon, we are told, walks along the sea of Galilee, he didn’t see them (His apostles) with his bodily eyes, rather He saw them with their spirits, He saw their souls and disposition, He created them for this very reason...
Our Lord has created us, each with a unique mission, each with a unique path. Are we open to following what God has Willed for us? Are we ready to say not my will, but Your Will be done?
After Our Lord, having delivered the beatitudes on the mount, He came down and immediately a leper came to Him and He cured the leper. Now we hear how Our Lord makes His way to Capernaum and the centurion makes his way to Him. Mystically we understand that in the leper we see the healing of the people of Israel and in the coming of the centurion the healing of the gentiles. In the case of the centurion, he comes on behalf of his servant whom he describes, ‘my servant is lying at home paralysed and in great pain’ which indeed is the condition of the gentiles. By nature we are paralyzed and incapable of doing good, for we know neither law nor the prophets. So Our Lord comes to us in the person the centurion. The centurion is a man of exceptional quality motivated by charity…
This advent can we be animated by this same charity? Are we willing to open our hearts further to Our Lord and Blessed Mother?
In the time of Noah, the ark was being built, but people were eating, drinking, taking wives and husbands completely oblivious to what was going to happen. In our day a new ark is being built, the Church. Once again people are eating and drinking and marriage is being abolished. Therefore be ready, because you know not, at what hour the Son of man will come.
Our faith is important, your believing means that other people will receive grace. Your believing is the very means by which God has chosen to bring others to salvation. Why do you think the devil is so eager to break our faith, to destroy our practices? There are many ways we can do penance. But what kind of penance does God want from us; the acceptance of the difficulties of each day (that is enough for those who are lukewarm). Those who want to make progress in spiritual life need to undertake more serious penances. How can you make effective sacrifices in your daily life?
We have been given a gift, a precious faith which we have received at baptism. This faith is objective, not something we feel. It is concrete and explicit. It is manifested and articulated in doctrine. We must know the doctrine, this is what we have to believe if we are to be saved...
Our Lord performed His first miracle in the synagogue (according to Mark’s Gospel) casting out demons. The second, we're told that he went to the house of Simon Peter, curing his mother. The Third, was a man whose body was rotting away. The Leper says, 'If you want to, you can cure me', here is faith, he knows the Saviour has the power, what he doubts is the Saviour’s goodness. Do we find ourselves doubting Our Lord's goodness? Do we doubt that Our Lord will listen to our prayers? Do we question whether He will answer them?
‘Beelzebub is in him’ and ‘It is through the Prince of devils, that he casts devils out’. These are the accusations laid against Our Lord by Pharisees. These two accusations which are levelled against Our Lord, the head of the Church are also levelled against His Body. The Church is often accused of not understanding or being up to date with the age in which it exists. It has been argued that the Church should marry the spirit of the age… But hasn’t the Church seen every age? What does this age have to give to Christ’s Body?
The Gospel details Our Lord calling His first four ‘Apostles’. We need to look beyond the literal meaning of the word ‘Apostle’ and need to delve into it’s mystical meaning. We need to apply it to ourselves. Our Lord is calling each one of us according to his ability, according to disposition… Everyone is called according to grace. Do we hear His voice? Do we answer that call?
Our Lord has a destiny for each and everyone of us. He explains to his apostles that he has prepared a place for them (and us). But He will not force us to go to that place, he will however, invite us, encourage and forgive and do everything possible that we might arrive at that destiny. Do you want to respond to Our Lord's goodness and grace? Do you want to realise Our Lord's plan for you?
God has given each person with gifts and blessings. Every single gift we have is exactly that, a gift given by God. Given for his own good pleasure and according to his purposes. We can think of a garden with many kinds of flowers, some flowers are more beautiful than others. Is that a reason for one person to be jealous over another?
All the priests stand at their duty every day, offering sacrifices, over and over again which are quite incapable of taking sins away. The Jewish priesthood is a shadow of what was to come... How should we consider the old sacrifice and the New? Why did we need the True Sacrifice? How are we sanctified by this Sacrifice?
Our Lord is accused of being in league with devils by the pharisees when he casts out devils. Our Lord says "Every kingdom divided against itself, shall be brought to desolation, and house upon house shall fall Luke 11:17". Our Lord warns them; all sins will be forgiven, all blasphemies can be forgiven, but he who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit he will never have forgiveness, because he is guilty of a eternal sin. What is this eternal sin, the sin that cannot be forgiven?