Run to Him, Serve Him, He is Risen, Alleluia!

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Homily Outline for Easter Sunday, Year A

Jesus Christ is risen, Alleluia Alleuia! Truly, He is Risen! Alleluia Alleluia!

Alleluia is Hebrew for “Praise God,” it is the Easter word par excellence, for on this day of all the days of the year we truly have reason to praise our God and Savior… Jesus has risen from the grave trampling death and sin! The stone which the builders rejected has become the corner stone! Most amazing of all, we are invited into and offered the fruits of this victory… Jesus rose precisely for us! God created us in love, now He has redeemed us in love by the blood of His Only Son.

We heard in the Gospel that St. Peter was the first to enter Christ’s empty tomb… listen to his testimony, the testimony of an eye witness, the testimony of one who denied the Lord and yet repented: “He commissioned us to preach to the people and testify that he is the one appointed by God
as judge of the living and the dead. To him all the prophets bear witness, that everyone who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”

Last night, after we had entered the church with only the light of the Paschal Candle, newly blessed and lighted from the Easter Fire, I proclaimed the Exultet, a song of rejoicing. One line of that most beautiful song captures the mystery of Christ’s resurrection, “O happy fault, o necessary sin of Adam, which gained for us so great a Redeemer!” The Church marvels, we marvel, that from Adam’s sin that sundered the tie between man and God, God has brought forth joy and beauty beyond measure. God Himself came and dwelt among us, Jesus Christ, fully God and fully man. He bore every price of our sin, was beaten and crucified, died and descended down into the land of the dead, and yet rose victorious! Alleluia, Praise God for His mercy, Praise God for His love, Praise God for the invitation made to each one of us, especially in our baptism, to respond to this love with love.

Paul tells us that our lives are hidden with Christ in God. When we were baptized, we descended into the depths of the water, dying with Christ, and we rose up out of the water reborn. “When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with Him in glory.” We are drawn into this praise, into this victory, OUR weakness and sin is overwhelmed in Christ’s victory… This is a mystery, truly our lives are hidden with Christ… so often we do not see all, we do not understand… but Christ has won the victory! May we praise Him this morning in His hiddenness, even as we do not fully understand.

It is often the case that on Easter, like Christmas, many people come to Church who are not here every week… I just want to address some words to you this morning: Welcome! We are glad you are here with us! Of all the days of the year to go to Church, today is the most important day… for your presence here we say Alleluia, Praise God! In our joy that you are here, we also extend the Lord’s invitation… do not come today in joy, and then stay away! We want you to be with us every Sunday, we need you to be with us every Sunday, indeed, you need to be with us every Sunday!

  For every one of us here, today, this morning, in this Easter Joy, there is an invitation… God has given us everything, even Himself… and He has won for us the victory… there is only one response that is fitting… to respond in joy, to give our lives to Him, to seek Him… not just today, on Easter, not just on Sunday, but every day of the week. We are to seek Him, to serve Him, to love Him at Church, at home, at work, at school, each day and in every moment. He offers us grace and strength and light. May we wait upon His love as Mary Magdalene did, may we run to Him as Peter and John, may we see the empty tomb and believe.

In just a few moments, we will renew our baptismal promises… this is our renewed response to the Lord. May our prayer be heartfelt, and may we in this way prepare our hearts to receive the Risen Lord Himself from this altar.

He died for our sins.... for love of us.

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Homily Outline for Good Friday, Year A    

In many powerful ways, this Good Friday service speaks for itself… it places before us the Passion of Christ, His suffering and death. We will respond shortly by praying for the whole world, we will venerate the Cross, sign of our salvation, and we will receive the fruits of the Lord’s Sacrifice, His Body Blood Soul and Divinity. We will depart in silence, into the waiting and fast, lasting all the way through tomorrow evening, if possible. Only on Good Friday and Holy Saturday, of all the days of the year, is the Mass not celebrated. We wait in silence while Christ lies in the tomb. Tomorrow evening, having passed through this silence, as darkness falls and Saturday ends, we will gather again for the Easter Vigil, the most joyous of all nights.

I simply want to draw your attention now to the reason for all of this, the reason for our somber and sober liturgy today, the reason for Christ’s suffering and death. There is an immediate reason, a painful one, and a deeper reason, a joyful one.

Listen again to the prophet Isaiah “he was spurned and avoided by people…. the guilt of us all.” Christ died because He bore our offenses, He was crushed for our sins. This is not hyperbole, this is not immoderate or inappropriate guilt, this is simply the truth. Christ died for our sins. Every time we’ve been unkind to someone, every time we’ve used pornography or indulged a lustful thought, every time we’ve refused forgiveness, whatever sins we have preferred or been unable to overcome,… the lash of our sin strikes painfully into the Lord’s wounded back. Physically, the Roman soldiers and the Temple Guard beat and killed him, Pontius Pilate in his cowardice condemned him, people in the crowd that day yelled “Crucify Him,” but only our sins brought Him to the Cross. If we ignore this fact, if we fail to be sorry for our sins… if no ray of sorrow pierces our hardened hearts at the thought of the Lord of Glory ground to a pulp, we have not understood this day or the Gospel.

If in honesty we can gaze upon our broken Lord, if we can gaze upon our broken promises, the baptismal purity that we have sullied by our sin, then and only then are we open to the deeper and far more joyful reason for today.

Listen again to Isaiah, who dimly and through shadows foresaw this mystery and joy. “If he gives his life as an offering for sin, he shall see his descendants in a long life, and the will of the Lord shall be accomplished through him.” Christ gave His life for our sins… and he was motivated only by perfect love and obedience. “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” God loves us perfectly, faithfully…. although our sins often render us unable or unwilling to receive that love, nothing we do diminishes His perfect and faithful love for us. That love took on flesh and dwelt among us in Jesus who is Himself God, who is Himself Love. “Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.” Jesus, in His infinite power as God, is only held to the pillar to be scourged, He is only bound to the cross, by love for us. This is the irony when they mock him, “come down from there.” He could have come down, but out of love, he took our sins all the way to death, so that we could be saved.

So, this afternoon, let our hearts be pierced with sorrow at the pain and sorrow we have caused the Lord. In this sorrow, let us be filled with thanksgiving… He bore the lash for us. By his stripes we are saved…. and in the midst of that healthy and truthful sorrow, let joy be found, and awe and wonder. Jesus loved us perfectly, and was obedient unto death, death on a cross. All has been bought and paid for at the greatest price. Through our tears, as it were, let us see the unimaginable love, the infinite love that has conquered our grief. Let us fast and wait for the joy of the coming dawn.  

           

Embrace healing or remain blind?

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Homily Outline for the 4th Sunday of Lent, Year A

“Rejoice, Jerusalem! Be glad for her, you who love her; rejoice with her, you who mourned for her, and you will find contentment at her consoling breasts.” (Is 66:10-11)

Today is Laetare Sunday, Rejoice Sunday, named after the “introit” or entrance antiphon proper to this Mass, which I just read. Rejoice Jerusalem, rejoice O Mother Church, rejoice members of Christ’s Body, the Church… on this Fourth Sunday of Lent, we have come through over half of our 40 days of fasting, only 18 days to go until the feasting of Easter! We have been in the desert, but we draw nearer each day to the wellspring of our salvation.

God’s ways are not our ways; God’s power goes far beyond our own power. In our first reading, God chooses David, the youngest brother, despite everyone's expectations.  God sees not just the exterior, but also the heart!  We see Jesus using His divine power as He heals the man born blind. Physically, this is impressive. Spiritually, it is beautiful… this man can now behold the beauty of the natural world, the faces of his parents, even the face of our Lord Jesus Himself. As Paul speaks of us as “children of light,” this description is very tangible for that formerly blind man who sees light for the first time, and at the same time comes to know the Lord.

 What might the Lord heal in your heart this Lent? Perhaps you harbor wounds or pain or grudges or fear that are not nearly so evident as that man’s blindness. Maybe they’ve been caused by your own sin, the sin of others, or by circumstances beyond anyone’s control. Jesus can heal your heart. It does not seem that the blind man expected to be healed that day, and so often God’s healing comes to us unawares, from unexpected quarters, in times and ways we cannot predict.

I suspect that many of you have already had this experience before today… perhaps it was kind words from someone you considered an enemy, maybe it was making a good confession after being away from the Lord. To receive God’s healing is beautiful, but do we embrace it? Does it continue to change our lives? As God pours out the healing water of His grace, are our hearts hard and frozen clay, or are they rich broken soil? To be contrite, to be sorry for our sins, this means to have a heart that is broken, but also a heart that is open to God’s healing. We can look at past healing in our lives, or healing in the lives of others with skepticism, with disbelief, with hostility as the Pharisees, or we can greet that healing with honesty as the blind man did. He doesn’t in any way fully understand what has happened. He doesn’t even recognize Jesus when he encounters Him again. But he is open, desiring the gift of faith that he cannot manufacture himself. Listen to that final dialogue: When Jesus heard…. and those who do see might become blind.”

If we can know and own our brokenness and sin, we are in a position then to receive healing and the gift of faith. This is precisely what Lent is about. We courageously enter into our hearts and lives and seek the sinful places, the painful places, the ugly places, not to wallow in guilt, but to know our need and then be ready to receive. Jesus is the Light, and in Him we can see the truth about our hearts. That may not always be pretty, but it can lead us to the true beauty of healing and reconciliation.

Karol Wotyla, the man who would become JP II

Today is the 6th anniversary of Pope John Paul II, soon to be beatified. I think we can see in his life and ministry this healing light of Christ in a particularly bold way. Karol Wotyla experienced every sort of pain and loss as a young man… he lost his mother, his brother, and his father by 22. He saw his country ravaged first by the Nazis and then by Communism. Many of his friends, both Catholic and Jewish, were killed. Out of this crucible of violence and hatred, by God’s grace he was not a man filled with hatred or anger, but a man filled with a visceral sense of God’s infinite capacity to heal and sustain us in the face of suffering. He was also deeply convicted of the need to speak the truth in the face of falsehood and deception. 

To me, and perhaps in a special way to my generation, John Paul II tore away the blindness and lies of  materialism, relativism, and individualism and spoke of love as the perfect gift of self for the good of the other. He rejected the culture of death, condemning attacks on human life and dignity from whatever direction. As the world slid into an abyss of sexual confusion and sin, he spoke clearly of the beauty and sanctity of the human body, of Christian marriage between a man and a woman, and of the gift of our sexuality. He said no to abortion, contraception, sterilization, capital punishment, and war. He said yes to truth, love, generosity, solidarity with those most in need, and reconciliation. He experienced God’s healing grace, and responded with unusual openness and generosity. The man born blind, once healed, encountered Christ, and believing in Him, worshipped. Six years after the death of John Paul II, I still marvel at the way he too followed this example.

We stand in the line and heritage of redeemed and healed sinners from every age. May we use well these 3 Lenten weeks that remain to go deep within and welcome Christ’s healing light.

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Pictures of the Sisters' Visit

Who knew Jilly the cow was a Dominican?

  I've posted a bunch of pictures from the sisters' visit on Facebook.... Check them out on the external links below.

High School Game Night

Middle School Event: Living the Prolife Message

Pizza & Ponder at Catholic Campus Ministry

Visiting Fr. jMarquette Elementary School ( and Jilbert's!)

Speaking to the Fr. Marquette Middle School

Theology on Tap at the Vierling

As you'll quickly see, it's been a busy, and joyful, four days!

Love in the Desert of our Hearts

Homily Outline for the Third Sunday Lent, Year A

Are you satisfied? For whom do you long? Today Jesus tells the Samaritan woman, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” This is His offer, His promise to us at every moment, above all during Lent, above all at every Eucharist, His offer to you NOW.

The Israelites have followed Moses into the desert, they saw God work great wonders, but now, when they’re out of water, they ask “Is God in our midst or not?” Does that question echo in your heart? When we face sickness, or a broken friendship… when we face our own weakness and sin, our own confusion, when we feel isolated and alone, with a thirst that nothing seems to quench, “Is God in our midst, or not?” God hears and answers this question, this prayer: water comes from the least likely place… a hot sun burnt desert rock. Moses strikes it with his staff and sweet water gushes forth. Could God do something like that to our dry and dusty hearts? Can His love pierce them and shower them with life-giving streams?

We thirst, for many things. We seek, and sometimes we are able to quench our thirst for a time with the things of this world. But the thirst returns. In our Gospel today we learn something astounding… not only do we thirst for God and seek Him, even when we don’t realize it, but God seeks us, mysteriously He thirsts for our love. In Jesus Christ, God has come to us; He has come for us. Paul says it very clearly, “God proves his love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” God comes to us precisely in our thirst, in our need. He does not wait for us to get everything straightened out, but He comes to us wherever we are, even in the pew you’re sitting in this morning!

The Samaritan woman comes to the well as she does every day, but to her surprise she encounters a Jew, Jesus, and he speaks to her and even asks her for a drink. Jesus offers her living water. This seems to make no sense at all; he doesn’t even have a bucket. “Are you greater than our father Jacob,” she says. Indeed, He is greater… Then, Jesus speaks clearly of what He offers her, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again; but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Not fully understanding, but thirsty and desiring the gift He offers, her heart opens to the Lord and she says, “Sir, give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty…” She speaks for every one of us here… Lord, give us water, give us joy, give us hope, give us the grace we need to persevere. Even the good things of this world do not finally satisfy, we hunger and long and thirst for your love. Lord, give us this gift!

Dust and deception often swirl in our hearts, obscuring our knowledge of self. God’s grace pierces this storm. If we can look within our hearts and honestly see the desire that persists, we have reached a moment of opportunity, a moment of grace. But there is more, the journey has only begun, not ended. We come to the Lord thirsty, in need… but to truly receive the full grace He offers us, we need to be healed and reconciled. If we still grasp our bitter beguiling sins in our fists, we cannot dip our hands into the water of life and slake our ravening thirst. Jesus invites the Samaritan woman to repentance, and reveals to her the way she sought to quench her thirst with a broken rusty chain of relationships. She sought in human love that which only God can provide. Before she can drink from the spring, she needs to be healed. Jesus reveals her heart to her… it is painful, but He will do the same to us, He will speak to us in our consciences, showing us clearly where we have turned away.

It is hard to look clearly at our sin. It is easier to turn away, to rationalize, to pretend we do not see our sins. The woman is unsure… she challenges Jesus with some basic religious questions, areas where Jews and Samaritans did not agree. She speaks of the Messiah. Having laid bare her heart, Jesus also reveals himself. “I am he, the one speaking to you.” Her subsequent actions reveal her response. She has found the Lord, she brings the glad tidings to her people. Christ reveals her heart to her, He reveals Himself, and she responds by accepting the gift of faith, this living water, the Holy Spirit. This gift brings forth in her heart the courage to live and speak the truth.

Sr. Katty, Sr. Jessa, Sr. Francis Mary, Sr. Elizabeth John

It has been a real gift to work with these four sisters from the Dominican Sisters of Mary Mother of the Eucharist.  In each of them you can see the joy of Christ that can fill one's heart.  It is evident and visible!  They have shared that joy so generously with literally hundreds of people since they got here on Thursday, from recess with the Pre-Kindergartners to Theology on Tap with the Marquette Frassati Society, even foosball with the high school group last night.  Obviously we are not all called to be sisters, bu we can imitate their generosity in saying, "Yes" to God.

Jesus can work this same joy and healing in you and in me. He offers us living water; he offers us food that satisfies: His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. With His help we can look within. In the beautiful Sacrament of Penance, He offers us mercy beyond measure. What do you hold clenched in your heart that God longs to heal? Why have you stayed away from His Mercy? Trust Him, do not resist His love any longer. What better time to seek repentance and healing than now, during this Lent? Today is the day of salvation, Jesus will meet us in our thirst.

God so loved the world

Heaven in our eyes, on our lips?

A glimpse of the basilica

Homily Outline for the 2nd Sunday of Lent, Year A

This Thursday I had the beautiful opportunity to spend my day-off at Holy Hill. This is the beautiful shrine with a long official name: The Basilica of the National Shrine of Our Lady, Help of Christians. It’s on a big round hill near Milwaukee and it’s run by the Discalced Carmelite Friars. If you’ve never been there, you need to visit it! I met one of my seminary classmates from Chicago. Thursday evening we were waiting in the hallway near the refectory for dinner to start. An elderly Carmelite Friar came up to us… after introductions he paused and said with wonder and excitement in his voice, “I wonder what heaven’s like?” We discussed this, and I could hear the awe and quiet joy in his voice. He questioned us on some points of doctrine as if we were back in seminary, and was content when we answered well!

Heaven is no theoretical question… it’s not something we should push off to the sidelines of our lives. Our gospel this Sunday complements last Sunday’s where we heard of the temptations of Christ in the desert. Three times he rebuffed Satan. Fr. Jamie spoke in his homily of the full reality of Christ’s divinity AND humanity. Jesus in His humanity was tested and found to be true during that trial in the desert. Unlike Adam and Eve, unlike each one of us, He NEVER fell to temptation. He felt the pain and fear and struggle of rejecting sin, and stood strong and true. In taking on flesh, Jesus raised and lifted up our humanity, and rejoined us to God. In Christ, we need never face temptation alone. So here is one piece of the pie: In Christ, we are given strength resist evil.

The Transfiguration shows us of the second piece. The trials and temptations here on earth are not the full story: to be joined to God in eternity is full and true joy… that is, heaven: eternal and perfect intimacy with the Holy Trinity, to know and be known, to see God face to face. When we are in the desert, assailed by temptations, it can seem VERY far away. But heaven is the joyful goal to which we lift up our eyes. This is the final homeland to which our earthly pilgrimage is directed. Jesus not only raised our humanity above sin and temptation, but He actually draws us right into heaven, if we are willing to accept this gift.

God’s call to us began long ago! When Abram is called by God in Ur, God begins to reveal this promise. He speaks of “ a land that I will show you,” and tells Abram He will make of him a great nation that will be a blessing to all the communities of the earth.” Abram probably understood this at first as an earthly and tangible blessing, but we see already foreshadowed our heavenly home. There is a land and a place prepared for us. We have here on this earth no lasting home. Paul encourages the young bishop Timothy, “Bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God.” Strength comes to us “through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus, who destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.”

The Church of the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor

That light shone with nearly full force upon the faces and into the hearts of Peter, James, and John. They saw those descendents of Abram, Moses and Elijah, conversing with Jesus in glory. They had glimpsed Jesus’ Godhead and power in His miracles, in the authority with which He taught, in the intimacy with which He spoke of being one with the Father. On that day, on the summit of Mount Tabor, this glory shone through clearly. Our earthen humanity, made of humble clay, had been assumed by the Son as He was conceived in the womb of Mary. Our humanity was lifted up, drawn away from sin and death, drawn into intimacy with the Father. On that day, Peter, James, and John were given a glimpse of this beauty, Peter wanted to stay there forever, and they fell prostrate in awe and fear. They heard with their own ears the voice of the Father, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”

The penance and discipline of Lent are meant precisely to prepare us and purify us and dispose us for the heavenly joy of Easter. We learn to say no to created things so that we can give our full and joyous yes to God. To live these days and weeks of Lent well in prayer, fasting, and almsgiving is our preparation. Not only does it dispose us to receive Easter joy, but even the very joy of Heaven itself! In His victory over temptation, Jesus empowers us to reject evil in all its forms. In this revelation of His glory, Jesus gives us joy and hope, a taste of what lies ahead.  Do we live in light of this truth?  Does heaven touch our daily lives? Do we speak and act in light of the promise and hope of eternal life?  This is what the Gospel calls us to.

That elderly friar has heaven before his eyes and in his heart. Peter, James, and John were given a glimpse of heaven. God does not leave us on the sidelines either. In just moments, Jesus will be before us Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. This presence will be veiled, but no less real. I will hold aloft the consecrated host, and each one here will behold with their eyes and hearts the God-Man. Truly we can say with Peter, “Lord, it is good that we are here.” May this glimpse and foretaste of heaven fill us with joy and lead us to persevere on this Lenten journey, and through this life to heaven.

Spring Break Missionary Trip and Pie Bonanza

These last weeks have been busy and very blessed.  I had the opportunity to spend last week with our Catholic Campus Ministry Spring Break Mission Trip... we worked at the Salvatorian Mission Warehouse in New Holstein, WI, and at Fr. Carr's Place 2B Homeless Shelter, Food Bank, and Free Clinic in Oshkosh, WI.  In addition to our labors, we visited the Discalced Carmelite Monastery in Denmark, WI, the Manitowoc Franciscans, and Holy Hill.  And, to top things off, we spent an evening at Catholic Youth Expeditions' Base Camp Coffee House in Appleton, and we stopped at the Marian Apparition Site and Shrine of Our Lady of Good Help in Champion, WI...  A busy and joy-filled week: work, prayer, pilgrimage, fellowship, FUN!

The Spring Break Missionaries, and the CYE Mission Interns at Base Camp.

Spring Break Mission pictures are here and here.


Our World Youth Day Pilgrims also recently baked up close to 90 pies as a fundraiser!

A busy beehive of pie-making

Since we'd done it before, our team worked lickedy-split!  And, early returns suggest the pies were tasty.


The rest of the pie-baking pictures are here.







The Final Results:

SOME of the pies!