St. Thomas the Apostle Parish

Homily for January 12, 2020

The life of Helen Keller is an inspiration to everyone who knows her story. She was left blind and deaf at the age of 19 months after a bout of scarlet fever. She learned to communicate through sign language and Braille and was even able to learn to speak with the help of her teacher, Feeding Hills native, Anne Sullivan. Helen later became a best-selling author and a renowned lecturer. Helen Keller is a symbol of human determination to live life to its fullest, despite the limits and challenges that confront us. In her autobiography, The Story of My Life, Miss Keller writes about the day the outside world broke into her closed world.

She said that she and Anne walked down a path to the well-house, attracted by the fragrance of the honeysuckle with which it was covered. Someone was drawing water and Helen’s teacher placed her hand under the spout. As the cool stream gushed over one hand, Anne spelled into Helen’s other hand the word water, first slowly, then rapidly. Helen stood still; her whole attention fixed on the motion of Anne’s fingers.

Suddenly, Helen felt what she described as a “misty consciousness as of something forgotten – a thrill of returning thought;” and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to Helen. She knew then that w-a-t-e-r meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over her hand. The living word awakened her soul, gave it light, hope, joy, [and] set it free! She said that there were barriers still, but barriers that could, in time, be swept away.

Miss Keller concludes, saying, “I left the well-house eager to learn. Everything had a name, and each name gave birth to a new thought. It would have been difficult to find a happier child than I was as I lay in my [bed] at the close of that eventful day and lived over the joys it had brought me, and for the first time longed for a new day to come.”

Helen Keller’s discovery of water mirrors our own rebirth in the waters of baptism. In baptism, we not only discover the Word for and of God, but that Word becomes our own name and identity - Christian. In the “wonderful cool something,” our lives are renewed in the life of God – the love, hope, and peace of God become ours.

As her discovery was the beginning of a new journey for Helen Keller, baptism is the beginning of our journey to the dwelling place of God with Christ as our teacher and constant companion.

Today, as we celebrate the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry with his baptism by John at the Jordan, let us remember and give thanks for the new day that dawned in our lives in the waters of our own baptism. +

Homily for January 11, 2020

Today’s passage from John’s Gospel sums up in two phrases the honor given Jesus by John the Baptist when he says “He (Jesus) must increase; I must decrease.” This is the spirit required by his God-given role as the forerunner to the Messiah. John showed genuine deference, of knowing his place in the order of things. He did not seek celebrity, nor did he seek to be the focus of attention.

John’s Gospel credits John the Baptist with a spirit of honesty. While many were prepared to admire him as the awaited Messiah, he stubbornly refused to claim that honor for himself. He called himself the signpost pointing to Jesus, the Voice in the Desert preparing the way of the LORD. He was to Christ as the best-man is to the bridegroom, the reliable, supportive friend.

John the Baptist offers us a challenging role-model: how to become a forerunner, a herald, for Jesus in our own lives. All of us are called to help others to find the way of the LORD, worship Him and to partake of the special gift He has brought to our lives. Like John the Baptist and the many saints who came after him, we can and should make Jesus the center of our motivation: “He must increase; I must decrease.” +

Homily for January 10, 2020

In ancient times, lepers were required to stay beyond the borders of towns and villages, and they were required to yell, Unclean, Unclean!” to warn passersby that they were afflicted with the horrible disease of leprosy. People didn’t touch lepers; they didn’t go near them. In fact, they judged them and held them in contempt. So, there is one seemingly small but significant detail in today’s Gospel passage.

The passage tells us that Jesus stretched out his hand and he touched the leper. This was unheard of, not just because of the disease, but because of the laws regarding purity. And, priests and rabbis were to be especially mindful of this so as to not compromise the purity of their worship.

In touching the man, Jesus shows us that to truly minister to one another, we must be willing to take a chance, a risk, whether it be physical or social, so that we may have the opportunity to be instruments of God’s love, peace, and healing action in our world. +

Homily for January 9, 2020

In today’s Gospel passage, we find Jesus in the synagogue in Nazareth telling the people what His ministry was going to be all about. First of all, He announced the Lord’s favor; He would reveal God’s loving favor for all people, but especially for those who were often out of favor with others: the poor, the captives, the blind and disabled, the downtrodden. We might add to that list: the lost, sinners, widows, and all who found themselves on the margins of society for whatever reason. Jesus was announcing that He was about to reveal the generosity of God, a generosity that was as all-encompassing as God’s love. This was, indeed, good news.

Strangely, however, this good news was not well received by the people of His hometown. Later in this story, the townspeople were ready to hurl Him down from the brow of a hill. It seems as if Jesus’ God was just too much for the people of Nazareth, too hospitable, too welcoming, too forgiving, too all-embracing, too generous.

Just as He did to His fellow Nazarenes, Jesus challenges our image of God. Yet, because He proclaims the favor and hospitality of God, He has the power to transform us: to enrich us in our poverty, to bring us freedom where we are captive, to give us sight in the many ways that we are blind, to restore our sense of belonging to the Lord after we have been lost. +

Homily for January 8, 2020

The Gospels often show Jesus at prayer. In today’s passage, Mark tells how, after being busy feeding the five thousand, Jesus retreated onto the mountain to pray. Even though Jesus went off by Himself, His prayer did not separate Him from people. Actually, it made Him more responsive to the needs of others and the challenges they endured. As He was praying, Jesus saw that His disciples, who were in a boat at sea, were struggling against the wind and worn out by rowing. So, He left his prayer and went to His struggling disciples, and spoke words of great reassurance to them, “Take courage, it is I, do not be afraid.”

Mark shows us that while Jesus was in communion with God the Father, He also stayed in communion with people in need. That is true of our own awareness too. In prayer, we open ourselves to the LORD’S presence; we become attuned to the LORD who is present to us, but as we do so, we will often find ourselves thinking of others, feeling with and for others. This is not surprising. The LORD, whom we approach in prayer, is full of love for others; as we draw near to Him in prayer, we will be caught up into His concern for others. Indeed, much of our prayer tends to be intercessory prayer — prayer for others. Genuine prayer will deepen not only our communion with the LORD, but our communion with others as well, especially with those who, like the disciples in today’s Gospel passage, are struggling with and battling the storms of life. +

Homily for January 7, 2020

In the encounter we witness in this morning’s Gospel passage, Jesus struggled to get His disciples to become trusting, generous givers; people who work to create results that help those in need.

Faced with a large, hungry crowd, rather than find a way to help them, Jesus’ disciples asked Him to send the crowd away to fend for themselves. But Jesus asked for quite a different approach, “Give them some food yourselves.” Basically, He was saying, “Take some responsibility for these needy people; don’t just wish them away.” He pushed His disciples into doing something for the people, no matter how small. Eventually, they found five loaves and two fish, very small resources indeed. But with those few resources, the crowd was fed.

According to Jesus, the willingness to do something, no matter how small it may seem, the readiness to give something, no matter how small it actually is, can bear rich fruit. The LORD can take our giving, no matter how small, and do great things through it. The Gospel encourages us to be giving people, even when we seem to have little to give and the situation we are facing seems beyond us. +

Homily for January 6, 2020

It is often said that Matthew depicts Jesus as the “New Moses,” guiding us like Israel’s great lawgiver and shaping the New Covenant with an inner, even more challenging, code of conduct than the Old Covenant. While the parallel of Jesus with Moses is evident in Matthew’s writing, even more significant is today’s message of a salvation going far beyond the confines of the Jewish people. Matthew sees great importance in Jesus’ move to Capernaum, on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. It’s at the heart of what he calls the “Galilee of the Gentiles” and foretells how all nations will see great light through Jesus – that is, they will be called into God’s own family and be saved.

Matthew goes on to show Jesus teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the Good News of the kingdom and curing every disease and illness. It was His concern with healing people, improving the lives of the downtrodden, that drew such crowds to Him.

The dynamic that drove His ministry and compelled Him to travel the country on foot, making Himself available to all kinds of outsiders, was love. While He called on people to repent – to reconsider their aspirations, priorities, and lifestyles – it was in order that they may have the fullness of life. Therefore, Matthew can sum up the impact of all Jesus’ activities in the wonderful phrase: “The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light!” +

Homily for January 5, 2020

A cup of water, it would seem, is not terribly valuable. It is made up of two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen. It seems so ordinary. It seems so common. After all, a large portion of the earth is covered with it. But it can unlock the life-giving harvest of a planted seed; it can bring healing to the sick and comfort to the dying; it can revive the tired, the faded, and the exhausted.

Or consider a piece of bread: we know that it is the most basic of foods, but it can hardly be considered a feast. However, when it is shared lovingly and gratefully with the hungry, the poor, or the forgotten, a single piece of bread becomes the banquet of heaven; it becomes a means of feeding both body and soul

Finally, consider a single flower: it may not seem like much, but one rose given by one lover to another, even a dandelion given by a child to his or her mother, says, "I love you," more eloquently than the most beautiful sonnet, more than the most elaborate bouquet.

A cup of water, a piece of bread, a single flower: All of them, in themselves, do not seem to be much of anything. They are so simple, so ordinary, and so mundane. Yet each one can manifest, in its own way, in its own time, compassion, forgiveness, and love, all of which find God as their origin. 

The mystery of the Incarnation — that is, God being born among us as a human being like ourselves — is that nothing is so secular that it cannot be made sacred, nothing is so mundane that it cannot be made heavenly, nothing is so ordinary that it cannot be an instrument of the love of God 

In becoming human in the person of Jesus, God makes holy our humanness; in taking on our human nature, God sanctified, that is, made holy, our very lives. When we become a means of God's love to others in our world, when we open ourselves to be vehicles and instruments of God's active presence in our world, then we become holy as well.

May all that we hold, all that we touch, and all that we are, help to make the world realize that the true miracle of the Incarnation is that we and our world are holy and sacred in the eyes of our Creator. May that realization help us to live lives worthy of the legacy that is ours in being created by God and in the image and likeness of God. +

Homily for January 4, 2020

At the beginning of the twentieth century, an Italian boy heard God's call. He was an unlikely choice because his father was quite anti-Catholic. A member of the Italian Socialist Party, he constantly mocked the Church. His son, Albino, heard a Franciscan preacher and felt called to the priesthood. Albino's dad was working in another city so, with great trepidation, he wrote him a letter. It took some time for the response. Trembling, Albino opened the letter. It contained a small piece of paper, on which his father wrote, "If that is what you wish, do it." 

Eventually, his dad was reconciled with the Church. Albino kept the note all his life - and he still had it in 1978, when as Patriarch of Venice, he was called to serve the Church in a new way. He became known as "The Smiling Pope," Pope John Paul I. His papacy lasted only thirty-three days, but it made a deep impression. Today Albino Luciani — the late Pope John Paul I — is on the path to beatification and sainthood. 

God chooses not only famous people; He chooses people like you and me. And what appears to be a humble role might be a hinge on His plan of redemption. In God's production, we do not know who the leading actors are, but we will find out on the final Judgment Day. What we do know is that God chooses us with care for our role in His plan. Like a great director, selecting exactly the right person for a part, God chooses you and me. 

Today Jesus asks, "What are you looking for?" Do not be afraid to tell Him. And you may hear those beautiful words, "Come, and you will see." +

Homily for January 3, 2020

Something that is prominent about the depiction of John the Baptist is his generosity of spirit. John was a very charismatic person to whom many people were drawn; he had many disciples of his own. Still, in today’s gospel passage, we see John directing two of his followers away from himself and towards the One whom he declared to be the Lamb of God. These two disciples end up becoming disciples of Jesus. Having responded positively to John’s invitation to go towards the Lamb of God, they then respond to Jesus’ invitation to come and see. John was not controlling about his group of disciples; he encouraged them to go towards Jesus, who had more to offer them than he did.

John’s attitude and action show us human nature at its best: human love as an expression of God’s love. When we love others in the same way that God loves them, we want what is best for them, and that often means letting them go to others who can help them to grow as human beings and as children of God in ways that we cannot. It is, above all, the LORD who can help us to grow fully as human beings and as children of God. The greatest act of love we can show others is to direct them to the LORD as John the Baptist directed his own disciples. There was only so much John could do in leading his disciples to Jesus. They had to make their own personal response to the call of Jesus to come and see. It’s the same with us. At some point, we all have to make our own personal response to the LORD’S personal call to each one of us to come and see, and then to remain with him. +