Thursday Jan 5 St. John Neumann 1811-1860
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Jan. 4
Only in the Eucharist
It is New Year's Eve!
Do you want to look back or forward?
It all depends.
Where have you been and where are you going?
On New Year's Eve we straddle the past and the future.
Memories become mixed with dreams.
Tears with Hope.
Laughter with Sighs.
We see the faces of those no longer with us,
And wonder whose face we will see in the year ahead.
We think about the things we did,
And make resolutions to do better.
On New Year’s Eve, The past, the present and the future all seem to blend into one moment.
In Mass The past, the present and the future all come together in one Heavenly Moment!
For in Heaven the Past, the Present and the Future all come together in one Eternal Now.
At Mass we Remember.
We remember all that Jesus did for us,
His birth, His Death and His Resurrection.
At Mass we remember all our loved ones who are no longer here with us.
At Mass we Give Thanks for what we have Today.
Our life and our loves.
And at Mass we look Forward to that Day,
Where there will be no more mourning or suffering.
Where everyone we love will be gathered around the Table in our Heavenly Father’s house for one Never Ending Thanksgiving Dinner.
Every Mass is a New Year’s Eve.
We look Back on our lives.
We Give thanks for what we have Today.
And we look Forward to the Supper of the Lamb,
Around Our Heavenly Father’s table with all our family and friends.
Every Mass, is New Year’s Eve
When we look back, give thanks today and get ready for what is to come.
Holy Family
There are many different types of families.
There is the immediate family
With moms and dads and children.
There is also the parish family,
Made up of all the Parishoners.
And There is the Human Family.
Made up of every race, language and people.
And For a family to be Holy
Each member of the Family must play their part.
So What role do we play in our various families?
In our immediate family?
In our parish family?
In the Human Family?
In our immediate family
Are we loving and supportive?
Do we give and take?
In our Parish Family,
Are we Faithful to coming to Church?
Do we give more to the Church than just when the collection comes around?
In our Human Family,
Are we concerned with those around us?
And that we are all children of God?
Maybe if we started treating all those in our different families
The way Jesus, Mary and Joseph
Treated each other.
Then maybe our immediate family,
And our parish family
And the human family,
Would become Holy Families.
Thomas was the Archbishop of Canterbury and martyred on this day in 1170
in the Cathedral in Canterbury England by henchmen from King Henry.
Who wanted to silence Thomas.
While We may not have to defend our Faith by shedding our blood;
We may have to defend the Faith,
Against a society and government that wants us
to compromise our Faith and
what we believe and how we practice it.
For many would prefer us to put our Faith under a bushel basket and never speak of it.
And so like Thomas Becket sometimes we too must stand up for our Faith.
For While we may not be martyred for the Faith like Thomas a Becket
We may most certainly experience rejection and ridicule for it.
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Toyland is a very special place
Filled with magic and wonder and imagination.
But once you cross its borders you can ne’er return again.
It is the same with innocence.
As a child we are innocent.
And the world is a place of magic and wonder and imagination.
But one day we wake up and it is all gone.
Our dreams are replaced with cynicism and all of the other other “isms”
That compete for our attention, our vote and our time.
Like Herod who killed the Holy Innocents;
The world seeks to kill our Innocence
And only the Innocence of the Christ child,
Wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger,
Can save us and bring us back to our Innocence.
And this is why we are drawn to Christmas;
Not only to see a Child lying in a manger;
But hoping to find our Innocence once again.
1 John 1:1-4
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What makes Christianity different from all other religions
Is the Incarnation.
God becoming flesh.
Judaism, Islam and Buddhism do not believe this.
But as Christians we believe that the Son of God became flesh.
That He has eyes and ears and hands just like us.
This is why St. John writes about what he has
Heard with his ears
Seen with his eyes
And touched with with hands.
Because he heard and saw and touched the Son of God.
How glorious that must have been.
If only we could do that.
Well we can.
Because of the Incarnation
God has eyes and ears and hands just like us.
So if God is like us,
Then we are like God.
This is why God became flesh.
So that we can hear and see and touch God,
In each other.
Being First
Everyone loves being first.
First in line.
First to be chosen,
And First to choose.
Except when it comes to Martyrdom.
Very few people race to the front of the line to be stoned, crucified, or beheaded.
But Stephen did.
He is the first martyr.
The first to die for Christ.
As he was dragged outside of Jerusalem
And stoned.
We may not be called to lay down our lives,
But we can be martyrs of a different kind.
We can be the first to forgive.
The first to apologize.
The first not to gossip.
The first to lay down the phone or turn off the TV in order to pray.
These kind of firsts are not always easy.
But then again Martyrdom never is.
Shepherds and wise men, inn keepers and Herod.
Christmas means different things for different people.
For the inn keeper there was no room for Christ.
Joseph and Mary were looking for a place to stay but not only was there no room at the inn, there was no room in the inn keepers heart.
The inn keeper saw that they were not from Bethlehem.
He saw that they had nowhere to stay.
He saw that Mary was with child, but there was no room for compassion or generosity.
He did not want to get involved in the problems and life of another, so he turned them away from his inn and from his heart.
On the first Christmas and every Christmas since and probably this Christmas too, there are still inn keepers in the world who have no room.
No room for Christ.
No room for the homeless.
No room for those in need.
For Herod, the Christ Child was a threat.
A threat to his power, his throne, his tiny little kingdom.
So he tried to kill Jesus, because the Christ child would cast down the mighty from their thrones and lift up the lowly.
He would fill the empty with good things and send the rich away empty.
On that first Christmas and every Christmas since and probably this Christmas too there are still Herods threatened by the Christ Child.
Threatened that they would lose their money.
Threatened that their tiny little kingdom that they have worked so hard to build will all come tumbling down if power, money, and influence were no longer the motivating factor in peoples lives.
For the Shepherds, the Christ child was their hope and fulfillment.
The Shepherds were not only the lower class they were the empty class.
They not only had no power or influence or money, they had no hope for change in their life.
They had no hope that their emptiness would be filled.
So they heard the angels song of praise and good will that a child had been born who would bring them hope.
On that first Christmas and every Christmas since and probably this Christmas too, there are still shepherds who can hear angels sing.
There are still poor and lonely and empty people in the world who look to the Christ Child as their hope and their fulfillment.
For the Wise Men, the Christ Child was the Light and the Truth.
What the Wise Men searched for all of their life was not power and riches but enlightenment and truth, so they followed the star to the Christ Child.
And they gave Him all they had in exchange for His Light and His Truth.
On that Christmas and every Christmas since and probably this Christmas too, there are still Wise Men who search not for power or riches or pleasure or possessions but for Enlightenment and Truth.
What Christmas means for each one of us depends on who we are and what we are looking for.
Christ is here for each one of us.
He knocks on the door of our hearts.
He comes to dwell in our midst.
Angles still announce Him and Stars still point out the way to Him.
And the true meaning of Christmas is still found only in Christ!
