The Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
Ezekiel 47:1-2,8-9,12  +  1 Corinthians 3:9-11,16-17  +  John 2:13-22
St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Garden Plain, KS
November 9, 2025

The word “temple” is found in all three of today’s Scripture readings.  In the First Reading, a temple is the heart of Ezekiel’s vision.  In the Gospel Reading, the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem is the focus of Jesus’ cleansing.  In the Second Reading, Saint Paul tells the Corinthians that they themselves are a temple.  Although the image of a “temple” is described differently in these three Scripture passages, taken together they help us see where we can find God in our lives on earth.

But why are those Scripture passages chosen for today’s feast?  What is today’s feast, anyway?

Every year on November 9^th, even if it falls on a Sunday, the Church celebrates the feast of the dedication of St. John Lateran Basilica in Rome.  This church, which was founded in the year 324—just over 1,700 years ago—is the cathedral of the Diocese of Rome.  Most people assume that St. Peter’s Basilica is the cathedral of Rome, since the Pope lives next to it.

But St. John Lateran and St. Peter’s are two of the four most important churches in Rome.  Whenever you make your lifetime pilgrimage to Rome—and every Catholic ought to make a pilgrimage to Rome at least once in their life—these four churches need to be at the top of your itinerary.

The most important is St. Peter’s Basilica, built over the tomb of St. Peter, and the largest church in the world, its inside length measuring 300 yards (the length of three football fields).  The second most important is St. John Lateran Basilica, the cathedral of Rome.  The third is St. Mary Major Basilica, the oldest church in the West dedicated to Our Blessed Mother, and containing relics from Bethlehem in the grotto beneath the high altar.  The fourth is St. Paul Basilica, built over the tomb of St. Paul.

As far as what the dedication of a church is in general, you could say that a dedication is to a church what a baptism is to a person.  The ritual of the dedication of a church is a lengthy ceremony performed by a bishop, consecrating a building made by human work so that the building can be used by God for His divine work of making those who dwell there holy.

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So why is a church building even important, or needed?  You may be familiar with the old Western song called “Cowboy Church”, the lyrics of which suggest that a church building is not important.  Here are some of the lyrics (sing along if you know the melody):  “My church is the great out of doors / My song is nature’s sound / The sky is my cathedral / My altar is the ground”.  And a little later he sings these words to God:  “Don’t think that I don’t love you / because I’m not herd bound / It’s just that I’m uncomfortable / With other folks around / I know you’re all around me / I see you every day / It’s just that I don’t go to church / Where other people pray”.

Of course, the composer of this song is not the only one who thinks you don’t need a church building to worship God.  Others will tell you that you can worship God in the mountains, on the beach, in your recliner at home, or on the golf course.

However, both Jewish and Christian Scripture and tradition tell us that having sacred spaces in our lives—spaces dedicated by God used only for the purpose of prayer and worship—is important for several reasons.  All of these reasons are summed up in a single word:  “church”.

The word “church” literally means “assembly”, as in God’s people assembling—coming together into one body under one roof—for the purpose of worshipping God.  It’s in this assembly that the two great commands of Jesus come together:  to love our God with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength; and to love our neighbor as our self.

Yes, it’s true that you can pray in the mountains, and if you’re ever in the mountains, you certainly ought to pray there.  But the detriment of praying there is that you’re not with others in the way that you are at Sunday Mass.  When we pray with others, we praise God more fittingly.  It’s more fitting to praise God by joining together with other believers, because we show God that we are united with each other, and with Him, in the same act of worship:  the worship He Himself has taught us how to offer.  The Sacraments, after all, are not man-made.  The Sacraments and all the Divine Liturgy were crafted by God and given by Him as a gift to man.

Of course, there’s another argument that gets thrown in the face of church-attending Christians.  It’s illustrated in the story about the Baptist preacher, who one day was walking down the sidewalk in Mayberry when he met Mr. Cratitch.  After exchanging pleasantries, the preacher said, “Why don’t you join us this Sunday for worship?”  Mr. Cratitch replied, “Bah! I wouldn’t be caught dead there!  Your church is full of hypocrites!”  The preacher replied, “Don’t worry:  there’s always room for one more!”

There are certainly times when it would be easier to pray alone, without other hypocrites to “distract” us.  But maybe God wants us to take up this challenge because that’s what He Himself did.  After all, it would have been easier for God’s eternal Son to stay in Heaven, and never come down to earth to take on our human nature, and to take up the Cross that is ours.

But God did not choose Heaven over earth.  He did not choose solitude over the mess of human hypocrites.  He did not choose peace and quiet.  He chose the sword and insults, because His choice to dwell among us was not primarily for His sake, but ours.  Or rather, we could say that it was first for our sake, so that we could be redeemed, and as redeemed sinners, more fittingly give God the worship that we owe Him.

At the same time, if we can enter with humility into communal worship, we see how many blessings there are in communal worship.  We cannot enjoy these blessings in prayer offered in solitude.  The most obvious of these blessings—especially to those of us without such talent—is the spiritual joy of being surrounded by the voices of those who sing beautifully, and who play instruments beautifully.

We certainly don’t want to be like the old gentlemen in Ireland whom Father O’Sullivan chastised after Mass one day for never taking out the hymnal and singing.  Paddy replied, “Well, Father, it’s like this.  With the voice that God did not give me, I consider my not singing to be one of the spiritual works of mercy!”  Most likely, Father Sullivan worked to help Paddy see that we need to bring all our talents to the Lord, no matter how meager.  If you have a meager singing ability, you still need to sing. You might consider your singing to be like the widow who put the penny in the collection, as opposed to the choir members whose talent is like a hundred-dollar bill.  This is important to keep in mind during our parish’s annual renewal of Stewardship.

Our own weaknesses, and the weaknesses of others, are not reasons not to worship the Lord as He commands.  In fact, our weaknesses are opportunities to believe more deeply in the Gospel.  Remember that St. Paul preached to the Corinthians that he three times begged the Lord to take away his weakness from him.  But the Lord replied to St. Paul in the same words that He speaks to you:  “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness” [2 Corinthians 12:8-9.]

You can take a virtual tour of the basilica at the parish website, by clicking HERE.

All Souls’ Day
St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, Andale, KS
November 2, 2025

The “communion of saints” is the Church’s focus this weekend.  The “communion of saints” is a familiar phrase.  We recite it during the Apostles’ Creed.  But some Christians have a narrow view of the Communion of Saints.

Some Christians think that the the “communion of saints” refers only to those who are already in Heaven.  But the “communion of saints” has three parts to it, or three divisions, or three degrees.  The Communion of Saints includes not only those who are in Heaven, but also the members of the Church in Purgatory, and those who are on earth.

Every year on November 1—on the Solemnity of All Saints—we who are on earth honor those who are in Heaven.  We ask their prayers for us and our intentions.  In other words, the prayers of those in Heaven are offered for those of us on earth.

Every year on November 2—on the commemoration of All Souls—we who are on earth remember those who are in Purgatory.  We pray for those souls in Purgatory.  In other words, the prayers of us on earth are offered for those who are in Purgatory.

In other words, those in Heaven, those in Purgatory, and those of us on earth are part of the same Family of God.  Every family member helps those in need to the best of their ability.

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The Mass of November 2 for the commemoration of All Souls bears many features of a funeral Mass.  The Scripture readings for today are taken from the options for funeral Masses, and the Gloria is neither recited nor sung.  Today’s Mass commemorates all the souls who have died, and have not yet reached Heaven, and therefore are in need of our prayers.

Here we have to focus on the Church’s teaching about the existence of Purgatory, and God’s reason for creating Purgatory.  The best start is to understand the differences among Heaven, Purgatory, and hell.

All three are on the other side of the “door of death”.  We on earth stand on one side of death’s door.  On the other side of death’s door are Heaven and Purgatory and hell.

When a person dies, that person’s soul goes to one of those three places:  either Heaven, or Purgatory, or Hell.  Which of those places a person’s soul goes to depends upon the state of their soul at the hour of death.  In other words, at the hour or death, to what extent is the person’s soul corrupted by sin?

If a person’s soul at the hour of death is completely free from sin and its effects, then that soul goes straight to Heaven.

If a person’s soul at the hour of death bears even one mortal sin, then that soul goes straight to eternal punishment.

However, if a person’s soul at the hour of their death bears no mortal sins, but is marked by venial sins or the effects of sin called temporal punishment, then that soul—in God’s eyes—deserves neither hell nor Heaven.  That is why God, in His Divine Mercy—created Purgatory:  to be a place of temporary purgation, where venial sins and temporal punishments could be purged from the soul, so that the soul could then fly to Heaven.

It’s St. John the Apostle and Evangelist who teaches us about the difference between mortal and venial sin.  In his first New Testament letter, St. John preaches that “If anyone sees his brother committing what is not a mortal sin, he will ask, and God will give him life….  There is sin which is mortal; I do not say that one is to pray for that.  All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin which is not mortal” [1 John 5:16-17 (NRSV)].

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There are two important points that St. John is making in this passage, and which he develops more fully in all of his New Testament writings.  The first is the distinction between mortal and venial sin.  Mortal sin kills the soul, while venial sin wounds the soul.

The second point is that God calls Christians to pray for other Christians, and especially in regard to their venial sins.  Praying for other Christians is the type of prayer called “intercession”.

Even in heaven, saints pray for those Christians who are not yet in Heaven.  Saints do not have their full attention fixed on God in prayers of adoration, without regard for others.  Saints in heaven pray to God for the other members of the “communion of saints” who are in Purgatory and on earth.  St. Therese the Little Flower spoke to this when she promised to “spend her Heaven doing good on earth.”

We on earth are like the saints in Heaven in this regard.  While we might want in our prayer to fix our attention on God alone, God wants us to offer our prayer for others, because this is often where we find God revealed in our lives.  So it is with our prayers of intercession, both for fellow pilgrims on earth, and for those in Purgatory.

Of course, you likely know that some Christians falsely claim that asking others—whether saints in Heaven, or family members on earth—to pray for us is an offense against God.  They will explain to you that Jesus is the sole mediator of God’s graces.  What they will not explain to you is that each Christian is a member of Christ’s Mystical Body, the Church.  Therefore, each Christian shares in the work of Christ.

So does one Christian praying for another take something away from God?  No.  God wants us to turn to each other.  Intercessory prayer is one form of Jesus’ command to “love your neighbor as yourself” [Matthew 22:39].  If it’s valid in God’s eyes to pray for oneself, why wouldn’t it be to pray for others?  When a family suffers a tragedy, they often draw closer together.  Part of this occurs through prayer, and when they pray for each other, they all are stronger afterwards, and more closely knit.

Our prayer for others draws us closer to those for whom we pray.  Those in Heaven, in Purgatory, and on earth are drawn closer together through intercession.  When we intercede for another—or ask someone’s intercession—we don’t believe that that person is God.  We ask another to take our prayers to God.  When, for example, we call our mother on the phone and ask her to pray for us, we’re doing the same as when we kneel and pray a rosary:  we are asking our mother to pray to God on our behalf.

Through all prayers of intercession, the Body of Christ grows stronger.  In the person of Christ, God and man are united.  Within Christ, we live as members of his Body.  Within Christ, we build others up through our prayers for each other, and find God’s love for us all.

The Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time [C] 
Sirach 35:12-14,16-18  +  2 Timothy 4:6-8,16-18  + Luke 18:9-14
St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Garden Plain, KS
October 26, 2025

“… the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Look at the Pharisee and the tax collector in today’s parable.  They’re opposites.  Let’s say that the life of prayer is like climbing a mountain.  Then union with God—experienced on earth incompletely in contemplation, and in Heaven forever and fully in Adoration of Him—is the summit of the mountain.

Given that, neither the Pharisee nor the tax collector has reached that summit yet.  Both are still at the base of the mountain.  But they are facing in opposite directions.

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Consider an image that clarifies the difference between the Pharisee and the tax collector.  To paint this picture in your imagination, a modern world record holder will help us.  The sprinter who still holds the world record for the 100 meter dash is Usain Bolt.  Although he’s now retired, his 2009 world record for running the 100 meter dash in 9.58 seconds still stands.  At his fastest point during this race, he was running 28 mph.

But imagine if I told you that you could beat Usain Bolt in a 100 meter dash.  You would not have to trip him, or tie his feet together.  I can guarantee that you would win the race against him, fair and square.

Here’s how.  You and Bolt both start at blocks right next to each other.  Both of you run 100 meters as fast as you can.  The only catch is this:  before you begin, Bolt has to turn around 180 degrees and face the other direction.  If he does that, you’ll win every time!

Of course, Bolt would never do that, unless someone convinced him to.  But the Pharisee didn’t have to be convinced.  The Pharisee choose to do just that spiritually, turning his back on the real goal—the real summit—because the vice of pride was the starting block of his prayer.  Remember how St. Luke prefaces the parable.  The evangelist tells us that Jesus spoke this parable “to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else.”

In other words, the Pharisee and the tax collector are standing at the same base of the mountain of prayer.  But they’re facing opposite ways.  The Pharisee faces away from the mountain.  Every step he takes leads him farther from authentic prayer, and prayer’s summit of communion with God.

By contrast, the tax collector faces the mountain.  He looks up:  toward the mountain summit which is God, and toward the mountain face that he has to climb to reach the summit.  The tax collector knows the climb will be demanding, but he’s facing the challenge.  The key point of Jesus’ parable is that the first step up the mountain of prayer is the virtue of humility.

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To make this even clearer, listen closely to how the Pharisee and the tax collector pray.  This is important to listen in on, because their prayers reveal their hearts, and it’s the heart that determines which direction—and what goal—a person is facing in prayer.

The Pharisee begins with words of thanksgiving:  “O God, I thank you.”  So far, so good. Giving thanks to God is a holy thing.  Thanksgiving is one of the four chief motives for praying to God:  the others being Adoration, Petition, and Contrition.

But then the Pharisee’s prayer goes off course when he explains what he’s thankful for.  “O God, I thank you … that I am not like the rest of humanity.”  In that moment, the Pharisee reveals his hand:  his real goal in praying.  He uses prayer to separate himself from others.  Every word he speaks moves him a little farther down the wrong path, away from the summit of authentic prayer.

In telling this parable, Jesus makes sure we understand what’s happening here.  In narrating this parable, Jesus tells us that the Pharisee “spoke this prayer to himself.”  Honestly, this is not the best translation into English of the original Greek words that St. Luke used to record Jesus’ parable.  In English, when we hear that someone on some occasion was “praying to himself”, we might assume that the person was praying quietly, or “under his breath”.

But that’s not what it means when Jesus tells us that the Pharisee “spoke this prayer to himself”.  The original language means that instead of the Pharisee speaking this prayer to God, he was actually speaking the prayer to himself.[1]  Of course, you might argue that if someone is praying to himself instead of God, he’s not really praying at all.  But that’s Jesus’ point.  The Pharisee is not really praying.  What he’s doing is not giving glory to God.  He’s giving glory to himself.

By contrast, the tax collector does pray authentically.  He stands before God with humility in his heart.  He does not look around.  He does not compare.  He does not justify himself.  He simply lifts his eyes toward Heaven and says, “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner”.  Here, the tax collector is starting with a prayer of contrition.   This is the place to start.  Humility fosters a recognition that I am a sinner before God, and that humility motivates our prayers of contrition.  Once we’ve done that, we can advance in prayer:  first, to prayers of thanksgiving and petition, and finally, to prayers of adoration.

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So today’s parable is about prayer.  But the lessons that Jesus teaches us through this parable apply not only to prayer.  These lessons apply to every area of our lives in this world.  These lessons apply to everything we do, no matter whether the goal is the summit of prayer, or something much simpler.

Before we take a single step in life, we have to face the right direction.  We have to look up to see God.  We have to be resolved to act and succeed not for our own sake, but for God’s glory.

Humility is the beginning.  Divine charity—the very life of God—is the end.  But without the right beginning, we can never reach the right end:  the end for which God made us.[2]

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[1] The original Greek is “πρὸς ἑαυτὸν προσεύχετο”.  The Latin Vulgate renders it “haec apud se orabat”.

[2] See also St. Bernard of Clairvaux, In the Steps of Humility (London: St. Austin Press, 2001), and Father Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, O.C.D., Divine Intimacy (Rockford, Ill.: Tan Books and Publishers, 1996), especially 777-779.

“Zelo zelatus sum pro Domino, Deo exercituum” (Vulgate, I Kings 19:10)

Summary of Pope Leo XIV’s apostolic exhortation Dilexi Te

Please note: the numbers in brackets indicate the paragraph(s) of Dilexi Te referred to or quoted. This summary summarizes about nine-tenths of the material in the document. Sociological and economic assertions are largely not covered.

Dilexi Te can be accessed here:
https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/apost_exhortations/documents/20251004-dilexi-te.html

The PDF of this summary can be accessed here:
https://reflectionsonthesacredliturgy.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/dilexi-te-summary-pdf.pdf

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Dilexi Te (“I have loved you”) is the title of the first apostolic exhortation promulgated by Pope Leo XIV [October 4, 2025].  The document’s header explains that it’s addressed to all Christians, whereas some papal documents are addressed specifically to bishops, priests, religious, etc.

The total length of the document is 121 paragraphs.  In the introduction, which is three paragraphs long, Pope Leo clarifies that this document is a companion to Pope Francis’ final encyclical, Dilexit Nos [October 24, 2024].  Pope Leo also clarifies that Dilexi Te was drafted by Pope Francis, and that Pope Leo added some reflections to the draft.

Whereas Pope Francis’ encyclical focused upon “the human and divine love of the heart of Jesus Christ” [2], Pope Leo’s apostolic exhortation focuses upon love for the poor.  In other words, Pope Francis’ encyclical focused upon the Sacred Heart of Jesus as the subject of love (that is, the one who loves), whereas Pope Leo’s apostolic exhortation focuses upon the poor as the object of love (that is, the ones who are loved), albeit from a two-fold perspective:  first, the poor as loved by God; and second, the poor as loved by the members of Christ’s Church.

Chapter One of Dilexi Te is titled “A Few Essential Words”, and consists of twelve paragraphs touching upon diverse points.  Pope Leo in Paragraph 5 ties together three verses from the latter chapters of Matthew.  He introduces his weaving of these verses by asserting:  “Love for the Lord, then, is one with love for the poor.”  Tying these three verses together helps the reader to see the unity forged by Jesus’ two-fold command to love both God and neighbor.  This two-fold command reflects the human and divine natures united in the Person of Christ.  In this chapter, Pope Leo also makes a statement that reveals a motive for writing this apostolic exhortation:  “I am convinced that the preferential choice for the poor is a source of extraordinary renewal both for the Church and for society” [7].  Also of note in this brief chapter is Pope Leo’s explanation that there are many forms of poverty [9], a point which is not in this document fully explored.

Chapter Two is titled “God Chooses the Poor”, and consists of nineteen paragraphs.  It is the most thoroughly Scriptural and theological chapter of the document, and chiefly focuses upon two themes.  The first [16-23] is God’s outreach to the poor being fulfilled in the Messiah who Himself chose to be poor.  The second theme [24-34] is the call of God to His People—both the People of Israel in the Old Testament, and the Church in the New Testament—to imitate His merciful love for the poor.  A briefly mentioned though undeveloped point is that “works of mercy are recommended as a sign of the authenticity of worship” [27].  Hopefully Pope Leo XIV during a lengthy papacy will reflect in his writings about the link between the Church’s heritage of care for the poor and the heritage of the Sacred Liturgy.

Chapter Three is titled “A Church for the Poor”, and consists of 47 paragraphs.  It’s by far the longest chapter of the document:  in fact, it’s more than twice as long as the second-longest chapter.  Nonetheless, Chapter Three is a straightforward survey of saints who with zeal and devotion lived Christ’s call to serve the poor, which call Pope Leo wants Christians today to take up.

The survey starts in the apostolic era with the example of St. Stephen.  Pope Leo suggests that it’s not a coincidence that the first martyr of the Church was a deacon:  one ordained for service of the poorest.  In St. Stephen, “the witness of caring for the poor and of martyrdom are united” [37].  The survey also includes the witness of the Fathers of the Church [39-48], of those in monastic life [53-58], and of religious such as Franciscans and Dominicans who embraced poverty in a radical way as itinerant friars [63-67].  The survey also reflects upon individual saints and religious orders dedicated to particular examples of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy:  to the sick and suffering [49-52], to prisoners [59-62], to the education of the poor [68-72], and to migrants [73-75].  The chapter concludes by considering popular movements “made up of lay people” who dedicate their apostolates to caring for the poor [80-81].

Chapter Four is titled “A History that Continues”.  Over 21 paragraphs, the chapter considers the Church’s “veritable treasury of significant teachings concerning the poor” expounded over the past two centuries [83], beginning with Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical Rerum Novarum [May 15, 1891].  The chapter continues by exploring the teachings of the Second Vatican Council [84-86], and the three popes immediately preceding Pope Leo XIV [87-97].  The chapter concludes with a brief section titled “The poor as subjects” [99-102].  Pope Leo considers the Latin American bishops’ Aparecida Document [June 29, 2007], which “insists on the need to consider marginalized communities as subjects capable of creating their own culture, rather than as objects of charity on the part of others” [100; emphases in the original].  In a similar vein, Pope Leo quotes Pope Francis’ call to “let ourselves be evangelized” by the poor and to recognize “the mysterious wisdom which God wishes to share with us through them” [102, quoting Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium [November 24, 2013], 198].

Chapter Five, titled “A Constant Challenge”, consists of the final nineteen paragraphs of Dilexi Te.  Pope Leo notes that “love for the poor—whatever the form their poverty may take—is the evangelical hallmark of a Church faithful to the heart of God” [103].  That truth is based upon even more fundamental truths of the Christian Faith:  “No Christian can regard the poor simply as a societal problem; they are part of our ‘family.’  They are ‘one of us’” [104].  This solidarity with the poor raises the stakes even beyond those presented in the Parable of the Good Samaritan, to which Pope Leo next turns [105-107].  Jesus taught that parable to a scholar of the law to answer the question, “Who is my neighbor?”  Jesus taught the scholar of the law to see the suffering person as his neighbor, but Jesus teaches His disciples to see the suffering person as “one of us”.

Pope Leo concludes Dilexi Te with a section of seven paragraphs about almsgiving [115-121].  This might not seem a grand way to draw the document to a close.  Yet the simplicity, smallness, concreteness, and directness of the venerable Christian practice of almsgiving reinforces the key points of Pope Leo’s first apostolic exhortation.  Each of these four qualities of almsgiving also marks:  the love of God for the poor; the Incarnation of God’s divine Son in poor, mortal flesh; and the earthly mission of Christ’s Church.  The individual Christian is called to serve the poor as Christ Himself did:  seeing in the poor a human person created by God, bearing a heart called to love God and fellow man, and invited to share in the Father’s eternal banquet.

The Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]
Exodus 17:8-13 + 2 Timothy 3:14—4:2 + Luke 18:1-8
St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Garden Plain, KS
October 19, 2025

If you were to ask a group of priests what topic they preach about the least, their answer would probably be: prayer.

For every ten homilies about the Creed, or the sacraments, or the Ten Commandments, you might only hear one about prayer.

Why is that? Maybe it’s because our Catholic beliefs about prayer are harder to describe in clear terms.  Like prayer, they’re elusive, like the experience of prayer itself.

By contrast, the Creed is straightforward: the Holy Spirit is “the Lord, the giver of life… who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified.”  But the words of the Our Father are more mysterious, and take more work to unpack.

There’s also another reason that it’s difficult to preach about prayer.  That is that prayer is deeply personal. While we all share the same Creed, no two Christians have the same experience in prayer — nor are they meant to. God’s grace meets each heart in a different way.

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One helpful way to understand prayer is to understand that God means for it to unfold in three stages: vocal prayer, meditation, and contemplation.

The first, vocal prayer, is the most familiar. It’s the prayers we speak aloud—such as the Our Father, the Hail Mary, the Glory Be—or our own spontaneous words spoken to God from the heart.

In vocal prayer, we use human words to speak to God, just as we would speak to a loved one.

The second stage of prayer is meditation.  As with vocal prayers, meditation starts with the person who is praying.  That is to say, the person in each of these first two stages takes the initiative.  The third stage will be different.

Meditation is when we pray about God through our thoughts and imagination.  We might, for example, picture ourselves inside a Gospel story:  maybe putting ourselves in the place of St. John at the foot of the Cross on Good Friday, and seeing the scene as St. John did, and feeling as he did on Calvary.

If prayer were a conversation, we could say that the first two stages of vocal prayer and meditation use the mouth of the soul more than the ear.  In vocal prayers and meditation, we do most of the speaking.  The third stage will be different.

The third stage—contemplation—is where God takes the initiative.  God communicates Himself to the person praying.  Contemplation is not something you can produce.  It is God’s work in us.  It’s not a method or a technique; it’s a gift.

In contemplation, we don’t so much speak to God as rest in His presence:  this is a foretaste of Heaven, where the blessed behold God face to face.

Of course, we must dispose ourselves for this gift:  by turning away from sin and by offering our vocal prayers and meditations faithfully, with the right focus.  You might say that Jesus’ parable today helps bring focus to our prayer life:  focusing our will so it’s in closer conformity with God’s Will.

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Today’s Gospel begins with a simple line: “Jesus told His disciples a parable about the necessity to pray always without becoming weary.”

He tells us about a widow who keeps coming before a dishonest judge, begging for justice.

We’re not told exactly what her case is, only that she refuses to give up. And finally, the judge grants her request — not because he’s just, but because he’s tired of her persistence!

Now, Jesus isn’t comparing the unjust judge to God — He’s contrasting them.

If even a corrupt judge will do the right thing for the wrong reason, how much more will God, who is goodness itself, do the right thing for the right reason?

Still, the parable leaves a question hanging: If God already knows what we need, why does He ask us to keep praying — to persist in our petitions?

Here the Church gives us a guide in St. Teresa of Avila, whose feast the Church celebrated this past Wednesday, on October 15.

In her reflections on the Our Father, she wondered why Jesus didn’t simply teach us to pray, “Father, give us whatever is good for us.” Wouldn’t that be enough for an all-knowing God?

But she answers her own question. Jesus knows our weakness. We need to name our petitions one by one, so that we can reflect on them — to see whether what we’re asking truly aligns with God’s will.

St. Teresa writes that God may offer us a far better gift than what we asked for — but if it isn’t what we wanted, we might reject it. And so, He patiently teaches us that in our prayers we need to ask, to wait, and to trust.

The Lord calls us to pray always and not lose heart — not because He needs to hear our words, but because we need to learn how to listen.

Vocal prayer teaches us to speak about what is most important.  Meditation teaches us to imagine about what’s most important.  Contemplation is an experiences of what’s most important.  Contemplation teaches us to rest in the presence of God.

“Zelo zelatus sum pro Domino, Deo exercituum” (Vulgate, I Kings 19:10)

The Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]
II Kings 5:14-17  +  2 Timothy 2:8-13  +  Luke 17:11-19
St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Garden Plain, KS
October 12, 2025

In southwestern France, alongside the Pyrenees mountains, rests a small town called Lourdes.  In the year 1858, a fourteen-year-old girl named Bernadette began to see apparitions of a “small young lady” holding a rosary.  It was not until the sixteenth apparition that Bernadette learned the lady’s name.  The lady said to her: “I am the Immaculate Conception.”

Years after these apparitions of Our Blessed Mother, once the local bishop and civil authorities accepted Bernadette’s claims, a statue of the Immaculate Conception was commissioned.  It stands today in the center of the main square, in front of the great basilicas at Lourdes.

Preparations took a long time.  Bernadette insisted that every detail of the statue match what she had seen.  The artist grew exasperated — but Bernadette was insistent.

Among the many details that Bernadette corrected was the rosary the Lady held.  The artist had given her a five-decade rosary.  But Bernadette explained that the Lady’s rosary had six decades —the form known as the Carmelite Rosary.

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Many Catholics today don’t realize there is such a thing as a six-decade rosary, or that it’s been prayed for centuries.  The five-decade form — the Dominican Rosary — is more familiar, but both are beautiful ways of honoring Our Lady and meditating on the mysteries of our Lord Jesus Christ and His Blessed Mother.

The point is this: there is not just one single form of the Rosary.  The Church does not regulate the Rosary in the same way she regulates the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  If someone prays the six-decade Carmelite Rosary instead of the Dominican Rosary — that’s fine.  If someone wishes to read a Scripture verse before each decade — that’s fine.  If a person prays the Luminous Mysteries on Thursdays — that’s fine, also.

The form is not essential.  What is essential is to pray the Rosary.

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The Carmelite Rosary, for example, adds one extra mystery to each set of mysteries.  These additional mysteries focus on Mary’s unique share in salvation history:

the extra Joyful Mystery is Mary’s Immaculate Conception;

the extra Luminous Mystery is Jesus’ obedience to Mary and Joseph in their home at Nazareth;

the extra Sorrowful Mystery is the body of Jesus being taken down from the Cross and placed in the arms of His Mother;

and the extra Glorious Mystery is the loving patronage of Our Lady of Mount Carmel as the mother of each of us who belong to the Church.

The Carmelite Rosary reminds us that Mary’s life is inseparably joined to her Son’s mission — and that her prayers and example always draw us closer to Him.

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During this month of October, the Church encourages all Christians to deepen their devotion to Our Blessed Mother through the prayer of the Rosary.  Our Lady’s side altar is beautifully decorated this month — a reminder of that invitation to pray the Rosary.

Now, in our modern world, many people find it difficult to make time for prayer.  But we also have modern tools today that can help.

Many Catholics use prayer resources on their phones or tablets—digital aids that offer audio Rosaries, reflections on Scripture, and guides to the teachings of the Faith.  When used well, technology can make ordinary moments in life holy.  This can be the time that we spend driving, walking, or working.  When used wisely, tech can turn these occasions into moments for prayer and reflection.

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Venerable Sister Lucia, one of the visionaries of Fatima, said late in her life:  “All people of good will can — and must — say the Rosary every day.”

She explained that if God, through Our Lady, had asked us to go to Mass and receive Holy Communion every day, many would rightly say, “That’s not possible.”  This for some would be because of distance from a church, while for others because of health, family, or work.  But, she said, the Rosary is within everyone’s reach.

The Rosary can be prayed by rich and poor, wise and simple, great and small.  It can be said alone or with others, in church or at home, on a walk, in a vehicle, or even while rocking a baby’s cradle.

Sister Lucia offered this beautiful thought:  “God, who is our Father and understands better than we do the needs of His children, chose to stoop to the simple, ordinary level of all of us in asking for the daily recitation of the Rosary, in order to smooth for us the way to Him.”

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So pray the Rosary each day.

We need to pray it with love, with confidence, and with perseverance.  Through the Rosary, we join our sinful hearts to Mary’s Immaculate Heart, and through Mary, we draw closer to the Sacred Heart of her Son.

“Zelo zelatus sum pro Domino, Deo exercituum” (Vulgate, I Kings 19:10)

The Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]
Habakkuk 1:2-3;2:2-4  +  2 Timothy 1:6-8, 13-14  +  Luke 17:5-10
St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, Andale, KS
October 5, 2025

“… bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God.”

St. Paul is challenging us when he commands us in today’s Second Reading to bear our fair share of hardship.  It’s a challenge made more difficult by the fact that we’re surrounded by a culture steering us in the opposite direction:  that is, towards more and more comfort.

“… bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God.”

There are two parts to what St. Paul is saying here.

First, he’s commanding you who call yourselves Christians to “bear your share of hardship for the gospel”.  That’s the challenge.

But the second part of St. Paul’s command offers us hope, because he doesn’t say that we have to bear our hardship alone, in isolation.  Instead, we’re meant to bear our share of hardship for the Gospel “with the strength that comes from God.”

When St. Paul refers to “the strength that comes from God”, he’s talking about grace.  Human effort—that is, human strength—and God’s grace—that is, divine strength—are always meant to go hand-in-hand.  You cannot be an authentic Christian without both hard human effort and God’s free grace both working together within your soul.  If you try to get to Heaven only by your own hard work, without turning to God for His grace, not only will you not get to Heaven, but you will become very hardened and bitter.

On the other hand, if you try to get to Heaven only by God’s grace, without lifting a finger to work hard to cooperate with God’s providential will for your life, not only will you not get to Heaven, but you will become lazy and think that it’s everyone else’s job to care for you and your needs.  You cannot be an authentic Christian without both hard human effort and God’s free grace, both at work within your soul.

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Given all that as background, consider one specific problem in the Christian life.  Reflect on this problem in light of the fact that every October the Church calls each of us to consider more seriously the Church’s pro-life mandate.

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One way that Christians often over-simplify the spiritual life, and make it less than what God intends, is to think that the spiritual life is simply about “staying away from mortal sin”.  A well-meaning Christian might say to himself, “As long as I stay away from mortal sin, I’m on my way to heaven.”

Obviously, it’s incredibly important to stay away from mortal sin:  we might say it’s foundational.  But like with a house, you only build a foundation in order to put something on top of it.  When someone looks at a house, the foundation had better be there, and be strong, or the house is not going to be there when the going gets tough.  But when someone looks at a house, they don’t look at the foundation.  In the same way, when we die, and God judges our soul, the foundation had better be there.  But that’s not what God’s going to be looking for.

Here’s the question:  What are you building on top of the foundation?  Above and beyond staying away from mortal sin, you are called to choose among many good options in life, and do the greatest amount of good that you can during the years of your earthly life.  This is one of the reasons for using the corporal and spiritual works of mercy in order to make an examination conscience, along with also using the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes to make an examination of conscience.

So when Jesus judges your soul after you die, he’s going to ask, “What did you do for the least of my brethren?”  “Did you have faith enough to see me, Jesus, when you looked at the hungry, the thirsty, the naked and the homeless?  Did you—so that others might know Me—instruct the ignorant, give counsel to the doubtful and comfort to the sorrowful, admonish the sinner, and pray for the living and the dead?”

Do not define your life, and your faith, by what you don’t do, saying, “I don’t miss Mass on Sundays and Holy Days.  I don’t break the big Commandments.”  These statements begin with the word “I”.

The life lived in faith, that Christ calls us more deeply into, is shaped by the sacrifices that we do make for others.  It’s not about what “I” “don’t do”.  Instead, it’s about what is done, for others.

Here we see what it means to be “pro-life”.  I’m not pro-life simply because I’ve never had an abortion, or encouraged someone else to do so, or co-operated with someone who committed abortion.  Viewing our faith that way is like saying that I’m a patriotic American because I’ve never flown an airplane into a skyscraper.

But a patriot isn’t someone who does not harm his country.  A patriot is someone who does make sacrifices for his country.  The men and women of our military who are overseas, in hostile territory:  those persons are patriots.  They set the standard for the rest of us to live up to as Americans.  Maybe we can only fly a flag outside our homes or businesses, or send care packages, or pray rosaries for the members of our Armed Forces, but those sacrifices will make a difference.

Likewise, God calls each Christian to be pro-life.  During this month of October, you are called by God to reflect seriously upon what sacrifices you will make to defend the right of the unborn to live.  How will you do what Saint Paul encourages Timothy in the Second Reading to do:  to “bear your share of hardship for the gospel with the strength that comes from God?”

The Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]
Amos 6:1,4-7 + 1 Timothy 6:11-16 + Luke 16:19-31
St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Garden Plain, KS
September 28, 2025

“When the poor man died, he was carried away by angels to the bosom of Abraham.”

It’s been my experience that brothers and sisters do not like to share.  Of course, parents, through the virtue of prudence, try to teach their children to share.  When I was growing up, one of the ways my parents did this was interesting.  Our parents had us share names.  Our parents gave the same middle initial to all five of their children.  They gave the same middle name to both their daughters:  Marie.  Then they gave the same middle name to each of their three sons:  Michael.

In CCD when I was a boy, whenever we were asked to study one of our patron saints, I always chose my first name.  Maybe I didn’t want to learn about the patron saint that I had to share with my brothers.  Not until I was older did I become more grateful to my parents for giving me St. Michael the Archangel as one of my patron saints.

St. Michael’s feast day is Monday, September 29th.  St. Michael is a saint many of us do not turn to often enough.  He’s a saint that many of us might not know much about.  At the end of today’s homily we’ll pray together the Prayer to St. Michael, asking his protection, and asking him to help us imitate him.  But first, we need to consider some of the Church’s teachings about this great saint.

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Sacred Tradition identifies St. Michael as the one who—at the beginning of creation—led the good angels against the evil angels, banishing the evil angels to hell.  Sometimes those who don’t understand Jewish and Christian tradition, especially those influenced by New Age teachings, think of God and satan as opposites, similar to the Eastern notion of yin and yang.  Maybe these people have watched too many Star Wars movies, and think that God and the devil are equal in power, balancing each other as light and dark forces in the universe.

The truth is that God transcends all of creation, including all of the evil angels and all of the good angels.  If the devil as the chief fallen angel has an opposite, it would be St. Michael the Archangel.  You know, the literal meaning of the name “Michael” is actually a rhetorical question.  The name “Michael” is a question which means, “Who is like God?”  The answer, of course, is “No one”, yet all the fallen angels in their pride refuse to accept this truth.  Each of the fallen angels believes that he can be the equal of God.  Unfortunately, each of us does the same every time we choose sin over and above God.

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So why is the Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel an important prayer for us to pray?  There are at least two good reasons for praying the Prayer to St. Michael, whether you pray it after Holy Mass, at the end of your Rosary, with your night prayers, or at any time day or night when you are in need.

The first reason is to ask for St. Michael’s protection.  Each of us individually, and our families and our parish family collectively, need the protection of the holy angels.  That’s one of the chief reasons why God created the angels in the first place:  to protect God’s chosen People. (Two other reasons are to praise God in the Heavenly Liturgy, and to serve as messengers to those on earth.)

For several decades now in the Church, the angels have been largely ignored.  Some even consider a belief in angels to be a quaint custom from the Middle Ages that’s best left forgotten.  However, you may have noticed after the new translation of the Roman Missal started to be used in 2011, that the holy angels are more prominently mentioned again in the prayers of Holy Mass.  For example, in several of the Prefaces to the Eucharistic Prayer, right before we sing the “Holy, Holy, Holy,” the priest concludes his prayer to God the Father by saying:  “And so, with Angels and Archangels, with Thrones and Dominions, and with all the Hosts and Powers of Heaven, we sing the hymn of your glory….”

Every Christian ought to know about the nine Choirs or Orders of angels.  Every Christian ought to pray to the holy angels, including St. Michael and each person’s Guardian Angel.  But in addition to praying to St. Michael for the sake of his protection, we also ought to pray to him because each of us ought to imitate those holy angels who serve mankind.  This leads to the second reason to pray to St. Michael:  in order that we might imitate his example.  As an illustration, consider today’s Gospel passage.

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In the parable we just heard, Jesus preaches what’s commonly called the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus.  But that name for the parable, like all the names of the parables in the four Gospel accounts, are modern inventions.  Jesus never gave a name to any of His parables.  In the case of today’s parable, the common name for the parable is misleading.

In the first line of today’s Gospel passage, the evangelist tells us that Jesus preached this parable to the Pharisees who surrounded Him.  This is important for understanding this parable.  The Pharisees are not symbolized by either the rich man or Lazarus.  Who in today’s parable symbolize the Pharisees?  The five brothers of the rich man symbolize the Pharisees.  When Abraham declares, “If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead”, the clear reference is to the Pharisees not being persuaded by Jesus’ future resurrection from the dead.

Of course, Jesus is wanting the Pharisees to accept now the graces that God is offering them, even if God’s graces come to them through simple and humble messengers sent by God.  Just as the rich man during his life on earth failed to lead his five brothers to God, so each of us has a choice about whether or not to be a simple and humble messenger to others.  Or in other words, each of us needs to be a human angel—metaphorically speaking—because the word “angel” literally means a “messenger”.  Whether we intend to or not, we send messages to others all the time.  But do the messages that we send to others communicate God’s kindness, mercy, compassion, and forbearance?  Or their opposites?

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Today’s parable illustrates the second reason to pray to St. Michael:  as a reminder to us to be angels in our own place in life.  God calls us to be messengers of God’s goodness, as the rich man in today’s parable failed to be.  St. John Henry Newman wrote a meditation stressing this calling that each of us has.  Here are just two sections of it:

     “God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another.  I have my mission—I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next.

     “I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons.  He has not created me for naught.  I shall do good.  I shall do His work.  I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place while not intending it—if I do but keep His Commandments.”

With that in mind, please join me in kneeling and praying the Prayer to St. Michael:

St. Michael the Archangel,
defend us in battle.
Be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the Devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray,
and do thou,
O Prince of the heavenly hosts,
by the power of God,
thrust into hell Satan,
and all the evil spirits,
who prowl about the world
seeking the ruin of souls. Amen.

St. Michael Vanquishing Satan by Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino [1483-1520]

The Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time [C]
Amos 8:4-7 + 1 Timothy 2:1-8 + Luke 16:1-13
St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Garden Plain, KS
September 21, 2025

“You cannot serve both God and mammon.”  This sentence is sometimes falsely thought to mean that you cannot have both God and money in your life.  In other words, this false interpretation says that there’s a sort of competition in your life between God and money which is a zero-sum game.  To use a visual metaphor:  this false interpretation says that there’s a see-saw in your life, and that God and money are sitting at opposite ends of the see-saw.  If one goes up, the other goes down.  The holier you are, the less money you will have, and the more money you have, the less holy you must be.  This interpretation of Jesus’ words is false.

In fact, our spiritual well-being and our financial well-being are not in competition with each other.  Rather, when Jesus plainly tells you that “You cannot serve both God and mammon”, the key is the word “serve”.  “You cannot serve both God and mammon.”  You can serve God, or you can serve mammon.  But you cannot serve both.  You can have both in your life.  You just cannot serve both.  The key is that simple word “serve”.

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One of the most recited prayers cited by Jewish people throughout the centuries is called the Shema.  It’s from the fifth book of the Old Testament, the Book of Deuteronomy.  This brief prayer is only three sentences long.  Here is the Shema:  “The Lord is our God, the Lord alone!  Therefore, you shall love the Lord, your God, with your whole heart, and with your whole soul, and with your whole strength.  Take to heart these words which I command you today” [Deuteronomy 6:4-6].  This prayer helps us understand that to love someone is to serve her.  This is true in our relationship with God, as well:  to love God is to serve Him.

The beautiful thing about serving God is that through this form of love, we become more like Him.  After all, “God is love” [1 John 4:8], St. John taught the first Christians.  So when we love God by serving Him, the more we serve Him faithfully, the more we love, and so the more we become like God. This is true because of a basic metaphysical principle: a person becomes like that which he loves.

By contrast, what happens when you try to serve money?  One simple way to get at an answer is to ask yourself whether your self-image goes up and down with the amount of money that you have.  Do you feel worse when you lose a significant amount of money?  Do you feel better about yourself when you gain a significant amount of money?  If so, then there is a certain likeness between your money and you.  As the money in your possession grows, so you grow.  As the money in your possession diminishes, so you diminish.  This is a false form of love, and a false serving:  a false servanthood.  It is a love of something that is beneath you, and so when you love money you debase yourself.

So we need to ask:  what is financial wealth for?  The answer is:  financial wealth is a means by which to serve others:  the Other who is God, and the others around us on earth, who are our neighbors.  That doesn’t mean that the wealthy person has to give it all away, like St. Francis of Assisi.  Despite what some socialists might say, there’s nothing inherently immoral about the action of accumulating wealth.  The sin lies in not using one’s wealth for others, especially within the setting of one’s vocation.

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So with that as a backdrop, consider the guidance of Holy Mother Church.  Consider her precept about personal finances.  As you know, there are five “Precepts of the Church”, listed in the Catechism of the Catholic Church in sections 2041-2043.  The fifth Precept of the Church is to provide for the material needs of the Church, each according to his abilities.  In a single word, this is the Church’s precept to “tithe”.  The word “tithe” literally refers to giving one-tenth of one’s income.  The Diocese of Wichita does break this ten percent down into two parts:  eight percent given to one’s parish, and two percent given to any charitable group of one’s choice (which can be one’s parish, or which can even be a secular charity that follows sound moral principles).

Some Christians are unaware that tithing is a practice not only rooted in Scripture, but also in the life of the Church and her saints.  In the Old Testament, tithing was seen among the Israelites as a giving of one’s “choicest first fruits” [Exodus 23:19].  This phrase—“choicest first fruits”—comes from the Book of Exodus.  This is an important image to consider spiritually, because it reveals to us that tithing is not merely a Precept of the Church, but also a spiritual exercise:  a practice that stretches the soul.

The image of “choicest first fruits” explains two things about tithing as a spiritual exercise.  First, what does the word “choicest” tell us?  This word, if you’ll pardon a mixing of metaphors, insists that we give God not the rump roast, but the sirloin.  Tithing is giving to God our best, not our leftovers.

But even more demanding is the call to give our “first fruits”.  If you were a farmer harvesting his crops, then your “first fruits” would be given at the beginning of the harvest, when there’s more harvesting to come.  If you were to give God your tithe from the first day of harvest, you would have no way of being sure that Mother Nature wouldn’t wipe out the rest of the crops that night, leaving you with nothing for yourself.  Nonetheless, that’s exactly the sort of faith that the Bible describes in commanding the giving of one’s “choicest first fruits”.

Here are some practical suggestions. If you don’t already know, then sit down and calculate what percentage of your monthly income you donate to the church each month. If it’s not yet 8%, increase it next month by one percent, and every so often, increase it by another one percent until you reach 8 or 10 percent. Along the way, with paper and pen look at your monthly expenditures and separate your wants from your needs, and also make sure to pay credit card balances in full every month.

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Our spiritual lives and our finances are not in competition with each other.  The chief threat that finances pose to our spiritual lives arises when we start serving money, instead of making money serve us (or more specifically, making money serve our need to give to God and neighbor).  When we make the sacrifices needed so that our finances serve our needs rather than our desires, then we’ll be more free to serve the Lord with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength.

St. Lawrence Distributing Alms by Fra Angelico [c. 1395-1455]