The Saving Power of God

 

TWENTY-EIGHTH SUNDAY

IN ORDINARY TIME

Saturday, 11 October 2025, St. Katherine Drexel

2 Kgs 5:14-17

2 Tm 2:8-13

Lk 17:11-19

 

The Lord has revealed to the nations his saving power.

Don’t mind me, but I have to express my conviction that declarations like this one from the psalms, from our responsorial psalm today don’t really make enough of an impression upon us, when we sing or recite them. The Lord has revealed to the nations his saving power. That is especially true in terms of our understanding and profession of how He makes His power known to all the ends of the earth. Let’s take the example of miraculous healings.

       The horrible disease of leprosy figures big in both our first reading from 2 Kings and in the Gospel passage we just read from St. Luke chapter 17. We may not have run into this horrible illness in our own experience, but for most of human history up until very recently, leprosy was considered a death sentence after long suffering and social isolation for those who contracted it. The infection was very much feared. With that in mind, it is fair to ask why the Gospel of Luke doesn’t record a bigger reaction to Jesus healing those 10 lepers.

Even today, we may have heard of leper colonies in southeast Asia or Africa, places where the infected went to die in misery. Perhaps we know of Damien De Veuster, popularly known as Father Damien or Saint Damien of Molokai (born in Belgium on 3 January 1840 – and died in Hawaii on 15 April 1889). He was a Belgian Catholic priest in the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. He ministered to a leper colony in Molokai, Kingdom of Hawaii, from 1873 until his death in 1889. After 11 years caring for the physical, spiritual, and emotional needs of those in the leper colony, Father De Veuster himself contracted leprosy. He continued with his work despite the infection but finally succumbed to the disease at only 49 years of age. De Veuster was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on 11 October 2009.

       On this Sunday the Naaman the Syrian we read about in 2 Kings was a military general, a warlord, who had the confidence of his king and could pretty well write his own ticket. But nothing to do, He was a leper. A little maid of his wife, captured in a raid on Israel offered this tough guy the first hope of healing or cleansing from this malady. But as Sacred Scripture tells us he had to learn from this little slave girl and from his own servants that tough as he was and despite his commanding presence, Naaman could not set the terms for his own healing and salvation. He could not give orders to the one true God. Elisha, the man of God, pointed the way for him which was to be achieved through humble obedience: “Go and dunk yourself in the Jordan River seven times”.

       In the Gospel, we hear that the 10 lepers calling to Jesus on the road had a similar experience. “Go show yourselves to the priests!” All ten were healed, but only the Samaritan recognized that their healing was bound to confession of faith in Christ: your faith has saved you.

       The Lord has revealed to the nations his saving power. What should be your Sunday meditations? How should you reflect on God’s power and His action in our world and specifically in your life? Think, if you will, especially about how renouncing stubborn, habitual sin in your life can free you for true happiness in this life and in the next. Spend some quiet time this Sunday considering how through obedience to all of God’s commands and through the humbling experience of making a good and honest confession (“Go and dunk yourself in the Jordan River seven times”) can free you and heal you from what keeps you outside the circle of the fullness of life already now and forever. “Go show yourselves to the priests!” That is Jesus’ command and the pathway to true happiness and holiness.

       Praised be Jesus Christ!

 PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

Restoring justice

 https://remnantnewspaper.com/web/index.php/articles/item/7838-official-vatican-report-dismantles-traditionis-custodes

https://remnant-tv.com/video/mass-deception-vatican-push-to-cancel-latin-mass-based-on-fake-news

The Little Church

A dear friend wrote to chide me for having slacked off on writing of late! I can't say as I mind his nudge in the least and by chance it pushes me to offer a book recommendation and kind of a little challenge with this quote from Joseph Bevan:

Looking back, I do not think that my family was as happy as God wanted it to be, because the spiritual side of our existence was sidelined and ignored. I do not blame Ma and Pa for this, because they trusted the teachers and clergy of the Catholic Church. Unfortunately, they were badly let down, and the result is that a whole generation of unbelievers has now been spawned by my brothers and sisters. It is still a mystery to me how my parents were so blind to the unfolding crisis and often uncritically supportive of some of its worst results. [Bevan, Joseph. Two Families: A Memoir of English Life During and After the Council (p. 23). Os Justi Press. Kindle Edition.]

You can debate all you want about Bevan's analysis of the crisis in the Church and even remain pensive about whether passing on the faith to your children is reducible to Mom and Dad witnessing to their children their own love of the Lord, but Joseph convinces me even further that the faith will not be passed on if not within the family.

Bevan's "memoir" contrasting his parents' family and that of him and his wife Claire couldn't be more respectful, offering judgments which do not lack in the slightest the love and respect in which he holds his big, talented and broken family.

What's my challenge? To move beyond denial to embrace the present brokenness of the Catholic Church. I will leave it at that and see whether I can find the words and the heart to compose a more detailed and pointed analysis of the situation.

Pray for me as I do for you!

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

Happy Septuagesima Sunday!

In my Father's House

 

THE HOLY FAMILY

OF JESUS, MARY AND JOSEPH

December 29, 2024 – Dell Rapids

Sir 3:2-6, 12-14

Col 3:12-21

Lk 2:41-52

 

Praised be Jesus Christ!

       Today, on this year’s Holy Family Sunday, we have a lot to think about and to pray over, because even here in God’s country our world is not exactly in order when it comes to family life. The ideal of the family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph seems unattainable as a model for our families. That must not be so. I would insist that Holy Family Sunday is a time to pray for Catholic families and for the grace of the Lord’s aid in favor of our little church, the normal family, the building block basic to the greater unity which is the Church for the sake of the life of the world.

Sadly however, these days Jesus, Mary and Joseph at Nazareth, who should be our hope and inspiration, indeed do seem out of reach as a model. In our world, the classic mom, dad, and children family of my childhood has become somewhat of the exception to the rule. Sadly, we know much more today about the struggles of single parent homes. Divorce has become way too common, but even before we get to that point, young people seem hesitant to marry. People will tell you that the reason young people are not marrying in the Church these days and are not founding families is because everything has become so expensive. They say that buying a home since COVID is out of the question for most young folks; renting has become the norm. As odd as it seems, the couple’s second salary hardly seems to cover the cost of childcare. You’ll hear people say that they need two sources of income just to get by, and that they can’t afford children because a big van or SUV is too expensive and with all those car seats it is just too much to deal with. Lots of years ago I can remember Mom saying that no couple can raise more than 4 children (I am the oldest of 8), after the fourth she said wisely and proudly that the older children need to help out with the younger children. Granted, seat belts are important, and car seats make sense, but we used to travel all together in the family car with a younger child on each older child’s lap, so we had a double row in the back seat of a regular 4 door sedan, and that being not a new car but a very used vehicle. Even so I had the impression that we wanted for nothing and were very happy.

       Grandma would come and visit for about two weeks at some point each winter and she spent a goodly part of her stay patching jeans, sewing on buttons, darning socks, maybe putting a new zipper on some of the things which had piled up in the mending basket since her last visit. I felt loved and cared for and had no understanding of what it meant to go hungry, even though soft drinks and snacks were a rare occurrence, maybe for a little family New Years party. My point would be that family could not and still should not be factored around something like buying power for luxury items. Think about it!

       Today is Holy Family Sunday! What is it all about? No doubt many people would just assume that this would be the day to talk about behavior issues. They might even quote today’s passage from Luke Chapter 2 and say: see, that’s the way you should behave, obedient to your Mary and Joseph like Jesus was at 12 years of age. The boy Savior speaks up: “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he said to them. He went down with them and came to Nazareth and was obedient to them; and his mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor before God and man.

       Even at age 12 the boy Jesus, the Lord Jesus, even though He knew better than Mary and Joseph just Who He was and what He was about (“Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”). Even so, He respected the order of things. He respected family. He didn’t stay behind in Jerusalem at age 12 when Joseph and Mary came looking for Him.  “He went down with them and came to Nazareth and was obedient to them…”

       Could Jesus not have started His public ministry at age 12 instead of waiting until age 30? I suppose so, even if it would have been a bit odd. Whatever the Lord Jesus would have done, He would have done rightly, but we have been gifted with the message and mystery of His humble but terribly normal life at Nazareth a pattern for family life, for mutual respect among members of family and of course of obedience.

       Holy Family Sunday should be that time, and rightly so in the midst of our celebration of the birth of Christ, when we come to appreciate just what is true happiness. True happiness in life has something to do with being grateful for things as they are and treasuring each other at home.

       On this Sunday, pray for the happiness of your own family, pray for healing for broken families, and pray that young people might not shy away from marriage and family, from giving the gift of life and the only real happiness which matters.

Praised by Jesus Christ!

 PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

The Lord comes on the Clouds of Heaven

 

FIRST SUNDAY OF ADVENT

1 December 2024, St. Mary, Dell Rapids

Jer 33:14-16

1 Thes 3:12-4:2

Lk 21:25-28, 34-36

To you I lift up my soul, O my God. That’s how we prayed in the Entrance Antiphon for this First Sunday of Advent. Today with the beginning of a new church year, we set our hearts anew upon the Lord. He is the one for Whom we long. To you I lift up my soul, O my God.

       Yes, Advent! It’s a word we tie together with Christmas and the coming of our Lord and Savior born in a stable at Bethlehem. In Advent we think of Christ’s coming back in the time of the reign of the Roman emperor Caesar Augustus. He came as a tiny baby and in abject poverty to save us from our sins.

Advent, however, as is evident from our readings for Mass today, is more than just the annual remembrance of the birth of the Savior. The season of Advent also helps us focus on the Last Judgment Day, on preparing for the Risen and Glorious Lord Jesus Who will come again at the end of time to establish justice once and for all, justice for everyone whether we be still living at the time of His coming or long dead. The Fathers of the Church also speak of Advent in terms of a third coming of Christ here and now to dwell in our hearts by grace. Some of our most beloved old church hymns are Advent hymns in which we pray for the Lord to come again. “Come thou long expected Jesus, born to set Thy people free. From our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in Thee.”

       The people of the Old Testament obviously did not know the Messiah’s name. They had lived before Christ and as God’s chosen people they hoped in His promise. We need but think of the Prophet Jeremiah in our first reading: “The days are coming, says the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and Judah… I will raise up for David a just shoot; he shall do what is right and just… Judah shall be safe, and Jerusalem shall dwell secure… The Lord our justice.”

       Longing for justice upon the earth, for justice and security in our lives and in society generally seems to be much more relevant these days. It is something we need even more urgently that in the past, as things seem to be more messed up these days. I say that fairly sure that it can’t be that in the past we contented ourselves with less than now. Maybe we were less sophisticated or just plain naïve forty or more years ago. For my part I can remember back as a young man reading stories about Communist dictatorships and being very anxious for those unfortunate people living under those regimes where average folks were basically defenseless, where the powerful and wicked lorded it over ordinary people, where truth and justice, the rule of law really did not have much meaning. We thought about those people as suffering from oppression, as being denied their God-given human dignity by people whose atheism put a small minority of oligarchs on top of the heap and generally stole purpose and basic happiness from the rest of the world. Sad to say, but our country today seems almost as bad as any cold war country behind the iron curtain.  “Come thou long expected Jesus, born to set Thy people free. From our fears and sins release us, let us find our rest in Thee.”

       O, come Emanuel, God with us! On our own without the Lord, we cannot get it handled. Advent is a powerful, unequivocal statement about how things work in the world, about how they can be better than now, about how things can truly be right and just.

        In Advent then we have three reflections about how the Lord comes to deliver His people. Once in history we acclaim and thank the Lord for His faithfulness to His promise to Israel. A second time we beg Him to come into our hearts and lives for the sake of our own salvation and for the sake of the life of the world. And so binding our hearts and lives to Him Who fills us with His grace and power, we stand tall and strong.

       “For that day will assault everyone who lives on the face of the earth. Be vigilant at all times and pray that you have the strength to escape the tribulations that are imminent and to stand before the Son of Man.”

To you I lift up my soul, O my God.

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

Not far from the Kingdom of God

 

THIRTY-FIRST SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

November 3, 2024 – St. Mary in Dell Rapids

Dt 6:2-6

Heb 7:23-28

Mk 12:28b-34

Praised be Jesus Christ!

       I think we could rightly spend time this Sunday answering the question of how we should go about loving God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and our neighbor as ourselves.

The two great commandments of love of God and neighbor come up all through the Bible. In the New Testament they complement what the people of the Old Testament understood by their obligation to obey God’s commands. In the world today people often balk at the idea that we show our love through obedience, but that failure or doubt is a contemporary thing, unknown in times past. The children of Israel and the Church across the centuries understood very clearly that obedience is the true test for love, love of God and love of our parents.

Deuteronomy quotes Moses as saying, “Fear the Lord, your God, and keep throughout the days of your lives, all his statutes and commandments which I enjoin on you, and thus have a long life.” It makes perfect sense that that is how we show our love for God. St. Paul tells the Ephesians 6:1-3, honoring our parents is the one of the commandments which carries with it a promise or a reward. “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. “Honor your father and mother”—this is the first commandment with a promise: “so that it may be well with you, and you may live long on the earth.”

       In the New Testament we build on what was established in the law of Moses and reaffirm that by saying that love of God is truly a matter of obeying His will. This is the teaching of Christ transmitted to us by His Church. Jesus’ love of the Father was expressed in His obedience to the Father’s will for the salvation of the world. It required of Him the supreme sacrifice of His life by His great suffering and death upon the Cross.

One of the greatest lessons we learn in life is that love is not and cannot be just a matter of hugs and kisses. In the course of growing up we learn that sweettalking to our parents is no sure sign of our love for them. Knowing mom and dad’s will and promptly obeying them is a much better, more honest, and really the only convincing sign of our love for them, for our gratitude for all they have done for us.  

       “Fear the Lord, your God, and keep throughout the days of your lives, all his statutes and commandments which I enjoin on you, and thus have a long life.” This passage from Deuteronomy not only states clearly what we owe to God for all He has done for us. Certainly, first and foremost it is a declaration about who God is for us and for the sake of the world.

       Understanding love of God as bound to obedience, we can understand Jesus’ reply to one of the scribes in today’s Gospel. To answer the man, Jesus quoted the text of the two greatest commandments, love of God and love of neighbor. The Lord said, “There is no other commandment greater than these.” The man responded by showing he understood Jesus’ teaching: “Well said, teacher. You are right in saying, ‘He is One and there is no other than he.’ And ‘to love him with all you heart, with all your understanding, with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself’ is worth more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.” Jesus congratulated the scribe for his words and said, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

       The question then is, where am I, where are you, where are we in terms of the kingdom of God? Not far from it? Far away? Close? Are we all in when it comes to God’s kingdom or are we distant, kind of standoffish, rather noncommittal? Jesus did not declare the scribe saved, but rather not far from being so. It is here that we can understand the close bond between love and obedience. Besides outright disobeying, some children lie to subtract themselves from the will of others. By doing so they withdraw from the possibility of loving or being loved. It is impossible to claim you love, if you lie or disobey.

       I would just like you to think about that on your day of rest, the Lord’s Day. Our refusal to respond to those who are set over us or to whom at some point we have committed ourselves in life, especially those of our family circle, spouse, children, parents, is or must be seen as a failure to love. Don’t let this Sunday get away from you without examining just how far you are from the kingdom of God because you don’t really love as you ought.

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI

 

Us against the crowd, seeking deliverance from the Lord

 

THIRTIETH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

October 26-27, 2024 – St. Nicholas, Tea

Jer 31:7-9

Heb 5:1-6

Mk 10:46-52

Praised be Jesus Christ!

       In our first reading for this 30^th Sunday in Ordinary Time, the Prophet Jeremiah announces to his people in exile in Babylon what their promised deliverance is going to look like. In the name of the Lord, Jeremiah announces the return from the north to Jerusalem of the remnant of God’s people.

       “The Lord has delivered his people, the remnant of Israel… with the blind and the lame in their midst.” Jeremiah explains God’s reason for bringing them safely home in the words: “For I am a father to Israel, Ephraim is my first-born.”

       In today’s Gospel, we see the prophecy of Jeremiah fulfilled with Jesus granting sight to the blind man in answer to his plea. “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!” As sons and daughters of our heavenly Father we may ask about our possibilities. What is God’s will for us? Can we be as insistent, as demanding with God in Jesus Christ, as was the blind man, Bartimaeus? Or rather shouldn’t we just sort of cool it after the manner of the crowd which tried to get the son of Timaeus to be silent? What is the sort of deliverance that we can hope for from Christ in answer to our prayers? “Master, I want to see.” Jesus told him, “Go your way; your faith has saved you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way. Very simply, it is an egregious mistake not to beg like the blind man. It is wrong to hold back and not cry out for help like Bartimaeus.

       Lots of questions, but actually I am asking myself another question, just one. And namely this: Why? What is this business of the crowd trying to tamp down the desperate plea of the blind man? “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me!” What’s the deal? Why are these people annoyed or embarrassed by the cries of Bartimaeus? How do they understand the nature and mission of Christ? Isn’t Jesus supposed to bring deliverance to us in our hour of need? Shouldn’t it be understandable that this blind man cry out in this desperate situation of blindness which has rendered him virtually helpless?

       When you get to be my age, you can spend more time maybe than you should talking about aches and pains, about your failing eyesight and, even more commonly, about hearing loss, which affects a lot of elderly people. I am sure that Bartimaeus’ blindness or somebody else’s lameness was much worse than anything any of my contemporaries may have suffered. But when you talk to couples especially, you hear about their compassion for a spouse who has become hard of hearing and not only misses the plot but is often emarginated from life to such an extent that they may appear to be losing it even mentally, even though that is not the case. We don’t know if Bartimaeus’ wife or some other relative might have been there in the crowd hushing him down, but we can speculate about how the crowd’s lack of faith in the person and power of Jesus Christ would keep them from hoping for and pleading for deliverance from Christ the Redeemer, real deliverance for this blind man.

       Who is Jesus Christ? October, Rosary month, is a time when we remember the early Church councils which struggled with this question and answered it by professing Mary the holy Mother of God and thereby professing Jesus, her Son, to be truly God and truly Man. Part of Jeremiah’s prophetic message to Israel in the Babylonian captivity was that God’s people should not give in to desperation, but accept their punishment at the hands of God, remain faithful and live in hope of deliverance and a return to their homeland.

       On the Jericho road there, the crowd was ostensibly following Jesus, but not really. By shouting down Bartimaeus’ cries for deliverance they were denying Christ’s power to save him and them. Jeremiah in his prophecy of deliverance for Israel showed God saving his people despite themselves. Jesus restored sight to the son of Timaeus despite the crowd who would hear none of it.

       In the last couple years we in the Church have been struggling with several things which have undermined the faith of many of our Catholic people. Let me mention only the complicity of the Church authorities in the COVID lockdown which further and radically brought down Sunday Mass attendance. As far as is physically possible we are obliged under pain of mortal sin to assist at Mass on all Sundays and Holy Days of Obligation. There is no room for discretion here: if we can, if we are able, then we must get to church. By so easily dispensing from Sunday and closing churches, we scandalized people seriously. I still occasionally run into people who have not gone back to Mass. The precepts of the Church form a substantial part of the backbone of our faith. The great efforts that were made to prepare and celebrate the national Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis some months back were wonderful indeed, but ultimately secondary in importance to precept and obligation when it comes to fostering people’s faith in the true presence of Jesus, the God man, in the Sacrament of the Altar, the holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

       Just as back at Jericho in the days of our Lord, there is a crowd out there which tends to discourage. And so we cry all the louder just like Bartimaeus. “Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me!” Deliverance is ours in the Blood of the Lamb.

PROPERANTES ADVENTUM DIEI DEI