May 11, 2025 at Saint William and Saint Peter Parishes in Naples, FL

Acts 13: 14, 43-53 + Psalm 100 + Revelation 7: 9, 14-17 + John 10:27-30

Those of you holding books in your hands know that I have taken the liberty of adding more earlier verses to the Gospel passage assigned to this day. I have done so because the four verses we get out of context in Chapter ten leave us nowhere. At least, I didn’t know what to do with those verses several weeks ago when I began to prepare for today. We have to know why he said that. We know about hearing the voice of Jesus, and all that it promises. But that last verse is the punch line that matters: “The Father and I are one.” 

So, don’t get all sentimental about this shepherd talk and shepherd image. In my opinion, artists have complicated our access to the message of this Gospel painting a calm, long haired, slim, white-faced man dressed in flowing white robes. The truth is, no real shepherd then or now looks clean, spotless, and well groomed. It’s dirty, messy work, and if they’ve been sleeping in the field with the sheep, they will not look like they have stepped out of a painting or greeting card. 

At this point in John’s Gospel the identity of Jesus is the issue. This is what matters here, identity – his and ours. He is not claiming to be a shepherd. He is claiming to be one with God. In doing so, he is giving us a clue about how God works or God feels. At this point in the flow of this Gospel, those John writes to are stuck over the issue of identity and how to confirm or recognize it.

Just before this conversation begins, Jesus has cured a man born blind, and this act has stirred up a controversy over the identity of Jesus. Some of these Pharisees feel like Jesus might well be the Messiah judging from his works. Others, paying no attention to what he does and only listening to what he says, think he is a fraud. They refuse to connect words and works.

The importance for establishing an identity through works is what matters, not words, especially if the words do not match the works. John is writing to those early followers of Christ. They are struggling with the Jewish community in synagogues, and John is reminding them about what matters. They will never win over those in the synagogues with arguments and words. What they do is what will get the attention of their opponents, and he has the same message for us. We ought to remember that it was the things Jesus did that brought those crowds of people to him. Once they were attracted by what he did, he began to speak about what it meant and who he was.It can be no different now. The Gospel we proclaim on this Fourth Easter-Time Sunday gives us reason to look carefully at what we do all day long, how we use our time, and where we go. This is what reveals who we are. After taking a good look at what we do, we might then see if what we say matches what we do remembering what Jesus had to say to those who questioned who he was. “The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me.” The question raised today is who we are – and what we do all day tells the truth.

May 4, 2025 I am in Oklahoma City this weekend

Acts 5:27-32, 40-41 + Psalm 30 + Revelation 5: 10-14 + John 21: 1-19

John’s use of darkness and light should be familiar to us by now after hearing the Passion proclaimed on Good Friday. It continues today as the disciples go fishing at night. They catch nothing. We should know by now what’s coming, and John does not disappoint. After the uselessness of darkness, he tells us it is daybreak, and now they go they back to fish again in the light, and the catch is huge. Once you get the point of what happens when we work in the light of Christ, the Gospel hardly needs any preaching. I could sit down now, but the Word has more to say to us.

There is a charcoal fire there on the shore, and it’s not the first time we have heard about a charcoal fire if you recall the Passion Narrative. This time Peter does a bit better than he did at the other charcoal fire allowing the Gospel to reveal both the place of Peter among the apostles, and the patient, forgiving mercy of Jesus toward those whose faith is inconsistent. Peter gets to start over as Jesus calls him by his former name: “Simon, son of John.” He does not call him “Peter.” Then, with Peter’s final affirmation of faith, he gets the same invitation he had much earlier, “Follow me.” This time, Peter knows the truth of what following Jesus will cost him, and so do we.

Many come into this church today after a week of hard work that sometimes produces nothing like those men fishing in the dark. We come into this church today, into the light of the risen Christ who will feed us here as he fed those weary apostles. We come into this church today, and he asks us who are so much like Peter, “Do you love me?” “Do you love me?” As we consider our answer to his question, we need to remember the cost of saying, “I do.” 

April 27, 2025 At Saint Peter and Saint William Churches in Naples, FL

Acts 5:12-16 + Psalm 118 + Revelation 1:9-11, 12-13, 17-19 + John 20:19-31

“I have seen the Lord” says Mary Magdalene. “We have seen the Lord” the disciples tell Thomas. These declarations bring to a climax a theme of sight and blindness that runs through John’s Gospel as a whole. At an earlier time, some Greeks come to the disciples saying, “We wish to see Jesus,” but he hides from view and reveals himself only to the disciples. It’s as though he does not really want to be seen except after he has risen. After the resurrection there are always the wounds suggesting that if we do not see Jesus on the cross as well as in resurrected glory, we will not see him at all.

Perhaps then, wounds are important for recognizing Jesus, and there are plenty of wounds around these days. Wounded people are everywhere except where politicians want to hide them. As a Church, we feed them, we comfort them, and we do so because we can see not with the eye, but with the soul. We believe.  Notice in this Gospel that Thomas does not want to see Jesus. He wants to see the wounds. This is not about whether the resurrection is real or not. It is about whether it matters or not. It is one thing to believe that Jesus was raised from the dead. It is quite another to believe that it can mean anything for our lives.

The marks and wounds still matter today, but they are not the ones in the side and hands of Jesus. They are our wounds, the ones in this city and everywhere people suffer.

We hear so many stories from people without faith that include their disillusionment with the church, and our failure to make real what we profess. What this world is looking for, at heart, is some legitimate and trustworthy connection with the Divine. That can happen when we are present revealing the love, the patience, the forgiveness and mercy of God.

Faith in the Resurrection of Christ is not a dogma we have to believe. It is a new way of life that comes from the conviction that Christ’s new life is ours as well. The Resurrection is not a mystery to be clung to either. It is a practice that develops in new and deeper ways as we live into it. With practice, our lives will proclaim the presence of Christ in every wounded, living human being. As we perfect a new way of life that recognizes the living Christ in every single one of God’s children, wars will cease, hunger will vanish, and those most abandoned, avoided, and feared will be embraced, while those who do not believe come from darkness into the light.

April 20, 2025 at St Peter the Apostle and Saint William Churches in Naples, FL

Acts 10: 34, 37-43 + Psalm 118 + Colossians 3: 1-4 + John 20: 1-9

There is a lot of running around in the Gospel verses we proclaim today, and it is proclaimed to world that is still running around all over the place. From one relationship to another, from one job to another, from one home to another, the running goes on and on. Artificial Intelligence tells me that there are 45,000 passenger planes in the air every day with 2.9 million people in them. They will all hit the ground and start running all over the place. Yet, here we are in the sacred space, and at least for the moment, no one is running, but many of you know the signal to start.

Just like Mary, Peter, and John, we have run to this place hopefully seeking the Lord. Like those three, we are sometimes confused, sometimes uncertain, sometimes believing, and most of the time struggling. The world in which we live and from which we sometimes want to run insists that religion has had its day and that the church is finished. The resurrection could not possibly have happened. “Some things never change” so they say, leaving us all frozen in time helpless and hopeless in the face life’s challenges and demands.

As John writes these verses, there are four characters put before us: Mary, Peter, John, and “They.” There is always a “they” in this life and so they have to appear in this story. “They” have taken the Lord. It was the “they” who were at work in the trial and death of Jesus. It was “they” who stirred up the people. “They” were the ones who decreed that the body of Jesus must be removed for whatever reason. They are always nameless, their identity is vague, but they are always pitted against us the helpless.  Whatever it is we don’t like or whatever leaves us helpless, it is almost always, “they.” They closed my street for repairs. They turned off the water to fix the pipes, and we are never quite sure exactly who has done this, but we have a vague sense of some power impinging on my world. 

All of this thinking can eventually make us unwilling to take personal responsibility for our lives. A world dominated by “they” is one in which we are forever at the mercy of powers and authorities beyond us leaving us without any control over our destiny. This is what Mary, Peter, and John were facing the moment they stared into that empty tomb.

Have “they” done something or not? Are “they” going to determine what those three see and believe? That’s the issue here. “They” are casting their influence over Mary and the others. As we see, that spell, that dark power gets broken. It does not happen all at once for everyone, but in the character of these three we see how it is possible to move from the anger, fear, and grief of Mary to Peter’s curious wonder over how or why the wrappings and napkin were all folded up to the belief of John.

My friends, faith in the resurrection of Christ is not a dogma. It is a way of life that flows from the conviction that Christ’s new life is ours as well. It is not some mystery to cling to. It is a practice to develop in new and deeper ways. I can stand here saying these things because I have witnessed the resurrection, and so have you. I have seen survivors of tragedies that “they” have caused rise up with courage starting a new live that in many ways is better than the old. I have seen men and women face the death of their loving companions come out of a tomb called “grief” and find and live a new life marked by hope and joy. I’ve seen people whose homes have been destroyed by fire or storm begin life again with joy because they are still together.

In this life, if we surrender to the power “they” may have over us, we shall live always in fear, plagued by doubts, angry and helpless. The resurrection of Jesus Christ offers us another way. It is the way of hope. It is the way of faith. It is without a doubt, the way of love which conquers all things. We have to go into that tomb. We have to die a little to ourselves if we have any hope of coming out. We have to take off the clothes of death, remove the veil that covers our face and our eyes so that we can see the face of God and live. When we do so, our lives will proclaim the presence of Christ and we can dare to proceed in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. This will make all the difference in the world.

April 18, 2025 At Saint Peter the Apostle Church in Naples, FL

Isaiah 52: 13-53:12 + Psalm 31 + Hebrews 4: 14-16, 5: 7-9 + John 18: 1-19:42

We have just completed part one of a great and ancient ritual that has known very little change since the year 381 when a pilgrim made her way to Jerusalem to join that early Christian Community gathering to remember what Saint John passed on to us. She writes that the Christians gathered in silence at the place of the crucifixion from Eight in the Morning until Three in the afternoon with the wooden cross exposed. Then they carried that cross to their church where they listened to the Prophet, sang Psalms, and offered prayers for all in the world. Their focus was the Passion and Death of Christ. It was a day of intense fast and constant prayer. The fast even extended to Holy Communion, because there was no Mass celebrated on Friday or Saturday of Holy Week. The cross was what held them and drew them together just as it does today.

In a few moments we shall begin the Solemn Prayers for all the world with the hope that no one might be left out of God’s Mercy and God’s Kingdom. After which, the climactic moment that brings us here today begins as a cross of wood is brought into this place. We can only be stunned to silence by the power of that cross. An instrument of death becomes the source of our hope.

Some have and always will wonder what kind of God could demand the death of his only Son before forgiving us. They have failed to listen to the New Testament that never says God demands the death of His Son. It does say that Christ came among us to do the will of the Father. Jesus is crucified while doing the will of his Father. That does not make his dreadful death what the Father desired or demanded. A child can be killed while doing some chore asked for by a parent. The parent only asked for that chore, not the death.

The one great gift all of us have and have had since the dawn of creation is the gift of a will and freedom. The great adventure of life is about the choices we make with that freedom, and the whole history of human life is one great struggle over making the right choices. Until now, the stories of that history are tragic and violent. Too often we have come close to destroying everything and ourselves.

Then comes Jesus. That moment in history when God resets creation, and God’s Son comes with his mission saying: “I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me.” (John 6:38) He came to want what the Father has wanted from the very beginning, that we might all be one living in peace in this beautiful garden God made for us.

As we just heard, Jesus gave up his spirit so that his spirit might be poured out into us, and showered upon all creation. This ought to leave us startled and stunned only to be awakened, like Christ on Easter, empowered by the gifts of that Spirit to lift high the cross, to stand firm in the face of evil, to set right what is broken, always thirsting to do the Father’s will. When we do, we will know what Jesus knew at the final moment. It is “Enough.”

April 13, 2025 at Saint Peter Churches in Naples, FL

Isaiah 50: 4-7 + Psalm 22 + Philippians 1: 6-11 + Luke 22: 14-23:56

Our prayer is long today, and we give to God some extra time to listen to his Word and remember the two gifts we have all been given: life and death. Without that second gift, the first one, life, would not be nearly as precious. In fact, it might actually be tedious, monotonous, and frightening.

While we live we have before us a troubling sign of God’s love with the memory and the image of an innocent man crucified. Over and over again in Luke’s Passion Jesus is found not-guilty, and yet, a victim of jealousy and fear he dies while everyone who knew him, who loved, who followed him everywhere said nothing. We like to think that the Romans killed him and the leaders of the people demanded it. But the truth is, silence killed him. Even Joseph of Aramathea, a member of the Sanhedrin who, Luke tells us, did not consent to their plan seems to have done nothing except bury the body of an innocent man.

We have much to remember and even more to ponder this Holy Week. What must not be forgotten is that silence in the face in any injustice is a terrible thing that leaves us all accountable and responsible for the suffering of innocent people. We gaze at the cross and hear its story over and over again to be reminded of what comes next, because it is not the end of our story of God’s love.

It is Easter that we really celebrate. It is the hope we have in the face of death that gives us reason to really live. For people like us who can see beyond the cross, hope always defeats despair, joy wins over sorrow, good triumphs over evil, and faith conquers fear.

April 6, 2025 at Saint William Catholic Church in Naples, FL

Isaiah 43: 16-21 + Psalm 126 + Philippians 3: 8-14  + John 8: 1-12

 A quick look or listen to this Gospel and we could easily think that this is about the sin of adultery. But that doesn’t say much to me and, I hope, to most of you. Adultery is not my problem. Christ is speaking to us today in this place, and he is not speaking about adultery. There is shameful sin involved in the way these scribes and Pharisees treated that woman. There is not a shred of evidence that they recognized a human being. There is no sense that they gave any thought to her feelings. They are using her as bait to trap Jesus.

There is another sin in their attitude toward Jesus. They wanted to shut him up and just do away with him. Murder is in their hardened hearts and a stubborn refusal to listen to him because he threatened their way of life and their values. Those Pharisees thought more of the law than the person. Maybe the greater sin here is their refusal of mercy, and mercy is what this is all about, because that is what we see at this moment in Jesus Christ.

Do not be distracted by that writing on the ground business. No scholar knows what that is all about. Wasting time even thinking about it avoids facing the demands of this story. One of the most basic principles left to us by Jesus is that no human being is to judge another. Distinguishing the difference between the sin and the sinner, Jesus does not condemn. He did not need to realizing that she was already condemned. She did not need that. What she needed was mercy. Those standing around, and even some today might ask why she deserved mercy. Of course, that thinking only comes to those who have forgotten what mercy is, a gift, a pure gift. No one earns it. No one deserves it.

Jesus never approved of the sin. In fact, he urges her to sin no more, and he does so in such a way that his respect for her comes through in the telling of the story. He invites her to conversion which is why we retell this story now near the very end of Lent as we approach Holy Week. It’s not too late, is the message. It is not too late to recognize our own sin. It is not too late to admit that we have and we do use other people sometimes for our selfish pleasure or to protect our comfortable lives. It is not too late to open our hearts and our minds to the truth and the message of Jesus Christ. It is not too late to stop judging other people, to stop humiliating others and treating them without any respect for their human dignity no matter what they have done to themselves. We don’t need to do any more damage to them. It is not too late to hope for mercy either because we all need it badly.

Compassion for fellow human beings is without a doubt one of the most important things in life. If there was more of it, there would be lasting peace, and there would be justice that looks less like punishment or revenge. We would all be better for it and have more hope that standing before Christ in judgement we might receive what we do not deserve, his mercy.

March 30, 2025 at Saint William Catholic Church in Naples

Joshua 5: 9-12 + Psalm 23 + 2 Corinthians 5: 17-21 + Luke 15: 1-3, 11-32

 The Great Journey to Jerusalem continues with one of the best loved and known parables of Jesus. It speaks to all of us who know jealous rivalry, conflict between children and parents or among the children themselves. It speaks to every community that has some members who just go their merry way taking and never giving, and others who work faithfully for the good of all. Today we get a shocking picture of how the path of reconciliation begins.

The first shock is the son’s request, which at the time of Jesus and in that culture really meant he wished his father was dead. The second shock is that the older son raises no objection to this. The third shock is that father goes along with it. Those who heard this parable from Jesus would have gasped at that father’s behavior. He should have thrown the kid out with nothing and changed the locks. Today we would call that kind of father an “enabler.” Even more shocking is the father’s behavior later in the story as he gives up his manly dignity and runs outside with a kiss, a ring, and a robe. I’ve always wondered where the mother was. I think she nagged him until he surrendered his macho ideas and asked her to set the table for the party.

Familiar as the story is to us, we have to be careful and thoughtful about who of the three in the story gets our attention and is worthy of our imitation. I have sat through more Penance Rites than any of you have ever attended listening to preachers talk about the younger son urging everyone to repentance. Hardly ever does anyone pay attention to the other one who is really much more like us. People who can identify with the younger son are not here. They are still out there somewhere living it up with their “eat, drink, and be merry” life-style. We are the ones who are always here. We are the ones who give, sacrifice, and do what God asks of us, and herein lies the danger.

At that time, his attitude is a mirror image of the Pharisees toward sinners. Remember, this story started because the tax collectors and sinners were coming to Jesus and the Pharisees were plotting against him because he ate with them. An attitude of entitlement and privilege is the greatest problem emerging from this story then and now. It is a strong warning that God’s love is not earned. We are all God’s sons and daughters. We are not slaves. That sick and sinful attitude is dangerous to the whole human family of God.

This parable in an invitation to consider our discipleship and how it may deteriorate into joyless resentment toward those who seem to be benefiting undeservedly from all that God offers. At the same time, we might recognize the free offer of God to us all, a shocking generosity offered by the one is willing to pay the high humiliating cost to gather in all the children, none of whom have earned the right to this inheritance. The father is the humble one here, not that son.

Don’t think that the young one learned humility when he recognized how low he had sunk and decided to go home. His rehearsed speech was a job application. It had nothing to do with the family, with humility, or with repentance.  He was broke and he needed a job.  It’s the father who teaches us something here about God’s costly, humble love for us.  “All that I have is yours” he says to us. The cost of accepting that is to replicate such reconciling love in our own attitudes and actions.

March 23, 2025 at Saint William Catholic Church in Naples, FL

Exodus 3: 1-8 + Psalm 103 + 1 Corinthians 10: 1-6 + Luke 13: 1-9

The two events that Jesus refers to at the beginning of this Gospel passage could easily distract and lead us away from the point of the parable. These events could lead us to start the ongoing and never-ending question of why bad things happen to good people. Jesus never addresses that question. He raises those two situations about innocent people dying to remind us that the end can come for anyone unexpectedly whether you are good or not. Everyone sins and everyone dies. The issue here is what happens before the end comes. It’s about a fruitful life.

On the road to Jerusalem, Jesus is teaching and forming us all as he nears Jerusalem. Today, he challenges the smug assumption of those who enjoy good fortune when they look upon others with that ideology that too quickly says: “They got what they deserved.” No real disciple/follower of Jesus Christ could ever say that.

“Deserve” is a tricky word, and we use it way too often to assume that somehow God owes us or that somehow society owes us something. To this Jesus speaks through a parable here to suggest that our best hope, when it comes to whatever we deserve, is mercy.

The story of the fig tree reminds us that God is more merciful and more patient than we deserve. That fig tree had been there long enough to produce fruit. Yet, all it did was sap the soil of water and nutrients. It took and never gave.

There is an interesting comparison possible between the two men in this parable worth some thought. The owner who seems rather cold and greedy cares nothing for the tree. He is only interested in the product, figs. Chopping the tree down was an easy option. He didn’t have to do anything to help the tree. The gardener, on the other hand, is different. He took care of things and seems to be a lover of fruit trees. He cared about the tree, knew about the tree, and did not give up on it willing to put some of himself into it. He seems to know that things become precious to us not just because of what we get out them, but also because of what we put into them.

Too often we are like the owner in this story. His way seems sensible, but it is the way of the head over the heart. It is the way of power rather than love. Power is only interested in results, wanting them instantly. Power has little patience with the slow and no empathy with the weak. The gardener’s way is the way of love, patient and kind. Love does not give up easily, never forces, just coaxes, encourages, and waits.

We learn something about being a disciple of Jesus today, and we have choices to make over the head or the heart, force or coax, take or give. We may be reminded that all we can hope for in the end is mercy. There is a message here that God is patient with sinners. Yet the parable also makes it clear that there is such a thing as a last chance. For people who refuse chance after chance the day will come when they are shut out not because God shut them out, but because by their own choices they shut themselves out.

March 16, 2025 I am at Saint Gregory Abbey in Shawnee, OK

Genesis 15: 5-12 + Psalm 27 + Philippians 3: 17-4:1 + Luke 9: 28-36

We are so like Peter, James, and John in this ninth chapter of Luke’s Gospel. They want nothing to do with suffering, but they sure like the glory. Immediately before this mysterious event, Jesus has shared with his closest companions his sense of what lies ahead for him if he continues his mission fulfilling his Father’s will. He had to have been filled with a sense of dread and surely some fear. I suspect that he shared this with his companions hoping for a pledge of their support when he his finally attacked by the leaders of the people. As Luke tells it however, they say nothing as Jesus speaks about how following him would mean taking up a cross.

Perhaps to prepare them for what they would see on another hill outside Jerusalem, Jesus takes these three to another hill where he prays and they sleep. This is the same three who do the same thing in a garden after their Passover dinner. On this first hill they want to hold on to this great glory and declare that it is good to be there. Then on that other hill, they are nowhere to be found.

They are so like us. We want nothing to do with suffering, or for that matter others who are suffering. We don’t want to see it. So, we close our eyes as if sleeping would make it all go away, and we are quiet too often saying nothing about the injustices that cause so many to suffer. Yet when the glory time comes, most of us would be found at the head of the line like Peter who wants to share in that glory by building tents. Yet he wants nothing to do with anything or anyone when it comes to suffering.

For the second time in Luke’s Gospel there is a voice from heaven. At his Baptism Jesus heard a voice that said: “You are my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased.” No one else heard that voice there are the Jordan. It was spoken only to Jesus. Now the voice speaks for a second time, and now it speaks to those three disciples with an added directive: “Listen to him.”

Two powerful statements leap off the page of this weekend’s Gospel: “Listen to him” and “It is good for us to be here.” They had a hard time listening when he did not say things they wanted to hear. Yet, the command will not go away. Then for Peter to say that “It is good to be here” when Christ is revealed in his glory is troubling because when it would have been good to be on another hill, he was absent. We can leave this church today with those two statements ringing in our minds. We have come to listen, as he tells us to take up the cross and follow him. While it is good to be here today, it would be better if we were with the suffering, the lonely, the homeless, the sick, or the imprisoned. It will very good when we can say that and mean it as we accept and take up the crosses that do and will always come our way.