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Fourth Sunday of Lent
March 27, 2022 — Year C
Readings: Jos 5:9a, 10-12; Ps 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7; 2 Cor 5:17-21; Lk 15:1-3, 11-32
by Rev. Mr. Mark De La Hunt, Permanent Deacon
The gospel begins with these words: “Tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to listen to Jesus…and then the scribes and Pharisees said, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them (Luke 15:1-2).” They meant it as an accusation, but I love, love these words about Jesus. We are living them right now, because like the tax collectors and sinners in today’s gospel, we come in our sin to draw near to Jesus at His table and to listen to Him in the Word. Drawing near to Him is our mission during Lent, and it is why we are putting extra effort into fasting, praying, and acting in charity.
Today, the readings from the Holy Bible speak to us about two ways to powerfully draw near and listen to the Risen Lord. The first way is the final covenant with humanity, established by Jesus at the Last Supper and consummated on the Cross: the Eucharist (Mt 26:28; Jn 19:30). The second way to encounter Him is the sacrament established by Jesus to keep us prepared to receive all the grace He desires to give us, most especially in the Eucharist in Holy Communion.
Holy Communion is the Wedding Supper of the Lamb (Rev 19:9). Jesus is the groom, we are the bride, and we prepare ourselves to receive Him with a nuptial bath, Baptism (the bath a bride takes before her wedding – CCC 1617). And when we need that nuptial bath refreshed, which we often do because of sin, we seek the Sacrament of Confession which is also known by the name of Penance and of Reconciliation (CCC 1423-1424).
Before we speak of Confession, we should start at the source of our faith, the Eucharist (CCC 1324; Lumen Gentium 11). In the first reading from the book of Joshua, the Israelites eat the food of the Promised Land for the first time. Using a spiritual interpretation, the Promised Land represents Heaven, and the food of Heaven is Jesus (Kreeft 198, 200). In the Psalm we prayed, “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord (Ps 34).” We see His goodness in Adoration of the Holy Sacrament (which Father gifts us with in his extended elevation of the host), and we taste His goodness in receiving the Eucharist, the Bread of Angels. The many biblical references to the Eucharist (and there are many) are not there to highlight a mere religious symbol, but to open our minds to the reality that it truly is the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus.
As for the Sacrament of Confession, for those who deny that priests have the authority to forgive sins, let them read today’s second reading, 2 Cor 5: 18 “All this is from God, who has…given us the ministry of reconciliation…So we are ambassadors for Christ.” Fr. Nixon is an “ambassador for Christ” in the confessional. Not convinced? In John 20:21-23, shortly after Jesus is risen, He appears to the apostles in the upper room and says, “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you…He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
Yes, we can ask Jesus for forgiveness anytime and in any place and should do so. However, “Reconciliation with the Church is inseparable from reconciliation with God (CCC 1445). Father forgives you on behalf of the Church and, if you are truly sorry and have been honest in your confession, he exercises the power Christ has given Him and removes all your sin as an ambassador of Christ. Take advantage of this gift regularly like the saints have done throughout the ages. God’s mercy knows no bounds.
Indeed, God’s boundless mercy is the crux of today’s gospel. The story Jesus tells is called the story of the what? Prodigal Son. yes. The Prodigal and his older brother, yes. Maybe an even better name for it is the one Fr. Pablo Gadenz uses, “The Compassionate Father and his Two Sons.” The Father is the star in the story. His extraordinary compassion and generosity is the surprise (Peter Kreeft 206). Let’s sift some of the gold in this rich parable of our Lord.
It is important to keep in mind the context in which Jesus told this story. His audience was the tax collectors, sinners, AND the Pharisees, and scribes. St. Augustine and many other Church fathers saw Jesus as addressing the Prodigal son story to the tax collectors and sinners, and the story of the older son, who had always served and obeyed his father, to the Pharisees and scribes (Gadenz 275). And of course we will find our sinful and self-righteous moments mirrored in one or both of them too. Peter Kreeft describes the Prodigal son as “hot and rebellious and unrighteous, and the older son as cold and proper and self-righteous (Kreeft 206).” Which one is most like you?
That is a great question to take to prayer and reflect upon, but there is another, less obvious lesson for us in these two sons. Which one would we judge most harshly, if they were members of this parish or a neighbor? The Prodigal, of course. What a deplorable person, breaking his father’s heart and squandering his inheritance on sin. The older brother, however, is obedient, and works hard for his father. Which one, however, is most in danger spiritually?
The Prodigal son became truly sorry for his sin and acknowledged the truth that he was not worthy to be a son, only a servant. The older brother though, seemingly breaking the Greatest Commandment and the one “like it”, did not acknowledge his father as father, nor his brother as brother. In his pride he refused the father’s love and was more interested in being with his friends. Ironically, he is the flip-side of his Prodigal brother, though a son, he saw himself as only a servant saying, “all these years I have served you and not once did I disobey your orders (Gadenz 278).” His self-righteous pride blinds him to his sonship and threatens his destination for eternity.
Now for the star of the story, the father. He loves both the messed-up sons so much. When that thankless, dirty, good-for-nothing prodigal son returns, the father is looking for him and probably looked for him on that road every day since he left, praying for his boy to return. The gospel says the father “was filled with compassion.” Bishop Barron points out that in the original Greek, the word for compassion was esplagnisthe, meaning his “guts are moved;” his love was visceral. Any parent who has dropped off their child at school or at college for the first time, knows this ache in their gut or chest. And when the father goes to the angry older son, who thinks he has to earn his inheritance, he is not upset. He says, “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours (Lk 15:31).”
Do you see how much God, our Father, loves us? Like the father in Jesus’s parable, Our Heavenly Father forgives us no matter how badly or often we have sinned, in Confession. And when we seek His forgiveness, He not only forgives, but throws a celebration meal for us: the Eucharist.
I want to close by leaving you with that joyously, happy, and beautiful image of a wedding. We are the bride; Jesus is the groom. The Mass is our wedding. Baptism and Confession are our preparation to come down the wedding aisle. You have to admit that preparing a bride for her procession down the wedding aisle is an event within the event. Thinking of her Groom and how He will be waiting for her at that altar, she diets for months, like the fasting of Lent, to get to look her best. She has her hair done professionally. Her mom, sisters, and friends team up to put on her dress, make-up, and veil. Our extra acts of charity during Lent beautify us in a similar fashion.
And the Groom? He waits at the altar, looking to spot His bride afar off like the father in the story. And when his bride appears and processes down the aisle. Time seems to stop. She is all He sees and desires. His heart beats so fast. He prays that her beauty and her love for Him does not overwhelm him in the moment and bring him to tears. And when she gets to the altar, she gives Him her hand, and He gives her his heart (Eucharist). And the two rejoice. Amen
Book References
Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time
February 27, 2022 — Year C
Readings: Sir 27:4-7 / Ps 92 / 1 Cor 15:54-58 / Lk 6:39-45
by Rev. Mr. Mark De La Hunt, Permanent Deacon
I have a tongue-in-cheek conversion story for you. My wife was preparing dinner, and I walked into the room and asked if she would like to listen to some music. She said, “Yes,” so I jokingly said, “Alexa, play risqué music.” Alexa paused and then said, “I can’t seem to find that, how about some Contemporary Christian music?” Ha! Our family’s musical habits have led Alexa to Christ. Hopefully, Alexa’s conversion goes viral in Amazon’s algorithms.
Alexa’s conversion, however, wasn’t a random thought while shaving. It leads into the fact that today is the last Sunday before Lent begins. Ash Wednesday is in three days. Interestingly, even though it is not a Holy Day of Obligation, it is in the middle of the week, and the Church tells you that “You are dust and to dust you will return,” and smudges ashes on your forehead. It tends to be well attended by young and old alike.
Why? I suspect it is because, in our heart of hearts, in the depths of our soul, we sense a call to conversion. And that call begins first with acknowledging that we are sinners, second, with the hope that we can be freed from sin, and lastly with confidence that Jesus is THE WAY to that freedom (Acts 19:9).
In the gospel, Jesus uses a bit of humor to open our eyes to our sin. “Can a blind person guide a blind person (Lk 6: 39)?” How many times have we chuckled and said, “There goes the blind leading the blind,” as we watch one young or lost person lead another? It’s not that they are bad in some way, but more that they don’t know what they don’t know and so, as Jesus said, “Both fall into a pit (Lk 6:40).”
There is a saying that doctors do not self-diagnose well. The spiritual equivalent of that wisdom is that the person who is his own spiritual director has a fool for a spiritual director. Jesus said it this way, “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own (Lk 6:41)?” The truth is, we are better at perceiving another person’s flaws and sins than we are our own. We need help to see that beam in our eye, so that we can progress in virtue and move towards deeper conversion.
Who do we turn to, to help us “see the wooden beam in our eye” and to help us learn how to remove it? We turn to Jesus… in prayer, in the scriptures, in examining our conscience, in going to Confession, and in coming to Mass. It is Jesus that we hear in the readings at Mass and in the homily. It is Jesus we speak to and are forgiven by in Confession, and it is Jesus we receive in the Bread of Angels (Jn 6:51, 53). In all these forms, Jesus helps us notice that uncomfortable, aggravating wooden beam in our eye.
Once we recognize it, we can repent and begin the Lenten journey of deepening our conversion, from being centered on self to being centered on Jesus. In fact, that is what repent means, to turn away from MY WAY to Jesus’ WAY; THE WAY (Acts 2:38; 19:9). His way is conversion, and it will lead us to grow in the virtues of Faith, Hope, and Love (1 Cor 13;13).
To acknowledge this spiritual need for conversion, only through Jesus, is a mark of Christian humility, the virtue required to progress in all other virtues. Thus, it is the arch virtue. Satan is powerless against it, because he is eaten up by pride. He can’t understand and therefore cannot defeat humility. Mary and Joseph had humility in spades, and they passed that virtue on to Jesus who perfected it in His obedience in the Garden, and His Passion and Death.
Humility is not natural to us, though. It must be practiced. Lent is set up to help us practice humility through the three pillars of repentance or conversion explained by Jesus in Matthew 6:5-18. Those pillars are Prayer, Fasting, and Almsgiving or Charity. We practice humility through Prayer, where we are a humble beggar before God, fully aware that we can do nothing good without Him (CCC 2559-St. Augustine). We practice humility through Fasting, where we deny ourselves enough that we might fail and therefore be humbled by how weak we are. And we practice humility through Charity, where we are humbled by the gratefulness of the people we love through acts of mercy and kindness.
Accordingly, the Church teaches us that Fasting, Prayer, and Charity “express conversion in relation to oneself (fasting), to God (prayer), and to others (charity) (CCC 1434). Jeff Cavin’s bible study on the Gospel of Matthew said it another way. He said fasting combats lust of the flesh, prayer combats pride of self, and charity combats lust of the eyes (Mt 6: 1-18; 1 Jn 2:16).
Between now and Wednesday ask the Holy Spirit to help you choose how you will fast, pray, and do good for others during Lent. The Church asks those between the ages of 18 and 59 to fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday and those age 14 and up to abstain from meat every Friday of Lent (USCCB.org). That is the minimum. We can go beyond that. I recommend abstaining from activities we spend too much time doing or from devices or hobbies we spend too much time on. In doing so, we free up time for Prayer and Charity. And the charity is enhanced by the grace coming from that extra prayer. You see, the three pillars are mutually reinforcing.
For prayer, consider trying a different type of prayer like Lectio Divina, where you read a passage from the Bible and ask God what it means for you. Or pray the Rosary, which is a meditation on the key moments of Jesus’ life. Or Liturgy of the Hours, which is prayer using the Psalms and Hymns prayed in the morning, mid-day, evening, and night. You could do just morning and night if you are busy with children and work. Stations of the Cross on Fridays of Lent are another great way to pray. And do not forget that Mass is the greatest prayer we have; consider going during the week where you can.
For Charity or Almsgiving, consider abstaining from eating out and movies, etc., and keep track of the money saved, and give it to the poor at the end of Lent. Call people you need to call, especially the homebound and sick and your children or parents you don’t speak with enough. Do random acts of thoughtfulness for your spouse like you did when you were falling in love. If you can, serve at one of our community charities for the poor.
I do not think I can summarize Lent much better than St. Paul did in today’s second reading from 1 Cor 15. “Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be firm, steadfast, always fully devoted to the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain (1 Cor 15: 58).
Lent, like exercise, hurts so good, when we push ourselves as spiritual athletes in Prayer, Fasting, and Charity. And if we stumble, we get back up. Jesus does not need us to be perfect. He only needs us to get up each day, lace ’em up, and go at it again persevering in faith.
Our young like hype songs before big events. If I were to ask our new convert, Alexa, to choose a hype song to be a theme for Lent, I think she would play Zach Williams’ song, “Less Like Me”. I’m going to pray the first three verses from it. If you start praying it in song, feel free to prayerfully do so.
[Lord], I have days I lose the fight
Try my best but just don’t get it right
Where I talk a talk that I don’t walk
And miss the moments right before my eyes.
Somebody with a hurt that I could have helped
Somebody with a hand that I could have held
When I just can’t see past myself
Lord, help me be…
A little more like mercy, a little more like grace
A little more like kindness, goodness, love, and faith
A little more like patience, a little more like peace
A little more like Jesus, a little less like me.
Lord, may we have faith, that no matter how many times we lose a fight during this Lent, we may confidently pray St. Paul’s words, “Thank God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Cor 15:57).”
Amen
KEEP READINGThird Sunday in Ordinary Time
January 23, 2022 — Year C
Readings: Neh 8:2-4a, 5-6, 8-10 / Ps 19 / 1 Cor 12:12-30 / Lk 1:1-4; 4:14-21
by Rev. Mr. Mark De La Hunt, Permanent Deacon
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God (Jn 1:1).” Today is the “Sunday of the Word of God,” established by Pope Francis on September 30, 2019, in his apostolic letter, Aperuit illis. September 30 was not a random date, either. It is the feast day of St. Jerome, who translated the scriptures into the common language of his day, Latin. He is famous for saying “Ignorance of the scriptures is ignorance of Christ,” which would be a good theme for today’s homily. (more…)
KEEP READINGThird Sunday of Advent
December 12, 2021 — Year C
Readings: Zep 3:14-18a / Is 12:2-3, 4, 5-6 / Phil 4:4-7 / Lk 3:10-18
by Rev. Mr. Mark De La Hunt, Permanent Deacon
Good morning and welcome to Gaudete Sunday, which in Latin means rejoice. To help us understand that word, I would like you to recall a time in your life when you went from feeling incompleteness, or pain, or uncertainty, or loneliness, or boredom, or aimlessness to feeling whole and joyful.
Maybe it was when that person you liked asked you on a date or agreed to go on a date with you, or when your significant other first said, “I love you”, or when your boss, out of the blue told you that you are doing a great job, or when your doctor relieved your pain, or when your best friend or family member forgave you, or when you and your wife first realized you were going to have a baby. (more…)
KEEP READINGThirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time
October 24, 2021 — Year B
Readings: Jer 31:7-9 / Ps 126 / Heb 5:1-6 / Mk 10:46-52
by Rev. Mr. Mark De La Hunt, Permanent Deacon
Jesus performed miracles two thousand years ago and is still doing so today. Today, may we leave this church with a renewed faith in Jesus’ power to heal us and to truly help us when we are in need, and to heal and help others through our prayer.
In today’s gospel, the setting is important. Jesus is walking from Jericho to Jerusalem. Said another way, Jesus is walking from the site of the opening of the Promised Land through Joshua’s obedience to God, to the site of the opening of the gates to our final Promised Land through Jesus’ obedience to His Father. (more…)
KEEP READINGTwenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time
September 26, 2021 — Year B
Readings: Nm 11:25-29 / Ps 19 / Jas 5:1-6 / Mk 9:38-43, 45, 47-48
by Rev. Mr. Mark De La Hunt, Permanent Deacon
My hope in today’s homily is that all of us might leave today with one temptation and sin in mind that we are going to root out of our life with an intentional plan of attack that includes changes in our behavior and Jesus’ grace in the Sacrament of Confession. (more…)
KEEP READINGWednesday: 7:00 PM
Friday: 9:30 AM
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