BIG C CATHOLICS

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) From time to time it is good for us to stand back and look at The Big Picture, so I want to begin by doing that as I share some thoughts with you on this Solemnity of Pentecost. In ancient times God approached us through the Jewish prophets and through their major leaders such as Abraham and Moses. It was through Moses that God gave us His Ten Commandments, commandments that allowed us not only to live as God intended us to live but to live with each other in peace and communion. Then in the fullness of time God came to us in His Word made flesh, in His only begotten Son who became man and thus brought the nearness of God into our very own humanity. “ And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us ,” reports St. John in the Prologue to his gospel. After He lived among us, suffered and died for us, rose from the dead and ascended into heaven, God came to us, and still does even now, in His Holy Spirit. From

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) When it comes to stories about what Jesus did, Mark’s Gospel is usually the most interesting because he gives the most detail, not leaving a lot of room to the imagination. Today’s passage is something of an exception. This has the advantage of allowing us to do some creative listening, to embroider on the text. We might embellish various parts of the story. What else did Jesus say to the man as he led him away from the crowd? Who was allowed to accompany him? Why did the evangelist record the word of healing in the original Aramaic language? Why didn’t Jesus want anyone to know what he had done? But let’s take just one example. Put yourself in the place of the man whose hearing and speech has just been restored by Jesus. Now that you can say something, do you have anything to say? What are the first words out of your mouth? Presumably they would be ent

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today's readings ) On March 27, 2021, at sunset, millions of families the world over gathered around their table to hear a famous question: “Why is this night different from all other nights?” It was the beginning of the Jewish feast of Passover. The answer to that question starts with four specific details about the meal itself. Then comes this: “We were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt, and God brought us out with a strong hand and an outstretched arm. And if God had not brought our ancestors out of Egypt, we and our children and our children’s children would still be subjugated to Pharaoh in Egypt. Even if we were all old and wise and learned in Torah, we would still be commanded to tell the story of the Exodus from Egypt. And the more we talk about the Exodus from Egypt, the more praiseworthy we are.” At the Easter Vigil we could ask the same question: “Why is this

Msgr. Bernard Bourgeois 2 Samuel 7:4-5a, 12-14a, 16; Psalm 89; Romans 4:13, 16-18, 22;  Matthew 1:16, 18-21, 24a "Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary  your wife into your home." (Mt 1:20) Try for a moment to see the situation through Joseph’s eyes. The woman he loved and was engaged to tells him she is pregnant. He knows he is not the father of this child. Already Mary has shared enough information to hurt Joseph. Wait! There is more. Mary claims an angel has visited her. The visitor informed her that she was to conceive through the Holy Spirit. Thus, the child will be the Son of God. If it was found out that Mary was pregnant outside of marriage she could be in grave trouble with the authorities. It is no wonder Joseph had decided to send her away quietly. The Gospel chosen for today’s feast is the dream in which Joseph is told not to fear and to bring her into his home. Her story is true! When Joseph awoke, he took Mary into his home, marri

By Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America (Isaiah 45:1-6; 1 Thessalonians 1:1-5; Matthew 22:15-21) Cyrus is a fascinating historical personage. His was the largest empire the world had yet seen. He governed wisely, repatriating deported peoples, and respecting cultures and religions, including Judaism. In the Bible, he is the only pagan to be called ‘Anointed,’ which in Hebrew is the word ‘Messiah.’ God called him by name, i.e., he had a special purpose for him. He was chosen. St. Paul calls to mind the faith and love of the Thessalonians, and knows how they were chosen, to become disciples of Jesus Christ, whose name means ‘Lord-Savior Anointed.’ The Pharisees had a clear sense of their mission. Among the chosen people of Israel, they were to be faithful to the Law of God, to promote fidelity to it, and to defend it. In the Gospels they were often scandalized by Jesus’ seeming indifference to the Law, and more than once they tried to trap him

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S.  La Salette Missionaries of North America  Hartford, Connecticut  ( Click here for today’s readings ) Isaiah was surely an honest prophet, but he doesn’t seem to have grasped the economic principle of an honest profit. “You who have no money,” he says, “come, receive grain and eat; come, without paying and without cost, drink wine and milk!” Imagine if you owned a restaurant in town, and someone set up a local charity serving the same menu, or maybe even better, and offering it free of charge to one and all. At the very least, you would object that the charity was making a mess of the local economy. Jesus wasn’t helping the local economy either. Surely local farmers and vendors were counting on a banner day when they saw the huge crowds gathered in the area. Earlier in Matthew’s Gospel there is an account of Jesus’ casting out demons from two possessed persons into a large herd of swine. The entire herd ran down into the Sea of Galilee and drowned. When the loc

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Most people that we know are carrying heavy burdens these days. Anxieties and fears burden us all, fears about our economy, the cost of food and fuel, home values and mortgages, what’s happening to our children, terrorism, our national debt, and so on. The list seems both overwhelming and endless. People are trying to stretch out paychecks, paychecks that never seem to go quite far enough. They are working on stressed marriage relationships they fear are breaking up. They’re unemployed or they’re under-employed and are looking for a better job that will give them a reliable and adequate source of income. Others are waiting for biopsy reports on certain abnormal cells that are growing in their bodies, filled with fear that they may have cancer. Or they’re trying to provide for and shape the characters of their children, children that are so influenced by all that is immoral and degrading in our culture.

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) In speaking with you about Pentecost I must speak of what cannot be fully explained. All we can do is reverently gaze into the mystery of God’s final movement toward us, the alienated and distant men and women who, with Adam and Eve, have broken off relations with God. Words cannot capture the enormity God’s merciful love for us; they buckle under the weight of it. So Scripture and the Church employ symbols to try to carry Pentecost’s meaning to us. Sometimes symbols are more effective than words in conveying the truth of stupendous events. Essentially Pentecost is the final movement of God’s journey toward us. The initial movement begins in Genesis with God in the Garden of Eden. Note that it is God who makes the move. It is God who initiates; God who offers; God who loves us first. He chooses us. We do not choose him. He chooses us first because He is the superior. If it were otherwise, and inde

Deësis mosaic, c. 1261, Hagia Sophia, Greek Orthodox Basilica, Istanbul  The Fifth Sunday in Easter, May 10, 2020 By Msgr. Bernard Bourgeois Acts 6:1-7; Psalm 33; 1 Peter 2:4-9; John 14:1-12 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Have faith in God; have faith also in me.” John 14:1 The Church is now in the midst of what is known as the Great Fifty Days, or the Easter Season. This sacred time began with the Easter Vigil Mass and will conclude Pentecost Sunday. Easter is the high point of the liturgical year. It is the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the most important moment of human history. Now, in the middle of May, it might seem that Easter and the joy it brought to the Church is a long time ago. The joy and festivity of Easter can wear off quickly when everyone returns to work, school, and life. Day-to-day living has a way of wearing the human person’s faith down. Life can become a matter of routine and even monotony. Suffering abounds, and

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Last Sunday’s Gospel account was about the disciples who were huddled in the Upper Room behind locked doors out of fear, and Jesus’ appearance among them. Today’s Gospel account is about another appearance of Jesus, this time with other disciples who were dejectedly walking from Jerusalem to a nearby hamlet called Emmaus. St. Augustine along with others of the Fathers of the Church suggest that Jesus didn’t want the disciples to recognize Him right away, that He wanted them to recognize Him in “the breaking of the bread.” Moreover Jesus, they believed, wanted the disciples to see and understand what the Jewish prophets had foretold in Scripture about how the Messiah was to be recognized. Hence Jesus spent some significant time opening up the Scriptures so they might see them in a new light, His light, and then recognize Him. We can easily overlook the importance Jesus placed on Scripture. He re

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Blood is life-giving; it is the essential element in sustaining us in life. Babies the womb receive oxygen and nutrients from their mothers’ blood. When natural disasters occur the Red Cross appeals for blood donors. During surgeries it sustains patients in life. In many cultures the bonding of people is sealed in rituals that mingle blood. In all cultures blood has a deeply religious significance. When God brought the Hebrew people out of their slavery in Egypt, the blood of sacrificed lambs marked their homes and they were spared the punishment that fell upon their Egyptian captors. Later, on Mt. Sinai, when God bound Himself to His people, Moses offered animal sacrifices and then took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he threw against the altar. Then he took the book of the covenant, and read it in the hearing of the people; and they said, “All that the Lord has spoken

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) All of us, I am sure, have read recent accounts about the decline of interest in religion among Americans. A recent survey reports that 20% of Americans have no religious affiliations at all and feel no need of God or belief in God. It seems they feel that they are self-sufficient; God is not necessary. So why are we here? Our motives are many and mixed. Some are here in their need seeking God’s help. Some are here seeking God’s forgiveness, others out of love of God, others out of thanksgiving for all that God has done for them. Some are here simply out of a sense of duty and others out of mere habit. All of us are looking forward to everlasting life with God in heaven. In the opening prayer of today’s Mass, we heard the words: “Help us to embrace the world that you have given us, that we may transform the darkness of its pain into the life and joy of Easter.” In the first reading from the prop

Fr. Charles Irvin Senior Priest Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for today’s readings ) We have all heard the phrase “Seeing is believing.” The idea comes, I suppose, from skeptical people who won’t believe anything is real or anything is true unless and until they see it for themselves. In today’s Gospel account the phrase “Seeing is believing” is paradoxically both proved and disproved. It is proved by the blind man eventually seeing Jesus and acknowledging that indeed Jesus is “from God.” The blind man recognized Jesus for who He is. The Pharisees, on the other hand, men who were sighted, did not or would not see Jesus for who He is. The blind man could see, the sighted Pharisees were blind. Seeing, they would not believe. In this Gospel account Jesus gives us some additional clues as to who He really is. You will recall that in the Book of Genesis we find God creating us from “the slime of the earth.” Here we find slimy mud formed from Jesus’ saliva bringing lig

Fr. René J. Butler, M.S. La Salette Missionaries of North America Hartford, Connecticut ( Click here for today’s readings ) One of my favorite Scripture quotations is, “As cold water to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far country.” (Proverbs 25:25) Today, however, I feel I should quote Samuel Taylor Coleridge: “Water, water, every where, nor any drop to drink.” The first half of the quotation seems apt for today’s readings. Water, water everywhere! In their wanderings in the desert, the Lord led his people to an area where, as we read: “There was no water for the people to drink.” The dramatic scene depicted in the first reading follows immediately. Here water is obviously meant in the strictly literal sense. Water is even more prevalent in today’s Gospel. The word occurs eight times in Jesus’ conversation with the woman of Samaria. But here, as often happens in John, the literal sense is soon eclipsed by a deeper symbolic sense. As we read, it becomes clear

The Second Sunday of Lent (A), March 8, 2020 By Msgr. Bernard Bourgeois Genesis 12:1-4a; Psalm 33; 2 Timothy 1:8b-10; Matthew 17:1-9 "He saved us and called us to a holy life." (2 Tim1:9)  The annual retreat of Lent is upon us once again. It is an intense period of prayer in which we unite our hearts, minds, and souls with Christ as He walks His final days on earth, remembering who we are and to what we’re called. Holiness is the key to Lent. A holy life is one that is united with Christ. Through works of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, the hallmarks of Lent, the disciple will focus her attention on the person of Jesus Christ, and His passion, death, and resurrection. In the journey toward holiness, prayer, fasting, and almsgiving will help the person understand the centrality of faith. One can become holier through fasting. It is an ancient practice in which the person usually sets aside some portion of food for a greater cause. However, one can fast f

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) “And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” I have often pondered over the meaning of those final words in the Lord’s Prayer and I want to pay some attention to them with you today. Throughout the centuries there has been any number of translations of the original Hebrew words that Jesus used when He taught the Lord’s Prayer. For instance, most of the original translations did not say “And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Instead the phrase was translated as, “And forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.”  By the way, as an aside, just when or why the word “trespass” was substituted for the word “sin” is unknown to me. As for the phrase “but deliver us from evil” other ancient translations render it as: “And deliver us from the time of trial.” Still others render it “deliver us from the time of testing.” That being the case,