BIG C CATHOLICS

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) “A body in motion tends to stay in motion, while a body at rest tends to stay at rest.” I’m sure many of you have heard that phrase used in an often-repeated TV commercial that has been airing recently. The phrase has caught my attention especially when I have been a couch potato watching more TV than I should. It’s the “staying at rest” that I am talking about because I am so often afflicted with laziness and lethargy. I resist getting in motion. Well, you may ask, what do those words and that thought have to do with the readings from today’s scripture passages that we just heard? Today is Laetare Sunday. Joy is its theme, joy because we are halfway through Lent and thus very close to the joy of Easter when our Elect will be baptized, confirmed and receive Holy Communion and our Candidates will be received into our Communion of Faith and likewise receive Holy Communion. There is joy, too, because...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Why was this church building built? If everyone who is here wrote down their answer and I read them all back to you, you might be surprised at some of the answers. The answer that is obvious to me might not be so obvious to some of you. Well, why then was this building built? My answer is that it was built to be a temple. It was not built just to be a meeting place, or an auditorium, or a theater where we go to experience a drama. A temple is a building that is purpose-built. Our church building here has one chief purpose, namely to immerse us in the drama of our relationship with God. Note that I said “our” relationship with God, not “my relationship with God.” While we may come here for private prayer, the main reason is because this where we as God’s family play out our roles in the great drama of God coming to us and our going back to God our Father. A temple is certainly a building dedicated t...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) If you read letters to the editor in newspapers, you will realize that many people have lost confidence in a loving God. Nowhere is this more forcefully indicated than in the debate over abortion and assisted suicide. Some have gone so far as to assert the Catholic Church wants people to suffer, that it’s a death dealing rather than a life-giving institution, and that it extols human pain and suffering. In the world of art this attitude is reflected in works of self-proclaimed “art” that, in just one instance, portray the crucifix, Christ nailed to the cross, immersed in a jar of human urine. Certainly all those who support partial birth abortion and “mercy killing”, along with others who advocate the position that we can terminate the lives of they declare to have a “miserable quality life”, vociferously oppose traditional Judeo-Christian teachings which hold that God and God alone gives life… tha...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) You and I have prayed The Lord’s Prayer countless numbers of times. In it we always ask God to “lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” Some translations of that famous prayer have it “and subject us not into the trial.” Just what is it that we are praying for? Well obviously there are various levels of temptation — some powerful and severe, others not so powerful and not so grave (not weighted with much gravity). Some temptations are of the flesh. Some temptations are of the spirit. Some involve passion… others involve cold calculation. Whatever a temptation’s quality or type may be, at whatever level, it is always a time of testing. Our resolve, our spiritual muscle, is being tested. And if our character is spiritually weak and flabby, without any muscle power at all, we will be a pushover for the devil. Jesus also had His times of trail. The first we know about was during His ti...

February 14, 2024  "Remember that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return." On Ash Wednesday, Catholics receive ashes in the shape of a cross traced on the forehead. The rite evokes Saint Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians: "For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." (1 Corinthians 15: 21 - 22) Adam’s sin condemned man to sin and death. But the instrument of our salvation, the cross, reminds us that in Christ, man is redeemed, and the gates of heaven are opened. The original injunction conferring ashes: "Remember, O man, that dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return," contrasts with the words of the Nicene Creed concerning the Incarnation: "For us men and for our salvation, he [Jesus] came down from heaven: by the power of the Holy Spirit, he was born of the Virgin Mary and became man." In becoming man, Christ assumed our iniquities: offering...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) High up on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican, Michelangelo’s magnificent painting depicts the Creation Account found in the Book of Genesis. In Michelangelo’s depiction God’s finger reaches out to touch Adam’s finger. Into Adam’s already perfectly created body, God is about to endow Adam with an immortal soul. The hand of God is limpid, relaxed. God’s finger is beckoning, not accusing, gentle, not harsh. Recently I found a copy of that painting and meditated for a while on what was transpiring. God’s creation of all else had been completed – this was His final and highest act of creation. Adam’s body had been brought into being. It now was about to receive an immortal soul and thenceforth all of Adam’s descendants would, because of him, be born with immortal souls. God’s profound and infinitely generous love was about to be given to us, His creatures brought into being from the slime of the ea...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Once again, the Book of Life is opened, and the Liturgy calls us to recognize ourselves and recognize our God. Once again, the Church places the Passion of our Lord before our eyes. In it we can see ourselves and see God’s only begotten Son in our humanity, this time in man’s inhumanity toward man. The same roles are there; the same actors, the same forces at work in our world just as they were in the year 33A.D. First there are the indifferent, the easy-going, those who simply drift uncaring through life, those who give consent to the Passion by silence. There are millions and millions in this majority. They wash their hands of the whole thing. They never budge as long as the blows of life fall on the backs of others. They have no opinions to voice, no stand to take. They simply let events take their course. These silent ones let the sufferings and the crucifixions of God’s sons and daughters continue unche...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) We hear a lot about the high cost of living. Today I’d like to turn the phrase a bit and share some thoughts with you about the high cost of transformation. Becoming someone greater than we are now does not come freely or easily… it comes at a great price, a price that takes us out of our comfort zones. We all know that nothing in this life, except perhaps love, comes to us free. And we all know that the really valuable things in life cost us in terms of our own personal efforts. So, too, the cost of transformation demands its price for us to pay. You and I live in a time in which excellence and perfection are much sought after when it comes to material things, but are ignored when it comes to spiritual things. It is a great American goal to have a perfect body. To be physically attractive is something that’s constantly put in front of us in all of the media images we receive. But how many of those physica...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) There are three characters that in this parable Jesus is asking us to examine. Actually, Jesus is presenting them to us so that we might take a look at ourselves in them. How does each one of these characters mirror us, reflect back to us our attitudes and our condition relative to God? Parables invite us to enter into the actors and see ourselves in them. The first is the younger son. It’s important for us to pay attention to his fundamental condition in which we must see ourselves. The first thing to see is his radical departure from God our Father. When he asks for his inheritance, he isn’t just asking for a big sum of money. He is in effect saying to his father: “I’m treating you as if you’re dead. And I want to get now what I’m supposed to receive after you’re dead.” How many people do you know who live and act as if God is dead… as if God may as well be dead? Or how often have we had an “attitude” ...

Fr. Paul Werley The Pittsburgh Oratory & Catholic Newman Center ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) Without paying undue attention to anyone in particular, I just want to point out that there is a statistical possibility that at least one of us in this chapel may have a close friend, or at least an acquaintance, who is a Mount Everest expedition enthusiast. Such people might aspire to climb the world’s tallest mountain even though their knowledge about doing this Herculean undertaking is superficial and limited... Contrast this with a Sherpa. A Sherpa is a native Tibetan and an expert climber, who acts as a guide for hikers as they ascend Mt. Everest. If we should find ourselves on our first expedition and we had to choose between following the Mt. Everest enthusiast, also there for the first time, and following a Sherpa, who knows the mountain by heart, who would we choose to follow? Knowing the choice was a matter of life or death, who would we follow? Today, Jesus tells t...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Wednesday’s readings ) Womb to tomb is the pattern of all human life. You, and I with you, are on individual and collective pilgrimages, processions, journeys. Here we are this Ash Wednesday walking in procession to God’s altar to receive ashes. In this same hour we will be in a procession to receive Holy Communion, our food, our living Bread, the Bread of Life to nourish us and strengthen us for our individual journeys though life. Yesterday is gone; we can’t go back into it. Tomorrow lies ahead; we cannot stop it from coming. Today we’re on the move. But where are we going? Where are you going? What direction are you taking as you live out your days here on earth? Are you journeying toward God or apart from God? You can’t escape it. You are on a spiritual journey. Even if you don’t realize it you are, in fact, on a spiritual journey. You came into being because of our heavenly Father’s love. You are, in Christ our Blessed...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) We have come here to this sacred place, in this holy time, both of which are set apart from the rest of the world around us, in order to hear what God is saying to us. We are here, hopefully, to respond to God’s call, to surrender to God’s love, and to receive the Bread of Life Jesus won for us on His Cross. May you, and I with you, now yield to God’s love and respond to the gift He offers us here in this the most important celebration in our Church. As Catholics, we hold a sacred trust. It is our calling to remain integral with the Church of the eyewitnesses of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. As Catholics, our integration with the Church of the Apostles is something that we hold precious. May we receive and always treasure what they have handed on to us. More people come to Mass on Easter than on any other Sunday of the year, some making the effort only this one time each year. The possi...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) In our newspapers we read of disasters and watch catastrophes on television. And we deal with painful tragedies in the lives of our friends and loved ones, and ask: “Where is God?”, “How can God allow these things to go on?” It is implicitly the question put to Jesus in this Gospel account dealing with the fact that the Roman Governor of Judea, Pontius Pilate, the same one who condemned Jesus to be crucified, murdered a number of Jews in Jerusalem while they worshipped! He mingled their blood with the blood of their temple sacrifices. It was a terribly shocking thing to do, to say the very least. Some people explain away tragedies by telling us that it is sinners who suffer tragedies. Tragedies, they claim, are God’s way of punishing us for our sins, justified punishments from God inflicted upon us for our sins. That, of course, may or may not be true. Why? Because bad things happen to good people –people wh...

Fr. Charles Irvin Diocese of Lansing ( Click here for Sunday’s readings ) They didn’t set out each day to change the world. They didn’t think of themselves as persons of power, people who could influence our culture and the powerful media elite or the sHomily for All Saints Day, November 1, 2024, Year Bhapers of public opinion. They didn’t want to do anything more than simply go to work, do their jobs, care for their families and maybe help a few other people besides. Most, if not all of them, would wince if anyone called them saints. Most if not all of them would rather be thought of as ordinary folks, people who just wanted to do their job and do it with caring concern for people other than themselves. So, then, what is holiness? And who are saints? Perhaps we need to change our mental pictures of who they are and how they behave. And perhaps, too, we should examine what we think God wants of us. These Beatitudes we just heard. Did we hear them or did we just listen to th...