Today, we observe the feast of martyrdom of Saints Peter and
Paul. Peter was the son of Jonah and brother of Andrew. He was
a professional fisherman from Bethsaida, a fishing town on the Lake of Galilee
or Gennesaret. He might have been a follower of John the Baptist. It was his
brother Andrew who introduced him to Jesus, and Jesus who changed his name from
Simon to Cephas or Peter. Jesus made him the leader of his apostles and the
rock on which he would build his Church. Peter was the first to preach the
risen Lord on the day of Pentecost. He also convened the first Church Council in
Jerusalem and wrote two epistles to the whole Church. He was crucified by the
Emperor Nero in A. D. 64, and over his grave was built St. Peter’s Cathedral in
Rome.
Paul, the fanatical Pharisee and scholar of
Judaism was miraculously converted and chosen by the Holy Spirit to be
the “apostle to the Gentiles.” He wrote 14 epistles, made several
missionary journeys and spent his final days in prison in Caesarea and Rome. He
was beheaded at Tre Fontane. Over his grave was built the Basilica of St. Paul
Outside the Walls in Rome. After Jesus, Paul is the most prominent person in
the New Testament. 14 of the 27 books of the New Testament are letters
attributed to Paul and more than half of the Acts of the Apostles is
devoted to Paul’s conversion and to his apostolic activities in spreading the
Good News. Paul’s greatness lies in his passion for the Good News about Jesus
and his desire to share it. That is why Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed the period
from June 29, 2008, to June 29, 2009, as the Pauline Year to
commemorate the 2,000th anniversary of the apostle’s birth.
Scripture lessons: Today’s Gospel passage
immediately precedes the first of the three times when Jesus foretold his
passion, death and resurrection. It consists of two sections, the messianic
confession of Peter (Mt 16: 13-19,) and the prediction of his own Passion by
Jesus (Mt 16:21-23) The passage explains the basis of our Faith as the
acceptance of Jesus as the Christ, our Lord and Savior. It also tells us that
Christ Jesus became our Savior by his suffering and death and Resurrection.
Life messages: 1) Let us accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior
as St. Peter did: Jesus is not merely the founder of a new religion, or a
revolutionary Jewish reformer, or one of the great teachers. For Christians,
Jesus is the Son of God and our personal Savior. That is why we have to give
all areas of our lives to him.
2) As Peter did, we need to experience Jesus as our Lord and
Savior and surrender our lives to him. This is made possible by our listening
to him through the daily, meditative reading of the Bible, talking to him
through daily, personal and communal prayers, offering to him our lives on the
altar whenever we attend Holy Mass and leading a Sacramental life. The next
step is the surrender of our lives to Jesus by rendering humble, loving service
to others with the strong conviction that Jesus is present in every person.
June 30 Tuesday: The first martyrs of the Holy Roman
Church: Mt 8:23-27:
The context: Matthew’s emphasis on Jesus’
wondrous works helps him to reveal Jesus’ true Messianic identity. The role of
God in calming the storms of life is the central theme of today’s Gospel. By
describing the miracle, Matthew also assures his first-century believers that
nothing can harm the Church as long as the risen Lord is with them. The
incident reminds us today to keep Jesus in our life’s boat and to seek his help
in the storms of life.
The storm: The Sea of Galilee is a lake thirteen
miles long from north to south and eight miles broad from east to west at its
widest. It is notorious for its sudden storms. When a cold wind blows from the
west, the valleys, gullies, and hills act like gigantic funnels compressing the
storms and letting them rush down to the lake to create violent waves. Unable
to control their boat or their fears, the disciples wake Jesus up, accusing him
of disregarding their safety. Jesus’ response is immediate. At once he rises and
rebukes the winds and the sea, and instantly there is total calm. Only then
does Jesus gently chide his terrified and now astonished disciples for the
smallness of their Faith.
Life message: 1) We need to welcome Jesus into
the boat of our life to calm the storms we face. All of us are making a journey
across the sea of time to the shore of eternity, and it is natural that we all
will experience, occasionally, different types of violent storms in our lives —
physical storms, emotional storms, and spiritual storms. We face storms of
sorrow, doubts, anxiety, worries, temptations, and passion. Only Jesus can give
us real peace in the storm of sorrow or console us for the loss of our dear
ones. When the storms of doubt seek to uproot the very foundations of the
Faith, Jesus is there to still that storm, revealing to us his Divinity and the
Authority behind the words of Holy Scripture. He gives us peace in the storms
of anxiety and worries about ourselves, about the unknown future, and about
those we love. Jesus also calms the storms of passion in people who have hot
hearts and blazing tempers. (Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
July 1 Wednesday: St. Junipero Serra, Priest
(U.S.A.):
Mt 8:28-34
The context: Today’s Gospel episode demonstrates
Jesus’ power over the devil in a Gentile town called Gadara (Matthew) or Gerasa
(Mark and Luke) of Decapolis, east of the Jordan. Two (in Mark and Luke, one),
possessed men came out of a tomb-filled desolate place. The possessing demons,
recognizing Jesus as the Son of God, begged that Jesus send them into a herd of
swine. In Mark’s and Luke’s version of the incident, the possessed man’s demons
named themselves Legion (6000), indicating their number. Jesus did as the evil
spirits requested, the then-possessed swine ran down the slope, and they
drowned in the sea. The frightened people of the city asked Jesus to leave
their city. The people considered their swine more precious than the now-healed
possessed men, just liberated from evil spirits by Jesus. If we have a selfish
or materialistic outlook, we fail to appreciate the value of Divine things and
push God out of our lives, begging Him to go away as these people did.
Life messages: 1) We need to come out of
our tombs: 1) Jesus is calling us to come out of the tombs. Our tombs are the
closed-in, sealed-off areas of our hearts where Life in the Spirit of God has
died because we have not allowed Jesus to minister to us through others. When
we are sealed off from God, we are lonely. We try to satisfy our inner
emptiness by filling our lives with money, promiscuity, addictions, or
workaholism. 2) Jesus, the liberator, is ready to free us from the tombs of our
evil addictions, and habits. Let us go to Jesus and receive his love, that we
may experience the joy and freedom of the children of God. Tony
July 2 Thursday: Mt 9:1-8:
The context: Beyond exercising Divine authority
over temptation, over the lives of men, over nature, over demons, and over
sickness, Jesus, as we see in today’s Gospel, demonstrates a new form of
authority – the Divine authority to forgive sins. Jesus miraculously restores a
paralyzed man to health as a sign of having this Divine authority. The healing
episode presents Jesus as God Incarnate, sent to save us, restore us, and make
us new. So, we have to look beyond the boundaries of our limited religious
experience to appreciate the healing and forgiving operation of our God in
newer and newer ways.
Many kinds of sickness, like the paralysis of the man in the
story, were seen by the Jews as punishment for the personal sins of the
sufferer or of the sufferer’s parents. It was also a common belief that no
sickness could be cured until sin was forgiven. For that reason, Jesus had
first to convince the paralyzed man that his sins had been forgiven. Once Jesus
had granted the paralytic the forgiveness of God, the man knew that God was no
longer his enemy, and he was ready to receive the cure which followed. It was
the manner of the cure which scandalized the Scribes. By forgiving sin himself,
Jesus had, they thought, blasphemed, insulted God, because forgiving sin is the
exclusive prerogative of God. This healing demonstrates two facts: that we can
never be right physically until we are right spiritually, and that health in
body and peace with God go hand in hand.
Life messages: 1) We need God’s forgiveness to live
wholesome lives. The heart of the Christian Faith is the “forgiveness of sins.”
In the Creed we say, “I confess one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins.” While
we have, and need to exercise, the power to forgive others who have offended
us, we need to be forgiven ourselves by the One who has the authority to
forgive. In Jesus, we see this authority, the same authority He gave to his
Church. Today’s Gospel gives us an invitation to open ourselves to God’s
forgiveness in the Sacrament of Reconciliation and to hear from the priest’s
mouth the words of Jesus to the paralytic being spoken to us: “Your sins are
forgiven.” The Gospel also instructs us to forgive others their sins
against us and to ask God’s forgiveness for our daily sins every day of our
lives.
Tony (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
July 3 Friday: St. Thomas, Apostle:
Jn 20:24-29:
The context: Today we celebrate the feast of St.
Thomas, the Apostle. Today’s Gospel passage (Jn 20:24-29) presents the fearless
apostle St. Thomas, in his uncompromising honesty, demanding a personal vision
of, and physical contact with, the risen Jesus as a condition for his belief.
Thomas had not been with the disciples when Jesus first appeared to them in the
Upper Room. As a result, he refused to believe. The following week, Jesus
appeared to the apostles and Thomas in the still-locked Upper Room and said: “Peace
be with you!” and word- for-word told Thomas to do what he has set as
a condition for Faith, namely, to insert his finger into Jesus’ wrist wounds
and his hand into Jesus’ pierced side. Thomas obeyed and exclaimed, his Faith
on fire, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus accepted that, noting
that Thomas believed only after he had seen for himself. His final word, “Blessed
are those who have not seen but have believed” apply to all of
us! The unique profession of Faith: The confession of “doubting
Thomas” — “My Lord and My God!” — ” is highly significant for two
reasons. 1) It is the foundation of our Christian Faith. Our Faith is based on
the Divinity of Jesus as demonstrated by Divine miracles, especially by the
supreme miracle of the Resurrection from the dead. Thomas’ profession of Faith
is the strongest evidence we have for the Resurrection of Jesus. 2) Thomas’
Faith culminated in his self-surrender to Jesus, his heroic missionary
expedition to India in A.D. 52, his fearless preaching, and the powerful
testimony given by his martyrdom in A.D. 72.
Life messages: 1) Faith culminating in
self-surrender to God leads us to the service of our fellow-human beings.
Living Faith enables us to see the risen Lord in everyone and gives us the
willingness to render each one loving service: “Faith without good
works is dead” (Jas 2:17). Mother Teresa presents it this way: “If
we pray, we will believe; if we believe, we will love; if we love, we will
serve. Only then we put our love of God into action.” It was his Faith
in the Lord and obedience to Jesus’ missionary command that prompted St. Thomas
to travel to India to preach the Gospel among the Hindus, to establish seven
Christian communities (known later as “St. Thomas Christians”), and eventually
to endure martyrdom. 2) We need to grow in the living and dynamic Faith of St.
Thomas using the following means prescribed by the Spiritual Fathers: a) We
come to know and experience Jesus personally and intimately by the daily and
meditative reading of the Bible. b) We strengthen our Faith by the power of the
Holy Spirit through personal and community prayer. c) We share in the Divine
Life of Jesus by frequently receiving the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist at
Mass and in spending time in Adoration of Jesus in the Eucharist. d) We are
reconciled with God on a daily basis by repenting of our sins and asking God’s
forgiveness and by receiving the Sacrament of Reconciliation whenever we fall
into a grave sin.
July 4 Saturday: Independence Day (U. S. A.): This
is a day to thank God for the political and religious freedom we enjoy and to
pray for God’s special blessings on the rulers and the people of our country.
1) It is a day to remember, with gratitude, the founding
fathers of our democratic republic, especially Thomas Jefferson, the author of
the Declaration of Independence, and James Madison, the architect
of the Constitution, who believed that all power, including political power,
came from God and was given to the people who entrusted this power to their
elected leaders.
2) It is a day to remember and pray for all
those who have served in our brave military forces on land, sea, and air who
made the supreme sacrifice of their lives to keep this country a safe and a
free country, and for those who are now engaged in the fight against terrorism
in other countries.
3) It is a day to remember the basic principle
underlined in the constitutions, that “all men are created equal, that they
are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these
are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”
4) It is day to remind ourselves that we have a
duty to protect these God-given rights by voting into power leaders who believe
in God and who have character, integrity, experience, and strong belief in
inalienable human rights.
5) It is day to fight for the fundamental right to
life denied to pre-born children to grow and develop in their mothers’ wombs
and to the sick and the elderly to die gracefully without fearing euthanasia.
6) It is day to pray for and work forliberation for all
those who are still slaves in our free country – slaves to evil habits and
addictions to nicotine, alcohol, drugs, pornography, promiscuity and sexual
aberrations.
7) It is a day to take a pledge to become recommitted to
doing something about our own growth in Christ, and to living as Americans who
contribute something to our religion, Church, country, and the lives of others.
8) It is a day to remember where we came from, what we stand
for, and the sacrifices that thousands of our countrymen have made on our
behalf.
9) It is a day to raise our voice of protest against
liberal, agnostic, and atheistic political leaders, media bosses, and activist,
liberal judges who deny religious moral education to our young citizens.
10) It is a day to offer our country and all its
citizens on the altar of God, asking His special providential care, protection,
and blessings.
Intercessory prayers for Independence Day (USCCB)
http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/faithful-citizenship/liturgy-and-prayer-suggestions.cfm
§ For the people of the United States, that we may be united
in building a society in which everyone can have the opportunity to live with
dignity and hope, we pray to the Lord. . . .
§ For the Church, that we may be a witness to Christ’s love
by practicing charity and promoting justice and peace throughout the world, we
pray to the Lord. . . .
§ For Catholics throughout our nation, that the values of
our faith may guide us as we exercise our responsibility as voters, we pray to
the Lord. . . .
§ For the members of this community, that we may find ways
to help build a world of greater respect for human life and human dignity, we
pray to the Lord. . . .
§ For those who serve in elected office, that they may lead
with courage and wisdom, reflecting the Church’s teaching that the moral test
of our society is how the weak, the poor, and the vulnerable are faring, we
pray to the Lord. . . .
§
§ For all citizens of the United States, that our
participation in the upcoming election may lead to a world of greater respect
for life and commitment to justice and peace, we pray to the Lord. . . .
§
§ For those who are suffering from poverty and injustice,
that our decisions this election year may lead to policies and programs that
help them live in dignity, we pray to the Lord. .
§
§ For parishioners who have been elected to public office,
that they might use their offices to protect the unborn and promote the dignity
of the poor and vulnerable, we pray to the Lord. . .
§
§ For the earth, that our nation’s leaders will be inspired
by God’s Spirit to protect all of His creation, we pray to the Lord. .
§
- For
workers around the world, especially children who work long hours for
little pay, that we might all seek ways to promote fairness, justice, and
dignity in their lives, we pray to the Lord. . . .
July 4 Saturday: Mt 9:14-17:
The context: Today’s Gospel passage gives Jesus’
reply to the question asked by a few disciples of John the Baptist about
fasting and feasting. Prayer, fasting, and almsgiving were three cardinal works
of Jewish religious life. Hence, John’s disciples wanted to know why they and
the Pharisees fasted while Jesus’ disciples were seen feasting with him but
never fasting.
Jesus’ reply: Jesus responded to their sincere question
using three metaphors: the metaphor of the “children of the bridal chamber,”
the metaphor of patching torn cloth and the metaphor of wineskins. First, Jesus
compared his disciples with the children of the bridal chamber, the selected
friends of the bride and groom who feasted in their company during a week of
honeymoon. Nobody expected them to fast. Jesus explained that his disciples
would fast when he, the bridegroom, was taken away from them. In the same way,
we are to welcome both the joys of Christian life and the crosses it offers us.
Using comparisons of the danger of using new, unshrunken cloth to make a patch
for an old garment and the danger of using old wineskins to store new
fermenting wine, Jesus told the questioners that they must have more elastic
and open minds and larger hearts to understand and follow his new ideas which
were in many cases different from the traditional Jewish teachings.
Life message: 1) We need to be adjustable
Christians with open and elastic minds and hearts: The Holy Spirit, working
actively in the Church and guiding the teaching authority in the Church,
enables the Church to have new visions, new ideas, new adaptations and new ways
of worship in the place of old ones. So, we should have the generosity and good
will to follow the teachings of the Church. At the same time, we need the Old
Testament revelations, the New Testament teachings and the Sacred Tradition of
the Church as main sources of our Christian Faith.
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
