Special Blog Post 9/11/2026 – A Vision from the Prophet Isaiah & A Homily Offered 25 Years Ago

 

 

Today is the 25th Anniversary of 9/11, let each of us take some time today to pray for peace in our world, in our country and in our families. The prophet Isaiah offers us this magnificent vision, “They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; One nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again.”

 

 

 

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Today ponder Isaiah’s vision, pray for peace and praise God.

*Kelly Latimore at: https://kellylatimoreicons.com/

 9/11 Reflection - Homily from 9/16/2001 [Special Blog on 09/11/2026]

I offered this  Homily on Sunday, September 16, 2001, five days after 9/11, at Our Lady of Good Counsel in Vienna, Virginia. [Our Scripture readings for that day came from Cycle C.]

We have been through a most devastating week, as a nation. Tuesday’s events are seared into our hearts and minds. In our reading from Exodus we heard “…for they have become depraved” - - and don’t the people responsible for Tuesday’s death and destruction come to mind. Those of us who were not personally affected by Tuesday’s events can readily identify with Paul’s letter to Timothy, “… but I have been mercifully treated.” 

But in today’s Gospel we must grapple with a most difficult lesson: the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son(s). These parables turn our world upside down - -they turned Jesus’ world upside down!

How hard it would be for us to rejoice if the people responsible for Tuesday’s devastation,  repent and are saved by God’s compassion?  Is it beyond our wildest dreams and hopes?

So Jesus tells us the story of the two sons - -one who tells his Dad to drop dead! As a father, if my children did that I would be devastated. Jesus tells us that God our Father calls us to: bear our grief, forgive our hurts, and to be compassionate.

Today we should search our hearts for the pain and hurt we haven’t forgiven yet; those in our families most especially!

This week has taught us many lessons - one of them is how fragile life is - Today forgive in your families because tomorrow may be too late. We hope and pray that Tuesday’s horror is never repeated. Let us heed Jesus’ call to be compassionate. His call to be the “foolish” shepherd, woman, father.

His call to heal first in our families and then in our world, then we will join with the psalmist and “…rise and go to my father.”

May God Be Praised.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wednesday’s Wink from Above 09/09/2026

 

The prophet Hosea tells us to Return to the Lord, the Lord who loves & offers us His mercy. Malcolm Muggeridge once observed, “The only disaster that can befall us … is to feel ourselves to be at home here on earth.” And, St. Augustine wrote, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in You [in God].” The theologian Wendy Wright said, “The human heart despite the centuries has not changed, its fundamental rhythm is still the heartbeat of God.”

So making prayer the center of your life will enable you to Return to the Lord and not make your earthly life "the be all & end all", but prayer guides your heartbeat to God’s design for your life. 

May God Be Praised.

N.B. On Friday September 11, 2026, the 25th Anniversary of 9/11 I will post a special blog of remembrance.  

Wednesday’s Wink from Above 09-02-2026 The Garden

In a little town in Ireland, John O’Toole found a messy plot of land.  

He spent weeks cleaning up; then raking & fertilizing the soil.  He planted flowers and carefully watered them.  After a few months, his garden was a thing of beauty.

As he was admiring his garden one-day, Fr. O’Reilly walked past and said,  “What a fine garden you & the Lord have made.”  O’Toole said, “Father, you should have seen it when the Lord had it on his own!” 

Well the garden of our life is our offering of Love to God, Who created us and loves us totally. Planting seeds is the easy part of gardening, the weeding, the racking, the watering, of the garden are the hard parts.

In the Book of Genesis we read, “The LORD God planted a garden in Eden, ….. Out of the ground the LORD God made grow every tree that was delightful to look at and good for food, with the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” [Genesis 8-9]

St. Francis de Sales offers us these precious insights for spiritual purification [fertilizer]: Pruning the Soul: Just as flowers require cutting away dead growth, our hearts' good desires require us to prune away sinful habits and attachments. Spiritual growth is Gradual for most people, spiritual pruning is a slow, lifelong process.  

St. Francis de Sales proffered this observation "illnesses of the heart come on horseback" [rapidly] but "leave on foot" [slowly]. Purification is achieved primarily through the Sacraments [Eucharist and Reconciliation], regular examination of conscience, and prayer. [Part One, Chapter 5 of St. Francis deSales’ Introduction to the Devout Life] Life in the garden of this world is filled with sin and temptations, crosses and hardships making walking with the Lord hard and difficult.

May we prepare for our eternal garden by cultivating the soil of our garden [life], we are offered the rich fertilizer of the Sacraments, prayer, and a review of our day. To aid us in living our Baptismal call as disciples of Christ, there are beautiful  additional [spiritual] fertilizers to cultivate our spiritual garden here on earth, to support us to “Live Jesus.” Make your decisions on the Theological Virtues: Faith, Hope & Charity [Love] & implement them using the Moral Virtues: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude and Temperance.  The frame of reference for using our time and energy should be The Beatitudes [Matthew 5:3-12].

When our time here on earth is finished we will take the bouquet of our life to the Lord.

May God Be Praised.  

Wednesday’s Wink from Above 08-26-2026 - Profound Questions

 

Ordinary time invites us to reflect on two simple but profound questions, “Who are we?, Why are we here?”

We begin by reflecting on Wisdom, “Simply I learned about Wisdom, and … those who gain this treasure win the friendship of God, to whom the gifts they have from discipline commend them.” [Wisdom 7:13-14]

And St. Paul teaches us, “For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”  [Ephesians 2: 10]

Pope Leo XIV said, “At the heart of the Christian understanding of the human person lies the great biblical affirmation that men and women are created in the image and likeness [Gen 1:26-27] of the Triune God. Created for relationship, every human person is planned and willed by God to enter into communion with him, with others and with creation.”

The Holy Father also, offered this insight, "… human existence points beyond itself, seeks beyond itself, desires beyond itself, and is restless until it rests in God. ‘Deus enim solus satiat,’ God alone satisfies ….”

We are God’s children here to share our glimpse of Jesus with everyone we meet.

May God Be Praised.

 

Wednesday’s Wink from Above 08/19/2026; May we reflect Jesus to the world.

 

Our life should reflect Christ to our family and our world. St. Gregory of Nyssa wrote, “The life of the Christian has three distinguishing aspects: deeds, words and thought. Thought comes first, then words, since our words express openly the interior conclusions of the mind. Finally, after thoughts and words, comes action, for our deeds carry out what the mind has conceived.

                               

So when one of these results in our acting or speaking or thinking, we must make sure that all our thoughts, words and deeds are controlled by the divine ideal, the revelation of Christ. For then our thoughts, words and deeds will not fall short of the nobility of their implications.” [From a treatise on Christian Perfection by Saint Gregory of Nyssa, bishop]

 

 

 

Today think about your words send your deeds to God, as your gift to Him. Remember we are on earth for a short time so do all you do in the name of Jesus and you will do them well.

 

 

 

May God Be Praised.