Blog Post 3/18/2024 - Homily Cycle B 3/17/2024 – 5th in Lent - [St. Patrick’s Day]

Sheamus O’Toole was driving down the street in a sweat because he had an important meeting and couldn't find a parking place.  Looking up to heaven he said, "Lord take pity on me.  If you find me a parking place, I will go to Mass every Sunday for the rest of my life & give up drinking Irish Whiskey!"

Miraculously, a parking place appeared.  Sheamus looked up again and said, "Never mind Lord, I've just found myself."

Jeremiah announces that a New Covenant is coming, when the God will place His law upon our hearts, and we shall be God’s people.  We prayed in our Responsorial Psalm “Create a clean a pure heart in a willing spirit.”

Then, in the Letter to the Hebrews we heard that Jesus is “… the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.”  And in our Gospel a rather odd incident is recounted.  “Some Greeks … came to Philip … and asked him, ‘Sir, we would like to see Jesus.’”  For the Greeks [at that time] the request to see Jesus meant to believe in Jesus.

Jesus responds to their request in a peculiar way, “… unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.”

Jesus doesn’t promise an easy life for his disciples rather He promises a life based on loving God which will leads to eternal life.  He offers us a life focused on doing God’s Will, by bringing Christ’s mercy & compassion to the world.  By dying to our prejudices, our fears & our wants we can “Live Jesus.”

When we pray the Hail Mary we say“… pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.”  As we move through our life, we discover that there are many “hours” of death; we “die” many times as we grow and mature.  There’s the death of childhood, when we put aside our innocence to deal with “real life,” we come to understand that our needs & our wants are not the center of the universe, from the “death” of  childhood comes the “birth” of adulthood.

 

There’s the death of dreams, when we accept the reality that we will never play in the NBA, on the PGA Tour, for the Phillies or the Yankees.  We will never Sing on Broadway or in Carnegie Hall.  We put aside those “dreams” and accept who we are, the talents we are blessed with.  We accept our life, with its meaning and purpose as gift from God.  We learn that work, sacrifice, perhaps most important of all — forgiveness, are essential in every meaningful relationship.  Every life is a series of death & birth,  of change and discovery, of joy and sadness.

 

With the image of the “grain of wheat” Jesus teaches us that life demands “dying” to our fears and our self-centeredness.  True life means to choose to love Jesus, love ourselves, and love others.  The Gospel “harvest” prepares us for eternal life with the Lord.

[Adopted from Connections, March 17, 2024]

C.S. Lewis said the Lord challenges us to “irrigate desserts.”  [The Abolition Man, p.14]. Lent reminds us to “irrigate desserts” in this life with Pray, Almsgiving and Fasting.  To strengthen our Faith with the Sacraments, especially Penance and the Eucharist.  Receiving The Eucharist, enables us to give our lives to the Lord in reverence, in obedience and in awe confident that He will bless us & pour our His Grace upon us.

Jesus is the Bread of Life, the Author of Life, and the Conduit to Eternal Life.  The New Covenant is written on our souls at our Baptism, upon our hearts, invisible but essential to our lives.  For a few minutes, in silence, reflect on your gift of Faith and what you doing this Lent strengthen your Faith?

 

May God Be Praised. 

Readings: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/031724-YearB.cfm