The Creed Written Into This Altar

The designers of this new high altar and the murals above it intentionally "wrote" the entire Apostles' Creed into it. Like medieval cathedrals, which were "sermons in stone" and the Bible of the illiterate, we tried to physicalize the great creeds in it. And how perfect then that Christmas, the day when we even genuflect during the Creed, was the first holy day the parish held in this new space. Included here is one more picture of the sanctuary, because you're going to need it to follow all the steps in the homily.

Father, Altar, Heart

One day after the high altar was done. Three days before Christmas. And three years after heart surgery changed my prayer. These threads come together as we reflect on the line "Such is the race that seeks the face of the God of Jacob" and contemplate the Father of the baby to be born at Christmas.

Depression and Other Diseases

Friday, Bishop Conley told us he's taking a medical leave of absence. Today the readings for 3rd Sunday of Advent were all about healings. It's time we accept that mental suffering is real suffering. That's why I shared my story today. And while we're at it, it's time to stop avoiding medical doctors too, and go take care of our bodies. (If you've heard the Bishop's letter already, you can just start at 2:25.)

The Perfect Confessor

Advent gives us some very cool insights into the child who is coming. But the readings (especially the prophecies) also tell us who the man is to be. When we read about the king-to-come in Isaiah 11, we can recognize the wise and gentle servant who we know Jesus to be, and that should give us the hope and courage this Advent to 1) get to confession and 2) lay it all out there in order to change.

Advent and the Song of Ascents

A very literal translation of John 1:14 would be "the Word was made flesh, and tabernacled among us." Another would be to say he "pitched his tent among us". It is the same Greek root word for how God camped among Israel in the desert and dwelt with them in Solomon's Temple. The Temple, and therefore Jerusalem, was understood to be the place where heaven and earth met, the place where God's glory physically dwelt. "To it, the tribes go up" to meet their God. What we await in Advent though is something even greater than a temple, in a city, in a kingdom. It is God in the flesh, who then will live in every Christian, and be present on every altar, even till the end of time.

Jesus, Loser and King of Losers

Jesus loses. He empties himself to become a man. He preaches that we must lose our pride, our power, our treasures, and our very selves. And then he loses even what he had as a man. His public preaching and his passion are the same lesson told two different ways. Jesus loses out of love. Loss is the language of love, and he invites us to love —and therefore lose— too. This is the kind of king he is, and the kind of kingdom he is launching.

A Visitation vs. A Staying

The 9am Mass had a pretty bad first draft of this homily, so I rewrote it entirely for the evening Mass. I think most people could probably follow it the second time. It compares and contrasts the visitation that God had been promising Israel (Mal 3:1, Luke 1:68 & 78, Luke 19:44) and which will come again (2 Thes 2:1-2) with what Jesus is doing with Zacchaeus and with us after the Ascension.