Some of the Fathers of the Church speculated that, after their creation, Adam and Eve only lasted 6 hours in the Garden before committing the original sin.

It’s a sad fact of our humanity that mankind has been rejecting God almost from the first moment that He created us!
While we were created in beauty and have a great capacity for nobility and virtue, while we were created to shine with the very radiance of God Himself, that magnificent gift of freedom that separates us from the animals often gets misused by us, and sometimes with disastrous effects.
Indeed, each of our individual human natures hangs in this precarious balance between corruptibility and incorruptibility. We can incline ourselves in either fashion, giving our natures either the chance to be ennobled by God’s grace or debased by our sins.
In a sense, during our earthly lives we stand always between the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and we constantly must make the decision as to which tree’s fruit we will feed upon. That is the tension of our earthly lives.
It’s a sad irony of our race that, even though God created us out of love and for love, we do not always return His love.
In our willfulness we often reject Him, and like Adam and Eve, we feed upon the bittersweet and cursed fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.
We see this in our society so very acutely this time of year!
While most of our society is celebrating this holiday as the happiest day of the year, aday of gift-giving and mirth-making, a day of feasting and celebrating with loved ones,there is a dark undercurrent present in our society today when it comes to Christmas.
Many of us go through herculean efforts to decorate our homes, prepare food, buy andwrap gifts, and so forth as a means of celebrating this special day. And of itself, this isnot a bad thing.
It’s nice that our world has one time of year when we all try to be a little kinder andmore generous with each other!
But sadly so many people go through these efforts without the least thought of doing sofor our Lord! Instead of celebrating because our Lord became man in order to save usfrom sins, many of us celebrate and serve ourselves at Christmas.
And so it is that Christmas – Christ’s Mass – has degenerated into a secular holiday forone and all to celebrate, regardless of what creed one professes.
The sad part is not that non-Christians celebrate Christmas. The sad part is that thesecular world has commandeered Christmas, so much so that it’s a breach of politicalcorrectness to even say “Merry Christmas” out in public.
But we should not be surprised that this type of evil exists. Evil has been with mansince the very beginning of our human history.
As St. Peter tells us, the devil prowls like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.The evil one is alive and well, and he is especially active the holiest times of the year.
Just as he had his way with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden so long ago, thatserpent still slithers about spreading his falsehoods and deceptions, doing all he can to turn souls away from God.
And this serpent of sin, who preys upon the weakness of humanity, is precisely why our Lord came to us as man!
So as we look out upon our society this time of year and witness the outright rejection of Christ by our world at a time when we should love Him more than ever, we should not fear or be angry.
No, my brothers and sisters, this rejection simply shows us how much we need Jesus and His gifts of grace and mercy and redemption! Thus we should hope in the Lord all the more – and be so thankful that He came as He did 2000 years ago!
Let’s be clear, Christ came as man to fight the devil and to redeem our fallen human nature. He came to stand with us between the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil to point out the way that leads to eternal life!
Sometimes when we see the evil that exists in our world, and even the evil that exists within our very selves, we are tempted to despair of our Lord. Like a bully, the devil tries to make himself seem more powerful than he really is.
Worse yet, the devil tries to make sin look not only irresistible, but inevitable. And that’s a lie. No matter how sinful and corrupted he may be, man always maintains some freedom to reject the temptation to sin. God’s grace is always sufficient. Always!
More importantly, Christ is stronger than the devil, and He constantly comes to our aid in our own personal battle against the darkness of sin – just as He came into the darkness of our world as a baby 2000 years ago to redeem all of mankind.
And this is what we really celebrate at Christmas. As Isaiah tells us tonight, “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom, a light has shone.” And this light is Christ!
As the Beloved St. John wrote in the first chapter of his Gospel: “All things came to be through Him. . . . What came to be through Him was life, and this life was the light of the human race; the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
My brothers and sisters, with the angels in Heaven let us rejoice and give glory to God on this holy night, for unto us a Savior has been born, Who is Christ and Lord.
It is He who will save us from our sins and protect us from the snares of the evil one. May we place all our hopes in Him, trusting that bring to us the gift of eternal life.
May we all turn to Him now and open up the gift of salvation!
25 December 2013

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio.
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Link to Homilies:
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Our first and second readings today call us to rejoice! And this is appropriate, for the 3rd Sunday of Advent is also known as Gaudete Sunday. Gaudete is a Latin word that means “rejoice.”

And we should rejoice, because we are nearing the day of our Lord’s arrival. But we should rejoice not only because our Lord is near, but also because of all He does for us!

Last Sunday I spoke a bit about the beauty of human dignity, a dignity that shines forth perfectly in the sinless Virgin Mary.

The greatness of our human dignity is based not only in the fact that we are created by God in His own image, but that He desires the human soul to be His very own dwelling place. Our souls are designed to be a paradise for our Lord to dwell in!

Therefore, every human person – regardless of race, nationality, age, education level, or mental or physical capacity – has a dignity more sublime that we can possibly imagine.

It’s this understanding of the greatness of human dignity that underlies all of the Church’s teachings on pro-life issues. Because of the inestimable value of each human soul, we know that all human life is sacred – as is the act by which life is created.

But not only does our Lord desire to come dwell within us; He desires that we seek to be united with Him. Thus He has created the human person to worship. Indeed, the need to worship is embedded within the fabric of each of our souls.

We can see this need to worship displayed throughout the entire course of human history, for in every land and every culture of every time, religion of some sort has been present. Man has always worshipped something.

This is because it is part of man’s nature to seek out and render homage to something greater than himself. God has created us this way, but He created us this way so that we would worship Him. But this is not always the case, is it?

Alas, history shows us that man often worships things other than God.

We see this so clearly with the Jew of old. The Old Testament is filled with stories of their fidelity to God, their turning away to worship something else, and their return to

God after realizing the punishment for their infidelity.

The Jews were longing for a Messiah. Filled as they were with expectation for this

Messiah, it’s understandable that the Jews mistook St. John the Baptist for the

Messiah.

John was a man like no other, and his message of repentance and preparation struck

deep into the hearts of those who heard him preach. And so it is that we find the Jews

asking John for direction in today’s Gospel.

But St. John knew that he could not fulfill the longings of the Jewish people. He

knew that he was the forerunner, and that his role was to announce the arrival of the Messiah.

So it is fitting that, as we draw near to Christmas, we focus on St. John and his message of good news. He tells us that One mightier than he is coming, a Messiah who will send forth the Holy Spirit into our souls through baptism.

This Christ, in His power and might, will separate the wheat from the chaff – the good souls from the bad souls – taking the good unto Himself for all eternity, while the bad shall be consigned to the unquenchable fires of everlasting torment.

So St. John called the people of his day to repent, to prepare the way of the Lord! Even though we are living 2000 years after St. John, we should heed his message all the same.

As we consider St. John’s message of repentance and the imminence of the Savior’s coming, we must ask ourselves who or what it is that we worship. To Whom or to what do we give ourselves?

Sadly, the commercialization of this time of year makes it so very easy to forget the essence of Christmas, and to fill our souls with the mammon of this world.

In our hopes and desires that the latest and greatest thing be found under our Christmas tree on Christmas morning, we can easily forget that the best gift, the most important gift we can receive is the peace of God’s presence within our souls.

This gift of peace will only be ours if we humbly repent of our sins, confess them, and seek to follow God’s will. Peace of soul will only be ours if we worship God, rather than ourselves or some golden calf.

Brothers and sisters, our dear Lord is coming soon. And rather than coming with a shiny bauble, the latest fashion, or some technological gadget, He is coming with the gift of salvation.

Let us prepare ourselves well for His arrival and seek to make ourselves worthy of so great a gift and so great a Giver. With Mary’s help, may we worship Him, and Him alone.

16 December 2012

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio .
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 The Gospel of Luke tells us that, immediately upon hearing that she will conceive and bear the Christ Child, the Blessed Virgin Mary sets out to visit her kinswoman, Elizabeth, who has conceived a child in her old age.
 Presented with the most important task in human history by no less than the Archangel Gabriel, the task of bearing the Messiah, Mary turns not inwardly upon herself. Rather, she charitably goes to help out her elderly relative who is 6 months pregnant.
 Although she has been the recipient of the greatest promise our Lord has ever made with mankind, the Virgin Mary thinks not of herself for even a moment. Pride, even in its subtlest forms, has no place in that virginal mind or virginal heart.
 Instead Mary humbly makes a promise, in turn, to help her relative Elizabeth in her need.
 Keep in mind that this promise of the Messiah is a promise that the entire Jewish people had
been awaiting for generations, a promise spoken of by the prophets of old – as we hear in our first reading from the prophet Jeremiah.

 Knowing the Scriptures as she did, the significance of what our Lord was asking her was not
lost on Mary. Our Lady understood, even at her young age, that she was to become the one through whom the long-awaited promise of a Messiah would be fulfilled.

 So Mary goes to Elizabeth, who confirms and rejoices that Mary is indeed the mother of their
Savior as St. John the Baptist leaps in her womb.

 And in an act of gratitude that recalls the long-awaited hopes of her people, Mary proclaims
to the Lord in her Magnificat: “You have remembered your promise of mercy, the promise of mercy You made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children forever.”

 In that moment the ancient longing for a Savior felt deep within the hearts of all Jewish
people found satisfaction in the hearts of those saintly women, anticipating the joy of Easter.

 With this Mass we enter once again into the beautiful and solemn season of Advent, which is
the time of year in which we recall this promise our Lord made with Israel.

 Blessed Pope John Paul II referred to the Jews as our “older brothers in the faith of
Abraham,” which means that their spiritual history is, in a manner of speaking, our spiritual history.

 Indeed, the Israelites of old prefigured the Church of Christ and found their fulfillment in the
Church of Christ.

 And just as the Israelites of old looked forward with great expectation to the coming of the
Messiah promised to them so long ago, Advent is our time of longing for our Savior.

 In Advent we give thanks that this promise of a Messiah was fulfilled 2000 years ago, but we
also await the promise of our Lord’s second coming at the end of time.

 We hear about the first of these promises in the reading from Jeremiah. In speaking to His
prophet Jeremiah, our Lord promises that He will “raise up for David a just shoot; [One who] shall do what is right and just in the land.”

 The just shoot, of course, is none other than Jesus, born of the lineage of King David.
 With regard to this promise made by our Lord long ago, the Season of Advent is our time to give thanks. It’s a time to recall how the world was in darkness before Christ, who is the Light of the World, came as a lowly child born of the Virgin Mary.

 Moreover, Advent is a time to prepare our hearts to receive the Christ Child anew at Christmas so that He may be incarnate in the world once again through us.

 But there is a second promise that our Lord has made to us that has yet to be fulfilled: the promise that He will come again in glory at the end of time with salvation for His people. It’s this second coming of Christ that we hear about in today’s Gospel.
 We are told that the Son of Man will come “in a cloud with power and great glory.” We are told that, “there will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on earth nations will be in dismay, perplexed by the roaring of the sea and the waves.”
 And when this happens we are told not to be afraid, but to stand erect and raise our heads because our redemption is at hand!
 While many “people will die of fright in anticipation of what is coming upon the world”, we who know the Redeemer, who long for the Redeemer, will be rejoicing in His victory over sin and death.
 Thus, Advent is at its heart, a season of watchful preparation. It is symbolic of the prayerful posture that we should always have with our Lord, much like the aged Simeon who greeted the Holy Family when Jesus was presented in the Temple shortly after His birth.
 Our Lord promised Simeon that he would not die until he saw the Messiah. Luke describes him as being: “righteous and devout, awaiting the consolation of Israel” (cf. Luke 2:25). We are called to be the same way as we await our Lord’s arrival: prayerful, hopeful, and joyful.
 In today’s world, we tend to experience Advent as a time of parties and indulgence.
 In our secular society today we see this period between Thanksgiving and Christmas as a
generic “holiday season” that includes any holiday anyone wants to make up. In its decadence secular society has gutted Advent of its proper meaning.

 Instead of filling ourselves with hope as we joyfully await our Lord’s coming, secular society
tempts us to fill ourselves with the mammon of this world, which can – if we let it – blunt and dull our love for our Lord, or even extinguish it altogether.

 While it can be difficult to fight such strong cultural currents, we should nevertheless strive
to experience Advent as a period of longing, a period of watchful preparation.

 This we do by making extra time for prayer and meditation during Advent, by doing works
of charity, by going to confession, and by practicing a little quiet restraint and penance in preparation for the great feast of Christmas.

 You’ll note that with Advent we once again don the color violet, the color of penance and
contrition for our sins. Historically, Advent has been a penitential season in preparation for Christmas, just as Lent is a penitential season in preparation for Easter.

 But the purpose of our penance is not so much to deny ourselves the goodies of the season in
puritanical fashion. Our fasting and penance this time of year is meant to cultivate within our souls a true hunger for our Lord so that we might joyfully await His arrival.

 So just as the Israelites of old waited with great longing for their Savior, we must do the
same. We must cultivate within our hearts the great longing for Jesus to come again by our prayer, fasting, acts of charity, and the humble confessing of our sins.

 By living Advent in this way, we can learn, as St. Paul says to the Thessalonians, “to be
blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus” so that we will enjoy the promise of salvation He makes to all who love Him.

 So my dear brothers and sisters, by all means, bake your cookies, buy and wrap your gifts,
mail your Christmas cards, and enjoy all the parties and get-togethers with your family, friends and co-workers.

 But in the busyness of this season, do not neglect to prepare yourself spiritually for the great feast that is upon us. Cultivate that sense of longing for our Lord that is proper to those who love Him, and prepare your soul well for His coming!
 With St. Simeon and Our Lady as our models for preparing ourselves, may our Lord find all of us eager for His presence and worthy of His mercy when He comes!
02 December 2012

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio .
To enable the audio, please go directly to Fr. Reid’s homily homilies and select the matching date.

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In addition to celebrating the 2nd Sunday of Advent this weekend, we are also celebrating the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, which is patronal feast of our country.
In honoring our Lady under the title of the Immaculate Conception, we recall that by a special grace, our Lord preserved our Lady free from every trace of sin from the first moment of her conception in the womb of St. Ann.
We know by faith and tradition that our Lady was not only conceived without sin, but that she kept her soul free from all stain of sin throughout the entirety of her earthly life.
In Mary’s sinlessness we are given a glimpse of the great dignity of the human soul. In Mary we see just how beautiful and magnificent humanity can be when we are freed from the terrible bondage of sin.
Our Lady shows us the mystical heights to which a humble soul can ascend; she shows us how majestic a soul can be when perfectly united to our Lord and His most holy will.
In Mary we see the radical and radiant beauty of the perfectly pure soul, and are thereby spurred on to holiness by her gentle example.
While Mary’s immaculate conception was a grace uniquely given to her, we are still called to a life of sinlessness, even though we were all born in the darkness of original sin.
We are called to a life of sinlessness in part because of our human dignity. What we must remember about ourselves is that not only did God create us for Himself. He created us so that He might dwell within us. Each of us is the dwelling place of God!
The human soul is called to be a paradise that our Lord inhabits through the grace of baptism. Though He is infinite, our Lord dwells within us – thus giving our souls a dignity that we can scarcely imagine!
So it is that man – especially the Christian – is called to avoid sin at all costs, for sin damages our souls and obstructs our relationship with God. Sin obscures the tremendous beauty of the human soul and makes our souls less hospitable to God’s holy presence within us.
We must remember that, as Christians, we are called to be living icons of Christ! People should look upon us and see our Lord radiating through our words and actions.
The more Christ-like we are, the more we realize and participate in the tremendous dignity our Lord has given to the human race. The more Christ-like we are, the more we show forth His glory, and the greater our glory will be in Heaven!
As we consider the tremendous dignity God wishes to grant us, and the beauty of soul we are called to possess, perhaps it is easy to become discouraged when we realize just how sinful we all are.
But Advent is our time to dispel whatever discouragement we might feel in our sinfulness. For Advent is our time to recall that, despite our sinfulness, our Lord Jesus comes to us anyway. Indeed, He comes to us precisely to save us from our sins.
And so we are called to anticipate Christ’s coming with great joy, both His coming as man at Christmas and His coming at the end of the time when His glory will be made manifest and all flesh will see the salvation of God.
Like Jerusalem of old that we hear about in our first reading, Advent calls us to “take off our robes of mourning and misery” so that we might “put on the splendor of glory from God forever”!
Looking east, the direction of the rising sun – which Christians have always understood as a symbol of Christ – we who love our Lord and profess belief in Him must anticipate His coming with hope, rejoicing that He has remembered His promise of mercy to us!
But if we wish to have our Lord’s mercy, we must prepare ourselves for it, for as Jesus tells us in St. Matthew’s Gospel: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven” (Mt 7:21).
And the will of the Father is this: that we “be pure and blameless for the day of Christ.”
In writing to the Philippians, St. Paul reminds us that we are all called to holiness; we are
called to realize to the best of our abilities the great dignity of our human nature that we see

shining forth so perfectly in the Blessed Virgin Mary.

This growth in holiness is the work of God, one that His Spirit will bring to completion
within us, but only if we submit ourselves to Him and to His holy will.

We do this by making every effort to avail ourselves of His grace through our prayers,
through our worthy participation in the sacraments, through our obedience to His Church,

and through our service to others.

My dear friends, our Lord is coming soon! If we are truly going to be prepared for our
Lord’s coming as man in the Incarnation and His second coming at the end of time, we must

invite Jesus to reign in our hearts now.

May have the courage to rid from our lives and from our souls all that prevents us from
receiving our Lord as we should. Specifically, may we come to know our sins, detest them,

and seek to be free of them through the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

And may our Lady, who is the Fairest Honor of our Race and the Refuge of Sinners, aid us as
we seek to become more like her and more like her Son.

O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.

09 December 2012

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio .
To enable the audio, please go directly to Fr. Reid’s homily homilies and select the matching date.

Link to Homilies:
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Last Sunday while you were enjoying Fr. Julian Harris, I was spending time in the Holy Land. I was invited to go on this trip by an old friend who happens to be the P.R. Director of the Franciscan Foundation for the Holy Land.
Unlike my other trips to the Holy Land, which were pilgrimages to all of the holy sites, this time in addition to praying at the holy sites, I spent time meeting with Palestinians – both Christians and Muslims – to learn more about their plight.
Those of you who have been to the Holy Land know that it is one of the most fascinating places on earth – and certainly it’s a place that all Catholics should try to visit at least once during their lifetime.
Being in the land where Jesus lived and died and seeing all of the places connected to Him and to other biblical figures does so much to bring our faith alive and make it incarnate.
But for all the beauty and spiritual significance of the Holy Land, it is also one of the most tense and politically complicated places in the world. Particularly in Jerusalem, you can feel the tension that exists.
While I cannot pretend to fully understand all of the complexities in the relationships between the Israelis and Palestinians, what I do know is that there is much suffering amongst the people there – suffering that most likely will not be alleviated any time soon.
In speaking about this one of the people I met, Brother Peter Bray, who is the Vice Chancellor of Bethlehem University, said rather provocatively: “I am not optimistic that there will ever be peace in the Holy Land, but I am hopeful.”
Brother Peter’s point was that, if we look at the political situation between Israel and Palestine in purely human terms, there is no reason to be optimistic. But the virtue of hope gives us a different perspective, for the virtue of hope is rooted in God – not in man.
Truly, hope is a virtue that all Christians must cultivate, for it enables us to look at even the most hopeless of cases with the eyes of faith and see that with God, all things are possible.
And to their credit, I found the virtue of hope alive amongst Jews, Catholics and Muslims alike last week.
One day I was walking around the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem where I met an Israeli couple sightseeing with some friends from Denmark. And as we parted after a short conversation, the Israeli man remarked to me rather earnestly: “Father, let us pray and hope that we will have peace some day.” I was touched by his sincerity and good will.
Another time, I was talking to our driver, a Palestinian Muslim named Achmed, who is a descendant of one of the 5 original founding families of Jerusalem. As such, Achmed’s family owns a good bit of land around Jerusalem.
Yet, the most important piece of land they own is now controlled by Israelis in the Jewish Quarter of the Old City, and so even though he has papers proving his ownership, he effectively has no rights to the most valuable piece of his patrimony.
Yet Achmed has this luminescent hope that one day his family’s land will be returned to him, and if not to him, then to his children. His hope is a hope for justice, a hope that he will be able to pass on to his children a better life than he has enjoyed.
I could go on with more stories of the beautiful hope that I found amongst the good people I met, especially amongst the young Palestinian Catholic college students from Bethlehem who are digging in their heals to stay in the Holy Land, even while so many of their peers and so many Christians in general, are leaving the cradle of our faith.
What impressed me most, though, amongst so many of the people I met last week was this deep longing for things to be right: for peace and justice to reign, for the chance to live a life not marked by violence and strife. I was impressed by their profound hope.
What struck me is that this hope found amongst both Israelis and Palestinians for peace and justice in their land is quite symbolic of the hope we Christians should have for Heaven. Our lives on earth should be marked by this perpetual hope for the peace and justice of Heaven.
I bring this up because hope is precisely the virtue that our 1st reading and Gospel both call us to today. Both of these readings speak of the end times in rather frightening terms.
The prophet Malachi speaks of how the world will be cleansed of the proud and of evildoers by fire, while Jesus speaks in apocalyptic terms of the sufferings that must precede the end of the world and of the particular sufferings He and His followers must be willing to endure.
Yet for all the frightening aspects of these readings, the prophet Malachi tells us in very consoling terms: “But for you who fear [the Lord’s] name, there will arise the sun of justice with its healing rays.”
Malachi tells us to fear the Lord, and so indeed we should, but not in a servile way as a slave fears his master. Rather the fear of the Lord we should have is a filial fear rooted in our respect and awe of God because He’s all-powerful.
But because God is all-powerful, we should also hope in Him! The fact that He is all- powerful should give us great hope!
In the same way, even though the Gospel today warns us of the sufferings that are to come, we mustn’t let our earthly sufferings deter us from our faith and hope in God.
Jesus tells us that He will be with us in our sufferings, but that “by [our] perseverance [we] will secure [our] lives.” And this perseverance isn’t just perseverance through the suffering; it is a perseverance in hope, always keeping our eyes on our Lord and trusting in His almighty power to save us.
Brothers and sisters, we are once again coming to end of the liturgical year in which Holy Mother Church turns our hearts and minds to contemplating the last things: death, judgment, Heaven and hell, as well as to the final confrontation between good and evil that will occur at the end of time.
As frightening as these things may be, we mustn’t fear them. Nor must we fear the sufferings of this present life, especially those sufferings we must endure in the practice of our faith and in our witness to our Lord.
Instead, we are called to hope. We are called to hope in the eternal reward of Heaven that our Lord promises to all of those who believe in Him, who trust in Him, and who love Him.
May we repent of our sins, pursue virtue, and spend our lives meditating on the beautiful mysteries of our Catholic faith. And may we persevere in hope.
With the psalmist, let us pray for the peace of Jerusalem in this life, so that all men may come to know the eternal peace of the new and heavenly Jerusalem. (Cf. Psalm 122.)

17 November 2013

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio.
To enable the audio, lease go directly to Fr. Reid’s homily homilies and select the matching date.

Link to Homilies:
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On the left side of our church we have this beautiful stained glass window of our Lord crowned with thorns. I love this window – in large part because it is dedicated to the memory of a dear friend of mine: Fr. Peter Conroy.
Fr. Peter and I met in Eastern Europe almost 20 years ago, and by providence we ended up in the same seminary a year later where we were classmates and close friends.
Fr. Peter was ordained in June of 1999 for the Diocese of Portland, Maine, and I was planning a trip to see him in November of that year, when he died quite unexpectedly in his sleep. Today is the anniversary of Fr. Peter’s death. He was 39 years old.
Fr. Peter was a priest on earth for only 5 months, but now he is a priest for all eternity.
When I look at this window, I think not only of my good friend, but I am also reminded of
the brevity of life and of how none of us knows when we’ll have to face our Lord and His particular judgment of us.

Certainly that is the theme of our readings today. Both our first reading from the Book of
Daniel and St. Mark’s Gospel speak in apocalyptic terms, reminding us of the great, final battle between good and evil and the subsequent Final Judgment.

As we come to the close of the liturgical year and prepare for Advent, Holy Mother Church
leads us in the liturgy to meditate on death, judgment, Heaven and hell – what we traditionally call the “Four Last Things.”

And Holy Mother Church encourages us to meditate on the Four Last Things bearing in mind
that we do not know the day or hour when we will be asked to give an accounting of our lives.

So while we trust whole-heartedly in God’s mercy and goodness, we also know that we need
to prepare ourselves to see Him!

Our second reading today reminds us that our sins are forgiven through Christ’s sacrifice on
the cross, but all the same we must be sorry for our sins, ask forgiveness, and make reparation for our sins if we hope to enjoy the benefits of Christ’s sacrifice!

The prophet Daniel tells us in very clear language of the eternal punishment that awaits those
who have refused to repent of their sins, but he also speaks so beautifully of the eternal reward that awaits the just!

He says that, “the wise shall shine brightly like the splendor of the firmament, and those who
lead the many to justice shall be like the stars forever.”

And so we must give very careful consideration to our death, knowing that once we pass
through that great and mysterious veil separating the invisible from the visible, there will be no going back.

The judgment rendered in that first moment that we step into eternity will be final and
irrevocable.

As a priest it has been my observation that most people die as they live. What I mean by that
is that, if you live your life for God, seeking to love and serve Him; if you have a real relationship with our Lord, placing yourself in His presence daily through prayer, then you will – in all likelihood – know His presence at your death and pass away peacefully.

But if you’ve fought God and His commandments your whole life, if you’ve refused His mercy by refusing to repent of any of your sins, then chances are you won’t repent on your deathbed.
It is the sad lot of serious sinners that they tend to die in despair rather than in peace. Even when at death’s door they know they have sinned against God, so many refuse to trust in His mercy that our Lord gives so willingly and freely to any who ask for it.
The point is that we must begin preparing for our death now, even if we’re young.
Death is a mystery. For the soul who knows our Lord, who trusts and loves our Lord, death
can be beautiful and joyful. But for those who have turned away from our Lord, death can by horrifying.

This is because the soul knows its eternal fate before it passes into eternity. Indeed, none of
us will be surprised by the final judgment rendered upon us by our Lord. For in the depths of our hearts we know whether or not we are truly God’s friends.

So how do we ensure our names are written in the Book of Life that Daniel mentions? First
of all, we must repent of all sin – especially our mortal sins. This means that not only must we be sorry for those actions, but we must try never to commit them again.

For Catholics it is imperative that we participate in the sacramental life of the Church, going
to confession regularly and receiving Holy Communion regularly.

We must seek to follow all the tenets of the Church, and we must do our best to serve our
Lord and show our love for Him by serving and loving others.

But most importantly, my brothers and sisters, we must pray daily. We must cultivate the
silence necessary to truly listen to our Lord. For this is how we develop a lasting relationship with Him that will help carry us into eternity.

In prayer our Lord gives all the graces we need to fulfill our vocations and live holy lives. In
prayer our Lord reveals His will to us so that we know what it is that He wants us to do.

But He also reveals His heart to us in prayer so that we come to love Him more than we love ourselves. And this is the key! For it is when we love God more than we love ourselves that
our contrition for our sins becomes perfect and we make great strides in holiness.

We are very blessed here at St. Ann’s to have Eucharistic Adoration 33 hours each week, for
in Adoration we can enjoy the profound experience of seeing God in the Eucharist.

By faith we know that at every Mass our Lord humbly descends from Heaven to come to us
under the appearance of bread and wine. Our Lord is really, truly present in the Eucharist, and in Eucharistic Adoration we can worship Him at length.

Truly, my brothers and sisters, spending time with our Eucharistic Lord is the best way to
prepare for Heaven, for by being in His presence we get to see Him Whom we hope to adore for all eternity. If you don’t already come to Adoration, make it a point to do so.

Death comes for us all. But for Christians death should be a joyful and peaceful event. It can be just that: joyful and peaceful, if we are willing to live our lives in communion with
our Lord.

May we all resolve to dedicate more time to our Lord in prayer. And by doing so, may we all
be well prepared for that moment when we must render an account to God for our lives.

St. Joseph, Patron of Happy Death, pray for us.
18 November 2012

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio.
To enable the audio, lease go directly to Fr. Reid’s homily homilies and select the matching date.

Link to Homilies:
http://stanncharlotte.org/content/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&id=8&Itemid=61

Once again this Sunday a tax collector figures prominently in our Gospel story. And once again mercy is shown to a tax collector, even though tax collectors were considered to be the most morally bankrupt people in ancient Hebrew society.
Today we hear the story of Zacchaeus, Jericho’s wealthy tax collector who, because of his short stature, climbs a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus as He passes through town.
Like the humble tax collector begging for mercy as he prayed in the Temple that we heard about last week, Zacchaeus, too, shows remarkable humility.
When Jesus honors him by saying He must stay at his house, Zacchaeus makes a public declaration that he will make reparation for his sins by giving half of his possessions to the poor, and by repaying 4-fold any money he has extorted.
And what does Jesus say in response? “Today salvation has come to this house”, which is wonderfully reminiscent of our Lord’s words spoken to the Good Thief as they hung together on Calvary: “This day you shall be with Me in Paradise.”
What we can see here, both with Zacchaeus and the Good Thief, is that our humility disposes our Lord to grant us His mercy! Humility makes us pleasing in God’s eyes, and it thereby gives us a claim on our Lord’s mercy.
Note as well the opening line of the Gospel: “At that time, Jesus came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town.” In other words, our Lord didn’t plan on staying in Jericho; He was merely passing through.
But Jesus cannot resist an opportunity to show His mercy! Upon seeing Zacchaeus in the tree, He saw an opportunity to test him. Jesus saw the opportunity to bring a sinner to repentance.
And by deciding to make such generous restitution for his sins, Zacchaeus passes this test with flying colors, and thus he receives the gift of our Lord’s mercy.
Last Sunday I mentioned that sin should be avoided at all costs because it is so offensive to God. I mentioned that sin is the most destructive force in our world, capable of robbing a man of his eternal salvation.
Yet while sin is the most destructive force in the world, it is not the most powerful! God’s mercy is the most powerful force in our world – more powerful than any sin we can commit.
Our first reading from the Book of Wisdom speaks of God’s omnipotence in poetic fashion. We are reminded that, before our God, “the whole universe is as a grain from a balance or a drop of morning dew.”
But even though God is all-powerful, even though all things that exist only exist because God wills it, our Lord is a lover of souls. The Lord “loves all things that are,” and He “spares all things, because they are [His].”
So His omnipotence, though very real, is tempered by His mercy. Therefore, He rebukes “offenders little by little, warn[ing] them and remind[ing] them of the sins they are committing that they may abandon their wickedness and believe in [Him].”
So while God’s omnipotence shows us what God is capable of, His mercy shows us Who He Is. Our Lord’s mercy reveals His nature! And God’s perfection and love shines forth most poignantly and powerfully in His mercy!
We all know that one day we will all die and have to face Jesus as our Judge, but we shouldn’t fear this, for the Gospel tells us that He: “has come to seek and to save what was lost.”
Our Lord desires our salvation! God is a lover of souls! He calls each and every one of His children to an eternity of bliss, and so He wants us to be worthy of this calling.
But for this to happen, we’ve got to be like Zacchaeus. We’ve got to be desirous ofseeing Jesus and be willing to go to any lengths to do so.
Like Zacchaeus who descended from the sycamore at Jesus’ command, we, too, must beperfectly obedient to our Lord in all matters, most especially when He calls us toHimself.
You see, even though we are sinners, our Lord still wants to be with us, just as Hewanted to be with Zacchaeus and even asked to stay in his home.
While we cannot host our Lord for dinner, as did Zacchaeus, if we have been baptized, we host our Lord in our souls. He dwells within us! Thus, we should make our souls ahome worthy of our Lord.
Whenever we invite guests into our homes, most of us go out of our way to make ourhomes inviting and comfortable for our guests. We clean our homes and do our best tomake them look nice.
And if we are willing to go to such lengths for our fellow sinners, should we not go outof our way to make our souls a comfortable and inviting dwelling place for our Lord?
This we do by our worthy reception of the sacraments, through our constant prayer,through the cultivation of the virtues – most especially the theological virtues of faith,hope, and charity – and through the love we bear our Lord in our hearts.
Lastly, just as Zacchaeus was repentant of his sins and willing to make amends for them, we, too, must confess our sins and do penance regularly in order to make reparation forour sins.
A penance is not really a punishment for our sins, but rather a medication, a treatment,for a spiritual illness. While we tell God we’re sorry for our sins when we make ourconfession, our penance is the way we show God we’re sorry for our sins.
My dear brothers and sisters, our blessed Lord cannot resist a soul in need of His mercy,but we’ve got to be willing to accept His mercy. And this we do by following theexample of Zacchaeus.
In the spiritual life there are two constants: our sinfulness and God’s overwhelmingmercy and compassion. And as Zacchaeus shows us today, there is only one way torespond to this reality if we wish to receive God’s mercy.
We must humbly acknowledge our sins, and we must seek to make reparation for oursins. We must be desirous of seeing God, be obedient to Him, and make our souls acomfortable home for Him.
Through the intercession of Our Lady and all the angels and saints, may God make eachof us worthy of His calling so that we may enjoy His mercy at the hour of our death and His blessed company for all eternity.

03 November 2013

© Reverend Timothy Reid

Fr. Reid is the pastor of St. Ann Catholic Church, Charlotte, NC

Homilies from June 17, 2012 onward have audio.
To enable the audio, lease go directly to Fr. Reid’s homily homilies and select the matching date.

Link to Homilies:
http://stanncharlotte.org/content/index.php?option=com_content&view=section&id=8&Itemid=61

As we celebrate this important Feast of All Souls on which Holy Mother Church calls us to pray for the souls of all those who have gone before us, it is right and just that we should also spend some time meditating on this one reality that all of us must face.

Without question this is a day that we remember our deceased loved ones, as our prayers illustrate for us, but it is also a day in which we are called to meditate on our own death and the hope of eternal life that we bear as Christians.
We are reminded of this 2-fold purpose for this feast most starkly by the catafalque that stands at the foot of the sanctuary, but as well in the vestment that I wear.
While the vestment I wear is black to symbolize our mourning for the dead, it is trimmed in silver to remind us that, in our mourning, we are called all the more to bear witness to our hope in the resurrection of all men – even our own resurrection.
Indeed, from a Christian perspective, death is something to hope for, to long for, even though our weak human nature is inclined to fear it and fight it.
Many of the saints of our Catholic faith have written about death, but perhaps none has written so eloquently on this topic as the good St. Ambrose.
St. Ambrose is truly a saint of great distinction. Not only is he one of the four great Western fathers of the Church, he is perhaps the only man in Church history to be baptized, and to be ordained a deacon, priest, and bishop all within a week’s time.
A capable administrator and an ardent lover of the poor, St. Ambrose was also a courageous man, who took on even emperors face-to-face to secure the rights of the Church when he couldn’t win them over with his eloquence.
But for all of his steely composure, St. Ambrose was also a very tender and loving man, and upon the death of his beloved brother, Satyrus, Ambrose suffered greatly. But he found relief from his sorrow through meditating and writing upon death.
St. Ambrose wrote so beautifully that Christians should have: “a daily familiarity with death, a daily desire for death,” because ultimately death is the great remedy for our concupiscence and earthly desires.
While we live on this earth, our fallen nature is often at war with our faith and reason. While we know by faith and reason that we should desire God above all else and work diligently to cultivate virtue, the propensity to sin that we inherited from our first parents often gets the better of us.
As St. Ambrose wrote that: “Human life was condemned because of sin to unremitting labor and unbearable sorrows and so began to experience the burden of wretchedness.” But God’s mercy limits this sorrow, and death restores to us what life has forfeited.
In a sense, our lives as Christians are one long labor to recover the lost innocence and perfect ordering of our souls that was lost in the Garden when Adam and Eve sinned.
That original sin of our first parents resulted in a wound of concupiscence that we all now bear, a wound that that we must seek to heal through the cultivation of the virtues and the courageous rejection of all that is contrary to God’s will.
And if we have labored strenuously throughout our lives on earth to find healing for this wound – if we’ve labored for holiness – then our death is the final remedy for that terrible wound.
So then death is not a cause for mourning; it is not something to be avoided. St. Ambrose tells us rather, that death is the cause of man’s salvation!
Of course this is only true provided that we turn away from the wickedness of this world, that we turn away from the enticements of sin and the deceits of the devil.
Some day we will face our Creator and have to make an accounting of our lives. Our death is truly the most important moment of our entire life, for it is in this dramatic moment that our eternal destiny is decided!
Our eternal fate will rest upon the state of our souls and the attitude we have before God at that moment our souls slip away from our mortal bodies.
Considering the absolute importance of this moment, it is imperative that we prepare well for our deaths. If we are well prepared, our death can be a moment of tremendous grace and mercy. If not, our death can lead us to everlasting horror.
While it is true that God never leaves any soul without His divine aid, most especially in this moment of supreme importance, our Lord will not force His grace upon us.
Priestly ministry has taught me that most of us die as we’ve lived. For those who have lived in that peace that only comes from doing God’s will, or who have earnestly repented, they usually die peacefully and filled with hope.
But for those who have fought or ignored God’s will in this life, death approaches as a frightening specter of darkness and gloom.
In short, whoever lives his life in union with God’s will; whoever has chosen for God in this life will generally have no problem choosing God and His mercy at this last and decisive moment of his life.
But for those who ignore God throughout life and choose their own will instead of His, salvation will only come through a miracle of God’s mercy.
So as we mourn for our loved ones and pray for the happy repose of their souls, let us not forget to meditate on our own death, nor should we ever forget that death can come at any moment, even when we least expect it.
With this in mind, let us live our lives for God. Let us honestly repent of all of our sins and ask for our Lord’s mercy.
In all things, let us always trust in our Lord’s promise of mercy: both for ourselves, and for those who have already died.

02 November 2013