Fr. Roger J. Landry
Sacred Heart Convent of the Sisters of Life
Friday of the 22nd Week of Ordinary Time, Year I
Votive Mass of the Sacred Heart of Jesus
Ten-thousandth Mass Since My Priestly Ordination
September 6, 2019
Col 1:15-20, Ps 100, Lk 4:33-39
To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click here:
The following points were attempted in the homily:
- Twice a year, on Friday after Ash Wednesday, and Friday of the 22nd Week in Ordinary Time, we have a chance to ponder Jesus’ words in today’s Gospel, which are almost identical between St. Matthew and St. Luke. Jesus speaks about feasting and fasting and gives us very strong words that both our feasting and fasting need a revolution in the way we go about doing so. Jesus describes himself as the Bridegroom and us as the Friends of the Bridal Chamber — the members of the wedding party — and says that when we are with him we must feast and when he is “ripped away” we must fast. In Lent each year, we focus on what he teaches us about fasting. In September, we focus on what he says about feasting. He makes a couple main points. The first is the joy we should have in his presence, because of his spousal love. We’re supposed to have the joy of people on their wedding day, because we’re not merely the bridal party but the bride. Many Christians don’t live this nuptial reality with the joy of newlyweds. We don’t go into the presence of the Lord with joy, as we say in the Responsorial Psalm. When the Lord is with us, and we are with him, we should be feasting! But Jesus says that when he is taken away from us — the verb here is the violent one used for the arrest of Jesus in the Garden, when they ripped him out of our presence — then we fast. There are parts of us, and certainly parts of the world, that are not yet united with the Bridegroom. There are also parts of us that are not fully with him, shown by the fact that we are not yet joyful. Fasting is meant to stoke our hunger for the Lord. The second main point is that there is a radical newness to our feasting and fasting. Jesus uses the image of a new patch on old clothing as well as pouring new wine into old wineskins to illustrate the point that we need to fast and feast differently than before. We need more than just patching a little of our garment. We need more than the receptivity of yesterday. We need new clothing, we need new wineskins to receive the new wine.
- In the first reading today, St. Paul writes that Jesus Christ is the true “icon” of the invisible God, that God had come in the flesh, that Jesus had manifested of God-is-love in Christ’s redemption on the Cross. But those affected by gnosticism in Colossae had, to use Jesus’ image in the Gospel today, “old wine skins” such that they were not ready to receive the significance of the Incarnation. We, too, need to have new wineskins to receive the true image of God — to receive Jesus according to his categories rather than our own — so that we, in turn, can grow more and more into the image and likeness of God, so that we will be united to him and become the manifestation of his love. We prayed at the beginning of Mass that God the Father would clothe us in the virtues of Christ his Son — those are our new wineskins, that’s our new cloak — and inflame us with the passion of his love so that, conformed to his image (icon), we may merit to enter into his redemption, the redemption St. Paul tells us in today’s first reading.
- We prepare to enter into full communion with the Bridegroom each Mass in the consummation of the spousal union on the marriage bed of the altar. Just like in the parable of the kingdom in which the king sends out the tailors to vest us for the banquet, so Jesus wants to vest us in his virtues, to give us new wineskins to receive his ever fresh outpouring of his enfleshed love. He wants to help us in this Holy Communion really to unite ourselves to him. I rejoice that today, I have the chance to celebrate Mass for the 10,000th time stretching back to the Mass of my priestly ordination. A priest hopes to celebrate each Mass as if it were his first, last and only. Each time we are called, as we pray in Psalm 43, to go up to the altar of God, the God who gives joy to our youth, who regularly seeks to make our joy complete and make us more childlike. I am so grateful to God for this gift, as I ask him not only to help me become more conformed to the One I consume, but the One whom I am so privileged to have hijack my voice at the consecration, to hold in my hands as the incarnation happens within them, and to give him to others, so that he may make their joy complete. Today we come with joy into the presence of the Lord, the icon of the invisible God. The Bridegroom is here. Let us go out to meet Christ the Lord!
The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1
COL 1:15-20
Brothers and sisters:
Christ Jesus is the image of the invisible God,
the firstborn of all creation.
For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth,
the visible and the invisible,
whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers;
all things were created through him and for him.
He is before all things,
and in him all things hold together.
He is the head of the Body, the Church.
He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things he himself might be preeminent.
For in him all the fullness was pleased to dwell,
and through him to reconcile all things for him,
making peace by the Blood of his cross
through him, whether those on earth or those in heaven.
Christ Jesus is the image of the invisible God,
the firstborn of all creation.
For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth,
the visible and the invisible,
whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers;
all things were created through him and for him.
He is before all things,
and in him all things hold together.
He is the head of the Body, the Church.
He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things he himself might be preeminent.
For in him all the fullness was pleased to dwell,
and through him to reconcile all things for him,
making peace by the Blood of his cross
through him, whether those on earth or those in heaven.
Responsorial Psalm
PS 100:1B-2, 3, 4, 5
R. (2b) Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Sing joyfully to the LORD, all you lands;
serve the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful song.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Know that the LORD is God;
he made us, his we are;
his people, the flock he tends.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
his courts with praise;
Give thanks to him; bless his name.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
For he is good,
the LORD, whose kindness endures forever,
and his faithfulness, to all generations.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Sing joyfully to the LORD, all you lands;
serve the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful song.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Know that the LORD is God;
he made us, his we are;
his people, the flock he tends.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
his courts with praise;
Give thanks to him; bless his name.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
For he is good,
the LORD, whose kindness endures forever,
and his faithfulness, to all generations.
R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.
Gospel
LK 5:33-39
The scribes and Pharisees said to Jesus,
“The disciples of John the Baptist fast often and offer prayers,
and the disciples of the Pharisees do the same;
but yours eat and drink.”
Jesus answered them, “Can you make the wedding guests fast
while the bridegroom is with them?
But the days will come, and when the bridegroom is taken away from them,
then they will fast in those days.”
And he also told them a parable.
“No one tears a piece from a new cloak to patch an old one.
Otherwise, he will tear the new
and the piece from it will not match the old cloak.
Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins.
Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins,
and it will be spilled, and the skins will be ruined.
Rather, new wine must be poured into fresh wineskins.
And no one who has been drinking old wine desires new,
for he says, ‘The old is good.’”
“The disciples of John the Baptist fast often and offer prayers,
and the disciples of the Pharisees do the same;
but yours eat and drink.”
Jesus answered them, “Can you make the wedding guests fast
while the bridegroom is with them?
But the days will come, and when the bridegroom is taken away from them,
then they will fast in those days.”
And he also told them a parable.
“No one tears a piece from a new cloak to patch an old one.
Otherwise, he will tear the new
and the piece from it will not match the old cloak.
Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins.
Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins,
and it will be spilled, and the skins will be ruined.
Rather, new wine must be poured into fresh wineskins.
And no one who has been drinking old wine desires new,
for he says, ‘The old is good.’”
