Homily MP3 version Homily PDF version
Sign of the + Cross
Good Morning. Today this Holy Mass is being offered for: by:
Thank you for your support. We are reminded today that rather than punish us for our sin and infidelities, Jesus has volunteered to stand in our place and endure the punishment we deserve. During this Live Daily Mass, we offer to God our personal intentions, those of his Church, and the intentions of all of humanity. We especially pray for all native and indigenous peoples.
Penitential Rite Brothers and sisters let us acknowledge our sins and so prepare ourselves to celebrate the sacred mysteries. (Formula 1)
We thank you for supporting this Live Daily Mass through your daily prayers, Mass intentions, and donations to the Cathedral and to Salt + Light Media.
Saint Joseph, pray for us. Blessing and Dismissal
+ + + + + + + + + + + +
HOMILY
Our God is strange… a better word is mysterious. Our Creator God is very mysterious. His ways are not our ways. We can come to know his ways, but it is likely that we will never quite fully understand the ways of the Lord. Still, we can know his ways enough to do his will. It was the very same situation with the patriarch Abram whom the Lord called to leave his home at Ur of the Chaldees in what is today Iraq in order to lead him to the land He promised him.
Talk about strange! What do you make of the strange ritual God told Abram to do by killing and cutting in two a heifer, a goat, and a ram, along with a turtle dove and young pigeon? Well, I wouldn’t know either if I had not learned about it in the Seminary.
You see, at that time and in those lands and cultures, their societies were divided into two parts, much like it is today, only then it was much clearer. The world was ruled by those who were rich and powerful, and the rest of the population was governed by these rulers. Now, when someone wanted a special favor or position or loan from a ruler, the ruler would require them to go through this ritual, but not the way God did it with Abram.
In such a ritual, the ruler makes a contract by making the person walk in between the pieces and say “In return for the favor I seek from you, I will give you obedience, loyalty, and the tax. If I fail to keep my part of the agreement, you will do to me as you did to these animals.” This is how infidelity on the part of the poor was punishable by death; by being cut in two.
So, you see how different are the Lord and his ways from the ways of this world? God made covenant with Abram by taking Abram’s place in the ritual promise punishable by death; God in the fire took Abram’s place and passed between the two parts of the animals cut in two. In the covenant God made with Abram, the Lord made the deadly promise, not Abram: “If either of us breaks our covenant, I your God will suffer death and be cut off and separated from life.”
The end result of all our infidelities and disobedience to God, from the time of Abram until the time of Moses, the judges, the prophets, and the kings of Israel, down through the centuries until the coming into the world of the Son of God and beyond Him to our day and beyond us to the end of time; the end result of all of humanity’s sinful contempt for God is that Jesus, the Son of God, the son of Mary, accepted to suffer the punishment of death and was cut off from life. Lord Jesus, teach us to be grateful for your sacrifice to pay for our collective and personal sins.
Lord Jesus, grant us eternal life by giving us the grace to know and love You and the Father in Heaven, and fill us with your Holy Spirit who gives us to understand your ways, Jesus, only-begotten Son of the Father, our Lord on Earth and in Heaven; may You welcome us into your eternal home with the Father and the Holy Spirit and all the saints at the end of our lives.
In the Name of the Father, + the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
https://frgilleshomilies.blogspot.com
© 2006-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal QC
© 2006-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC
