Mar. 31, 2010: Priesthood is the Heart of Jesus

In the face of mounting criticism on priesthood and our Pope Benedict XVI in the media, here we present the true face of priesthood. (Video: Alter Christus - part 1, 2, 3)

Mar. 30, 2010: Divine Mercy and St. Therese of Lisieux

 (Click here for audio of homily)

In October last year, I showed up at the Basilica of St. Therese in Lisieux, France with a 40 lb. backpack on my back. I asked if I could celebrate mass at one of the altars in the basilica. The lady taking my request had a quizzical expression. I must have looked more like a camper than a priest. I didn't look too sharp either; I had not slept well on the trans-Atlantic flight and I came by train immediately from Paris. But I was determined to celebrate a mass in honor of St. Therese before I had to catch an overnight train in few hours to Lourdes. I was instructed to take an altar near the relic of St. Therese.  On the altar was a quote from Therese, "It is love alone that attracts me. Abandonment alone guides me." Few days later, I would meet Therese again, when 1,200 priests from all over the world gathered for the International Priest Retreat at Ars, France the final resting place of St. Jean Vianney. Her relic from the Basilica near where I celebrated mass was brought to our gathering. I thought, "How nice, Therese didn't want to part with me just yet."

Today's topic is Divine Mercy in the writings of St. Therese of Lisieux. To start off, I want to quote you the question that a speaker at our International Priest Retreat asked us priests. She said, "Fathers, when one enters thru the seminary doors, does he become a saint automatically? Does his weaknesses vanish and virtues increase as if by a miracle?" Now I will ask all of us here a related question, "Brothers and sisters, when one gets baptized and enters through the church doors, do they become saints automatically? Do their weaknesses vanish and virtues increase as if by a miracle?" Let me ask you another related questions. "Husbands and wives, when one gets married on the altar, do you automatically become perfect husbands and perfect wives?" Yet we are torn inside by conflicting feelings. On one hand, we feel the infinite desire to be holy, to be a saint. On the other hand, we come to confession repeatedly over and over again for the same sin. Why would God put in every one of us a desire to be holy, the desire to become saints, when He knows we're going to fail repeatedly? 

St. Therese toiled with this question, and first she tried to live a perfect life. She quickly found herself failing miserably. What to do? She knew she could not not live out such ideals and aspirations by her own strength and efforts alone. How can a simple, ordinary person like me become one of Jesus' beloved saints? Therese said, "...I have always wanted to be a saint. But I have always noticed that when I compared myself to the saints, there is between them and me the same difference that exists between a mountain whose summit is lost in the clouds and the obscure grain of sand trampled underfoot by passers-by. Instead of becoming discouraged, I said to myself: God cannot inspire unrealizable desires. I can, then, in spite of my littleness, aspire to holiness...I want to seek out a means of going to heaven by a little way, a way that is very straight, very short, and totally new." 

Then she saw an invention in the 1890s that would be a perfect metaphor to explain her  search--an elevator. She said, "I want to find an elevator which would raise me to Jesus, for I am too small to climb the rough stairways to perfection. I searched then in the Scriptures for some sign of this elevator, the object of my desires, and I read these words coming from the mouth of Eternal Wisdom: "Whosoever is a LITTLE ONE, let him come to me" (Prov. 9:4) ...I continued to search and this is what I discovered: "As one whom a mother caresses, so will I comfort you; you shall be carried at the breasts, and upon the knees they shall caress you" (Isaiah 66:13,12) ...The elevator which must raise me to heaven is Your arms, O Jesus! And for this I had no need to grow up, but rather had to remain little..." "How happy I am to realize that I am little and weak, how happy I am to see myself so imperfect." "...It is needful to remain little before God and to remain little is to recognize one's nothingness, expect all things from the good God just as a little child expects all things from its father..."

On December 12, 2006 I was reading these very words in a hotel right outside of the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City on the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I just finished my deacon internship at St. Louis King of France parish and was wondering to myself, "How am I going to become a priest in few months when I have doubts about my own virtues, when I know I'm far from being holy?" Then these words of Therese reminded me not to look at my weaknesses and my nothingness. Rather look at Jesus who bends down low to pick up this little child, like an elevator and raise him to His Heart. I was to trust Jesus who will provide all the means and grace necessary, just as Jesus is the one providing all of us all the means and grace necessary to lift us up to His Heart. Jesus I trust in You!  

Mar. 28, 2010: Palm Sunday (C)

During this week, I had someone in my office for confession. After I gave the absolution, I asked the person if they have seen the movie, "The Passion of Christ" by Mel Gibson. The person said, 'no,' and I told the person that it is a tough movie to watch. But I wanted to show the person the portion where Jesus took up the cross and meets his mother along the Way of the Cross. If you remember that movie, physical suffering by Jesus was not left to the imagination. It's strange. I see excessive if not gratuitous violence and blood on most of the action, horror, and science fiction movies in the theaters these days, yet it was difficult to watch this one, on Jesus. We came upon the scene where Blessed Mother made it past the crowd and was catching her breath. Then her son nearby fell under the heavy weight of the cross, and the cross nearly crushed his body. As Blessed Mother witnessed this, she hesitated approaching him. Then her mind jogged back to the day when Jesus was a little child, when he fell. She remembered how she ran toward him, pulled him to her bosom and said, "I am here." This was the moment Jesus needed his mother to be there for him. She ran, fought the soldiers who was blocking him, and grasped his face and said, "I am here." Jesus, comforted by her presence grasped again the cross and reminded her, "See mother, I make all things new." At that moment, hot tears streamed down from my face. Jesus reminded me again how he made all things new in my life, how he turned a sinner into a priest.

Why does Heavenly Father give us the Holy Week every year? This is not like some re-run of a sitcom or a re-run of Charlton Heston's Ten Commandments every year. Some real change happens every year to us through the Holy Week. And only when we stay faithfully with Jesus through the Palm Sunday, the Last Supper on Holy Thursday, and at the Calvary on Good Friday, do we hear Jesus says to us, "I make all things new in your life" on Easter. So do not abandon him this Holy Week. Nothing is more important than the week that changed the entire world. This is the week that will change you.    

Mar. 25, 2010: The Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord

Many of us have signed up for things like health club memberships, auto insurance, and 401k retirement plans. The sales person quickly places many documents in front of us to sign on the spot where it says, "I agree with all the terms and conditions." How many of us really take time to actually read that when we sign it? No many. When we think of the event of the Annunciation of the Lord when the Archangel Gabriel appeared to Blessed Mother to announce that she was going to be the mother of the Lord, we immediately think of her 'fiat' or her 'yes' to God as she said, "Let it be done to me according to thy word." I don't see in the Gospel of Luke where Archangel Gabriel brings her a 30 page terms and conditions contract for her to sign. Do you? Nor do I see a 30 page terms and conditions contract being signed at the wedding day between the groom and the bride. The 'yes' that Blessed Mother said to God and the 'yes' that the groom and the bride said to each other presupposes the following: "I trust you completely, and I trust that what you ask of me is for my good because you love me. For that reason, I give you permission to change me, I give you permission to transform me. In the end, my heart will be conformed to yours, my wants and my desires will be conformed to yours."

For some couples, after 25 years of marriage, can finish each other's sentences, can anticipate each other's needs without words ever spoken, and can come to each other's side when one spouse feels under the weather. That's the transforming power of 'yes' of that wedding day, isn't it? Yet we are aware also, that for some couples the number of years in marriage does not necessarily translate into closer union and transformation, but more of tolerance because of children or even growing apart. The same can be said with our 'yes' to God. For those of you who have been a Catholic for a while, if I ask you, "Have you grown to trust God more? Do you find yourself anticipating and carrying out with haste what He desires for you? Or have you grown to resent what He asks of you, to cringe at His requests."

Perhaps one of the reason why God invites us to mass every week is to help us move from resentment to trust. And He helps us grow to trust Him each time we come before receiving Communion. When the priest hands us Jesus in the Eucharist, we say, 'Amen.' This Amen is like Our Lady's fiat or "Let it be done to me according to Thy word," when she consents to our Lord's making His dwelling in her virginal womb.

Our Amen, in a real way , gives the Lord permission to come in, change us imperceptibly from within, and orients us toward our true and eternal good. But this Amen, this permission, often comes with strings attached on our part, as we don't necessarily want Him to change everything.  Nevertheless, He gently and relentlessly teaches us through the Eucharist that we will find our ultimate happiness giving ourselves away to God and neighbor without reserve. "Let it be done to me, according to Thy word."

March 23, 2010: Divine Mercy Novena Week 7 - Fr. Miles Walsh

Divine Mercy Novena, Week 7: Divine Mercy Greater Than Sin and Despair

Fr. Miles Walsh, the Pastor of Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church

Throughout the nine weeks of our Divine Mercy novena, we’ve been tracing the theme of Divine Mercy in both Sacred Scripture and in the tradition of the Church, especially in the lives of the saints and in their writings.  We’ve looked, for example, at God’s Mercy as it is revealed to us in both the Old and the New Testaments, and we’ve also looked at the message of Divine Mercy in the writings of saints like St. Paul in the first century, St. Augustine in the fourth and fifth centuries, St. Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth century, and St. Catherine of Siena in the fourteenth century.  Last week Fr. Paul introduced us to St. Catherine’s Dialogue of Divine Providence, which is really the record of a dialogue between God and a soul mystically united to Him in prayer.  One of the profound truths we find in the Dialogue of St. Catherine is that the Mercy of God is Greater Than Sin and Despair.

In section 37 of the Dialogue, for example, St. Catherine speaks about the unforgivable sin--the sin that even God Himself cannot forgive.  To be sure, St. Catherine did not come up with the concept of an unforgivable sin on her own.  In all three synoptic Gospels, in Mark, chapter 3 (v. 29); in Matthew, chapter 12 (v. 32); and in Luke, chapter 12 (v. 10), Jesus teaches that every sin which a man commits can be forgiven except “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.”  No less an authority than the Catechism of the Catholic Church defines blasphemy against the Holy Spirit as the sin of despairing of the Mercy of God.  The Catechism says (in #1864): There are no limits to the mercy of God, but anyone who deliberately refuses to accept his mercy by repenting, rejects the forgiveness of sins and the salvation offered by the Holy Spirit.  Such hardness of heart can lead to final impenitence and eternal loss.  In other words, the only sin that God cannot forgive is our final and obstinate decision to reject his offer of Divine Mercy in Jesus Christ.  This sin is also a sin against the Holy Spirit because the Spirit of God inspires within us the gift of trust in Christ as well as the ability to humbly repent of our sin, and so to persist in the attitude of not trusting and of refusing to repent is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.  It is an ultimate rejection of God’s grace!

Question: Who among us would dare to approach to the confessional to ask God for the forgiveness of our sins unless we had some measure of faith, however small, in the Mercy of God, and trust in Jesus Christ?  I know I could not.  I’ve been tempted at times to think that my sinfulness is so great that God could not change my heart, that He could not forgive my sin, that I was beyond hope of redemption, but to give in to such an attitude is to give in to despair.  If I had done that, I wouldn’t be here today.  Yet how many individuals persist in believing and acting as though they are beyond the reach of God’s mercy and forgiveness, beyond His power to bring them back to Him?  

In her dialogue, St. Catherine describes how God the Father spoke to her about this obstinate rejection of His Mercy.  The Lord said to her: The sin which can never be forgiven is the refusal, the scorning of my mercy.  This offends me more than all the other sins committed by men.  The despair of Judas displeased me more...and was a greater insult to my Son than was his betrayal.  Those who consider their sins to be greater than my mercy will be punished with the demons and are eternally tormented with them, for they grieve more for their own plight than for having offended me. This is a great injustice to Me, for they refuse to give me what is mine and will not take what belongs to them.  It is their duty to offer Me their love and bitter contrition for the sins they have committed against Me. Instead they lavish tender love on themselves and feel sorry about the punishment they expect for their sins.  They have scorned my mercy, so I turn them over to my justice (section 37).

By the way, St. Catherine is not saying here that God desires to destroy those who refuse his Mercy--far from desiring to destroy them, she says, God  ultimately permits souls who stubbornly reject His offer of Mercy to destroy themselves, for the simple reason that He has given us the gift of freedom, the freedom to accept or reject His love.  If you’ve ever known or loved someone who stubbornly refused the offer of our friendship, our forgiveness, and our love, then we have some idea of what God is saying to St. Catherine.

In her diary, St. Faustina tells us  Jesus revealed this same truth to her, when he said: Before the Day of Justice, I am sending the Day of Mercy.  I am prolonging the time of mercy for the sake of sinners.  Whoever refuses to pass through the door of my Mercy must pass through the door of my justice (Diary 1146).  How blessed are we that God has sent us his saints as messengers and apostles, to tell us how great the Mercy of God is!

Next week Fr. Paul will look at Divine Mercy in the writings of St. Therese of Lisieux, the Little Flower in the nineteenth century; and then in the final week, I will speak about the private revelation of Jesus’ Sacred Heart, given to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque in the seventeenth century.  I want to remind you that next week is Holy Week.  I want to encourage your attendance at the Sacred Triduum, beginning on Holy Thursday; and also remind you that at next Tuesday night’s novena we will take up a special collection for Catholic Radio of Baton Rouge. (Information cards will be handed to you as you leave church tonight.)  Also, I’d like to remind you that we still have copies of the little booklet by Fr. Kosicki which describes the importance of Divine Mercy Sunday.  Those booklets will be available in the vestibule after Mass.

The Mercy of God is infinitely greater than Sin and Despair!  And so we pray:  Jesus, I trust in You!

Mar. 21, 2010: 5th Sunday Lent (C)

Do you remember when you got your very first credit card? For me it was during freshmen year at UT Austin. There were tables lined up offering free tee shirt if you signed up for a card, so I got one. It was quite exciting spending money on the card thinking that I'll have enough money to pay for it at the end of the month. Then when the monthly bill comes I say to myself, "I can't believe I spent this much!" For the first few times, my parents paid for it. But after that, I decided that I can't mooch off of my parents, so I decided to put the card somewhere I cannot reach so easily.

I want to use the credit card bill as an anology to understand purgatory. Sometimes we think that what we do to others have very little impact in the end--the hurtful words we say, telling lies here and there, taking occasional glances at inappropriate stuff on computer, and not so charitable ways we treat each other. Yet at the end of our life, we get to see how large the 'credit card bill' comes out to be. For most of us, before we die, we will have gone to confession and received forgiveness from God for all our sins. God is the one who has the 'deep pockets' of His Mercy, to pay the debt we cannot pay. So in a sense, God has already paid for the large 'credit card debt' that we owe. Yet just like I felt guilty about each time that I carelessly used my credit card, Jesus is going to give us an opportunity to look at each time that we carelessly hurt others and let Jesus down. This opportunity happens right after we die. Some calls this the Hour of Truth or the Judgment Hour. That sounds foreboding doesn't it. We often think the our Judgment Hour to be what happened to the woman caught in adultery in our gospel today. We imagine that there will be lots of people with stones in their hands, ready to accuse us for each of our sins and to throw the stones at us. But what really happens in the gospel? Doesn't Jesus say to them, "“Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” And no one is left to accuse. In the end, only Jesus is left with the woman, and he says, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?...Neither do I condemn you.”

Many who have experienced near-death recall that Jesus showed them a movie of their life. While watching this movie, the soul sees the movie not from their perspective, not from their usual self-deception or self-delusion, and not from the devil's temptations, but from God's perspective. Just like what Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery, we do not feel condemned by God. Rather we see each moment of our lives from His Truth--His compassion, mercy, and love. As we watch each moment of our lives, we will know how God wanted us to serve Him at that moment. And we will know whether we have served Him or we have not served Him. We will see how each of our sin hurt the other person. Although this debt has been forgiven, we will still say to ourselves, "I cannot believe that I did that! I need to in someway pay back to that person what I've done. Lord you have forgiven all my debts, but I still need to spend some time in Purgatory making up for what I did wrong to that person." Hence, Purgatory is really a place where we will take time in order to come to terms with our mistakes and proceed in self-acceptance. But instead of doing this in Purgatory, we can do this here on earth. We can come to terms with our mistakes by making reparation, whether it be through physical and spiritual sacrifice or making amends to restore broken relationships. It's like me being shocked at the end of the month credit card bill and making prudent changes to my spending behavior so that I will not have to have my mom and dad bail me out of my debt again.    

March 19, 2010: Charismatic Conference Mass on Friday at 3PM

I was invited at a dinner the other day by a couple who has been married for over 25 years. And I listened to the husband say, "You know, all I know about St. Joseph is that he was the husband of Jesus and the foster father of Jesus. Other than that, I really don't identify with him or connect with him." This is probably true for many of us. I had devotions to Blessed Mother, St. Therese, St. Bernadette, and Father Seelos, but I didn't have devotion to St. Joseph until after Katrina.

After Notre Dame Seminary was damaged, all the seminarians were relocated to St. Joseph Abbey in Covington for 4 months while our seminary was repaired. When we returned to the seminary in January of 2006, we dedicated the year to St. Joseph, asking him to help rebuild the seminary. Certainly the physical plant needed much work, but what was more in dire need was our morale at the seminary. Katrina has stirred up a lot of things in us seminarians, and it was affecting our resolve to priesthood. We stormed the heaven for the intercession of St. Joseph. We honored and thanked him for his intercession at the seminary by setting up St. Joseph's Altar.

When I look back at my seminary years, I notice that St. Joseph was the one who was guiding me. I had two spiritual directors during my seminary days, both named after St. Joseph--Fr. Joseph Benson and Fr. Joseph Palermo. For the past two years, I have been appointed as the chaplain for our all-girls' high school, St. Joseph Academy which is run by Sisters of St. Joseph.

For that reason I really rely greatly on St. Joseph for those who seek my confessional. When husbands, fathers, and men say to me in the confessional that they have fallen short in being a good husband, in being a good father, failing to be kind, gentle, patient, humble, and chaste men. Without a fail, I give them this penance. Please go over to the statue of St. Joseph in our church, put your hand on his feet, and ask him, "St. Joseph please help me to be the good and holy man that God called me to be." Often the men receiving this penance would say, "Father, I really don't know St. Joseph." And I would reply, "Well, this is the better time than never to get to know him. He will help you greatly."

Sometimes mothers and wives come into my confessional and complain, "Father, my husband use fowl language in front of our children, or he is so insensitive, or I caught him on the computer looking at something that he shouldn't have." And invariably I tell them, "As your penance, could you go over to the statue of St. Joseph, put your hand on his feet, and ask him to give your husband the necessary virtues to become better and holier husband and father?"

No wonder saints have relied on St. Joseph throughout our history. One in particular, St. Teresa of Avila found him to be her most important patron. She said,

"I took for my advocate and lord the glorious St. Joseph and commended myself earnestly to him...I am astonished at the great favors which God has bestowed on me through this blessed saint, and at the perils from which He has freed me, both in body and in soul...
I wish I could persuade everyone to be devoted to this glorious saint, for I have great experience of the blessings which he can obtain from God. I have never known anyone to be truly devoted to him and render him particular services who did not notably advance in virtue, for he gives very real help to souls who commend themselves to him...If anyone cannot find a master to teach him to pray, let him take this glorious St. Joseph as his master and he will not go astray."

Wow, if St. Teresa of Avila, who is one of the 13 Doctors of the Church, recommends St. Joseph to us, we do well to take her advice.

March 18, 2010: St. Joseph Academy School Mass

Ladies, you know that meeting the right guy is very important. Since this is the Feast of St. Joseph, who in the scripture was the Mr. Right Guy for Blessed Virgin Mary, I'd like to ask you what qualities of a guy makes him the Right Guy. I simply want you guys to say "Yes" or "No." Should Mr. Right guys be:

1. Humorous or funny?
2. Kind or sweet?
3. Honest or sincere?
4. Intelligent?
5. Respectful or considerate?
6. Keeps commitments?
7. Trustworthy or dependable?
8. Mature?
9. Good listener?
10. Attractive or good looking?

Ladies, of all the boys you dated in the past have any of you truly dated a guy who met all these criteria I called out? (Raise your hands) How long did that relationship last? (1, 3, 6 months, 1 year) Ladies, I also know that some of the boys you dated didn't quite meet all the criteria. You may have dated a guy who was inconsiderate, crude, foul-mouthed, unfaithful, undependable, selfish, unchaste, or untruthful. And some of you have been hurt from relationships like that. Right? It's times like that I get asked, "Fr. Paul, what can I do to overcome these hurts? I really don't want to date anymore. I fear I will meet a jerk like that previous one." So what advice do I give them?

Let me tell you in another way. Many men young and old come into my confessional. And inevitably they tell me that they fall short of being a good husband, a good father, or a good boyfriend. Do you know what I tell them as a penance? I tell them to go over to the statue of St. Joseph in the church, put their hand on his feet and ask St. Joseph to help them become the husband, the father, and the man that God the Father called them to be. Ladies, all of us men, including this priest, in someway fall short of Heavenly Father's calling for us to be holy, trustworthy, kind, humble, and loving men. What are we as men to do, other than be discouraged, give up, or continue to be men who fall short? That's where St. Joseph comes in.

Ladies, have you ever prayed to St. Joseph to help you to meet godly men? You should. He really does help. Ladies, have you ever prayed to St. Joseph to help make your present boyfriend more godly and more holy? You should. Many women who are married pray to St. Joseph to help their husband become better father, better husband, and better men. And they say St. Joseph's intercession is powerful. It's for that reason that the sisters here have asked St. Joseph to be the patron for their order.

What kind of qualities did St. Joseph have that made his marriage to Mary special? Let's read the most popular wedding reading from the First Corinthians. We can say that St. Joseph's love for Blessed Mother was: kind, patient, not jealous, does not boast, not proud, not rude, not seeking self-interest, not easily angered, and does not brood over injury. St. Joseph always protected Mary, trusted her, hoped in her, and persevered.

Ladies if you have not met a man like St. Joseph, ask St. Joseph to help you meet such a man. If you are currently dating a guy who is falling short in someway, ask St. Joseph to help him. And hold your boyfriend to the high standard, the high moral standards of St. Joseph that you would like to see in him. Don't settle for mediocrity. Ask St. Joseph for help.

March 16, 2010: Divine Mercy and St. Catherine of Siena

Last Tuesday, Fr. Miles began his homily with the following words that Jesus spoke to St. Faustina: "The greater the sin, the greater the Mercy of God.  The greater the sinner, the greater his right to partake from the infinite abyss of God’s Mercy." Hence, Fr. Miles spoke about Divine Mercy as Super-Abundant Satisfaction for Sin. We often wonder "How can God forgive me for truly unforgivable things that I dare not mention to priests in confessional?" Our Lord gives the following image to describe his mercy--the Ocean of Mercy, unfathomable in depth and in width that envelops the whole world. There is no sin which the Ocean of Mercy cannot wash away with giant tsunamis. I've been asked the past two weeks in confessional, "Father Paul, if God forgave me all of my past sins, why is it that they still come up in my mind and bother me? Have I truly been forgiven? Should I confess it again? "


This question is related to what I'm going to speak to you tonight. The topic is Divine Mercy as revealed to St. Catherine of Siena. We have been looking at how God's mercy was there at the very beginning of time starting with the Book of Genesis and then throughout the New Testament. In each generation, God desires for us to be able to understand his mercy, so he sends apostles of mercy. For our century, He sent St. Faustina. For the 14th Century, He sent St. Catherine of Siena.


St. Catherine was born in 1347 in Siena, Italy, to a very large family. Beginning at the age of six, she had a vision of Christ, and at age seven, she made a private vow of celibacy to Christ. At the age of 18, Catherine was admitted into the Dominican Third Order. Thereafter, Catherine began a most remarkable life of prayer, asceticism, literary output, and political activism. Because of her holiness, many bishops, cardinals, and even popes consulted her. At that time, the pope took his residence in Avignon, France instead of Rome. Catherine persuaded the Holy See to relocate back to Rome. For us, Catherine is well known for her great spiritual masterpiece, The Dialogue. The writings of this book was dictated by Catherine to three secretaries while she was in a state of mystical ecstasy over a period of five days (from Oct. 9-13, 1378). In her mystical experience, Catherine dialogs with Heavenly Father, and these dialogs she dictates to her secretaries. Although this mystical experience lasted only five days, it produced nearly 300 pages of document.


Let's go back to the question that some people were asking in my confessional: "Father Paul, why do my old sins still bother me if they have been forgiven?" To answer this question, let's look at one of the dialogs of Catherine with God. She said to the Heavenly Father, "O eternal Mercy, you who cover over your creatures' faults! It does not surprise me that you say of those who leave deadly sin behind and return to you: "I will not remember that you had ever offended me." If Heavenly Father is that generous in forgiving our sins, why does our forgiven sins still feel like thorns on our side, thorns on our conscience? For example, if a husband comes into confessional and asks for forgiveness for cheating on his wife, why does it still bother him after going to confession numerous times for the same forgiven sin?


One possibility is that we feel a guilt or a need to pay restitution for the damage and hurts that we have caused. Sin leaves behind broken hearts. And in the case of this husband, he sees how his infidelity still causes daily anguish in his wife and even in his children, for they have lost their trust in him. For the husband, he will have to carry this cross as a reminder and a reparation for his sin. If the husband feels that this reparation is not satisfied in this earthly life, he himself will feel compelled to satisfy it in Purgatory. In Anne the Lay Apostle's book "The Mist of Mercy," Anne tells how when a person dies and the soul meets Jesus, the soul will be shown the movie of his life. And this time, the soul will have the full truth, meaning he will know beyond the shadow of his doubt the impact of his own sin without self-deception or self-delusion. And it will be the soul who will accuse his own self; the soul tells Jesus, "Lord, I'm unfit to enter Heaven just yet. Let me spend some time in Purgatory praying for those whom I have hurt by my sins." Yes, God has forgiven his sins out of his generous mercy, but the soul, in a sense, has not forgiven himself because he realizes that he still needs to make reparation. By analogy, when a teenager breaks a neighbor's glass, he is glad that his dad paid to have glass replaced. Yet, the teenager feels compelled, out of love for his dad, to forgo his allowance for the next several months to in someway make reparation for what he has done, until the teenager feels satisfied he has done all he can.


Heavenly Father, as told to Catherine, desires for us to move to repentance not because of fear of divine punishment or not because of shame and disgust with ourselves, but because out of love for Jesus. We should be sorry because our sins have betrayed His great love for us and we have let him down. This is what's called "perfection contrition." How do we get to this "perfect contrition"? St. Catherine says it is vital to our spiritual health that we come to self-knowledge, especially knowledge of how dependent we are upon God for everything: for existence itself, and for the grace that sets us free from sin. We hear the echo of this in the Diary of St. Faustina where a sinful soul dialogs with Jesus:


Soul: Lord, I doubt that You will pardon my numerous sins; my misery fills me with fright.


Jesus: My mercy is greater than your sins and those of the entire world. Who can measure the extent of my goodness? For you I descended from heaven to earth; for you I allowed myself to be nailed to the cross; for you I let my Sacred Heart be pierced with a lance, thus opening wide the source of mercy for you. Come, then, with trust to draw graces from this fountain. I never reject a contrite heart. Your misery has disappeared in the depths of My mercy. Do not argue with Me about your wretchedness. You will give me pleasure if you hand over to me all your troubles and griefs. I shall heap upon you the treasures of My grace...Child, speak no more of your misery; it is already forgotten.  (Diary, no. 1485)

March 16, 2010: Staci Pepitone Funeral Homily

If you ever followed Staci on Twitter, here are some of Staci’s last thoughts:

• Nov. 19, 2009, “I’m at work...yay!”
• June 22, 2009, “I am very blessed to have not only good friends, but great friends. I couldn’t have come to my non-chemo status without you!”
• May 10, 2009, “Beautiful day, terrific mama-san, Celtics win. It's been a good day!
• Feb. 27, 2009, “Listening to ‘Bye Bye American Pie’ and waiting for the chemo to finish drippin'.
• July 8, 2009: “I want my stamina levels to magically come back to what they were...Making progress, but impatient!”

You can really hear Staci’s personality coming through even in her Twitters, right? Here is an interesting Twitter from April 27, 2009:

“To get something you never had, you must do something you never did...(makes sense, but tricker than it sounds.)”

Why did this quote struck a bell in Staci? Did it reflect how she wanted to live her life? The quote says, ‘You must do something you never did.’ What does it take for us to do something we never did? There is a lot of fear, isn’t there when we try to do something new. And isn’t there a lot fear when we try to get to know someone new, especially someone who falls outside of our comfort zone? So in order to get to know someone  new, in order to understand new, if not uncomfortable ideas, we have to stretch. So we must do something we never did, in order to get something new.

Isn’t this how Staci lived her life and how she challenged us to live? Her mother, Brenda (or aka Mama-San in her Twitter) told me that Staci had this sign hanging outside her apartment: “Be kind: Everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” Many years ago Staci was one of the first persons on LSU campus to bring AIDS quilt. She wasn’t instantly praised for this action; in fact she was criticized. But what was she challenging us to do? To be kind to another human person, all of whom Jesus loved unconditionally, who were battling and suffering not only their illness but stigma. Staci took Our Lord Jesus’ challenge seriously. How does Our Lord challenge us? In Matthew’s Gospel we read, “'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?' And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.' One of the great challenge as a Christian on this earthly life is to conform our heart to that of Jesus so that we can see and love as he did. Isn't that how Staci wanted to challenge herself and us?

Staci herself had to undergo severe suffering with illness, esophageal cancer, which eventually took her life. She chronicled her journey with her cancer on a website called, 'www.geauxpastcancer.org' In one of her entries she said this:

"I'm not wearing my wig anymore. It is getting warm in Louisiana and it was itchy and my sensibility won out over my vanity. I have little sproutlets of hair and it doesn't look great, but it feels better that is for sure! It only took me losing my hair 3 times to get to this spot. The other times, the wig was securely on my head for the smallest of trips outside the house...or for any visitors! Occasionally I get funny looks but no one has had the guts to say anything mean...I've had friends experience that. If they did, I'd have a snappy comeback."

One of the reasons why she wanted to share her cancer experience with the rest of the world was that she knew that cancer attacks not only our body but our place in our community. Once you announce that you have cancer, you don't get invited to many things anymore; your friends begin to think that you'll be too weak to be there. But moreover, they are fearful of uncomfortable conversations. So the person with cancer gradually gets left out of her usual support system. Staci said this on her website: "Cancer is scary, and it demands a lot of time, but I believe it doesn't have to control what kind of person I am. I'm optimistic and happy (most of the time) and cancer is never going to change that." I'm glad that last Friday, our local newspaper carried the story of Fr. Than Vu (the pastor of The Christ the King Catholic Church on LSU)
and his battle with cancer. Fr. Vu and Staci showed people that you can still be active and enjoy life living with cancer. Staci was remarkable in that those who encountered her did not know she was battling cancer, for she did not let her pain and suffering take her joy away.

So what was Staci's source of strength amid cancer and her gift to see the persons as they truly are rather than by their labels or appearances? Each weekend, Staci spent time before her true love, Our Lord Jesus Christ at mass. At each mass, Staci experienced for herself, how much Lord loved her and sacrificed for her. When she heard the priest pronounce the words, "Take this all of you and drink from it. This is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and for all so that sins may be forgiven. Do this in memory of me," she knew in that chalice was the blood of her beloved Christ, shed for her. Therefore, she listened intently and carried out what Lord asked her to do, just as St. Paul directed the Colossians in our Second Reading:

"Put on then, as God's chosen one, holy and beloved, heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if one has grievance against another; as the Lord has forgiven you, so must you also do...And let the peace of Christ control your hearts, the peace into which you were also called in one body...And whatever you do, in word or in deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him."

In your encounters with Staci, have you came across a person showed you compassion, kindness, gentleness, patience, and forgiveness? As Staci has put her Lord's words into action, so must you also put Our Lord's words into action.

March 14, 2010: 4th Sunday of Lent (C)

This week, I was asked to preside over one of more unusual memorial services for the deceased. The request came from Our Lady of Mercy School's second class. I walked in to the class, I noticed a small casket by the teacher's desk. That day, it was dark and raining, and the somber weather reflected the mood of the class. I began the memorial service thanking the Heavenly Father for sending our friend who is deceased now. I thanked the Father for reflecting His goodness in our friend. I then asked if some in the class could offer a prayer to the Heavenly Father for the deceased friend. A girl said, "We will miss you, Stanley." Another said, "I hope to see you in Heaven, Stanley." A boy said, "We're so sorry Stanley for overfeeding you." Another boy said, "We're sorry for shaking your aquarium." A girl said, "We're sorry for being so loud in the class and tapping on your glass." I looked over to what was once Stanley's house, and it was now empty. I walked over to his casket and blessed it. Stanley was wrapped in Bounty paper towel and placed in a weatherproof Ziploc bag. I think the kids finally had their closure in their grief.

As these kids have shown, there is something in us that tells us that our life goes beyond death. But how do we explain to these kids that death is not just about grieving. I was surprised that these kids already knew the answer; they said it matter-of-factly that Stanley the Fish was going to Heaven and that Jesus was going to welcome him. How did these kids have such profound understanding about death? Parents, if you ever wondered  what Catholic education is doing for your child, if you ever wondered where your hard-earned dollar is going to, what happened in that second grade class was a great testament. These kids understood about death because the Passion, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus were preached to them in class. Their Catholic education was preparing them to face bigger death and loss in their future.

What else did they learn from the death of Stanley the Fish? Death reminded the kids all the things they could have done and should not have done for Stanley. They could have treated Stanley better by not harassing him, but it was too late. They learned that time was a gift from God, and it can be squandered. In other words, it taught them what the Prodigal Son learned today in the gospel. Only when he squandered all of his inheritance from his father and ended up working with pigs, did the Prodigal Son come to his senses and say, "How many of my father’s hired workers have more than enough food to eat, but here am I, dying from hunger. I shall get up and go to my father and I shall say to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I no longer deserve to be called your son; treat me as you would treat one of your hired workers.”’

When the kids come inside the church, especially during Lent, they see the crucifix prominently displayed in the sanctuary. They learn that Jesus suffered and died for all of their sins, including the time they didn't treat Stanley the Fish with love. Yet looking at Jesus on the crucifix, they somehow know they have been forgiven for their sins. And there next to the crucifix is the tabernacle with the candle burning next to it. The kids learn that like the Prodigal Son's father, Jesus waits there for us to come back to him. He does not condemn us but waits for us. And how do we know that he'll forgive us? The light at the confessional is on for us. There in the confessional we'll hear what the Prodigal Son heard from his father: "Quickly bring the finest robe and put it on him; put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Take the fattened calf and slaughter it. Then let us celebrate with a feast, because this son of mine was dead, and has come to life again; he was lost, and has been found."

The other day I was speaking to a young man from another Christian denomination. He was going through some financial difficulties, and he was ready to give up on his faith in God. "Why," I asked. He said for the past year he has been praying daily and diligently for his finances to improve. Didn't God say in the scriptures, he said, ' Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you?' And God has not answered his request, for his finances has not improved. In someways, I find this kind of teaching at some churches disturbing. They call this the "Prosperity Gospel." We are in an economic downturn and countless faithful moms and dads and brothers and sisters are unemployed, suffering, and going to bed worrying if there will be food on the table for the family. Most of these folks are faithful, they are trusting God, and they are still suffering. The prosperity gospel (or the health and wealth gospel) teaches that God desires the material, spiritual, and physical prosperity of his people. To become prosperous, all one has to do is believe, receive, and act upon God's promises. An image that summarizes this is God as a vending machine. You put in a dollar, and you get a dollar worth of blessing back.

Yet didn't Jesus tell his followers to take up the cross every day and be ready to suffer? The crucifix in the sanctuary is a reminder that Jesus was crucified for us, and we are to follow his footsteps. The model shown to us in the scripture is the human who has died with Christ, died to self, died to everything we want, died to the world, and died to the flesh. On this Stewardship of Finance Sunday, when we ask from the pulpit that all of us give generously to the Church and to its mission, we are not promoting the vending machine model of God. Rather we are asking that we help keep the light on by the tabernacle and by the confessional to welcome any soul who wanders into this church to be welcomed into the Heavenly Father's arms once again. We are asking that we help proclaim Jesus' gospel by singing God's Divine Mercy and to help keep Jesus' heart to shine day and night in the adoration chapel to weary souls seeking some comfort from their suffering. And finally, we are asking us to help teach lessons to our children that even Stanley the Fish was a great gift from God and that death is not the final word.

Mar. 9, 2010: Fr. Miles Walsh - Divine Mercy Novena

Divine Mercy as Super-Abundant Satisfaction for Sin

Fr. Miles Walsh, Pastor of Our Lady of Mercy

The greater the sin, the greater the Mercy of God.  The greater the sinner, the greater his right to partake from the infinite abyss of God’s Mercy.  Those words and those sentiments, by the way, are not mine; they are the words and thoughts of Jesus Himself, confided to St. Faustina.  Two weeks ago, when I preached on Divine Mercy as the greatest attribute of God, I quoted Pope John Paul II to the effect that Mercy can indeed be said to be God’s greatest attribute in this sense, namely, that God became mercy solely for our sake.  In Himself, in the blessed communion of the three Divine Persons, God has no need for Mercy, for the simple reason that the Father does not need to be merciful to the Son or to the Holy Spirit, nor do the Son and Holy Spirit need to be merciful to the Father or to one another.  No, God became mercy for us because sinful and weak creatures though we are, He loves us with an unconditional love.  When man we disobeyed God and had no way of making satisfaction for our sin, He sent His own Son to suffer and die for our salvation.  And once He made that sacrifice for us–the Father giving us His only Son; the Eternal Son emptying Himself of glory to become flesh like us, even to the point of suffering and dying on the cross; the Spirit of God taking up His abode in the humble temple of our bodies and our souls–once God made this sacrifice for us, He desperately desired that we take advantage of His Mercy and immerse ourselves in it.  The Father wants us to approach Him through His Son.  He wants us to know and to trust Jesus Christ, who is His Mercy in human flesh, and He wants Jesus and the Holy Spirit to lead us to Him.  

Tonight I want to speak to you on Divine Mercy as Super-Abundant Satisfaction for Sin.  That phrase, “super-abundant satisfaction for sin,” comes from St. Thomas Aquinas, but it reflects a truth of Divine Revelation.  It also provides an answer to a question, an objection really, that many of us have often wrestled with, viz., how can God possibly forgive all our sins and give us a new beginning in life?  With so much water (so much bad water) under the bridge, how can the mercy of God ever make up for my sin and the sin of the whole world?  And yet the Church teaches us that as the eternal Son of God and as an infinite Person of the Godhead, Jesus more than made up for our sin by becoming man and by suffering and dying on the Cross.  Think about it–who among us could ever have imagined or fathomed that the remedy for our sin would be the incarnation, death, and resurrection of God’s beloved Son? As St. Paul says in  5:20: Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.  The greater the sin, the greater the mercy of God.  

Nine years ago, in 2001, I went on a pilgrimage to Poland.  Our group visited the tomb of St. Faustina, the birthplace of Pope John Paul, the shrine of Our Lady at Czestochova, but we also visited the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz.  Even by the most conservative estimates, more than 1,000,000 innocent people were put to death, with calculated cruelty, in that place. Infants were torn from their mothers’ arms; children were separated from their parents, experimented on, and killed; the old were exterminated; the young and the healthy were humiliated, starved, raped, beaten, worked almost to death, then poisoned with gas, their bodies incinerated in brick ovens.  There can be no earthly explanation for what happened in that place except for pure hatred of the human race.  Auschwitz was the very embodiment of a world apart from the mercy of God.  And yet tragically, it is not unique.  

We live in a world today in which our tax dollars are being used to procreate human life in laboratories for the sole purpose of medical experimentation and certain destruction; a world in which unborn children are put to death in their mothers’ wombs to spare us the inconvenience of their unwanted lives; a world in which bombs are dropped on civilian populations and justified as the inevitable cost of waging war; a world in which killing fields and the denial of the most basic human rights have abounded in places as disparate as China, Cambodia, Russia, South America, and the abortuaries of our own land; a world in which, in the hearts of many, money reigns as god.  Meanwhile, what has the world’s response been?  While Rome burns, so to speak, countless millions entertain themselves with internet pornography; others fill the void in their lives by turning to alcohol and drugs. Our movies and our films are rife with blasphemies and curses against God; and those who reject God are doing all in their power to banish prayer and the knowledge of God from the public square.  Much of the world is content simply not to be bothered, to remain ignorant of God and indifferent to Him.  

Is it any wonder that in our world today...God wants the message of His Divine Mercy to be known more urgently than ever before?  Is it any wonder that Jesus confided the message of Divine Mercy in a new and utterly compelling way to a humble Polish nun just before her death on the eve of the Second World War?  Is it any wonder that the Spirit of God inspired Christ’s Vicar on earth, a Polish Pope, John Paul II, to spread the message of  Divine Mercy throughout the world and to institute the feast of Divine Mercy at the dawn of this new third millennium?  Is it any wonder that the Spirit of God fills this church week after week, inviting us to a transformation of heart so that we can carry the message of God’s Mercy to the ends of the earth?  Imagine how much better our community would be...if six or seven hundred of us went out of this church as dedicated apostles of Divine Mercy.  God is pouring out His Mercy on the world in a super-abundant way today...for the simple reason that the world needs Divine Mercy as it has never needed it before.  Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.

Before I close tonight, I want to recommend a little booklet entitled, Why Mercy Sunday?, by Fr. George Kosicki. (Copies of this booklet for a donation of $5 will be available in the vestibule of the church after tonight’s Mass.)  Fr. Kosicki is one of the foremost apostles spreading the message of Divine Mercy in the world today, and in this little booklet he explains how our prayer at this novena is preparing us for the feast of Divine Mercy on octave day of Easter, a day when Jesus wants to pour out his super-abundant Mercy on us and on the whole world.  To accomplish that, Jesus must first lead us to repent and to unite our hearts to His Sacred Heart, so that we will be able to pray from the very depths of our souls:  Jesus, I trust in You!  

(Fr. Miles Walsh)

March 7, 2010: 3rd Sunday Lent (C)

(Click here for audio homily)
The last time I flew somewhere on an airplane, I took out the in-flight magazine from the seat pocket in front of me and thumbed through it. One of the photos captured my attention. It was a lush green golf course dotted with cactus trees in the middle of bone-dry Arizona desert surrounded by towering red boulders. Where did they get all that water, I wondered. And I wondered how large must be the groundskeeper staff to fight to keep that golf course looking that good every day. As I prayed with this Sunday's gospel, I thought how similar that golf course is to our soul. If lush green grass can be compared with a soul whose life is about self-giving, self-sacrifice, and virtues of humility, patience, kindness, and gentleness, then the dry cracked desert ground can be compared with a soul whose life is about self-absorption, selfishness, pride, rebellion, anger, lust, gluttony, envy, jealousy, and greed. As a fig tree cannot bear any fruit when the ground is cracked from drought, a soul likewise cannot experience any peace when he's preoccupied and self-absorbed with himself.

This week I saw on a video a priest giving a homily illustrating an example of a soul lacking any peace because of selfishness and vice--a soul who was like the cracked, dry desert. The priest said,

"I know a young man 11 years ago who was not a Catholic, who was not even a Christian, baptized Episcopalian when he was 10 years old. But his family never lived the faith. This young man did everything possibly imaginable from the ages of 12 to 21. You name it, he did it. He used every kind of drugs you can possibly imagine; alcohol was a given. Everything! Dropped out of high school. He was literally kicked out of a country for crimes of felony at the age of 14. He went to jail 3 times, twice in another country, once in Louisiana. He was once homeless, living in a tree trunk on macaroni and cheese and drugs. He had tatoos and long hair down to his waist, extremely foul mouthed. A word that described him was dead; his body may have been working, but his soul was dead in sin, because he never humbled himself to the Truth that can set free hearts of men. One day in 1992, this young man read a book at his mom's house, just returned from yet another unsuccessful drug rehab. The book was called, "The Queen of Peace Visits Medjugorje," and it rocked his world. At that time he was an avowed atheist. He opened the book, saw photos of kids staring at a direction of Blessed Virgin's apparition. He was drawn to it. When he finished that book at 4 in the morning, he knew he finally found the woman he was looking for. He wanted to give all of himself to this woman named Mary, even though he did not know who she was. Next morning, he ran to the Catholic chapel on the military base where his parents were living, found a Catholic priest, and began to unload. The priest was overwhelmed with this young man's confession. He had him wait in the back of the church so that he could say mass. A group of Filipino ladies were praying rosary in the front, and one lady turned around walked back to him and asked, "Young man, would you like to lead the next decade of the rosary?" She held in her hand what looked like a necklace, and he thought she was asking him to pray the next 10 years, for he has never heard of the words rosary, decade, or mass. He said no. When the mass began and when the part where the priest raised the host in the air saying, 'Take this all of you and eat it,' this young man knew by infusion of knowledge that it was Jesus, body, soul and divinity. The priest did not know what to make of this young man, so he gave him a picture of Sacred Heart of Jesus, Pope John Paul II, and a crucifix and told him to come the next day. This young man went home, got seven large garbage bags and went into his room. He bagan to tear down all the sinister posters he hung of Grateful Dead, emptied his drawers of drugs, and dark clothes. After he put out the full trash bags outside of the driveway, he hung the crucifix, the picture of Pope John Paul II, and the Sacred Heart. He knelt before the image of Sacred Heart, not knowing how to pray. But he folded his hands like the kids in the book he read the night before, and said to himself, "Okay, set. Ready." As he looked at that image of Sacred Heart, miraculously, he knew that this man who is in the picture was God-man who died for him and loved him. Tears of repentance flowed uncontrollably. He then slept like a baby. A while later, he was awakened by something sinister trying to grab him and his soul. He was seized with mortal fear. The only person he knew to cry to was Mary. So he cried out, "Mary!" Then that sinister presence vanished. Then he heard the most beautiful woman's voice, "Donny, I'm so happy."No one called him 'Donny,' except his mother, and he knew which mother it was.

The priest continued, "That experience changed everything in that young man's life. Everything! Even the addictions! Within in 8 months, he became a Catholic. Within a year, he joined a religious community, and he's never been to Medjugorje. But he's here now before you in Medjugorje, as a Roman Catholic priest, celebrating mass, for you. Yes, that young man is me. God has His ways. When we humble ourselves. God comes down and says, 'I want you to know Me and love Me passionately. All those times you pursued worldly things in your life with zeal and ardor and fervor. Yet now, turn to Me.'

As I listened to his homily and testimony, I could see the peace in his eyes. In the video old photos of himself was shown with his long hair, tattoos, and his eyes drooping and dead from all those abuse of drugs and sin. Yet as he stood there on the pulpit, looking so clean cut, giving that homily, you would have never known that he led such a life before. Fr. Donald Calloway's life is a testament to Heavenly Father who can change a dead, lifeless cracked desert into a lush green patch of life. As Fr. Calloway closed his homily he said this to us. "Friends, these are days of God's grace. Don't let His grace pass you by. If you are dead to sin, come to Jesus. May be you have never confessed some things. Unburden yourself. Go to Jesus. Go to confession. May be you got shameful things on your soul, shameful things you never confessed. Go to Jesus. Jesus is the Divine Mercy. There is nothing that falls outside of His shadow of His Cross. Nothing. Go to Him. Lay it all out. Let the tears flow if you are given that gift."

Mar. 2, 2010: Divine Mercy in the New Testament

(Click here for audio homily)
Last Tuesday at the Divine Mercy Novena mass, Fr. Miles spoke about mercy as God's greatest attribute. Fr. Miles said, "because there is no sinfulness or lack of love in God, the Father does not need to be merciful to the Son or to the Holy Spirit, nor do the Son and Holy Spirit need to extend mercy to the Father or to one another. The Mercy of God is only expressed in relationship to us, because we need it, because we would perish without it." An image I have of this is a party at home for adults where they are chatting away and having a great time. The moment a small child slips out of his bedroom into the living room in his pajama looking for his mama, all the adults, all of a sudden stops talking, become captivated by his littleness. Some will inevitably stoop down to the little boy's eye level, to comfort him and and to attend to his every need. When we hear that God is All-powerful, All-knowing, and All-justice, we may get the impression that we cannot approach Him. Yet for the Heavenly Father, we are that little child; He stoops to our littleness and gazes at us with His loving compassion. This is the mercy that God shows us, His children.

This is the precisely the image that Jesus reveals about Heavenly Father in the New Testament. It begins with Jesus, the Almighty God, the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, who arrives in an obscure little town to a teenager, resting in a manger fit for animals. God becomes little for us, small enough for us to hold him in our arms, small enough for us to hold him in our hands during communion. I'm touched during Christmas season when the little children kneel at the Nativity scene, pick up the little statue of Baby Jesus and hold him in their arms. Imagine, a God who is so small and cute that even little children find themselves irresistible to hold. How approachable God is for us!

This approachable God in turn, touches us with his hands and with his words in person, not from a long distance. Often when Jesus healed, he touched the ears so that they may be opened, he touched the eyes so they may see, and he laid his hands on the person who was sick or dying. When someone approached him for healing, he looked at the person with his eyes Even after he ascended to heaven, Jesus made sure that his healing touch and his words were delivered in person by his disciples. God who in Old Testament seemed so distant, is now so near us, in flesh. Even if he does not seem physically present to us, he sends us as his hands, his feet, his mouth, to make present his great mercy for us. I was reminded of this, this afternoon at the hospital. I was at the Baton Rouge General Hospital at Bluebonnet; I came out of the room after anointing someone, and then a lady approached me if I could anoint her father who was dying. When I entered the room her father was near death. I noticed that a small cloth relic of Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos was safety-pinned to his gown. I thought to myself that this was not a coincidence. I took out of my bag, a cross with a First Class Relic of Father Seelos embedded on it, and laid it on his chest. I told the family what it was, and the daughter who asked me to come began to cry. She said, "Before I left Texas on a plane this morning, I asked Fr. Seelos to send angels to my dad to escort him to heaven." Jesus truly cared about her dad that he himself came personally, in the person of this priest, to give him the Last Rites and to escort him home.

The New Testament shows this compassionate God who searches for those who are lost. For Jesus, not a single one of us is a number lost among the multitude. Jesus tells us that God is searching for that one sheep lost among the 99 sheep, that one coin lost among the many already in possession. Why? Because each soul is a pearl of a great price. Each soul is purchased at an enormous price of the suffering and death of Jesus who searched for their souls high and low.

Take the Samaritan woman at the well, whose restless heart thirsts for comfort and love, in all the wrong places, seeking them in relationships with various men. She finally finds her thirst quenched in Jesus who offers her Holy Spirit whose water does not leave her thirsting again. In Jesus, she encounters God who does not condemn her, but listens with compassion and leads her gently to conversion of heart. That is God's mercy.

Not single one of us have come to this mass by accident. Each of us has been invited by Jesus, even I. Jesus tells me, Paul, I want you to open your heart to me. Will you answer my invitation? I invited in that Samaritan woman thirsty for lasting and true love, I invited Peter who denied me, I invited Saul who persecuted me, and I invited Judas who betrayed me. No sin is too grave for me to abandon you. Yet it is you who hide from me and abandon me because of your shame and guilt from your sins. Come and meet Me in the confessional. I have asked my holy servants to patiently wait in the confessionals to welcome you back, to forgive your sins, and to heal you from your hurts. Run back to me like the Prodigal Son. I who am the loving Father is standing on a hill, anxiously looking out for your return. I am waiting here with your ring, ready to put it on you and to celebrate your return. Please return to Me.

Feb 23, 2010: Fr. Miles Walsh - Divine Mercy Novena

God's Greatest Attribute is Mercy

Fr. Miles Walsh, Pastor of Our Lady of Mercy

You may have noticed in this week’s bulletin that the topic of our reflection for this third night of our Divine Mercy Novena is: Mercy, God’s greatest attribute. During this fifth year of our Divine Mercy Novena, Fr. Paul and I are taking turns preaching on nine themes relating to the message of Divine Mercy; those nine themes, in turn, have been chosen from a series of talks given by Dr. Robert Stackpole, who is the director of the John Paul II Institute of Divine Mercy in Stockbridge, MA. Tonight I’d like to take up where Fr. Paul left off last week, when he preached on the message of Divine Mercy as it is revealed in the OT, in the Book of Genesis, at the very dawn of salvation history. Fr. Paul made the point that while the Mercy of God is not as clearly revealed in the OT, as it is in the New, when God sent His Son into the world to reveal His Mercy in a way that exceeded all of mankind’s hopes, expectations, and desires...nevertheless the message of Divine Mercy is indeed present in the book of Genesis and the other books of the OT. In fact, contrary to the belief in some quarters that the God of the OT is a stern Judge, who punishes man’s sinfulness with justice but without mercy, if you examine the account of our first parents’ sin, you see that God acts with justice but also with tenderness and mercy. E.g., when Adam and Eve sinned and immediately became ashamed of their nakedness and tried to hide from God, the Lord sought them out and fashioned leather garments for them, so they would not be so ashamed (Gen. 3:21.) And even though he sadly told them that their sin would bring about the inevitable consequence He had warned them of–namely, exile from paradise and the curse of death–God also promised in Gen. 3:15 to send a Savior who would redeem mankind from sin and death. In that verse of Scripture, God says to Satan, the tempter of man: I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your offspring and hers. He will strike at your head, while you strike at his heel. This verse, which is known as the proto-evangelium, or the first announcement of the Good News, is also the first proclamation of Divine Mercy, which will one day be fully revealed in Jesus Christ.

Speaking about the mercy of God revealed in Genesis, Fr. Paul left us with a quote from St. Faustina’s diary in which Our Lord Jesus compares the soul of the one who comes to Him with a contrite heart, with a heart filled with sorrow for sin but a heart also filled with trust in his Mercy, to a little child who knocks at a door, trembling and in tears, asking for a piece of bread, lest he or she die of starvation. When Jesus asked Faustina what she would do in such a situation, she responded, I would give that child not only a piece of bread but a thousand times more. And Jesus promised her, That is how I treat your soul. And He promises that He will pour out His mercy upon any soul who comes to Him with a humble, trusting and contrite heart, asking for His mercy. He will give us a thousand times more than we ask.

In fact, no less an authority than Pope John Paul II wrote in his encyclical, God is rich in Mercy, that God’s mercy is his greatest attribute, and in this affirmation, he is joined by both St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas. That affirmation, by the way, brings up a philosophical problem. According to our Catholic theological tradition, God is, by definition, the only infinitely perfect Being. His goodness, His power, His wisdom, His mercy, and His love are all simply names or descriptions of God, and because God is both simple and infinitely perfect in being, then theoretically, one attribute of God cannot exceed another in perfection. If God is infinitely perfect, how can His Mercy be more perfect ...than His Wisdom, His Justice, His Goodness, or Power? Does perfection admit degrees? And the answer is: God’s Mercy is His greatest attribute in this sense–it is the expression of God’s perfection specifically for us! Mercy is his greatest attribute for us! (Let me explain.)

St. John tells us that God is Love. God is, was, and ever will be eternal love even apart from our being. If God had chosen to not to create us, if he had never created the universe in which we live, He would still be eternally perfect in His love, His wisdom, His goodness, and His power, but there would be no Mercy in Him because there would be no need for Mercy. From all eternity, God the Father loves the Son, and the love between Father and Son generates the Holy Spirit. Yet because there is no sinfulness or lack of love in God, the Father does not need to be merciful to the Son or to the Holy Spirit, nor do the Son and Holy Spirit need to extend mercy to the Father or to one another. The Mercy of God is only expressed in relationship to us, because we need it, because we would perish without it. Without us in the picture, God would still be all-good, just, wise, powerful and loving within Himself, within the communion of three divine Persons we call the Holy Trinity. Yet once we come upon the scene, finite and sinful creatures that we are, we need a God who is not only just and loving, but a God who is Merciful as well. Even in the very act of creating us, God acts mercifully, by bringing us out of nothingness into existence. And once we had sinned, God acted in an even more merciful way by sending His Son to suffer, die and rise for our salvation. That’s why we human beings can say the Mercy of God is His greatest attribute, because in the Incarnation of Christ He literally becomes Mercy for us!

I don’t know about you, but that humbles me in a profound way, and it also assures me that I can trust in Him. No wonder God wants us to trust in His Mercy–He has become Mercy for us. No wonder He has told us to become like the little child begging for a crust of bread and to pray with utter confidence: Jesus, I trust in You!

Feb.9, 2010: Fr. Miles Walsh - Divine Mercy Novena Mass

Overview of St. Faustina's Life

Fr. Miles Walsh, Pastor of Our Lady of Mercy

First of all, I want to take this opportunity again to welcome all of you to the first night of our fifth annual, nine-week Divine Mercy novena! I don’t know about you...but I’d rather be here in our nice, warm church than standing on Canal Street on the parade route in New Orleans.

Of course, tonight we do thank God for the great victory of the New Orleans Saints. You know, a lot of prayer and a lot of faith and hard work went into the Saints’ Super Bowl victory, and I can’t help but think that the Who Dat nation received a little divine help. The papers reported that Archbishop Hannan, who is 96 years old and who was present when the Saints were created, was a guest of Saints owner, Tom Benson, in his box in Miami, along with the new Archbishop, Greg Aymond and two Dominican nuns...and it did seem that Drew Brees was inspired when he said that destiny was on our side this year. Someone on TV noted that Saints fans waited 43 years for a Super Bowl victory, longer than the time the Israelites spent in the desert, but that now, just like the Israelites of old, they have entered the Promised Land.

And yet the truth is-- what we are asking of God tonight...and what God Himself has promises us through His Son, Jesus Christ, tonight, is much greater than a Super Bowl victory, and it’s being offered to each and every one of us who is here tonight...What God is offering us is a new beginning in our relationship with Him...and a much deeper and more perfect communion with Him. It doesn’t matter where you were in your relationship with God when you entered the doors of this church tonight–I assure you...if you spend the next nine weeks praying this novena with us, and if you open your heart, beginning right now, to Jesus Christ, God will make you new...He will change your life! By the way, that’s not a promise Miles Walsh is making to you, it’s a promise Jesus Himself is making, and He asks you to trust in Him! Jesus wants to offer you a grace that some have called a kind of “second baptism,” a cleansing of mind and heart that is a unique gift indeed. And we’ll be saying more about that as the weeks go on.

I’d like to ask: how many of you are here for the first time tonight? Like many of you, I am here for the fifth year in a row, and each year, the message of Divine Mercy goes deeper and deeper into my heart and my soul. So if you’ve made this novena before, and you find that you’re still spiritually stubborn and have a long way to go, don’t worry–this may be the year for you, just like the New Orleans Saints. In fact, I’m going to step out on a limb, like Drew Brees, and make a prediction that God has something new and unique in mind for us all.

This year, Fr. Paul and I are going to alternate preaching and presiding. Next Tuesday, Fr. Paul will be preaching about the message of Divine Mercy in the OT, promised at the very dawn of salvation history, and the week after that, I’ll be speaking about the message of Divine Mercy as it is revealed through J.C., in the NT, but tonight, as a beginning orientation, I’d like to say something about the person who was chosen by Jesus to spread the message of Divine Mercy in our own time, St. Faustina.

You see, when God was looking for someone to spread the good news of His mercy in our age, which is so desperately in need of God’s presence, He chose one of the most humble and obscure souls, but also one of the holiest souls on the face of the earth. St. Faustina was born in Poland in 1905, and the name given to her at birth was Helena Kowalska. She was one of ten children born into a very poor but faith-filled family, and from a very early age she manifested the signs of a very profound friendship with Christ. At the age of seven, she experienced the call to religious life, and Jesus revealed to her that He wanted her as His bride. Yet because she was one of the oldest of the ten children in her family, her parents needed her to help care for and support her younger siblings. They could not afford to send her to school, so when she was 14 they hired her out as a housekeeper, to work in other people’s homes. Four years later, when she was 18, an extraordinary event occurred. She went to a dance one night, and as she was dancing with a boy, Our Lord appeared, in the flesh, at her side. He appeared to her bruised and beaten, as He was during His passion, and He said to her, “How long will you put me off?” A good question. I’m sure that many of us, in our own hearts, have heard the Lord addressing that very same question to us. Helena was frightened, and leaving the dance, she ran to the nearest church, knelt before the tabernacle in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, and promised the Lord she would do whatever He asked of her.

To do that, she had to run away from home. She borrowed money for a train ticket to Krakow from an uncle, and once in Krakow, a city she had never visited before, she began to knock on convent doors. No one would take a penniless, uneducated peasant girl into their community, until she knocked on the door of the convent of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy (a convent which shared the same name as our own church) and there Helena was welcomed. Hearing her story, a wise mother superior told her to go into the convent chapel and to ask the Master of the House, if he wanted her to live there. When Helena returned some time later, she told the superior that Jesus had said, “Yes.”

I won’t go into the all the details of Sister Faustina’s life tonight, but we will return to Faustina in weeks to come. Suffice it to say that the risen Lord would appear to her many times before her death in 1938, at the age of 33, just in the way we see Him in His Divine Mercy tonight. And he would appoint her to bring the message of Mercy to us. I’d like to leave you with this thought. In a few moments, Jesus will become present to us in the Sacrament of the Altar, in the Sacrament of His Body and Blood. We will kneel before Him, and He will speak to the heart of each and every person who is here. Our Lord is going to put to each of us the same question he put to Faustina: How long will you put me off? Let us pray for the grace to respond, as St. Faustina did, Jesus, I am ready to do whatever you tell Me to do. Jesus, I trust in You!