Christmas Mass of Shepherds – (Cycle B) – December 24/25 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

What really brings us to this temple today? Why is it that every year at this time the streets of our cities are empty, that there are fewer cars on the roads, that so many temples, which seem too spacious on most Sundays, are now overcrowded. What means that even those who are not used to bothering God on a daily basis, today feel free to sing “Lulajże Jezuniu” or … at the top of their voices. Is it just a matter of tradition, childhood memories, the unique mood of this “silent and holy night”? Although the tiredness of the pre-Christmas rush and the experiences of Christmas Eve are not conducive to reflection, let us consider for a moment what Christmas is really about. Not the commercial one, which has been going on in advertising and supermarkets for weeks, but the real one, which we are starting today.

It is not easy to discover the true meaning of Christmas at a time when it has become one of the most attractive goods for sale, from which you can make great money. It is also not easy to extract the content of Christmas from beyond the screen of folklore and easy sentimentality, idyll and lights. At the center of Christmas is an event that changed the history of the world. Christmas, however, is not only about remembering something that happened a long time ago. It is, above all, “Good News” addressed to all of us. It must include the wonder of faith that comes from the realization that “the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger” is “the Savior and our God”, the One who became man for us and for our salvation. The true meaning of what happened in Bethlehem is revealed to us by St. Paul in the second reading of the Mass: “The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all people.”

Every Christmas tells us about the extraordinary and incomprehensible closeness of God. He reminds us that the Child “wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger” is truly Emmanuel – “God with us.” How is it possible for the One who has existed for centuries to be born? How is it possible that the Creator and Lord of the universe comes to earth in poverty and abandonment? – Saint Paul tells us: “For your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich.” The “Lord of great majesty” became man out of love for us.

There is no Christmas without faith. To recognize the presence of “God with us” and allow Him to act in our lives requires something of the attitude of shepherds. First of all, an attitude based on simplicity and faith. They were the first to believe that the Baby in the manger was the awaited Messiah, the Redeemer of the world. What they heard was so important to them that they set out without the slightest delay. Certainly, they were also driven by curiosity, but above all by being moved by a great matter that had been announced to them, small and insignificant people. Shepherds teach us to put God first. They teach us inner freedom, capable of putting other activities into the background – no matter how important they are – in order to go to God and let Him enter our lives. Today, for so many people, the things of God are no longer important. On the list of the most important things, God is often at the bottom. Today, many Christians have problems with the truth about God being close to them. It is difficult for them to come to terms with the closeness of God that goes beyond imagination. Often we also prefer to deal with a distant God, standing at a safe distance, with a God who does not interfere too much in our affairs. We also sometimes dream of a powerful Savior, some kind of magician who will finally solve all our difficulties in one stroke. God, who comes to us once again in the mystery of Christmas, will not impose His presence on anyone, just as He did not impose himself on the inhabitants of the houses in Bethlehem, who did not open the doors on the night of His coming into the world. He only expresses a burning desire to come to each of us. And He will come if you let Him. In a moment, while reciting our “Confession of Faith”, we will genuflect to the well-known words: “He descended from heaven for us, men, and for our salvation, and became man.” When saying these words, let each of us do it with a sense of great gratitude and think only of ourselves: It was for me, truly, that God became man.

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IV Sunday of Advent – (Cycle B) – December 24, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

We talk about faith in different ways. Some of us with less, some with greater ease. The problem is that it is much more difficult to say “I believe” than to talk about faith.
As long as we stay on the surface of more or less theoretical considerations about matters of faith or ask about the lives of others and about things that do not directly affect our personal lives, talking about faith comes relatively easily to us; anyway – who knows – maybe it’s just a conversation about religion… A real conversation about faith is a decision to – like Mary – let God enter our lives and change literally everything in it. Cross the border of the impossible.

When we read in today’s Gospel that “nothing is impossible for God”, perhaps it is worth realizing that exceeding the impossible is often achieved in completely different ways than those we imagine. The impossibility associated with the lack of a husband is only a shadow that impossibility that was transcended when God decided that “a virgin would conceive and bear a Son” and that He, born of a woman, would be “great and called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God would give Him the throne of His father David, and His dominion there will be no end.”

Christ the Lord entered our human world completely unexpectedly and not in the way a person could imagine. Although, He was expected, He showed up unexpectedly. While the world expected the triumphant appearance of the Messiah, He came in the mystery of our humanity and in all the simplicity of human birth. Although one could have expected an enthusiastic welcome, it turned out that the door was closed to Him.
The greatest impossibility that God exceeds and that He forces us all to overcome is the unimaginable, incomprehensible and exceeding all human expectations truth that God took on a human body from Mary and became a man.

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III Sunday of Advent – (Cycle B) – December 17, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

The very titles of the TV programs with the word “show” in the foreground – or at least in the subtext – reveal the dominant method. Namely, it is about creating idols, winners, successful people who, thanks to television, have made a career and become the audience’s favorites. All this, of course, is an excellent sell, but unfortunately few people realize that these “favorites” lead their admirers nowhere…

Whenever I return to the figure of St. John the Baptist, I am moved by his ability to remain in the background. In everything he does, one thought always stands out: He must increase and I must decrease. St. John doesn’t want to keep anything to himself. He doesn’t want to be anyone’s favorite. His only desire is to prepare the way of the Lord. So that Jesus could come and find everything ready to receive the Good News.

This must be treated as a challenge for our times. In a world that creates idols in order to use their faces, behaviors and ways of dressing to arouse new needs and create fashions that will bring huge profits, it is necessary to be able to distance oneself from this extremely strong pressure – first from the media and, consequently, also from society.

There are many important issues that we can care about and strive for. Having the right talents and recognizing the tasks to which God calls us, we must undertake them with full responsibility. However, we cannot forget that we are not supposed to lead people to ourselves and not our own way. Like St. John the Baptist and many other people of God, we must take responsibility for others, i.e. lead them.

III Sunday of Advent – (Cycle B) – December 17, 2023 Read More »

II Sunday of Advent – (B) – December 10, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

“Comfort, comfort my people!” – with these words God calls us to comfort His nation in Babylonian captivity. What is a consolation? In the Holy Scripture it is never a downplaying of a difficult situation, an empty statement like: “Cheer up, it’s not that bad.” God, comforting a man, takes him in His arms, offers him closeness, binds his wounds, heals him, and stays with him in pain. God’s consolation is reconstruction, creation anew. The German theologian, Karl Rahner expressed it this way: “Consolation is for the believer the gift of experiencing that the love of God in Christ sustains every life, even those that seem to be astray or falling into ruin.” God, bringing comfort, enters the very center of human sadness and desperation, descends to the very bottom of our “pits” and awakens hope in us. He who is Emmanuel, God-with-us, strengthens us “when the nights are sleepless, when the days are powerless”, when “we scream, we are silent, we chase the dawn” (Peter du Chateau).

Every person needs consolation to gain new strength and not to escape from the helplessness of others. However, when comforting others, we experience all our helplessness and powerlessness. We are entering situations where not words, but silently staying with someone is the only and true consolation. We learn that there is no comfort in those who are prone to uttering platitudes that do not heal but hurt even more. The one who can truly console us is the one who, in the darkness, in the middle of “too night” (Peter du Chateau), saw the light of hope lit by God.

The prophet from today’s first reading found himself in a similar situation. God ordered him to preach words of comfort. We know that he followed this call, but he certainly had to carry with him the burden of the fragility of his own faith and the narrowness of his heart. What to do when, in the face of suffering, depression and doubt, words do not come out of our mouths? We must believe deeply that God also works through the imperfections of human words and gestures. This is rarely done in a spectacular way. God works most often in secret: in the privacy of our sensitive hearts.  Advent announces that God who comforts comes to people in the person of Jesus Christ.  He is all our comfort.

II Sunday of Advent – (B) – December 10, 2023 Read More »

I Sunday of Advent – (B) – December 3, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

Every year, Advent makes us realize that once again we have become too attached to this world and have become too embedded in the present. We have forgotten that this world will come to an end and that nothing will remain as it is. Advent makes us look and look into the future. It is, like the present, full of both light and darkness.

But our future is Jesus Christ! He is the One who came and who will come again; He is the One who continually comes. And Christians are waiting for His day, His Advent. Advent means: coming, coming of God to man. God meets us: He gives us the present, the present time as a time of grace, as a path to the future. “I am the way,” says Jesus, the Incarnate God who entered our reality. Advent reminds us that Christians are people full of gratitude and blessed impatience. As Saint Paul says, we are to be grateful for the gifts of the Spirit: for faith and hope in the “revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.” We should wait impatiently for His coming, we should go out to meet Him and pursue Him persistently. And the degree of our holy impatience depends on the greatness of our faith and love. Their everyday testimony is faithfulness. Can someone be faithful who almost never puts off meeting the Lord until after a saint “NEVER”?

Advent calls us to vigilance: “Be careful and watch, for you do not know when this time will come,” says today’s Gospel. To be vigilant means to see clearly the reality in which we live and the reality towards which we are heading. It is Christ who is already among us in His word, sacrament and brother.

Advent announces that God is close, very close. You can meet Him. We, humans have no yardstick with which to measure His immeasurability; we have no hands to grasp Him; we do not have concepts that could capture His essence and help us understand Him. But He gave us a heart capable of seeking and finding Him. God is close, although hidden.

The time of Advent, which begins today, calls us to return to God’s ways, so that the coming Lord will not find us lost in the wilderness, in dark alleys and blind paths.

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XXI Sunday in Ordinary Time – (A) – August 27, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

What a pity that we so rarely, I think, ask ourselves this question today; who is Jesus Christ to me? If we thought about it more often, our lives would look different.

Sometimes a provocation is needed to ask such questions. Jesus did it directly. First, He asked about popular opinions, about the so-called human talk. You can clearly see how superficial and unreliable it is. People are always looking for sensation. If a gossip is fancier and less plausible, the more it listens and spreads more easily. This is probably not a coincidence. In this way, by means of basically absurd slander, we release ourselves from responsibility, or at least from a more serious discussion and our own thoughts. It is an easy and cheap way to justify your thoughtlessness, carelessness, stupidity and sins.

Therefore, a mature and wise man never stops at hurdles and human opinions, but tries to form his own opinion and judgement, at least in the most important life issues. There is enough data for that. The apostles were especially competent to give a credible answer to the question of the identity of Jesus: they stayed with Him constantly, listened not only to the instructions for the crowds, but also to the explanations for the initiates, they saw and knew more than others. And here’s Simon’s correct answer. But it was not just the result of human observation and deduction. Simon’s statement was a confession of faith having its source in God. This fundamental belief was inspired by the Holy Spirit. Simon said this without being fully aware of what he was saying. He uttered the formula without fully understanding of its meaning. In fact, we’ll never fully understand it. We are limited in understanding, but all the more we can and should trust in our faith. Simon, and then Peter, is the embodiment of this faith, he is the rock to which the Church constantly refers, because God Himself gave Peter this function.

But then should we appeal to this confession, since it is not our own, since it can only be regarded as someone else’s opinion? Isn’t the uncritical repetition of Peter’s sentence also the reproduction of gossip and human talk? It’s just that it shouldn’t be. We would refer not only to the repetition of words from 2000 years ago, but that we explore these words, look for their meaning – first original, and then modern, related to our lives. This process of seeking understanding is also inspired by the Holy Spirit. And it is He who guarantees us the credibility of our knowledge, and the Church watches over us so that we do not go astray.

XXI Sunday in Ordinary Time – (A) – August 27, 2023 Read More »

XIX Sunday in Ordinary Time – (A) – August 13, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

The Apostles, staying in a boat in the middle of the lake certainly didn’t expect to witness an unusual phenomenon. Behold, as it was beginning to down, they saw in the distance the figure of a man who was walking towards them on the water. Terrified, they began to scream, but then they heard the voice of the Master: Do not be afraid!

In our lives, such a situation may never happen, but it often happens that we too have a problem with recognizing God who comes to us. Without looking far, we can ask ourselves: Do I see God’s presence in the Sacred Scripture and in the Eucharist? Do I see Him in my problems and difficulties, as well as in other people? It is a presence so discreet that we may not even notice it. It is said that modern man has lost the sense of the sacred, sanctity. But without God, we won’t get far. There will always be some “water” to be crossed, and then human calculations will be useless. The only strength capable of overcoming even the greatest difficulties is faith and trust in God.

As long as Peter looked into Jesus’ eyes and trusted Him, he walked on the water, but as soon as he looked away from Him and began to analyze his situation, he began to sink.

The Bible teaches that nothing is impossible for God. Perhaps for this reason, He demands difficult and demanding things from us, because contrary to our feelings, He never leaves us alone. He always extends His helping hand to us and rushes to our rescue.

XIX Sunday in Ordinary Time – (A) – August 13, 2023 Read More »

XV Sunday in Ordinary Time – (A) – July 16, 2023

Frackville, From the Pastor /

The key to the proper reading of today’s Gospel is one word: to understand. The Word of God, if it is to bear fruit in our lives, must first be well understood. Maybe here lies the answer to our various doubts and frustrations related to the fruitlessness of faith? The lack of understanding of the word of God means that the effects of preaching the Gospel cannot be seen.

This understanding of the word of God doesn’t have to rely on intellectual learning and linguistic and theological analyses. On the contrary: it is about trusting and humbly accepting what God has hidden from the learned and revealed to the simple. To understand the word of God means to first grasp its essential meaning, that is the Good News about salvation, about who and how it was accomplished; about God’s love, which is expressed through mercy, and about how to respond to this love. The word of God received in this way bears fruit.

Therefore, two factors are needed: the effort of the sower who preaches the word, and the effort of the hearer who receives the word. The word itself is a reliable factor, perfect, because it comes directly from God, it has an objective value, an absolute truth. The sowing of preaching the word of God should be abundant, even lavish. This task already belongs to bishops and priests, although to some extent also to lay people, who should bear witness to faith with their own lives. It will depend on our joint commitment, prayer, zeal and dedication whether the word of God will reach people’s hearts in a clear and convincing way or not.

But despite the zeal of the witnesses of the Gospel, this is not always the case. There is still the human factor in the listeners – that is, indifference or bad will; and obstacles from the world and Satan. Jesus loyally warns about them. Man is free and responsible for his decisions – good or bad. The quality of life, and ultimately salvation, depends on human choices and consequences. Therefore, we must be aware of the difficulties in order to be able to resist them.

First, we must understand the word of God; its promises, exhortations, instructions, understand who is its author and addressee. Without understanding, there will be no effect. Then we have to learn how to transform feelings into decisions and their persistent implementation. Momentary enthusiasm is not enough if it is not followed by concrete actions. It is known that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. And finally, we have to be resistant to temptations, stresses, fears and threats. God is stronger than all of this. If we trust Him, our faith will bear fruit in this life and the next.

XV Sunday in Ordinary Time – (A) – July 16, 2023 Read More »