Tuesday, October 31, 2006

Dem Bones (All Saints Homily)

Perhaps you noticed something different at Mass today.
Did you notice something placed

at the foot of the altar?
These are relics of various saints!

A “relic” is part of the saint’s body—
such as a piece of a bone.
You might wonder,

why do we have something like that?

You have to go way back in time—
like the cartoon on TV!—

to the beginning of the Church:
to the first 100 years after Jesus rose from the dead.

Right after Jesus came back from the dead,
people began facing persecution for following the Lord,

and it wasn’t long before the government
started killing people for believing Jesus is Lord.

They killed St. James the Apostle within a few years.
And there were many others who died,
rather than deny that they saw and knew Jesus,
rather than deny he is the Son of God,
the Savior of the world.

When those people died for the Lord,
those who remained were very careful
to gather their bodies and honor them.

And because Christians had to hide,
one of the places they would hide was underground.
The Romans would bury their dead
in caves underground—
and that’s where the first Christians would gather.

The priests and people would gather underground,
and there, they would celebrate Mass together.
They would celebrate Mass

So you can see why it would be important
to remember those martyrs, and to honor their bodies.

And up here, we have a little part
of the bodies of the following saints:
Sts. John and Thomas; Sts. Philip and Bartholomew,

St. Boniface, our patron,
St. George (who has a window over there),
St. Theresa Avila, St. Alphonsus,
and St. Francis Cabrini—an American saint.

There’s another reason

we honor the bodies of saints—
because we honor the bodies of everyone
who follows the Lord.
When someone dies, we have a funeral—
and we honor the body because God created it,
and God has promised to raise our bodies again,
at the end of time.

Did you see how I used incense

at the beginning of Mass,
to honor the memory of all the saints?
At a funeral, we use incense

very much the same way.

You see, when you and I honor

and remember the saints,
we are honoring what God is doing—
not only in their lives,
but what he is doing in our lives as well!

Because as many saints as there are—
and no one knows how many—

Do you know who is supposed to join them?
You and I are!
God has called each of us to be a saint:

every one of us!

In the first reading, you heard a number: 144,000.
But then, you heard it say:
“a great multitude which no one could count.”

A lot of Christians died in the early years,
But do you realize, in 2,000 years,
there has never been a time when Christians
have not faced persecution and death?
in Cuba, people are persecuted, sometimes killed,
for following Jesus.

You and I aren’t facing that.
But we are still asked to be faithful.
And there may be times we wonder,

"Why does it matter?"

The bits of bone up here remind us
that our lives do come to an and.
The question is, what will our lives be for?
When our life has ended, where will we be?

That may seem faraway when you’re young;
But as you get older,
the psalm we prayed means a lot more:

Every saint who lived and died,

longed to see his face;
those first Christians did see his face—
and they remained faithful

so they would see him again.

you too come to long to see his face.
When you know his forgiveness;
When he guides you with his Holy Spirit,
You long to see his face, in heaven, forever.

Many live their lives without thinking much about God.
I don’t know what will become of them.
But you and I know what we hope for:
We have hope in Jesus Christ, who died and rose;
and to those who follow him, he said:
“Rejoice and be glad,
for your reward will be great in heaven.”


Anonymous said...

Besides revering the remains of the saints, perhaps we should also honor the timeworn and battlescarred bodies of the elderly, who have longed to see God's face the longest of any of us, and who are closest to actually doing that.

Instead, our society has little respect for the old.


Extraordinary Wife said...

Thank you for that wonderful homily. I will try to keep it in mind when our pastor drones on about something small and unimportant - sorry been rather disappointed with our new pastor.

Ephrem said...

Nice one, Fr. Fox.

Deacon Jim said...

Excellent witness to all - what we are called to do in the limited lifespan we have.

Kasia said...

Very nice homily, Father - I wish you'd been preaching at the parish I visited this morning.

Sharon said...

I wish you were my parish priest.

Tiber Jumper said...

Dear Father:
From one ex-charismatic to another:
You got the anointing brother! The Holy Spirit was all over that Homily!
I would want to clone you if possible for our parish(just kidding)
God bless, keep up the good work,
You are in my prayers today.