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Take Five for Faith
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HOMILY PREP
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- Daily (Starting Dec 29)
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Homily stories

12 Sep 2021 - Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

At the beginning of 2020, my diocese declared it the Year of the Eucharist. Ironic, since after that Ash Wednesday, it was the year I went without it. But I spent that year caring more about it than I ever have. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, they say—and I repented taking it for granted. During the pandemic, I watched Mass on YouTube every Sunday, and for the first time learned what an Act of Spiritual Communion was. Saying those words before a TV screen—“I desire to receive you into my soul . . . come at least spiritually into my heart . . . Never permit me to be separated from you.”—I encountered Christ present in the Eucharist in a way I couldn’t have imagined without being present myself. Even though I’d spent more than a year preparing for my next Communion—on an isolated spiritual journey courtesy of a plague of biblical proportions—I wanted to treat it like my first, and as the day got closer, I doubled down on prayerfully getting ready. It wasn’t until the first Sunday after Pentecost 2021 that I returned to Mass. Ordinary Time seemed so fitting as I started to feel normal again. Except I wasn’t the same as before. Having been denied, I wanted to follow him more.

Authors Jennifer Tomshack

Eucharist communion sacrifice pandemic spiritual journeys

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Homily stories

13 Oct 2024 - Twenty-eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B

A doctor I know finds today’s gospel about the rich man going away sad the most disturbing of all Jesus’ stories and parables. He has notes and comments scratched alongside these verses in his Bible, and his personal journal is filled with pages of reflections about what it takes to follow Jesus. The doctor, who happens to be a very generous person, is constantly looking for a catch, a way out of Jesus’ command to the rich young man. But there is no catch—except to say the gospel isn’t necessarily about wealth and personal possessions. It is about our spiritual journey and what it takes to progress. For some of us, money gets in the way; for others, it is a desire to be liked or admired or perfect or in control that prevents us from taking that last leap and trusting in God for all our joy and happiness. Jesus loves the rich man, and the rich man is trying to do his best to be a good and decent person, but Jesus is telling him and us: “Don’t hold anything back. Love God with your whole heart, mind, and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself.” Like the rich man and my doctor friend, most of us end up sad after hearing this gospel because we know we still have some major hurdles in our spiritual journey.

Authors Patrice J. Tuohy

jesus and the rich young man spiritual journeys

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