Category: Pastor’s Corner

From a sermon by St. Bernard, abbot

That they might guard you in all your ways

“He has given his angels charge over you to guard you in all your ways.” Let them thank the Lord for his mercy; his wonderful works are for the children of men. Let them give thanks and say among the nations, the Lord has done great things for them. O Lord, what is man that you have made yourself known to him, or why do you incline your heart to him? And you do incline your heart to him; you show him your care and your concern. Finally, you send your only Son and the grace of your Spirit, and promise him a vision of your countenance. And so, that nothing in heaven should be wanting in your concern for us, you send those blessed spirits to serve us, assigning them as our guardians and our teachers.

“He has given his angels charge over you to guard you in all your ways.” These words should fill you with respect, inspire devotion and instill confidence; respect for the presence of angels, devotion because of their loving service, and confidence because of their protection. And so the angels are here; they are at your side, they are with you, present on your behalf. They are here to protect you and to serve you. But even if it is God who has given them this charge, we must nonetheless be grateful to them for the great love with which they obey and come to help us in our great need.

So let us be devoted and grateful to such great protectors; let us return their love and honor them as much as we can and should. Yet all our love and honor must go to him, for it is from him that they receive all that makes them worthy of our love and respect.

We should then, my brothers, show our affection for the angels, for one day they will be our co-heirs just as here below they are our guardians and trustees appointed and set over us by the Father. We are God’s children although it does not seem so, because we are still but small children under guardians and trustees, and for the present little better than slaves.

Even though we are children and have a long, a very long and dangerous way to go, with such protectors what have we to fear? They who keep us in all our ways cannot be overpowered or led astray, much less lead us astray. They are loyal, prudent, powerful. Why then are we afraid? We have only to follow them, stay close to them, and we shall dwell under the protection of God’s heaven.

Dear Friends,

It’s been a little over a week since we remembered the anniversary of the tragedy of September 11, 2001.  There have been a number of articles and shows remembering that day 17 years ago.  And so it’s been on my mind.  Like all of us, I don’t think I’ll ever forget where I was that morning it happened.  I was at the clinic treating cats and dogs and one squealy pig.  And one of our technicians called to tell us that a plane had hit the world trade center.  Now this woman was prone to exaggeration so we didn’t really give it much thought.  But soon after a client came in with the same report and so we turned the small TV on in the office and that’s where we stood for the next few hours.  A lot of clients never even showed up for their appointments that day.

In the course of that morning one of the national network anchors, was summing up all the details for those who were just tuning in.  He mentioned that one of the planes was supposed to be headed for Los Angeles.  He then added looking to the camera saying, “That flight is routinely taken by many stars and celebrities, I bet some very important people were on that flight.”

“I bet some very important people were on that flight.”  In saying that, he meant important people like himself TV news-anchors, or actors, or directors, or politicians, or industry executives, or athletes.  People with rank, with power, with money, with fame, with beauty, with athleticism.  The things that make someone to be great.  The other people on the plane, the regular people, they’ll be missed by their loved ones, of course, but not by the world.  Because, after all, they weren’t “important.”

In the Gospel today, Jesus is speaking to us about greatness. He’s speaking about the greatness, or significance, or importance of each person.  And it’s maybe a bit funny that as Jesus tells the Apostles He’s going to suffer and die, they’re arguing about who is the most important.    (By the way this kind of story is great evidence for the reliability of the Gospels.  If this was all made up, you can bet the Apostles would have made themselves look like brilliant and courageous men.  Instead in today’s Gospel they look like fools.)

Jesus uses the occasion to teach the apostles and us about true greatness and true importance.  And He does so by use of a child.  He calls the child to Himself and put His arms around him to show that he values the child.  In order to grasp the lesson here, we need to know that children weren’t symbols of cuteness and innocence in the ancient world.  Children were symbols of non-persons.  Children at the time of Jesus had no rights, no social status, no value, and no significance.  They were totally dependent on others.  To be kind to a child, to welcome a child, was an act that could bring no reward.

The Gospel message is this, there are no unimportant persons.  There is no “greatest.”  No one, here or anywhere else, is more important or less important than another.  No income or title or celebrity status makes me either inferior or superior to another.  We are all equal in dignity.  We’re not the same, we have different vocations, but we’re all equal.  We all have the same origin and the same destiny.  We all have the same Heavenly Father.  We come from the Father and its our goal to go back to the Father.

Concepcion Cabrera a Mexican mystic once wrote, “Souls are an extension of the Trinity, its Heaven on Earth, and just like the Trinity, they should be respected and loved, since they share in the Divine and the immortal,” an awesome statement.  Read it again, “Souls are an extension of the Trinity, its Heaven on Earth, and just like the Trinity, they should be respected and loved, since they share in the Divine and the immortal.”  The human person is both body and soul and C.S. Lewis, author of the Narnia Chronicles would add, “Outside of the Blessed Sacrament, your neighbor is the holiest object ever presented to your senses.”  Every neighbor, including the family member who no longer goes to Church, the kid in class who doesn’t fit in, the man begging for money at the freeway exit, the woman in jail, or the man in rehab, our neighbor.

Now none of this should be a major revelation but we can make it practical.  I have homework, let’s try to call to mind today one person in our life we struggle with, the one who just annoys us to no end, or grates on our nerves, or seems beyond hope.  Then, let’s sincerely ask God this week for the grace to recognize that person’s worth and dignity and importance, for all are important in His eyes. And then let’s act accordingly.

And who knows, we ourselves may be the recipients of extra prayers and graces this week.  Because we ourselves may be the ones that annoy, and grate on the nerves of others.

“Souls are an extension of the Trinity, its Heaven on Earth, and just like the Trinity, they should be respected and loved, since they share in the Divine and the immortal.”  “Outside of the Blessed Sacrament, your neighbor is the holiest object ever presented to your senses.”

May we be great Saints,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

Dear Friends,

Every Friday all the priests of the diocese receive an email from the Bishop.  Bishop Bradley calls it the B-mail.  In one Friday’s message he talked about visiting St. Mary’s school in Bronson.  To the Students he spoke of the Feast of the Exultation of the Cross.  Now Bishop Bradley always likes to ask the students questions during his homily so he asked them for the definition of “Exultation.”  And they came up with a pretty good answer they told him it meant “Yeah for God, Yeah for God’s love of us.”  That’s pretty good, not what you’d find in the catechism, but pretty good.

This past Friday’s feast commemorates the discovery of the relics of Christ’s crucifixion.  These relics of the true cross were discovered by the Roman Empress, St. Helena.  Early in the fourth century St. Helena, mother of the Roman emperor Constantine went to Jerusalem in search of all the holy places of Christ’s life.   She wanted to build churches at all the holy sites.   When she got to the site of Christ’s tomb she found that a pagan temple to the goddess Aphrodite had been built over it.  And being the empress she had the power to have the temple destroyed.  And so she did, as Mel Brooks might say, “It’s good to be the empress,” and below the temple wreckage according to Tradition the True Cross of Christ was found.

This feast of the Cross celebrates the event of Christ’s Passion, that awe filled event in which God, in Christ, accepted the experiences of suffering and death, allowing himself to feel what we feel, even the terror of the sense of being abandoned by God.  Jesus accepts death on the cross so that he might use it as the means by which he would unite his divine life to us in all things, even in suffering and in death.  He died in body through a love greater than anyone has known.  For Christians, because of God in Christ, suffering and death are not just sad and inevitable facts of human existence, but they have become, in Christ, potential routes of access to God.  Even in these experiences, God is present and working, and even through these experiences; God can accomplish his will to save and to redeem.

Through the Cross Christ shows us the willingness of God to forgive us in the most astounding way.  The cross reveals that the great covenant that God makes with us in Christ offers us the possibility of another chance.  The grace is not deserved, but it is still given.  Now we receive this grace in all of the sacraments, which are the fruits of the crucifixion.  And once we have received this grace Christ asks that what we have been given, we pour into the relationships we have with others, imitating what Christ has done for us in the forgiveness and the charity we share with one another, forgetting about ourselves and focusing on the other.  As our Lord said in the gospel, “Whoever loses himself for my sake and that of the gospel will save it.”

In our second reading St. James says that we demonstrate our faith from the good that we do, we demonstrate our faith by the way we love.  As we know faith is the door to the spiritual life.  It’s a gift from God and it comes first from God’s own initiative.  Our response, our good works, comes second, all the time inspired and supported by his grace.  Faith is perfected by love; faith is perfected by the gift of our self.  When we help someone, we – if only for a moment – deny our own importance, acknowledging the other person’s importance.  When we help someone, we are giving our life – if only a small portion of it – for them.  Perhaps, this seems exaggerated to say that I gave my life to someone, but what is life other than a series of minutes?  To give a few minutes to help someone is to give a little bit of your life for them. To give years to a spouse, a child, a church community is to give your life for them.  This is how we imitate Jesus, who gave his life for us.  This is how our faith is perfected, by our practice of love.  And it takes a lot of practice and if we mess up we go back to that room and start again, and again, and again.  God is so good.

St. Catherine of Siena describes our faith, as expressed in love in three stages.  And she uses the image of Christ’s body hanging on the Cross as the image of our spiritual faith journey.  These three stages are not exclusive of one anther and all three stages can be present in the same person.   At the first stage our affections begin to undergo a conversion we begin to turn away from sin.  At this stage we embrace our Christ’s feet.  At this point our love for God and others may still be self-centered and maybe fear based.  A major motivation for our conversion is to save ourselves and to avoid the pain of sin and eternal damnation.  This is a great place to start.  And even if we’ve made great strides in our spiritual life we sometimes fall back to His feet, still a very good place to be.

The second stage of the spiritual journey is where we begin to understand important truths about God and ourselves and this is symbolized by the wounded side of Christ.  The purification of the soul continues and there is growth in virtue and understanding.  Our love at this stage is that of a servant.  We love the Lord and are willing to serve Him, but we very much expect a reward both now and in eternity; there is still self-centeredness to our love.

The third stage is symbolized by the mouth of Christ.  At this stage there is a profound and abiding union with Christ.  Our love has grown and become purified to that of a truly loving, faithful son or daughter, or friend, or spouse.  We see our Lord face to face.  At this stage we love the Lord and others with a purified and unselfish love that truly cares for the well-being and interests of the other.  The focus now is not on what we are getting from the relationship but on what we can give.  Our focus is on the other and how to please Him.

Whoever loses his life for the sake of Jesus and the gospel will save it.  The only way to preserve oneself- to attain the ultimate fulfillment for which we are created- is to be willing to give oneself away in love.

May we be great saints,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

Dear Friends,

At this time, late summer, 21 years ago two women died.  And their deaths dominated the news throughout the world.

These two world-renowned women were about as unalike as any two persons could be.  An article in the newspaper captured the

contrast well when it wrote:  “Diana, tall, glamorous, rich and young, was a romantic figure who won the affections of first a prince and then finally a playboy.  Mother Teresa was short and plain; purposefully poor, dressed always in a cheap cotton sari, and pledged to a man who died 2000 years ago.”

Now it’s very easy to understand why the British princess achieved such fame.  She had all the qualities needed to fascinate us:  wealth, youth, and stunning good looks.  But how do we explain Mother Teresa’s appeal to a worldwide audience from heads of State, to people of all faiths and no faith, to the poor and to the powerful?   She was old and frail, wrinkled and worn, a woman who vowed to be chaste and celibate, obedient and poor.  She had been born to wealth, but chose to be poor.

And yet this tiny woman wielded more influence than many presidents, parliaments, and politicians who work hard to project a perfect image.  Ironically, Mother Teresa never tried to project an image or to give a spin to what she did with carefully crafted words.  Both she and her message were genuine, authentic and consistent.  When she spoke, her words were not “tailored “ to suit the audience. She never watered down her opposition to abortion, doctor-assisted suicide, or contraception, in case anyone in her audience might take offence.

But neither did she ever insult, demean, or vilify those who disagreed with her.  Her strong respect for all human life wouldn’t permit her to treat with disrespect those who did not share her convictions.  Mother Teresa had the rare ability to promote a cause without alienating, and to disagree without demeaning or insulting.

On February 3, 1994, Mother Teresa addressed an audience of 4000 at the National Prayer Breakfast in our nation’s capital.  The audience included President Clinton, Vice president Gore, their wives and many members of congress.  She spoke plainly about the evils of drug abuse, abortion, violence and contraception.  She spoke strongly in support of adoption and natural family planning.  She spoke simple words to the leaders of the richest, most powerful nation in the world.  She said, “The great destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child, a direct killing of an innocent child, murder by the mother herself.  And if we accept that a mother can even kill her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?  By abortion the mother does not learn to love, but kills her child to solve her problems.  And by abortion, the father is told that he does not have to take any responsibility at all for the child he has brought into the world…Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but uses violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion…We cannot solve all the problems in the world, but let us never bring in the worst problem of all, and that is to destroy love…The poor are very great people.  They can teach us so many beautiful things.”

How did Mother Teresa get away with such plain speaking without offending or insulting?  Perhaps it results from her being such an authentic advocate of the weak, the poorest of the poor, the most vulnerable.  She together with other Missionaries of Charity, the religious community founded by her, have taught the world the true meaning of compassion by their quest for the poor, the dying, the victims of AIDS, the unwanted children.

Compassion is from two Latin words that mean “to suffer with” and Mother Teresa shared the suffering of the poor, the world’s rejects.  She and her followers lived in poverty even as they alleviated the poverty of others.  They told desperate mothers considering abortion, “Come to us, please don’t destroy the child, we will take the child.  Come to us we will take care of you, we will get a home for your child.”  And even to hurting post abortive women she would say the same thing, “Come to us, we will take care of you, our good God is rich in love and mercy.  He knows your pain, he knows your sorrow, and he forgives.”

One of the dying, abandoned, unfortunates she took from the slums of Calcutta to her home for the dying told Mother Teresa, “I have lived like an animal in the street, but I am going to die as an angel, loved and cared for.  Sister, I am going home to God.”  He died with dignity and a smile on his face.

With such practical love Mother Teresa answered with her life St. James’ rhetorical question, “Did not God choose those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom he promised to those who love Him?”

Pax et Bonum,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

Dear Friends,

Religion is all about faith.  And in our catechism’s four parts we see exactly how it all fits together.

The four parts of the Catechism are Creed, Sacraments, Christian Morality and Prayer.  The Creed is faith professed.  The Sacraments are faith celebrated.  Morality is faith lived.  And Prayer is faith deepened.  Religion is all about faith.

Our scripture readings today focus on morality, faith lived.  Faith that is only professed and celebrated is not only useless, it is phony as well.  Or, as St. James in his letter said, “Humbly welcome the Word that has been planted in you, and is able to save your souls.  Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves.”

Jesus also accurately labels as hypocrites those who profess faith and at the same time practice immorality.  Quoting Isaiah, the premier prophet of the Old Testament, Jesus says of the Pharisees of his day and all phony practitioners of religion,  “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.  In vain do they worship me.  You disregard God’s commandments.” 

Jesus makes the point that genuine holiness depends not so much on observance of Mosaic dietary law, on what we eat, as it does on what comes from our hearts.  Notice that Jesus is not content to leave this in the realm of generalities. He gets very specific, by mentioning some of the evils that issue from human hearts, evils such as premarital and extramarital sex, theft, greed, murder, deceit, maliciousness, sensuality, arrogance, and an obtuse spirit.  He ended His litany of human evil and sin by saying, “All these evils come from within, from their hearts, and render a man impure.”

In the language of the Bible the heart is the inner depth of a person, its where all the great decisions of life are made.  It’s the source of love and joy but also the source of grief and anxiety.  It’s the source of thought, will, and conscience.  And today Jesus is telling his people that their hearts are far from him.  And the Lord always wants their hearts.  He wants our hearts.  He wants our whole being.

August 19th was the Feast day of St. John Eudes, a French Saint who lived in the 17^th century.  He popularized the devotion to the hearts of Jesus and Mary.  But he’s probably best known for his central theme that he repeated often, “Jesus is the source of all holiness, and Mary is the model of Christian life.”  Mary is the one who gave her heart, more than anyone, to our Lord.

At the Annunciation, the Angel Gabriel asked her, “Will you give God a human nature?”  She answered with a full hearted yes! So then God took from this woman a human nature.  And in this human nature He taught us, He sanctified us, and He governed us.

Now for the rest of us, everyone who is sitting here, at some point in our lives, maybe when we were very young, but at some point we were called by God and He asked us, “Will you give me your human nature?”  “(Your name here) will you give me your human nature?”

Our Lord wants to continue the incarnation in each one of us; He wants to live his life in each one of us.  As Mary gave him a human nature he continues His incarnation by us, giving Him a human nature.  But as we know it’s not always a total gift on our part.

Fulton Sheen once explained this by using the example of a pencil.  A pencil is a very useful instrument in my hand, he wrote.  If I want the pencil to write the word “God” it will write the word “God.”  It is totally subservient and obedient to my will.

Suppose, however, the pencil had a will of its own.  When I wanted to write the word “God” it might write the word “dog.”  I couldn’t do anything with it.  And why?  Because this pencil would not be completely obedient to my person.  And so, not every one of us gives our human nature to God in such a way that He can use it totally and completely.  We hold back!  We don’t give him our entire heart.

There was a study that came out recently and it found that the happiest people are those that are religious.  And this is because they give their human nature to God, and family, and neighbor.  To give ourselves away in love is to be happy.  The unhappy life is the one where we give ourselves, our human natures to the great substitutes for love, like money, pleasure, power, and honor.

As St. John Eudes once wrote, Mary is the model of the Christian life.  She gave herself totally to God.  St. James in his letter tells us, “Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you and is able to save your soul.”  This word is the word of Scripture, but also the Word made flesh.  So after we receive Holy Communion as we walk back to our pew we are in a very real way like Mary.  We have received Jesus’ body into our body we have become a living tabernacle, we are carrying Jesus into the world.  This is serious business and our Amen after receiving the body and blood of Christ means, “I stake my life on this!”  So if Mary is the model of the Christian life let us imitate her in prayer.  In the prayer she prayed after receiving the Lord into her body and soul.

Soon after the Annunciation Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth and Elizabeth greets her with the words, “ Blessed are you who believed”  after hearing this Mary prays the Magnificat, a prayer of one who has totally given her heart to God.  It begins with the words, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my savior.”  She is giving her all to God.

After receiving our Lord in communion let us make the Magnificat our prayer as well.  Making our hearts more and more the Lord’s.  Expressing a faith that is openly professed, celebrated, lived, and deepened.  Letting the Lord write beautiful words with our human nature.

Peace and all good,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

August 18, 2018

Greetings to the Church of Saint Jerome,

With humble gratitude I thank the entire Saint Jerome Parish Community for your prayerful support of my vocation.  A year and a half ago Msgr. Osborn accepted my discernment papers for a second time in my life; the first being forty-five years earlier under the tutelage of Father Nadrach. The year passed quickly—I was commissioned at Saint Ann Parish last August and entered Sacred Heart Major Seminary later that month. One miracle after another has brought me to the conclusion of my first year of studies and my first Parish Assignment with you here at Saint Jerome.

Altering career direction in one’s late sixties is a challenge no matter what the vocation. Fortunately the priesthood is not a career: it is a way of living and a commitment to the Lord in service to Him as High Priest under the direction of Pope, Bishop and mentor priests.  This first year brought not only the predictable challenge of learning the course material but also the challenge of relearning how to study as well as how to live with brothers a third my age. In two Semesters my program covered thirteen areas of study including: Evangelization and Catechesis; Field Education I & II; Church History I & II; Synoptic Gospels; Church Fathers I & II; Christology; Research Writing; Method & Pentateuch; Fundamental Theology; Theology of Trinity; along with all my Formation Classes and finally the Desert Pilgrimage. Through your support and the graces of the Lord I had a good outcome to this year of study: my final grade average was a B, which is possibly my most hard earned academic achievement to date. It is now with a great joy in the Lord that I can say I am a second Theologian studying for the Diocese of Kalamazoo.  This is not my work alone but that of the Lord and all of you here at Saint Jerome.  I am so very grateful to be able to share with you as a member of your Community.

Your prayers and the daily graces of the Holy Spirit will give me the energy and love to face each day offering every sacrifice to the Lord in the name of Saint Jerome Parish.  It is an offering that I will gladly make and will continue to make in the days and years of study ahead.  I particularly want to thank Father Chris, and Father Jose’ and Deacon Gary and Chris for all their help and guidance; I learned a lot from them.  I will put to great use all that they have taught me.  Both of your great priests have showed me that a priest’s time is never there’s—it is always God’s time.  Please pray for me that I and my brother seminarians will be as good in our ministry as Father Chris and Father Jose’ are.

Throughout this coming year, I hope to make it back here as often as possible to share with you in the Holy Eucharist and my experiences as a T2 student.  Know that my prayers are with you and continue to be with you, especially before the Blessed Sacrament.  May the Lord ever watch over and protect you.  May He continue to give you the graces intended by the Father from the beginning of time.

In the Light of Christ,

Mr. David Pinto—T2

Dear Friends,

Not long ago I was at a conference which was held at the St. John Center in Plymouth.  The St. John Center is an old converted seminary, surrounded by a golf course, a beautiful place.  And at one of the presentations a psychologist by the name of Andrew told us his conversion story.  And I’m such a geek that I took notes about his conversion.  Andrew began his adult life by pursuing the gay lifestyle to the utmost.  He was a great proponent and defender of the life-style.  After nearly a decade of doing whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted and with whomever he wanted he began to feel that something was missing.  This so called freedom, he was living felt empty and meaningless, it felt like a dead-end.  One night after getting drunk he wandered the streets not really knowing where he was going and he ended up passing by a tent revival of some evangelical Christian group.  They were loud, singing and praying at the top of their lungs.  And they were joyful.  And Andrew thought to himself, “What have I got to lose?”  He went into the tent, and in that tent, he found a community, and he found love, he found real love, and most importantly he found Jesus.

That was Andrew’s turning point.  He joined that community, he left behind his old life.  And he pursued Christianity with gusto.  He prayed, he went church services, he researched and he studied.  He studied everything he could find.  Even studying the earliest Christian writings.  And in those writings he read of the Eucharist.  He read of Christ’s presence in the Eucharist.  And he was intrigued.   Now he knew that Catholics believed in the Eucharist but he wasn’t ever going to become a Catholic, they’re crazy, all those outdated beliefs.  And so he did the next best thing, he said, he joined an Episcopal church.  But after a few months that just didn’t seem right either he said.    And so one Sunday he did what he thought he’d never do, we went into the Catholic Church down the street from his home.  And in that church he saw a tabernacle for the very first time.

At this church during communion time the priest left the tabernacle door open.  And this caught Andrew’s attention. Week after week that open door beckoned him. He began seeing it as an open doorway to Heaven, Jesus was there, he couldn’t take his eyes off of the open door and the Inhabitant of that gold box.  He was beginning to ache to receive the Eucharist.  He really believed that this was Jesus in that tabernacle.  And so he reasoned with himself, “If I can believe that the Church gives me Jesus in the Eucharist, then why can’t I believe that the Church gives me Jesus, the way of life.”  In other words if I can believe the Church when she tells me Jesus is really present in the Eucharist, then I can believe everything else she teaches.  He eventually did, and through the RCIA process, and a big dose of grace, he came to believe everything.  And at the next Easter vigil he made his first Holy Communion.  And as he walked back to his pew, after receiving for the very first time, he said he felt a fullness, and a satisfaction, and a sweetness like he had never felt before.  He was home.

The Eucharist is the center of our lives as Catholics.  Objectively speaking, there is nothing that we can ever do in this life that can compare with what happens when we receive communion.   There is an intimate union of hearts.  By the power of the Holy Spirit, ordinary bread and wine are changed into the Body, Blood, soul, and Divinity of Jesus.  So when we receive the Eucharist, we feed on God, we feed on His divine life, his power, and his love.  That’s why we don’t chew gum when we come to communion, and why we wear nice clothes when we come to Mass, because nothing can compare with this.  And yet, often times, for many of us, we don’t leave full and satisfied and filled with a sweetness.

How can we change this?  Let me make three suggestions.  Let me suggest we all make an effort to do three things and see if Mass changes any for us.  First, let’s try to get here a few minutes early.  And when we get here, let’s take some time to pray, to ask God to help us understand the Mass; let’s ask Him to help us to encounter Him; lets ask Him to reveal Himself to us with all of our cares and  concerns.  Second, don’t leave early.  What could possibly be more important than saying “Thank You” to the One who made you, loves you, and has just given Himself to you to eat?  So take a minute or two to say thanks, and to reflect on what has happened and who has just entered into you.  And we’ll try to be quiet here in the church.  Third, make an effort to read the Gospel before coming to Mass.  Come prepared, and come both hungry and expecting to get fed.

God has so much more for us than what many of us are settling for.  As you approach the tabernacle remember, he’s been waiting for you for twenty centuries.  He always does His part.  Let’s try in the weeks ahead to work more on our part.

Pax et Bonum,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

Dear Friends,

A theologian once explained the assumption of Mary into Heaven by using the concept of love.  He said that love is like fire, it burns upward.  And since love is basically desire.  Love seeks to become more and more united with the object that is loved.  Now we all understand the law of gravity.  Gravity is what keeps us firmly planted on the ground.  But there’s also a law of spiritual gravity and that Law of Spiritual gravity is the pull on our heart by God and the closer we get to God the greater the pull.  This divine pull on our hearts is always present, and it’s only our refusal and the weakness of our bodies due to sin that keeps us earth-bound.

Now Mary knows how to love.  She’s free of original sin and she never committed sin.  Her body didn’t wage war with her soul; there was no opposition between body and soul.  Her heart and soul were totally directed to God and His will.  Now given the intense love of our Lord for His Blessed Mother and the intense love of Mary for our Lord, the saints will say that this love is at such an advanced stage it would be great enough to “pull the body with it.”   Mary’s love for God was so great that her body followed her soul.  Do I understand all the mechanics of the Assumption, no?  But I do believe it.  And I think that one reason the Church gives us the Dogma of the Assumption of Mary is to proclaim loudly to the world the sacredness of the human body.  Each human body is made to be a temple of the Holy Spirit more beautiful, in God’s eyes, than the grandest cathedral.  Fr. Delbee would say that each of us is a marvel of creation made in the image of God, a masterpiece of his love.  And even though we were wounded and disfigured by sin, we have been remade by the Redeemer, more beautiful than before.

By proclaiming the dogma of the Assumption the Church shows us what God thinks of human flesh; human flesh is worthy of eternal glory and of union with the Most Blessed Trinity.  Not only does Jesus bring his human body to heaven, but he wills that his Mother Mary should be with him as well, in both her body and soul.  The two of them, Jesus and Mary together, await all of us when we will one day join them too, body and soul.

Our world today is in need of a constant reminder of the Assumption.  The world of 2018 tells us that human flesh has seemingly no value, no sacredness.  Our world profits in human trafficking, it glamorizes pornography, relations outside of marriage, it contracepts, experiments on human embryos, kills the unborn and then harvests their organs. We are in need of the constant reminder of the Virgin Mary’s Assumption.  We are in need of a reminder of the value and sacredness of the human body.  And that’s our job to be the reminder to the world of the Assumption and we do this by monitoring the language we use, the music we listen to, the shows we watch, the businesses we support, the websites we visit, the magazines we buy, and ultimately the politicians we elect.  In all we do we preach the assumption using words because what happened to Mary will one day happen to each of us.  Although we wait, we believe in the glorification of our body and soul together in heaven.  First Christ, then Mary, then the entire church, or as St. Paul says; “all those who belong to him.”  And this gives us great hope.

Pax et Bonum,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley

From the beginning of a letter attributed to Barnabas

Hope of life is the beginning and end of our faith

Greetings, sons and daughters. In the name of the Lord who loves us, peace be to you.

Because the Lord has granted you an abundance of blessings, I rejoice immeasurably in your blessed and glorious company.

You have received abundantly that indwelling grace which is the Spirit’s gift, and for this reason I hope in my own salvation and I give thanks all the more when I see the bountiful fullness of the Lord’s Spirit pouring over you. I have longed so much for you that when I saw you I was overwhelmed.

I am now convinced and fully aware that I have learned much by speaking with you, for the Lord accompanied me on the road to righteousness, and so I am driven in all ways to love you more than my own life. For surely there is a great store of faith and charity within you because of your hope for life in Christ. Therefore, I have been thinking that if my concern for you inspires me to pass on to you a portion of what I have received, then I will be rewarded for ministering to souls such as yours. Consequently, I am writing you, that you may have perfect knowledge along with your faith.

The Lord has given us these three basic doctrines: hope for eternal life, the beginning and end of our faith; justice, the beginning and end of righteousness; and love, which bears cheerful and joyous witness to the works of righteousness. Now the Lord has made the past and present known to us through his prophets, and he has given us the ability to taste the fruits of the future beforehand. Thus, when we see prophecies fulfilled in their appointed order, we ought to grow more fully and deeply in awe of him. Let me suggest a few things – not as a teacher, but as one of you – which should bring you joy in the present situation.

When evil days are upon us and the worker of malice gains power, we must attend to our own souls and seek to know the ways of the Lord. In those times reverential fear and perseverance will sustain our faith, and we will find need of forbearance and self-restraint as well. Provided that we hold fast to these virtues and look to the Lord, then wisdom, understanding, knowledge and insight will make joyous company with them.

Truly, the Lord has revealed to us through the prophets that he has no need of sacrifice, burnt offerings or oblations. He says in one place: Your endless sacrifices, what are they to me? says the Lord. I have had my fill of holocausts; I do not want the fat of your lambs, nor the blood of your bulls and goats, nor your presence in my sight. Indeed, who has made these demands of you? No more will you trample my courts. Your sacrifices of fine flour are in vain; your incense is loathsome to me; I cannot bear your feasts of the new moon, nor your Sabbaths.

Dear Friends,

Being a Christian means believing in miracles.  You can’t be a Christian without believing in miracles.  Christianity absolutely demands a belief in miracles.  Because all of Christianity’s fundamental claims and doctrines are miracles, the Incarnation, the Resurrection, Salvation, and Divine Inspiration.  Miracles always belong to the realm of the divine, because God and miracles always go together.  Miracles are always wonders of the supernatural, they’re not earthly natural wonders.  There is no scientific explanation.

As an example, babies are sometimes called miraculous and while they’re beautiful, and wonderful, and great, and cute, they’re not miracles.  Instead, they’re wonders of nature, natural wonders that are completely scientifically explainable.  The Virgin Birth on the other hand, is a supernatural wonder, a heavenly wonder, a true miracle that science can’t explain.

Laws of Science are made from observations of how nature works here on earth.  Supernatural events or miracles don’t contradict natural events, because science only tells us how things operate in nature, science can’t tell us how things operate in Heaven.  The scientific method, developed at Catholic Universities in the middle ages, explains this world.  The scientific method   better helps us to understand and appreciate God’s creation.  And that is a very good thing, however, science cannot explain Heaven, science cannot explain Heaven’s inhabitants, and science cannot explain Heaven’s miracles.  And would we even want to worship a god who could be examined in such a finite way, say, under an electron microscope.  God is much more magnificent and infinite to be discovered in such a limited way.  To discover God with science would reduce him to something earthly and worldly.  But God is not of this world, He was, even before this world even existed.  He is transcendent.

Modern science has explained away some of the things that ancient people thought were miraculous, like thunder and lightning for example, but science has not explained away any of the miracles in the New Testament and it never will.  Science has not made the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, or the feeding of the five thousand one bit less miraculous.

The New Testament gives us an account of the many miracles performed by Jesus.  He instantaneously cures lepers, the blind, the mute, and the deaf.  He also cures paralytics and raises the dead to life.  He even cures those with a hardness of heart.  The miracles worked by Jesus invited those around him to a belief in Him and all that He taught.

The miracle we heard about today, the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, foretells of the unique bread of the Eucharist.  As we heard Jesus took the bread, gave thanks, and distributed the bread.  And they all ate and were satisfied.  Jesus fed that multitude with earthly bread.  Today, however, he feeds us with his body and blood hidden in the form of bread and wine.  The visible miracles of the New Testament were short lived and they all took place within a small area of the Middle East.  The invisible miracle of the Eucharist today, however, has been with us continually for two millennia and has taken place throughout the entire world and will endure until the end of time.

The Vatican has a traveling exhibit on Eucharistic Miracles.  I once viewed this exhibit and there are hundreds of miracles described.  There are miracles from every century of our Church’s history.  These miracles have helped to strengthen the faith of many throughout the centuries.  They reinforce what was taught to us by Jesus.  During his preaching Jesus pre-announced the Eucharist (as in today’s Gospel) and later, he gave it to us when celebrating the Last Supper with his apostles.  Our faith in the Eucharist is based on what Jesus taught and the Eucharistic miracles strengthen this faith.

One of the miracles in that display involves a man by the name of Andre Frossard.  He was a Frenchman who died in 1995.  He was born and raised in an atheistic household.  Issues of faith and religion never crossed his mind.  He once said, “Religion isn’t even a subject worthy of human thought.”  It was that unimportant to him.  By the age of twenty Andre was a content and happy man who greatly enjoyed his free-love lifestyle.

The incident of his conversion begins with him in a car going on an errand with a friend.  On the way to their destination the friend needed to stop at a church to see someone.  Andre waited in the car.  He soon got bored, however, and decides to enter the church to see what had happened to his friend.  At this point in his life Andre has no interest in faith. And isn’t even seeking God.  He’s only in the church to find his friend.  Within five minutes, however, his whole life is changed.  Standing in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament, of which he is totally unaware, in his own words he says, “An indescribable force shatters in an instant the absurd being that I was, and brought to birth the amazed child that I had never been.”  He left the church a converted man and was quickly received into the Catholic Church.  Andre Frossard went on to become a famous newspaper columnist and bestselling author.  He even wrote two books about St. John Paul II who had become one of his closest friends.  Through this miraculous and instantaneous conversion who knows how many souls were positively influenced by the Catholic witness of Andre Frossard.  God used Andre to reach many people.

On this day when we hear about the miraculous multiplication of the loaves and fishes, a foreshadowing of the Eucharist I want to end with a quote from Frossard writing about his own miraculous conversion:

“…I have had the good fortune to be a forgiven child who wakes up to discover that everything is a gift…God existed and was present…one thing only surprised me:  The Eucharist – not that it seemed incredible, but it amazed me that Divine Charity would have come upon this silent way to communicate Himself, and above all that He would choose to become bread, which is the staple of the poor, and the food preferred by children…O Divine Love, eternity will be too short to speak of You.” 

Pax et Bonum,

Fr. Christopher J. Ankley