Posts Tagged 'Fr. Phil'

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Reflection – March 10th, 2024 – Fourth Sunday of Lent

Reflection – March 10th, 2024 – Fourth Sunday of Lent


Testing or Trusting?

As a kid growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, the two things’ boys talked about most on the school yard were “Friday Night at the Fights” (boxing from Madison Square Garden in N.Y.C.) and stuntman Evel Knievel. We didn’t have pay-per-view, the wide range of live stream venues, or the internet to entertain us. Evel Knievel was a motorcycle daredevil who performed death-defying jumps over buses, cars, and even canyons to the thrill of audiences. He would ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – March 3rd, 2024 – Third Sunday of Lent

Homily – March 3rd, 2024 – Third Sunday of Lent

This story of Jesus upsetting the tables of the moneychangers and speaking about destroying and rebuilding the Temple is not only very visual but also is found in all four gospels. John, the gospel writer we heard from today, places the story at the beginning of Jesus ministry while Matthew, Mark, and Luke place it near the end. By placing it near the end of Jesus’ ministry, Matthew, Mark, and Luke are suggesting that this talk and action of Jesus ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – February 25th, 2024 – Second Sunday of Lent

Homily – February 25th, 2024 – Second Sunday of Lent

A few years ago, I had the privilege of being on Mount Tabor, the mountain of Jesus’ transfiguration. While it was “good to be there,” I have to admit, it was a little anticlimactic. It would have been wonderful if, on that day, the words of today’s gospel would have come true where it says, “they saw no one with them anymore, but only Jesus.” I didn’t get to that personal moment with Jesus alone, not even in my mind. ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – February 18th, 2024 – First Sunday of Lent

Homily – February 18th, 2024 – First Sunday of Lent

On Ash Wednesday we celebrated, as we do each year, a rite called the “Imposition of Ashes.” It sounds like throwback language the Church used long ago, yet there is something to this word. An imposition is something imposed on us that seems unfair or something that makes an unwelcomed demand on us. The boss asks you to do more at work without necessarily increasing your salary is an imposition. It’s an unwelcomed demand and doesn’t seem fair. Impositions are ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – February 14th, 2024 – Ash Wednesday

Homily – February 14th, 2024 – Ash Wednesday

Almost all the Scripture readings we hear at liturgy, we hear only once every three years. One of the exceptions to this pattern is the Ash Wednesday readings; we get them every year. From it, we hear that Jesus is all for prayer, fasting, and almsgiving and thinks we should be, too. However, he warns against parading these classic Lenten disciplines before others. Perhaps he saw too much of this in the Pharisees of his time and how far their ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – February 11th, 2024 – Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily – February 11th, 2024 – Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

In both the first reading and the gospel, we have references to leprosy. That first reading, from the book of Leviticus, speaks about the consequences of being diagnosed with leprosy. The consequence is that lepers had to wear torn clothes, had to let their hair become disheveled, had to live outside the camp, and had to announce in a loud voice when approaching others, “Unclean, unclean!” Those where some of the consequences of living with leprosy, but the deep pain ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – February 4, 2024 – Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily – February 4, 2024 – Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

As always, a little bit of context might help us enter into these Scripture readings. In the Mediterranean world, the world where Jesus walked the earth, the world where all our books of the Bible emerged from—in that world every gift carried the expectation of a gift in return. However, don’t think of it as a tit-for-tat world where you only return a favor to those who have shown you favor, or where you only love those who have shown ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – January 21st, 2024 – Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily – January 21st, 2024 – Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

A common thread from the three Scripture readings we just heard from, is that they are all “call stories”; someone is being called by God. And, like all Scripture stories, they are not just stories about people during Biblical times, but they are speaking to us here and now. In the first story, God calls Jonah to go to the city of Nineveh and preach repentance to them. In the second reading, Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians says ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily – January 14th, 2024 – 2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily – January 14th, 2024 – 2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Homily – January 14, 2024 – 2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time

I’m going to make a generalization which I think is true. It is that everyone, who has ever come into our lives—even for the shortest amount of time—has made a contribution to who we have become. Even someone who was a bad example, indirectly, set us on a path to become the opposite of what they are. So, there is learning in the negative. There is much to be learned ...

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Fr Phil

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Homily ~ Christmas Eve – December 24th, 2023

Homily ~ Christmas Eve – December 24th, 2023

While baby showers have been around for a long time, gender reveal parties have only existed for less than 20 years. If you don’t already know, a gender reveal party is a party held during pregnancy to reveal the baby’s sex to the expectant parents’ family and friend, and sometimes to the parents themselves. To me, the real excitement is looking into the face of the newborn child…that’s the real reveal. There’s nothing more beautiful and nothing more  mesmerizing than ...

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Fr Phil

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