Who is pursuing you?

Homily

1st Sunday of Advent A2

30 November 2025

St. Ann Catholic Parish Prairie Village

AMDG

Who is pursuing you?

The first question I put on our missionary discipleship worksheet was this one?  How and why is God pursuing you?  It's pointless to start one's spiritual life anywhere else.  God's desire to visit you is infinitely greater than your desire to make your way toward him.  But why is God pursuing you?  And how?  It's a primary question for the spiritual life - it's the perfect way to start Advent.

When someone surprises you by knocking on your door or calling you, what's your initial reaction usually - it is one of excitement or fear?  Perhaps a bit of both.  This question goes deeper than whether you are an introvert or extrovert.  It's an attitude of faith.  Faith loves surprises and interruptions, because it's nice to be wanted, chosen and desired.  If you are living life as a gift, the most likely response to someone interrupting you is that they have a gift for you!

It's why God is pursuing you, by the way.  He's a giver and gets great joy out of making a gift of Himself.  You are made for God, not as a robot or slave to an owner or master, but as a child who is fit to receive the gifts your Father most wants to give you.  

My initial inspiration to the priesthood, Msgr. Vincent Krische, lived life in just this way.  He received every phone call, every interruption, every surprise knock on his door, as a gift.  Not as a threat to his privacy, but as a gift.  In fact, he left the front door of the rectory open in case someone wanted to leave a gift for him.  Now, he did get a lot of things stolen, but his security was in knowing everyone and trusting their generosity.  He received so much more than was ever stolen; and if something was stolen, he figured the person needed the gift more than he did!

Your very existence and certainly your future is secured by the weight of God's affection and attention bearing down upon you.  Your growth in faith this year will not come from what you are able to privately master and control, but in how ready you are to respond to the surprises and interruptions in life with faith.  For at the moment you least expect, the Son of Man will visit you to make the gift of His presence known.  

Happy are those whom the Lord finds vigilant upon His arrival.  This is Advent - awaiting with eager expectation the greatest news of all time - the Lord will not leave us to our own devices.  We are not alone and He will not leave us alone.  The Lord has come in history, he is coming now in mystery, he will come again in majesty!

Advent is about sensitivity, awareness and readiness to respond.  We begin again our celebration of the Christian mysteries not by plotting, planning and tinkering with our own self-improvement projects, but by daring God to come faster, and to come sooner, and to actually mean it.  

Come, Lord Jesus, come!

Who is pursuing you right now?  Better yet, how and why is the Lord pursuing you?

Have I ever been stranded?

Homily

Solemnity of All Souls

2 November 2025

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village

AMDG

Have I ever been stranded?  Most of us have.  In this do-it-yourself world where privacy and self-reliance mask as true security, being stranded and not knowing how you're going to get home, or who is going to help you, can be a terrifying experience.  Such is purgatory.  Most of us can relate.  Whether it was an accident, a canceled flight, a storm or natural disaster, or a breakdown, sooner or later, most of us find ourselves stranded, in need of help to survive and make it home.  

You're the good Samaritan in this scenario, at least in today's liturgy of All Souls. Eternal rest grant unto them O Lord, and let the perpetual light shine upon them.  May they rest in peace.  May their souls, and the souls of all the faithful departed, rest in peace.

This solemn duty of the Church militant - that's YOU btw - is highlighted today and carries through the end of the liturgical year, as the Church fixes its attention on the eschaton, ultimate things, and the Catholic final four of death, judgement, heaven and hell.  Black vestments are recommended, along with the spiritual maxim to keep death daily before our eyes, so that we may gain wisdom of heart.  What is more, today we resolve as part of our faith, prayer, and holy work, to never forget our beloved dead, and to always offer the best of anything we do that in pleasing to God in union with the saving sacrifice of Christ, to those most in need of his mercy, to the most forgotten soul in purgatory. We do this in union and through the heart of our blessed mother, who received the dead body of Her son from the cross, and prepared the body to return to the dust from which it came.  Her 'pieta' is the symbol of our prayer for All Souls day.

At every funeral Mass we wish our beloved dead to have a safe trip, and to come home safely!  When we ask people to pray for us, and promise to pray for them, we mean it most of all once they have passed from this world.  It's when our beloved ones die that we really start praying for them to have a good trip, and to let them know we're here if they need anything!

Today we solemnly remember that it is a complete waste of time to presume that nice people go to heaven.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  The Gospel is just the opposite!  Nice guys always finish last, and the lukewarm are always cast out of the kingdom of heaven, unless they passover in Christ to the fullness of love that constitutes who God is.  Man has just one proper end - to become like God, who is perfect, sacrificial and heroic love.  That passover process must be completed, sooner or later, in every person.  The transformation and divinization of the human person from good to holy is the most dramatic and improbable change of all.  It is only possible through fervent prayer and through fear and trembling!

Again, I say that canonizing nice people is a complete waste of time, and totally misleading.  Of course we live in the hope that God desires each of us to be saved and to lose nothing of what belongs to Christ, but to equate myself with a saint like Maximilian Kolbe, and to pretend there is no substantial difference, is to do the most absurd thing of all. To equate my friends to Mother Teresa, or my family to St. Therese of Lisieux, and to pray like they are close enough and ready instantaneously for heaven, is to truck in nonsense.  

The God of justice and love is too good and too loving to shove us into a new reality that does not correspond to the state of my soul.  Hence purgatory, the doctrine of justice and love and great hope, which is highlighted today and celebrated as a solemn duty and corporal and spiritual work of mercy for the Church militant.

I'm so glad it fall on a Sunday this year, so we can all mark this feast together.  It's not about earning out way to heaven, but praying our way to a worthy participation in the passover mystery of Jesus, a cooperation with the one saving sacrifice that infinitely pleases the father, and a sharing of these graces won by love with our beloved dead, especially the forgotten souls in purgatory most in need of God's mercy.

+mj  

Is holiness easy or hard?

Homily

27th Sunday in Ordinary Time C

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village

5 October 2025

AMDG

Is holiness easy or hard?

I bet your first answer is that holiness is really hard.  Really hard.  And you're not wrong.  Or perhaps your first response was that holiness is neither easy nor hard.  Maybe you sniffed our a false dichotomy.  When considering matters relating to God, paradox oftentimes prevails, and both . . and answers are much better than either . . . or answers.  So maybe holiness is both easy and hard.  

The right answer is the last one though.  Holiness is easy.  Holiness is simple.  My yoke is easy and my burden is light, says the Lord.  All it takes is the smallest amount of faith.  Then holiness, a complete sharing in the love and power of God that overcomes all things, is the fruit.  

Holiness is easy.  It is simple.  It is expected.  It is at hand.

Don't believe me?  Look at the three honorees who receive the Ave St. Ann award this weekend.  They make it look easy.  What's the key ingredient, the common thread between these St. Ann heroes of faith?  They pray.  They have faith. They put themselves simply at the the service of God's plan. They live not an ego-drama of trying to get, but the theo-drama of simply giving.  The result of this trusting relationship of faith is powerful indeed; the fruit is a heroic love the endures and prevails and bears fruit that lasts.

None of the three honorees - Dick and Martha Taylor, Al and Pat Kolarik, Jim and Patti Lisson - think they deserve these awards. Which is why we are so happy to give them to them.  Each would in their own way say they are the least deserving, that they are only unprofitable servants, doing what life requires.  Yet in trusting God and serving His plan and not their own, they have truly moved mountains.  

Faith obtains all things.  Perseverance obtains all things.  Prayer obtains all things. Chastity obtains all things.  Service obtains all things. Being pro-life obtains all things!  It's all utterly simple, and just takes a mustard seed of faith.  

It's hard when you make your life about you; when your life is about you, the simple demands of holiness seem impossible.  Yet they are easy for God, and easy for one who just has a mustard seed of faith.  

I'm not saying that the Taylors, Kolariks and Lissons have had comfortable lives.  Far from it.  They have just learned a very simple secret.  That trusting God and serving Him redounds to their own benefit.  Trusting in God's plans makes them strong.  The just one is not one who has life figured out, but the one who lives by faith.

In honoring our Ave St. Ann inaugural award winners, we honor all of us, just as when we honor the saints, a new path to holiness opens up for each one of us. Thank you Lissons, Kolariks and Taylors, for showing us the way.  Holiness is for everyone.  And for the one who has faith, it's not hard at all.

+mj  

What's your favorite paradox?

Homily

Exaltation of the Holy Cross

14 September 2025

St. Ann Catholic Church

Prairie Village, KS

AMDG

What is your favorite paradox?

Before we answer that question, let's make sure we understand paradox.  A paradox is an expression that seems contradictory, but is actually true, and in so being, pushes the limits of what we can know and experience.  

Jesus plays in paradox all the time, and so consistently reminds us that as far as the heavens are from the earth, so far are God's ways about our ways.  You know some of the simplest and maddening paradoxes.  Love your enemies.  Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who persecute you.  Give to those who steal from you.  Then, and only then, will you understand what love fully and really is, what love is capable of.  

Paradox is a key feature of the Gospel.  It's the secret sauce of the beatitudes, what it means to be truly happy.  It is constitutive of heaven, where our narrow categories, judgments and ways of thinking give way to deeper and greater truths and realities.

Another way to think of it is remembering something that you were most sure about, that you were wrong about.  Last weekend I was in Columbia, Missouri, and I was horrified.  I hated it.  Yet I loved it.  The last thing I would ever need are Mizzou friends, and now I'm getting lots of them.  I hate it, but I don't.  I joked that the worst thing that could ever happen to me was to be made the bishop of Jefferson City, and have the University of Missouri as part of my flock.  That would be the worst day of my life, but paradoxically, maybe not.  

A parent said at a kindergarten parent party Friday night - my last kid is starting kindergarten. We have a long way to go, but it will be over too soon. How can it both be true that I can't wait for it to be over, but I'll miss it too?  Cue paradox.

Another paradox is that we are safest not when we are in lockdown, but when we face our fears with courage.  Another is that the greatest way to defeat evil is not to defend against it, or even eliminate it, but to suffer it with courage in love.  No has greater power than this, than to surrender one's life for one's friends.  

There's so many!  

Jesus paradoxically says that I am happiest when my suffering and pain is greatest, for it is precisely at that point when I am most threatened, that my faith, hope and love are stretched to the limits, and my security is placed in them not in self-preservation.  

It's when it's most dangerous to go to Mass and stand up for what I believe, that people are motivated to go. When it's cheap and easy, it's not worth anything.  

Fast forward the paradox of the cross, a reminder that that punishment due to sin is also mysteriously, in Christ, the cure.  When I embrace the thing I least want, or can change, I rob it of it's power.  When I kiss the most threatening thing in my life, I overcome that thing.

The cross is re-presented to us in the middle of ordinary time, as the reminder I need is that the paradox of the cross is my only glory as a Christian.  The glorious cross, the ultimate paradox which reveals fully the power of God and the wisdom of God.  

+mj  

Is life just a potluck dinner?

Homily

22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time B1

St. Ann Church - Prairie Village

31 August 2025

AMDG

Is life really just a potluck dinner?

The more I pray over the dinner stories in the Gospels, the more I think the answer is yes.  

What did Jesus do all the time?  Well, lots of things, but He was accused of being a glutton and a drunkard, hanging out with tax collectors and sinners.  In today's Gospel, He's at a fancy dinner again, and observing things carefully.

What do priests do all day?  Well, we're just like the rest of you.  We live hand to mouth.  We gotta eat.  We survive meal to meal.  It's the one thing we all have to do.  How we do it, and with who, makes all the difference.  All of life and all of reality pass through dinner.  It's how heaven is described.  If you're paying attention, it's how Jesus set it up.  All of life and all of reality pass through this wedding banquet right here.

How do we do it?  Jesus says make sure you have the right four food groups.  Did you catch them?  Make sure you have the poor, the blind, the crippled and the lame.  Remember it's not only what's for dinner, it's who for dinner.  Make sure you're eating with people who can't pay you back.  Invite people who are broke, and sick, and stuck, and lost.  It shouldn't be that hard.

Life is just a potluck dinner, when you never know what you're going to get.  Jesus teaches us that we worry way too much about our rank and place at the table, seeking security in people who have the same status as us.  To hell with that, says Jesus.  Dinner is much more exciting when there is risk, vulnerability, and unpredictability.  

That's true for Mass too.  There has to be something at stake, some risk in it.  Ironically, the more dangerous it is to go to Mass in history, the more people come to Mass.  The more comfortable we are, the less we value Mass.  

That is not to say that we should be reckless or throw out all precautions for Mass.  Far from it.  We have entered a time when we will probably always be adding security to Mass.  I don't know if we can ever go back to the way things used to be.  

But if we let fear scatter us, then evil wins and has the last say. That can't be so.  There has to be some risk, and vulnerability and unpredictability to Mass, or it's not worth coming to.  

All of life and all of reality pass through this wedding banquet, and this sacred meal. Jesus set it up that way.  And in the end, He really just wants it to be a potluck dinner.

+mj  

Am I the underdog?

Homily

21st Sunday in Ordinary Time B1

24 August 2025

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village

AMDG

When it comes to salvation, am I the underdog?  Is anybody here tonight really comfortable with the question, are you saved?  If you died today do you know where you would spend eternity?  

On the one hand, the question should not make us uncomfortable at all.   Jesus has already answered it!  When asked if many or a few will get into heaven, a question everyone always wants to know, Jesus doesn't answer it!  So when I am asked the question, am I saved, I am free to answer as Jesus does.  It's the wrong question!  He simply answers with a verb - strive!  Strive to enter through the narrow gate!  It's the easiest answer, and you can't be wrong, because it's Jesus answer!

On the other hand, though, the question should always make me uncomfortable!  For Jesus says clearly that when it comes to salvation, I am the underdog.  Who could possibly boast that they have already become what heaven is - perfect, consistent, sacrificial, unselfish, merciful, and heroic love that strong as death?  Certainly not me!  Jesus says to never presume on salvation - always act as the underdog!

This does not mean of course that the opposite response of presumption - despair - is the right response to the question.  What can I be certain of?  That God desires my salvation, that I become even now what heaven is, fully alive through perfect love.  For God, 1 person lost is too many and 99 saved is too few!  I am certain that He desires my salvation and all the means are there, for nothing is impossible for God.  The pattern for my salvation is that of the Blessed Virgin, who believed that what was spoken to her by the Lord would be fulfilled!

I can be certain of God's desire that I be saved, but not that I have fully cooperated in this desire!  Even as I have accepted the paschal mystery of Jesus Christ as the only means of salvation, and the only sacrifice infinitely pleasing to the Father, still my life has to be fully processed within this mystery, this passion of Jesus.  Strive! Strive!  Strive, Jesus says, taking nothing for granted ever!  Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.

To put it another way, the process of my salvation is the same as Jesus.  His passion, and my being incorporated into his body through baptism, initiate me into the process, but like Him I am in anguish until it is accomplished!  God desires all people to be saved, but is in anguish until and unless it is accomplished.  Such is my attitude!

While enjoying great protection and the many great things God has done for me, still the Gospel is clear that my entire being must also be processed and reformed through the passion, the paschal mystery, and the heart of Jesus.  Nothing less than heaven gets into heaven, and God is too loving to save me without myself, without my being capable of experiencing what heaven really is!

So Catholics, even and especially as we endure suffering that is unfair and beyond our understanding, and what we least want, always embrace the discipline of the Lord as a key part of the process of working out salvation with fear and trembling.  Training, teaching, suffering, adversity, consequences and punishment, are all part of the necessary way in which love is purified, and made ready to participate in the kingdom of Heaven.

Nothing less than heaven gets into heaven.  That's why we're underdogs, and the only story of salvation is the story of us beating all the odds and allowing our entire being to be processed in the paschal mystery of Jesus.

Am I saved?  Answer it the way Jesus does, as an underdog.  Strive to enter through the narrow gate.

+mj  

 

When's the best time to risk it all?

Homily

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time C1

10 August 2025

St. Ann Church - Prairie Village, Kansas

AMDG

When's the best time to bet it all?

You know from the urgency demanded in the Gospel what the answer is. Don't pretend you don't.

August 10th is the Memorial of St. Lawrence, who knew when to bet it all.  Martyrs are always ready for the moment.  Lawrence witnessed the martyrdom of the Pope and several of his brother deacons under the 3rd Century persecution of the Roman emperor Valerian.  Lawrence's life was spared so that he could gather all the treasure of the Church and hand it over to the Roman authorities.  You may remember what Lawrence did.  He gave anything the Church had to the poor and then presented the poor little ones to the Emperor as the Church's greatest treasure.  For this Lawrence was grilled at the stake, but with his life already given away through supernatural love, courage, faith and hope, he famously said to his persecutors - I'm done on this side, you can turn me over now!  He is the patron saint of barbecue - so feel free to honor him by having some today. 

Lawrence knew when to bet it all?  Do you?  Do I?

The biggest risk I've ever made was deciding to go to seminary.  I was set to go to medical school, and had someone I wanted to marry and have a family with.  I gave those up to go to seminary, and gave them up for good when I promised obedience and celibacy, to conform my life more closely to the one whom I represent in personal Christi capitis.  Not nearly as dramatically as Abraham giving up Isaac, did I sacrifice the chance for my own kids, as a sign of faith in God's ability to raise even from the dead.  It's a test of faith that the Church invites of her priests even today. 

I was asked in my final year of seminary if I thought celibacy would be hard.  It was a trick question, and I failed it miserably.  I thought it wouldn't be that hard, that the risk of faith was more behind me than in front of me.  Most of my classmates answered correctly, that it's a risk of faith that only gets more dramatic over time.  Harder, and yes better, but no less dramatic.  

When's the best time to bet it all?  I think you know the answer. Do I?

This week I faced the question at least 100 times - Father, are you ready for school to start?  I hate the question.  I bet you do too. So why do we keep asking it?  It's because readiness and urgency are proper to one who is good at life.  Are you ready is a favorite question for one who knows the best time to bet it all is right now, in the dramatic moment that is right before us.  Procrastination costs us everything, even the kingdom of heaven.  Life is not to be lived in regret or fantasy, but by faith.

Faith is that readiness to respond to what is being made possible right now.  New and greater things are always opening up before us.  Faith is the exploration of the more that attains to the fullness of life and the kingdom of heaven.  Faith is a readiness to respond to the faith that God has first placed in you. Through the gift of Jesus God has bet it all on you.  God got to Mass before you tonight, ready to serve you at that banquet of charity, believing in the love you are capable of.

Since becoming pastor here you all have challenged me not to be afraid of what is possible, and definitely not to settle for what I can manage or control.  Now is the time for me to bet it all on you, in a more dramatic and compelling way than I have ever risked before.  Now is the time for me to believe that each one of you is made for this moment in time, and to believe that you will all respond to the chance before you to attempt the impossible, suffer and die for what you believe, to believe in the fullness of life available in Christ Jesus, and to play your critical part in His redemptive mission.

When is the time to bet it all in faith?  If you haven't guessed it yet, you better answer now.  It's not in the past.  It's not in the future.  The time is always now.

+mj  

Who knows me?

Homily

4th Sunday of Easter C1

Good Shepherd Sunday and World Day of Prayer for Vocations

Mother's Day

11 May 2024

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village, KS

AMDG

Who really knows me?

I have a ton of fun with the kids who run around St. Ann.  They're always asking if I know their name!  One of them this week asked me if I knew her mom's name, because she saw me talking to her mom!  I teased back at her - did your mom forget her name?  Is that why you're asking me?  If so, I'm so sorry that your mom forget her name.  This teasing escalated the conversation, and the little girl ended up screaming at me to remember her mom's name!

We don't really have a parish here until everyone wants to know everyone. There's no such thing as an anonymous Christianity.  Jesus has called us into intimate communion with Him and each other.  None of us makes sense in isolation; much less so our faith.  The only real chance we have of knowing ourselves is by first being known.   Otherwise, we remain enigmas and mysteries to ourselves and each other.  We don't really have a parish until and unless everyone wants to know everyone.

Our need to be known is immense, as deep as the mystery of a human soul.   When I am interested in God and others, and them in me, life takes on its full excitement and adventure.  When I stop being curious, and conclude that nobody really knows me, nobody cares, and nobody can do anything, despair and death lurk in wait for my soul.

There's someone who says He knows you like no one else.  Those who belong to Him know His voice, the most unique voice in human history, the only voice that leads those who follow it to eternal life.

There can be many powerful voices in our lives. The voice of our mothers is usually one.  Not always, but usually, and it can even be powerful in its absence.  I remember a ton of things my mom said to me. Now that she has been gone almost 25 years, I can't hear her tone anymore in my head.  That makes me sad, and I miss it.  But my mom's voice was unmistakable.  She always believed I was capable of more.  She never wanted me to settle.  She told me not to be a priest if my heart was not in it.  Most of all, she said that I was not myself around any of the girls I brought home to Hoxie, especially the ones who didn't know how to peel carrots or potatoes.   My mom knew me like no one else.  She knew my blind spots.  Her voice is still powerful even in its absence.  It's because she knew me in ways I could never know myself.

There are two ways of knowing things.  There's the factual way and the personal way, the way of ideas and the way of experience.  Guess which way teaches us more?  You know the answer well.  We learn more by experience, and by story, than by facts and ideas.  The latter aren't bad, but we all know ultimately that what matters is not what you know, but who you know.

Most of us have three competing voices in our souls.  The first one is the voice of the Good Shepherd, the voice of encouragement, inviting us to go where the the brave Shepherd has gone before. For our shepherd, the Lord, is also a sheep who was shorn naked, killed and eaten.  His is the voice of encouragement, that there is no heroic nor sacrificial love that's impossible for you.  It's the voice that echoes the first words of the Risen Christ, and that of Pope Leo XIV - Peace be with you!

The next voice is the voice of discouragement.  You're not good enough, and you never will be, so you might as well not try.  It's the voice of shame that divides us against ourselves.

The third voice is ours, it's the voice that desperately seeks control out of fear of the pain and vulnerability of the human experience.  It's the voice that just wants to be alone, and seeks to avoid, escape and hide.  

Which of these three is the most powerful voice in your life?  Only one leads to true and everlasting life.  It's the voice of encouragement.  You're capable of greater and more heroic love that you think you are.  Peace be with you.  Be not afraid.  Leave your old self behind, pick up your cross, and follow me, for the sake of the joy and new life that lies ahead. Amen.

+mj  

Will I show up to confession?

Homily

2nd Sunday of Easter

Divine Mercy Sunday

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village

27 April 2025

AMDG

Will I show up to confession?

I know, I know.  Lent is over. The penitential season of Lent has passed over into the graces of Easter, through which we rise with Christ to newness of life.  Still, if we are paying attention , we will notice that the best confessions are not Lenten ones, but Easter ones.

It is the Risen Christ who appears to the scared apostles who is eager to forgive.  The Risen Christ of Easter comes not for revenge, but to show the greatness of the Divine Mercy.  Peace be with you!  I come not for revenge, but for forgiveness.  Then He breathes on them and asks them to be instruments of this divine mercy.  This all happens not during Lent, but in the new days of Easter!

Then we have Thomas' confession. You might notice that he forgets to confess missing Mass on the first day of the Lord's resurrection.  But he doesn't make the same mistake twice.  He shows up on the 8th day of recreation, and confesses that he's scared, and he has doubts.  So do I, Thomas!  Thanks for being my hero and for confessing on my behalf.  I'm not from Missouri, but I'm a show-me kind of guy.  I know believing is seeing, not seeing is believing, but I'm just to scared to believe.  Lord, help my unbelief.

Thomas' Easter confession is received within the embrace of divine mercy.  If you don't trust that there is a love stronger than death, then feel for yourself.  I feel so blessed that Pope Francis, the icon of the Risen Christ, fought like hell to let us see one last time that there is a love stronger than death, as he went through the square on Easter Monday.  Pope John Paul did the same exactly 20 years ago, as he appeared at the window overlooking the square, even though he was completely paralyzed and unable to talk, so that we could see his wounds and feel them, and sense his trust in the divine mercy that begets eternal life.  

What heroes are in our midst, who allow me to place my doubts in a love stronger than death within the wounds of Christ as manifested in his beloved disciples and in his vicars the Holy Fathers of our faith.

I have only to move myself behind the closed door of the confessional, and beg for the mercy to heal my doubts, to confess like Thomas eventually did, so that I can proclaim, even at the cost of my own life, the truth of the Resurrection!

What's my last word?

Homily

Easter Sunday of the Lord's Resurrection 

20 April 2025

St. Ann Parish Prairie Village    

AMDG

If you've been following my pivotal questions during this Triduum, you'll notice they're all ultimate questions tied to the unique liturgical actions of these ultimate holy days.

Holy Thursday - What's your never - tied to the washing of feet.

Good Friday - How would you give your last kiss - tied to the veneration of the cross.

Now to Easter Sunday - What's my last word - tied to the renewal of my baptismal promises.

If I could say only one word for the rest of my life, what would be my final word?

I bet you can guess what mine is.  Risen!  Risen!  Risen!  Jesus Christ is risen from the dead.  He is risen just as He said!  Alleluia! Alleluia!

That's my word, tonight and forever.  Risen! On this word, and on this word alone, I am happy to bet everything I am and all that I ever will be.

Tonight I witness to you that this word -  Risen -is the most mysterious, dramatic, profound and TRUE word that has ever been spoken or could ever be spoken in all of human history.  Tonight I sing this word - Risen - in liturgical concert with the angels, the saints, and yes, the martyrs who died for the truth of this word even today, including Fr. Arul Carasala who died in the line of fire two weeks ago, betting his life on this word - Risen.  Today, I shout into the darkness that threatens so much and so many that this word - Risen - is the one thing I know to be true out of everything I know to be true.  

Risen - that's my word - now and forever.  What's yours

Today my prayer is that you too will dare to shout into the world a word that is your destiny to proclaim.  Today my prayer is that each of us and all of us, led by our catechumens and candidates, and the great risk of faith they speak tonight, will get off the couch!  Today is no time for a virtual Easter.  To hell with that.  I pray that in this Church today there is no sideline, no bench, no bystanders!

You have my answer.  I dare you to proclaim yours!

Why this word for me?  Because without it, even the most heartfelt words of love I ever say, words first spoken by Jesus - this is my body broken for you - lose their power. Without the word Risen even the greatest sign of love I have ever known, the cross on which I gave the most passionate kiss of my life Friday afternoon, is powerless in the face of death.  St. Paul said it best - unless Jesus is Risen, all of us here are just a bunch of pathetic losers.

But I don't profess this word tonight because I need it to be true.  My conviction about the empty tomb of Jesus is not a vain wish that justifies my life or helps numb me to the sting of death.  No, this word is the fruit of being a real disciple of Jesus.  Jesus never invites you to a wishful faith. That's weak sauce!  No, he invites me to follow Him first to the cross to verify whether there is a love strong as death.  I pray my discipleship has been a courageous one, filtered through the cross of Jesus where I have learned from Him how to face reality, fear nothing and avoid nothing.

My conviction comes from the times I have actually dared to be a a real Christian, and I'll be damned if Jesus wasn't right  - literally!  Every time I die to sin and to myself for love of Him, I lay hold of a new, different and powerful life that does not fade. Every time I suffer and die with Him, I also rise with Him.  

The paschal mystery - the passover mystery.  It's real people!  It's the only thing that ultimately works, every time!

Jesus Christ is Risen!  He is truly Risen!  Shame on me if this is ever something I have to pretend to be true, instead of something that as a disciple, through the risk of faith, I have discovered to be true.  On this truth - not this wish - but this truth - I am happy to bet everything that I am and ever will be.  Not because I need to, not because I'm afraid not to, but because I want to.

My word is Risen!  You've got next!

You're invited shortly to beat me or to join me.  If you dare join, renew your baptismal promises on Easter Sunday.  If you join, please don't do anything cheap or easy or pitiable.  This is conviction Sunday - the word means 'with victory'.  As our profession goes so goes our participation in the greatest victory of all time!  So let's decide with sharp minds, and pure hearts and courageous wills.

So I propose to you now a word that has rocked the history of the world, and changed forever the meaning of life and the destiny of man more than any other, to be the word of your life.  On this most holy moment set apart precisely for your risk of faith, I invite you to say the most mysterious, dramatic, profound and yes true word that has ever been or could ever be spoken.

Risen!  Jesus Christ is Risen!  He is Risen from the dead, just as He said.  Alleluia! Alleluia!

+mj  

How would I spend my last kiss?

Homily

Good Friday of the Lord's Passion

17 April 2025

St. Ann Church Prairie Village

AMDG

Who's the best kisser here today?  Is it you? Is it me?

Welcome to the Church's annual smackdown, her ultimate kissing contest.

What if I had only one kiss left to give?

Would I give it now?

Would I give it here?

I can tell you for sure how I would NOT spend my last kiss - on the kiss cam!  I hate the kiss cam.  I don't go to sporting events for PDA.  The inventor of the kiss cam should be canceled.  I don't care if everyone but me loves it.  I live in perpetual fear that some cameral operator far far away would think it funny to zoom in on a priest during the kiss cam.  So whenever it comes on, I make a beeline for the beer line.  The kiss cam - it's a hard no for me.

Yet I do have within me one passionate kiss.  I do have an expression of adoration that is ultimate within me.  How will I use the last kiss of my life?  Will I spend it now?  Will I spend it here?

The last kiss in today's Passion story is that of Judas.  It's the kiss of betrayal.  It's the kiss of death.  You just participated in the drama.  Jesus is dead, and you killed him.  You kissed him.  That's where the story is. That's where the story could end - his and yours.

Yet what if you have one kiss left?  Would you spend it now?  Would you spend it here?

The Good Friday liturgy is famous for its liturgical kiss.  When you approach the crucifix in just a few minutes, you get to choose what your kiss means.  Will it be the most passionate kiss of your life?  Will it be the kiss of betrayal, the kiss of death, and where your story will end.  Or will it be a passionate kiss of devotion for a love that dares to die, and where you story truly begins?

The story of God's love for you, and your response, turns on the axis of the cross.  There's an ultimate decision to be made.  The axis of the cross that we hold in veneration can only mean two thing.  It's either the final defeat of love, or the precise place where new and eternal life begins.  

So what if you only had one kiss left to give?  Would you give it now? Would you give it here?

+mj  

What's my superpower?

Homily

7th Sunday in Ordinary Time C

23 February 2025

St. Ann Catholic Church - Prairie Village, KS

AMDG

What's my superpower?

Well, there are a lot of things I'd like to be good at.  I'm sure you know the feeling.  I'd like to be in better shape, to be able to play baseball like Bobby Witt, to know what it takes to get everyone to Mass, to be a world-class organist . . the list is endless.  I'm grateful for all the gifts and talents I have, but never satisfied.  

Yet today's Gospel says that I already possess the greatest superpower the world has ever seen, a superpower that far surpasses any I could ever achieve, hope or ask for. 

I have the superpower of mercy.  I can forgive.  There is nothing greater.  So says Jesus.  Because I have received this superpower, Jesus commands that I use it.  In case you didn't notice. the Gospel of Jesus admits of no exceptions.  As I have been forgiven, so I am to forgive. It's what distinguishes a real Christian from a fake one.  It's the ultimate thing that makes us children of God, not children of this world.  It is what heaven is made of - forgiveness.  It is what hell lacks - forgiveness.  Hell instead is ripe with judgment.  Jesus says to stop it, lest that be my destiny.

Pope Francis, who needs our prayers by the way, reminds us as the world's superpower, the most prosperous and free nation on earth, that our greatest power is not to dominate or control, but to serve and to forgive.  Those without status among us are more than problems or criminals, they are the children of God whom the Lord wants us to redeem with His merciful love.  Pope Francis reminds us that if we ever fail to see God and ourselves in the most desperate and vulnerable, we have lost our souls, and the path that leads to the kingdom of heaven. Even as we can applaud efforts to restore order and end dysfunction, we must grow even more in mercy and compassion, for that is who our Father in heaven is - merciful to all without distinction.

The world is moving fast, and it's only picking up steam.  The Pope is sick, our Bishops are suing the United States for overdue contract funding for the legal settlement of refugees, while reminding the Administration that babies are great, but IVF is immoral, and while applauding efforts to restore the rule of law and ending dysfunction, while urging that all people be treated with dignity and compassion.  The Gospel needs to be applied to the signs of our times, and those times are dramatic and explosive indeed!

Yet the most urgent reminder of today's Gospel is that you and I have been forgiven; therefore, the greatest superpower we ever will have is the capacity to forgive.  To be a real Christian, no matter what the circumstances we find ourselves in, is to launch a pre-emptive strike into the world, and to echo the self-sacrificiing and merciful gift of Jesus.  Nobody takes my life from me.  I freely give it.   Those who live the law of the gift know that the grace and mercy of Jesus conquers all things, and there is no fear of any enemy.  For all is already given and forgiven.  

What's my greatest superpower?  It's the supernatural mercy of God that I have received, a mercy that turns the wisdom of the world upside down, the superpower that alone build the kingdom of heaven.

My greatest superpower is to forgiven even when I don't want to or have to.  My greatest superpower is to always forgive, as I have been forgiven.

+mj

What's my favorite story of all time?

Homily

26 January 2025

3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time - Word of God Sunday

St. Ann Catholic Church  - Prairie Village 

AMDG

What's my favorite story of all time?

When I was featured in the Archdiocesan Newspaper The Leaven upon my ordination to the priesthood, I was asked about my favorite things.  I said that my favorite book was Death Comes to the Archbishop by Willa Cather, a curious choice for a new priest just ordained by an Archbishop.

That was 2004.  I wonder what I would say today.

On the 10th Anniversary of the Royals beating the Mets in the World Series, I'm tempted to say that team is my favorite story. The Jayhawks have won a Natty, and the Chiefs three Super Bowls since then, so there are other candidates.  A lot of us are rooting for the unprecedented story of three straight Super Bowls to be written.  If so, will that be my favorite story of all time?

I love it when athletes begin their postgame interviews by thanking and praising their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Most all the time it is genuine, that these athletes who do incredible things and win amazing victories that inspire so many, attribute their success to the story of Jesus Christ, who won the ultimate victory over sin and death, and who thirsts to share this victory with all his disciples.

The athletes get that as glorious as is it to win sports victories, unless those victories participate in the redemptive mission of Christ, they are doomed to extinction as history inevitably fades into oblivion.  These athletes get something, that unless their story participates in the greatest story of all time, glory is fleeting at best.

This is true for you and me too.  That passion that is proper to your human nature, to write a heroic story of love with your life, to dramatically win the battle for faith over doubt, good over evil, and life over death, has been invited to play a pivotal role in the redemption of the world and the building of the kingdom of Heaven that will never end.  Remarkably, St. Paul says God has so written the play, and involved the actors in the body, that those with lesser roles mysteriously have the greater importance.  For the kingdom of Heaven is built from the inside out, from least to greatest.

This is the great story of salvation that we begin telling again on Word of God Sunday. For the next 34 weeks of Ordinary Time, we will see how St. Luke tells the greatest story of all time.  Most dramatically and importantly, you will get to pray through how you play a pivotal role in the story, as the story of redemption is meant course right through your heart, your body and the precise circumstances of your life.

What could be more dramatic than this, that you play a pivotal role in the greatest story of all time, and that the fulfillment of the story is riding on your response?  No other story, not the Chiefs, not politics, not the movies, not the economy, nor even the countless dramas being played out in every corner of the human experience, is more important than your story.

Chew on that as you meditate on Luke's Gospel throughout this new year.  Remembering always, that although we are a religion of the book, we are even more so a religion of the Word made flesh, who runs His story through the hearts, minds and bodies of His mystical body the Church.

What is my favorite story?

+mj

Who is pursuing your heart?

Homily

Solemnity of the Epiphany

4 January 2025

St. Ann Catholic Church Prairie Village, KS 

AMDG

Who is pursuing my heart?

It's what I desperately and deeply want for Christmas.  It's also what I'm most afraid of, that someone is pursuing my heart.  Remember that at Christmas, we reflected together on the most primal human need and desire of every newborn baby. Will you hold me?  It's what Jesus asks of us for Christmas.  It's what I most deeply want as well.

How about for Epiphany?  What does Jesus want, and what do I want?  As I age, I no longer need as much physical touch; still, I want to be pursued, recognized and cherished by someone.  I want what Jesus receives from the wise men.

Is anyone pursuing my heart?  This question lies at the heart of all reality.  Why is there something rather than nothing?  Why is there me instead of not me?  Why does there seem to be so much mind, truth and meaning embedded in creation, and a person, a love story, at the heart of it all?

You guessed it - all of reality exists so that someone who is radically in love with you can pursue your heart.  It's the most glorious, and scariest thing imaginable.

On Epiphany I get to choose whether to greet this reality with joy, or fear.

The strange magicians from nowhere couldn't have known that the God of Israel was pursuing their hearts.  Yet thank God they were seekers, not skeptics.  These foreign scientists were interested in the why of everything.  So God was able to bait their hearts by teasing their minds.  You're familiar with this God, I pray.   In order to slip by my fear and elite defenses, He puts on disguises, playing tricks as it were, so that He is not trapped by our skepticism.  He teases these astrologers from timbuktu with a star, betting Epiphany on their curiosity, and winning big!

The magi set out on a courageous expedition that every person is made for, to pursue with passion the real meaning of all things!  The Magi stand in stark contrast to Herod, who was supposed to be the most powerful man in the region.  Instead, He is incredibly scared, paralyzed and terrorized by any revelation beyond his control, privacy and choice.  Herod represents all of us skeptics, who hide behind our controls, rather than setting out in faith to live on new edges of truth.  This fear of Herod, to refuse to engage or worship anything that would draw in beyond myself into the heart of things, is why there is so much boredom and depression among us.  It's why none of our kids go to Church.

Thankfully, there is plenty of room at Epiphany for hope.  God seduced the wise men into the truth that He was pursuing their heart.  He can do the same for me and my loved ones.  The magi make the conversion from skepticism to seeking, then from seeking to worship. They make the incredible conversion of letting the truth beheld by their eyes descend deeply into their hearts.   They gave Christ what He wants for Epiphany - pursuit, recognition and worship.  In giving this, I let my heart be pursued, recognized and cherished by the Lord.  

This was true at the first Epiphany, but will it be true at the next?

Who is pursuing my heart?

+mj