February 16, 2025 Homily: Fr. Vigoa — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:07let me Begin by sharing with you a true
2. 0:10story of a man whose Faith was tested
3. 0:14but whose deep roots in Christ kept him
4. 0:19standing his name is Shane he was a
5. 0:22firefighter a devoted husband a loving
6. 0:27father one one night he responded to a
7. 0:30raging house
8. 0:32fire he did what he was trained to do he
9. 0:36ran in to save
10. 0:39lives but the house
11. 0:41collapsed and in that moment his world
12. 0:44turned
13. 0:45dark Shane
14. 0:48survived but with severe burns that left
15. 0:51him
16. 0:53unrecognizable months in the hospital
17. 0:55turned into years of painful recovery
18. 1:00his once strong hands were now scarred
19. 1:03his face barely resembling the man that
20. 1:06he once
21. 1:08was he could have given
22. 1:11up and most
23. 1:14do he could have turned to anger to
24. 1:17despair to
25. 1:19bitterness many people in his situation
26. 1:23would
27. 1:24have but Shane stayed rooted in the
28. 1:28Lord his families and friends watched in
29. 1:31awe as he continued to go to mass on
30. 1:35Sundays continued to pray continued to
31. 1:38smile even through the
32. 1:41pain when asked how he endured he simply
33. 1:44said my roots are
34. 1:46deep my faith has always been planted in
35. 1:50Christ the fire burned my skin but it
36. 1:54couldn't touch my
37. 1:57soul if there's one overarching theme
38. 2:01that jumps out at us today and leaps off
39. 2:05the pages is
40. 2:07this stay rooted in the
41. 2:10Lord no matter what the situation in
42. 2:13your state of life no matter what you're
43. 2:15going through right
44. 2:17now stay rooted in the
45. 2:20lord it's another way of saying that we
46. 2:22trust in Christ and his words and his
47. 2:27promises we hope in him not in the
48. 2:30things of the world or what the world
49. 2:32can give us as far as
50. 2:35security we seek to live always in his
51. 2:38grace according to His holy
52. 2:41laws we Bend Our Lives to conform
53. 2:44ourselves to Christ and his gospel
54. 2:47instead of always trying to bend Christ
55. 2:49and his gospel to conform to our
56. 2:54lives amidst the great Joys that this
57. 2:57life has to offer and amidst the sorrows
58. 3:00in times of Plenty and in times of
59. 3:03want when we are at ease and when we
60. 3:07carry heavy
61. 3:09burdens we need to stay rooted in the
62. 3:11lord
63. 3:13always that's the theme this
64. 3:16Sunday we hear today the Beatitudes as
65. 3:19recorded by
66. 3:22Luke and these words really are quite
67. 3:26shocking but our theme helps to make
68. 3:29sense of what Luke is giving
69. 3:33us Jesus proclaims that blessed are the
70. 3:36poor the hungry the Weeping and the
71. 3:41persecuted you can almost hear the
72. 3:44people who heard this for the very first
73. 3:46time say what those people are blessed
74. 3:50what are you talking
75. 3:53about it no doubt went against
76. 3:56everything that PE the people at the
77. 3:58time and probably what you're thinking
78. 4:01as
79. 4:02well yet that's precisely what Jesus was
80. 4:07saying now what is it about poverty
81. 4:10about Hunger about sadness about
82. 4:12persecution that's so great well not
83. 4:16much they are not
84. 4:19blessings except in this one
85. 4:22way those conditions lead us to recall
86. 4:26our need and dependence on God and make
87. 4:30us rely solely on
88. 4:33him they make us sink
89. 4:37deep putting placing Our Roots in the
90. 4:40Lord that's our theme and in that sense
91. 4:44they can lead to Greater
92. 4:48blessings the
93. 4:50opposite situation can also be
94. 4:53true listen again to the shocking words
95. 4:56of
96. 4:58Jesus woe to you who are
97. 5:02rich who are filled who laugh who are
98. 5:06well spoken of woe to
99. 5:10you again you can almost hear the people
100. 5:12who heard these words for the first time
101. 5:14say what woe to those
102. 5:17people it no doubt went against
103. 5:19everything the people at that time and
104. 5:22probably what we think as
105. 5:25well yet that's precisely what Jesus is
106. 5:27saying
107. 5:30now what's so bad about having money
108. 5:32about plenty about Earthly happiness and
109. 5:35in and the esteem of others well nothing
110. 5:38nothing's wrong with
111. 5:40that they are blessings to us these are
112. 5:43gifts from God for us except in one
113. 5:49way when they tempt us to wander away
114. 5:52from the Lord to take our eyes off of
115. 5:56Jesus to uproot ourselves and move away
116. 5:59away from him that's our theme again to
117. 6:04forget our dependence to forget our
118. 6:06Reliance on God to treat those
119. 6:10blessings the gifts from God as Gods
120. 6:15themselves there's the danger because if
121. 6:18we do that then woe to
122. 6:22you we hear today in our first reading
123. 6:25from the mighty Prophet
124. 6:27Jeremiah and he uses an image that fits
125. 6:30in well with our theme today he says
126. 6:33that those who trust in the Lord whose
127. 6:36hope is in the Lord are like trees that
128. 6:39are planted beside the
129. 6:43water if there's rain the tree is good
130. 6:47if there's a drought the tree is still
131. 6:50good why because the roots are sunk deep
132. 6:53to the source The Roots reach the
133. 6:57water he goes further saying that
134. 7:00because the tree has deep roots in the
135. 7:02water it does not fear the heat nor does
136. 7:05it feel the distress of the drought but
137. 7:09stays green and even bears
138. 7:14fruit what was true back then remains
139. 7:18true
140. 7:19today if you're a Catholic who takes his
141. 7:22or her faith seriously if you're a
142. 7:25person of faith and you open openly live
143. 7:28out your faith
144. 7:30you will be called a religious
145. 7:33fanatic you will be told that Catholics
146. 7:36are hung up on
147. 7:38sex you will be told that you have a
148. 7:42Catholic guilt
149. 7:45complex that Catholics today are out of
150. 7:47touch with social problems you will be
151. 7:51told all sorts of crazy things because
152. 7:53the people making these sorts of
153. 7:55statements think that you can not be
154. 7:58possibly at all be right in your head
155. 8:00you got to be
156. 8:02crazy something must be
157. 8:05off wasn't too long ago we learned even
158. 8:08the government had targeted Catholics
159. 8:10labeling them as
160. 8:12extremists imposing restrictions on
161. 8:14religious freedoms and pressuring the
162. 8:16church to conform to secular
163. 8:20ideologies the more the world drifts
164. 8:23from God the more it seeks to silence
165. 8:25those who refuse to follow along
166. 8:31there's no doubt about it Jesus has a
167. 8:34system of values that is contrary to the
168. 8:38world the only question that remains is
169. 8:41are you crazy enough to accept them and
170. 8:44live by them are you crazy enough to
171. 8:47admire the life of the Saints are you
172. 8:49crazy enough to change your life are you
173. 8:52crazy enough to believe that God offers
174. 8:55you happiness a happiness that the world
175. 8:57cannot give you
176. 9:00I want to be that
177. 9:02crazy what we heard in the gospel The
178. 9:05Sermon on the Mount is not just some
179. 9:07pretty
180. 9:08poetry does not offer us merely a
181. 9:12Sentimental
182. 9:13religion The Sermon on the Mount
183. 9:15presents us with a high
184. 9:18standard along with the promise that God
185. 9:21makes that no matter how tough life
186. 9:25gets he will be with
187. 9:28us take my yoke upon you and learn from
188. 9:31me Jesus says for my for I am meek and
189. 9:34humble of heart and you will find rest
190. 9:37for yourselves for my yoke is easy and
191. 9:40my burden
192. 9:43light it's easy to laugh at
193. 9:46Jesus and to call him
194. 9:49insane it's hard to take Jesus's way
195. 9:53truth and life to transform ourselves
196. 9:56for the good I've told you that before
197. 9:58being a Christian is it's not
198. 10:00easy but if we do we have his promise
199. 10:04that he will be with us and that our
200. 10:06reward in heaven will be out of this
201. 10:10world so back to Shane our
202. 10:14firefighter after years of recovery
203. 10:17Shane was invited to speak at his
204. 10:20Parish he stood before the congregation
205. 10:23his scars visible his pain
206. 10:26undeniable but his smile was radiant you
207. 10:29can you can see the YouTube video he
208. 10:31shared his story and then he points to
209. 10:34this tree outside the window this huge
210. 10:37old oak tree that had stood there on the
211. 10:40church property for decades and he tells
212. 10:43them he says that tree has survived
213. 10:46every storm every winter every drought
214. 10:49because its roots go
215. 10:52deep that's why I'm standing here today
216. 10:55not because I'm strong but because my
217. 10:58faith is rooted in Jesus
218. 11:02Christ my brothers and sisters it's
219. 11:05really a simple lesson today but one
220. 11:08that we need to
221. 11:10hear just as the tree remains green and
222. 11:13fruitful because its roots no matter if
223. 11:16it rains or if there's a
224. 11:18drought the same way with us whether we
225. 11:22experience riches poverty Plenty or want
226. 11:26laughter or sadness sickness or health
227. 11:29persecution or or
228. 11:31esteem we will not be harmed or come to
229. 11:35be lost if we stay rooted in our Lord
230. 11:39Jesus Christ because life will be crazy
231. 11:43we will feel overwhelmed at times and
232. 11:45have anxiety and all the things that
233. 11:47come with that but those who stay in the
234. 11:50L those who stay rooted in the Lord
235. 11:54Jesus calls them blessed amen