Four minute homilies

Thomas              Jesus’ disciples were afraid of the Jews and locked the doors where they were staying. Jesus came through the walls, stood in the midst of them and said: Peace be with you. He came with his glorious body and they found difficult to recognise him. This is the kind of body we are going to have at the end of time, when our soul will be reunited to our body. We are body and soul, a...

Holy Thursday               One of the most beautiful ceremonies we perform today is the washing of the feet. The Church wants us to witness again what happened at the last supper, not to forget the example of the Master. Saint John begins this chapter in is his Gospel saying that Jesus “having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.” John is the beloved apostle who had the...

Good Friday               After the homily we are going to bring the crucifix veiled, Jesus crucified hiding behind a purple cloth. Purple used to be a royal colour, because it was the most expensive colorant to produce. Herod covered Jesus with a purple robe, to mock him. This is why we use this colour. We cover the crucifix because we don’t know if he is still alive; we don’t want to see him dyi...

Easter Sunday               While the men were sleeping, women went to Jesus’s tomb. Women are always more on top of things. They didn’t have time to finish anointing Jesus’s body on Friday night. They waited till Sunday, because on Saturday it was forbidden to work. We must be like them, awake, here on the most important day of the year, waiting for Jesus to rise from the dead. We believe that he...

Palm Sunday               Today we read the Passion from Saint Luke’s Gospel. Every evangelist gives his particular vision of the event. When we witness or hear about something that happened, we all have different recollections. Luke presents five specific details that are absent in the other three Gospels. The first one is about the night in the garden of olives. He uses the word “agony”, a word...

Lent 5 C The adulterous woman             Saint Augustine defines the meeting between Jesus and the adulterous woman with this great expression: Misera et Misericordia, Misery and Mercy, the wretched woman and the merciful Jesus, the sinner and God, sin and grace. Pope Francis calls his Apostolic Letter at the conclusion of the Jubilee of Mercy, Misericordia et Misera. He turns them around, emphas...

Lent 4 C The Prodigal Son               In chapter 15 of Luke’s Gospel, Jesus proposes three parables of mercy: the lost sheep, the lost coin, and the lost son. His Gospel has earned the title of Gospel of Mercy. To receive his mercy, first we need to recognise we are lost. Nowadays with GPS, it is very difficult to get lost, unless we run out of data or we lose our internet access. The most famou...

Lent 3 C Barren fig tree             Today Jesus gives us the parable of the barren fig tree. Why was it barren? We don’t know why. In spite of all the care and concern of the gardener, the tree remained barren, esterile. It was maybe a proud tree that wanted to just produce leaves, to show off, a beautiful manifestation of its magnificence. Or perhaps it was its selfishness, to keep the produce f...

Lent 2 Transfiguration              Today we are going to ask five questions about the transfiguration. First of all, Where did it happen? Tradition places this event at Mount Tabor, 300 metres above the plain. It looks taller than it is. Now there is a winding road that goes to the top; they use shuttle buses to take you up there. Pope Francis says that these days of Lent we need to climb up, bec...

Lent 1 Temptations             Today we accompany Jesus to the desert to be tempted. For us temptations are part of our daily lives. They say that every temptation can be reduced to one: to believe that we can fulfill the desires of our hearts by ourselves, with our own strength. It was the first temptation of Adam and Eve: to be like gods, knowing good and evil. It is the temptation of the child...

Ash Wednesday   “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” The Gospel acclamation of today’s Mass centers on our struggle for the weeks ahead. We begin an intense liturgical time during which God through the Church will give us special graces to undergo a new conversion. We need to hear his voice and let our hearts become softer like a sponge, to absorb as much as we can from the power...

Two Parables               Today in the Gospel Jesus gives us two parables, more like two comparisons or examples, very practical for our Christian lives. The first one is about the blind leading the blind. We all have the image of a line of blind people falling into a cliff, one after the other, oblivious of what is going to happen to them. It helps us to ask the question: What or who are we foll...

Magnanimity             Today’s Gospel reading reaches a higher level. Jesus is always lifting us up to a higher level of perfection. It is a reminder of the universal call to holiness. We are all called to become holy; it means that when we die, we go straight to heaven. It is a central message of the Second Vatican Council. We are not called just to be a good Christian, but to become holy. It is...

The Beatitudes               The readings of today’s Mass focus on trust. The first reading from the book of Jeremiah, compares a man who trusts in human beings with the man who trusts in the Lord. The first one is like a bush planted in the desert, dried and barren; the second one is a tree planted on the shore of a river, its roots sucking up water all year around and producing magnificent fruit...

Miraculous catch of fish             Today in the Gospel we have a beautiful scene full of lessons. We are at the lake of Gennesaret, surrounded by boats and nets. This is how we imagine Jesus, close to the water, on the shores of the lake, among fishermen. The scenery hasn’t changed much from Jesus time. He got into Peter’s boat, which represents the Church. The Pope is the captain leading us to...

Presentation of Our Lord             Today Jesus is brought for the first time to his temple, to fulfil the duties prescribed by the Jewish Law. He comes in his mother’s arms; he is too little to be able to walk. Joseph brings a pair of pigeons. They were a poor family and couldn’t afford a lamb. A poet says that because God couldn’t find poverty in heaven, he came to find it on earth. After all t...

Beginning of Luke's Gospel             We begin this new year with the Gospel of Saint Luke. He is the only evangelist to give his book a preface, where he describes why he has written the book: to provide an orderly account of the life of Jesus. Luke is the most prolific author of the New Testament: he wrote the longest Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles. He was a Greek from Antioch, and he...

Wedding at Cana              Jesus’ public life begins with a wedding banquet, with a celebration. It is the beginning of the announcement of the good news. It this setting Jesus chose to manifest himself first as a Messiah. The apostles were happy to begin to follow Jesus to a wedding. They were afraid that they were going to go through the hardships of the disciples of John the Baptist. Jesus be...

Epiphany             The three wise men saw the star and followed it. This is the story of their lives, of their encounter with God, of their place in history. It is an amazing one; by following a star, they met a baby, and they discovered the Messiah. Humanly speaking it was crazy. Why did a passing star provoke that reaction on the Magi? How do you follow a star? Where or when is it going to sto...

Holy Family C             There were three important feasts for the Jews, the Passover, Pentecost and the Feast ofTabernacles. Many Jews used to go to Jerusalem for one of these feasts. The Holy Family used to go for the Passover, the greatest of the three. Nazareth is just some eighty miles from Jerusalem. For the trip they used to go several families together; the journey took four or five days....

Christmas             During this Advent, in our quest for Jesus, we have been following the example of John the Baptist, Joseph and Mary. They have led us to him. We have arrived at our destination. We have reached the center of our lives and the focus is a baby. Now we realise that baby Jesus is all that matters. These days of Christmas are days of calm and serene contemplation of baby Jesus. Al...

Fourth Sunday of Advent             After the Annunciation, when the angel Gabriel left Mary, Saint Luke says that she set out in haste to a town in the hill country of Judah. Mary was in a hurry to fulfill the will of God. Even though God didn’t ask her directly to help her cousin Elizabeth, Mary understood immediately what God wanted her to do, and she didn’t waste time thinking about it. Joseph...

Third Sunday of Advent             Today we can use rose vestments. Why? To express our joy because the Lord is coming. Today’s Sunday it is called Domenica Gaudete, because this is how its entrance antiphon begins in Latin: Gaudete, rejoice. It comes from Saint Paul’s letter to the Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say rejoice. The Lord is near.” After two weeks of penance for pre...

Second Sunday of Advent              Today we follow Saint John the Baptist in our way to Bethlehem. He is going to lead us to baby Jesus. But his path is not going to be easy for us because it goes through the most difficult terrain, the desert. He was inspired by the Holy Spirit to retire into the wilderness. There he devoted himself to prayer and to live a penitencial life, where he could meet...

First Sunday of Advent             Today we begin a new liturgical year. It is a new beginning, where we walk again through the life of our Lord Jesus Christ. Why do we need to tread on his footsteps every year? Because once is not enough. We human beings need to be reminded of important things over and over again, because we forget or because it takes us a long time to grasp its full meaning. Tha...