Fr. Brian Soliven Sermons

Christ has come to form a new people.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to generous listeners like you. If his words have blessed you, consider supporting this volunteer effort. Every gift helps us continue recording and sharing the hope of Jesus—one homily at a time. Give Here: https://frbriansoliven.org/give

Last night we had our parish Penance Service. Ten priests were available to hear the confessions of our parishioners. By the time we started at 6:30pm, well over a hundred people came. It was a beautiful sight.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to generous listeners like you. If his words have blessed you, consider supporting this volunteer ef...

We all want happiness. It’s the universal truth, crossing all national boundaries, cultures, economic status, and religions. We cannot choose otherwise. All the decisions that we make each day, from the most minut to the biggest, all relate to that goal somehow. Even the mere act of getting up in the morning to a job we dislike, for example, is made to achieve happiness. The job allows me to earn...

The amazing story of St. Patrick is reminder that God is truly, our loving Heavenly Father. He can take the darkest moments of our lives when we're tempted to believe the lie that God has abandoned us and use it for His glorious providence. Listen now and see how Patrick went from slave to marvelous saint.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to...

Déjenme hacerles una gran pregunta. ¿Qué creen que Dios quiere? En este mismo momento, ¿qué quiere? Es una pregunta inesperada. A menudo no pensamos en esta perspectiva cuando pensamos en Dios. A menudo, nos enfocamos en lo que está sucediendo en nuestras vidas y en las tremendas cargas que llevamos. Pedimos a Dios que nos ayude con nuestra familia, nuestras enfermedades e innumerables problemas....

Let me ask you a great question. What do you think God wants? At this very moment, what does he want? It’s a strange question. We often don’t think about this perspective when we think about God. Oftentimes, we focus on what’s happening in our lives and the tremendous burdens that we carry. We petition God to help with our family, our sicknesses, and the myriad of other problems. When we go about...

I remember once on a pilgrimage toTurkey, a group of my classmates decided to fly to Turkey and follow the path of St. Paul. We were still seminarians. We wanted to visit the places that Paul visited, two-thousands years before. On this particular trip, there happened to be another American couple from Oakland. There were retired, probably in their late sixties or seventies . As we were walking up...

If you were like me high school, you learned a very specific narrative about the Crusades in public school. It probably went something like this: the big bad Catholic Church in its thirst for power and money attacked the peace loving Muslims. That's complete garbage. When we study the real Crusades, the reality is much more complex. They were launched after 400 years of unchecked aggression from t...

The great Italian mystic, St. Padre Pio, famously said, "Prayer is the oxygen of the soul." How do we do this well? If we want to succeed in anything in the Christian life, we must follow the example of Christ himself. He shows us how to pray like the saints we're meant to be.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to generous listeners like you. I...

The spiritual battle begins! Lent gives us that glorious opportunity to grow in holiness, as we join Jesus in the coldness of the desert for the next 40 days. This is probably my favorite liturgical season, even more than Easter and Christmas. Like our Lord, we confront the Devil in Lent and the false claimants to our hearts. God simply wants our love; he will not settle for second place. The only...

In warfare, the nuclear bomb is the weapon of desperation. It's the choice when political and military leaders feel they have no choice. In one way, Jesus gave the Christian something similar, minus the destruction, as we see in the encounter with a possessed boy in Mark 9. The disciples ask him why they were unable to cast out a demon. They tried everything in their arsenal. Our Lord tells them,...

In the summer of 2004, my bags were packed, all my affairs were in order and I was shipping off to seminary. Years of prayerful discernment had finally come to an end -- God was calling me to the priesthood. Yet weeks before leaving, a tidal wave of doubt suddenly hit me, "What was I doing? I can't do this." Then as if on theatrical cue, I heard the devil's voice. --- Help Spread the Good News ---...

Lent has begun! As we enter with Jesus into the desert for the next 40 Days, the false claimants of our hearts will be unmasked. St. John called them the "lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." (Cf. 1 John 2:15-16). All these things the world dangles before us but they will always fail to deliver the happiness they promise. Christ shows us the way.  --- Help Spread the G...

*Please note* The following homily was given at our Traditional Latin Mass, which follows a different liturgical calendar. The Epistle is from 1 Corinthians 13:1-13 and the Gospel is from Luke 18: 31-43. The addict, the atheist, and the saint all have one thing in common -- they search for healing. We're all broken in some way. It's part of the human condition, whether we like it or not. "It is wh...

Muslim extremist groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda, mockingly call us the "People of the Cross". To my ears, there's no better compliment to hear.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to generous listeners like you. If his words have blessed you, consider supporting this volunteer effort. Every gift helps us continue recording and sharing the hope of...

I am excited to officially announce an amazing opportunity for our parish. This November, we are embarking upon a pilgrimage to the very places where the Church began – the Holy Land. In the bulletin this Sunday, you will see a detailed itinerary of the amazing sites we will pray and visit. To see and touch the very places where Jesus walked will change how you read the Bible. It will open up the...

Adam was shocked when he first laid eyes on Eve. "At last!" He exclaimed in our First Reading today. "Bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh." (Cf. Genesis 2:23) Her beauty must have been blinding. It should not shock us after all, women are the pinnacle of God's creation.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to generous listeners like you....

The worth of every human soul is rooted in Genesis as we hear today in the first reading: "the LORD God formed man out of the clay of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and so man became a living being." (Cf. Genesis 2:7) The sin of Adam and Eve destroyed this "breath". Jesus comes to restore it in the most unexpected of ways.  --- Help Spread the Good News --...

One of the greatest gifts of being a Christian is that we are no longer beholden by what people think of us. Often times we can place our dignity on silly things -- my job title, how my body looks, how much money I have, etc. Jesus breaks those chains. Rather, he alone tells me my deepest worth; He alone gives me my purpose. And that, my brothers and sisters, brings freedom.  --- Help Spread...

Fun fact: the first Christian nation on earth is Armenia. In the year 301, King Tiridates III converted, along with the entire nation. Why is always the question. There was no earthly benefit at the time. What convinced him to accept Jesus as the Lord of all was the powerful witness of simple, holy Christians, unafraid to live the faith. We are called to be the same.  --- Help Spread the Good...

Since the time of the Prophet Ezekiel, God's presence left the Temple in Jerusalem because of their infidelity. Nothing could have been more devastating. Yet despite their sins, God promised one day he would return. As we celebrate the great Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, God comes back in the most unexpected of ways.   --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are sha...

The next time you are in a Catholic church, pay attention to where the altar is built. No matter what church you walk into, whether you're in the jungle of Sao Paulo, Brazil, a Gothic cathedral in Paris, or a suburban parish in rural Dixon, you’ll soon notice a familiar pattern. The altar is always built on a raised platform. The only way to get to it is by climbing stairs. Even if it’s only one s...

As Christians we are always tempted to conform to the ways of the world and change our teaches to align with the current trends. We must resist. Like our Lord, we are called to transform society, not the other way around. As the Church remembers saints Timothy and Titus today, who traveled with St. Paul we remember, the high bar we are called to live by. When writing to them, Paul would alway...

He went from a killer to a saint in a matter of seconds. The direction of his life changed radically on that road to Damascus (Cf. Acts 9:1-22). To a persecutor of the faith he loathed to the Church's greatest evangelist, St. Paul's conversion changed the world as we know it.  --- Help Spread the Good News --- Father Brian’s homilies are shared freely thanks to generous listeners like you. If...

The photo attached to this homily post was taken in the summer of 2008 during a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. I had just finished my third year in the seminary when the school offered to take a group of us to see the very places where Jesus walked and lived. Oftentimes, when we read the stories in the bible the places they name can seem utterly foreign and mysterious to us, especially with names li...