Thine Own Service

Thine Own Service

Monthly Archives: February 2015

Homily for Lent II

28 Saturday Feb 2015

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

cross, glory, homily, lent, sacrifice, transfiguration

High Altar of Rolduc Abbey, Kerkrade, Netherlands

High Altar of Rolduc Abbey, Kerkrade, Netherlands

The tradition of hearing the account of the transfiguration of the Lord on this second Sunday of the season of Lent is a venerable one. In the midst of the disciplines and penances of this sacred time, Christ comes to us in the words of the holy gospel to encourage us in our pilgrimage through the wilderness, journeying as we are from slavery to sin to the freedom of the promised land of our heavenly inheritance. By revealing his glory to his apostles, the Lord impresses on them the reality of his divine person that it might, as Dom Prosper Guéranger puts it, “keep up their faith in that trying time, when the outward eye would see nothing in his person but weakness and humiliation”. As it is with the apostles preparing to witness the passion and death of Christ, so it is with us who draw closer and closer now to the unsettling events of Holy Week, when we will again become participants in the mystery of the Lord’s sacrifice.

Continue reading →

Homily for Lent I

21 Saturday Feb 2015

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

baptism, homily, lent, penance

Crucifix in the mission church of San Antonio de Pala, CA

Crucifix in the mission church of San Antonio de Pala, CA

Some weeks ago now, in the days following the feast of the Lord’s nativity, the Church celebrated the Baptism of the Lord in the River Jordan by Saint John the Baptist. It is a surprising event because Christ, whose divine person is possessed of no sin, has no need of the sacramental washing that results from baptism; the effect which that sacred action has on us cannot have the same effect on him. Rather, the baptism of Christ does not sanctify him, but the water which we in turn receive, and which opens for us the portal of the sacred font as the way to our salvation. As Saint Gregory Nazianzen writes that by his baptism Christ buries the whole of the old Adam in the water, thus putting to death the sin of our first parents—the original sin of the Garden of Eden—and preparing for us a new and living way to be united with Almighty God for all eternity (Or 39, 14-16.20). So through baptism in Christ nothing remains in us to impede our entry into the heavenly kingdom (CCC 1263).

Continue reading →

Homily for Ash Wednesday 2015

18 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Ash Wednesday, homily, lent, penance

Detail from a 14th century diptych in the Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore

Detail from a 14th century diptych in the Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, MD

In his meditations on the liturgical year the saintly Bishop Richard Challoner recalls an important lesson found in the texts of today’s Mass. In the reading from the prophet Joel the Lord God calls us to conversion: Be converted to me with all your heart, in fasting, and in weeping, and in mourning; the ashes we receive are a sign of that—‘an emblem of contrition and humility’— and thus an exterior reminder of an interior disposition. To receive the ashes is to give expression to a spiritual reality which is presumed to exist in us; by bearing the mark of the ashes we affirm something that (at least in theory) is already present in our lives.

In her wisdom, however, the Church knows that we fall short of this ideal and so recalls us to the standard demanded of us by baptism through the stark character of this Lenten season. The ash we receive, which Bishop Challoner calls ‘a remembrance of our mortality, of our frail composition, and of our hasty return to our mother earth’, is a sign of the death we deserve; a reminder of the result of sin and the vacuum that exists by our rejection of the Lord’s grace. Yet we receive those ashes in the sign of the cross. They are a bitter warning, but by them is also revealed the means of our salvation. As the baptismal font is both the tomb of our death to sin and the place of our birth into eternal life, so by accepting these ashes as a memento mori we are enjoined to embrace that which itself kills sin and returns us to the Lord, and to the unending life he offers.

Continue reading →

Homily for Quinquagesima 2015

16 Monday Feb 2015

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

confession, homily, lent, septuagesima

14024273272_1359e98930_z

Through the sacramental cleansing of the waters of baptism the festering wound in our soul, the uncleanness caused by original sin, is healed, and we are restored to the life given to our first parents, Adam and Eve, before the fall. Those reborn by water and the Holy Spirit at the font are made new creatures, adopted children of God, partakers of the divine nature, members of Christ and co-heirs with him, temples of that same Holy Spirit (CCC 1265). As the Catechism of the Catholic Church reminds us, through baptism nothing remains in us that impedes our entrance into heaven, the Kingdom of God (CCC 1263). And yet, as we know, the pure and spotless baptismal garment which is draped around the newly-baptized does not remain so for very long. Even though original sin is forgiven in baptism, we nevertheless remain subject to the consequences of the fall, and continue to struggle against our inclination to sin; choosing our way over that of the Lord. When we sin after baptism the relationship we share with God is attacked and is either wounded (by what we call venial sin) or destroyed (by what we call mortal sin, because it puts to death the bond with enjoy with God). Thus the disfiguration of our soul—the muddying of our baptismal robe, we might say—separates us from the spotless perfection of God.

Continue reading →

Homily for Septuagesima 2015

01 Sunday Feb 2015

Posted by Fr James Bradley in Homily

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

extraordinary form, lent, liturgy, ordinariate, patrimony, pre-lent, septuagesima

The Fall of Man, ca. 1650-1700 (Florence?) in The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, MD.

The Fall of Man, ca. 1650-1700 (Florence?) in The Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, MD.

One of the distinctive elements of our life in the personal ordinariates is the calendar which regulates our celebration of the liturgical year as a particular community within the wider Catholic Church. For the next three weeks will we differ from the celebrations in many diocesan parishes, where they continue with the Sundays of the year or Ordinary Time, and ourselves embark on the pre-Lenten season of Septuagesimatide. The apostolic constitution Anglicanorum cœtibus indicates that the liturgical books approved for our use by the Apostolic See are amongst the principal means by which legitimate elements of our Anglican patrimony are to be retained in the Catholic Church, both ‘as a precious gift nourishing the faith of the members of the Ordinariate and as a treasure to be shared’ (AC III). As we begin this distinctive season, then, it is worth asking how this treasure might offer us (and, perhaps, others) that nourishment of faith, and so bring us to a deeper, more sincere knowledge of the mystery of our salvation in Christ.

Continue reading →

Enter your email address to follow:

Categories

  • Canon Law
  • Evangelisation
  • Homily
  • Liturgy
    • Beauty
  • Media
  • Music
  • Ordinariate
  • Pope Francis
  • Talk
  • Uncategorized

Tags

advent Anglicanism anglicanorum coetibus Anglican Use apologetics architecture baptism Beauty Benedict XVI bishops BOL2015 BSDW bxvi canon law catechesis catholicism charity christmas church communications communion confession cross discernment discipleship Divine Worship DW: Collects easter ember days eucharist evangelisation extraordinary form faith fid formation fr robert barron heaven holy week homily intentional catholicism law lent liturgy mary mass media mercy morality music new evangelisation new media ordinariate ordination our lady papacy passiontide patrimony plainchant pope pope benedict pope francis pre-lent priesthood reform of the reform sacred heart sacrifice septuagesima sherry weddell social communications social media tracey rowland unity virtue vocation worship

Archives

  • February 2021
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • April 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012

Blog Stats

  • 128,299 hits

Meta

  • Register
  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.com

Blog at WordPress.com.

Cancel

 
Loading Comments...
Comment
    ×