30th Sunday in Ordinary Time (B) : Homily / Sermon

Son of David, have pity on me. (Mark 10:50)

If you had to do without a particular sense, which one would it be?

It is a silly and pointless question, in a way, but it may have some purpose.

If the question means which sense do you value the most, then I suppose it has some interest. If the question leads us to realise how valuable our senses are, then I suppose it is a really worthwhile question, because I know that while I would hate to lose the enjoyment of music and speech which deafness would bring, I would just as much feel bereft if I could not read or watch television or just get about with ease. If a question like this makes us admire those who cope with the limitations of a disability (rather than just pity them) then all the better.

And of course people believe that if you lose one sense, the others become stronger, or more acute. There’s some doubt whether that very common belief is actually true. People who lose the use of one sense have to use the other senses more and so take more notice of them, but - from what I have read, at least, it seems that there is very little evidence that the common belief, that the other senses become more acute, is actually true.

But whether you believe this or not, it would very foolish to underestimate or patronise those who do have a disability of one kind of another. People used to assume that the deaf were also unintelligent. And the word “dumb” meant both “unable to speak” and “stupid”, as if one were the same as the other. And when someone is confined to a wheelchair, people often talk directly to the person pushing the chair, rather than the one sitting in it - as if being unable to walk also affected your ability to understand and answer simple questions.

You can see this kind of attitude in today’s Gospel. The crowd underestimated poor old blind Bartimaeus. A blind beggar, because that was the only way he could to live. To be pitied, for sure, but not to be respected. To be given the odd coin, or a scrap to eat, perhaps, but not to be listened to, not to be accorded an opinion. Don’t shout out blind man. Don’t make a scene, poor beggar. But blind Bartimaeus is bold, because although he cannot see Jesus with his eyes, with his heart he makes an act of faith.

Your faith has saved you, Jesus says.

While those around may be inquisitive to see what this man, Jesus, looks like, the blind man, unable to see his face, nevertheless loudly worships him - much to the embarrassment of those who think they can see - but who in fact, though they barely realise it, are truly blind.

25th Sunday in Ordinary Time : Homily / Sermon

A guest homily this week!

Poor Deacon Tony. He spent time, effort, and prayer for inspiration, only to discover just a few days before the weekend that the Bishops of England and Wales have issued a Pastoral Letter for this coming weekend. 

I am pleased to host his homily on this website. 

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Our second reading today is taken from the letter of St James. 

It is an extract from the only letter to Christian people he wrote. 

I personally like the letter from St James, they are easy to understand and have a practical approach to many of today’s problems.

If you read it you will see how full of common sense it is, and how true it is today as it was when it was first written; probably about fifty years or so after the first Good Friday. 

James seems to have that ability of getting straight to the point and is able to explain it in words that anyone can understand.

Just look again at the beginning of our second reading. James tells us
 "Wherever you find jealousy and ambition you will find disharmony, and wicked things of every kind being done."

Now I am sure no one can argue against that, "Wherever you find jealousy and ambition you will find disharmony”

In the previous verse he adds the word 'selfish' to ambition. 

Ambition by itself is a good thing — we all have ambitions and the desire to get on and do well — but if that ambition is only motivated by what we can get out of it for ourselves, with no thought for others then it becomes wrong, and results only in a lack of harmony and all kinds of other evils.

Today he is talking about our relationships with others; not just about our relationships with our family and friends but with everyone, both at home and across the world.

Today our world is so much smaller.

As the news over the past few weeks, of Syria and Afghanistan has shown the world is getting smaller and smaller. News that not too many years ago would take weeks or even months to reach us is now instant. It is on our TV screens as it happens across the world. Today we see the refugee crisis day by day, minute by minute and it all adds up to our worries, our discontent and the ambitions for ourselves, our family and for our country.

Sometimes our worries and concerns may manifests into a deep felt concern for others or on the other hand manifest into prejudice or may be just pure selfish ambition. 

We see the refugees fleeing from Syria and Afghanistan, fleeing from their homes and countries destroyed by war and terrorism. All they want is a new life in the west and safety for themselves and for their families. 


I’m sure that people, both adults and children, sick and the elderly who are prepared to walk, yes walk from Syria through Serbia and on to Austria and Germany are NOT economic migrants, they are fighting for their lives and for their families. Now that that route is closed they are walking through Croatia to the West. 


For us here in the West it’s all we can do to walk to the car to get wherever we want.

Yes we do have concerns and ambitions for our country and for our children, but we shouldn’t make these issues just selfish concerns. We can only hope that if we were in the same position as the refugees, someone or some country would hold out a hand of friendship and be there to help us.

As individuals we are powerless and must rely on World Leaders to come up with a solution and quickly for each country and especially for the refugees who are fleeing for their lives and their futures when all many are finding is Police lines, pepper spray and water cannon.

Everything in our lives today depends on the way one nation gets on with the next, and the way one each person here gets on with his or her neighbour.

James gives us a few guidelines — they apply to me as a deacon, to a doctor, a teacher, a father and mother, a brother and sister. It is up to us to take note of them and then try to apply them when the occasion arises.

The first thing, as James tells us at the end of the reading today is - We have to pray properly and not pray for our own selfish needs.

We have to pray that we will not get fanatical or prejudiced, that our prayers and concerns are both for the refugees and for our own good. That we will guard against unbalanced ambitions instead of a reasoned conviction.

The refugee crisis is causing arguments across the world, in our own countries, in our own communities and probably in our own families and so James advices us; try and not to be bitter. Many discussions end with tempers lost and tears shed. 
 Ideas are talked through sensibly and quietly and finish up in a shouting match. 
 In an argument don’t think of those holding opposite views as enemies but rather as friends to be persuaded.

James warns about having selfish ambitious that we cannot satisfy.

To finish I want to pray a prayer that Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta wrote for her sisters,

and really for us, to help us understand what really we need to be concerned with in life:

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centred. 
 Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. 
 Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. 
 Be honest and sincere anyway.

What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. 
 Create anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. 
 Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, will often be forgotten. 
 Do good anyway.

Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. 
 Give your best anyway.

In the final analysis, it is between you and God. 
 It was never between you and them anyway. 

22nd Sunday of the Year (B) : Homily / Sermon

This people honours me only with lip-service, while their hearts are far from me. The worship they offer me is worthless (Mark 7:6-7)

What is worship really all about? 

It is a sad fact that while worship can often inspire us, it at just as much infuriate us. 

Pope Francis, in his letter “The Joy of the Gospel” made it very clear that worship can sometimes become an obstacle to faith as much a window into it. 

“There are Christians whose lives seem like Lent without Easter,” he says. Lives, and worship which may be earnest, but is also dour, bland and uninspiring. 

The long and dreary sermons. The awkwardness of the priest. Familiar hymns with unfamiliar tunes. And familiar tunes with unfamiliar words. The new translation. Latin. The lack of Latin. Modern music and clapping. Traditional music and starchiness. Talking in Church. And people who tut when you greet a friend. 

I could easily go on. 

And there are those, of course, who are very concerned  that things must be done correctly. According to the Churches rules. Without variation. 

It can lead to the accusation that the Catholic Church  is just like the Pharisees who Jesus attacks in the Gospel. 

And of course the accusers might be right.  The faith is not at all about how many candles you have on the altar, how much incense you use, whether mass is celebrated in Latin or not, how colourful and valuable the vestments are and so on. The beauty of the liturgy, the splendour of the music, and even the language used can become gods in themselves. If they do, then we fall into Jesus’ condemnation - lip service, worthless worship. 

But of course, it is not just the old mass or the high mass which can go this way. The number of choruses sung, the quality of the sound system or video projector, the number of guitars or flutes, the height of the hands raised in worship - all these can become over-important too. 

The person who claims that elaborate and beautiful worship falls under the condemnation of this Gospel is missing the point. The question about what is the right way of worship is just not the same question as whether that worship is lip-service or not. 

The test of our worship is the meaningfulness of the words. 

Will we forgive those who trespass against us? Are we truly sorry for our sins? Will we leave Church to glorify the Lord with our lives? 

Worship becomes worthless, Jesus tells us, when the heart is not in it - or rather, when the heart is not in God himself. Our words become empty when the focus is on human desires, not divine purposes. 

And the measure of true worship is not the quality of the ceremony, impressive and inspiring though that may be, but the song sung by the charity, the mercy and the love of those whose worship is their lives.