Videos

The 30th Sunday in Ordinary TIme

Added Oct 30, 2017 •

Copy this URL:
Embed code:	<iframe class="edlio-embed-player" type="text/html" width="640" height="360" src="//www.allsaintschurch.com/apps/embed/?v=163046" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> Change dimensions

Fr. Chad VanHoose, Associate Pastor October 29, 2017

Show Transcript

I had the great blessing to start this year 2017 in southern France I know I know priests have a pretty rough life huh stroke of midnight on January 1st I was in a Eucharistic procession with hauntingly beautiful chanting by some French nuns as we processed through the fog Easter of the town of ours ours of course is the town where St John Vianney the patron of all priests was a parish priest for the entirety of his life MSU Christi procession finished in the Basilica where St John Vianney is buried and his body is there on display in corrupt so the pilgrims would come and visit him so as you can imagine it was a pretty surreal moment for me in my life here this year that I would be ordained a priest I began it with the patron of all priests and then later that day we have 10 hour rental car to head back to Northern Italy but not without a pit stop first in Geneva Switzerland I'm sure Geneva's a lovely city but when we were there yet cold and damp and most of the businesses were closed for the holiday now Geneva has been called the Protestant Rome because of the in fluential stronghold the city headband for John Calvin and other Protestant reformers after him so I think this added to the difficulty and somewhat of the discomfort of this Geneva for my friends and myself during a quick stop in to a former Catholic Cathedral now turned Protestant church I knelt in prayer and I braids for my many family members who have followed their faith tradition in the Dutch Reformed Church many of them being Protestant clergy this was an important image to start my year as you can imagine the year that I would be ordained a priest and the year that would Mark the 500th anniversary of the beginning of the Protestant Reformation when Mart what nail his 95 Theses on the doors of Wittenberg cathedral in Germany as I alluded to earlier most of my paternal family is not Catholic having a Dutch last name like vanhoose and you know what they say if you're not Dutch you ain't much but my dad converted to Catholicism when my oldest sister Mary was back guys and this created somewhat of a rift with our family and even somewhat of a break with some of my ancestry so being a Catholic priest today with a Dutch name is significant for me when my sister's got married and changed their last names I became one of only three Catholic vanhoose is that I know in the world not mention the only father vanhoose sharing in a mediation of Jesus the role of the priest is to be a bridge a go-between and I think we see this obviously in the sacraments that the priest is a bridge between the people and God in the mass and confession and the other Sacrament but the priest is all a bridge a mediator between people and places between ours and Geneva between Wittenberg and Rome between Catholics and Protestants and I know that this is a sensitive subject for all of us because it affects everyone sitting here in the church today we all know and love people who are separated from the Catholic Church are cousins are parents brothers and sisters children even spouses and I recognize that even some of you here today are not Catholic but you're here every week because you have a certain strong relationship with our community and you live in this tension but today Protestants throughout the world are commemorating Reformation Sunday with the actual 500 anniversary coming up this Tuesday on October 31st All Hallows Eve how are Catholics remember this events and think about the Reformation we find the key to answering this question in Jesus's answer to the Pharisees in today's Gospel how are Catholics respond in light of Martin Luther's 95 Theses Jesus gives us to Theses today in the gospel only two and neither of them Harkin to Martin Luther's primary argument that were saved by faith alone his solo feed a argument in Latin if anything Jesus says today in the gospel that the two greatest Commandments are Love Alone Sola Caritas he says you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and the second commandment is like it you shall love your neighbor as yourself but let's first look at loving God because I think it's important how Jesus tells us to love God with our heart our soul and armor the mind and body art can be seen as images of the intellect and the will the two powers of the Soul by which we know things and by which we choose who sings this is how we are to love Jesus tells us with our intellects with right Doctrine with right thinking this is important and with the choice to love with our Wills this is not an anti-intellectual or an anti dogmatic love no brothers and sisters it involves our entire personhood but Jesus follows up with other Commandments doesn't he and the two of them work together in tandem first love God and if we do this then we'll love the things and the people that God loves our neighbors we cannot love God without loving our neighbors are Protestant neighbors are Christian brothers and sisters family members and friends we can debate points of Doctrine certainly and this is important we need to do this but you cannot debate another human person the only response to a human person is love so this is what Jesus tells us today that are Catholic response to the Protestant Reformation is love celebrate the division created by the Reformation nor do we make excuses for the sins and the mistakes that have been made on either side but we are in the division with heavy heart yet we celebrate instead the good works that have been going on to bring about the unity of the Christian Church documents like evangelicals and Catholics to the Catholic Lutheran dialogue happening throughout the world the Anglican ordinariate that Pope Benedict XVI opened a few years ago and the great work being done from the time of say John Paul II to our current day Pope Francis healing the wounds between the Orthodox and the Catholics theologians and church leaders on both sides are doing and writing amazing things for Unity in our world and this is what we should celebrate we start by recognizing our commonality those things that we have in common with our Christian Brethren though we be separated and then we recognize even that some good things have come from our separated brethren I'm thinking of a greater emphasis on sacred scripture but even we have today in our Catholic mass a personal relationship with Jesus as missionary disciples this is a strong point with our Protestant Brethren and personal prayer that we take everyday I know for me when I was in college I had a lot of protestant friends and so I get up on Sunday morning and go to baptist service with them and then I go in the evening to Catholic mass and they got me a lot of things so we should celebrate even these good things that have come from our brothers and sisters ultimately we should love God and love our neighbors we and fast for Unity the first reading from Exodus tells us that we will be judged by how well we love the stranger the outcasts the Protestant Brethren even here in our midst so today in this Mass let us love God with all your heart soul and mind and love love all of our neighbors as ourselves

Videos

The 30th Sunday in Ordinary TIme

More videos in LITURGY