Presider: Fr. Patrick Heppe
Parish: Catholic Community of Waukesha
TEXT FROM THE HOMILY
We look around at our world and we look to our own life and so often we're distracted by the imperfections that we see. Or sometimes we might call it the crosses that we bear. In the first reading, Isaiah is talking about the blind and the lame and the mute and we have a tendency to kind of look at those things and almost be distracted by those things but in the letter of James we hear about showing no impartiality. One of my former parishioners was Esther. Esther is with God at this particular point, but Esther was an incredible human being. She was blind and she got around town, she lived downtown. All the business people knew her. She was kind of a star in her own right. And she was connected to most of the churches in town, be they Catholic or not and she was the number 1 raffle ticket salesperson of all those places. She loved it! She had trouble seeing obviously, she was blind, but she could see shadows. I was giving a homily one time on blindness and so I needed to consult the expert, so I met with Esther and I said, “Esther tell me more about this.” And Esther was saying that yes, there was blindness but she said, “I have enhanced other senses.” She said I can hear incredibly well and that helped her get along with life. So things weren't always as bad as we might think. Our diocese has a mission in the Dominican Republic and I had the opportunity to go down there a couple of times and I don't speak Spanish. But I went down and it was a marvelous way of getting to know people and connecting and you know, I don't know Spanish but I know when I see love and when I see family and when I see faith. It was absolutely incredible. I have never been hugged so much in all my life and I felt the love. I felt the faith. I felt the connectedness. You know, sometimes we jump to conclusions when we look at our imperfections. Sometimes we say, you know, I don't know if I want to get to know these people and James, in today's letter, talks about God, and God showing no impartiality and if we want to walk in the footsteps of Jesus the same thing must be true with us. We have to look at each other with that lack of impartiality, lack of judgement, and lack of drawing conclusions because we really don't know. We go to a foreign country we can say, oh they're poverty stricken. But boy some of them are rich in faith, rich in family and rich in love. We can look at people like Esther and we say, “Oh she can't get around very well, she must be missing out on things.” Once you get to know those folks you realize, oh my gosh this is absolutely incredible. Jesus came as a healer and ultimately all of our ills will be healed. But until that time, our job is to make sure people are gathered into one, that they know the love of God, that they know of the healing touch of Jesus that can come through each and every one of us. And that's where we need to make sure that we show no impartiality because God loves us, takes care of us, wants to be part of the family and eventually wants us to cure all of our ills. I look forward someday to getting up there and having a meeting with Esther again and talking about those things. Talking about really what made her tick in a very real way. I miss her. And I think if we look at those people around us that are less than perfect or the people in our society that are less than perfect or the people in our world that are less than perfect we'll know that we have a lot of work to do and we need to be better listeners and instruments of healing and hope.
Entrance: We Belong To You
Text © 2006, Victoria Thomson. Music © 2006, Trevor Thomson. Text and music published by Spirit & Song®, a division of OCP. All rights reserved.
Psalm 146: Praise the Lord My Soul
Text © 1969, 1981, 1997, ICEL. All rights reserved. Used with permission. Music © 2016, Sarah Hart. Published by OCP. All rights reserved.
Preparation: Open My Eyes
Text: Based on Mark 8:22-25. Verses 1-3 text, Jesse Manibusan; verse 4 text, Kelly Cullen, OFM. Text and music © 1988, Jesse Manibusan. Published by Spirit & Song®, a division of OCP. All rights reserved.
Communion: The Feast Meant For Everyone
© 2019, Tom Booth and Sarah Hart. Published by Spirit & Song®, a division of OCP. All rights reserved.
Sending Forth: All That We Have Seen
© 2019, Sarah Hart. Published by Spirit & Song®, a division of OCP. All rights reserved.
Mass Setting: Mass of St. Mary Magdalene
Text © 2010, ICEL. All rights reserved. Used with permission. Music © 2018, Sarah Hart. Published by OCP. All rights reserved.
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