August 20, 2023
Our readings this weekend remind us that Jesus came to invite people of every land and nation to join Him in coming to know the Father and to enter the Kingdom of God. Isaiah foretells: my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples and the responsorial Psalm rejoices that all the nations praise you! St. Paul, while mourning that Israel has not accepted Christ, reminds us that Israel is still dear to God because the gifts and call of God are irrevocable. St. Paul is also hopeful about how this mystery of unbelief has led to the reconciliation of the world. Finally, the Canaanite woman shows great faith, even when it might appear that she is being rebuffed by Jesus! Jesus heals her daughter and rejoices in her faith.
One of the great delights and gifts for me at St. Mary’s Cathedral is noticing the peoples from every land and nation that join together to worship and to receive the Eucharistic gift of Jesus throughout the week. We are from many continents and individual nations. I’d attempt to list them all, but I’d likely overlook some, so I shall not try! We are part of a Catholic, that is universal, Church. The one thing that matters is that each person is created, known, and loved by God. This gives us equal dignity with a variety of gifts and cultural backgrounds. Jesus, let all the nations praise you at St. Mary’s Cathedral!
Msgr. Joseph P. Goering
September 3, 2023
This Sunday’s responsorial psalm speaks movingly about our soul’s desire and need for God: “O God, you are my God whom I seek; for you my flesh pines and my soul thirsts like the earth, parched, lifeless and without water.”
God created us out of love and intends and desires that we find all of our heart’s desires in Him. This is why the longing and hungering for God, even when it is uncomfortable, is a sweet desire. We may experience life at times like the parched earth…and God’s love and grace are the rain that we need to flourish.
The gift of this desire can help move us to the more difficult challenges of being God’s adopted sons and daughters. In the first reading, Jeremiah laments that although the desire to speak God’s word is like a fire burning in his heart, he has to speak difficult words that bring him “derision and reproach all the day.” Meanwhile, St. Paul reminds us that following Christ sets us in conflict with a world not centered on Jesus: “Do not conform yourselves to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect.” Finally, Jesus tells his disciples that He must suffer on the Cross. He then tells each of us that “Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.”
Let us ask Jesus for the grace to experience the desire Him and a relationship with Our Father. It is that desire, that return of love for love, that enables us to keep focused on God even when it leads to conflict, derision, or even death on a cross.
-Msgr. Joseph P. Goering
September 5, 2023
Dear parishioners of St. Mary’s,
Today is the feast day of St. Teresa of Calcutta, who showed the value and dignity of every human life through her call to minister to Jesus in the poorest of the poor. She is a great model of truly pouring out her life for Jesus in Himself and in the poorest of the poor. St. Teresa, pray for us!
I have been blessed to work with the Missionaries of Charity throughout my priestly life…in no small part due to the fact that one of my own biological sisters is a Missionary of Charity. I was able to visit Sr. Sylvia yesterday in Winnipeg, along with two other family members of St. Mary’s: My own mom, Marita, and my sister, Jacinta. So you see, again, vocations come from our families.
Here is what Mother Teresa says about the place of our families in learning to love:
The family is a special instrument in God’s hands, for it is chiefly through the family that God wants to tell us that we are created for greater things: to love and to be loved. As our families are, so will our relations with our neighbors be, and so will our towns, cities, and our whole country appear. If the family becomes a place of love and peace and holiness, then our nations and our world too will live in love, in peace and in unity with God and with each other.
Msgr. Joseph P. Goering
September 8, 2023
Happy Birthday of the Blessed Virgin Mary!
St. Andrew of Crete writes beautifully about today’s feast: The present festival, the birth of the Mother of God, is the prelude, while the final act is the fore-ordained union of the Word with flesh. Isn’t that a nice description of the wonder of this day? St. Andrew also writes about how Mary was raised in her family to know and love God. I think you’ll agree that this is a great description for parents and children (and all of our households) as they work together for holiness: Today the Virgin is born, tended and formed and prepared for her role as Mother of God, who is the universal King of the ages.
Blessed Mother pray for us that we may be born, tended and formed and prepared for our roles in the Body of Christ!
Since we have a birthday, let us offer our Lady a birthday “cake” and get ready for the first weekend of caramel rolls!
Msgr. Joseph P. Goering
September 12, 2023
Our readings for the coming weekend set up a tremendous challenge to be dedicated to God and to be merciful as God is merciful.
The dedication comes from St. Paul: For if we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord; so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s. Do we understand our lives as totally encompassed by Christ, no matter what our age, abilities, or vocation? It is good to recall that we are His, for this puts all the difficulties and joys in perspective.
The challenge for the weekend around mercy is tremendous! I give you a new commandment, says the Lord; love one another as I have loved you. As Jesus has loved…we are to love, and not less. As Jesus has revealed mercy we are to be merciful, and not less. We then hear the parable of the man who was forgiven a huge debt, and then went out and found his fellow servant and seized him and started to choke him, demanding, ‘Pay back what you owe.’
If that parable isn’t clear enough, Sirach has more than enough to ponder and apply to our relationships, our engagement in our parish or our politics, our social media postings, etc. The vengeful will suffer the LORD’s vengeance, for he remembers their sins in detail. Forgive your neighbor’s injustice; then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven. Could anyone nourish anger against another and expect healing from the LORD? The whole reading is well worth taking to prayer and asking Jesus, “How may I choose this in my own thoughts, words, and actions towards others?”
Of course, we need the grace of God to be a remotely as loving and merciful as He is! But imagine the difference we can make for those we come into contact with if we choose to be merciful…remembering how merciful God has been to us.
Msgr. Joseph P. Goering