Bishop Barron’s Sunday Sermons - Catholic Preaching and Homilies

Today we hear the first line of St. Mark' Gospel, which in a sense contains the whole Gospel message. It expresses the euangelion, the good news of Christ the King, whose victory over death brings salvation to God's people. Advent is all about coming under the reign of this newborn king.

The single biggest challenge of the Advent season is to feel our need for a savior. The truth is, we can't solve our problem through an act of the will, because the perversion of the will is the problem. We need help. We need the intervention of a loving God who will shape us anew. We need a savior.

When Israel begins to long for a new David, the true David and true king of the world, we witness the longing for God. Jesus Christ is precisely this king: the Davidic king, and God ruling his creation. His ministry reveals the nature of his kingship, from the manger to the cross.

Your being increases in the measure that you give it away. That's the law of the gift, and it can be found from end to end of the Bible. One application of this law has to do with faith itself. Your faith will grow only in the measure that you give it away, sharing it with others.

Today we celebrate the great Feast of the Dedication of St. John Lateran Basilica, which is the Pope's cathedral church. It's a time to remember that while the Church is, properly speaking, the people of God, church buildings do nevertheless matter. They are meant to recapitulate the Temple, the New Jerusalem, Noah's Ark, and the Mystical Body of Jesus.

Near death experiences, the loss of a loved one, other other out-of-body occurrences point toward the truth that we are meant to be born out of this world into a higher one, even though this transition is often a traumatic one. The reality that our mind wants not just particular truths, but the Truth Itself, indicates our orientation to God. We are our bodies, rooted in this world, but we are more than our bodies. This mysterious capacity within us the Church calls "the soul." And at the end of our earthly lives, the soul is breathed out, not into non-being, but into the hands of God.

Is the Catholic Church a proponent of social justice? Yes, according to this week's readings. They reveal a compassionate God, who hears the cries of the poor and then encourages us to reciprocate his love. Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati understood this well. The young saint heeded both of Jesus' Great Commandments by loving God and, therefore, loving his neighbor.

Jesus places everything in its proper relationship to God. But he also chastises those who are involved in power games. God is ultimately in charge and rules over even Caesar.

Many devout believers find the parable of the wedding feast in the Gospel of Matthew difficult to understand. The story is meant to stir us up with its exaggeration, to signal the spiritual destruction that follows from refusing the divine invitiation. We are meant to see how valuable an invitation we have received and how odd it is that we would choose to reject it.

At the end of his letter to the Philippians, St. Paul reveals the secret to a peaceful life. Serenity of spirit, born of the confidence that one is linked to God, arrives when we surround ourselves with God's truth, goodness, and beauty.