Acts 3:1-10 Peter and John were going up to the temple area for the three o’clock hour of prayer. And a man crippled from birth was carried and placed at the gate of the temple called “the Beautiful Gate” every day to beg for alms from the people who entered the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked for alms. But Peter looked intently at him, as did John, and said, “Look at us.” He paid attention to them, expecting to receive something from them. Peter said, “I have neither silver nor gold, but what I do have I give you: in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazo ..read more

In preparation for this homily, I consulted the 21st Century theologian, Charlie Waltz.  You probably haven’t heard of him because he’s an 8th-Grader in our school.   You also probably haven’t heard of him because he isn’t a very good theologian.  He told me that the moral of our readings today is “don’t commit adultery or you're gonna get in trouble." Imagine my surprise, then, when I discovered that Saint Augustine had virtually the same interpretation!         In his commentary on the Gospel of John ..read more

I spent the year before I came to the abbey taking Greek at Saint Louis U. and waiting tables at a fine dining establishment downtown.  For the record, I was, without a doubt, the world’s worst waiter.  I forgot which tables I was assigned, I brought entres before salads and deserts before drinks.   I once spilled an entire tray of margaritas down the back of a patron’s blouse.  And worst of all, no matter how I tried, I couldn’t, for the life of me, remember the difference between Boston clam chowder and New England clam chowder.  N ..read more

    Christmas is a return to our origins. It is possible to feel the “Spirit Christmas”, but only if we have the strength of mind to go back to kindergarten, and pretend that we never left. So I will not apologize, on Christmas morning, for taking you back to the origins of the human race; to those nursery rhymes which came together to form the introduction to the oldest story in the world, a story which begins at a time when the world did not exist at all. Those kindergarten stories have fallen out of vogue in recent years. We don’t like to be caught reading them; it was the s ..read more

Georgia then...   I’m not a fan of children.  It’s no secret.  They creep me out.  They always seem to be watching me, and never have anything constructive to offer about their observances.  They are largely uneducated, they’re selfish, their hygiene is deplorable, and their conversation lacks depth.  I once had a thirty-minute discourse with my two-year-old niece during which her only response—in fact, the only word she used during the entire conversation—was “Fork.”  And little babies are even worse.   ..read more

    Saint Luke, the evangelist, spends more time on Jesus' prayer than any other Gospel writer; and in today's reading, he hones in on the core of that teaching:  a communal declaration of faith, an exhortation to relentless prayer, and the assurance that God will answer.     But it all begins with a request from his followers.  The disciples notice that Jesus has this special way of praying, and they say to him, “Teach us how to pray like that.  Teach us how to pray like you do.”  Jesus’ answer is a seven-stage dialogue of ..read more

Today is “Laetare Sunday.”  On this day, priests wear rose-colored vestments, and our liturgy begins with a Latin introit commanding us to rejoice.  “Laetare!” we sing. Lent is half-way over.   So.  This morning’s sermon starts with a riddle:  What do Gerard Manly Hopkins, Earnest Hemingway, Prostitutes and pink vestments have in common?  To be honest, I don’t know the answer to this riddle.  It’s just that I started writing this sermon four times, kept getting distracted, and then finally, fell asleep.  So what I’ve got here are four ideas with nothin ..read more

Praised be Jesus Christ now and forever.  A few years ago, I was reading with my students the story of the birth of Dionysus.  Persephone, the legend goes, was impregnated by Zeus and asked to see him in his true form.  But a finite creature cannot look upon and eternal being and live…so the mere sight of a Zeus caused Persephone to explode—then and there, on the spot.  One of my students asked me why we didn’t explode when we received the Eucharist.  I told him I didn’t know…but it couldn’t hurt to be prepared. In a few minutes, in this very churc ..read more

Our Lady, Terror of Demons Sermon to the Saint Louis Priory School on December 10   On Wednesday, we celebrated the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. Not to be confused, by the way, with the Virgin Birth—people are always doing that.  The doctrine of the Virgin Birth teaches that Mary conceived Jesus without losing her virginity.  The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception teaches that Mary herself was born free of original sin—that she was, as the angel Gabriel said to her “full of grace”—no room for sin in her.  On December 12, we celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of Guad ..read more

I've received a lot of questions about this, so here's my take: I’m no moral theologian…though I play one in the classroom.  I’m also not a doctor.  But I am most definitely a Catholic.  So…while I expect vigorous debate among theologians, authorities and scientists, when it comes to issues like vaccination, I rely primarily on 1. Obedience and 2. Scientific consensus. Bearing that in mind:   1.  If it is immoral to take this vaccine, then it’s on the bishops.  They will be accountable to God.  But the vast, vast, vast majority of them agree that it is oka ..read more