Foot-washer

Fifteenth Sunday  in Ordinary Time Cycle B  July 10/11, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/082221.cfm Last April, I got to serve at the Confirmation mass for our 8 th graders at the Cathedral.   During the sacrament of Confirmation, I stood next to the archbishop while he led the rite.   I had the very special and Covid-specific job of wiping the oil off his thumb between 8 th graders. That position gave me a really privileged view of each of these young people as they came forward to be anointed and blessed.   Each one stepped forward, greeted the archbishop with their sponsor’s hand on their shoulder and told him what name they wished to be called—which saint the had selected for their patron.   The archbishop called them by their new name, used the oil in the shape of a cross on their forehead, and said, “be sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit.” There were a large number of “Sebastians” (he’s the patron saint of athletes).   And...

Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time Cycle B June 19/20, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/062021.cfm Good morning / afternoon, St. Agnes. Happy Father’s Day to you and a Happy Juneteenth, which is America’s second independence day, the day that we celebrate the end of slavery in our country.   This is the first year that it is an official, federal holiday.     I often get asked, as the father of triplets, what it was like to find out that we were expecting the three of them.  The experience was something like what the Apostles experienced in today’s Gospel story when they realized just who was in the boat with them.     Two years ago—on January 31, 2019—Kate and I went to the obstetrician [Dr. Heather Wilson] for our first pregnancy checkup.  We had found out a month before (on Christmas Day actually) that we were expecting our second child, and this felt like it would be kind of routine, in a way.  After ...

Feast of the Ascension   Cycle B May 15/16, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/051621-Ascension.cfm    Two years at this time of year, my sister Katie got to deployed to Afghanistan.     She is an OR nurse in the US Army Reserves and was sent to serve in a forward surgical team in a dangerous part of the country.       When it was time for her to ship out, my family met her at Louisville International Airport to say goodbye in the area between the check in counters and the TSA security lines.    I have a picture of her from that moment that I was looking at as I wrote this homily.  She is dressed in her army fatigues and boots with a big rucksack.   And she is holding my then 3-year old son EJ in her arms.  EJ is her nephew and godson.  In the picture, he is happy for the attention and the hug.  She looks determined and composed—holding back sadness.  The...

What does the resurrection of Jesus tell us about the relationship between science and faith?     The answer is in the baked fish that Jesus ate in the presence of his amazed disciples.     But first, a story.       A few years ago, I was out fossil hunting with my wife and a group of other paleontologists in Northern Kentucky.  You may not know this, but the Cincinnati area contains an incredible trove of fossils from an age of natural history called the “Ordovician Period.” My wife, Dr. Kate Bulinski, is a paleontologist who specializes in this period and the invertebrates that populated it.   Fossil hunting often involves going to “road cuts,” which are places where hills or other rises have been blasted and dug out to allow a road to pass through.  This exposes a wide cross section of rocks and, in some places, fossils.     After a long day of visiting several of these cuts, I remember standing next...

April 1, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/040121-Evening.cfm    Put yourself at the Last Supper.     The meal has just begun.     All of Jesus’ closest disciples are present—a rabble of people called out of fishing boats, tax collecting offices, brothels, and gangs—who followed him these three years through his long and winding road to Jerusalem.     They are family now.     Here they are seated at table during the Passover season.     It is an explosive time, fraught and tense with religious expectations and fear of a Roman garrison.     Yet the excitement of a palm waving parade into the city is still fresh.     It is good to be here and good to eat together.     And then Jesus does something shocking.       The Lord and Master strips down to his undergarments and gets on knees with a pitcher and bowl.  He signals that he is going to do the filthy, shameful wor...

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time   Cycle B Feb 13/14, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/021421.cfm . Happy Valentine’s Weekend / Day, St. Agnes.   Or if you prefer, Happy Singles Awareness Day!   Also, happy last weekend of the Carnival, Mardi Gras season. I am going to pose two questions to you this evening / morning.   They are: What is your definition of the Church? What did Jesus intend the Church to be?             You may not have a quick answer for these two questions.   I would definitely encourage you to explore them after mass today.   You do talk about the homily after mass, right?   I sent my high school sophomores out last month to interview five different people in their community, including family and friends, a child, an elder, and a teacher. Some were believers, others nonbelievers. They posed these two questions.   Two of the most frequent responses were: the Church is a building or a ...

January 24, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/012421.cfm   If you ever visit the city of Venice in Italy, you will see a peculiar sight.     Flying  from flag poles all over the city, is a red and yellow flag with a huge image of a winged lion holding a book in its paw.     As it turns out, this is the flag of Veneto, the province that Venice is in.       The lion represents St. Mark, the evangelist who wrote the second Gospel.  You see, twelve hundred years ago, a group of clever and crafty Venetians travelled to Alexandria in Egypt.  Once there, they stole the body of St. Mark and snuck his remains away in a barrel covered in produce and took him back to Venice.  Then the Doge of Venice built a giant, glorious basilica called, of course, “St Mark’s” with an altar over his remains, and the city has showed off their great Christian pedigree by flying their St. Mark flag everywhere.  And they t...