Foot-washer

St. Agnes Catholic Church Good Friday Cycle C Apr 15, 2022 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/041522.cfm What is the greatest crime a person can commit?   What is the evilest action that a human being can do?   When I was in middle school, an English teacher taught my class a list of vocabulary words ending in the root, - cide . which means “to kill” or “to cut down.”   These words are a catalogue of awful things, many of them have a good case to be the answer to the question I posed about humanity’s word deed.   Listen to this litany of terror: Homicide – the killing of another human being Patricide – the killing of a parent Aborticide – the killing of an unborn child Infanticide – the killing of a child Suicide – killing oneself Regicide – killing a king Most of our worst actions involve violence, especially taking the life of a human being.   To this catalogue of cruelty, we added two words in the bloody 20 th century.       Genoc...

St. Boniface Catholic Church  M and M’s Wedding April 2, 2022 “…as I love you.” Song of Songs 2-8-10-14-16-8-6-7 (?) Psalm 103 Romans 12:1-2, 9-18 John 15:9-12 Good afternoon, friends and family of Groom and Bride and especially to our very soon-to-be bride and groom.   It is a pleasure to be here with you to celebrate and witness to this joyous event. I am Ned Berghausen, permanent deacon at St. Agnes parish.   I am also a former teacher of Bride’s.   I taught her when she was a senior at Mercy and had the pleasure of working with her for a year at Mercy.   Bride is a third generation Mercy employee, following in the footsteps of her grandmother, Lillian, and father, Kevin.   I have gotten to know Groom this year through the process of wedding preparation. It is a thrill to be presiding on your special day.   Groom and Bride have been together for ten years and have grown into a comfortable, solid couple, relaxed in their ability to be in each other...

2nd Sunday of Lent   Cycle C March 12/13 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/031322.cfm Three weeks ago, a group of more than twenty St. Agnes and six Good Shepherd parishioners visited Christ the King parish on 44 th Street in our city’s West End.   Christ the King is one of four predominately Black Catholic parishes in our city.   Our visit was a continuation of a program called “Moving Towards Oneness” that partnered several of our parishioners with others from Christ the King and Good Shepherd this year. During Lent we are called to go unfamiliar and sometimes uncomfortable places and to respond, in the words of our Lenten theme for this year, “I must go.”   Last week, the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the desert.  This week the Holy Spirit appears in a stranger guise—a bright cloud that overwhelms the three disciples, Peter, James, and John, that accompany Jesus to the top of Mt. Tabor.  The journey to Christ the King did not have as ...

 A Wedding Homily    Jeremiah 31:31-32a, 33-34a Psalm 128 Romans 15:1b-3a, 5-7, 13 Matthew 7:21, 24-25 Good afternoon, friends and family of L and A and especially to our very soon-to-be bride and groom.   It is a pleasure to be here with you to celebrate and witness to this joyous event. I am Ned Berghausen, permanent deacon here at St. Agnes. If you ask L and A how they met, the two of them will tell you a story with lots of disputed facts.   They first met when they were out at night somewhere. Maybe…   A doesn’t remember that.   L’s told him many times the facts of the meeting he just doesn’t remember it. No, he says, they first met when she began interning at his workplace.   But she was acting strangely shy—and hiding behind a pillar. The two of them frequently interrupt and tease each other.   You can tell this is a story that they’ve told and fought about many times.   They tell me, “our friends would describe us as an old ...

5th Sunday of Ordinary Time   Cycle C Feb 6, 2022 Bellarmine University – Our Lady of the Woods Chapel https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/020622.cfm   Good evening Bellarmine and Happy Sunday.   I’m Ned Berghausen, a permanent deacon at St. Agnes across the street as well as graduate of this university.   Thanks to the friars for inviting me to serve and to preach this evening.   The first time I preached with Fr. John it was very unexpected.   I travelled with him to India on one of the Christmas Break trips he organizes. This was six or seven years ago before I was ordained.   I was at an early morning mass in a friary filled with Franciscan priests and seminarians.   Fr. John read the Gospel and when he was done, he turned to me and said, “we don’t usually give homilies at morning mass, so I would like to invite Ned to come up in preach.”   Luckily, he gave me a little more warning for this one.   And I’ve had a little more t...

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/122520-mass-at-night.cfm In the first reading tonight, we hear a very familiar passage from the prophet Isaiah proclaimed: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light… for a child is born to us, a son is given to us. Upon his shoulder dominion rests. They name him Wonder-Counselor, God-Hero, Father-Forever, Prince of Peace.” Six years ago at midnight mass, I heard these words while sitting in the pews. My wife, Kate, and I went with my family to Holy Trinity parish. I remember it vividly because ten days before the two of us had found out that she was pregnant. Our Christmas Eve was in that electric time when no one else, only she and I knew the secret: a great joy had just entered into the world. Holy Trinity that night was jammed packed. So full that we sat in overflow seating in a separate section of the church with no view of the altar and with the audio piped into our room. That suited us fine because she needed to sit clo...

4 th Sunday of Advent Cycle C Dec 18/19, 2021 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/121921.cfm I have a cousin who was born one week after me.   I always think of him when I hear this story of Mary’s visitation to her relative Elizabeth when they were both pregnant.   In fact, at his wedding reception, I gave a toast saying that I liked to imagine that I leapt for joy in my mother’s womb when we first met.     Patrick is my first cousin, the son of my mom’s sister, and he is my oldest friend.   Though I am a week older, it is only because I was premature by a month.   He was expected to be born first.   My hurry to enter the world made me the first grandchild in our family—which has been a source of much gentle rivalry and teasing throughout our lives.   Having a cousin so close in age is like having another brother.   Almost a twin.   First a so-called “belly buddy,” then a “brother from a different mother.”   Every year at...