Foot-washer

  Deacon Ned Berghausen St. Agnes June 24/25, 2023 12th Sunday in Ordinary Time https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/062523.cfm If the psalm prays, pray. If it laments, lament. If it rejoices, rejoice. If it hopes, hope. If it fears, fear. For everything which is written here is a reflection of us.  St. Augustine. There is one book of the Bible that we hear at almost every single mass, both on Sundays and at daily mass with the exception of only four days of the year [where we hear canticles].   It is the longest book of the Bible.   Do you know what it is?   It’s the Book of Psalms.   Today we heard Psalm 69 which we sung together, led by our cantor [name], in between our first and second reading.   It’s sometimes easy to miss or forget that these songs are Scripture, just as much as the other readings and the Gospel.   When we approach the Bible, we may think of it primarily in terms of narrative stories, law codes and rule books, parabl...

St. Agnes Catholic Church 4th Sunday in Easter Cycle A Apr 29 & 30, 2023 https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/043023.cfm Ten years ago, Kate and I travelled to Rome and the Vatican for our honeymoon.  We spent a couple days exploring St. Peter’s Basilica, which as I am sure you know is the biggest church in the world, located in Vatican City where the pope lives and the global Catholic Church is centered.   We signed up for a special tour that took us deep into the necropolis underneath St. Peter’s Basilica. The great church was built onto what used to be a cemetery on Vatican Hill on the spot where St. Peter was martyred. It takes about an hour to explore this subterranean cemetery.  The ground slowly rises until you come to an ancient tomb, which is marked by a very simple monument that is scrawled with Greek graffiti saying, “this is Peter.” In the center, is a simple, transparent box containing the very bones of Peter.   As we ascended back t...

St. Agnes Catholic Church February 25/26 1st Sunday of Lent https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/022623.cfm Good evening / morning, St. Agnes, and a blessed beginning of Lent. On Martin Luther King weekend, a group of St. Agnes parishioners from the St. Thea Bowman Society visited Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic church, a predominately Black parish on the West End. My six-year-old son EJ was with me. In the lobby were numerous posters of Dr. King in honor of the occasion, but there was also a permanent framed poster on the wall there.  It was titled, “the Fork in the Road” and it shows a man and a woman standing at a crossroads.  On one side is a leafy green pathway reading to Jesus, wreathed in a rainbow and clouds with his arms extended in invitation.  On the other half of the image, is a desolate path, enveloped in storm clouds and lightning.  At the end top is an ominous figure with a death’s-head and horns.  Just like Jesus, his arms are extended in ...

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 ...