Dear Saints,

We’re back to tempus per annum (Ordinary Time) this Sunday. Well, we’ve been in this post-Pentecost season for a couple of weeks, but our Sundays have been taken up with Easter-overflow themes (Trinity Sunday and Corpus Christi).

One of the problems with seeing this season as Ordinary Time is that it can lull us into a routine, pacifying, Sunday-to-Sunday religion. What do I mean? Let’s look at this weekend’s Gospel to find out.

We read in Matthew’s Gospel, "Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin? Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s knowledge. Even all the hairs of your head are counted. So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows."

When we bend this promise to our own purposes it can have a pacifying effect: God affirms us as we are, so nothing else matters. This kind of Catholicism is no Catholicism at all.

No, when Jesus speaks of the Father’s love he’s not cultivating complacency. The tenth chapter of Matthew’s Gospel has Jesus sending out the 12 Apostles to announce the coming Kingdom of God. What Jesus is saying, then, when we read the passage in its context, is that when we live for God and his purposes we have nothing to fear. Going on mission with Jesus is the only thing that matters.

This weekend, as I celebrate ten years of priestly life and service, I thank God for having used my “yes” to help others hear and heed this call on their lives. It is a blessing beyond my deserving to serve you as a priest of Jesus Christ, and to bring God’s Fatherly blessing to life here at OLMC. I want to thank in a particular way OLMC’s men who never cease to encourage and inspire me. This Father’s Day I give thanks to God for you, and am glad that we’re in this thing together.

I love you, my friends. Be assured of my prayers for you and yours.

Christ’s Peace,

Father Daniel

δοῦλος Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ