Search

Results

Exploring the word

20 Jun 2010 - Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

TODAY IS FATHER'S Day and also World Refugee Day. The dual observance is a coincidence, yet the two fit together. We honor fathers who guide and protect those entrusted to them and also remember those multitudes that are without the guidance and protection of good governments or world agencies. Those who did not know their own father's protection in their early years often experience themselves as refugees in the world even decades later. With a father's love many things seem possible that might have remained impossible. Jesus certainly derived his identity in large part from the trust and delight he enjoyed from his Father: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Secure in this self-understanding, he could embrace any task, including the grave mission of being the Christ of God. His true identity, however, is not so clear to those around him. When Jesus asks his closest friends to define him—Who do you think I am, really?—Peter alone has the guts to reply boldly with the perfect answer. Or at least he can enunciate the precise term. But what the “Christ of God" means to Peter is very different from what it means to Jesus. Herein lies the problem. So Jesus fills in the gaps of his disciples' ignorance. Being the Christ of God doesn't mean ascending to David's long-empty chair in Jerusalem. It won't mean chasing the Romans out and gaining control of the nation. And sorry, James and John, but it won't mean seats of honor to the right and left. What it does mean is suffering, rejection, execution—and afterward, unthinkable victory. So who's prepared to follow their leader? If any of them were listening with an ounce of understanding, they'd have scattered directly. Happily, their dullness works to the good on this occasion as on many. In the end, most will scatter—and be reassembled—and, finally, will even find themselves prepared to pick up their own crosses as advertised. The “Christ of God" answer will finally sink in and make sense. It takes awhile, even for modern-day disciples, to realize that Christianity isn't life insurance so much as death insurance. Because Jesus is the Christ of God, we who follow and believe in him come to know ourselves as children of God in Christ, Saint Paul explains. Just as Jesus reaches self-understanding by being the Son of his Father, we come to know our true identity through our Christ identity. What divides us in the world—nationality, race, social status, even gender—are not our defining qualities in the Body of Christ. In Christ our unity is our shining attribute. In this assembly, we are all heirs of the promise. Related scripture links I do not call you slaves but friends: John 15:13-15 Matthew's discourses: Matt. 5-7, 10, 13, 18, 23-25 And the word was God: John 1:1 Jesus as I AM: John 4:26, 6:20, 8:24, 28, 58; 13:19, 18:5, 6, 8 Who do you say that I am: Mark 8:27-30; Matt. 16:13-20

Authors Alice Camille

fathers refugees protection Children

Restricted
Libyan refugees feared lost at sea

15 May 2011 - Preaching the News for Sunday

The people of God “had gone astray like sheep” before returning to the shepherd who is guardian of their souls, we hear in the passage from the First Letter of Peter this Sunday. A ship carrying refugees fleeing Libya went astray and is feared lost along with an estimated 600 souls aboard, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency. Witnesses on a second boat said the vessel broke up shortly after departing from a port near the Libyan capital, Tripoli, and gave accounts of bodies floating in the sea, according to the U.N. The refugee ship was one of dozens that have attempted the journey to Europe since the uprising in Libya descended into a protracted civil conflict. There is no official tally of how many refugees--most of them workers from sub-Saharan Africa--have attempted the journey from Libya across the Mediterranean, although 10,000 are thought to have reached Italy since mid-February. The U.N. believes that at least three boats that left Libya for Italy in late March never made it to their destination, disappearing at sea. The agency alerted the Italian Coast Guard that they were on their way but the boats never arrived. "There's been no way of charting for sure how many boats have left, how many people never made it. Some of them we will never know about," said Jemini Pandya of the International Organization for Migration. Source: An article by Catrina Stewart for theindependent.co.uk

italy international organization for migration libya mediterranean sea jemini pandya united nations refugee agency refugees

Restricted
Pope makes good-neighbor visit to island

14 Jul 2013 - Preaching the News for Sunday

In this Sunday's gospel account of the Good Samaritan, Jesus challenges his audience to consider what it means to be a good neighbor. Pope Francis used the first pastoral visit of his papacy to challenge church and world on the same theme. Upending protocol and politics on a visit to the tiny island of Lampedusa off the coast of Sicily to pray for refugees and migrants lost at sea, Francis criticized "global indifference" to the refugee crisis: "Today no one in the world feels responsible for this; we have lost the sense of fraternal responsibility.“We have fallen into the hypocritical attitude of the priest and of the servant of the altar that Jesus speaks about in the parable of the Good Samaritan," said Francis in a direct reference to the Sunday gospel. "We look upon the brother half dead by the roadside, perhaps we think 'poor guy,' and we continue on our way, it's none of our business; and we feel fine with this.”Lampedusa is only 113 kilometers from Tunisia and has been the first point of entry to Europe for more than 200,000 refugees and irregular migrants who have passed through the island since 1999. The Italian coast guard had just rescued a crippled ship with 165 Eritreans on board only hours before the pope's arrival.The pontiff flew to Lampedusa from Rome on Monday morning and immediately boarded a port authority cutter that has been involved in the rescue of more than 30,000 refugees in recent years, according to the Italian coast guard. Outside the port the pope paused to pray at the sight of a deadly 2011 shipwreck before launching a wreath of flowers into the water to commemorate the lives of those lost at sea "in search of a better life."On arriving in the port the pope then met 50 selected migrants including men, women, and children who were both Christian and Muslim and listened to their stories about their perilous voyage from North Africa. The pope then held a mass for 15,000 people under a blazing sun at an outdoor sporting center on the island. Standing at an altar made of the wooden remnants of refugee boats and dressed in purple robes normally reserved for Lent, Pope Francis gave an emotional homily focused on "global indifference" to the refugee and irregular migrant problem.Homily hint: Though we’d all like to identify with the Good Samaritan in this Sunday’s gospel, when we are honest with ourselves we see a lot of the priest and the Levite in ourselves. Perhaps we can do a little better in community, with the support with others who, like us, would like to get on the right side of the road and be good neighbors. Source: An article by Barbie Latza Nadeau for CNN

Pope Francis immigrants Good Samaritan refugees north africa irregular migrants lampedusa

Restricted
Deadly voyage awaits migrants fleeing Africa

21 Sep 2014 - Preaching the News for Sunday

Saint Paul writes about life and death in this Sunday’s second reading. Crossing the Mediterranean Sea to Europe in rickety, overcrowded boats has become a life-or-death experience for many thousands of migrants from northern Africa fleeing violence and poverty. This year is on track to become the deadliest ever, after two heavily loaded boats were wrecked in the past week, killing possibly 700 people.That would raise the total number of migrants killed on the sea in 2014 to about 2,900, according to estimates from the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The migration organization says the steep death toll reflects turmoil in Libya, Syria, Iraq, and across the Middle East and Africa. To escape those conflicts, many people are willing to board unsafe smugglers' boats.About 500 Syrians, Palestinians, Egyptians, and Sudanese are feared dead after their boat was rammed and sunk off the Malta coast last week, said the IOM, an inter-governmental organization with 156 member countries. Another 200 are feared dead in the wreck of a second boat that was carrying at least 250 African migrants to Europe when it capsized off the Libyan coast.For years now, thousands of African, Asian, or Middle Eastern migrants have attempted risky voyages, departing primarily from Libya, across the Mediterranean to get to Italy's coastline and islands. Hundreds die en route. Unless they are eligible for asylum or have families or jobs in Europe, they risk expulsion by Italy. This year, with the surge of conflicts, roughly as many arrived in the first few months of 2014 as in all of 2013. Many are Syrians, Palestinians, Eritreans, Sudanese, or from other African countries. Italy has repeatedly pleaded with its European partners for more help patrolling the waters. Previous deals between the Italian government and the regime of Moammar Gadhafi to thwart smuggling operations in exchange for Italian infrastructure projects yielded at best only modest results and fell apart when the regime was ousted. Homily hint: The fact that people are willing to risk their lives crossing treacherous seas in rickety boats indicates their level of desperation. Only when nations come together to address the causes of these migrations of desperation will there be hope of preventing these tragic deaths at sea. Let us join Pope Francis in calling attention to the plight of desperate migrants. Source: An article by John Heilprin for Associated Press

refugees and migrants poverty and violence

Restricted
Desperate refugees flood Europe

13 Sep 2015 - Preaching the News for Sunday

The psalmist cries out to God this Sunday, “O Lord, save my life!” Europe has been flooded with refugees desperately making the same plea. The European Commission is scrambling to come up with a plan to accommodate the 120,000 refugees currently arriving from the Middle East and Africa. Germany, which expects to take in about 800,000 refugees by the end of the year, is pressing for a system of mandatory quotas—or limits—that distributes refugees proportionally among member nations. Many of the refugees are coming from Syria, which has been torn apart by a five-year civil war. An estimated 4 million people have fled that country, and nearly 8 million more have fled their homes but remain in Syria. Homily hint: The refugee crisis now overwhelming Europe speaks volumes about the failure of the international community to work together for peace and reconciliation rather than war and enmity. Pope Francis has suggested that every faith community adopt one refugee family. Are we in? For more on the flood of refugees in Europe, see: Europe scrambles to handle refugees from Middle East and Africa

europe syria refugees

Restricted
Pope Francis calls out religious communities on refugees

20 Sep 2015 - Preaching the News for Sunday

The disciples don’t seem to get what Jesus is talking about in this Sunday’s gospel: He talks about suffering and dying, they talk about who will get to sit next to him in the afterlife. Pope Francis warned religious communities that do not get on board with his call to take in refugee families that if they prefer to rent their spaces out for profit instead, they should be prepared to pay taxes on that. “Some religious orders say ‘No, now that the convent is empty we are going to make a hotel and we can have guests, and support ourselves that way, or make money,’ ” the pontiff said. “Well, if that is what you want to do, then pay taxes! A religious school is tax-exempt because it is religious, but if it is functioning as a hotel, then it should pay taxes just like its neighbor. Otherwise it is not fair business.” Homily hint: Francis upends business as usual in so many areas of church life. Welcome this breath of fresh air and embrace the challenge to be a church out on the margins rather than safely settled in comfort. For more on the pope’s challenge to religious communities, see: Pope warns religious orders: Take in refugees, or pay property taxes

refugees religious communities

Restricted
Don’t counter terror by living in terror

22 Nov 2015 - Preaching the News for Sunday

“Jesus Christ is the faithful witness,” this week’s second reading reminds us. He was also a refugee, Pope Francis recently commented, and this week he returned to the theme amid questions over whether European nations will reevaluate their migrant policies in the wake of the recent deadly attacks in Paris. Francis reminded listeners that refugees are more than statistics: They are children of God, each with his or her own inherent dignity. “Behind these statistics are people, each of them with a name, a face, a story, an inalienable dignity which is theirs as a child of God,” the pope said last Saturday at an audience marking the 35th anniversary of the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS). Homily hint: When we respond to terrorism by succumbing to fear and prejudice, the terrorists win. They turn us into a mirror image of themselves. We must find a way to respond to terrorism that moves beyond “counter-terrorism.” When we embrace the outcast and take compassion on the refugee, we strengthen our own society and make it ever more immune to the efforts of terrorists to destroy it. For more on Pope Francis and refugees, see: Refugees are God's children, Pope says in wake of Paris attacks; Pope Francis: 'Jesus Was A Refugee'; State, local officials continue arguing over accepting Syrian refugees

refugees Pope Francis terrorism

Restricted
Homily stories

08 May 2016 - Seventh Sunday of Easter, Cycle C

I never truly understood what it meant to bear witness until I stood in a room with 250 refugees staring at me. I thought I had a better grasp of it. After all, I’m a journalist, who listens to and tells people’s stories. And I’m a Catholic, who is called to testify to God’s truth. But the idea of bearing witness always struck me as somewhat passive and not terribly difficult. Then again, I’d never before confronted anything as extreme as the desperation and hopelessness of these refugees—Iraqis who had fled to Jordan and were being sheltered by a Christian parish near Amman. They can’t go home, they can’t stay, and there’s little chance they’ll get to the West. I was there to write about them, as part of a press trip, but I felt so useless. However, they didn’t expect me to do anything for them other than my job; that is, listen and tell others about them. They wanted to be seen, heard, and acknowledged. They needed their experience, their existence, their truth to be shared. I realized how important this act is, and how tough when you can’t do much else. I can hope that my work moves hearts and leads others to help, but ultimately I learned how much just being present matters.

Authors Jennifer Tomshack

witness refugees

Restricted
Homily stories

26 Dec 2010 - Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, Cycle A

Estimates say that during the 20th century well over 50,000,000 people died because of genocides at the hands of political leaders, rival tribes, and oppressive nation-states. Even to this day people are seeking refuge from genocide as well as poverty, famine, and corrupt governments. Today's gospel reading tells the story of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus fleeing Herod's execution of all of Bethlehem's young children. Throughout the Bible we see people struggling to live out their faith in the face of political oppression. Though the Bible is filled with lessons on morality and spirituality, readings like today's gospel give us a historical context to relate to these biblical figures and better understand the world in which we live. When crimes like genocides occur and force people into becoming refugees, the Bible provides us with insight on how to approach these political and social injustices, whether it be through action, compassion, or a general consciousness that these events are actually occurring somewhere in the world. At times we tend to overlook the fact that biblical figures were also historical figures. It is helpful to stand back and remember that people today are going through the same issues that people in the Bible went through thousands of years ago.

Authors Nate Pierce

genocide refugees Bible

Restricted
Humanitarian Summit calls us to a higher standard

29 May 2016 - Preaching the News for the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi), Cycle C

Appropriate to this Sunday’s Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, the gospel relates how Jesus fed the hungry multitude, turning scarcity into plentitude in the process. Worldwide, the hungry multitude grow daily, with some 125 million people urgently needing humanitarian assistance. In response, representatives of 175 countries, including 57 heads of states or governments, attended the first World Humanitarian Summit this week in Istanbul, Turkey. Outgoing United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called the summit in an attempt to restructure the way the world responds to humanitarian crises. The agenda before summit members: how to deal with a surge in global crises that have been exacerbated by war, climate change, and natural disasters. With so many in need, aid groups increasingly under-resourced, and international law under growing threat, Ban Ki-moon wants the international community to agree to new global humanitarian standards. Yet the absence of many of the most powerful heads of governments, including the leaders of the U.N. Security Council's permanent members, disappointed aid officials. And not all aid groups were convinced the summit was worth attending. Médecins Sans Frontières withdrew before the summit, claiming that it had become a fig-leaf of good intentions that allows systematic violations to continue to be ignored. The summit reinforced the urgent need for people affected by conflict and disasters to receive better help, but the first meeting of its kind may not trigger the changes necessary to fix their plight, aid officials and experts say. Vital to any long-term success is a ramping up of efforts by world leaders to end the wars that are causing record numbers of people to be uprooted, they said. German Chancellor Angela Merkel was the only G7 leader present. As the two-day conference ended on Tuesday, Ban Ki-moon appealed to the permanent members of the U.N. Security Council—Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States—to act. "The absence of these leaders from this meeting does not provide an excuse for inaction," Ban Ki-moon said. "They have a unique responsibility to pursue peace and stability, and to support the most vulnerable." Pledges made at the summit include an education fund aimed at raising $3.8 billion for emergency schooling and a "grand bargain" between major donors and agencies to administer aid more efficiently. The summit also launched an international partnership to help vulnerable countries prepare better for natural disasters. "These will kick-start transformative change from the top down and the ground up. We must now take it forward together," Ban Ki-moon said. While critics of the summit argued that its lack of a binding agreement made it toothless, defenders of the gathering said that was never its purpose. Lessons drawn from the readings In the gospel, the apostles want Jesus to send the people away to fend for themselves: “As the day was drawing to a close, the Twelve approached him and said, ‘Dismiss the crowd so that they can go to the surrounding villages and farms and find lodging and provisions.’” When he tells them to feed the people themselves, they protest that resources are limited. But Jesus sees plenty where they see scarcity. He offers an alternative vision in which, if we pool our resources, they are multiplied and abundant. The gospel truth is that resources are bountiful if we learn how to share. There is more than enough for everyone. Final thought in light of the news This first-ever humanitarian summit was an important step. But it was only a first step. The summit website encourages us to act individually and to call on our leaders to step up their humanitarian efforts. With so many millions affected by war, natural disaster, and global warming, we need to become global citizens and commit to actions to reduce human suffering. All should have a place at the table at the feast of redemption.

climate change refugees united nations miracle of the loaves and fishes humanitarian summit

Restricted

← Previous 1 2 Next →