Homily for Ordinary Time 23 - September 10, 2017

Homily for Ordinary Time 23

September 10, 2017

What Does Your Love Look Like?

 

            Thomas Vander Woude was an ordinary Catholic man – a husband, a father of seven children, a diligent employee, a volunteer at his church in Virginia, a basketball coach…and a hero.

            In September of 2008, he was working in his yard with his youngest son, when he heard a shout. Turning around, he saw that his twenty-year-old son, who has Down’s syndrome, had fallen through a 2’x2’ hole into their septic tank, where he was quickly drowning in sewage. Without a second thought, Thomas jumped in and began to try to rescue his son.

            Neighbors heard the commotion and ran over to help. Initially Thomas was able to keep both of them afloat, but it took a while to pull the large disabled man to safety. By the time the young man had been rescued, Thomas had succumbed to the sewage and drowned.

            Over two thousand people, seventy priests and a bishop attended his funeral, because they wanted to see what love looks like when it’s lived out in a radical way. Because this “love one another” that Paul talks about in today’s second reading is anything but a lofty ideal or a warm fuzzy feeling – no, this love has a cost – the cost of sacrifice.

            This past spring I had to chaperone the eighth grade dance at Trinity Middle School (talk about awkward!). But as I was listening to the songs, I noticed that most of the songs sang about love – but every single time, love was a feeling. “Can you feel the love tonight” and songs like that. But love-as-emotion has disfigured our understanding of what love truly is.

            Pope St. John Paul II defined love as “giving oneself” – it’s not about what one gets from but what one gives to the other. St. Thomas Aquinas says that love is “willing the good of the other”. It is, essentially, an others-centered choice. Does my action benefit another person? Do my words build them up? Do my choices help them to flourish? This is how we understand what love is – it must be proven in deeds.

            When priests hear confessions of little kids, most of the times the sins end up being remarkably similar – “I hit my brother, I disobeyed my mom, I told a lie.” I always ask kids, “Do you love your mom? Do you love your siblings?” And of course they say yes. I then tell them, “If you love them, have you proven that love with your actions? It’s not enough to say you love your mom, you have to obey her. It’s not enough to say you love your siblings, you have to share your toys with them, say kind things, and treat them fairly.” Usually they look quite intrigued with the idea that love has to be backed up with deeds of sacrifice!

            Love even sometimes means correcting someone who has strayed from the right path. Our world often says that if you love someone you can never challenge them or correct them, but that you have to approve of every choice they make. But Christ offers a different view – He says in the Gospel that sometimes the loving choice is to actually correct a friend or family member who has strayed from the right path.

            This makes sense, after all. If love is “choosing the good of another,” then we should always want our loved ones (and even our enemies!) to pursue the highest good. We know that people are happiest when they are in a right relationship with Christ, in the state of grace and avoiding sin, so if we love someone we ought to desire their growth in holiness! This, at times, requires us to speak up – with love, patience, and kindness.

            Consider, you who are parents, the times you speak up to your children. Parents don’t watch their little toddlers heading to a hot stove and say, “Well, it’s a free country, he can choose what he wants.” Of course not! We correct them, not to curtail their freedom, but to help them choose the right path, because we love them. In the same way, Jesus makes it clear that love sometimes involves bringing people back to the right path, as long as our corrections are given out of love.

            So what does love look like for you? For Thomas Vander Woude, who I spoke about in the beginning, love looked like jumping into a septic tank to save his son. For you, love will look different – it might look like doing the dishes without being asked, holding back an uncharitable remark, using your money and possessions for generosity instead of self-indulgence, sitting with the lonely kid at the lunch table, smiling at the person who cut you off in traffic, praying for your difficult mother-in-law, speaking up to the family member who is making self-destructive choices. Love is real when it takes sacrifice, when it costs something, when it is proven in actions. What will your love look like today?

Ordinary Time 22 - September 3, 2017

Homily for September 3, 2017

Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

Character Over Comfort

 

            The Carmelite religious order was supposed to be an order of priests and nuns who practiced fasting, penance, and intense prayer – but by the 16^th century, they had become very lax. Instead of praying, they spent their time in idle gossip; instead of fasting, they practiced gluttony amidst considerable wealth. A reform had to be initiated, and a young nun with a powerful personality, St. Theresa of Avila, felt called by the Holy Spirit to begin reforming the Carmelite order.

            But of course no one likes to be told that they are wrong, so she faced opposition everywhere she went. Many Carmelite monasteries refused to welcome her; abbesses fought with her; the other nuns gossiped about her. In all, it was a difficult mission!

            One day she was riding a horse to get to another monastery, praying desperately and frustrated about her mission. As the horse was crossing a river, it got startled and bucked, throwing St. Theresa of Avila into the river, fully clothed. As she got up, soaked and covered in mud, she famously prayed aloud, “Lord, if this is how You treat Your friends, it’s no wonder You have so few!”

            Many people expect God to make their life easier. Back in 2005, two researchers studied the spiritual lives of American teenagers, and they concluded that most teens thought that God’s job was to make them feel good. They called this “moralistic therapeutic deism” – basically the belief that God exists, but He doesn’t interfere with us on a daily basis unless we need Him to solve some problem or take away some pain.

            Sadly, though, many adults treat God in the same way. God, why don’t you heal my mother? God, why am I out of a job? God, take away all my suffering…and then when He doesn’t we often start to question if God exists, if He cares, if He loves us.

            But what if making life easy isn’t God’s job? In today’s Gospel, Peter wants Jesus to choose the easy way – “Lord, since you really are the Messiah, just bypass the Cross! What good does suffering entail?” But Jesus rebukes Peter and then proceeds to reveal the truth – that following Him will, necessarily, involve suffering.

            The Protestant pastor Rick Warren said, “God is more interested in your character than your comfort.” In other words, the goal of life is not to live an easy, suffering-free life. The goal of life is to be transformed into Christ. And often, that transformation comes through suffering.

            I hope we can all point to the good that has come from a difficult situation. I know that from some of my greatest suffering, I matured a lot, grew in compassion and humility, and learned to trust God more. It’s never easy, but it is the only path to becoming holy.

            Consider this example – how is a statue carved from marble? Think about Michaelangelo’s “David” or the “Pieta”. It’s necessary to chip away all of the pieces of marble that are not part of the statue. But what if the marble block could talk and feel? It would say, “Stop! Stop this hammering, this chipping! It hurts! Look, I am losing so much – nothing good can come from this! Too much pain, too much loss!” And yet, when it is finished, it becomes a work of art.

            In the same way, the Father wants to form us into the image of Christ. But to do that, He needs to strip away all that is not Christ – all our selfishness, immaturities, pride, the lies we’ve grown to believe. This takes a complete reorientation of our life, though – to see everything through the lens of “is this making me more like Christ?” This suffering, that disappointment, this pleasure, that relationship – is it making me more like Christ? Because, in the end, isn’t that all that matters?

            The Cross is not an end in itself, just like death on the Cross was not the end for Jesus. For Jesus, the Cross led to the Resurrection, just as for us, suffering can lead to Jesus coming to life in and through us – if we unite our suffering to Christ’s, trust God through the storm, and learn the lessons of holiness that He wants to teach us.

            So do not seek an easy life. Seek a REAL life – one that comes from letting God form you, so that you become like Christ.

Ordinary Time 20 - August 20, 2017

Homily for Ordinary Time 20

August 20, 2017

God’s Favor Is for Our Fruitfulness

 

            Why did God pick the Jews as the Chosen People? Doesn’t it seem like God is picking favorites? That doesn’t quite seem loving of God, right? Here we see in today’s Gospel Jesus seeming to reject this foreign woman because she isn’t part of the Jewish race – is Jesus being racist? Why would He choose one person over another?

            Let’s go back to the Old Testament to see the answer to these questions. God did indeed choose a Chosen People – but He did so in order to prepare the world for His coming. It was never enough for the Jewish nation to be insular, separated – they were supposed to be transformed by obedience to the Law so that other nations saw their holiness and were attracted to the Lord. Our first reading speaks of how any nation or foreigner, who loves the Lord and sacrifices to Him with a virtuous heart, will be accepted.

            The Jewish people were set apart precisely so that they might be a light to the nations. They were given a unique law so that they became holier than the other nations. When the Jews entered the Promised Land, they were surrounded by nations who worshipped Ba’al and the other false idols, who practiced sexual immorality, and who even had human sacrifice at times! So, God needed to give them a Law which set them apart and taught them the true way of holiness.

            But the problem was, the Jewish people became proud, arrogant, and idolatrous. They said to themselves, “We’re the Chosen People – we can do whatever we want and God will protect us.” So they started to adopt the practices of the surrounding nations – worshipping false idols, living lives of violence and lust, breaking the Law. They thought that because they were “chosen”, they would be able to sin with impunity.

            But that is not WHY they were chosen! They were chosen to be a shining example to the other nations of how to live as beloved sons and daughters of God. But they shirked that responsibility and even turned away outsiders who sought to know the Lord – in fact, even now, if a person wants to convert to Judaism, a traditional Jewish rabbi will turn someone away three times or more before allowing them to convert!

            With Christ’s death on the Cross, salvation was no longer only for the Jews, but now accessible to anyone who had faith in Him. St. Paul, in today’s second reading, talks about how God’s mercy is showered upon all people – Jews and non-Jews (called Gentiles) alike. We are the new Chosen People of God – we, the Catholic Church.

            Have you ever thought about how blessed you are to be Catholic? I was born Catholic, like many of you, and so I never had to wrestle with the challenge of conversion – I always knew the Truth of our Catholic faith from the time I was very young. That is a great gift, one that we don’t appreciate enough – the fact that we have been chosen, by God’s free grace, to belong to His Chosen People in the Church. We didn’t earn it – it was freely given to us!

But like the Chosen People of the Old Testament, we too must bear fruit. Just like it wasn’t enough for the Jewish people to say, “God will protect us because we are Jewish”, we cannot believe that God will save us or that we will automatically go to Heaven because we are Catholic. On the contrary – we are chosen so that we will bear fruit! The fruit that the Lord requires is a holy life, so that we too may be the light to the nations.

When I was ordained a priest, a very wise older priest wrote me a note where he said, “Bring thousands of souls to Heaven with you.” I never forgot that exhortation. Yes, my vocation to the priesthood is a free gift, one that I did not earn – and one that I must use now for His glory, for my own salvation and the salvation of thousands of souls. It’s not for my own benefit or pleasure, and it certainly doesn’t guarantee a free ticket into Heaven. As my grandfather used to say, “Just because you put on a collar don’t make you a saint!”

Likewise, just because you are baptized a Catholic doesn’t make you holy automatically! His grace is there – but we must respond with eager hearts. We have been chosen by grace so that we bear the fruit of a holy life.

When you stand before God, you will understand all of the graces you have been given: the gift of your faith, the Sacraments, the ways in which the Holy Spirit has inspired you, the people in your life who have encouraged you along the right path. My question for you is this – when God asks, “What have you done with all of those graces I offered you?” – how will you be able to respond?

Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time - August 13, 2017

Homily for August 13, 2017

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The Difficult But Good

 

            Let’s break down this parable and see how it applies to us. Peter starts out in a boat that was sinking. Perhaps many of us find parts of our life that are sinking, that aren’t working out well – maybe we struggle with a particular temptation, or we haven’t really developed a prayer life, or we are estranged from a family member, or we just fall into the same pattern of sinful behavior that isn’t healthy and is spiritually destructive. Many of us have parts of our life that just aren’t working. But we’ve gotten used to it, and it’s become somewhat comfortable with it – we hate it, but we’re used to it, and it would take too much to change, just as Peter would not leave the boat without an invitation from the Lord.

            But Jesus wants Peter to draw near to Him, so He invites him to leave the sinking boat and come towards Him. Christ wants us all to experience abundant life – the freedom from sin, deep inner peace, the security of His love – but to experience this life, we must draw closer to Him.

            The problem is the waves. Peter’s fine until he realizes that it would be difficult to draw close to Christ – then he starts to sink, because he took his eyes off of the Lord. If we really want to follow the Lord, we must expect that it will be difficult. It is difficult to put away our smartphones and really develop a prayer life. It is difficult to give up, once and for all, our addiction to food and lust and alcohol. It is difficult to live simply when we are tempted to surround ourselves with self-indulgent luxuries. When we seek to draw closer to the Lord, it will be opposed – by our fallen nature, by Satan, and by the temptations of the world in which we live.

            If we look at the difficulties instead of Christ, we are likely to be overwhelmed. Who can overcome strong temptations? Who can practice fasting, self-control, constant kindness with difficult people? No one can on their own – but if our eyes are on Christ and His grace, we can do all things!

St. Augustine, even after his conversion to Catholicism, still struggled with some of the temptations of his lower nature – particularly lust. One time he prayed, famously, “Lord, give me chastity, but not yet!” His heart was divided – he wanted to follow Jesus, but also wanted to indulge in the pleasures of this world.

            The turning point came when he picked up St. Paul’s letters one day and read, “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the desires of the flesh.” From that moment, his soul was flooded with grace. His eyes were now fixed, not on his temptations and sins, but on the Lord. It was hard to be pure – but now it was worth it.

            Many people feel like their life is stuck on hamster-wheel mode – going round and round, but getting nowhere. Is that because we are always willing to take the easy way out, live our lives in our comfort zones? Christ is inviting you to a better life – peace, joy, freedom, love – but to have this better life, we must be willing to do the difficult things: give up sin, love our enemies, practice sacrifice, have a disciplined life of prayer and fasting. These things are only possible if we keep our eyes fixed on Christ – when done for love of Him, we will find it easy to overcome all difficulties in our life of discipleship, until by His grace we become saints!

Final Homily at St. Mary's/St. Benedict's Parish, Stamford

Last Homily at St. Mary’s/St. Benedict’s

August 13 & 20, 2017

 

            Carnegie Mellon University has a unique tradition: every year they invite one of their professors to give what they call the “Last Lecture”. If this was the last lecture this professor was ever to give, what would he or she say? Well, this is my “last homily” here at this church. So I have to ask myself – what would I impart to you as I depart from this community?

            I want to leave you with three points. In some way, they’re a summary of everything I’ve tried to preach and live for the past three years here on the East Side of Stamford. First, strive for holiness. Second, stay close to the Eucharist. Third, life is short so do not put off loving God and our neighbor.

            First, strive for holiness and become a saint. To a lot of people, this sounds impossible. We often think of saints as plaster statues, with their hands folded and their eyes looking toward Heaven, instead of seeing them as flesh-and-blood human beings. But to be a saint is simple. We must love God more than anything else on this earth, and love our neighbor to the point of sacrifice. Simple, but not easy – and we do not do this on our own, but through Christ who lives in us through grace.

            I have been very inspired by reading the lives of the saints, who show us that holiness is possible for all of us. One in particular who inspires me is a young man by the name of Venerable Faustino Perez. This young man from Spain died at the age of 17, but had already achieved great holiness. After going on a life-changing retreat at the age of thirteen, he made it his life’s goal to be like Christ. He began to pray the Rosary daily, and to unite all of his daily sufferings to the Lord. He didn’t become some cloistered monk – he still played soccer, enjoyed hanging out with friends and camping, and even smoked cigarettes a little (which was legal for teenagers in Spain in the 1950s). When he came down with cancer, he continued to suffer well, without complaining, remembering the Lord’s sufferings on the Cross. He eventually died of his cancer, but before his death he said, “Holiness is very hard. But I will try, and who knows if I might achieve it?” Here was an ordinary young man whose life revolved around God – and who became a saint because of it!

            It is precisely that union with God that allowed him to be holy, and the best way to be united to Him is in the Holy Eucharist. My second point is to stay always close to Jesus in the Eucharist. I am willing to give up everything, even my life, for the Eucharist, because to receive the Eucharist is to be united to the very Body and Blood of God. Never pass up an opportunity to attend Mass! Make sure that it isn’t just one more thing to fit into your week, but truly the cornerstone of your week! The Mass is an infinite value – every time we come to the Mass, we come to the Cross, and we allow the merits of His death and resurrection to be applied to our souls. If we had to choose between having a long life, great riches, superior talents, constant pleasure, being adored by everyone, or receiving the Eucharist once, we ought to choose the Eucharist. What good are riches, honors, pleasures without God? And when we have the Eucharist, we have God.

            Finally, we ought to consider that life is very short, and eternity is very long. Most days we spend our entire day thinking about things that won’t matter at all in a year, let alone for eternity. If our eternity is going to be about loving and praising God, then we must begin here on earth. What if you were given two options: to be a billionaire for one hour, then spend the rest of your life penniless and in pain; or to suffer and be poor for one hour and spend the rest of your life as a billionaire? Of course, any rational person would choose the second. And yet so often we live this brief life as if it were the only thing that matters, when on the other side of death we can be princes and princesses in God’s Heavenly Kingdom – if only here we learn to live with Him as our King. I can remember when I was probably ten years old, I was sitting outside on a giant rock that was on my family’s property, looking at the leaves changing color in the fall and thinking, “Man, it seemed like summer was just beginning, and now it’s over…life goes by too quickly!” And the older I get, the quicker it goes! So let us live for something eternal – which means living in the love of God and seeking His Kingdom first.

            My friends, I love you and pray for you. Let us pray for each other, that we may meet again in eternity in Heaven with God. Seek holiness – stay close to the Eucharist – and live for God.

Fifteenth Sunday of Ordinary Time - July 16, 2017

Homily for Ordinary Time 15

July 16, 2017

Ridding Our Soil of Sin

 

            One of my least favorite chores growing up was picking up rocks. My dad had a huge garden – probably twice the size of this church. Every year, during the spring time, my dad would pay us a dollar to fill up a bucket of rocks from the garden, and then dump them in the woods. Not a fun task – but an easy way to make a buck, and an important job, because it is hard to make a garden if there are too many rocks in the soil.

            The rocky ground, the hard ground, and the thorn-infested ground in today’s Gospel are symbols of three things. The rocks symbolize unrepentant sin – if our life is full of sin, we will be unable to become holy. The hard ground is a symbol of a hard heart and a bad attitude – we are convinced that we don’t need God. The thorns and weeds are a symbol of worldly desires – we want pleasure and money and comfort far more than we want Christ.

            All of us would like to believe that we are the good ground – that we are living a life of faith in God. But are we really? Let’s look at each of these types of ground more closely to see which ones we really are.

            First – the rocky ground. St. John tells us in his first letter that “if we believe we are without sin, we are deceiving ourselves”. No matter how many rocks my siblings and I took out of our garden, there were always more. It was a never-ending chore! Likewise, all of us are sinners, even if our sins are small. Thus, repentance must be daily. St. Francis wrote to his Franciscan brothers that their lives should be marked with “constant conversion”.

            So what does that look like, practically? Well, when is the last time you have been to Confession? If it is more than a couple months, then you are still living in sin. Are there sins in your life that you have made peace with? Perhaps an addiction to lust and impurity, or greed, or unforgiveness? Or even worse – living in a state of sin, such as those who are divorced and remarried outside the Church, or living with someone without marriage? If we are not making a daily effort to repent and rid our lives of sin (with God’s grace, of course), then we are not truly disciples!

            Second – the hard ground. Many of us live our lives as practical atheists! Perhaps we believe intellectually in God but He makes no real difference in our life. How do you know? Well, do you pray – really pray, seeking Him in Scripture and the Rosary and the Mass and silent prayer? Do you ask God what His will is for your life? I love what Corrie Ten Boom, a Holocaust survivor and author of the famous book “The Hiding Place” says about prayer – she asks, “Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tire?” In other words, does your relationship with God direct your life? If not, then we are hard ground!

            Third – the thorns and weeds. What do you truly want in life? What is the most burning desire of your heart? Is it to be holy, or to be rich and famous? I sponsored a great kid for confirmation this past year, and at his confirmation party we were all outside playing sports. In the heat of competition, he let out a mild curse word – as mild as you can get. I didn’t think anything of it, but he immediately came up to me and apologized. I said, “Peter, it’s not a big deal.” But he responded, “It is a big deal. I don’t want to be the kind of person who has a foul mouth.” I was taken aback – wow, this kid gets it. His goal in life is to be holy, and he is willing to do what it takes to live for Christ.

            So, for us, what really is our goal in life? What do we spend our time on, our money on, our energy on? Is it soccer, or our job, or living for Christ?

            This was meant to be an honest – even brutally honest! – examination of where we are in the spiritual life. Do not be discouraged if you find your soul to be rocky ground filled with sin, hard ground without a deep relationship with God, or thorny ground distracted by the things of this world. The good news is that soil can change! To make a garden, we have to till the ground, remove the rocks, weed it, water it, and prepare the soil – in the same way, God wants to change you – if you will let Him. Ask Him to do that today. Invite Him into your soul. He will come, with His grace, and like a master gardener, produce the fruits of a holy life in your soul. Invite Him in – start praying deeply from your heart, receiving the Sacraments frequently, seek the Lord in His Word. His grace is all you need to change hard ground into a fruitful garden.

Ordinary Time 13 - July 2, 2017

Homily for Ordinary Time 13

July 2, 2017

Generosity

 

            There was once a poor man who owned an orchard, and one year his trees produced a remarkably beautiful, huge apple. He debated what to do with it – should he eat it, or make it into a pie, or what? Finally, being a generous man, he decided to give it away to a widow who was even poorer than him. So he put it into a basket and anonymously left it on her doorstep.

            She opened the door and was surprised and delighted at what she saw, but immediately thought, “This is far more than I need! I know what I shall do, I will add some of my grapes to this basket and pass it along to a family who is even poorer than me.” So that is what she did, and she went down the mountain and left the basket with the apple and grapes on the doorstep of an even poorer family.

            This poorer family opened the door and was surprised. “We cannot keep such a gift,” they thought. “Let us give it to the even poorer man who lives down the road.” So they added a quart of wild blueberries that they had been collecting, and set off to leave it at the door of the very poor man down the road.

            The poor man saw the basket and was filled with gratitude but said, “I have more than enough. I know – I will bring it to another man who needs food, and I will add some of the eggs from my chickens.” So he went up the mountain to a poor man who lived at the top.

            The man who owned the apple orchard was shocked when he saw his own basket back on his front steps – not just with the apple in it, but also with grapes and blueberries and eggs! He thanked God for the multiplication of the food, and invited all of his poor neighbors to a feast.

            There is a saying that “God is never outdone in generosity.” I have absolutely found that to be true. There have been times in my life when I have debated, “Should I make such a large donation to this organization that helps the poor?” The times that I have said yes, I have found that God – through other people – has actually allowed me to end up with MORE money than before!

            At the risk of sounding like a televangelist, I can confidently assure you that God is never outdone in generosity. He promised in today’s Gospel that anyone who practices hospitality for the sake of the Gospel will receive a reward. Consider what He says – if you give a cup of cold water, which costs nothing and only takes a little effort, you will be rewarded. And if you treat a disciple with kindness, we will receive a disciple’s reward.

            It feels like a risk to be generous sometimes. We wonder if it’s worth the effort, if we will ever get that money back, or if we can really open our homes to someone. What if they are not grateful? What if they take advantage of us? It is risky, indeed – but with risk comes great reward. Just like it’s a risk to invest in stocks, but the payoff is huge, it is a risk to be generous with your time, money, and energy, but the payoff is huge – and guaranteed – in the blessings you will receive back.

            Allow me to suggest three practical ways in which we can practice generosity.

            First, we can tithe. That’s a dirty word to some Catholics! Tithing is a biblical principle which means giving 10% to the Lord – either to the Church or to a Catholic charity. In the Old Testament, the Lord requires a tithe of all of the crops, grain, wine, oil, and livestock. The first 10% belonged to Him – as a sacrifice in the Temple, or as an offering to the priests, or as generosity to the poor. Proverbs 3:9-10 says, “Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the first-fruits of your crops, and your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine.” In the New Testament, St. Paul instructs his churches to practice tithing, and the early Church followed suit.

            We do not tithe because the church needs a new roof or because the poor need food. Ultimately, we tithe as an act of worship! By tithing, we are recognizing that God is the source of all blessings and that we honor Him by our generosity. Money can strengthen our union with God if we use it rightly, by giving it away to the Church and to the needy. I tithe, and I highly recommend the practice to every Christian!

            A second way to practice generosity is to be open to life in our marriage. I used to ask couples preparing for marriage, “How many kids do you want to have?” But I stopped asking that question because it’s a fundamentally stingy attitude! (And because no couple ever said more than 2 or 3!). We should rather be asking, How many kids does God want us to have? If children are a gift, why would we not want more gifts from God? Yes, it does take time and effort to raise children – and this is where the generosity part comes in. God wants us to be as generous as possible in opening our family to His gift of new life!

            Finally, one last act of generosity that we ought to practice is to give time. Think to yourself – how many of you would say that your life is “busy”? Busyness is the curse of the modern age. Often, we are too busy to take time to listen to people, to reach out to family members and friends who would benefit from a conversation or a visit. This can be a powerful form of generosity – to reach out to a neighbor, friend, or family member who could use a listening ear or a friendly visit.

            So, my challenge for you is to challenge God. I said at the beginning that God is never outdone in generosity – put that to the test! Pick one of those three ways: tithing, openness to life, and spending quality time – and practice it this week or this month. See if God does not overflow your life with joy and blessings in response to your generosity!