SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Heart of the Homily Podcast.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Michelle Lopez, and I'm here with Father Vigo, our pastor.
SPEAKER_01: How's it going, Michelle?
SPEAKER_00: Good.
SPEAKER_00: How are you doing today?
SPEAKER_01: We're on a Tuesday.
SPEAKER_00: We're on a Tuesday, I know.
SPEAKER_01: Yesterday was crazy.
SPEAKER_00: It was, but glad that we're able to still record.
SPEAKER_00: And um, and actually, I'm I'm really looking forward to talking about your Humley Father.
SPEAKER_00: I think it was very powerful and um really helpful to kind of un unpack the the gospel from this past Sunday, which I think that's that's helpful start off this Humley is or this podcast is I'll I'll read the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Um is this a gospel, Father, that's hard to preach on?
SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to ask that.
SPEAKER_01: Um, it's a fun gospel in the sense that a lot of people have a question about it.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, I had someone who wrote me an email asking me or telling me saying, you know, I I like to read the scriptures before I come to mass.
SPEAKER_01: And I was struggling with what Jesus said in the beginning.
SPEAKER_01: And then right off the bat, you answered it.
SPEAKER_01: And so that when that works, it's so cool.
SPEAKER_01: And last night I went to anoint um an elderly lady, she's in her 90s, actually, it was her birthday, which is really cool.
SPEAKER_01: The whole family was there, uh, gathered around.
SPEAKER_01: And um, the son was walking me out to the car, and he says, Open hands, Lord, that's what I'm praying for.
SPEAKER_01: I was listening to your homily this weekend, and it's helped me so much through this whole process that we're grieving, letting go of my mother.
SPEAKER_01: And I can't tell you how much it helped.
SPEAKER_01: And that's where it just blows me away because this is the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Like the Holy Spirit sees everything, right?
SPEAKER_01: And so, how how he can use one person or one homily and say, across the board, there's so many people that are going through this, going through that, or even trying to um grow in the faith and say, Okay, this is the message for this weekend, right?
SPEAKER_01: If we we truly understand that the Holy Spirit is in control, that it continues to guide the church, and you allow yourself to say, okay, what's the message this week?
SPEAKER_01: Right.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but very powerful.
SPEAKER_01: I think you're right.
SPEAKER_01: I think it's um one of those homilies or one of those gospels where it can be challenging, but um at what an opportunity.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: Because it'll stretch you, right?
SPEAKER_00: It will.
SPEAKER_00: And um, you unpacked it in a in a way I think that invited people to understand more deeply what Jesus was trying to say and not be distracted by what he's not trying to say.
SPEAKER_00: Which I think this is the gospel, or sometimes people get tied up in words and misunderstandings.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Um okay, well, let's dive into it.
SPEAKER_00: I'll go ahead and read from the gospel of Matthew.
SPEAKER_00: It's Matthew 10, verses 37 to 42.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus said to his apostles, Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.
SPEAKER_00: And whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
SPEAKER_00: And whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet's reward.
SPEAKER_00: And whoever receives a righteous man because he is a righteous man will receive a righteous man's reward.
SPEAKER_00: And whoever gives only a cup of water to one of these little ones to drink, because the little one is a disciple.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: I say to you, he will surely not lose his reward.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so so good, Father.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Um okay, your homily kind of the closed hand, open hands is the image that you really focused on.
SPEAKER_00: You know, first would love to just kind of hear what inspired the image of our hands because you you actually like you really opened up even that we a lot can be revealed about us from our hands.
SPEAKER_01: So what happened was that I when I started writing the homily, I was thinking a lot about what Father Andrew Dalton talked about when we had the presentation for the Shroud Etern.
SPEAKER_01: It was so impressive.
SPEAKER_01: I was blown away.
SPEAKER_01: Um, what a great young man and how he's given his life to really study the shroud as a scientist, as a uh philosopher, as a theologian, but he presented in such a beautiful way.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and he's been here at the rectory for a couple days, and uh I've been able to really pick his brain and ask more questions and things and have a front row seat to uh his presentation.
SPEAKER_01: But um if if if you were at the presentation, you saw that he talked a lot about the body, right?
SPEAKER_01: The placement of the hands, and um and so I was just thinking about that.
SPEAKER_01: I was thinking about the body of Christ and it this whole idea of open hands, closed hands, clenched fists.
SPEAKER_01: And if you ever see an Italian talking that they use their hands a lot, right?
SPEAKER_01: Or or even Cubans, we um try to ask directions to a Cuban and tell them, okay, give me directions, but don't use your hands.
SPEAKER_01: They can't do it.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: But um, I think that hands say a lot about who we are, how we express ourselves, um, what's going on, whether we're at peace or whether whether it's uh or we're anxious or there's something going on, our hands can tell or give it away right away.
SPEAKER_01: And um, and I use the example of someone uh sitting outside waiting for a loved one who's in surgery, or even in a difficult situation, you're gonna clench your hands, you're gonna pace, you're gonna do things that will display or model to someone else.
SPEAKER_01: I'm kind of in the wait and see.
SPEAKER_01: I'm in I'm in an anxious state right now.
SPEAKER_01: Um, so our hands uh can say a lot about that.
SPEAKER_01: And to be honest with you, while yeah, a lot I got a lot of great feedback, I still at the end of the day, um did not feel like I did a good job trying to convey the underlying theme that I was trying to run through the whole homily, and that was um possession, control.
SPEAKER_01: Um I and even I'll tell you this the 530 mass is different than what turned out for the Sunday Masses because the Sunday Mass was too many competing ideas, and I just couldn't ground it to and then I that night I went back to the desk and I kind of tweaked it for the Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: Um, I'm not a perfectionist, but I I do want to get it right.
SPEAKER_01: I want to be able to say, do people really understand what I'm trying to say?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, Father, I think um you're using things that are relatable.
SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, you talk about fear closing the hands, and hands can bless, heal, comfort, the hands also reveal our fears and what we hold on to.
SPEAKER_00: And that's, I mean, we know that, but we don't think about that.
SPEAKER_00: And we connect that to, I mean, I mean, even think about like the way we pray, that many times the surrender position is an open hand, you know, and our body says so much.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and you talked about how fear closes a hand.
SPEAKER_00: How does fear um kind of point to the things that we hold on to tightly, which is kind of what going into the gospel you were kind of highlighting of what we possess, what we kind of take control of.
SPEAKER_00: What are the things that you feel like kind of using that image of hands um that fear kind of clutches us onto things?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I think the easiest example is um parents that hold on or over possessive of their children.
SPEAKER_01: That's an easy because we see it a lot.
SPEAKER_01: We know people, maybe we ourselves have been parents that are just holding on so tightly to the one we love, but we end up harming them.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and that that's an easy example.
SPEAKER_01: But we if we go back to what Jesus says at the beginning of the gospel says the person who loves child or husband or more than me is not worthy of me.
SPEAKER_01: That's hard.
SPEAKER_01: Like, who says that?
SPEAKER_01: Who says, No, you have to love me more than your daughter or your son?
SPEAKER_01: Um, only God can say that.
SPEAKER_01: And I and I've told you this before.
SPEAKER_01: I've had people tell me, honestly, in confession or spiritual direction, they'll say, uh, I struggle with that.
SPEAKER_01: I I can't love God more than my child.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe more than my husband, but I can't love him more than my child, you know.
SPEAKER_01: And um, but it's it's that whole.
SPEAKER_01: And what I was trying to say is that that clenched fist or that open hand, if you live your life, you start to live um a life where it is open, then it it what it's saying right off the bat is this child does not belong to me.
SPEAKER_01: I cannot possess this child.
SPEAKER_01: I'm a steward, I take care of this child.
SPEAKER_01: This is this child belongs to God.
SPEAKER_01: And um because we can do a lot of harm.
SPEAKER_01: And we do that in all of our relationships and even our spouse, our friendships.
SPEAKER_01: Um, when we why?
SPEAKER_01: Because when it's only it, when it's all about this world, it will be about possessing, about being controlled.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta hold on what I got.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta hold it tight because the shoe can drop at any moment.
SPEAKER_01: I can lose all of this.
SPEAKER_01: So I gotta be in control 24-7.
SPEAKER_01: And so when you're when you grit your teeth and you're clenching because you want to control it and possess it, that's not a great place to be.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Well, Father, you're highlighting something I think that's challenging for for many people if they haven't really kind of thought about that they belong to God first, you know, whether it is your your child or your husband.
SPEAKER_01: You've taught a lot about this, even with the tragedies that you've gone through and your children that you've lost.
SPEAKER_01: I think that that was a uh when you teach about this and form hearts, I've heard you talk about wait a minute, first and foremost, foundational is how do we understand this gift that we've been given?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I think that's been honestly the the saving truth in in my own story, because that I mean, that is the truth that has set me free to steward well the gifts given, and then also to be grateful when I have to give them back.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: You know, is knowing that first they belong to God.
SPEAKER_00: And and I think for for myself too, having the the vision of the end goal, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like, why did God give me a child?
SPEAKER_00: It's to get them to heaven.
SPEAKER_00: It's not for my own possession, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's not for for just me.
SPEAKER_00: It's it's there's a larger store, there's a larger picture, and the gift is given for have the time appropriate and to trust that God is a loving father, you know.
SPEAKER_00: And I think I think you're uh it's a challenging scripture because it it helps to reorder um the gifts that are given to us.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes we um we order them in a way that uh really is not love.
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's what people get caught up on is thinking, like, oh no, I love them so much, which is why I have to like, you know, control them, you know, or um, but really being able to step back and and recognize um, you know, spouse and children are are gifts to steward in the sense of um they're they belong to God first, which gives a freedom to love them rightly, which is knowing that you're not God and you can't control them, but you're here to love them well as long as God allows.
SPEAKER_00: And with the vision though, and the eyesight that it's towards heaven, that it's not towards an earthly goal, but it's one that has an eternal weight to it.
SPEAKER_01: It's so hard to get there too.
SPEAKER_01: I I I'll I'll say that it's it's growing in discipleship, it's in knowing your faith and making a clear intention that that's where you want to because it's painful.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's painful to let go, it's painful not to be possessive because um you feel that if you don't do that, it it's gonna all unravel and it's just gonna go wrong.
SPEAKER_01: And that's not the case, yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Because um it's if if you hold on so tight, well, that's the only thing you're gonna have where God wants to give you more.
SPEAKER_01: And but if you're if that's all you're holding on to, well, there's no room for anything else.
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I even think about like myself, even with our our daughter right now.
SPEAKER_00: You know, when I think about the future, I remind myself of that of like I'm gonna do my best with the time I have for her.
unknown: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: But she ultimately belongs to God first.
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_00: And for me, again, it's a saving grace of freedom to be able to be where I'm at and not worry about the future, but to do well what's before me, and then know that God is God and ultimately, like, He loves her more than me.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, which is hard to imagine as a parent, but I but I love that imagery because it makes me stand in awe before God of like, how do you love her more than me?
SPEAKER_00: This means that what I think of how much you love me is so small compared to how much you actually love me.
SPEAKER_00: You know, like and that's what parenthood is supposed to be.
SPEAKER_00: It's supposed to be this um deepening of understanding of God's beautiful love, depth, the depth of his love for us, his uniqueness of his love for us.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then we get a small taste of it, you know, in the way that we um experience it with our own children, and it points back to God's love for us.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but Father, so a few quotes from your homely just to kind of go a little bit deeper here into this topic.
SPEAKER_00: You said Jesus is not asking us to love our families less, he's asking us to stop possessing them.
SPEAKER_00: And you said, love protects, possession controls.
SPEAKER_00: A closed hand always becomes a cage.
SPEAKER_00: The safest place for the people you love has never been in your own hands, it's always been in God's hands.
SPEAKER_00: I'd love for you to comment a bit more on that.
SPEAKER_00: And also you kind of mentioned St.
SPEAKER_00: Augustine too, um, kind of rightly ordering, um loving God.
SPEAKER_01: And that's the key.
SPEAKER_01: That's the key to what you just mentioned there is um because Augustine calls that ordo amoris, and where there's an order to love.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you'll see it in um ordinata di letio, um, which is that um what he calls ordered charity.
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, Augustine didn't invent that phrase, he got it from scripture.
SPEAKER_01: There's um I think there's a line from Song of Songs where the bride says, He set love in order within me.
SPEAKER_01: How beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: And Augustine's reading that, and that he's probably reading that one verse, and he builds a whole vision of how the human heart can be properly ordered.
SPEAKER_01: Um, he was brilliant, I'm sure, uh even as a pastor, and he's shepherding his people and he's seeing um the same things we're seeing today, right?
SPEAKER_01: The human being is a human being.
SPEAKER_01: Um, because his question is the question all of us are living, whether we know it or not, it's not, do you love me?
SPEAKER_01: Because everybody loves something.
SPEAKER_01: The question is, do you love things in the right order?
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I was trying to communicate.
SPEAKER_01: Because if you read his book, um in uh The City of God, he puts it about as plainly as it can be because he says that the good person, the just person is simply the one who loves rightly.
SPEAKER_01: And how do we learn to do that?
SPEAKER_01: Um who doesn't love what shouldn't be loved?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, who doesn't fail to love what should be loved?
SPEAKER_01: Who doesn't love more than what should be loved less?
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
SPEAKER_01: It's um it's virtue for Augustine.
SPEAKER_01: It's just the love in the right order.
SPEAKER_01: Um sin is love out of order, not love of bad things, usually love of good things is the in in the wrong place.
SPEAKER_01: Again, I I've said this many times.
SPEAKER_01: It's um if sin wasn't pleasurable, if sin wasn't seen as something that I enjoy, then I wouldn't do it.
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: I if it's something that I see as as uh a pleasurable thing, then I'm gonna engage in it.
SPEAKER_01: But he has this distinction that sounds cold until you're able to really pray with it.
SPEAKER_01: He says that there are things we enjoy and things that we use.
SPEAKER_01: Um, God alone is to be enjoyed, and and he's love for his own sake as the end.
SPEAKER_01: Everything else, everything that we we have in our lives, we love in reference to God.
SPEAKER_01: And that's what I was trying to pinpoint.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I don't want people to misunderstand that because he's not saying use people, he's saying the opposite.
SPEAKER_01: He's saying the person who puts a creature in God's place is the one who ends up using them.
SPEAKER_01: Because you're asking your husband, your wife, your child to be God for you, to fill that void, to fill that space.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's it's that hole that only God can fill.
SPEAKER_01: And no human being can ever do that.
SPEAKER_01: They can't survive that.
SPEAKER_01: You will crush that very person you say you love.
SPEAKER_01: So if we put God first and um we sit back and see what happens, well, then the spouse comes back to you as a spouse, not as an idol.
SPEAKER_01: Um, your child comes back as a gift and not as a possession, like what you were talking about.
SPEAKER_01: You love them more, not less.
SPEAKER_01: Because um a clenched fist holds on to one thing and it will slowly strangle.
SPEAKER_01: An open hand holds everything, the possibility of everything.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because it's holding it all in God.
SPEAKER_01: And just one thing.
SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm trying to one thing that I would just add to that is that Augustine gives this line because uh as I remember he he lost a friend and he's grieving it, and and when you read about it, it almost breaks him.
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's out of this that he writes, Blessed is the one who loves you and and his friend in you.
SPEAKER_01: Um I don't know.
SPEAKER_01: I I think that if you're afraid to uh uh open your hands, you'll lose what you love.
SPEAKER_01: Augustine is saying the reverse.
SPEAKER_01: He's saying the only way to keep them is to hold them in God.
SPEAKER_01: Open your hand.
SPEAKER_01: Don't lose people.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because clenched fists lose people.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes we we think it's the opposite.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta control this.
SPEAKER_01: I I gotta make it happen.
SPEAKER_01: Hold on to it tight because if not, it can just unravel.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: And I think, I mean, everything that you just shared, especially with um Augustine, I I think helps it's an invitation to rightly order love.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Which it's kind of opposite than than what our culture presents.
SPEAKER_00: Because I feel like our culture kind of says, you know, oh, well, get married so you're fulfilled, have children, so you're fulfilled.
SPEAKER_02: Right.
SPEAKER_00: And kind of what you're highlighting is only God can fulfill.
SPEAKER_00: And these other things are gifts that help point to God and help give fulfillment, but is not the ultimate fulfillment.
SPEAKER_01: Exactly right.
SPEAKER_01: Because if you build up your spouse to be the one who is supposed to fill you, or your child is supposed to fill your life, it's gonna disappoint you every single time.
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna live with a funk, you're gonna, you're gonna say, you're gonna wake up one day and say, This is not what I signed up to be.
SPEAKER_01: It's I don't have any meaning.
SPEAKER_01: I don't feel fulfilled, I don't have that connection anymore.
SPEAKER_01: The love is not there.
SPEAKER_01: Well, because you made your spouse into God.
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Or your child into an idol, and you're hoping that that will somehow fill that void that you have inside.
SPEAKER_01: That's dangerous because to live like that, you're gonna be miserable.
SPEAKER_00: Well, always disappointed because you're looking for an infinite love or an infinite something, something that's finite, someone that's finite.
SPEAKER_00: So it doesn't even equal up, you know?
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I think all these truths, although they're hard to kind of take in, I think they're they're so freeing when we see, wow, I've been trying to seek something that I that's actually not possible to receive in my spouse or in my children.
SPEAKER_00: And so beginning to take those deep, deep desires, like take that to God.
SPEAKER_00: And I think I think for myself, like that's one of the things that I've experienced the freedom and is like it's not ignoring those desires, but it's where I take them.
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
SPEAKER_00: You know, and being able to be like, man, Lord, I I want a perfect, infinite love and I need that from you, Jesus first, you know, so that I'm free to love my spouse in the greatest of moments and in the most trying of moments, not expecting perfection or um anything that only God can give, but being able to like love where I'm at, but then seek my deep desires and longings in the Lord Himself.
SPEAKER_01: And and what everything that you're saying, it's the next question is so how does how do I actually do this?
SPEAKER_01: Because people are saying that sounds beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: Um, how do I do this?
SPEAKER_01: How do I put God first when my hands are already full?
SPEAKER_01: And the reason one of the reasons why I I I threw in that first reading is because it answers that question in a very quiet way.
SPEAKER_01: Um and I love it.
SPEAKER_01: It's it's this woman who lives up in uh Shunam and the prophet Alicia keeps passing through that town and she notices him, and she and I love how she notices him.
SPEAKER_01: She sees that he's a man of God, and she goes and she tells her husband, hey, I think this man is a holy man of God.
SPEAKER_01: Why don't we do something for him?
SPEAKER_01: Let's build him a little room on our roof, nothing fancy, and let's put a bed and somewhere he can sleep, maybe a chair, a lamp, a place for the man of God to stay whenever he comes through town.
SPEAKER_01: That's that's beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: That's the whole thing.
SPEAKER_01: She makes room, she she makes a little room for God in her own house.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what gets me every time because this woman had no children, her husband was getting on in years, we're told.
SPEAKER_01: And in that world, for a woman, that was a door that had been closed a long time ago.
SPEAKER_01: And she had probably stopped praying about it.
SPEAKER_01: And she was probably she could have been miserable.
SPEAKER_01: And she had probably made her peace with it.
SPEAKER_01: And then this prophet she made room for turns to her and says, This time next year, you're gonna be holding a son in your arms.
SPEAKER_01: And one of the things what I was trying to say is that do you see what happened?
SPEAKER_01: She made room for God, and God made room for life.
SPEAKER_01: The closed door opened up, that closed clenched fist opened up, the empty space she had given up on.
SPEAKER_01: Well, that's exactly where the new life came from.
SPEAKER_01: And that's what you were just talking about.
SPEAKER_01: It's how do we make this happen?
SPEAKER_01: How does this come about?
SPEAKER_01: Well, when we have closed hands, when we're our our our hands are clenched, our fists are clenched, we don't have room.
SPEAKER_01: And we're very good at filling our schedules, we're very good at busyness, at noise, and it there's so much going on that God is one thing among the many things.
SPEAKER_01: If we're lucky, if I can fit in prayer, if I can make that discipline a routine and really make a conscious decision to say, no, God is first.
SPEAKER_01: And and because if that's how it happens, well, then you're making room.
SPEAKER_01: You're saying, I have made a beautiful room in my life for you.
SPEAKER_01: And that's it's the most important room in my life.
SPEAKER_01: But when you say, I don't, because Jesus will come knocking on your on your heart.
SPEAKER_01: And a lot of times we have to say, I don't, I can't fit in.
SPEAKER_01: I I just I'm trying to, I don't have any room.
SPEAKER_01: And so that's where this woman in the first reading really answers what you were just saying and shows us that despite your difficulties, despite your trials, despite your disappointments, what you thought was closed off, you still have the open hands to say, I want to make room for God.
SPEAKER_01: I want to be faithful.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I want to trust.
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's about that trust and surrender.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and two things come to mind, Father, even in that story of the woman that I think is so important and relatable, is there's two things that she wasn't doing.
SPEAKER_00: You know, she wasn't looking at her situation and being like, oh my gosh, what else is God gonna take?
SPEAKER_00: Like her fertility, right?
SPEAKER_00: She didn't have the fertility or or she didn't have children, like, oh, what it what else is God gonna take now?
SPEAKER_00: Now I have to like close my fist and like hold on to everything in my life because I'm afraid that more is gonna be taken.
SPEAKER_01: Right.
SPEAKER_00: And that's a temptation for people, you know, because they didn't get something particularly that they thought they wanted or were owed, you know, or especially with even with fertility, that's a sensitive topic.
SPEAKER_00: But you know, sometimes we can be like, oh no, what else is God gonna take from me?
SPEAKER_01: I know I I've struggled with that in my life too.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Not in fertility, but just clarifying.
SPEAKER_01: But different situations.
SPEAKER_01: What you're saying, it can be related across the board on other issues.
SPEAKER_00: Something not happening our way or something or something being taken, you know, that was good, and being like, oh no, what else is going to be taken?
SPEAKER_00: And then and then also the other part is is that she wasn't focused on what she did not have.
SPEAKER_00: Like she started shifting her gaze to like, how can I serve?
SPEAKER_00: You know, of like instead of her eyes being on like what she doesn't have or what wasn't given, her eyes were on like, how can I serve you, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: Like, um, because I think in the midst of the fear, we can get very much, we start looking at our own, our life alone, you know, like what I don't have, what I should have had, what is got like out of fear, instead of being able to kind of have that open hand of service, being able to say, like, okay, Lord, I might not understand, but like, how are you bringing life into my life?
SPEAKER_00: You know, like where do you want to bear good fruit in my life?
SPEAKER_00: And her, you know, she was open to being generous.
SPEAKER_00: And that generosity, you know, abundant life came and even literal life came, you know.
SPEAKER_00: But I think those are kind of two dispositions that I find in that story that are really relatable to what you're talking about is because she made room for God and was focused on doing the Lord's work and not just her own work or her or what she wanted of life, like life came into like God made miracles happen.
SPEAKER_01: Um But I like what you're saying because I like the struggle.
SPEAKER_01: Um now, someone who's going through it doesn't like the struggle, but what I what I'm saying by I like the struggle is can we honestly dialogue with God like that?
SPEAKER_01: Can we honestly look at our lives like that?
SPEAKER_01: Can we have the self-awareness to engage the conversation to get me to what you're talking about?
SPEAKER_01: Because I'm so worried about my image, I'm so worried about being perfect, I'm so worried about what people think of me, um, about things, possessions, uh all these worldly things, which are good if they're in their proper place.
SPEAKER_01: Right.
SPEAKER_01: But what I'm saying is what you're talking about is that that beautiful struggle of hopefully gets you to a place of growth and a deeper understanding of who you are before God.
SPEAKER_01: And I don't think, and I don't want to pass judgment here, but I don't think a lot of people are in a place to do that, and that's where the big problems and the big hurts come about, compounded because we're gonna have storms, and storms will come.
SPEAKER_01: It's not whether they will, they will.
SPEAKER_01: Um, and so how do I get to a place where I'm really struggling of who I am before God and am I place and am I loving in the proper order?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: And I think the clenched fist and open hands is a great place to like look inside.
SPEAKER_00: Like, where am I clean?
SPEAKER_00: What am I clenching on to?
SPEAKER_01: It's easy, right?
SPEAKER_01: It's easy to um to use that example to apply it to our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, where am I clenching on to?
SPEAKER_00: And that's the place, that's the very place where if I keep holding, something's gonna die.
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_00: But if I let go, if I let go, life and give it to God, like new life will come from that.
SPEAKER_00: And I I even go back to like, you know, the gospel's talking about mother, father, like the whole thing about rightly ordering our life with even with children, being like if I'm clutching my fist on my children or my spouse, or even the possibility of children, if that's what I'm just clenching my fist to, I I have to let go and give it to God so that new life can come.
SPEAKER_00: I even think about that story with the the woman too.
SPEAKER_00: Like maybe the roof was gonna be her children's her child's room.
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
SPEAKER_00: That's give that too.
SPEAKER_01: That's a beautiful reflection.
SPEAKER_01: And then giving that to God, I mean, he I don't need that space anymore because I'm giving it to you.
SPEAKER_00: And Lord, what do you want to do with this?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, and it's letting go of our own plans of like, no, I have to have this.
SPEAKER_00: But it's like, no, what you have to have is Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: And if you can really shift that to like, what I have to have is Jesus, and then Lord, what do you want to do with these beautiful desires that I have that I thought looked like this, but maybe they need to be open to other things.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where new life and miracles happen, you know, when we when we have that shift.
SPEAKER_00: So, Father, as we kind of start wrapping up our conversation, you're you ended the homily, um, open hands at the Eucharist.
SPEAKER_00: And I I want to say, like, this really touched me because I I felt like it was an invitation for people to in that in the mass and then in our daily mass to have that posture of open hands when we go to receive the Lord Himself.
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: And it it was a, I think, uh, an invitation to let go and to look at where we're clipped clenching on to to be more free to let go to receive.
SPEAKER_00: So you kind of a couple lines that you mentioned were um, you'll you simply open your hand like a child, empty, waiting, trusting when you go to receive the Eucharist.
SPEAKER_00: And I thought that was it's so like if we can approach the Lord like we approached the Eucharist, which sometimes we're not even thinking about it, but like if we can go with that trust, like you're going to give me yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and what I said there was that you're about to be you're you're about to preach the gospel just with your hands and your body and your emotions.
SPEAKER_01: I can't tell you how many people again, no judgment.
SPEAKER_01: It's just it is what it is.
SPEAKER_01: People are in different places, they're different growth, different journeys.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but people sometimes will come up to receive the Eucharist and they're somewhere else.
SPEAKER_01: They're somewhere else, you know, and we need to help them because they're so distracted and they're so tied to the world that even at the time of the Eucharist, it's like, okay, just give me the cookie or let me just have the Eucharist.
SPEAKER_01: Um, I gotta move on.
SPEAKER_01: But I I have to say that after I preached this homily, I can't tell you how many people came up and intentionally opened their hands wide, like I am giving it, I am surrendering in humility, like a child.
SPEAKER_01: Here, I don't want to grab it, Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to possess Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: I just want to have the open hand so that He can just invade me and come um and be in my heart.
SPEAKER_01: And it was beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: And that's the posture.
SPEAKER_01: That's I think that's the bottom line of the entire Sunday experience that hopefully you bring to the rest of this week is open hands.
SPEAKER_01: Just trust a little bit more, surrender a little bit more.
SPEAKER_01: Don't possess so much, don't try to be so much in control and see it how you are in relationship to your children and to your spouse, to the friendships.
SPEAKER_01: What are you holding on so tight with?
SPEAKER_01: And uh you said it earlier, Michelle, that what you're holding on to so tightly will die.
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna suffocate it.
SPEAKER_01: And we gotta learn to let go and receive and place in his hands because anyone we love is gonna be safer in his hands than in your hands.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and the Eucharist is a uh a call for us to know that when we let go and open our hands, it's we don't receive something like something second class or like we receive God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: I I think of what a beautiful way to try to let go, try to give control over to God is when you go to receive communion um to do that, to maybe come forward with the things you're holding on to.
SPEAKER_00: And then when you're opening your hand, like you're letting it go, but also with that confidence of what you're receiving is always the greatest from God, like himself.
SPEAKER_00: It's not like okay, well, the second, it's it's I mean, that's what and that's what happens.
SPEAKER_00: That's the mystery of God's love for us is when we surrender, he gives us the greatest gift himself, you know, which is all we need.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so thank you, Father, for this great conversation and a lot of things to take into this week.
SPEAKER_01: So powerful, it's so great to be with you.
SPEAKER_01: Just a note, quick note, we won't be with you next week.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna be uh enjoying Independence Day and that weekend.
SPEAKER_01: And so we'll see you that other following week.
SPEAKER_01: But have a beautiful rest of your week.
SPEAKER_01: Take this homily and try to break it open with yourself, with your spouse, with your children, and with your friends.
SPEAKER_01: And if you found this podcast to be helpful and inspirational, we ask you to click the like button, make a make a review, and hopefully pass it on to someone else.
SPEAKER_01: We'll see you next week.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Michelle.