Tuesday, November 10, 2015

Homily for 10 Nov 2015

10 Nov 2015
Memorial of St Pope Leo the Great

Every now and then I’ll hear somebody suggest that because I’m a priest, it’s like I have a sure ticket to heaven—because I give my life to God.  Or maybe at a funeral, I’ll hear a eulogy that highlights all the things the deceased has done for God.  And, of course, we spend a lot of time praying to God, asking his help and guidance—if we just pray the right way or with the right words, he just has to respond to us.

Well, Jesus puts these words in our hearts today in response: “We are unprofitable servants.”  That doesn’t mean what we do in our life of faith isn’t worth anything.  Instead, it means that we do what we do as Catholic Christians simply out of love for God and others . . . we don’t expect anything in return.

And, you know, there really is a joy that comes from serving and loving and caring . . . without having that expectation of profiting from it.  We do what do for the good of others.  We pray to God and thank him out of simple gratitude.  We go through life expecting nothing.  And, in return—without us even looking for it—God repays us with his blessings; we don’t have to worry about that.

We are unprofitable servants . . . sometimes.  Other times, as we know, we can unintentionally expect God to pay us back for the good that we do.  Sometimes we can think that God owes us.  Sometimes we can think that friends owe us, or family.  And so, it’s good to let Jesus put these words in our heart from time to time: “We are unprofitable servants.”  We are unprofitable servants.  We serve and love purely to serve and to love.

And that’s an ideal, for sure.  But that’s what we aim for: Love without strings attached.  Love that doesn’t seek to paid back.  Love that is pure and simple.        

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