Homily for 4 Nov 2016

4 Nov 2016

We’re getting into the cold and flu season.  Our body starts to ache; we sneeze and cough, and have a headache.  But we know what to do.  We take some aspirin, maybe a cough remedy, and we try to get more rest than usual.  Those are just prudent things to do when we have a cold, because they help our body to get better.

Saint Paul writes, “Our citizenship is in heaven and from it we also await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.  He will change our lowly body to conform with his glorified Body.”  And I don’t think Paul is suggesting that Jesus is a like cold remedy.  However, Jesus “does a body good;” whether that’s the body of the Church, or the body of friends we have, or the body of work we call our life.

And if our life has more “downs” than “ups,” maybe it would be prudent to bring more of Jesus into it.  If there’s too much arguing in the home, or among people, maybe the prudent thing to do is to ask Jesus for guidance.  Whenever something needs to be going better than what it is, it’s always prudent to call on the Lord. 

And so, maybe Paul is suggesting that Jesus is like a cold remedy.  The Lord brings the body back to health—the body of our families, the body of our lives, the body of the Church.  The Lord brings the back to health.