Your Path to Holiness is Closer Than You Think

 

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Opening: The Solemnity of All Saints

Good morning, everyone.

Well, my dear brothers and sisters, today, November 1st, Solemnity of All the Saints.

And today is a day of hope, hope for all of us, because every saint had a past, every sinner has a future, right?

I hope you have heard that before.

Every saint has a past, just like me.

Every sinner has a future, just like me, just like us, like all of us.

So there's no reason for despair.

But we need to, once in a while, we need to recalibrate, regroup, reorient ourselves, so that we're doing what we should be doing, and we're going in the direction that we should be going in the direction.

In what direction we should be going in?

In the direction of God.

The Readings: Servants, Soldiers, and the Beatitudes

And here, in Revelations, in the first reading, it says, Do not damage the land, or the sea, or the trees, until we put, in other words, don't destroy the world, until we have identified on the foreheads of the servants of our God.

In the Bible, we use the word servant.

In the Catholic Church, we use the word servant, instead of the word soldier.

Because a servant is a soldier, who has a mission, a purpose, and is driven towards that from their leader.

So we are servants of our God.

We are soldiers of the Lord.

Lord, in the Responsorial Psalm, Lord, let this people that longs, this is the people that longs to see your face.

To see your face means we want to go in the direction.

I want to go in the right direction.

I want to see your face, Lord.

And in the church, the baptismal font is there.

That's the beginning of our journey, and at the very end, is Jesus here.

And it would be wonderful if it was just a straight path.

But many of us take some turns.

Someone once asked Pope Benedict, how many ways are there to heaven?

How many ways are there to heaven?

And Pope Benedict said, as many as there are people.

We're all on this journey, and all over the place.

But we all should be seeking the Lord's face.

And here, blessed are the poor in spirit.

Blessed are they who mourn.

Blessed?

Blessed?

Blessed are the meek.

And then, now things start getting clearer.

Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness.

What does the word blessed mean?

What does this word mean?

It means, blessed means, you're on the right path.

You're on the right path.

That's what it means.

Blessed are they who are willing to be poor in spirit, who are willing to mourn, who are willing to be meek, who are willing to hunger for thirst and righteousness, because that's how everything begins, through pain and suffering.

So the question here.

OK, so now, here's the question.

What are you looking for in your life?

What are you looking for?

And if you don't know what you're looking for, that's OK. But you've got to start thinking about it.

Because some of us are getting old.

What are you looking for?

The Trip to New York: NASDAQ and St. Patrick's Cathedral

And sometimes, we forget.

We just took, two weeks ago, two weeks ago, was it two weeks ago?

We went to New York.

So we took 13 of our students to New York City, to the financial district.

And we went on a personal tour in the NASDAQ.

We rang the bell.

We rang the bell for the NASDAQ.

Some top dogs were there.

Some company was celebrating 20 years there.

Millions of dollars, trillions of dollars.

And I was telling the kids, trillions of dollars go through this building.

Trillions of dollars.

And you can have some of it.

And I want you to have some of it, so that you can give it back to the church.

We'll put your name.

We'll put your name.

OK. And then, we went to St. Patrick's Cathedral for Mass.

And the reading, beware of those who are greedy.

And the kids were looking at me.

Father.

And then, of course, the priest at St. Patrick's said, can you give the homily?

I'm like, oh my.

What am I going to say?

Why beware?

Beware not to be greedy.

Don't be greedy.

Why?

Because if that's what you think will make you happy, if you think that being happy means having more things, you are in for a big disappointment.

You will never be happy because of having more things.

This is the message of Christianity.

Things will not make you more happy.

Your heart wasn't made to be happy having more things.

Your heart was made to love, to love.

That's what your heart was made for, not to be made for having more things, to be in love.

And so, yeah, sometimes love is painful.

Sometimes love is challenging.

The Saints Who Figured It Out

All the saints finally figured it out at one moment in their life.

St. Francis, who was rich.

He came from a rich family.

What did he do?

He said to his father, I don't want any of it.

I don't want any of it.

And then his father said to him, remember the story?

His father said to him, even the clothes you're wearing belong to me.

You can have all these clothes.

And he took off his clothes right in front of his father.

And he said, you can take it all.

I don't care.

Would you follow a man like that today?

I think I would.

I'm looking for something that is challenging.

I don't know.

I don't know.

Maybe I wouldn't.

But I don't know.

He was able to gather so many people who followed him.

And then St. Ignatius, another beautiful story.

Wounded in battle, convalescing in a hospital, he has only two books next to him, the Bible and the lives of the saints.

And he reads the lives of the saints.

And it converts his life, changes his life.

And instead of being worldly and superficial, he changed his life and became a great priest, a great founder of the Jesuits, and changed the course of history for the church.

The American Girl Doll and the Value of Challenge

Not too long ago, I went over to my sister's and I saw the American Girl doll, the one that I bought.

How many of you have an American Girl doll?

How many of you have an American?

Raise your hand if you have an American Girl doll.

I don't.

That thing was expensive.

And remember, there was a store, American Girl doll store at the Galleria.

And whenever it was my niece's birthday or Christmas, we went to that store.

And let me tell you something, Kristen, Addie, Josefina, Samantha, we got a lot of them.

And that thing was over $100.

I was like, let's go Barbie, $20.

We get a Barbie for $20, superficial Barbie.

No, we got an American Girl doll.

And not only that, but then we had to get the outfit, the two outfits, one for the doll and one for my niece.

And then we had to have the little tea party upstairs on the second floor.

And then for another $50, you could get her hair combed.

What a rat, what a business, what a business.

What a business.

But you know what?

The woman who started the American Girl doll, her name was Pleasant Rowland.

I looked her up.

She was a teacher.

She was a teacher, a school teacher.

And she was a textbook writer.

The reason why those dolls were so expensive is because she researched every piece of that period of history of that time.

The furniture, the little outfits, the books that talked about historical fiction, right?

They were historical in a certain sense, fictitious character, but they were meaningful.

Kristen, she was an immigrant from Sweden.

And her best friend died from cholera.

And Felicity, the 1770s, Revolutionary War.

Addie, she escaped from slavery.

She was an African-American.

Molly, her father, a doctor, was fighting in World War II in England.

Samantha, Victorian era, and was an orphan.

And the girls wanted to read more and more about these.

Why?

Because they were challenging.

They were challenging.

Like, these girls never knew about an orphanage, never knew about cholera, never knew about disease, never knew about losing your best friend, never learned about having to bring water from the river over to them.

And girls loved it.

And it became huge.

And then, in 1998, she sold the company to Mattel.

And you know what happened to the American Girl doll?

Now, instead of beautiful furnishings and stuff like that, now you have the American girl with the cell phone and with the Stanley cup, literally.

And nobody cares.

A Father's Lesson and the Danger of Comfort

Do you?

I realized one of the best things my father ever did was he used to tell me about his youth when he was younger.

I remember coming home crying because maybe one of my friends wasn't speaking to me anymore.

And I remember my dad said, why are you crying?

I'm like, Dad, I had a bad day.

A bad day.

Do you know what a bad day is?

Let me tell you what a bad day is.

When I was your age, the Americans, the English, were bombing our town.

In the 1940s, they were bombing.

We were running to the caves.

And you're crying because your friend won't talk to you?

You know?

But I'll tell you.

I'll tell you.

It kind of puts some muscle.

If you're looking for you or your children to have a comfortable life, you're sucking the life out of them.

And that sucks the life out of us.

What the Saints Did

The saints were like us, human beings.

And they did something about it.

They went after either changing something or making something better.

That's what they did.

They saw something that they didn't like, and they made it better, or they changed it.

And that's why they are saints.

Because they loved us so much, they thought that things could be better.

And that's why those dolls inspired so many young people.

Because they realized things can be better.

And things are better.

And when I think that my life is so bad, I have to remember what it really was like in the past.

And that there is hope.

There's hope.

Closing: Stick With Me

So my dear brothers and sisters, today, truly, we realize.

All in all, the lives of the saints means this.

Stick with me.

That's what it means.

Jesus says to people all the time, stick with me.

Stay with me.

Walk with me.

And we'll do great things together.

Amen?

Amen.

God Doesn't Want the Best Version of You

 

Starting with the Conclusion

Good morning, everyone.

Well, my dear brothers and sisters, I’m going to start this homily with the conclusion.

Okay?

With the conclusion.

Because I tried to give this homily yesterday and it didn’t go good.

Didn’t go well.

So, the conclusion.

God loves us just the way we are, but he loves us even more than that.

God loves us just the way we are, but he loves us even more than that.

And so he pushes us, he challenges us, so that we can not be the best version of ourselves, no, but to be another Christ, to be like his son, to be more like Christ who is honorable, virtuous, loyal, faithful, loving, compassionate, kind, merciful, generous, and not necessarily glitzy or showy or popular or good-looking or adventurous or romantic.

And this is the good news.

What God loves in us, what God wants from us, is the same thing that everybody wants from us and that everybody would love from us.

That’s the good news.

And you can be confident that having that loyalty, that honor, that virtue, that love, those values, those morals have a place in this world.

And if God loves them, you can be sure other people will love them.

Okay, that’s the conclusion.

A Wedding Story and the Temptation of Self-Doubt

Yesterday, I did a wedding, and this is one of those that I will never forget, because when I met this couple, their first date was just amazing.

So they met, they had their first date in 2021, and they went to the Blue Goose Cantina.

Blue Goose Cantina.

And he arrived before she did, and he told me that I was waiting for her, she arrived.

I said, this must be her.

I saw her, she saw me, and as soon as she saw me, she turned around and left.

Can you believe that?

I mean, just imagine, right?

Imagine, just like you’re, you know.

So, of course, what’s the first thing he thinks?

The first thing that he thinks that we all think, especially teenagers, what’s wrong with me?

Because every teenager thinks that they’re not the best looking or the most beautiful person, every teenager, and every adult.

We’re the worst critics of ourselves.

You know, we can’t imagine someone loving us so much that they want to spend their life with us.

We can imagine someone saying, you’re not that good.

We can imagine people dumping us.

We can’t imagine people wanting to be with us.

So, of course, that’s the first thing, right?

That temptation that I’m not good or I’m not good enough.

And that’s what he thought, it was obvious.

She turns around.

Of course, it could never have been the Blue Goose Cantina, ugh, forget it.

Could never be the place, right?

This is a true story.

Of course, that never entered his mind, that it was the Blue Goose Cantina.

Or, well, what’s wrong with her?

What’s wrong with her?

It’s always what’s wrong with me.

Can’t be what’s wrong with this person.

Do you want to be with a person that only cares about your looks?

Or only cares about, you know, you sweeping them off their feet or whatever?

Is that, is that what you’re looking for in your life?

So, well, it turned out that she turned around to go back to her car so that she could get her mask because it was 2021.

He was wearing a mask and she didn’t have her mask.

She left it in the car.

That was it.

But in that short period of time, all these things are going on in his brain.

And then here they are.

They end up falling in love and being with each other.

And so this is something that we have to be very careful of.

And that we put it in its proper place.

It’s not about glitz.

With God, it’s not about glitz.

It’s not about popularity.

It’s not about looking great or, you know, being rich.

None of that.

The First Reading: How We Treat the Downtrodden

In fact, in the first reading from the book of Exodus, you shall not molest or oppress the alien.

In other words, the downtrodden.

The one that’s going through tough times.

You’re not going to oppress them.

For you were once aliens yourself.

In other words, you could be in that same situation so easily.

And you shall not wrong the widow or the orphan.

And if you do, I will kill you.

That’s what he says.

And God is not talking figuratively like a mother.

I’ll kill you if you go out there, right?

No, this is like, I will be so upset with you that I will kill you.

Can you imagine?

Like, what is God saying?

This is important to me.

This is important to me.

How you treat your brothers and your sisters is important to me.

Especially those who are going through tough times.

How you treat them is important to me.

And if you don’t treat them right, I will kill you.

What We Love in the Lord

I love you, Lord, my strength.

I love you, Lord, my strength.

What does that mean?

I love you, Lord, my strength.

Is it, what is it that the Lord loves in us?

And what do we love in the Lord?

What do we love in the Lord?

What do we love in the Lord?

We love the Lord because He never breaks His promises.

Never.

Did you ever wonder why the apostles stayed with Jesus after He was beaten and killed, crucified and buried?

Do you ever wonder why did they stay in the upper room waiting for the Lord to appear?

Instead of saying, guys, no, He’s not going to appear.

Why did they stay there?

Because Jesus never broke a promise.

Never.

No, I am staying here for three days until He shows up because that’s what He said He was going to do.

And we love the Lord and they love the Lord because He never broke His promises.

And if you’re married, no, let’s not, we won’t go there, we won’t go there.

If you’re dating, if you’re dating someone and they can’t keep their promises, that’s a sure sign.

It’s time to say goodbye.

Keeping your promise is what we all want.

Someone that tells us the truth is what we all want.

Honesty, integrity, loyalty, fidelity.

The Second Reading: Be Imitators

Be imitators in the second reading from St. Paul Thessalonians.

You know what sort of people we were among you for your sake and you became imitators of us.

These Thessalonians, I don’t know if they were rich, they were poor, they were popular, they’re famous, they were nobodies, they were somebody, but no matter what happened, when the disciples began to preach to them, they began to imitate them in their piety, in their prayer life, in the way they dressed, in the way they presented themselves, and they liked it.

It didn’t become weird anymore.

You don’t have, but this is the thing, you don’t have to look like, what’s the word?

You don’t have to look, you can look stylish, you can look beautiful, you can look elegant, but it shouldn’t be that what defines you.

In fact, it’s great to be able to combine the two together.

There’s nothing wrong with wearing a Ralph Lauren polo or driving a Mercedes or a BMW, there’s nothing wrong, but integrity, honesty, loyalty, fidelity, that’s what we all are looking for in our life.

And whatever the disciples were doing at the beginning, people wanted to imitate them.

So don’t be afraid if you’re the only one praying before your meal in high school or in college or at work, be imitators of us, be imitators of the Lord.

The Greatest Commandment: Balance

Teacher, what is the greatest commandment?

And this, I mean, I’ve been reading this this whole week, and then when the deacon read it, boom, it dawned on me something new.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind.

Okay, why all this?

Why doesn’t he just say you’ll love your Lord the Lord with all your life?

Well, because he wants to make it clear.

I’m not looking for an intellectual faith.

I’m not looking that you can be the wisest person, the most beautiful orator.

I’m not looking for that.

And I’m not looking for that you’re just a heart, all heart, romantic, sweep me off the feet, tell me you love me, right?

Make me feel loved.

All this romantic, no.

Mind, muscle, heart, soul, everything.

In other words, balance.

Balance it.

Balance it.

Ulysses Grant and Julia

There’s this beautiful, there’s this beautiful, do I have my phone?

There’s this beautiful letter.

You know, I told you I’ve been reading the book on Grant.

Ulysses S. Grant, 1,000 pages.

I’m at page 503, 503.

But there’s this beautiful letter.

So Grant, Ulysses S. Grant, commander, general, he’s becoming world famous.

Like he’s becoming popular.

Everybody loves him.

Everybody thinks he’s the greatest.

His wife, Julia, she has cross eyes.

So his wife is cross-eyed.

In fact, every portrait she ever took in her life was always sideways so that you could never see that her eyes were crossed.

She wasn’t the most beautiful woman, physically speaking.

Even her sister says it.

But then one day she writes to her husband and says, I heard about a procedure.

Imagine, 1860s.

Imagine what procedure.

Imagine.

I heard of a procedure that might be able to fix my eyes.

Because she says, because he says, she said, you’re becoming a great man and I’m such a plain little wife.

And he replied, what in the world would put such a thought in your head, Julia?

Why are you getting, and she writes, why are you getting to be such a great man and I’m such a plain woman?

I thought if my eyes were like others, I might not be so very plain.

And then he wrote, did I not see you and fall in love with you because of those same eyes?

I like them just as they are.

And now remember, you are not to interfere with them, they are mine.

And let me tell you, Mrs. Grant, you had better not make any experiments as I might not like you half so well with the other eyes.

And I never did, I never did it.

A man of loyalty, of conviction.

What God Values

So my dear brothers and sisters, what is it that God values in us that we imitate his son in being honorable, loyal, faithful, compassionate, generous, giving?

And that will win out in the end because what God values, people value.

Amen?