Sunday Sermon

What should we do, when we realize that the world we live in is a cess pool? And how do we purify and guard our minds amongst such wickedness?

Let us at once and in good earnest return to God. He has long and often sought after us. He has often spoken to our hearts; often reproached our ingratitude, and shown us His judgments. There is not a path in which He has not pursued us, not a truth which He has not pressed upon us. In short, He has employed every artifice and expedient to win our hearts, and to attract us to His service -- love, kindness, the joys of Heaven, the punishments of Hell, the instability of human life, etc. Let us then remember well those words of the Holy Ghost -- Put not off from day to day. Even tomorrow, for aught we know, may be too late.

Today the Lord teaches us a manifold lesson regarding sight, both physical and spiritual. Just as our eyes must be rightly working in order for us to see physical things as they are, so also must our mind be rightly working in order for our soul to see spiritual things as they are. We must see rightly if we are to act rightly. For one can not serve two masters, and one must see clearly if one is to follow the True Master, God Himself.

THE FRUIT OF ANGER: As I like to say, there is nothing necessarily wrong with anger or being angry. We all get angry at times. Sometimes rightly and sometimes wrongly, though. But anger in and of itself is simply an emotion and we all have emotions. But it is typically what we do with the anger that gets us into trouble.

You may be asking, "What in the world does Baptism and Ice Cream have to do with each other?" Let me tell you.......

When is the right time to come unto Christ and to follow Him? Now! This Second Sunday after Pentecost, we turn our eyes and our ears to our Lord's call to repentance and belief in the Gospel, for this is the vocation of every Christian soul. Our Lord's call is heard by the humble fishermen of Galilee who do not hesitate to heed the invitation of our Lord: Come, follow me! In following Christ, they left behind all in order to find all. Our Lord likewise instructs and calls each of us today. Are we ready to act as the Apostles did?

"God has promised forgiveness to your repentance, but He has not promised tomorrow to your procrastination."-Saint Augustine

We look up to a whole host of people but the only person that truly matters is Our Blessed Saviour. It is Jesus Who came to die for us. It is Jesus Who came to save us from our sins. It is Jesus Who defeated death so that you and I could have everlasting life with Him.

Communicating with words is one of the distinguishing marks of human existence. Like so many aspects of human life, however, communication is a gift from God that can be abused. Whether our tongue is used for cursing others or cussin’ others, we must guard against such abuse.

Today we celebrate the memory of All Saints, both those who are known to us, and those who are known only to God. There have been saints at all times, and they have come from every corner of the earth. They were Apostles, Martyrs, Prophets, Hierarchs, Monastics, and Righteous, yet all were perfected by the same Holy Spirit.

People want "comfort foods." People want "comfortable surroundings." We need "comfortable beds which we will cover with our comforters." We need to feel "comfortable with the people around us." But when Our Lord was speaking of sending a "Comforter," this term is misleading to our modern ears. He is speaking of sending us a helper who will strengthen us . . . who will give us strength. Simply put, Our Lord is speaking of the Holy Ghost.

I’m suggesting to you that there is a direct line backwards from this time in history to A. D. 33 and from Rome to Jerusalem. Pentecost is the birthday of the Church. In that sense what happened on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2 is an unrepeatable event in exactly the same sense that your birthday is unrepeatable. But just as there is the resemblance, however faint, between the way you looked when you were born and the way you look now, there is a resemblance between the Church of today and the Church that was founded on the day of Pentecost. I’m suggesting to you that the true Pentecostal Church is not necessarily the church with the name Pentecostal in its title. The true Pentecostal Church is the one which reflects the marks of the Church which was born that day. That’s why the lessons of Pentecost are lessons for us today

The great feast of Pentecost is not simply the celebration of an event which took place two millennia ago. It is the celebration of what must happen and what does happen to us in the Church today.

The Holy Ghost really comes to the soul that receives sanctifying grace, and abides therein as long as that soul keeps itself in grace. This truth is founded on the words of St. Paul: “The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, who is given to us” (Romans 5: 5);

Sermon given by Fr. Todd based on the Gospel appointed for the Feast of the Ascension coming to us from the Twenty-Fourth Chapter of the Gospel of St. Luke.

"You shall be witnesses unto Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and even to the uttermost part of the earth." On the Sunday after the Ascension of our Lord, we make the remembrance of the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council. This day we commemorate the 318 God-bearing Fathers who gathered in Nicaea in the year 325, to address the heresy of Arianism as well as other grave issues that concerned the Church. The bishops of the Church, with one mouth and one voice, declared the truth of the faith handed down to the Church from the Apostles. They declared that the Son and Word of God is one in essence with the Father, true God of true God. The Fathers composed the holy symbol of Faith, the Nicene Creed.

"And Mary said: Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it done to me according to thy word." (Luke 1:38) How many of us accept God's will as readily as the Blessed Virgin Mary did over two millenia ago? What we need to remember is that all authority, including secular authority comes from Almighty God. The United States is founded on the proposition that the people give the government authority, but this is not Christian and not Biblical.

Peter did not press his way into the inner circle around the fire, and sit there; but he stood, and leaned forward just to warm his hands, and then it was that this woman, noticing how restless he had been, came up with a companion of hers, and, looking at him, began to say to the other woman, “I know that he is one of them, I am sure that he is”; and then, she and the other both broke out saying, “You were with him; we are sure you were with him”; and the men joined in the cry, perhaps most of them said, “Oh, yes! he is one of them”; and then Peter “denied with an oath, I do not know the man.” Oh, how dreadful for him to call Christ “the man,” when he had boldly declared that he was the Son of God! What a terrible fall this was!

There are a lot of people who could explain the Christian faith and they could go on and on and on about it, but the really important question is: Can they live the Christian faith and not just talk about it?

Novena to the Holy Spirit Friday after Ascension Thursday -- Saturday, the Vigil of Pentecost This is the prototype of all novenas. It commemorates the nine days between the Ascension of Our Lord and the descent of the Holy Spirit on the first Pentecost Sunday. During this time Our Lady and the twelve Apostles prayed in the upper room for the coming of the Paraclete.