Father Nick Blaha Homily Cast

Delivered at Christ the King Church, Kansas City, KS

I forgot to acknowledge the wonderful essay by Tom Hoopes of Benedictine College for most of the content for this homily. View it here:

https://media.benedictine.edu/this-sunday-forgiveness-is-hard-correction-is-harder-one-thing-is-needed?utm_medium=email&_hsmi=273424581&utm_content=273424581&utm_source=hs_email

Noble no es el alma que nada hiere, sino la que pronto sana.

--Don Colacho

The C.S. Lewis "Doodle" can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtTeCyrgjIQ

"The more I buy, the more I'm bought / and the more I'm bought, the less I cost"

--Joe Pug, "Hymn #109"

Pope Saint John Paul II, born Karol Wojtyla, was above all a preacher of God's Word. Much of his priesthood, episcopacy, and papacy was dedicated to opening the Scriptures so that they could bring life to the faithful. His formulation of the Law of the Gift offers us the chance to consider the ways in which we approach life as a game to be played rather than a gift to be shared, and to be converted to the full truth of the Gospel.

“Jesus wants me to tell you again, especially in this Holy Week, how much is the love He has for each one of you – beyond all you can imagine.  I worry some of you still have not really met Jesus – one to one – you and Jesus alone. We may spend time in chapel – but have you seen with eyes of your soul how He looks at you with love?  Do you really know the living Jesus – not from books but from being with Him in your heart?  Have you heard the loving words He speaks to you?  Ask for the grace, He is longing simply to give it.  Until you can hear Jesus in the silence of your own heart, you will not be able to hear Him saying ‘I Thirst’ in the hearts of the poor.  Never give up this intimate contact with Jesus as a real living person – not just an idea.  How can we last even one day living our life without hearing Jesus say ‘I love you’ – impossible.  Our soul needs that as much as the body needs to breathe the air.  If not, prayer is dead – meditation only thinking.”

--Mother Teresa, "Varanasi Letter"

Delivered at Most Pure Heart of Mary Catholic Church, Topeka, KS

9 June 2023

Congratulations and prayers to Mr. and Mrs. Gentry

First, thank you for your prayers for the principal search. I am pleased to announce we have hired a principal for the coming school year, Alex Weibel. Read about it at https://telegra.ph/Welcome-Alex-Weibel-as-Principal-of-Christ-the-King-School-05-20

Early in the morning on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalen went to the tomb, and found the stone moved away from the tomb door. So she came running to Simon Peter, and that other disciple, whom Jesus loved; They have carried the Lord away from the tomb, she said to them, and we cannot tell where they have taken him... The disciples went back home; but Mary stood without before the tomb, weeping. And she bent down, still weeping, and looked into the tomb; and saw two angels clothed in white sitting there, one at the head, and the other at the feet, where the body of Jesus had lain. They said to her, Woman, why art thou weeping? Because they have carried away my Lord, she said, and I cannot tell where they have taken him. Saying this, she turned round, and saw Jesus standing there, without knowing that it was Jesus. Woman, Jesus said to her, why art thou weeping? For whom art thou searching? She supposed that it must be the gardener, and said to him, If it is thou, Sir, that hast carried him off, tell me where thou hast put him, and I will take him away. Jesus said to her, Mary. And she turned and said to him, Rabboni (which is the Hebrew for Master). Then Jesus said, Do not cling to me thus; I have not yet gone up to my Father’s side. Return to my brethren, and tell them this; I am going up to him who is my Father and your Father, who is my God and your God.

John 20:1-2, 10-17

What I need is the meekness by which the prince of this world is destroyed.

-- Saint Ignatius of Antioch

Delivered at Our Lady of Good Counsel Catholic Church, Kansas City, MO

29 April 2023

Congratulations and prayers to Mr. and Mrs. Khadivi

A prayer request: https://ctkclassical.org/employment.html

Jesus Christ still lives upon earth as surely, though in another and what must be called a "mystical" sense, as He lived two thousand years ago. For He has a Body in which He lives, a Voice with which He speaks. As two thousand years ago He assumed one kind of Body by which to accomplish His purposes, so He has assumed now another kind of Body in which to continue them; and that Body consists of a unity of a myriad of cells—each cell a living soul complete in itself—transcending the sum of the cells and yet expressing itself through them. Christianity, then, to the Catholic is not merely an individual matter—though it is that also, as surely as the cell has individual relations with the main life of the body. But it is far more: it is corporate and transcendent. The Catholic does not merely as a self-contained unit suck out grace through this or that sacramental channel; the priest to him is not just a viceregent who represents or may misrepresent his Master; a spiritual life is not merely an individual existence on a spiritual plane. But to the Catholic all things are expanded, enlarged, and supernaturalized by an amazing fact: he is not merely an imitator of Christ or a disciple of Christ, not merely even a lover of Christ; but he is actually a cell of that very Body which is Christ’s, and his life in Christ is, as a matter of fact, so far more real and significant than his individual existence, that he is able to take upon his lips without exaggeration or metaphor the words of St. Paul—“I live—yet it is no longer I what live; it is Christ that liveth in me”; he is able to appreciate as no separatist in religion can appreciate that saying of Christ Himself, that unless a man lose his life, he cannot save it.

--Robert Hugh Benson, The Mystical Body and Its Head

Upon this hil Y fond a tree,

Undir the tree a man sittynge,

From heed to foot woundid was he,

His herte blood Y sigh bledinge:

A semeli man to ben a king,

A graciouse face to loken unto;

I askide whi he had peynynge,

He seide, Quia amore langueo.

I am Truelove that fals was nevere.

My sistyr, Mannis Soule, Y loved hir thus.

Bicause we wolde in no wise discevere,

I lefte my kyngdom glorious.

I purveide for hir a paleis precious;

Sche fleyth; Y folowe. Y soughte hir so,

I suffride this peyne piteuous,

Quia amore langueo.

Delivered at the Good Friday Passion Service, Christ the King Classical School

Delivered at Blessed Sacrament Church

In perfect renunciation lies unlimited fruitfulness. 

--Hans Urs von Balthasar

Dado en la parroquia de Christ the King

The language of theology, properly understood, gives birth to the language of love. 

--N.T. Wright, What Saint Paul Really Said

I pledge to seek the truth
and to love all that is good and beautiful.
I will strive to achieve clarity of thought,
nobility of character, and purity of heart.
Therefore, I will pursue my education with
diligence, humility, and honor, embracing
excellence and renouncing mediocrity.
I will assume responsibility for my actions.
I will treat my peers, my teachers, and
myself with the utmost dignity and respect.
And I will aspire above all to wisdom and
to a life of faith, hope, and charity,
so that I might fulfill my destiny
as a Christ-like Thinker for the Kingdom of God. 

Christ the King Scholars' Pledge

"Our ordinary activities are not an insignificant matter. Rather they are the very hinge on which our sanctity turns, and they offer us constant opportunities of meeting God, and of praising him and glorifying him through our intellectual or manual work."  

--Saint Josemaría Escrivá

As a pastor, I am always open to listening and accepting thoughtful feedback, which I value and need in order for my priestly service to be fruitful. I sincerely wish for there to be a deeper spirit of collaboration with the people of these parishes. I am praying for the grace to respond to what feels like a curse with a blessing. It is hard.

So, as a gesture of good will, I hope that re-forming the CTK Pastoral Council will provide an ongoing forum for this kind of communication and collaboration. More specifics will be shared soon. Please begin praying for its fruitfulness.

During Advent, the priests of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas will be walking through the basic Gospel message. This week focuses on the fourth part of the Gospel: that our response is the obedience of faith, worship, and surrrender.

During Advent, the priests of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas will be walking through the basic Gospel message. This week focuses on the third part of the Gospel: that God has rescued us through the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth.

Este Adviento, los sacerdotes del Arquidiocesis predican sobre el mensaje basico del Evangelio. Hoy, tratamos del tercer paso: Dios nos ha rescatado de la esclavitud y dominio del pecado por la encarnación, la muerte, y la resurrección de Jesús de Nazaret.

During Advent, the priests of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas will be walking through the basic Gospel message. This week focuses on the second part of the Gospel: that we are born on a battlefield and that a spiritual enemy is intent upon our enslavement and degradation. 

"Hell is not to love any more, madame. Not to love any more! That sounds quite ordinary to you. To a human being still alive, it means to love less or love elsewhere. To understand is still a way of loving. But suppose this faculty which seems so inseparably ours, of our very essence, should disappear! Oh, prodigy! To stop loving, to stop understanding—and yet to live. The error common to us all is to invest these damned with something still inherently alive, something of our own inherent mobility, whereas in truth time and movement have ceased for them; they are fixed for ever. Alas, if God’s own hand were to lead us to one of these unhappy things, even if once it had been the dearest of our friends, what could we say to it? Truly, if one of us, if a living man, the vilest, most contemptible of the living, were cast into those burning depths, I should still be ready to share his suffering, I would claim him from his executioner, to share his suffering! The sorrow, the unutterable loss of those charred stones which once were men, is that they have nothing more to be shared." 

—Georges Bernanos, Diary of a Country Priest

During Advent, the priests of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas will be walking through the basic Gospel message. This week focuses on the first part of the Gospel: that we are created, and we were meant to be loved and to love.

“Something I constantly notice is that unembarrassed joy has become rarer. Joy today is increasingly saddled with moral and ideological burdens, so to speak. When someone rejoices, he is afraid of offending against solidarity with the many people who suffer. I don't have any right to rejoice, people think, in a world where there is so much misery, so much injustice.
"I can understand that. There is a moral attitude at work here. But this attitude is nonetheless wrong. The loss of joy does not make the world better - and, conversely, refusing joy for the sake of suffering does not help those who suffer. The contrary is true. The world needs people who discover the good, who rejoice in it and thereby derive the impetus and courage to do good. Joy, then, does not break with solidarity. When it is the right kind of joy, when it is not egotistic, when it comes from the perception of the good, then it wants to communicate itself, and it gets passed on. In this connection, it always strikes me that in the poor neighborhoods of, say, South America, one sees many more laughing happy people than among us. Obviously, despite all their misery, they still have the perception of the good to which they cling and in which they can find encouragement and strength.
"In this sense we have a new need for that primordial trust which ultimately only faith can give. That the world is basically good, that God is there and is good. That it is good to live and to be a human being. This results, then, in the courage to rejoice, which in turn becomes commitment to making sure that other people, too, can rejoice and receive good news.” 

--Pope Benedict XVI

Este Adviento, los sacerdotes del Arquidiocesis predican sobre el mensaje basico del Evangelio. Hoy, tratamos del primer paso: Somos aquí para ser amados y para amar.

Christianity does not solve “problems”; it merely obliges us to live them at a higher level. Those who claim that it does solve them entangle it in the irony of every solution. --Don Colacho

1. El moderno ambiciona reemplazar con objetos que compra lo que otros tiempos esperaban de la cultura metódica de los sentimientos. 

2. El amor utiliza el vocabulario del sexo para escribir un texto ininteligible al sexo solo.

--Don Colacho

Please note: my father never let me drive on the interstate!       

“We sense that the human body is a precious thing, worthy of our reverence. It is not a tool, not an object of consumption like a steak or a keg of beer, not an animate provider of pleasure. It is the outward expression of a profound mystery, that of another human being.”
― Anthony Esolen

Credit to Father Robert Sokolowski for the summary formulation: God plus the world is no greater than God alone.

Delivered at Christ the King Catholic Church

Cuando hombres pequeños hacen sombras largas, se acerca el atardecer.

"We should live in such a way that our lives wouldn't make much sense if the gospel were not true." --Dorothy Day

To learn more about the prisoner whose writings were read in the homily, visit: nguyenvanthuan.com

Delivered at Blessed Sacrament Church 

“Out of every one hundred men, ten shouldn’t even be there, eighty are just targets, nine are the real fighters, and we are lucky to have them, for they make the battle. Ah, but the one, one is a warrior, and he will bring the others back.” 

--The Cynic Epistles

De cada cien hombres, diez ni siquiera deberían estar allí, ochenta son sólo carne de cañón, nueve son los verdaderos luchadores y somos afortunados de tenerlos, pues ellos darán batalla; ah, pero uno, uno es un guerrero; y él traerá de vuelta a los demás.

It’s said that words instruct, but examples inspire us to follow.  Do we not want to see Christians who, in the midst of all the darkness, are still able to stand above it all in clarity, calmness, and confidence, who, in the midst of all the lack of peace and joy, the egoism and hate, still stand there in the purest peace and cheerfulness? 

----Franz Jägerstätter

"All the way [to the guillotine] the Carmelite sisters sang: the 'Miserere,' 'Salve Regina,' and 'Te Deum.' Beholding them, a total silence fell on the racous, brutal crowd, most of them cheapened and hardened by day after day of the spectacle of public slaughter. At the foot of the towering killing machine, their eyes raised to Heaven, the sisters sang 'Veni Creator Spiritus.' Sister Teresa, their prioress, requested and obtained permission to go last under the knife. The youngest, Sister Constance, went first. She climbed the steps of the guillotine 'with the air of a queen going to receive her crown,' singing Laudate Dominum omnes gentes, 'all peoples praise the Lord.' She placed her head in the position for death without allowing the executioner to touch her. Each sister followed her example, those remaining singing likewise with each, until only the prioress was left, holding in her hand a small figure of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The killing of each marter required about two minutes. It was about eight o'clock in the evening, still bright at midsummer. During the whole time the profound silence of the crowd about the guillotine endured unbroken."

eu·ca·​tas·​tro·​phe ˌyü-kə-ˈta-strə-(ˌ)fē 

A sudden and miraculous grace: never to be counted on to recur, a fleeting glimpse of joy, joy beyond the walls of the world, poignant as grief.

Delivered at Our Lady of Most Holy Trinity Chapel on the campus of Thomas Aquinas College, Santa Paula, California

As fire transforms into itself everything it touches, so the Holy Spirit transforms into the divine life whatever is subjected to his power.

Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 1127

There is a much greater distance between the nature of man, or even between the nature of the highest of the angels, and grace, than there is between grace itself and glory. No created nature, however perfect, is the germ of grace, whereas grace is indeed the germ or the seed of eternal life, semen gloriae. Hence when the sinner is absolved in the confessional, an event occurs which is proportionately of greater importance than the entrance of a just soul into heaven.  

--Father Garrigou-Lagrange

"He loved humankind. And that’s why he died as the bridegroom who has gone off to rescue his bride from the robbers’ hands. And they bind him and torture him to death, but he sees his sweetest friend sitting at the table with his executioners, bantering with them and mocking his pain and his loyal love. 

I realized that this mighty love sustains everything in the world—even the fire in Hell. For if God wanted to, He could take our souls by force; then we would be completely powerless in His grasp. But since He loves us the way the bridegroom loves the bride, He will not force her; if she won’t embrace Him willingly, then He must allow her to flee and to shun Him. I have also thought that perhaps no soul is lost for all eternity. For I think every soul must desire this love, but it seems too dearly bought to let go of every other precious possession for the sake of this love alone. When the fire has consumed all other will that is rebellious and hostile to God, than at last the will toward God, even if it was no bigger in a person than one nail in a whole house, shall remain inside the soul, just as the iron remains in a burned-out ruin... 

I was so afraid. For I understood that the torment of God’s love will never end as long as men and maidens are born on this earth, and that He must be afraid of losing their souls—as long as He daily and hourly surrenders his body and his blood on thousands of altars and there are those who reject the sacrifice."

Sigrid Undset, Kristin Lavransdatter

Full text of the homily available at:

https://www.thomasaquinas.edu/news/fr-blahas-homily-baccalaureate-mass-holy-spirit

«La tradición musical de la Iglesia universal constituye un tesoro de valor inestimable que sobresale entre las demás expresiones artísticas, principalmente porque el canto sagrado, unido a las palabras, constituye una parte necesaria o integral de la liturgia solemne.» 

--El Concilio Vaticano Segundo

In the final three paragraphs of the fascinating memoir he wrote while still Prefect of the Congregation, Cardinal Ratzinger explained the significance of the bear: 

According to legend, on his way from Germany to Rome in the early 700s, St. Corbinian’s horse was torn to pieces by a bear. Corbinian reprimanded the bear, loaded onto it the pack the horse had been carrying, and made the bear haul that burden all the way to Rome. Only then did Corbinian release the bear. 

Then Cardinal Ratzinger quotes Psalm 22 (“When my heart was bewildered, I was stupid and ignorant. I was like a dumb beast before You. I am always with You). He tells us that in those very words, St. Augustine spoke of the burdens he carried once he became bishop: 

A draft animal am I before You . . . for You.
And this is precisely how I abide with You. 

How often, continues Cardinal Ratzinger, writing the last paragraphs of his memoir . . . 

did Augustine protest to heaven against all the trifles that continually blocked his path and kept him from the intellectual work he knew to be his deepest calling! But this is where the Psalm helps him avoid  bitterness: ‘Yes, indeed, I am become a draft animal, a beast of burden, an ox — and yet this is just the way in which I abide with You, serving You, just the way in which You keep me in your hand.’ 

And then, years before he became Pope Benedict XVI, Cardinal Ratzinger says: 

The heavily laden bear that took the place of St. Corbinian’s horse, or rather donkey — the bear that became his donkey against its will: is this not an image of what I should do and of what I am?

For God there are only individuals.  

Nicolás Gomez Dávila, Escolios a un Texto Implícito

Para Dios no hay sino individuos.  --Nicolás Gomez Dávila, Escolios a un Texto Implícito: Selección, p. 26.