Tuesday, August 9, 2016

Faith through a stroke story: 19th Sunday of Ordinary Time

Listen to the homily here.

Notes:

This weekend I would like to share two things: faith and my experience of faith after one year of my stroke
·      One year…praise God
·      I still remember an idea from a deacon that visited here: “Your parish love you, and you love them…and together you walk to Jesus”
o   That is a family in our Catholic Church
o   That is what I would like to speak about today
A great verse in Hebrew today:
·      “Faith is the realization of what is hoped for and evidence of things not seen…”
o   Faith = realization…believing…see through our spiritual lives
Faith during this year?
·      Praying
o   In my own heart without words
o   With parishioners here…around our diocese…our state…our country…in the world
o   Faith grows for many people that work together for each member
o   “what is hoped…evidence of things not seen…” to serve
o   Liturgy of the Hours
§  Again, people read it to me…priests, parents, friends, nurses!
o   Rosary
§  A priest prayed it with me because I did not know the prayers “Our Father” or “Hail Mary”
·      Bible
o   Within a few days, I pointed my Mother through the 73 books in the Bible…I started in Genesis, pointed to it and went to Exodus
o   I didn’t know the words or names
o   CD on the Bible
o   Listening from someone reading it to me
o   Beginning to read
·      Sacraments
o   Anointing of the Sick
§  Wasn’t awake for it
§  Anointing on the back of my hands…our hands were ordained on my palms
o   Eucharistic Body
§  Day #6
o   Mass on day #7
§  Fr. Rich told me, “You are a priest, and you will put on your stole on concelebrate Mass”
§  And I didn’t know the words!
o   Confession
§  I couldn’t even say the whole words for my sins!
Your faith must be important…your faith must be important
·      Please…grow in your prayer…in the Bible…in the sacraments of the Body and Blood and confession
·      I share this as my family
·      I share this as a gift that came from God to us which I believe calls us to serve our parishes, our school, our diocese, the poor and the sick

Praise God in this last year…very weird, scary but also awesome, powerful, relationships and FAITH

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