Homilia - Triens Dies Solis Adventus

St. Jose Maria Escriva

Amici, Americani et Compatriotae,

This past Sunday - the Third Sunday in Advent - Fr. Kirby gave an excellent homily on St. Jose Maria Escriva at Our Lady of Grace. The liturgical readings may be found here:

Third Sunday of Advent Lectionary: 8

And a 12+ minute audio recording may be found here:

Homily - Our Lady of Grace - December 17, 2017

The sermon was excellent and covered the following points:

• Martyrdom and the Communion of the Saints
• The Spanish Civil War and Communism
• Holiness

Our Lady of Grace has received a First Class Relic of St. Jose Maria Escriva, hence Fr. Kirby's homily. This opened an opportunity to explain how the Church certifies and distributes relics, how great men of old were martyred for their beliefs and the importance of the Communion of the Saints. Protestantism misses much of this, ignoring to its peril Hebrews 12:1-2:

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us and persevere in running the race that lies before us while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith. For the sake of the joy that lay before him he endured the cross, despising its shame, and has taken his seat at the right of the throne of God."

Interestingly on the previous Thursday night  I attended a Protestant Bible Study with my wife, and while the faith chapter of Hebrews 11 was duly emphasized, the phrase at the beginning of chapter 12 was ignored:  "We are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses." Strangely Protestants erroneously believe that the Saints being dead have no current function or purpose. But as Fr. Kirby pointed out, this was not the faith of the Church since the beginning. The Tradition of that great cloud of witnesses was preserved and gave us at the Councils of Carthage and Rome in the late 4th century AD our Bible. There was no true Bible before that - just the Greek Septuagint as the Old Testament and different collections of books from the Gospel writers and St. Paul. Individual churches accepted some of these, added others like the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas, and rejected other like Hebrews, Jude and Revelation. But finally the Church Herself using the living Tradition of the great cloud of witnesses who went before us finally determined the authentic Canon of Sacred Scripture well after the Gospels and Letters in our New Testament had been written. Indeed, I got to explain this to a Baptist co-worker today who had never seen a Catholic Bible until I let her borrow one of my extra ones. She was amazed that such books as Sirach and Wisdom in the Deuterocanonicals (or Apocrypha as Protestants call them) had been rejected by the Protestants in the 16th century regardless that the undivided Church had accepted them for over a thousand years.

Fr. Kirby went on to describe St. Jose Maria Escriva's ministry which took place during the Spanish Civil War. Communists under the disguise of Republicans fought against Nationalists who were mainly Catholic. These communists murdered Catholics - clergy and laity without regard. This lasted from 1936 to 1939. While we may have objections to the style of government which arose under Francisco Franco as the Republicans were defeated, we must remember that the communists in Spain did what their Soviet brethren had done in Russia in the early part of the 20th century. Under communism more than 20 million people were murdered in the last century. Today snowflake airhead millennials cry about how communism will bring about social justice and serve the common good. But as Fr. Kirby explained, this is a lie from Lucifer himself. Communism is evil and must be eradicated from the face of the Earth. Pope Pius XI issued an encyclical against communism called Divini Redemptoris and Pope Paul XII issued a decree against it as a Papal Bull. One cannot be Catholic and be a communist, period.

The last thing that Fr. Kirby discussed was holiness - how holiness isn't just for the clergy but for all of us. As Hebrews 12:14 says:

"Strive for peace with everyone, and for that holiness without which no one will see the Lord." And 1st Peter 1:14-16 says:

"Like obedient children, do not act in compliance with the desires of your former ignorance but, as he who called you is holy, be holy yourselves in every aspect of your conduct, for it is written, 'Be holy because I [am] holy.'"

Considering that on Monday next week we celebrate the Birth of our Savior, Lord and King, it would do well for all of us to strive for holiness, for the alternative to not seeing God once we die is unacceptable.

Benedictus Dominus Deus Israel

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

Today's Scripture readings for the Saturday in the Fourth Week of Advent have so much to unpack:

• Nathan's Admonition to David about the Temple in 2nd Samuel 7:1-6
• The Psalmist on the Davidic Covenant in Psalm 89:2-29
• The Canticle of Zechariah on the Birth of John the Baptist in Luke 1:67-79

ASIDE: Having read the notes in the Navarre Study Bible for each of these Scripture passages, I highly recommend the acquisition of such a study bible. It is expensive but well worth every penny.

Due to time and space limitations, I cannot repeat here everything I learned this morning. But one important thing did occur to me. King David wanted to build a Temple of marble and gold to replace the Tent of the Meeting which the Hebrews used for their worship in the Exodus from Egypt, and to house the Ark of the Old Covenant.

The Mosaic Tabernacle Tent
ESV Study Bible

The Mosaic Tabernacle and Court
ESV Study Bible

Nathan told David, "Thus says the LORD: Should you build me a house to dwell in?" While David's immediate son Solomon did build a Temple, the house in which the Lord would dwell would not be in a physical building made by man, but in the hearts of the Believers comprising the Body of Christ, the Una Sancta Catholica et Apostolica Ecclesia.

King Solomon's Temple
ESV Study Bible

Canticle of Zechariah in Greek

Thus Zechariah declares the following about his son:

You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High,
for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way,
to give his people knowledge of salvation
by the forgiveness of their sins.
In the tender compassion of our God
the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death,
and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

That dawn is shown in Revelation 12:1 in the Ark of the New Covenant:

A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.

Virgo Maria Regina Caeli

John the Baptist was the forerunner of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, and from Him came the Church - the Body of Believers - in whom the Lord dwells. Thus is fulfilled 2nd Samuel 7:16:

Your house and your Kingdom shall endure forever before me;
your throne shall stand firm forever

Yahweh Est Gratiosus

Birth of John the Baptist

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

There is no daily Mass today at Our Lady of Grace, however, I do have a few thoughts on today's Scripture readings for the Friday in the Fourth Week of Advent. The readings include the following:

• The Prophecy of Malachi concerning John the Baptist in Malachi 3:1-4, 23-24
• The Praise of the Psalmist in Redemption Being Near at Hand in Psalms 25
• The Birth of John the Baptist in Luke 1:57-66

As the reader can see, these passages all related to John the Baptist. And the name John is noteworthy in the context of this Advent season. In Latin it is Ioannes and in Greek Ιωαννης. The name derives from the Hebrew יוֹחָנָן or Yochanan meaning Yahweh is gracious, hence the title of this blog post. This then is a continuation of the theme of grace - Mary full of grace (Luke 1:28) and Hannah or Grace, the mother of Samuel in 1st Samuel 1.

Marriage and Divorce
NIV Archaeological Study Bible

Now on a different tangent, I have never liked the practice of seeing readings taken out of the context in which they were written, or divided up with important text between verses being deleted. Thus, for that reason I reviewed the text in Malachi chapter 2 immediately preceding today's Old Testament reading. Imagine therefore my surprise when I read in verses 10 through 17 what the prophet Malachi wrote, then considering it in light of what John the Baptist told King Herod regarding the sanctity of marriage:

10 Have we not all one father?
Has not one God created us?
Why, then, do we break faith with each other,
profaning the covenant of our ancestors?
11 Judah has broken faith; an abominable thing
has been done in Israel and in Jerusalem.
Judah has profaned the LORD’s holy place, which he loves,
and has married a daughter of a foreign god.
12 May the LORD cut off from the man who does this
both witness and advocate from the tents of Jacob,
and anyone to bring an offering to the LORD of hosts!
13 This also you do: the altar of the LORD you cover
with tears, weeping, and groaning,
Because the Lord no longer takes note of your offering
or accepts it favorably from your hand.
14 And you say, “Why?”—
Because the LORD is witness
between you and the wife of your youth
With whom you have broken faith,
though she is your companion, your covenanted wife.
15 Did he not make them one, with flesh and spirit?
And what does the One require? Godly offspring!
You should be on guard, then, for your life,
and do not break faith with the wife of your youth.
16 For I hate divorce,
says the LORD, the God of Israel,
And the one who covers his garment with violence,
says the LORD of hosts.
You should be on guard, then, for your life,
and you must not break faith.
17 You have wearied the LORD with your words,
yet you say, “How have we wearied him?”
By saying, “All evildoers
are good in the sight of the LORD,
And he is pleased with them,”
or “Where is the just God?”

Marriage and Divorce
NIV New Interpreter's Study Bible

Immediately following this admonition in marriage comes the prophecy in verse 1 of chapter 3, "Now I am sending my messenger—he will prepare the way before me." And what message did that messenger proclaim? Matthew 14:3-4 tells us:

Now Herod had arrested John, bound [him], and put him in prison on account of Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip, for John had said to him, “It is not lawful for you to have her.”

Herodias had apparently divorced (or had been divorced by) Philip who was Herod's half-brother, and then married Herod, Leviticus 18:16 forbade that with these words:

You shall not have intercourse with your brother’s wife; that would be a disgrace to your brother.

Because John the Baptist upheld the never changing principle of the sanctity of marriage (a principle reiterated and clarified by Christ Himself in Matthew 19:1-12), he was imprisoned and then eventually beheaded. Salome, the daughter of Herodias, brought his decapitated head into the party being held by Herod for inspection by Herodias. To this day that reminds me of what happened to another man who dared to tell the truth in public.

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Back around 43 BC or so Gaius Octavius (later Augustus Caesar), Marcus Antonius and Marcus Aemilius Lepidus formed the Second Triumvirate in the wake of the assassination of Gaius Iulius Caesar. Rome's most famous statesman, Marcus Tullius Cicero, spoke against the dictatorship which Second Triumvirate threatened to establish. He wrote 14 Philippics in defense of the Res Publica. Because he dared to oppose tyranny, he too was decapitated like his spiritual successor John the Baptist. Luvia, the wife of Marcus Antonius is reputed to have taken his head, extracting the tongue and repeatedly stabbing it with needles. Only her spiritual successor Herodias some 70 years later would be as vicious as she.

The point in all this is clear: grace isn't always "luvy duvy, peace 'n flowers, common good and social justice." Sometimes grace demands that men be manly and stand up against evil women (Luvia and Herodias) who eschew the example of Our Lady of Grace. That is what Cicero did, and that is what John the Baptist did. The Lord is gracious, but beware because His grace demands obedience. In the case of Malachi and John the Baptist, it demanded obedience to the principle of the sanctity of marriage.

Gratia et Arca Veti Testamenti

Hannah, Samuel and Eli the Priest

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

During daily Mass at Our Lady of Grace today I learned two new things, (a) the meaning of the name Hannah and (b) the end of the Ark of the Old Covenant. Fr. Kirby (whom Gov Nikki Halley has just awarded the Order of the Palmetto - congratulations!) gave the homily for the Thursday in the 4th Week of Advent whose readings included:

• The Account of Hannah Presenting Samuel to Eli in 1st Samuel 1:24-28
• Hannah's Song of Rejoicing in 2nd Samuel 2:1-8
• Mary's Magnificat in Luke 1:46-56

HANNAH MEANING GRACE

Hannah (meaning grace) was one of two wives, the other being Peninnah (meaning jewel), of a man named Elkanah (meaning God has possessed or God has created). These names are significant because of their relation to what would happen a little over a millennium later. Peninnah had many sons and daughter but Hannah had none. In those days it was a mark of shame not to have children (so unlike today). Even though Elkanah would give a double portion of the sacrifices to Hannah, nothing would console her grief except a child. So she prayed silently at Shiloh one day and Eli the priest saw her. Initially he suspected her drunk from seeing her lips move with no sound, but she explained to him the desire of her heart and he said to her in 1st Samuel 1:17, "Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant you what you have requested." And Scripture says in verse 19, "When they returned Elkanah had intercourse with his wife Hannah, and the LORD remembered her." Samuel (meaning heard of God) was then born, and after he was weened, she brought him to Eli in dedication to the Lord. It is significant that God created (Elkanah) through Grace (Hannah) the boy child Samuel just as some 1105 years later the Holy Spirit (God) would overshadow the Blessed Virgin Mary (Our Lady of Grace) so that she would conceive the Christ Child (truly heard of God, hence the name Samuel) within her womb. And truly Hannah's song of rejoicing presages Mary's Magnificat in the Gospel of St. Luke.

FATE OF THE ARK OF THE OLD COVENANT

One of the things which has always puzzled Biblical archaeologists and others is the eventual fate of the Old Covenant. But first we have to understand what replaced that Ark. Fr. Kirby explained that just as Mary pregnant with Jesus went to visit Elizabeth in the hill country of Judea for three months, so did a similar thing happen to the Old Ark of the Covenant. 2nd Samuel 6 gives the account of the return of the Ark of the Old Covenant to Jerusalem by King David. Some interesting parallels exist here:

• The Ark of the Old Covenant was holy, being filled with the presence of God, such that Uzzah reached out his hand to steady the ox cart by which it was being transported, God struck him dead on the spot.
• The Ark of the Old Covenant then remained at the House of Obed-edom in the hill country of Judah for three months.
• David the King danced before the Ark of the Old Covenant on its eventual return to Jerusalem.

In the same Mary is the Ark of the New Covenant:

• Mary was filled with the Christ Child, God Himself, and as such could not be touched by mortal man, hence her perpetual virginity.
• Mary made haste to stay with her cousin Elizabeth in the hill country of Judah for three months.
• John the Baptist leaped - danced - within the womb of Elizabeth upon being in the presence of Mary and Jesus within her womb.

The parallels are very clear. Indeed, Hebrews 9:4 tells us what was within the Ark of the Old Covenant: "...the manna, the staff of Aaron that had sprouted, and the tablets of the covenant." Those things also were within Mary:

• Jesus the Bread of Life - the Manna
• Jesus the High Priest - the staff of Aaron
• Jesus the Fulfillment of the Law - the Tablets of the Covenant

So to make way for the Ark of the New Covenant, what happened to the old Ark? Fr. Kirby said that it was destroyed in the final Babylonian attack against Jerusalem in 2nd Chronicles 36:15-21. However, 2nd Maccabees 2:5-8 says the following:

When Jeremiah arrived there, he found a chamber in a cave in which he put the tent, the ark, and the altar of incense; then he sealed the entrance. Some of those who followed him came up intending to mark the path, but they could not find it. When Jeremiah heard of this, he reproved them: “The place is to remain unknown until God gathers his people together again and shows them mercy. Then the Lord will disclose these things, and the glory of the Lord and the cloud will be seen, just as they appeared in the time of Moses and of Solomon when he prayed that the place might be greatly sanctified.”

So after Mass I asked Fr. Kirby what might actually have happened: did the Babylonians find the hiding spot and destroy the Ark? He explained what Ezekiel 9:3 and Ezekiel 10 indicate: that the Glory of the Lord departed from above the mercy seat, from between the Cherubim on the Ark of the Old Covenant because of the idolatry being committed in the Temple, and then finally left the Temple itself and all Jerusalem as the Babylonians came in to finally level the city. Without the Glory of the Lord there was no Ark. For all intents and purposes it was destroyed at that point. This had to be done in order to make way for the Ark of the New Covenant, for God's final Pact with Mankind - the promise of Grace, hence the name Hannah.

Vocabit Nomen Eius Emmanuel

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

The title of this post is taken from the end of verse 14 in Isaiah chapter 7 where the Lord through Isaiah the prophet tells King Ahaz of Judah to ask for a sign, and Ahaz in false piety refuses to "tempt the Lord," whereupon Isaiah prophesies the following in verses 14, 15 and 16:

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign; the young woman, pregnant and about to bear a son, shall name him Emmanuel. Curds and honey he will eat so that he may learn to reject evil and choose good; for before the child learns to reject evil and choose good, the land of those two kings whom you dread shall be deserted.

Isaiah 7:10-14 was the Old Testament reading for Tuesday within the Fourth Week of Advent. I have often disliked how certain Biblical readings are cut off without giving a fuller picture of the entire story of King Ahaz and the prophet Isaiah, so I did some subsequent research into the following related passages of Sacred Scripture:

• The Reign of Ahaz over Judah in 2nd Kings 16
• The Misdeeds and Punishment of Ahaz in 2nd Chronicles 28

Assyrian Empire

The period of time in which Isaiah's prophecy is given is during the time of the Divided Kingdom where 10 of the 12 Tribes form the Northern Kingdom of Israel whose capital is Samaria, and 2 form the southern Kingdom of Judah. Apostasy and the murder of babies filled both kingdoms. Indeed, 2nd Chronicles 28:3 records the following:

Moreover, he [Ahaz] offered sacrifice in the Valley of Ben-hinnom, and immolated his children by fire in accordance with the abominable practices of the nations whom the LORD had dispossessed before the Israelites.

Digression: This is prophetic of today's wicked and adulterous generation in these United States where more than 55 million children since the Roe v Wade decision in SCOTUS in 1973 have been butchered by the ax of the abortionist for the convenience of sexual intercourse without the consequence of child rearing.

During this period of time the Middle East was divided into:

• Egypt under the Pharaohs in the south
• The Southern Kingdom of Judah under Ahaz in Jerusalem
• The Northern Kingdom of Israel (also called Ephraim) under Pekah in Samaria
• Syria (also called Aram - hence the Aramaic language) under Rezin in Damascus
• Assyria stretching across northern Mesopotamia under Tiglath-Pileser III

Syro-Ephraimite War

Pekah and Rezin had formed an alliance against Assyria. Ahaz opposed that alliance. Pekah and Rezin feared a two-prong conflict between Judah to the south and Assyria to the north and east, so they tried to preemptively conquer Judah and replace Ahaz with a puppet king, but that effort failed. Ahaz obviously feared for his kingdom (and his life), so the prophet Isaiah came to him and said in Isaiah 7:9 (right before the prophecy about Emmanuel):

The head of Ephraim is Samaria,
and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah.
Within sixty-five years,
Ephraim shall be crushed, no longer a nation.
Unless your faith is firm,
you shall not be firm!

Note the last part of verse 9 and the forgiveness in the heart of God for the wickedness that Ahaz had done: "Unless you faith is firm, you shall not be firm." Then in verse 11 God tells Ahaz to ask for a sign and Ahaz refuses. Why? Because (as the reader will learn from reading the corresponding passages in 2nd Kings 16 and 2nd Chronicles 28), Ahaz intends to ally himself with Assyria instead of relying on the Lord. Nevertheless, the Lord gives a sign, that of a virgin who will bear a son to be named "God with us."  Isaiah goes on the prophecy in chapter 7 that while Jerusalem herself will be saved, because of Ahaz's lack of faith the surrounding countryside will be leveled, rendering agriculture impossible and leaving only cattle for milk and curds, and bees for honey. Furthermore, the machinations of Israel the Northern Kingdom came to naught, for 2nd Kings 17 records that during the reign of evil Hoseah the people living there were deported and the Northern Kingdom came to an end. In the meantime, Hezekiah succeeded Ahaz in Judah the Southern Kingdom, fulfilling on an immediate basis the prophecy that a young women would given birth to a child named, "God with us," for 2nd Chronicles 29:2 records:

He [Hezekiah] did what was right in the LORD’s sight, just as David his father had done.

And then a little more than 700 years later we would see the ultimately fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy in Matthew 1:22-23:

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet:
"Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son,
and they shall name him Emmanuel,"
which means "God is with us."

I like the manner in which the Latin Vulgate translates the last part of Isaiah 7:9: "Si non credideritis, non permanebitis." "If you have not believed, you will not endure." Neither the Northern Kingdom nor the Southern Kingdom endured. The inhabitants of the former were deported into captivity of Assyria and of the later by Babylon because both had fallen into unbelief and apostasy. Yet the promise of the Christ Child remained in spite of man's rebellion.

Gratia Praeveniens

The Visitation

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

Today I learned something new (at least to me) at Daily Mass which I have been able to attend while on Christmas vacation. First, the readings for Wednesday in the Fourth Sunday of Advent include the account of the Visitation in Luke 1:39-45:

Mary set out in those days
and traveled to the hill country in haste
to a town of Judah,
where she entered the house of Zechariah
and greeted Elizabeth.
When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting,
the infant leaped in her womb,
and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit,
cried out in a loud voice and said,
“Most blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb.
And how does this happen to me,
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears,
the infant in my womb leaped for joy.
Blessed are you who believed
that what was spoken to you by the Lord
would be fulfilled.”

Father Kirby at Our Lady of Grace discussed three important observations that he saw in this passage of Sacred Scripture:

1. Mary made haste to the Judean countryside, for Mary's visit with Elizabeth occurs immediately after Mary declared to the Angel Gabriel in the account of the Annunciation in Luke 1:38, "Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word." There was no delay to share the Good News (Evangelium) with her cousin Elizabeth.
2. Elizabeth who is elder to Mary uncharacteristically greets Mary as her senior with the words, "Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb." In Middle Eastern cultures, particularly at that time in history, it was customary for the younger woman (Mary) to give deference to the elder (Elizabeth), but here we see the opposite happening. Some paintings of this scene even depict Elizabeth bowing before Mary.
3. St. John the Baptist in the womb leaped for joy in the womb of Elizabeth upon the arrival of Jesus in the womb of Mary. This shows us the sanctity of new pre-born life from the start. It also indicates that by prevenient grace John the Baptist was saved from original sin at that point, and thus born without sin. He was not immaculately conceived as was Mary (the Ark of the New Covenant miraculously kept from original sin at conception). But as Luke 1:41 states, he was "...filled with the Holy Spirit" at that moment and the Holy Spirit cannot fill an unclean vessel.

I had never heard of the term, "Prevenient Grace," but I recognized the word "prevenient" since it derives from the present participle "praeveniens" of the Latin verb "praevenio" which means:

"I arrive / occur / come first / before / too soon; precede; surpass; anticipate / forestall"

The term prevenient grace occurs in both Catholic and Ariminian / Weslyan theology. The Wikipedia entry on this topic states:

"It is divine grace that precedes human decision. It exists prior to and without reference to anything humans may have done. As humans are corrupted by the effects of sin, prevenient grace allows persons to engage their God-given free will to choose the salvation offered by God in Jesus Christ or to reject that salvific offer...."

"...The Second Council of Orange of AD 529 stated that faith, though a free act, resulted even in its beginnings from the grace of God, enlightening the human mind and enabling belief. In canon 23 it is said that God prepares our wills that they may desire the good. Canon 25 states, 'In every good work, it is not we who begin . . . but He (God) first inspires us with faith and love of Him, through no preceding merit on our part.' Prevenient grace (from the Latin 'to come before') was discussed in the fifth chapter of the sixth session of the Council of Trent (1545-1563) which used the phrase: 'a Dei per dominum Christum Iesum praeveniente gratia' (rendered 'a predisposing grace of God through Jesus Christ'.) Those who turned from God by sins are disposed by God's grace to turn back and become justified by freely assenting to that grace."

In the case of John the Baptist, within a Q&A at EWTN on this topic the following is provided:

"The Church teaches that it was at this moment that the Baptist was freed from original sin and that he never sinned personally in the course of his life. Specifically, Pope Innocent III (1208 AD, DS 790) wrote: 'Iohannemque Baptistam ab eo missum esse sanctum et iustum et in utero matris suae Spiritu Sancto repletum' ('and John the Baptist had been sent from Him [God] holy and righteous and filled with the Holy Spirit in the womb of his own mother'). Furthermore, St. Augustine commented that we properly celebrate the birthday of the Baptist in addition to his day of martyrdom, since he came into the world without sin. Hence it is only properly said of Mary that she was conceived free of original sin, as proclaimed in the Immaculate Conception. But the Baptist was granted the privilege of freedom from original sin in the womb which is singular in its own right and by the same grace of Christ, but in anticipation of the crucifixion in which that grace was won for us."

I had not known anything about this topic of the sinless birth of John the Baptist by means of prevenient grace. That is why I think it is so important to pay attention to the homilies at Mass - you never know what you may learn.

Homilia Hodierna a Patre Kirby aput Dominam Nostram Gratiae

Amici, Americani, Compatriotae,

Today's Daily Readings for the Tuesday in the 4th week of Advent included the account of the Annunciation as recorded in Luke 1:26-38. Father Kirby at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church gave a homily specifically on what the angel Gabriel declared to Mary in verses 31 through 33:

"...Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end."

Jesus is the son of David and David was the greatest ruler which Israel had ever had. Likewise Israel under David was the most powerful that it had ever been in both antiquity and modern times, and thus the Star of David remains the symbol of the Jewish State. David in a sense was a "son" (de-capitalized "s) of God (and certainly called a man after God's own heart). Jesus was the only begotten Son (capitalized "s") of God. David ruled over the 12 Tribes of Israel and Jesus surrounded Himself with 12 Disciples. David's mother would in the practice of the ancient Hebrew kings be the Queen, not David's wife for he had many wives. This we know was the case when in 1st Kings 2:19-21 when Bathsheba, the mother of King Solomon, went to her son for Adonijah's request that he be granted Abishag the Shunamite as his wife. Verse 19 states:

"Then Bathsheba went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adonijah, and the king stood up to meet her and paid her homage. Then he sat down upon his throne, and a throne was provided for the king’s mother, who sat at his right."

In the same fashion the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Jesus, would become Queen of Heaven and Earth, something we see visualized in Revelation 12:1:

"A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars."

Jesus was also promised to rule over the House of Jacob forever. In the story of Joseph and the Multicolored Cloak, and its aftermath in the Book of Genesis, Jacob and his 12 sons (whose progeny would become the 12 Tribes of Israel) ended up in the land of Egypt. Jacob, to whom God gave the name Israel (meaning "God contended," a reference to the time when Jacob wrestled with God in Genesis 32:23-33) of course eventually died, requesting his bones to be returned to the land which God had promised him and his descendants. These descendants became the Hebrews who grew numerous Egypt. When finally after 400 years they left under Moses, they remembered the request of Jacob their father and returned his bones to the land which God had promised to him. From that land would then come David and then David's descendant Jesus who "would rule over the house of Jacob forever." The House of Jacob, the House of David is Mary's House (she being Queen Mother) and hence is Jesus' House (He being the one "of whose kingdom there will be no end").

I have found Fr. Kirby's homilies to be informative, thought provoking and orthodox. I would therefore encourage anyone living in the area of Lancaster, SC to visit Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church.