Read the Bishop's Blog

Monday, December 30, 2024

(The Opening Mass for the Jubilee Year was celebrated at 4 PM Saturday, December 28 in the Cathedral of Saint Mary. The homily for the Mass is below.)

“Hope is born of love and based on the love springing from the pierced heart of Jesus on the cross” (Spes non Confundit, 3). Hope springs from divine love. If you want to be renewed in hope, then you need to keep this in mind. “Hope is born of love.” We cannot produce hope on our own. It is a gift that flows from God’s love. 

God always guides the Church, and God provides exactly what we need in the moment. So, the Lord is giving us a Jubilee of Hope in 2025. 

In 2024 the book The Anxious Generation, was a #1 New York Times bestseller. In the early 2010s, rates of depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicide rose sharply among Gen Z. In The Anxious Generation, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt describes the epidemic of teen mental illness that hit many countries at the same time. Adults too are more prone to anxiety, restlessness, discouragement, or depression. Meanwhile, nations are at war, and millions of innocent people are suffering. Will we ever learn how to live without violence, senselessly killing each other?

So many things are happening that can cause us to lose hope. Yet, Pope Francis reminds us that “Hope does not disappoint,” which is the title for the Jubilee Bull of Indiction. He is quoting from Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans who wrote: “Hope does not disappoint, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us” (Romans 5:5).

In recent years, I have become more aware of this truth as a personal reality. So often I find myself weary from all the problems in the Church. We have factions and divisions in this diocese. I hear about it within parishes, and I deal with people who are not living in unity with the Catholic Church. Yet, in prayer my hope is always renewed because Christ refreshes my heart with his love. I find new hope because he is greater than all that divides us. 

On a personal level, I am often aware of an ongoing tendency to sin, whether it is pride, selfishness, impatience, and especially a lack of love. Again, in prayer that awareness of sin arises together with the awareness that Christ is humble and patient with me, just as he was with his disciples. 

Christ abides in me even as I sin. This is the reason for my hope. This is the basis of Christian hope. Christ’s abiding love gives us hope. “Hope is born of love and based on the love springing from the pierced heart of Jesus on the cross.” Hope springs from divine love. If you want to be renewed in hope, then you need to keep this in mind.

What are practical ways to nurture hope? Here are a few daily disciplines to foster hope. The goal of these spiritual practices is to help you to abide in Christ’s love. 

First, take time for silence. Without silence God’s voice is blocked out. Take time for silence with the Word of God every day. Listen to the Word in the Scriptures and in nature. God speaks to us through the beauty of creation. Take a walk outside and listen to God speaking through creation. Sit quietly in the church, and dedicate the first 10-20 minutes to silence, or meditate on a Scripture verse. Let the Lord speak first.

This Sunday we heard the story of Hannah filled with new hope (1 Samuel 1:20-22, 24-28). She said, “I prayed for this child and the Lord granted my request” (1 Samuel 1:27). So, she named her son Samuel, which means “God has heard” or “God has listened.” 

This story of faith reminds us that God is close to us. God listens. The stories in Scripture are a storehouse of hope. Take time to sit in silence with the Word of God, and God’s faithful love will renew your hope. 

Listen to the hopeful message from the First Letter of Saint John. “Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence in God and receive from him whatever we ask because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him. And those who keep his commandments abide in him and he in them” (1 John 3:21-22). Saint John wrote extensively about Christ abiding in us. This was his takeaway from the death and resurrection of Christ. 

Saint John urges us to live by the two great commandments, but he gives us a new angle on those commandments. John wrote, “his commandment is this: we should believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and love one another just as he commanded us” (1 John 3:23). The commandment regarding our relationship to God is to believe in Jesus’ love. Believe in his promise to abide in you. Believe in his faithful love, even when you sin. 

The only thing that can keep us from Christ’s abiding love is our doubt of his love. We doubt because we focus too much on our sin and too little on God’s mercy. Julian of Norwich was aware of such doubt, as she wrote this: “The wisdom is for a creature to act following the will and advice of his highest and supreme Friend. This blessed Friend is Jesus; and it is His will and His advice that we bind ourselves with Him and fix ourselves intimately to Him ever more, in whatever state we are. For whether we are filthy or pure, we are always the same in His love. For well or for woe, He wills that we never flee from Him.”

Believe that “whether you are filthy or poor, you are always the same in his love.” Julian of Norwich spent time in silence listening to God. She was convinced of Christ’s love. She became a woman of hope. 

First, be silent with the Word of God. Second, be faithful to the Eucharist where Christ’s love is poured into your hearts. During the Jubilee, notice how your hope is renewed at the Eucharist. Notice how your anxiety level drops and peace is given to you. The Eucharist is a Sacrament of Love and Hope. Notice how the Eucharist renews your sense of Christ’s faithful love. 

Finally, make a commitment to be a sign of hope. This happens when we love unconditionally like Christ has loved us. In the Bull for the Jubilee, Pope Francis invites us to do the Spiritual and Corporal Works of Mercy. The goal of the Jubilee is not only to be renewed in hope, but also to become a sign of hope for others.