Censings

FOURTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME January 31, 2015 Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Rev. David Justin Lynch Jeremiah 1:4-5;17-19  Psalm 71:1-6;15-17 I Corinthians 13:4-13 Luke 4:21-30        + In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        Last week, we heard Jesus announcing his mission statement, proclaiming that God anointed Him to bring glad tidings to the poor, liberty to captives, recovery of sight to the blind, and freedom to the oppressed. Like Jeremiah the prophet in the first reading, God called Jesus to carry out a mission. This week, we hear about how the people who heard Him reacted. The reaction, however, was quite unfavorable: they wanted to kill Jesus, just like the crowds several centuries earlier wanted to kill Jeremiah. As to both Jesus and Jeremiah, the crowd did not accept the mission of Jesus, nor did they wish to heed his words, the same way crowds trea...

THIRD SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME January 24, 2015 10:30 AM Saint Cecilia Catholic Community, Palm Springs, CA Rev. David Justin Lynch Nehemiah 8:2-4A;5-6;8-10 Psalm 19:8-10;15 1 Corinthians 12:12-14;27  Luke 1:1-4;4:14-21        + In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        One of the things the three Abrahamic faiths have in common is that we are peoples with books. The Jews have the Old Testament, Christians the new Testament, and Muslims the Quran. Every Sunday, we celebrate the Liturgy of the Word with four scripture readings, one from the Old Testament, one from the Book of Psalms, which is also part of the Old Testament, a second reading from the non-Gospel texts of the New Testament, and a Gospel Reading taken from Mark, Matthew, Luke, or John. Today’s readings invite us to meditate on the importance of scripture in our worship, to remind us of what we are, and wha...

FEAST OF BLESSED MARTIN LUTHER KING January 18, 2016 Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Rev. David Justin Lynch Genesis 37:14b-20 Psalm 77:12-21 Ephesians 6:10-20 Luke 6:27-36        + In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        I grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut during the nineteen fifties and sixties. When I was a very young boy, probably about five years of age, my mother and I were on the train to Boston, Massachusetts. Sitting next to us was a man with dark skin.  I asked my mother, “Why is his skin dark?” She explained to me that just like some people have brown eyes like I do, and others blue eyes like my sister, some people have light skin, and others have dark skin. That sounded like a pretty logical explanation to me.  A few years later, I had a friend named Vincent Powell who lived on the next street east of the one on which I lived. My mother and his moth...

BAPTISM OF JESUS – 1ST SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME January 10, 2016 Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Palm Springs, CA Isaiah 42:1-4; 6-7 Psalm 29:1-4; 9-10 Acts 10:34-38 Luke 3:15-16; 21-22        + In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.      On a hot day, nothing beats a cold, tall glass of  agua con hielo  to quench my thirst. Whether you call it water, or  agua , H-two-O is always in the news. For the about the past year, the California Drought has dominated the news. Over this past week, however, we’ve gotten more rain, or lluvia, than we ever expected, due to El Niño, a natural warming of the oceans that will bring much heavier than normal rain and snow to California this winter.  Flooded streets, mudslides, and snow in the mountains are now facts of life. Agua  is the primary of all earthly creation. If you will recall the first creation ...

FEAST OF THE EPIPHANY YEAR C January 03, 2015 Saint Cecilia Catholic Community, Palm Springs, CA Rev. David Justin Lynch Isaiah 60:1-6 Psalm 71:1-2; 7-8; 10-13 Ephesians 3:2-3A; 5-6 Matthew 2:1-12        +In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        One of the advantages of living in the Desert is that when the sky is free of clouds, we can see thousands of stars. Those residing in Orange and Los Angeles counties are not so lucky because smog obscures their view of the sky, even at night. Exactly which of those stars guided the Magi to the crib of Jesus, we do not know for sure.  Astronomers have indulged in considerable speculation about what celestial event lighted their way.  Their principal challenge is that the exact date on which Jesus was born is unknown. It was not on December 25 in the Year One A-D. Most modern scholars place it around 4 B-C to 7 B-C, and t...