Censings

Sixth Sunday of Easter May 06, 2018 10:30 AM Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Rev. David Justin Lynch Acts 10:25-26;34-35;44-48   Psalm 98:1-4 I John 4:7-10   John 15:9-17         + In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        I came of age in the free-love 1960s, which was widely understood to mean, free sex. In particular, I remember 1967, known as the Summer of Love. It was a social phenomenon, characterized by hundreds of thousands of young people sporting hippie fashions of dress and behavior who converged in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury neighborhood and elsewhere. They gathered to celebrate an alternative culture to replace the materialism and consumerism that characterized mainstream life in the 1950s and early 1960s.   But the 1960s was more than a sexual free-for-all. The 1960s had a serious and everlasting message as well, one we would do well to h...

EASTER SUNDAY Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Rev. David Justin Lynch April 1, 2018 10:30 AM Acts 10:34A;37-42 Psalm 118:1-2;16-17;22-23 Colossians 3:1-4 John 20:1-9        + In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        What exactly do we celebrate on Easter Sunday? In the secular world, we associate Easter with the season of Spring. We have Easter bunnies, Easter chicks, Easter baskets full of colored hardboiled eggs, and children hunting eggs. What do all these things have to do with the biblical account of the resurrection of Jesus? The answer is, plenty. Spring is a time of new life. We see buds on trees, flowers arising out of the ground, and many animals giving birth. Bunnies, eggs, and chicks symbolize new life.   Rabbits are among the most prolific reproducers of all the animal species. One female rabbit and her male partner will produce about 72 rabbits a y...

GOOD FRIDAY March 30, 2018 – 7:00 PM Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Rev. David Justin Lynch Isaiah   52:13-53:12 Psalm 31:2;6;12-13;15-16;17;25 Hebrews 4:14-16;5:7-9 John 18:1-19:42 + In the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN. Today, we commemorate the day when evil people did a bad thing to Jesus. They killed him, pure and simple.  Jesus was a victim of capital punishment. Today, I will explain to you why the death penalty is wrong, always and everywhere, no matter what the circumstances. That may sound rigid and judgmental in and of itself, and indeed, it is, intentionally so. As many of you are aware, I have a law degree, and I used to be an attorney. One of the concepts we learned in criminal law was, “malum in se.” That’s Latin for, “bad in and of itself.” What that means is that there are some acts that are bad, period, with no room for debate. For Catholic Christians, that means any killing of another person, self-def...

Palm Sunday - Saint Cecilia Catholic Community March 25, 2018 – 10:30 AM Rev. David Justin Lynch Mark 11:1-10 Isaiah 50:4-7 Psalm 22:8-9,17-20, 23-24 Philippians 2:6-11 Mark 15:1-47        + In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        Everyone loves a parade. It’s a time to march around to be seen by others for a purpose. Yesterday, my wife, Sharon, and others from our parish and I participated in a parade in Palm Springs demonstrating against guns. In church, we call a parade a procession.   The significance of any procession, is that it involves an action rather than just words.   Today we engage in an action to commemorate the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. People parade in the streets, or process in or around a church, to demonstrate something, to send a message. Today is   no exception. The journey of Jesus that we recognize today would ultim...

By Rev. David Justin Lynch Philippians, Galatians and Romans have Paul concerned about the Judaizers, those who believed that Gentiles, that is, non-Jews, who wanted to follow Jesus should be required to observe the Jewish law. The Judaism of Paul’s time looked to the Old Testament with its 613 very detailed commandments that controlled many aspects of daily life as defining how one appears in God’s sight. The message was that to make things right with God, one has to obey all those laws. Paul opposed this approach, known as legalism. It is the act of putting the Law of Moses above the gospel by establishing requirements for salvation beyond faith (trust) in Jesus Christ and reducing the broad, inclusive, and general precepts of the Bible to narrow and rigid moral codes. Paul sees this as making salvation dependent on “works”, that is, what one does or does not do, rather than God’s grace, that is, God’s love and mercy. Despite Paul’s message to the contrary, many Christian c...

FOURTH SUNDAY IN LENT (Laetare) March 11, 2018 10:30 AM Saint Cecilia Catholic Community Rev. David Justin Lynch 2 Chronicles 36:14-16;19-23   Psalm 137:1-6 Ephesians 2:4-10 John 3:14-21        +In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, AMEN.        The news this year has featured many rescue stories.   First responders, and even ordinary citizens, have heroically saved many lives -- human, canine and feline -- from fires and floods. My wife, Sharon, and I are no strangers to rescue.   Our relationship began when we rescued one another from loneliness when our lives as separate individuals were not going very well in 1993, Sharon in Texas, and I in California. On March the twentieth, Sharon and I will celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of our mutual rescue. That’s the day when Sharon arrived in California with her two dog-daughters, Buffy and Dolly, two sweet l...