Friday Frivolity: Unto ages of ages…
Tag: Sermon
Flat Screen Preachers
I’ve been thinking a lot about Mega Churches recently, the churches where there is a single leader who is the principal figure of not only the main congregation, but of all the satellite congregations, with their sermons being broadcast each week to those remote sites.
A few days ago, I came across a video from the Evangelical show “Wretched”, discussing that very question:
10/15/2014 Update: Mark Discroll has apparently resigned from Mars Hill Church, the mega church found in Seattle.
10/01/2014 Update: Mars Hill is now officially dissolving
Fr. Anthony’s Homilies
I recently discovered that Fr. Anthony Saroki, pastor at Our Lady of Mt Carmel in San Diego, has started posting his homilies on YouTube. If you’d like to listen to them, then subscribe to his YouTube Channel.
Fr. Saroki is one of my favourite homilists here in San Diego and he’s recently launched a new website, Good Life USA, as part of his parish’s ministry:
The View From The Pew
The homily given by the priest during the Catholic liturgy is incredibly important. Unfortunately, the homily is often one of the primary topics about which Catholics (and particularly former Catholics) complain.
“The ministry of the Word…among which the liturgical homily should hold pride of place…is healthily nourished and thrives in holiness through the Word of Scripture”
– Dei Verbum, 24
Unfortunately, it is often said that the homily is often unintelligible, boring, uninspiring and unrelated to real life.
Our priests certainly have a challenging task assigned to them. They should therefore receive our support and constant prayers. We should listen carefully to each homily, attentive to what God wishes to teach us, each one of us, through His minister. When I returned to the Church, I was often humbled by listening to a homily and being shocked by the gold that was there for the taking, if only I had ears to hear.
However, in today’s post I would like to do something a little brave and suggest some practical ways in which the typical liturgical homily could be enhanced. I know I’m in a bit over my head here. I am not a priest, nor have I been trained in homiletics, but as a Catholic layman, over the course of my life thus far, I have heard over 2,000 homilies. So, for what it is worth, drawing upon my experiences from my side of the pulpit, here are my top ten suggestions for the preachers of the Word…
Wise Words on Wednesday: In spirit & truth
There is no Bible study in the world that is good enough or stimulating enough or nutritious enough to substitute for the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. There’s no song moving enough to replace the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.
– Jeff Cavins, “I’m not being fed!”
More Sermons than you could shake a stick at
One of the purposes of this blog is to put people into contact with good Catholic resources. Well, today I have a doozy. Audio Sancto is a website run by a group Catholic laymen and contains well over six hundred sermons from a number of different priests, all categorized and iTunes-ready. Enjoy 🙂
When Church Sucks…
When Christians get together there’s really nothing we love to do more than to complain! In my experience, what we especially like to do is to have a good whine about the problems we have with our parish. In response to this, I would like to write a series of short posts about some common complaints I’ve heard. Today I’ll begin with one of the most common criticisms:
“Our priest’s homilies are boring…”
As I say, this is a very common complaint. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve heard people say something like this. Unfortunately, it’s often a reason given as to why someone left to join a Protestant congregation. 🙁
