Tag: advent

Hope Fleshed Out: Homily for the 2nd Sunday of Advent 2024

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2nd Sunday of Advent, C                                                                                December 8, 2024Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. Mary Magdalen, Abbeville https://youtu.be/XVSMWcTmRuA “I’m spiritual but not religious.” “I’m an open Christian.” “I am a spiritual person.” These kinds of sayings can be pretty appealing. For a little while, when I was younger, it was popular to be agnostic or atheist, to act like only dumb people believed in God or anything spiritual. Nowadays, however, most people are open to some kind of higher power or spiritual truth. The reality is that human beings need the spiritual. As soon as people start to...Read More

Hoping Through The End: Homily for the 1st Sunday of Advent 2024

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1st Sunday of Advent, C                                                                                 December 1, 2024Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. Mary Magdalen, Abbeville https://youtu.be/C0K8xlqVWJ8 Remember Y2K? The great “end of the world” scare in the late 90s? Most early computers were programmed to only list the last 2 digits of the year: 85, 93, 99. I don’t know how, but the idea spread that, when we hit the year 2000 and computers rolled over to the number ‘00’ in their programming, something terrible would happen. As a kid in middle school, the impression I got is that there was a chance this computer glitch...Read More

Surviving the End of the World: Homily for the 33rd Sunday OT 2024

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33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time, B                                                                   November 17, 2024Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. Mary Magdalen, Abbeville https://youtu.be/eg_n8cldRbY Repent! The end is near! No, really it’s true. I mean, it’s been true since Jesus ascended into heaven, but you really do need to repent nonetheless. Jesus could come back at any moment. Our own deaths could happen at any moment. So, we should be ready now. And if we are not, then we need to start getting ready now. We are two weeks away from Advent, which is the beginning of our liturgical year. So, on the Church’s...Read More

Your Will Be Done: Homily for the 4th Sunday of Advent 2023

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4th Sunday of Advent, B                                                                                 December 24, 2023Fr. Alexander Albert                                                              St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/8yjMcR6JPEo Some of the most useful and most underrated words in all of Scripture are the ones the prophet Nathan says to King David in our first reading: “Go, do whatever you have in mind, for the LORD is with you.” These words can pull you back to the center from one of two dangerous extremes: excessive self-reliance and crippling uncertainty. By far the most common one is excessive self-reliance. Even being too worried about what other people think is relying on...Read More

The Flight of Joy: Homily for the 3rd Sunday of Advent 2023

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3rd Sunday of Advent, B                                                                                 December 17, 2023Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/hGXZtli3eJ8 Fly! Go on, start flying! It’s not like you don’t know how, there are about a million people in the air right now. So why aren’t you flying? Probably because it’s not as simple as just deciding “I’m flying now.” We can only fly in specific circumstances. It is the result of several forces beyond our control, it took us thousands of years to figure out how to do it. Flying is the fruit of a complex process. Despite being possible,...Read More

How It Burns: Homily for the 2nd Sunday of Advent, B

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2nd Sunday of Advent, B                                                                                December 10, 2023Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/4QCixpBM44I If you were running from a fire about to burn your house down, would you stop to make the bed first? It kind of sounds like St. Peter is saying we should in the 2nd reading. Listen again: “the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a mighty roar and the elements will be dissolved by fire… Since everything is to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought...Read More

In The Beginning: Homily for the 1st Sunday of Advent, B

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1st Sunday of Advent, B                                                                                 December 3, 2023Fr. Alexander Albert                                                              St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/KxHrddNPiWA “In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” That’s the opening line to the second book of Douglas Adams’ comedy book series “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.” You see, Douglas Adams was a Christian-turned-atheist and his book series is full of funny little jabs at bad arguments for God’s existence. That opening line – creation being a bad idea – conjures up the classic...Read More

Homily for the 4th Sunday of Advent: The Forceful Humility of God

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4th Sunday of Advent, A                                                                                 December 18, 2022Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/uBkuluTIvBQ "Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly.” The prevailing explanation of this verse is that Joseph suspected Mary of committing adultery. Since he was righteous, he wanted to follow the law. The law required that women who commit adultery be put to death. Rather than killing her, he decided to divorce her quietly. Then the angel showed up to tell him the full...Read More

Homily for the 3rd Sunday of Advent: Crowned with Joy

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3rd Sunday of Advent, A                                                                                 December 11, 2022Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/3ngXssLUSws “Crowned with everlasting joy.” That’s what Isaiah the prophet promises us. Truly, that is the theme of this day – the joy of the Lord. Yet, that joy is not only something that comes in heaven. It begins here. That’s why the Church does this in Advent and Lent – two penitential seasons. Just over halfway through each one, we break from the purple to use the rose vestments and brighten up the décor and music. Today...Read More

Homily for the 2nd Sunday of Advent: Poison and Fire

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2nd Sunday of Advent, A                                                                                December 4, 2022Fr. Alexander Albert                                                               St. John the Evangelist, Jeanerette https://youtu.be/a8ZR_5PdF2w “You brood of vipers!” So much for Christmas cheer. John the Baptist says this to the Pharisees and Sadducees, but it’s not like he’s caught them doing something terrible. These are the ones who came to him! They traveled out of the city all the way to the Jordan river to hear him preach. They came to be baptized! People often say pastors should just be grateful that people show up… that they shouldn’t get caught up...Read More