If you want to “make a difference”…Strive to become a saint….If you think God “can not work with someone like you”….Tell that to St Matthew…Who me?….Yes - YOU!

Today at Holy Mass we honor the saints…Who are the saints?…They simply are people who are in heaven…Some of these people are known to the world but most simply made it their life’s goal to do God’s will in whatever state of life God had chosen for them…..St John tells us this clearly from the second reading today from Mass. ”Beloved, we are God's children now; what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Everyone who has this hope based on him makes himself pure, as he is pure”….Each of us have something to do and in order to do it, we must cooperate with God….At our Baptism, the life of Christ was placed in us….The mark of Baptism cannot be erased!….However, the process of sanctification is just that, a process…God who is “the potter and we the clay” are molded and formed by sanctifying grace…..Because of our human condition, we hold unto the “things of this world” as God gently “opens our hands”, which grasp too tightly to the many "things" that keep us from our true purpose……God does not call the qualified - He qualifies the called…And each of us have been called!…..Allow the “master potter” to work and mold his “clay”…..The final product will set the world on fire!

“I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus”

If you knew me at the age of 19, you would not recognized me now. When I was in college, a Catholic college I will add, there was a group of girls who would kid around with me, calling me “Father Joe”…....They did it as a joke because the way I comported myself was very far from being “Father Joe”…And we would all laugh…But I will share with you something I have never told anyone…When these girls would say that to me, behind all the laughter, there was something inside of me that knew that what was being said was more true than false…I can not put the feeling I had into words…But it was there, almost like a voice and it was very clear - And I still remember it!…..I am far from a saint…Just ask my wife, she is the saint for having to put up with me!…But I am trying!!!…The goal of my life is to grow closer to God…Why?…Because I know that the closer I grew to God, the better husband I will be, the better father I will be, the more I can do for humanity….This is something that the world misses….We prioritize so many things that in the end will “bear no fruit”……The closer we get to God, the more we will impact the world!…Don’t believe me?…Read the lives of the saints….They walked the earth, no different than we do, yet they radically followed the Gospel…And what God accomplished through them is simply amazing!…Why not us?….What is holding you back?

“After this I had a vision of a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people, and tongue. They stood before the throne and before the Lamb”

Caravaggio was an Italian painter in the 16th century. He famously painted a portrait entitled “The Calling of St Matthew”…Matthew before he encountered Christ was a tax collector and considered a public sinner……I love the painting for many reasons…In it Matthew is at a table surrounded by other public sinners and they are counting money….Jesus enters the room with St Peter and simply points to Matthew, who is shocked and basically responds to Christ like, “Who me?”…The interesting thing about Jesus in the portrait is, his feet are pointed away from Matthew…Almost communicating to the viewer of the painting a message something like this…”I am pointing at you (Matthew) and that is all I have to do….And now I am leaving the room because I know you will respond”….Jesus knew Matthew better than Matthew knew himself……The same goes for us today!

“Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you falsely because of me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward will be great in heaven”

Getting back to St John today from Mass…John was a gospel writer and a companion of Jesus…His gospel is not like the other three…Its more mystical…The other three gospels tell the story of Christ, St John takes it to another level…..He speaks of many things unseen….So why bring that up?…John tells us today that, “ What we shall be has not yet been revealed”…I believe he is speaking to us specifically…There is a “seed” within each of us that if we nurture it, will grow into a "mighty tree"…Ironically enough, St Matthew tells us about that "seed" in his gospel…”It is the smallest of all the seeds, yet when full-grown it is the largest of plants. It becomes a large bush, and the ‘birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches”….To nurture “this seed” is the greatest thing a person can do while they walk the earth…If you want to “make a difference”…Strive to become a saint….If you think God “can not work with someone like you”….Tell that to St Matthew…Who me?….Yes - YOU!