“I like what Pope Francis said in ‘Evangelii Gaudium’ when he talked about preaching and likened it to family conversation; I try and imagine that I’m at a coffee shop talking to someone and I just have a conversation with them,” Josh Whitfield says. “If I were to sit down with you and just talk about important stuff—share the Gospel with you—I would not lecture you. The homily is family talk.”
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Father Whitfield serves as the pastor of St. Rita Catholic Community in Dallas. A former Episcopal priest, he trained for ministry in England. After his conversion to Catholicism, he was ordained a Catholic priest in 2012, through the pastoral provision of Pope St. John Paul II. He now lives in Dallas with his wife and their five children. Father Whitfield is a regular contributor to the Dallas Morning News and Our Sunday Visitor and the author of The Crisis of Bad Preaching: Redeeming the Heart and Way of the Catholic Preacher (Ave Maria Press, 2019).
Listen to Father Whitfield’s homily for the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A, on this week’s episode of “Preach.” After the homily, he shares with host Ricardo da Silva, S.J., how this husband and father of five brings his whole self to the pulpit.
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I like what Pope Francis said about preaching…I try and imagine that I’m at a coffee shop talking to someone and I just have a conversation with them.
Scripture Readings for the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A
First Reading: 2 Kgs 4:8-11, 14-16a
Responsorial Psalm: Ps 89:2-3, 16-17, 18-19
Second Reading: Rom 6:3-4, 8-11
Gospel: Mt 10:37-42
You can find the full text of the readings here.
Homily for the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A by Josh Whitfield
I don’t know where he said it; I heard it secondhand—something Augustine said.
He said something like, “God has so much to give you, but your hands are already full.” It’s one of those things that once I heard it, I’ve never forgotten. It reminds me of all I desire, what I think I desire, what I want God to give me, to become a saint and all that stuff; but it also reminds me of the stuff I refuse to give up, everything I have in my hands, all that stuff I don’t want to part with, don’t want to get rid of, that I want to hold onto with a tight grip. It’s because I’m just not ready for the promises of an invisible God.
St. Basil the Great said once that “for many, it is prosperity of life that constitutes the greatest trial.” Now, of course, it’s all relative. I drive a Toyota that’s 10 years old, but still compared to most, still, I’m really prosperous. Some are really prosperous, some people don’t realize they’re prosperous, some are genuinely poor by measure; but there is trial in all of it for all of us; for each of us there is trial enough. I’ve been in ministry long enough, and I’ve been around people long enough, to know that, wherever you are in life, whatever your bank account looks like, there’s trial. Even if we have billions, or if we have barely enough food for the day, the spiritual challenge is similar if not the same. The challenge is: Can we trust the promises of an invisible God?
You’re supposed to listen to me, but I’m supposed to listen to you, the people of God. How well do we do that? Are our voices sacred to one another?
I am thinking, of course, first of that Shunammite woman. She made room for the prophet, and she received a prophet’s reward—the birth of a son, which was for her a practical good and for us Christians, for we Christians, an allegorical good. I also think of that other woman, that more beautiful woman to me, that poor woman whom Elijah knew. She gave from her nothingness, she didn’t have anything, and a miracle was her reward. The flour didn’t run out, nor did the oil run dry, and her son didn’t die. It’s a beautiful story. She, too, received a prophet’s reward. Making space for the word of God, giving to God even when your hands are almost entirely empty: These are the spiritual lessons these women teach. Women, I’ll be honest, most days are more faithful than me. For they believed in the promises of an invisible God. Sometimes for me, that’s hard.
In the Gospel today, Jesus is instructing his disciples—they’re apostles now, as Mark tells it—he’s instructing in the way of mission. We’ve heard all this before. It’s true and demanding and beautiful stuff. It is what it is, and there’s little I can do to enlighten you further about it. Take up your cross; be willing to lose your life for Christ; don’t hold on to the visible so tightly you lose the invisible; don’t trade heaven for earth, for you know very well that won’t go well for you in the end. You know this, I know this; it challenges you just as it challenges me.
But I just keep thinking of the prophet’s word and the prophet’s reward. What does that look like in my life? What does that look like in our life together? For me, I think it looks like trying to be as faithful and as strong as those women who received the prophets. I think it looks like me trying to accept the responsibility that sometimes my word can be a prophet’s word and also that your word can be prophet’s word, too. Not just mine, but yours too, which makes me think: How well do we listen to one another? I’m the priest. I’m the “professional Christian.” You’re supposed to listen to me, but I’m supposed to listen to you, the people of God. How well do we do that? Are our voices sacred to one another?
And I think it looks like you and I are doing our best—struggle though we may—to believe the promises of our invisible God. In just a moment, you’re going to see and hear me say “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world. Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb.” What does it look like to empty our hands and receive the prophet’s word, the prophet’s reward? I think it looks something like this, like what we’re about to do. It’s how our whole life should go, really—this walk to the altar with empty hands. Believing as best we can, receiving this Word, this flesh; because God really does, I believe, have so much to give us. Amen.
