Blessed Mother, You and Saint Joseph presented Jesus to the Heavenly Father through the hands of the temple priest, as we struggle to offer our hearts fully, totally, completely to the Heavenly Father through Jesus at this Holy Mass, please take our hearts and offer them yourself.

Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time. Feast of the Presentation. Sunday February 2, 2014

Today the Church celebrates the feast of the Presentation of the Lord, which occurs forty days after the birth of Jesus and is also known as Candlemas day, since the blessing and procession of candles is included in today's liturgy. The lighted blessed candles which are carried in procession on this feast day of the Presentation, and at every Holy Mass, are a sign of the divine splendor of Christ who comes to expel the dark shadows of evil.

Christ is the Light of the nations, and today He enters into His temple, which is the House of His Father: His presence purifies the temple made by human hands. The use of blessed candles at the Holy Mass and even reminds us that Jesus continues to penetrate the darkness of our present age by continuing to enter into the temple of the Holy Church. He enters into the Church today by becoming truly present in His resurrected and glorified body and blood in the Holy Eucharist. Through the Holy Eucharist He continues to pour out His life anew on the Altar of Salvation for the many.

In the Church’s liturgical calendar in use for 1500 years, which is still used in the 1962 missal of Bl. John XXIII in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite, the Presentation of the Lord concludes the celebration of the Nativity; in this ancient calendar, today actually marks the end of the Christmas season. "In obedience to the Old Law, the Lord Jesus, the first-born, was presented in the Temple by his Blessed Mother and his foster father. This is another 'epiphany' celebration, another manifestation of Jesus to the world, insofar as the Christ Child is revealed as the Messiah through the canticle and words of Simeon and the testimony of Anna the prophetess.

“Mary comes with her husband, Joseph, to hand over the child Jesus to the Lord; yet, through the eyes of Simeon, we learn that something even greater is happening here. We learn that it is God himself who has handed over his only begotten Son to us. Today’s Presentation of the Lord is prelude to another, future presentation–to that presentation that will take place on Calvary, in our Lord’s sacrificial death on the cross, of which every Mass is a re-presentation” (Archbishop Thomas Wenski ). At the Holy Mass God’s love continues to be manifested to the World.

Interestingly, at the end of every Holy Mass up until 1970, immediately after the final blessing, the First Chapter of the Gospel of John was read aloud. This Gospel was read at the end of every Mass, to remind us before we are sent forth to preach the gospel with our lives, that we too, if we are faithful to the Gospel Truth, will share, in some way, the rejection that Christ Himself experienced.

The Gospel of John said, that although Jesus was sent into the world as the true light, the world for its part would not know Him; and if that wasn’t sad enough, John goes on to tell us that, Jesus came unto His own and His own would not receive Him. Or, as we hear said this way in today’s Gospel when Simeon reveals to Mary, “This child is destined for the fall and rise of many… and to be a sign that will be contradicted and you yourself a sword will pierce so that thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.”

“Mary’s life – and our own lives – if we, like her, truly and faithfully follow Jesus to the end, will be lived under the sign of the cross. For in a fallen world, in a world that has turned its back on God, those who live “ad orientam,” that is, looking, in joyful expectation, towards the coming of Our Lord, Jesus Christ, inevitably will encounter opposition and resistance. Such was the life of Christ – and such was the life of his mother who at Calvary shared in his sufferings; such is the life of the Church” (Archbishop Thomas Wenski). If they are faithful to Jesus and His teachings, the members of the Church who make a public stance, will like Jesus encounter opposition and resistance. It is not only the Pope, the Bishops and the priests who will encounter opposition and resistance, but as well all lay people who are courageous and stand up for the truth. And like Jesus, they will be rejected sadly sometimes even by their own.

Let us take an example from our present day. Today, the witness of the Church on behalf of the dignity and right to life of the human person from the first moment of conception till natural death is itself a “sign that will be contradicted”; the witness of the church on the sacredness of Traditional marriage is itself a “sign that will be contradicted – So many of the Church’s other teachings are as well signs that will be contradicted. And anyone who proclaims these teachings will themselves become a, “sign that will be contradicted.” Look at our brave teenagers who march on Washington D.C. last week by the Hundreds of Thousands; Many of them were actually mocked as the walked together witnessing for Life; they were “living signs of contradiction.” You may have been criticized yourself for praying a rosary for life in public or standing up in a conversation over the water cooler about traditional marriage.

Jesus said in the Gospel of St. Matthew, “Blessed are you who are persecuted for righteousness sake and blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.” Today’s readings, very clearly state that the Church and her faithful members will share in the sufferings of Christ and in the rejection of Christ, even to the foot of the cross. “If any one serves me, he must follow of me; and where I am, there shall my servant be also…” But, in these very sufferings God will purify His Holy Church.

And so, God is allowing the Church in our day to experience her own passion, soon She will enter into Her own crucifixion—then a sword will pierce the hearts of her faithful members. But then the Church will rise to what Blessed John Paul the II called the “new Spring-time. It will be the most glorious age of the Church; her members, after being tried by fire, the fire of persecution, will reflect Christ own image in themselves. This is what lies at the heart of the prophecy we just heard from Malachi.

There is a story that helps to explain this prophecy of Malachi. It seems there was of a group of women religious studying the book of Malachi. As they were studying chapter three they came across this verse three which says, "He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver." This verse puzzled the women and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God.

One of the women offered to find out about the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible study. That week the woman called up a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn't mention anything about the reason for her interest in silver beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver. As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that, in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest so as to burn away all the impurities.

The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot - then she thought again about the verse, that He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver. She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. For if the silver was left even a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.

The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, "How do you know when the silver is fully refined?" He smiled at her and answered, "Oh, that's the easy part -- when I see my image reflected in it."

If today you are feeling the heat of the fire coming from your faithfulness to Jesus and to His Catholic Church and Her teachings, remember that God has His eye on you and will keep His hand on you and watch over you until He sees His image in you. This past week we celebrated the feast day of the conversion of St. Paul. Paul or Saul before his conversion persecuted the members of the early Church, especially he went after the early bishops and priest. Jesus for his part told Saul that by persecuting the Church’s ministers and members, Saul was actually persecuting Jesus himself. Saul saw that by attaching Christ’s faithful, He, Saul was attacking Christ Himself. Blinded by the penetrating light of Christ Himself and of the Truth who is Christ, Saul of course was converted and became the great apostle Paul. Paul went on to fearlessly suffer great persecutions for preaching the fullness of the Gospel of Christ, the fullness of the Truth; and sadly his greatest sufferings came from some within the household of God, the Church, from His own congregations-parishes.

May our lives as Catholics fearlessly reflect the light of Christ to all who meet us; and may that same light guide us, as it guided that righteous and devout man, Simeon, when we go forth from this life to meet Christ. If we remain faithful even to the shedding of blood, we will we hear Jesus say to us, “well done good and faithful servant, you have been faithful in small matters, I will place you over greater ones. Enter now into your rest.”

Let us pray: Blessed Mother, You and Saint Joseph presented Jesus to the Heavenly Father through the hands of the temple priest, as we struggle to offer our hearts fully, totally, completely to the Heavenly Father through Jesus at this Holy Mass, please take our hearts, consecrate and purify them and offer them yourself to the Sacred Heart. Place them as you placed Jesus, into the hands of the priest. Your hands became a living paten at the presentation may they become the same for use. Surely from your hands Jesus will accept our hearts, and see in love in us what He sees and loves in you in order to offer our hearts acceptable to His Heavenly Father.
At Holy Communion as Jesus is sent to us from the Father, help us to “lift up the gates” so that Jesus can enter the temple of our hearts, and purify them by bringing us His Holy Spirit in order to free us from sin and recreate in us Jesus’ image, His love and His Light, for the entire world to see. Simeon's joy will then be our joy today as in the Blessed Sacrament we behold what Simeon proclaimed at the Presentation: "My eyes have seen the salvation ... for all the peoples to see: a revealing light to the Gentiles, the glory of Your people." Blessed Mother may we like St. John who was helped by you, be faithful even to the foot of the cross, even to the piercing of our own souls. Amen.