Holy Mary, Mother of the Church, Mother of our Parish, Mother of the Holy Eucharist, pray for us, lead us to Jesus in the Holy Eucharist and help us to fall madly in love with Him there! Amen.

Dedication of St. John Lateran. November 9th, 2014

Today we celebrate the dedication of St. John Lateran Basilica in Rome which was erected by the Emperor Constantine. This feast has been celebrated since the twelfth century, first only in Rome but later it was extended to the whole Latin Church as a way to honor this church, which is called the “Mother Church Of All Christendom.” The feast was expanded as sign of devotion and of unity with the Chair of Peter, which, as St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote in the first century, “presides over the whole assembly of charity.” Many think that St. Peter’s basilica is the cathedral church, or “seat” of the Pope, but it is not. The Cathedral Church of the Pope, our Holy Father Francis and all popes is St. John Lateran.

As we celebrated this great feast day, which falls on Sunday this year, let us take a look at the physical church building here in South Beloit—St. Peter’s Church. Today let’s take a tour around it and let it speak to us. The church building is meant to be an Icon. An Icon is a window into heaven, to show us the Truth which us ultimately Jesus Himself. You are all familiar with an Icon that is a painting, but the church building too is meant to be an Icon. And if it is build according to liturgical norms, it can teach us many things about our Catholic Faith and about who we are as a family of faith, about who you are as a family, the family of St. Peter’s Parish; This church building can help us pear into heaven; in fact it is here where heaven and earth meet along with the myriads of angels and saints in heaven; it is truly the place of Jacob’s ladder.

Let’s begin by looking at the world parish; what does it mean? The word parish comes from two Greek words, oikos meaning home and para meaning near. It means literally near our house or near our home. It is our family home; it is our home, the heart of our parish territory. We are the sheep within the territory of this parish home. This building is the home of the Shepherd of the Sheep of His flock, Jesus. And He dwells within this building, as within all Catholic Churches, in a way that He dwells nowhere else on earth, but only in heaven; it is truly the House of the Lord. The places within this church building can teach us this and many more things about our family and our role and responsibility in it.

Jesus is our shepherd and His role of chief Shepherd of the flock is symbolized by this Chair, the Pastor’s Chair. Just as in St. John Lateran the Cathedral of the Pope, there is the Cathrada the word from which we get the word Cathedral from. Cathrada literally means the chair of authority and power on which sits the King; in this case, Jesus. When the priest, the human shepherd to whom Christ as given the care of His Sheep, sits in this chair by taking on the office of pastor, he stands for Jesus. When the priest is commissioned as the Pastor of the parish, one of the parts of his installation ceremony is for Him to be installed in this chair by the bishop or his representative, usually the vicar forane or dean of the deanery. The Pastor is then given the power, authority and the grace to teach, sanctify and govern Christ’s people, in Christ name, in Christ’s stead.

The Chair, which stands for the mind of Christ and symbolizes His three-fold office of priest, prophet and king, is situated in the sanctuary. The sanctuary itself stands for the head of Christ. The whole Church building in fact symbolizes the body of Christ and is usually build in a cruciform to represent the crucified Christ.

The Sanctuary is the head of the building because it is where Jesus the Head makes present for us Liturgy, that is, His Work of the redemption and sanctification of souls, of His mystical body. Through the Holy Spirit working through the person of the priest, Jesus makes present for us, His once and for all offering of Himself on Calvary to the Father. Jesus is the Head we are His Body. We as his body are called to unite ourselves to Him by offering ourselves in union with His offering so that through Him, with Him and in Him we can become more and more united to God.

In the sanctuary, along with chair representing the mind of Christ, we have the ambo, which represents the mouth of Christ. From it we hear His voice as the Scriptures, the Word of God is proclaimed. The Ambo is where God speaks to us. The preaching that takes place at the ambo is the Holy Spirit interpreting for us the Scriptures through the teachings of the Church and her prophet, the priest. In fact, we can only understand the Scriptures to the extent that Jesus enlightens our minds to their meaning; and he does this, through the teaching and preaching of his One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.

In the sanctuary, as we hear the voice of Jesus in the Liturgy of the word, that word leads us to, points us to the fact that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us; and, continues to dwell among us as the Word again becomes flesh on the Sacred Altar and offers himself as priest/victim. On the Altar at the words of Jesus spoken through the priest at the consecration, by the power of the Holy Spirit, Jesus once again descends from heaven and becomes flesh—we are literally present at the incarnation when God becomes man, one of us—God with us. On the Altar as well becomes present anew his passion and His once and for all Sacrifice of love for us on Calvary. So too on the altar, becomes present his resurrection from the dead and so His resurrected and living body in the Holy Eucharist; the Holy Eucharist is not His dead body but his living and glorified body as it is in Heaven-in fact where the Body of Jesus is there is heaven—hence Holy Mass is heaven on earth.

The crucifix shows us the climax of the Last Supper and the institution of the Holy Eucharist, which is the death of Jesus on the Cross. This occurs during the two-fold consecration at Holy Mass, which is then the climax of the Holy Mass. By this death which he really experienced and which He makes present for us anew, he is able to give us himself fully in the Holy Communion, body, blood, soul and divinity. Jesus died not just to save us, but to save us by giving Himself to us in the Holy Eucharist. He died in order to give us His entire self, body, blood soul and divinity. If we believe, adore, hope and love Him in the Holy Eucharist, receiving Him worthily, that is in the state of grace, we are saved by this Holy Communion with Him, becoming one with Him and one with the Father through Him in the unity of the Holy Spirit. Blessed Mother Theresa of Calcutta once said, When you look at the Last Supper and the Crucifix see how much Jesus loved us; when you look at the tabernacle you see how much Jesus loves us-present tense.

This brings us to the next point. We have spoken now of the head of Jesus, imaged by the sanctuary and the mind of Jesus imaged by the chair, but what about the heart of Christ? The heart of Christ is imaged by the tabernacle; but it contains not a image but the very Heart of Christ in the flesh, His Sacred Heart pierced, but now alive and beating for love of us in the Holy Eucharist…this presence of burning love for us is symbolized by the sanctuary candle which burns night and day for us to see, just as does Jesus love for us in the Holy Eucharist.

The Sacred Heart Statue, the image of Jesus Love in the back of Church gives us a visual representation of Jesus Sacred heart in the Eucharist (just as the Divine Mercy is an image of Jesus in the Holy Eucharist). It is there too that we have the place of Jesus’ mercy, the confessional. It is in confession that we can truly experience God’s infinite Mercy through the forgiveness of our sins in the Sacrament of confession. Confession opens us up to receive more fully the love of Father and Jesus given to us in the Holy Eucharist. This love is the Holy Spirit Whose work it is to make us into images of Jesus; living tabernacles in order to take Jesus, and His light and love into our dark and starving world.

From the head, the sanctuary, you have the neck of Jesus, which is the communion rail (sadly which many churches are missing--not this one thanks be to God). The communion rail was in fact never supposed to be removed in the first place. The communion rail as neck also is that symbolic dividing line between the sanctuary, which symbolizes the head of Jesus and the nave, which symbolizes the body of Jesus. In the nave sits on the pews, the true mystical body of Christ-all of you, you who are called to be living stones. The communion rail reminds and teaches the body that they are not the head; Jesus is the head of His Church and we must allow Him to rule fully over the body, over our individual hearts, minds and bodies. We must adore God the Father with the mind and in union with the head, Jesus. If not, we become a headless monster instead of a living body come to full statue in Christ Jesus.

The nave of this Church also represents the ark on which we are saved. Just like Noah and his family were saved by being on the ark, we too are saved by being in Jesus’ One true Church (some churches have rafters which symbolize the ribs of the ark). Jesus’ Catholic Church is our refuge of safety in the storms of this life; it is the bark of Peter that brings us safely home to heave. The stations of the cross on the walls of the nave help us to mediate on Christ’s passion, suffering and death, so as to carry our own cross and so travel in imitation of Jesus in our own passion and death toward the Resurrection, when we will share in Jesus’ own victory over sin and death.

To help us along the way of the cross, which is the path of holiness, we also have our Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary. In her image here, as Our Lady of Fatima. At Fatima she came holding the rosary and the Scapular to remind us that she is praying for us, and that in the rosary we can pray with her to her Son and so chain the devil up in our lives, our families and the word. The Scapular is the sign of our consecration to Jesus through her. In this total consecration, she obtains for us the grace to keep our eyes always on Jesus in adoration, and to offer ourselves fully to Him at the Holy Mass; and then to live out this “Fiat” of our in our daily lives. She is at the right of the tabernacle because she is at the right of Jesus throne in heaven, the Queen Mother, interceding to Him on our behalf if we ask her as her little children.

We also have the statue of St. Joseph, the Guardian and protector of the Church, the guardian of the
Church family, and our parish family. He can be the guardian of your family as well…do you have an image of him in your homes? Better yet an image of the entire Holy Family. He is also know as “Terror of demons,” and Patron of the Dying. I believe it has been nothing less that a demonic attack on devotion to him that so many of our beautiful songs to honor him are no longer found in so many of our hymnals or no longer sung in our churches regularly. Good St. Joseph Pray for us.

Also in our Church is St. Michael is the warrior. He reminds us of the invisible but very real world of spirits. There are the good angels who are with us, one of which is our guardian angel always at our side to light, to guard, to rule and to guide. But so too, Michael reminds us that the devil, here at his feet, and all the other fallen angels are real too, and they prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls. We need the help of the angels to defeat satan and all the evil spirits and so overcome their deceptions, lies and empty promises. Again here in this place all of the angels are present at Holy Mass.

In our church we have the baptismal fount, from which new members are birthed into the family of God and our parish family become adopted sons and daughters of God. When we use the Holy Water in the founts coming into Church, we are reminded of our own baptism and that this is our true home and that we are God’s beloved children. When fail in our faithfulness to our baptismal vows by sinning and so separate ourselves not only from Jesus but from His Church and so our parish family, the confessional in the back reconciles with God and the Church family.

The bells in the bell tower ring over the entire town to remind us to come to come to this Church our home often, every Sunday, even every day in order to experience Jesus and His love us in the Sacraments, especially the Most Blessed of all Sacraments the Holy Eucharist. If it is a real bell it is a sacramental. Every time it rings graces go out over the entire parish boundaries in order to bless all souls and call them to true worship of God.

In the vestibule of the Church is the picture of your patron--St. Peter sinking on the sea but upheld by Jesus. Peter is the Rock on Which Jesus build His Church. And so, Peter and His successors the popes, as holder of the keys are the Sweet Vicars of Christ on earth and their Cathedral is again St. John Lateran.

I hoped you enjoy this tour of the church building of your parish…which is primarily Jesus’ parish, for He is the Head. You are so blessed to be called and invited to be part of this Parish family, the Family of St. Peter’s. All of us are all part of the larger family of the Universal Church and of the parish, and we all need each other and have a responsibility to each other—there can be no loners in the Body of Christ…one cell cut off from the bodies quickly dies. And so, your parish family needs you and you need your parish family. St. Peter’s parish family should always be a “Family of families helping one another get to heaven”:…by helping one another fall in love with Jesus in the Holy Eucharist, believing, adoring and hoping in Him truly present there. Holy Mary, Mother of the Church, Mother of our Parish, Mother of the Holy Eucharist, pray for us, lead us to Jesus in the Holy Eucharist and help us to fall madly in love with Him there! Amen.