Homilies

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I’m still in the process of discerning the call to the permanent diaconate as I don’t believe I can even start the application process until the current group enters aspirant phase.

Anyhow, one thing that I have often wondered, and I don’t think it really plays into the discernment for me or not is how long does it take you (priests or deacons) to write out your homily each week? I know they will go over all this in homiletic’s, and I’m sure the answers will really vary, but I was just looking for some ballpark estimate of time that I would need to set aside each week if I did make it that far with this calling.

Thanks all, I’m looking forward to reading some of your comments as they will I’m sure give me much to think about and also pray about.

God bless,

John
 
You are right: you will get many different answers about timing and preparation. For me, I like to begin by studying/meditating on the Readings for about a week. At that time I notice some things that “hit me” or “jump out” at me. I begin to evaluate those ideas and settle on one main idea. I begin to write and rewrite for the next two weeks. Finally I spend the last week honing the homily … practicing the delivery and “tweaking” the written portion. Thank goodness I only preach once a month (at all our 6 Liturgies). I don’t know how priests do it day after day.

Hope this helps. I know some of my brother deacons are much quicker at preparation, and I also know others take even longer …
 
mikeghiorso said:
You are right: you will get many different answers about timing and preparation. For me, I like to begin by studying/meditating on the Readings for about a week. At that time I notice some things that “hit me” or “jump out” at me. I begin to evaluate those ideas and settle on one main idea. I begin to write and rewrite for the next two weeks. Finally I spend the last week honing the homily … practicing the delivery and “tweaking” the written portion. Thank goodness I only preach once a month (at all our 6 Liturgies). I don’t know how priests do it day after day.

Hope this helps. I know some of my brother deacons are much quicker at preparation, and I also know others take even longer …
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A priest should be well read, and after spending almost 10 years in seminary studying, it really helps to save time. Our priests don’t do a sermon every day, but our one priest seems to be gifted at giving off the cuff sermons.
 
I also know a few Deacons who never give a Homily. My Parish has three Deacons. Only two give Homilies, the older one never does.
 
I can’t speak for priests or deacons, but back when I was a Protestant preacher, I would spend anywhere from four to 10 hours preparing for a 30-45-minute message. Those messages would not have been written out; they would have been extemporaneous, from an outline.
 
DaveBj said:
I can’t speak for priests or deacons, but back when I was a Protestant preacher, I would spend anywhere from four to 10 hours preparing for a 30-45-minute message. Those messages would not have been written out; they would have been extemporaneous, from an outline.
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Ever think about becoming a Deacon?
 
Wow… thanks all… that’s some good stuff.

Deacon Jeff, you do that every week? Are you employed at the parish as well, or do you have a secular full time job? That’s a huge time commitment each week. I know God doesn’t ask us to do anything we can’t do, so I am sure I will be okay if I get to this point. I also know that each parish uses the talents we each posses, so if we are better at something else, we may not have to preach each week.

I know at my parish, we have one priest, and one deacon. Most weeks, the deacon will do the preaching. Granted, I will more than likely not be assigned to the current parish that I am at, and at some churches I have seen deacons who only preach once a month (or less) like deacon Mike stated.

John
 
Deacon Jeff… just curious. Why do you go from a typed out homily to an outline? Normally, I see people write the other way around. Is this so you can deliver the homily more from your heart and not just read it?

Thanks & God bless,

John
 
Thanks Deacon Jeff… I guess I am worried about something that I shouldn’t even be considering at this point. Who knows if I will even make it into the program, but it is a concern.

I think the reason for my concern is the deacon at our Parrish preaches at almost every weekend mass, and our pastor preaches less frequently. This might be due to the deacon being an employee of the local parish though. I forget his official title, but he is an employee of the local church, so that might be why. Prior to him (but with a different pastor too), our deacons would only preach once a month, which I though I could do much better with a full time job. I too have three kids (two which are in college, and one just graduated college) as well as a full time at a local hospital in informatics, plus a wife, two dogs and two cats so we are plenty busy. I know the Holy Spirit will get me though this though if I am called.

When I did my MBA, and when I have to give presentations at work, I never write out what I want to say. I normally use Power points (I know, you can’t do that at church) and I talk from them. Minimal text on the screen is my style as I want to talk with the audience. the problem I have though is I can go longer than I should at times.

Thanks for the information as this has been very informative.

God bless,

John
 
Deacon Jeff… sorry to be a pest. Which commentaries do you use? the only ones I have seen online seem to be non-Catholic commentaries. I have been looking for some Catholic ones as when I do my readings each day, I like to dig deeper into what the gospel is saying, and this would be a good tool to help me.

God bless,

John
 
KD8TZC said:
Deacon Jeff… sorry to be a pest. Which commentaries do you use? the only ones I have seen online seem to be non-Catholic commentaries. I have been looking for some Catholic ones as when I do my readings each day, I like to dig deeper into what the gospel is saying, and this would be a good tool to help me.

God bless,

John
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If I can add to this - don’t rely strictly on modern commentaries to prepare homilies. I often hear homilies with “factoids” drawn from the commentaries which actually don’t matter. They’re often dropped by the deacon or the priest in an effort to impress and show some sort of feigned facility with Scripture. I would recommend reading the exegetical works of the Church Fathers. Preaching on St. John’s Gospel? Read Augustine. Read Chrysostom. Feel free to absolutely steal whatever they say. Originality is not a virtue for its own sake. Better to edify the people than look impressive.
 
I didn’t say they shouldn’t be used. I simply was warning against the modern tendency to use strictly modern commentaries.
 
Tatian said:
If I can add to this - don’t rely strictly on modern commentaries to prepare homilies. I often hear homilies with “factoids” drawn from the commentaries which actually don’t matter. They’re often dropped by the deacon or the priest in an effort to impress and show some sort of feigned facility with Scripture. I would recommend reading the exegetical works of the Church Fathers. Preaching on St. John’s Gospel? Read Augustine. Read Chrysostom. Feel free to absolutely steal whatever they say. Originality is not a virtue for its own sake. Better to edify the people than look impressive.
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I would agree 100% here, use the ECF’s homilies. In the 4 years I have been ordained, one of the most affective homilies I have preached was on Good Friday at the Passion Service. I read St. John Chrysostom’s homily from the Office of the Readings for Good Friday. Powerful message, there were no dry eyes in the church and not a word of “my” homily was actually mine.

The commentaries are necessary too. I mostly use the Saint Joseph bible with the commentary notes. I use the commentaries to be sure I understand the readings in the time settings and the circumstances of the times. But I use that mostly to be sure I reflect the message properly without my interpretation, but the author’s.

Preaching at Mass is a very humbling and daunting task. When you think about what it is that you are participating in it can make your knees buckle. Look at it this way, we are still praying with homilies that were written and delivered within the first 500 years of Christianity. That fact in and of itself should let us know how sacred and critical the moment in time within the Mass is.

The most important part of any homily is the time in prayer with the Holy Spirit, not my nose in the books.

I preached this past weekend. My homily was about 10-12 minutes. I prepared for that message a total of about 8 hours. Most of my prep time comes in little moments, I just take time to re-read the readings and allow them to speak to me during my work day. Those moments are a good and valuable portion of the prep.
 
The Blood and Water from His Side
St. John Chrysostom
Early Church Father and Doctor of the Church

This Good Friday reading is an excerpt from The Catecheses (Cat. 3, 13-19; SC 50, 174-177) by St. John Chrysostom, one of the greatest Early Church Fathers of the 5th Century. It is used in the Roman Catholic Church’s Office of Readings for Good Friday with the accompanying biblical reading from Hebrews 9: 11-28 and is a powerful meditation on the passion. But it also tells us much about the connection between the passion and the sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist which flow from the paschal mystery and connect us to its saving power. Note the evidence for a very realistic interpretation of the Eucharist as truly Christ’s blood in contrast to the mere figure or symbolic prefiguration of the blood of Christ represented by the Lamb’s blood on the doorposts in the Exodus account.

*If we wish to understand the power of Christ’s blood, we should go back to the ancient account of its prefiguration in Egypt. “Sacrifice a lamb without blemish”, commanded Moses, “and sprinkle its blood on your doors”. If we were to ask him what he meant, and how the blood of an irrational beast could possibly save men endowed with reason, his answer would be that the saving power lies not in the blood itself, but in the fact that it is a sign of the Lord’s blood. In those days, when the destroying angel saw the blood on the doors he did not dare to enter, so how much less will the devil approach now when he sees, not that figurative blood on the doors, but the true blood on the lips of believers, the doors of the temple of Christ.

If you desire further proof of the power of this blood, remember where it came from, how it ran down from the cross, flowing from the Master’s side. The gospel records that when Christ was dead, but still hung on the cross, a soldier came and pierced his side with a lance and immediately there poured out water and blood. Now the water was a symbol of baptism and the blood, of the holy eucharist. The soldier pierced the Lord’s side, he breached the wall of the sacred temple, and I have found the treasure and made it my own. So also with the lamb: the Jews sacrificed the victim and I have been saved by it.

“There flowed from his side water and blood”. Beloved, do not pass over this mystery without thought; it has yet another hidden meaning, which I will explain to you. I said that water and blood symbolized baptism and the holy eucharist. From these two sacraments the Church is born: from baptism, “the cleansing water that gives rebirth and renewal through the Holy Spirit”, and from the holy eucharist. Since the symbols of baptism and the Eucharist flowed from his side, it was from his side that Christ fashioned the Church, as he had fashioned Eve from the side of Adam Moses gives a hint of this when he tells the story of the first man and makes him exclaim: “Bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh!” As God then took a rib from Adam’s side to fashion a woman, so Christ has given us blood and water from his side to fashion the Church. God took the rib when Adam was in a deep sleep, and in the same way Christ gave us the blood and the water after his own death.

Do you understand, then, how Christ has united his bride to himself and what food he gives us all to eat? By one and the same food we are both brought into being and nourished. As a woman nourishes her child with her own blood and milk, so does Christ unceasingly nourish with his own blood those to whom he himself has given life.*
 
This one is from today’s OOR. I do believe if I were preaching today, this would be my homily. Simple and straight forward!

The Five Paths of Repentance
St. John Chrysostom
Early Church Father and Doctor of the Church

St. John Chrysostom, patriarch of Constantinople at the beginning of the 5th century, here outlines the five paths of repentance (Hom. De diabolo tentatore 2, 6: PG 49, 263-264). This excerpt is used in the Roman Catholic Office of Readings for Tuesday of the 21st week in ordinary time with the accompaning biblical reading being the call of the prophet Jeremiah (Jer 1: 1-19).

*Would you like me to list also the paths of repentance? They are numerous and quite varied, and all lead to heaven.

A first path of repentance is the condemnation of your own sins: Be the first to admit your sins and you will be justified. For this reason, too, the prophet wrote: I said: I will accuse myself of my sins to the Lord, and you forgave the wickedness of my heart. Therefore, you too should condemn your own sins; that will be enough reason for the Lord to forgive you, for a man who condemns his own sins is slower to commit them again. Rouse your conscience to accuse you within your own house, lest it become your accuser before the judgment seat of the Lord.

That, then, is one very good path of repentance. Another and no less valuable one is to put out of our minds the harm done us by our enemies, in order to master our anger, and to forgive our fellow servants’ sins against us. Then our own sins against the Lord will be forgiven us. Thus you have another way to atone for sin: For if you forgive your debtors, your heavenly Father will forgive you.

Do you want to know of a third path? It consists of prayer that is fervent, careful and comes from the heart.

If you want to hear of a fourth, I will mention almsgiving, whose power is great and far-reaching.

If, moreover, a man lives a modest, humble life, that, no less than the other things I have mentioned, takes sin away. Proof of this is the tax-collector who had no good deeds to mention, but offered his humility instead and was relieved of a heavy burden of sins.

Thus I have shown you five paths of repentance; condemnation of your own sins, forgiveness of our neighbor’s sins against us, prayer, almsgiving and humility.

Do not be idle, then, but walk daily in all these paths; they are easy, and you cannot plead your poverty. For, though you live out your life amid great need, you can always set aside your wrath, be humble, pray diligently and condemn your own sins; poverty is no hindrance. Poverty is not an obstacle to our carrying out the Lord’s bidding, even when it comes to that path of repentance which involves giving money (almsgiving, I mean). The widow proved that when she put her two mites into the box!

Now that we have learned how to heal these wounds of ours, let us apply the cures. Then, when we have regained genuine health, we can approach the holy table with confidence, go gloriously to meet Christ, the king of glory, and attain the eternal blessings through the grace, mercy and kindness of Jesus Christ, our Lord. *
 
I don’t agree with those who advise completely avoiding Protestant commentaries. Having been a preacher and teacher in a Protestant background, I used commentaries a LOT, and I can vouch for the fact that there is a lot of good information and scholarship in them. Our own priest quotes occasionally from the commentaries of William Barclay, who was a minister in the Church of Scotland. Certainly by the time that one has been ordained a deacon, one should be smart enough to pick out what is good from a Protestant commentary and discard what is not good.
 
DaveBj said:
I don’t agree with those who advise completely avoiding Protestant commentaries. Having been a preacher and teacher in a Protestant background, I used commentaries a LOT, and I can vouch for the fact that there is a lot of good information and scholarship in them. Our own priest quotes occasionally from the commentaries of William Barclay, who was a minister in the Church of Scotland. Certainly by the time that one has been ordained a deacon, one should be smart enough to pick out what is good from a Protestant commentary and discard what is not good.
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I guess you’re talking about those outside of this thread because no one is saying to completely avoid the modern commentaries. The only comment I saw was don’t fully rely on them alone. We can agree with that right?

We should use all sources that help us present the Catholic message.
 
Lapey said:
I guess you’re talking about those outside of this thread because no one is saying to completely avoid the modern commentaries. The only comment I saw was don’t fully rely on them alone. We can agree with that right?

We should use all sources that help us present the Catholic message.
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Exactly! 👍
 
I absolutely LOVE the writings of St. John Chrysostom. At one time, I tried to see if there was a book that had all/most of them in it. I know that the four volume set of the LOTH has a number of them, but is there someplace where I could find these all on one place?

God bless,

John
 
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