November 17, 2024: 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

God has promised He is coming again.  Christ will come to set everything right, and establish a new order for everything.  He has already revealed this new order in the Paschal Mystery of His Death and Resurrection.

Those of us who were faithfully in relationship with God in this life and lived that relationship in righteousness will shine.

We can count on God to fulfill His promises because Christ came to offer the one perfect sacrifice that makes us, His Chosen, righteous before Him.

Now, we live in a state of readiness, living out the righteousness God imparts to us as we await His coming again, making ready by helping to bring forth the Kingdom on Earth now.

It is a Kingdom that will one day come in its fullness and last forever. For even though Heaven and Earth shall pass away, as Jesus said, His Word shall not, and that will be at the foundation of the Kingdom where we will be with Him forever, even as He is with us now.  We will live in the fullness of His Love that, as Bishop Barron said in his homily for this Sunday, He has revealed already in the Paschal Mystery, and the revelation to come will manifest His Lordship.

It was a special evening in Oak Park at the Sunday evening Mass with the Confirmation enrollment when the young people preparing for this sacrament expressed their commitment to the process.  It was a time to recognize how they are chosen to be part of advancing the Kingdom of God that is coming, even as we recognize how God has chosen us to be part of His Kingdom.  This week, I will reflect on my own Confirmation enrollment Mass 20 years ago.  And this week marks 10 years since Blase Cupich was installed as Archbishop of Chicago, and his role in shepherding the church in the Archdiocese of Chicago to Eternal Life.