3rd Sunday C, Sunday of the Word of God
Installation of Fr. Kevin Ewing
Catholic Community of South Baltimore
January 26, 2025
Introduction
Father Kevin has been serving you for some nineteen months, and in that time you have come to appreciate him as a person and as a priest. But since he’s been here for a while, a formal installation may see out of place. It is a case of better late than never? I hope it’s more than that! Celebrating Fr. Kevin’s installation offers your parish community an opportunity to reflect, not only on his wonderful priestly leadership and service, but also on the mission of the Catholic Community of South Baltimore.
Our reflection is framed around two beautiful things the Church throughout the world is celebrating: First, Pope Francis has designated this 3rd Sunday of the Year as the Sunday of the Word of God – a Sunday set aside to reflect on the richness, beauty, and relevance of God’s Word in our lives. Second, Pope Francis has declared 2025 as a Year of Jubilee, a special time of hope and grace and joy in the life of the Church. This practice started in the Old Testament times. It’s something Jesus alludes to in today’s Gospel, and it continues to be celebrated in the Church every twenty-five years. What does the Sunday of the Word of God and the Jubilee of Hope teach us about Fr. Kevin’s service and the mission of your parish?
The Primacy of the Word of God
As you can imagine there is a lot on your pastor’s plate. What’s more, a pastor’s “job description” isn’t getting shorter or easier. In an era of specialization, parish priests are the last of the generalists. But today’s Sunday of the Word of God helps us see the forest for the trees, that is to say, what is essential to Fr. Kevin’s leadership and service, in contrast to things that are good and even necessary, but secondary. At the forefront of his responsibilities is preaching the Word of God.
The importance of preaching God’s Word is on display in our first reading. The Old Testament Book of Nehemiah describes how Ezra, the priest, proclaimed the Word of God in a very public place known as Water Gate from day break until the middle of the day. Now this doesn’t mean that Fr. Kevin should go to one of So. Balto’s. many bars, open up a Bible, and start reading from sun up until noon. I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t work out too well.
But this is what Fr. Kevin and all of us who serve you must first do. We must take the Word of God in its entirety to heart in our lives. The Word of God must sink in to our mind, heart, and spirit before we preach it. We must commit ourselves without reservation to all the Word of God teaches, God’s Word as it comes to us through the Church. This means we must listen to God’s Word, allowing God to speak to our hearts, sometimes challenging us, at other times consoling us, and at still other times shedding light on what we should say or do.
But we do not listen to God’s Word in isolation. We are also to listen to you whom we are privileged to serve. We must come to know your joys and hopes but also your grief or anxiety. We must listen to God’s heart but also to what is in your hearts. We must ask the Holy Spirit for the wisdom and love to preach and teach in such a way that God’s Word can shed its light on your hearts, in your lives, amid the things that bring you joy, amid the things that trouble you or cause you doubt and uncertainty. We are to manifest the relevance of God’s Word for your lives and ours, and to present it in a way that is convincing and life-giving – no easy task.
But that’s not all. We who preach and teach must open God’s Word to you so well and wisely that you will want to delve into it yourselves, to read Scripture prayerfully, to make it part of your routine, to let the lamp of God’s Word guide your feet, and to let that lamp shine brightly in your homes and hearts.
A Word of Hope
In the Gospel, we see Jesus doing just that. He enters the synagogue in Nazareth where he was raised, and before an expectant congregation takes the scroll of Isaiah in hand. He reads from it words that fueled the hope of his people for centuries, words Isaiah first addressed to the poor, ragtag remnant of Israel. They are words of hope, words of liberation – liberty to captives, sight to the blind, freedom from oppression, the declaration of a year acceptable to the Lord, a perpetual year of jubilee.
Jesus sets aside the scroll and says, “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.” Jesus proclaims himself to be Savior, the fulfillment of all God promised, the One who came to set us free from whatever it is that is holding us captive, whatever it is that prevents us from leading a life of love of service.
Pope Francis proclaimed the current Holy Year dedicated to hope, precisely to reawaken our faith and our trust in the Lord who remains with us, not only in Word but also in the Sacraments of the Church, especially the Eucharist and the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Your pastor along with all of us who serve you are to be witnesses to hope, living witnesses to our hope in Christ Jesus, witnesses who have staked our lives on who Jesus is, what he taught, and what he has done to free us from the captivity of sin, the captivity of self. And while this year of jubilee comes along once in a quarter century, it reminds us that the Lord is always with us, always awakening in us “the hope that does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit” (Rom 5:5).
Gifts That Differ
Finally, in First Corinthians, St. Paul reminds us that the Spirit has poured out upon the baptized an immense variety of gifts, gifts and ministries that differ, but also gifts that related to one another the way the parts of a body relate to the body in its entirety. No one, not even Jesus, could accomplish his ministry alone. That is true for all of us who are your pastors. We are grateful that the Spirit of the Lord pours out his gifts upon you, and with you we seek to discern with you what those gifts are, and how they can be harvested and harnessed to accomplish the mission of spreading the Gospel, reaching the unchurched and the alienated, helping everyone to know the richness of the Word of God, the power of the Sacraments, the hope that is ours in Christ Jesus.
Thank you for Fr. Kevin for your leadership and service. Thank you, dear parishioners, for your leadership and service. And may the Lord who is the giver of every good gift fill your hearts with hope and joy, now and always. God bless you and keep you always in his love!