A Firm Foundation

Homily for Thursday of the 12th Week in Ordinary Time

One of my favorite hymns is entitled “How Firm a Foundation.” The first verse reads this way:

How firm a foundation, you saints of the Lord,
is laid for your faith in his excellent Word!
What more can he say than to you he has said,
to you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?

There are five more verses, but I have no intention of reading them all to you. The first verse speaks about the foundation we have in the Word of God. It goes without saying that the Gospels are the core of that Word as they tell us the story of Jesus, the Incarnate Word. Today’s Gospel passage is the conclusion of the Sermon on the Mount which we have been reading for the past two and a half weeks. Jesus concludes this discourse with a parable about foundations.

We all know the importance of a strong foundation. Buildings would tumble without them. Yet we cannot see the foundation of any building. We simply trust that it is there, supporting the building. The same can be said of our faith. We cannot see the foundation of our faith. Yet we trust that Jesus is there, supporting us as we make our way through this life.

Fr. Lawrence Jagdfeld, O.F.M., Administrator