Life Giving Water

Homily for the Feast of the Dedication of St. John Lateran

If you were to visit the website of the Development Office of Sacred Heart Province, you would find there a number of pictures of people in African villages standing around a newly opened well in their village. During Pope Francis’s Holy Year of Mercy, the Development Office told our donors that a portion of every donation would be used to dig wells in these villages. The goal was dig two wells during that year. I believe the office was able to dig four. The pictures on the website show the children playing in the flowing water with the smiling adults standing around the pump watching their children dance with joy.

The image comes to mind as I hear the words of today’s psalm:  “There is a stream whose runlets gladden the city of God” or, as the refrain has it:  “The waters of the river gladden the city of God.”  Ezekiel’s vision of a river flowing from the temple in Jerusalem, depicting the gift of God’s life, finds new emphasis and depth on this feast day as an image of the Holy Spirit flooding the life of the Church, now and in the age to come.

This feast gives us the opportunity to renew our belief that the Holy Spirit remains the soul, the animator of the Body of Christ, providing a hidden though powerful source of life, light, holiness, renewal, inspiration, and, perhaps most of all, joy.  Yes, this Holy Spirit brings joy to the Church in every age and in every human heart. 

These days in the life of the Church seem to be accompanied by much darkness together with a yearning for much renewal.  Today’s feast focuses our attention on the light rather than the darkness and reminds us that the Holy Spirit never abandons the Church but, as history shows, brings unexpected light out of the darkest of places.  May this light, be our hope and our joy.

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