On September 18, 2025, Bishop Daniel E. Garcia was installed as the Sixth Bishop of the Diocese of Austin. Bishop Garcia delivered a powerful homily.
I am blessed and grateful to my brother deacons, Deacon Guadalupe, for sharing with me the link to the YouTube recording of Bishop's homily and to Deacon Mike for taking the time to transcribe Bishop's homily and sharing it with me.
I invite you all to read or listen to Bishop's homily.
. . .
Today’s first reading from the book of the prophet Isaiah is often used and deemed appropriate for the ordination of a priest, deacon or bishop. But it reminds us all that by virtue of our baptism, we who have been anointed and are called to be those messengers of hope, of joy, of mercy and compassion that our world today is so much in need of my friends. Our world is hungry for the word of God, for the bread of life and the cup of salvation, but it is also hungry for justice and mercy. Look around every day there are stories after stories of hurt and misery. We find them in our families, amidst our friends and co-workers. We may not be able to prevent some of the hurt that is experienced, but we can make decisions as to how we choose to respond when we encounter these events.
About an hour and a half south of where I lived in Carmel, California there is the New Camaldoli Hermitage. It is situated about two miles up the San Lucia Mountains overlooking the Pacific coast. The site is unbelievably beautiful. The Camaldolese Monks offer anyone who wants to go a place that removes us from the everyday stuff that can cloud our vision and obstruct our hearts from listening to the voice of God. Soon after I arrived there I commented to the prior, after driving up the crooked road to the Hermitage. I said, I understand that this is a good place to get away and listen to God, but why is it that you monks cannot find God down at the bottom of the mountain? I said this in jest, but not completely. Most of us here are not called to that kind of life.
Most of us are called to come down the mountain to find God through the experiences and people we encounter along the journey of life. God calls you and me to get our hands and feet dirty. He calls us to walk with people who are hurting and who find themselves in situations that are very messy and complex. He challenges you and me to seek the good in each and every person, even those who have hurt or offended us. And, why? Because I believe that God has created each and every one of us in his own image. But that image can become disfigured over time and perhaps undesirable, but to God, no one is undesirable. Jesus never stopped trying to soften people’s hearts regardless of who they may be or where they are from.
Today we live in a world where all too often we find ourselves fostering division and hate and angst towards those who believe different from us. We have to relearn how to have conversations where we can disagree with one another, yet still be able to sit at table and enjoy each other’s presence rather than looking for what we do not like in the other. In my office, ever since I was a young priest, I always hung a picture of Dr Martin Luther King Jr, A hero of mine that has the bottom of that picture, I have a dream. My history and experiences as a child, a teenager and as a priest in the church in regards to race and religious indifferences in the church and in our society has often been heartbreaking, yet real. Because of my own experiences, I can tell you that I have no tolerance for racism, prejudice, or unacceptance because one is different or thinks different than I do. We need to call it out when we see it or experience it.
You would think that we could learn from the errors of our past and mistakes of our past and the history of the church, but also in our world. We as a church must not give into the voices of those who want to sow seeds of hate and fan the flame of division when it comes to race or religious differences. Pain and hurt can be found on so many levels in our society. In our world, we experience it in our politics. We see it so palpably in Ukraine or Russia, South Sudan, Gaza and Israel just to name a few places. So many of our family members and friends experience and suffer from mental health, domestic violence, physical and sexual abuse. Where are our voices when we see it? Where are our actions in response? I believe God weeps each and every time any of our brothers and sisters are hurt by actions, words, gestures, thoughts, but also through our indifferences to their struggles.
We cannot stand by and say we love God and yet look away from our neighbor even if they are here legally or not. The hateful and viral rhetoric towards our immigrant brothers and sisters today is shameful. We will all be held accountable to our actions and lack thereof.
In his apostolic exhortation, evangelical Pope Francis explained the woe of the world without weeping, elaborating on Jesus’ words. Pope Francis warns us in this quote almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people’s pain and feeling a need to help them as though all this were someone else’s responsibility and not our own.
My friends, it is time for you and me to change the way we treat one another, especially the least among us, those who live on the margins and peripheries of our society and those who are different from us. If our church is to be one that is to grow, we must first and foremost make people feel welcome and help people to see that they have gifts that are to be honored and treasured.
Sunday after Sunday we gather around an altar like this, not because we are perfect but because we are not perfect. We all seek the Lord’s guidance and wisdom to become more like him. It is from this table of the Eucharist and this table of the Word that we are strengthened to be Christ for one another.
So my friends, please join me in working together here in diocese of Austin to make this local church a beacon of goodness, mercy, hope and joy for all who visit and all who call this diocese home. Today I invoke the patron saint of the diocese of Monterrey Saint Junipero Serra and our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, the patroness of the diocese of Austin. As together we seek to walk humbly with God. May the Eucharist we receive this day give us courage to be the men and women that God is calling us to be gathered as one family in Christ and with confidence that comes from the Holy Spirit. We offer our prayers for the Universal church, for this local church and for the needs of the whole world.
Click to watch Bishop's homily at his Installation on 9/18/2025:
No comments:
Post a Comment