26th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2025 C

INTRO:

I am a routine person!
As much as I can, I try and follow the same pattern of my schedule…

For example…when I go somewhere…. SAME ROUTE…. someone can tell me “Oh try this shortcut… I DON’T DO IT!!!

I FEEL COMFORTABLE, SAFE, FOLLOWING MY PATTERNS AND ROUTINES!

Well, a while ago, the routine did me dirty, so to speak!

I was meeting for lunch downtown Cleveland…
Typically crowded…difficult to find a parking spot, but in this one area…I have always been lucky. Lo and behold that famous day…WOW spots all over the place waiting for MY parked car!
I park.
Get into my lunch meeting.
I finish and come out to come home and there it is …
A TOW truck with my car on it!!!!

Tell story: I NEGLECTED TO SEE THE NEWLY POSTED SIGNS!

I DIDN’T OBSERVE WHAT WAS RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME…

So how does that fit for TODAY’S Gospel of the RICH MAN and LAZARUS?

-look around the church, can you see anybody with RED HAIR?
-can you see someone who came to church ALONE?
Now try.
-can you see someone who needs some kind of help?
-can you see someone who is sad?

The last two may be a bit difficult, but I believe Jesus had a mission to instruct us to break down the difficulty of seeing these kinds of people who may be needing some help or are sad…..and to get involved with them Everybody wants to accuse the RICH MAN of BEING RICH and EVIL! The RICH man’s sin was not that he was rich, but that during his earthly life:

HE DID NOT SEE THE LAZARUS’S OF SOCIETY, RIGHT IN FRONT OF HIM AND DO SOMETHING FOR THEM.

I can almost hear Jesus say,
“Hey everybody, walk with your heads UP…look around and see where you can HELP someone!!!

Eyes up and on each other!

That is what this church is about.

CONCLUSION:

In a few moments I will hold up the consecrated host and wine and say BEHOLD the Lamb of God. And you will look up, and it is that posture of life, that this Gospel calls each of us to do.

Eyes up and ON EACH OTHER!