Homily for Saturday of the 28th Week in Ordinary Time

As Jesus' disciples, we must be unafraid in our witness to Him in sharing His message of love, mercy, compassion, and redemption with others. Jesus promised us that in our struggles to follow His call, we will not be left alone and that the Holy Spirit will help us and give us the words we need when facing challenges and difficulties in this mission.

Sharing our faith in today's world is very difficult; our culture can be very opposed to religion in general and, particularly, to the Catholic faith because of the many scandals in which our leaders have been involved and which the media has so strongly publicized.

We can be discouraged into silence and invisibility with so much negative commentary and feelings against our faith. But we need to be strong and share our faith with others. We have Jesus' promise that the Holy Spirit will be with us, and we hope the same Spirit will bring healing to our Church and its members. As St. Paul says, the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. We must keep praying for the courage to be true to the LORD who gave Himself for us, giving us life through His death on the Cross.