December 21, 2025 The Fourth Sunday of Advent (Fr. Eric Tellez)
This beautiful gospel from Matthew really touches me each time because there's a phrase that means a lot to me and hopefully to you as well on this fourth Sunday of Advent. And it's this, that you will name the child Jesus, and he will save his people from their sins. The word sin in the bible in Hebrew is said, In Greek, it's, and both those words mean missing the mark. So sin has its origin from archery, that in the ancient Greek world, when an archer then would release the arrow and miss and drift off target, the instructor would say, you missed. And it's not like you're a terrible person.
Speaker 2:You're condemned. You should be ashamed. God is displeased with you. But rather, not pointing fingers, but discerning a life that no longer is aimed at the heart of God and the way of God. And so what does an archer do when they miss the mark?
Speaker 2:Well, they work on their form. They breathe and work on their breathing. They work on technique, and they look to realign their focus on the target. And, you know, that's what prayer does. Today, I wanna talk about prayer helping us to deal with sin and some things that might help us have a healthier attitude as Christians in dealing with sin.
Speaker 2:Our theme, Lord, teach us to pray, again, is the disciples asking Jesus who models all the time, even in his busyness of healing and teaching and preaching, that he goes to pray to the father. And the disciples are so moved that they say, if we're gonna be a follower, Lord, teach us to pray. And that's what all of us need to be asking the Lord constantly. So the first Sunday of Advent, and I'll just briefly go this because you can go back on our website and listen to the podcast. But on the first Sunday of Advent, I talked about invitation.
Speaker 2:The first step of prayer is inviting God into our lives, taking the time. Saint Patrick's parishioners are the most busiest people on earth, aren't you? Some things that are very busy and things you make busy that really aren't. That's you and I. And yet, I invite you to consider ten minutes.
Speaker 2:Even if nine and a half minutes are just mind wandering and thinking, oh, what am I doing here? This is so hard. It might only be thirty seconds you give to God, but it's inviting God to be part of your life. And making that commitment is saying, that can make a difference. And I heard back from parishioners who say, whew, it was tough, but it's helped me so far.
Speaker 2:The second week, I talked about expectations, that there are good expectations. I wanna be a good father, a good wife, a good mother, a good father, a good member of the family, a good worker, a good classmate. Those are great expectations, but sometimes expectations are out of whack. When we have high expectations on other people, how they should behave, because we would rebehave that way. And trying to have our expectations done better towards God is a way a healthier way.
Speaker 2:Last week, I got more comments than any others because I talked about praying with patience. I guess we all struggle with patience. How to be patient with the lord? And part of it is moving prayer from demand to relationship. From demand to relationship.
Speaker 2:God, I need, I want, I expect. That's not patience because then we give up our hands and go, I tried prayer and it ain't working. That's a lot of times you and me, and to go from relationship to know it's ongoing. And so today, just share a few points. Just choose one.
Speaker 2:You don't have to know all, and you can listen to the podcast later if you're moved or wanna learn a little bit more about it. So the first thing about prayer in dealing with sin is this, that prayer brings awareness and honesty. Sometimes people can say, I have no sin. I don't sin. Part of it is they haven't developed that yet because first John in the bible would say, anyone who says they have no sin is a liar.
Speaker 2:It's not father Eric saying that. We do sin. We do fall short. We do miss the mark. I think one of the challenges in the Catholic church in the way that it preaches on confession and forgiveness is that there's some people so heavenly talking about going to confession that we do very little to help people know that they can experience the mercy of god daily, daily.
Speaker 2:The scriptures and the church teaches we can go directly to god every day. The Jesuits do a great job called the examine, that each day, either in the beginning or the end of the day, you reflect on your sins. But a lot of times, what we do then is that we have people that go up and say, I haven't killed anyone. That's kind of the standard they use with no opportunity to know what's really going on in one one's life. So prayer can help us become aware when we are in not right relationship with god and one another, and it happens because we miss the mark.
Speaker 2:And prayer helps us to realign to realign what? To target god's heart, god's way. The second thing, prayer opens us up to God's mercy and forgiveness. Here's what scholars say Jesus does three things in helping us deal with sin. The first thing that Jesus says is call out the sin.
Speaker 2:In other words, call out that you're a sinner. Again, just because you're not aware of it doesn't mean it's not there. But call it out to say, I am a sinner. I do fall short. I can see that in my life.
Speaker 2:So Jesus is saying, just admit that. The second thing is to name it. A lot of times when you and I go to confession, we're so scared because we think the priest is gonna judge us hardly or harshly or something. And when you name it, it doesn't own you. You know, Bob, it's the denial is more than a river in Egypt, isn't it?
Speaker 2:That sometimes we deny that we're sinners or we deny that it's wrong or not a sin. And that's why to name it is important. And the third thing is to lament, express sorrow. That's what we need to do because here's what can happen to Catholics sometimes. We treat confessions like a dump truck.
Speaker 2:Beep beep beep. And you tell the priest 50 things because you wanna be sure you don't forget anything. And you know what? You can't work on 50 things. And so after that, you feel good for about ten minutes, and then when you hit your next sin, you just feel shame again.
Speaker 2:Oh god. I gotta go back. And there's no working on transformation, conversion, and change. That's why one of my favorite penances to give, and penance is not punishment, but something to do to thank God for his mercy is imagine Jesus walking one full day with you. What's the one thing he would ask you to work on?
Speaker 2:If Jesus were to walk one full day, what would he ask you to work on to be a better disciple? And you gotta go more than just say, I gotta say my prayers. I gotta make up my bed. You should be doing those things already. You gotta go deeper.
Speaker 2:I need to be more charitable with my mouth because I'm negative and I downgrade people and I'm not very kind. I need to be more charitable with my time. I need to do better because I'm stuck on the phone all the time, and I don't do things that I ought to do. You know, I don't always am present to my parents or to my family. I use foul language towards them.
Speaker 2:I overjudge people, and I always think negatively, or I don't like and I discriminate against others. Those are the things that are real transformational, and that's how we lament, express sorrow, not just go beep beep beep. Oh, I feel good now for ten minutes. Real transformation. Prayer strengthens us against temptation.
Speaker 2:In a few moments, you're going to see the chrism oil placed on these children, just like at your baptism and mine. And that is strength against temptation. Temptation is not a sin. Even Jesus was tempted. Sin is when we know we are doing wrong, and we do that.
Speaker 2:And yet, you and I have the constant courage to look at our baptism. Many times, we treat our baptism like the flu shot. You get it once and you forget about it. And yet, that's why I I'm gonna tell you this. I roll my eyes every time people say, I've lost faith.
Speaker 2:No, you haven't. You have everything you need by your baptism. You have more strength. The devil tempted me and made me do it. That is b s.
Speaker 2:Because you have more power than the devil by your baptism. And in a few moments, remember that when we put the chrism on there. It helps us to be strengthened against temptation, against sin, and we just simply recall our baptism and not saying, well, I got it when I was two months old. It's constantly giving, constantly life giving as well. Prayer helps us to refocus on what God desires.
Speaker 2:Missing the mark is saying what I want, what I think should be done. And really to be able to be on mark is to realign, to breathe, to look at our form, to really focus again so that we don't miss the mark when it comes to god. We miss the mark when we stay away from sacraments. Here's where the church struggles with. People have decided their own spirituality that mortal sin, which can happen.
Speaker 2:It is in the catechism. But if you look closely at the catechism, it's pretty hard to do. But what you guys do is Google your Catholic faith and you go to sites that have a 100 mortal sins. And then you say, can't go because I'm being told that I will offend God, and I'm I'm not in the state of grace. And yet, the very sacrament that can heal you, you stay away from.
Speaker 2:It's like having medicine in your medicine cabinet and say, when I'm feeling better, I'll start taking the medicine. And you know, here's the thing, is if mortal sin keeps you away, you think you're doing good, yet how many people I see coming up just like me, could you watch me too, who really struggle with things that aren't mortal sin but are pretty serious. Every week there are people who come to communion who cheat, who are unethical, who are not faithful, who lie, who wound people and won't forgive, who are resentful. That's you and me every week. And if I watch you and you watch me, I pray for you because this sacrament is healing.
Speaker 2:Remember, Pope Francis writes down communion, the Eucharist is not a reward for good behavior. It is medicinal. It's meant for the sinner and yet you and I have to stay away. My grandparents used to live in Lordsburg, New Mexico. Go look it up if you don't know where it's at because I think a stagecoach goes there still from some book I read.
Speaker 2:And in Lourdesburg, there's the church, and this was many years ago, so you won't know the the priest there. But, I went with the family to a Saturday night mass and the church was packed. And at communion time of that packed church, only three people went to communion. Three people. Is God pleased because they stayed away?
Speaker 2:Or Lordsburg must be the most sinful place on the earth? And you know it was a missed opportunity to come and be healed. You are not perfect and neither am I. But Christ is ready to heal and Christ's grace is more strong than your mortal sin or mine. And mortal sin is pretty hard to do.
Speaker 2:Mortal means it is serious that it can damage the relationship with God. Some of the things they're saying are not mortal, but they make it that way. Now, there is serious sin, but we come to the Lord for forgiveness. And finally, prayer restores our relationship to god. That sometimes you and I feel unworthy.
Speaker 2:You and I maybe in our lives have never experienced unconditional love. You hear it talked about. You hear the preacher say, god loves you unconditionally, and some of you probably live in relationships or have in the past there where you were always loved conditionally. You never were accepted for who you are, and you always felt unworthy. That's what people bring to their experience.
Speaker 2:And prayer in dealing when we miss the mark can remind us that not any sin will keep us away from the grace and unconditional love. So even if you've never experienced unconditional love in your life, the Lord is ready whenever you are. And so sin, we missed the mark. Let us then realign. It's time to try again.