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Bishop's Homily for the Third Sunday of Ordinary Time

January 19, 2025

Homily of the Most Reverend Larry Silva, Bishop of Honolulu
[St. John Vianney Church, Kailua]

Jews, Muslims, and Christians are often referred to as “People of the Book,” because our faith life is based on written Scriptures.  For Muslims, it is the Koran.  For Jews, it is what we Christians refer to as the Old Testament.  And for Christians, it is both the Old and New Testaments, since Jesus Christ is the center of our Christian faith.  As we celebrate this Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, which Pope Francis has designated “Sunday of the Word of God,” I recall an intervention at a Synod of Bishops by Cardinal Marc Ouelette. He said that, while we Christians are indeed “People of the Book,” we would be more accurately described as “People of the Word.”  This is because we believe that a living Person is the Word, and that person is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the Word who became flesh and lived among us.  It is through the written Word of God that we learn about the living Word of God, Jesus Christ, so that we may enter more intimately into a relationship with him.

The Muslims believe that the Koran was almost literally dictated by God himself to his prophet Mohammed.  Some Christians also have this mistaken notion about the Bible.  They believe that God dictated every word of the Sacred Scriptures.  But, as I said, this is a mistaken notion, because for us the Word of God is living and active.  Yes, for sure it was inspired by the Holy Spirit, by God himself, but not in the sense that God dictated every word to be written down.  Our Scriptures are based on living encounters of people with God, the stories of faith and betrayal, of forgiveness and hope.  Before anything was written down, there were experiences.  For example, in our First Reading today we hear about the priest Ezra reading from the Law of God before the people and how effectively it touched them.  But the event happened before someone recorded it.  The same could be said of any of the stories we find written in the Old or New Testament.  God encountered his people, then he inspired someone to write down a record of the encounter for the benefit of future generations.

This is so important to know, because, even though we believe that the Scriptures were finished shortly after the death of the last Apostles of Jesus, and that nothing can now be added to them, the experiences that these Scriptures are based upon are continuing here and now among us.  St. Paul reminds us that everyone one of us – though we are all different – is an important member of the living Body of Christ, the risen One, who continues to live among us, speaking his saving Word.  When we bring healing to those who are sick in body or sick in spirit, we are speaking the living Word of God.  When we cast out demons of self-hatred, of hatred for others, and of depression and despair, the Word of God continues to be living and effective, sharper than a two-edged sword, as St. Paul tells us. When we visit those who are in prison or help them get on their feet just after they are released, we are making the Scripture passing of giving liberty to captives a reality that is fulfilled in our own day.  When we help others who only see doom and gloom in their lives and in the world to see light, and hope, and love, we are opening the eyes of the blind here and now, and thus fulfilling the Scriptures.  We are taking seriously our call to be members of the Body of Christ, so that he who is the Word can continue to take flesh in all aspects of human life.

Of course, it is easy for us to go our own ways, to think that we are helping people when in fact we may only be trying to aggrandize our own egos.  We can easily be led astray by voices that are not the Lord’s voice and do not want to lead us in the ways of righteousness.  This is why it is so important that all of us be immersed in the Word of God, reading the Scriptures, meditating on them, wrestling with them, studying them, and digesting them fully, so that the living Word, who is Jesus, can always be the one to guide us on our journey and in our service to one another.

Though no new Sacred Scriptures will be written, we are all called to be one with Jesus, who took the Sacred Scriptures and declared them to be fulfilled not only by his words but by his actions and interactions.  We are privileged to be invited into intimate and holy communion with the Word of God, so that together – each with his or her own talents and gifts – can make the Word of God become flesh every day in the world in which we live.