Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church - Arlington, VA
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  • Home
  • About Us
    • Staff >
      • Parish Administration & Communication
    • News and Bulletins
    • Just a Thought...or two...
    • Learning Alley
    • Contact Us
    • Register
    • Our History
    • Gallery
  • Worship
    • Mass Times and Schedule
    • Live-stream Schedule & Special Mass Programs
    • Liturgical Ministries
    • Sacraments
    • Music Ministry
  • Our Faith
    • Faith Formation 2022-2023 >
      • Family Circles, Foundation & Family Mass 2022-2023
      • Sacramental Preparation 2022-2023
      • CLW 2021-2022
      • Registration
    • Formacion en la Fe 2022-2023 >
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October 31, 2021

10/29/2021

 
So what is the greatest commandment?: ‘Loving God with your whole being and your neighbor as yourself.’...which Jesus says is worth more than all burnt offerings and all sacrifices and no commandment greater than these!

A very powerful statement to be sure, but it seems we still haven’t got it! We still put all kinds of rules and regulations and pious practices ahead of this “one”, clearly stated, commandment. Even though Jesus was so very clear about it, it seems that we still insist on putting all these other “things” ahead of this one straight forward commandment.

Imagine if we were to order our lives around this singular commandment -- imagine how the world might be. Imagine if we focused on truly loving God and our neighbor as if that was the singular organizing principle of our lives, of our church, of our public and social policies! Our whole world view would change...we would see migrants and immigrants and refugees not as strangers and threats but as sisters and brothers. We would see the poor, the needy and vulnerable not as taxing on our resources, but as family in need and respond to their needs out of love.

Our primary motivation would no longer focuses on just ‘what I can get or do for myself’ but would look to God and to my neighbor. Suddenly the wellbeing and safety of “the other” would take on a whole new significance in my life in the building up of “the Reign of God” here on earth!

So my stance on issues like just war theory, euthanasia, abortion, equal access to education, just wages, racial justice, affordable housing, equal access to healthcare, compassionate care of the elderly, informed and mentally ill, would all be shaped by my love of God and my love of neighbor, knowing them to be sisters and brothers.

If all these issues were viewed solely through the lens of this one commandment of loving God with our whole being and our neighbor as ourselves it would call me to learn to let go of all my biases.

Imagine the social and political impact it would have in our country and around the world if all Christians or even if just a majority of Christians began to work towards building up Jesus’ vision of the Reign of God!

And of course imagine the impact it would have on the church itself, if all the priests, deacons, nuns, brothers, bishops and cardinals used this commandment as their primary lens through which they exercised every aspect of their ministry -- it would be transformative! Clericalism and careerism would be replaced with servant leadership which would bring about an end to the ongoing leadership scandal in the church that Pope Francis so often de- cries.

Within our country all our political discourse would radically change -- poverty, racism, the marginalization of others would all be things of the past...imagine! Jesus did...No, he commanded that it be so! This is his vision of “the Reign of God”, and it is the challenge that Jesus places before us as his disciples...for us to put love of God and to love our neighbor first!

What would my life look like if I set aside any resentments or pettiness I might have and choose to accept and love people just the way they were regardless of how wrong I might believe them to be? How do I best show my love of God and my love of neighbor? What might I need to change in my life to make Jesus’ commandment more fully the standard by which I live?
​

Blessings,
Fr Tim 


October 24, 2021

10/23/2021

 
In this Sunday’s Gospel the blind man, Bartimaeus, sitting on the edge of the road begging, recognizes and “sees” who Jesus is and cries out to him “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Because, through the eyes of faith Bartimaeus has seen who Jesus is, and he is able to ask to be healed ...“Lord I want to see”!

Those words could very well be our cry for clarity in the way we “see” the world around us...these words may well be the exclamation of our deep desire to live more fully in Christ and to see as Jesus saw.

We want to believe more, we want to see more...but we are hindered by our individual and collective blindness and it can hold us back from following Christ with complete and utter abandon. The Word we hear today is meant to stir us in our discipleship, to rouse our “Gospel sight” that we might see the world as God sees it.... that we might have our blindness removed and truly see the poor and marginalized as our sisters and brothers and reach out to them. That our Gospel sight roused, we might see clearly the systemic injustices in our society; the scourge of systemic racism and bigotry towards all those who are other than me. That we might see the injustice of our broken immigration system that separates families and denies asylum to those honestly seeking a safe home, a place to live without the constant threat of death. That we might see how misogyny holds back our mothers, our sisters and our daughters and cheats our country of the richness of the gifts they have to share with the world.

Let us pray for “Gospel eyes” that help us “to see” solutions to war and global and local poverty, solutions for the hunger and suffering of migrants and refugees sojourning around the globe searching for freedom and justice...searching for a home. Let us pray to work for and “to see” solutions to all that divides our nation that we might live in peace and harmony, seeing each “other” as equals, as sister and brother, as God see us! In the midst of all the suffering, hurt and pain in our country and our world today let us, like blind Bartimaeus cry out, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on us and let us see a way forward to build up your Reign here on earth!
​

Blessings,
Fr Tim 


October 15th, 2021

10/15/2021

 
I am amazed at the audacity of James and John in today’s Gospel...asking...no, telling Jesus that they want him to “do for us whatever we ask”! Who do they think they are? Better yet, who do they think Jesus is?

The audacity to demand that Jesus do whatever they ask of him is unbelievable. And of course, it ignites the ire of other disciples, most likely because the others thought that James and John might be getting something more than they would get.

Jesus calls them all together and explains, once again, that to be a leader in the Reign of God is to be a servant...it is to make oneself available to the other. He says that the one who wishes to be the greatest among them must be a servant to the rest and the one who wishes to be first must be slave to all.

This image turns our vision of the world on its head, that the most important among us is to act as the least and to serve the others -- especially the poor, the social outcast and the marginalized. In Jesus’ world, as in ours today, servants were considered to be at the bottom of the ladder of society. They are the invisible ones, the expendable ones.

Yet in the Reign of God, the servants are the truly special ones. By their service to others they follow Jesus Christ, and through their actions proclaim their citizenship in the Reign of God. So let us reflect this week on our own place in the world and in the Reign of God. To whom am I called to serve? Who serves me and how do I treat them? How do I make myself available to the poor and marginalized; to those in need?
​

Blessings,
Fr Tim 


October 10, 2021

10/9/2021

 

In today
’s Gospel, Jesus sets aside the law of Moses regarding Jewish divorce law. Jesus makes it clear that while “the law” allowed a man, in a rather simple manner, to divorce his wife and kick her out of his house, he found it unacceptable. In the first century Middle Eastern world women were basically the property of men.
​

They had little or no identity aside from that which they had through their connection to male members of their family. They were either, a man’s daughter, sister, mother, or wife. Women rarely had an identity of their own which was not rooted in some relationship to a male.

When a man divorced his wife, she lost her identity within the community. When she had married her husband her primary identity came through him, no longer through her birth family. By the action of her husband, the divorce would have cut her off from the community...she would have been seen as bringing shame on her family of origin and therefore likely not welcome in their home nor in the home of another man because she would have been shamed herself.

For all practical purposes the woman (and often her children) was turned out into the streets to fend for herself and for her children. It is this reality that Jesus found unacceptable. In this case the woman and her children became the “the very least of the society”, those for whom Jesus claimed the rest of the society was responsible.

Jesus’ concern is about the woman and the children. Mosaic law allowed for divorce but without concern for what happened to the woman. There was no court that divided up the property of the couple in an equitable manner, it all went to the man. The man was the owner of all the property and objects contained in the home. Moses didn’t take the shame that would befall the woman into consideration when he wrote the law concerning divorce. Jesus said that it was because of “the hardness of their hearts.”

How do I respond to the needs of the “rejected ones” and those “turned out” by society? And for us men...how do I view women’s place in society, in the church and in my personal relationships...is it in line with Jesus’ teachings?

Blessings,
Fr Tim 

October 3, 2021

10/2/2021

 
In today’s Gospel, Jesus sets aside the law of Moses regarding Jewish divorce law. Jesus makes it clear that while “the law” allowed a man, in a rather simple manner, to divorce his wife and kick her out of his house, he found it unacceptable. In the first century Middle Eastern world women were basically the property of men.

They had little or no identity aside from that which they had through their connection to male members of their family. They were either, a man’s daughter, sister, mother, or wife. Women rarely had an identity of their own which was not rooted in some relationship to a male.

When a man divorced his wife, she lost her identity within the community. When she had married her husband her primary identity came through him, no longer through her birth family. By the action of her husband, the divorce would have cut her off from the community...she would have been seen as bringing shame on her family of origin and therefore likely not welcome in their home nor in the home of another man because she would have been shamed herself.

For all practical purposes the woman (and often her children) was turned out into the streets to fend for herself and for her children. It is this reality that Jesus found unacceptable. In this case the woman and her children became the “the very least of the society”, those for whom Jesus claimed the rest of the society was responsible.

Jesus’ concern is about the woman and the children. Mosaic law allowed for divorce but without concern for what happened to the woman. There was no court that divided up the property of the couple in an equitable manner, it all went to the man. The man was the owner of all the property and objects contained in the home. Moses didn’t take the shame that would befall the woman into consideration when he wrote the law concerning divorce. Jesus said that it was because of “the hardness of their hearts.”

How do I respond to the needs of the “rejected ones” and those “turned out” by society? And for us men...how do I view women’s place in society, in the church and in my personal relationships...is it in line with Jesus’ teachings?
​

Blessings,
Fr Tim 

    Author

    Fr. Tim Hickey, C.S.Sp.

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Our Lady Queen of Peace
2700 South 19th Street
Arlington, Virginia, 22204, USA
703-979-5580 Office
703-979-5590 Fax
office@ourladyqueenofpeace.org
Office hours: Mon-Fri, 8:30 am - 4:30 pm (closed on federal holidays)
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Weekend Mass Schedule
Saturday: Vigil Mass at 5:30 pm
Sunday: 8 am, 9:30 am, 11:15 am, 1 pm (Spanish),
​6 pm (young adult)

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