Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

31 May 2025 -- Visitation of Mary

So 3, 14-18; Rom 12, 9-16; Luke 1, 39-56

Homily

          In the first two chapters of his Gospel, Luke introduces us to all the major themes of his Gospel. He demonstrates his deep knowledge of the Old Testament, drawing on it for many of the images he uses in his highly symbolic stories.

          Mary's visit to her cousin Elizabeth is described with all the imagery of the transport of the Ark of the Covenant described in chapter 6 of the 2nd Book of Samuel. Mary is presented as the new Ark of the Covenant, in which the Lord of Lords dwells; and, just as the first Ark was carried across the mountains of Judah to the house of Obed-Edom of Gath, where it was a source of blessings, so Mary races across the mountains of Judah, carrying the Son of God within her and bringing joy and grace to the house of Elizabeth, her cousin. And just as David had danced before the Ark on that occasion, so John the Baptist moved with joy in his mother Elizabeth's womb before Mary, the new Ark.

          In the rest of the story, Luke tells us that when the time was fulfilled, Mary gave birth to a son, the First-Born - not ‘her first-born’ as most translations say, but ‘the’ First-Born - the First-Born par excellence, that is to say, the First-Born of the eternal Father, the first-born from the dead, the first-born of a multitude of brothers. This is what allows Saint Paul, in his Second Letter to the Corinthians - which we had as our second reading - to say that Christ was raised from the dead as the ‘firstfruits’ of all those who had fallen asleep, so that just as death came through a man, the resurrection was also to come through a man.

          As the first-born of many brothers and sisters, Christ is the first of many to rise. And who is the first human being to be received into glory in this way, if not his own mother, the mother who had carried him to Elizabeth's house to make her Son's forerunner leap for joy, and, making a mockery of time and chronology, had burst into an admirable song of praise?

          This song of praise that Luke puts into Mary's mouth sums up all the songs of praise of the Old Covenant and all those that we too are called to sing, as well as all the songs of praise that will be proclaimed by human voices until the whole multitude of the resurrected have followed their first-born in the way of the resurrection.

With Mary, let us sing the praises of the One who, full of tenderness, like a father or a mother, bends over her little child. Let us make ourselves small and sing the praises of Him who honours the lowly and humble and rejects the proud. Let us make ourselves poor, in heart and in truth, and let us cultivate our thirst for Him, and sing the praises of Him who fills the poor and the hungry with good things and sends the rich away empty-handed. And however conscious we may be of our sins, let us put all our hope in Him who promised the abundance of his mercies not only to our father Abraham, but also to all his descendants, of whom we are, by faith.

Armand Veilleux

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

Homélie pour le Vendredi de la 6ème semaine de Pâques

30 mai 2025

Actes 18, 9-18; Jean 16, 20-23a 

Homélie

Comme nous l’avons vu la semaine dernière, les Actes des Apôtres nous donnent une description admirablement réaliste des interactions et même des tensions au sein de la première communauté chrétienne de Jérusalem. Nous avons vu comment Barnabé était allé chercher Paul à Tarses et comment ils avaient travaillé ensemble avant de se séparer et de poursuivre leur œuvre d’évangélisation, chacun de son côté. Aujourd’hui nous voyons les difficultés de Paul avec les Juifs d’Athènes et ses premières difficultés avec la justice romaine. Heureusement, pour cette fois-ci, tout finit bien. Ce ne sera pas toujours le cas, comme nous savons.

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

29 May 2025 - Solemnity of the Ascension

Acts 1:1-11; Heb 9:24...10:23; Lk 24:46-53

Homily

          This is the fortieth day of our celebration of the Lord's Passover, which will conclude in ten days' time with the Solemnity of Pentecost. What we are celebrating today, on the feast of the Ascension, is just one facet of the same Paschal Mystery. Indeed, it was not until the 5th century that Christians began to celebrate the Ascension liturgically as a festival distinct from the Resurrection. In fact, these two feasts are simply two facets of the same mystery.

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

Le 29 mai 2025 – Solennité de l'Ascension

Ac 1, 1-11; He 9,24...10,23; Lc 24, 46-53

H O M É L I E

          Nous en sommes au quarantième jour de notre célébration de la Pâque du Seigneur, qui s’achèvera, dans dix jours, avec la solennité de la Pentecôte. Ce que nous célébrons aujourd’hui, en la fête de l’Ascension, n’est qu’une facette du même mystère pascal. Ce n’est d’ailleurs qu’à partir du 5ème siècle que les Chrétiens commencèrent à célébrer liturgiquement l’Ascension comme fête distincte de la Résurrection. Ces deux fêtes sont en effet simplement deux facettes du même mystère.

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

31 mai 2025 -- Visitation de Marie

So 3, 14-18; Rom 12, 9-16; Luc 1, 39-56

H O M É L I E

          Dans les deux premiers chapitres de son Évangile Luc nous introduit à tous les grands thèmes de son Évangile. Il manifeste sa connaissance profonde de l'Ancien Testament, y puisant un très grand nombre d'images qui lui servent dans ses récits hautement symboliques.

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

May 28,2025 – Wednesday of the 6th week of Easter

Acts 17, 15. 22--18, 1; John 16, 12-15 

Homily 

          We have reached almost the end of that beautiful and long discourse of Jesus to His disciples at the Last Supper. He told them many things already, some of them profound and difficult. Now He tells them that He has still many more things to reveal to them, but they are not yet able to bear them. He also announces to them that the Spirit about whom He has been talking to them since the beginning, and whom He always call the “Spirit of Truth”, will guide them to all truth. There are two things that should be noticed in this promise. The first one is about the verb “to guide”.

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Catégorie : Homélies de Dom Armand Veilleux

May 30, 2025 – Friday of the 6th Week of Easter

Acts 18, 9-18; John 16, 20-23 

H O M I L Y

Dear Brothers,

          The Bible is the Word of God transmitted to us in human words. Each book has a human author who shares with us his experience of God, in his own human words, according to his own preoccupations and in his own style. Likewise, the history of the beginnings of the Church that we find in the Acts of the Apostles is the human history of a little group of people who lived out their Christian faith in their own human life -- most of the time a rather normal human life. During the last few weeks, the first reading at Mass gave us an idea of the human relationships and at times the human tensions within the early Church. We saw how Barnabas, at the beginning of the predication in Antioch, went to fetch Paul in Tarsus, a move that certainly influenced dramatically the history of the Church forever. They worked together for a while and then Paul separated from Barnabas and recruited Silas. In yesterday’s first reading, we saw Paul arriving in Athens, looking for a place where to stay and for a job to earn his bread. In today’s reading, we see his difficulties with the Jews of Athens, and his first difficulties with the Roman courts, which, for this time end rather well for him.