Homily – NINETEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: WHEN THE STORM DOES NOT GET THE FINAL WORD 08-09-26

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1 Kings 19:9a, 11–13a • Romans 9:1–5 • Matthew 14:22–33

A man got out of prison after many years. His family was excited to see him, so his brother picked him up at the gate. As they drove home, they stopped at a grocery store. The former inmate walked in, froze, and quietly asked, “What happened to this place?”

His brother laughed. “What do you mean?” The man pointed to the self checkout machines. “So… they don’t even trust cashiers anymore?” His brother explained how everything worked, but after watching people scan their own groceries, the man said something his brother never forgot: “I spent years thinking the hardest thing would be surviving prison. I never realized the hardest thing would be learning how to trust the world again.”

That sentence is not only about prison. Many people outside these walls have never spent a single day behind bars, yet they live inside prisons of fear. They no longer trust other people. Some no longer trust themselves. And many quietly struggle to trust God. Fear builds invisible walls that can be harder to escape than the visible ones.

Today’s Gospel is about those invisible prisons. The disciples are trapped in a violent storm. These are experienced fishermen who know the sea well, yet this storm overwhelms them. Then, in the middle of the darkness, Jesus comes walking toward them. Instead of recognizing hope, they mistake Him for another danger. “It’s a ghost!” they cry.

Fear has a strange way of distorting reality. It convinces us that help is a threat, that tomorrow will be worse than today, and that nothing will ever change. Many of you know that voice. It whispers, “You’ll never repair what you’ve broken. You’ll always be remembered for your worst mistake. Nobody will trust you again. Why even try?” Fear always sounds convincing, but it has never told the whole truth.

Then Peter hears Jesus say one simple word: “Come.” He steps out of the boat, and for a few extraordinary moments, he actually walks on water. Think about that. The miracle is not only that Jesus walked on water. Peter did too. The impossible became possible because his eyes were fixed on Christ.
Everything changed the moment Peter shifted his attention from Jesus to the wind and the waves. The storm had been there all along, but only when he focused on it did he begin to sink. That is exactly what happens in our spiritual lives. When our minds are filled only with regrets, guilt, anger, fear, or everything we cannot control, our souls slowly begin to sink.
Someone once said that worrying is like sitting in a rocking chair. It gives you something to do, but it never takes you anywhere. Many of us become experts at replaying yesterday. We remember every bad decision, every argument, every addiction, every opportunity we wasted. The problem is that yesterday has terrible customer service. It never answers, never negotiates, and never gives refunds.
The only place where God’s grace can meet us is today. Jesus is not waiting for you in the past. He is not standing years from now demanding that you first become perfect. He meets you where you are today. That is where every new beginning starts.
The first reading teaches the same lesson through the prophet Elijah. Exhausted and discouraged, Elijah expects God to appear in dramatic ways through the earthquake, the wind, or the fire. Yet God comes instead in a tiny whisper. God’s greatest work often happens quietly.

Many of you have experienced those quiet whispers. Sometimes they come through a letter that arrives on the day you were ready to give up. Sometimes through another inmate who unexpectedly offers encouragement. Sometimes through a volunteer who treats you with dignity, a chaplain who simply listens, or a single verse of Scripture that suddenly feels as though it was written just for you. God often speaks softly because He speaks directly to the heart.

Saint Paul tells us today that he carries “great sorrow and constant anguish.” Even the greatest saints knew disappointment and heartbreak. Faith does not remove suffering. It gives suffering meaning. God can take what seems wasted and transform it into something that bears fruit far beyond what we can imagine.

One of the greatest lies we can believe is that our story ended with our worst decision. The Bible tells a very different story. Moses was a murderer. David committed adultery and arranged a killing. Peter denied Jesus three times. Paul persecuted Christians. Yet none of them were forever defined by their darkest chapter because they allowed God to write another one.

The same is true for you. What brought you here may explain part of your past, but it does not have to determine your future. Your mistakes are chapters in your story, but they do not have to become the title. With God’s grace, the best chapter may still be waiting to be written.

There is one detail in today’s Gospel that I never want you to forget. When Peter begins to sink, Jesus does not stand at a distance giving advice. He immediately stretches out His hand. Immediately. Not after Peter proves himself. Not after Peter swims back to the boat. Not after Peter promises never to fail again. Immediately.

That is the heart of God. His hand is always faster than our failure. If today you feel like you are sinking, do not pretend everything is fine. Peter didn’t. He simply prayed one of the shortest and most powerful prayers in the entire Bible: “Lord, save me.” Sometimes three honest words are enough to begin changing a life.

The story I began with was never really about self checkout machines. It was about trust. That man eventually learned how every machine worked, but he later admitted that learning to trust again took much longer. Healing the heart is always slower than learning a new skill.

The same is true for every disciple of Jesus. God does not ask us to pretend the storm is not real. He simply asks us not to give the storm the final word. The waves may still be high. The wind may still be strong. The sentence may still continue. The future may still be uncertain. But when our eyes remain fixed on Christ, the storm loses its power to define us.

The storm is real, but it is never the end of the story. Jesus is. And His final word is never condemnation. His final word is always hope.

 

Let Us Pray

Lord Jesus,
You know every storm we carry within us. You know our regrets, our fears, our loneliness, and the mistakes that brought us here. Yet You never stop coming toward us. Even when we cannot recognize You, even when fear convinces us that all hope is gone, You continue to say, “Take courage. It is I. Do not be afraid.”
Teach us to keep our eyes on You instead of on the waves. Help us believe that our past is not stronger than Your mercy, that our failures are not greater than Your love, and that no prison wall can keep Your grace from reaching our hearts.
When we begin to sink, give us the humility to pray like Peter, “Lord, save me,” trusting that Your hand is already reaching toward us. Renew within us the hope that one faithful choice today is more powerful than a hundred regrets about yesterday.
As we leave this chapel and return to our daily routine, remind us that wherever we walk, You walk with us. May we never allow the storm to have the final word, because with You, hope is always stronger than fear, mercy is always greater than failure, and no one who reaches for Your hand ever walks alone.
Amen.

 

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Homily – SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: SEVENTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: THE TREASURE BURIED BENEATH THE DIRT 07-26-26

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A man once bought an old farmhouse that had been abandoned for years. The property was overgrown with weeds. The porch was falling apart. The windows were broken. Quite frankly, most people thought it should have been bulldozed. It was the kind of place where, if you leaned against the wall too hard, you suddenly found yourself helping with the demolition.

One afternoon, while clearing away brush behind the house, his shovel struck something solid. Curious,he dug a little deeper and uncovered an old wooden chest. Inside were hundreds of silver coins that had been hidden there generations before. The treasure had been there all along. Years of dirt had hidden it, but the dirt had never changed what it was worth.

I have often thought that people are a lot like that treasure. Sometimes life piles on so much dirt that we can no longer see who we really are. Bad decisions. Addiction. Anger. Shame. Broken relationships.

Guilt. Regret. Before long, we begin to believe that we are nothing more than the mess we have made. We start introducing ourselves, not by our name, but by our worst mistake.
But God never does.

God never confuses who you are with what you have done.

That is exactly what today’s Gospel is about. Jesus tells us that a man discovers a treasure hidden in a field. Notice something important. The treasure did not become valuable because someone found it. It was already valuable. The man simply recognized what everyone else had overlooked.

Perhaps that is how God looks at every one of us.The world has a habit of reducing people to labels. Outside these walls, some people remember you by your crime, your sentence, or your worst decision. Inside these walls, you may be known by a number, a housing unit, or a file in a cabinet. But God does not call you by your crime. He calls you by your name.

He knows everything you have done, yet He refuses to believe that your worst decision is the most important thing about you. Beneath all the dirt, He still sees the treasure He created in His own image.

Now, do not misunderstand me. God does not pretend that sin does not matter. Sin matters. Victims matter. Justice matters. Choices have consequences. But grace means your sin gets the final word only if you refuse to let God speak.

Once God helps us rediscover that dignity, He asks us the same question He asked Solomon: “Ask something of me, and I will give it to you.” Imagine Jesus standing here today and asking every man in this chapel that very same question: “What do you want Me to give you?”

Most of us would probably answer, “Freedom.” An earlier release. A successful appeal. A chance to go home. None of those desires are wrong.

But Solomon asks for something even greater. He asks for wisdom.

Why? Because Solomon understands that wisdom changes every other part of life. A man with physical freedom but no wisdom often walks back into another prison of his own making. But a man who receives God’s wisdom begins to experience freedom long before any prison gate opens. Wisdom brings peace into a noisy cell. Wisdom breaks the chains of bitterness. Wisdom teaches you how to forgive. Wisdom frees you from spending the rest of your life being held hostage by your past.

Wisdom also teaches us to recognize the treasures we already have before we lose them.
Isn’t it funny how human beings work? We spend the first ten years praying for our children to learn how to talk, and the next ten years wishing they would be quiet for just five minutes. Then the house grows silent, and we would give almost anything to hear that noise again.
We spend years wishing our parents would stop giving us advice. Then we would give almost anything to hear their voices just once more. We call today “just another day,” never imagining that it may become one of the days we treasure most.

Sometimes we do not recognize a treasure until we can no longer hold it.

Do not let that happen with Christ.

There is another lesson hidden in today’s readings. There is a world of difference between regret and repentance. Regret says, “I wish I had not gotten caught.” Repentance says, “Lord, I do not want to be that man anymore.”

Regret fears the consequences. Repentance longs for a new heart. Regret looks backward. Repentance walks forward.

Think about Peter and Judas. Both betrayed Jesus. Both were overwhelmed with sorrow. One ran away from God in despair. The other ran back to Him for mercy. The difference was not the size of their sin. The difference was whether they believed that grace could still reach them beneath the dirt.

Perhaps the greatest prison is not made of steel bars or concrete walls. Perhaps it is believing that your past is stronger than God’s mercy.

Saint Paul refuses to believe that. He tells us today, “We know that all things work for good for those who love God.” Notice what he does not say. He does not say prison is good. He does not say crime is good. He does not say suffering is good.

He says God is so powerful that He can bring good even out of what is broken. Only God can do that. Some of the strongest, wisest, and most compassionate people I have ever met are people whose lives were broken before they allowed God to rebuild them.

Remember the story of the buried chest. The years of dirt never changed the value of the silver. In the
same way, your failures, your sins, your regrets, and even your years in prison have not erased the image of God within you.

Today Christ comes looking, not for perfect people, but for buried treasure. He has been digging patiently through years of pain, pride, addiction, anger, shame, and regret just to reach the man He created you to be.

Do not push His hand away. Do not cling to the dirt when He is offering you the treasure. Let Him keep digging.

Because the greatest miracle God wants to perform is not simply opening a prison door.
It is opening a human heart. And when He finishes His work, the world may still remember you for the worst thing you have ever done.

But God will rejoice because you finally became the man He always knew you could be.

Amen.

PRAYER

Lord Jesus,
Today You looked beyond our records, our failures, and our
regrets, and You looked directly into our hearts. Thank You for
seeing the treasure in us when we often see only dirt.
Give us the wisdom of Solomon, not simply to make better
decisions, but to become new men. Teach us to stop measuring
ourselves by our worst mistakes and to begin seeing ourselves
through the eyes of Your mercy. Where there is regret, give us
repentance. Where there is shame, give us hope. Where there
is anger, teach us forgiveness. Where there is fear, fill us with
trust. Break every chain that keeps us imprisoned inside, so that

even before these gates ever open, our hearts may already
know the freedom that only You can give.
Keep digging through the hard soil of our lives. Dig through our
pride, our addictions, our bitterness, our excuses, and our fear.
Uncover the man You dreamed of when You first created us.
Never stop believing in us, even when we struggle to believe in
ourselves.
When we leave this chapel today, remind us that we are more
than our past, more than our failures, and more than the
opinions of others. We are Your beloved sons, redeemed by
Your Cross, sustained by Your mercy, and called to become
saints.
For You are the greatest Treasure we will ever find, and in
finding You, we finally discover who we truly are.
Amen.

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Homily – SIXTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: THE STORY GOD READS 07-19-26

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Welcome to From the Prison Chapel, a weekly feature from Dismas Ministry.

Each week, we are honored to share a homily by Rev. Fr. Jarek Sniosek of the Diocese of Venice Jail and Prison Ministry. Fr. Jarek has graciously given Dismas Ministry permission to share his homilies with our supporters, volunteers, prison ministers, and friends.

We present each homily in its original form, preserving the message as it was written. Following the homily, you’ll find a brief prayer.

 

📖 Wisdom 12:13, 16–19; Psalm 86; Romans 8:26–27; Matthew 13:24–43.

 

A man who had spent years in prison once rolled up the sleeves of his shirt and looked quietly at the tattoos covering his arms. Some reminded him of the gang he had once believed would never abandon him. Others marked decisions he would give anything to undo. Every image carried a memory. Every memory carried a regret.

Someone asked him gently, “Have you ever thought about having them removed?”

He smiled and answered, “I have. But even if every tattoo disappeared, I would still remember why I got them. My biggest problem isn’t what’s written on my skin. It’s making sure it isn’t still written on my heart.”

Then, after a long silence, he added something he had learned through years of struggle.

“But here’s the good news. God reads hearts much better than He reads tattoos.”

That may be one of the most beautiful ways to understand today’s Gospel. Jesus tells a story about wheat and weeds growing together in the same field. The servants want to pull up the weeds immediately. They want everything cleaned up as quickly as possible. But the owner says, “No. Wait.” Why? Because he knows something they do not. He knows that if they rush to judge the field, they may destroy the wheat that is still growing.

That is exactly how God looks at us.

People usually see the outside first. They see the arrest record, the newspaper headline, the prison sentence, the addiction, the divorce, the failure, the mistake that changed everything. Many people decide who we are by looking at one chapter of our lives.

God never does.

He looks beneath the surface. He sees the tears nobody else has seen. He hears the prayers whispered in the darkness. He notices every sincere effort to change, every apology, every temptation resisted, every act of kindness that no one applauds. While others may still see weeds, God already sees wheat beginning to grow.

And here is the part of the Gospel that can change not only your life but also this entire place. If God can already see the wheat growing in you, then He can also see the wheat growing in the man sleeping in the bunk next to you. That difficult person, the one who gets on your nerves, the one everyone has written off, the one you struggle to forgive—Christ may already be doing His quiet work in his heart as well. Before you decide who someone is, remember how patiently God has decided who you can become.

The Book of Wisdom tells us something remarkable today. Because God is all-powerful, He is also patient. Human beings often think power means acting quickly and punishing immediately. God shows His strength differently. His strength is revealed through mercy. He gives people time to repent, time to heal, time to become the person He created them to be. That means none of us should ever decide that someone—including ourselves—is beyond hope.
Now, I know what some of you may be thinking. “Father, you don’t know what I’ve done.”
You’re right. I don’t.

But God does.

And He still brought you here today.

That tells me something.

Your worst decision did not have the final word. If it had, you wouldn’t be sitting here listening to the Gospel. The fact that you are here means God is still writing your story.
Sometimes we spend so much time wishing we could erase the past that we forget something even more important. God is not asking us to erase yesterday. He is asking us to surrender today. We cannot rewrite yesterday’s pages, but with His grace we can decide what gets written on the next one.

St. Paul gives us another comforting promise. He says that even when we do not know how to pray, the Holy Spirit prays within us. Isn’t that encouraging? There are days when the only prayer we can manage is, “Lord… help me.” There are days when words simply won’t come because shame, fear, loneliness, or regret have stolen them. Yet even then, God understands the language of a broken heart. Before we can even finish our prayer, the Holy Spirit is already carrying it to the Father.

And perhaps that’s why I love that man’s words so much.

“My biggest problem isn’t what’s written on my skin. It’s making sure it isn’t still written on my heart.”

When he first got those tattoos, they told the story of who he thought he was. Years later, they became a reminder not of his past, but of God’s mercy. He discovered that while tattoos may remain on the skin, they do not have to remain on the heart.

The same is true for every one of us.

Maybe everyone outside still remembers your past. Maybe some people will always define you by the worst thing you have ever done. That is their choice.

But it does not have to become yours.

And it does not have to become the way you see the men around you either. Every person in this chapel is more than the worst decision he has ever made. Every man here is still a field where God is patiently at work. Some wheat is easier to see than others, but the Lord never stops cultivating hearts that are willing to let Him in.

Because today Jesus asks a different question. He does not ask, “What did your life look like years ago?” He asks, “What is growing in your heart today?”

If the answer is faith, even a little… if the answer is hope, even when it feels fragile… if the answer is repentance, however imperfect… then the wheat is already growing.

And where Christ sees wheat, He never gives up on the harvest.

Prayer
Lord Jesus, there are moments when I look at my past and wonder whether I can ever become the person You created me to be. Sometimes I remember my failures more easily than I remember Your mercy. Sometimes I believe the labels others have placed on me more than the name You call me by: beloved.

Teach me to see others with the same patient eyes with which You see me. When I am tempted to judge, remind me how gently You have judged my own life. Help me never to forget that every person I meet is someone You are still loving, still healing, and still calling by name.

Today I place my heart into Your hands. Pull out whatever keeps me far from You—not by force, but by the gentle power of Your love. Give me the courage to stop living as the person I used to be and the hope to become the person You already see.

When I grow impatient with myself, remind me that You are patient. When I feel ashamed, remind me that Your mercy is greater than my past. When I cannot find the words to pray, let Your Holy Spirit pray within me.

Help me believe that my story is not finished, that my life is more than my worst mistake, and that with You, even the field where weeds once seemed to flourish can become a harvest of grace. May I leave this chapel today determined not only to let You grow wheat in my own heart, but also to believe that You are quietly growing it in the hearts of my brothers as well.

Amen.

 

 

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Homily – FIFTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME: THE CONCRETE AND THE WILDFLOWER

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Welcome to From the Prison Chapel, a weekly feature from Dismas Ministry.

Each week, we are honored to share a homily by Rev. Fr. Jarek Sniosek of the Diocese of Venice Jail and Prison Ministry. Fr. Jarek has graciously given Dismas Ministry permission to share his homilies with our supporters, volunteers, prison ministers, and friends.

We present each homily in its original form, preserving the message as it was written. Following the homily, you’ll find a brief prayer.

📖 Isaiah 55:10–11; Psalm 65; Romans 8:18–23; Matthew 13:1–23

A few years ago, a photograph spread across the internet that millions of people couldn’t stop looking at. It wasn’t a celebrity or a breathtaking sunset. It was a tiny yellow wildflower growing through a crack in the middle of a city sidewalk.

Think about that for a moment. All around it was hard concrete. Thousands of people walked over that sidewalk every day. Cars rumbled past. The summer sun beat down. By all appearances, that was the last place on earth where anything beautiful should have been able to take root.

Someone commented beneath the picture, “That flower obviously didn’t get the memo that it wasn’t supposed to grow there.”

I smiled when I read that. But then I thought, perhaps that little flower has something to teach every one of us.

Sometimes life feels like concrete. Some of you carry regrets that feel as heavy as stone. Some carry guilt, anger, disappointment, or grief. Some think about children who have grown up while they were away, parents they could not care for, friendships that ended, opportunities that slipped through their hands. There are days when you may wonder whether anything good can still come from your life.
Jesus understands that feeling better than we realize. In today’s Gospel, He tells the story of a farmer scattering seed. What always strikes me is how generous that farmer is. He throws seed everywhere: on the path, among the rocks, into the thorns, and on the good soil. He doesn’t stop and say, “This patch isn’t worth it.” He keeps sowing.

That is exactly how God loves.

Some people imagine God standing at a distance with His arms folded, saying, “You had your chance.” But Jesus paints a very different picture. God keeps sowing. He keeps speaking. He keeps hoping. He never stops believing that a human heart can change.

Isaiah tells us that God’s Word is like the rain. Rain doesn’t ask whether the ground deserves another chance. It simply falls, softening what has become hard and bringing life where everything seemed dry. God’s grace works the same way. He keeps pouring His mercy into places where others see only failure.

My friends, perhaps you cannot choose where you are today, but you can choose what kind of heart you will have today. Prison walls are made of concrete. Your heart never has to be.
Over the years, I have met people outside these walls who were physically free but imprisoned by bitterness, pride, addiction, resentment, or fear. And I have met men and women inside prison whose hearts had become gentler, wiser, and more peaceful than ever before. They discovered something the world often forgets: freedom is not only about where your body is. The deepest freedom is knowing that your heart belongs to God.

Saint Paul understood that. He had been imprisoned himself, beaten, rejected, and misunderstood. Yet today he tells us, “The sufferings of this present time are as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed.” He is not pretending suffering doesn’t hurt. He is reminding us that suffering does not have the final word. God does.

Some of the strongest trees grow because fierce winds forced their roots deeper. Some of the wisest people became wise only after making painful mistakes. Some of the most compassionate hearts belong to those who know what it feels like to need mercy.
One of the greatest lies we tell ourselves is, “If only I could go back.” If only I had made a different decision. If only I had chosen another path. But none of us can rewrite yesterday. The only page God places in our hands is today.

And today the Sower is still walking through the field.

Today the rain is still falling.

Today another seed is landing in your heart.

The real question is not, “What kind of soil have I been?” The question is, “What kind of soil do I want to become?” Every prayer softens the ground a little more. Every act of forgiveness removes another thorn. Every honest confession lifts another stone. Every decision to trust God breaks open another patch of hardened earth. That is how miracles usually happen, not all at once, but one faithful choice at a time.

So let us return to that little flower growing through the crack in the sidewalk. Nobody expected it to bloom there. People probably walked past without even noticing it. Yet it grew anyway.
Perhaps the world has already decided what it thinks about you. Some people may remember only the worst chapter of your life. Some may never expect anything beautiful from you again.
But God has never looked at a single human being and said, “This life cannot bloom.”

He still sees the person He created. He still sees His image within you. He still believes that grace is stronger than failure, mercy stronger than shame, and hope stronger than your past.
So do not let your heart become concrete. Let God’s Word fall like rain. And perhaps one day, someone will look at your life and see what they never expected to see: A flower growing through the concrete. And they will know that only God could have made something so beautiful grow in such an unlikely place.

PRAYER
Lord Jesus,
Sometimes my heart feels like that stretch of concrete, worn down by mistakes, disappointments, regrets, and choices I wish I could undo. There are days when I wonder whether anything good can still grow from the life I have lived. Yet today You remind me that You have never stopped scattering the seeds of Your love. You have never stopped believing in me, even when I struggled to believe in myself.

Thank You for refusing to define me by the worst thing I have ever done. You see not only who I have been, but who, by Your grace, I can still become. Where I see dead ends, You see new beginnings. Where I see cracks, You see places where light can enter. Where I see failure, You see fertile ground waiting for new life.

Soften whatever has become hard within me. Pull out the thorns of resentment, fear, self pity, and despair. Remove the stones that keep me from trusting You completely. Give me the courage to make one good choice today, then another tomorrow, believing that You are quietly transforming my heart one day at a time.

And when I am tempted to think that my story is already finished, remind me of that little flower growing through the concrete. Help me believe that Your grace is always stronger than my past, Your mercy always greater than my failures, and Your love always capable of bringing beauty where no one thought it could ever exist.

Amen.

 

 

 

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