WHERE ARE 

OUR DESERTED PLACES?

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 1^st Wednesday in Ordinary Time is, “Where Are Our Deserted Places?"

In today’s gospel - Mark 1: 29-39 - we have mention of a theme we find several times in the gospels:

Rising very early before dawn,
he left and went off to a deserted place,

where he prayed.

The title of my homily is, “Where Are Our Deserted Places?

I know I have preached on this topic and theme at various times.

Where are my deserted places?

MAKE A LIST

Make a list of the places where you can go to in order to escape, to find peace, to be alone.

My father loved the cellar.  A friend of mine built a chapel out of his garage. My niece told me about a Muslim co-worker, who used a closet to get in some of her prayers. I know of a lady who used to hide from her four sons under the kitchen sink. You’d have to be in great shape to do that one. My sister-in-law used the bathroom - to escape from her seven daughters when they were tiny. Fingernails from tiny hands on a locked bathroom door can induce guilt.

Where are your deserted places? The Eucharistic chapel, a corner in this church or St. Mary’s, a book, the library, a walk in the cold or the warm, shopping, a drive, the back porch, the house when nobody is home, Quiet Water’s Park, the Naval Academy, a museum, sitting with a journal, painting, writing a poem, knitting, making Ranger Rosaries, etc.?  Where are your woman caves, man caves, secret places?

TODAY’S READINGS

Today’s gospel for starters triggers this topic, theme and question about deserted places?

Today’s gospel takes place in Capernaum - just off the Lake of Galilee. I can read today’s gospel and put myself in Capernaum with ease - because I was  there once. Anyone who has been to Israel knows this. Capernaum is part of the bus ride - part of the tour. It has the Fourth Century synagogue - whose restoration began in 1922-24. again in 1969, and 1984.  

When I was there in 2000 with 22 priests, Father Stephen Doyle, a Franciscan, who was leading the retreat and tour read today’s gospel story in one of its versions, He told us that this roofless ruin of a synagogue was possibly where this gospel took place - and then gave us a half hour or a hour for quiet prayer. Wonderful.

 Then we went to where the ruins of Peter’s house. It now has a church built over it - a church with glass floors - through which you can see the ruins - where today’s gospel took place - where Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law. That place was somewhat crowded compared to the space in the synagogue area - and it’s huge stones on which people can sit - and reflect.

Then we went to the gift shop and I bought this book by Stanislao Loffreda, Recovering Capharnaum. I have stepped back in many a gift shop in a place like Capharnaum - and noticed people often buying a pamphlet or guild book about a place - perhaps to hold onto the holy - perhaps to be able to go back there in memory - in some quiet place - in some quiet time - in the future.

CONCLUSION

Where are your quiet places? 

How do you quiet down?  

What do you do to grow and know the Lord and yourself and others better?  

What did Jesus do in his quiet places? 

The gospels tell us he talked to Our Father - and I’m sure he figured out how to do what today’s first reading from Hebrews 2: 14-18 - tells us he did: how to become like his brothers and sisters in every way. 

That’s our Jesus. That’s our brother! No wonder everyone was looking for him. They wanted to eat him up.