Official Website of the
Catholic Diocese of Little Rock
Bishop Taylor Homily Library
Bishop Anthony B. Taylor celebrates Mass across Arkansas and beyond. This library features the homilies delivered from March 2014 to the present. To listen to earlier homilies, please visit the bishop's Homily Archive.
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Wednesday of the Third Week of Easter 2023 Published: Wednesday, April 26, 2023 Every time someone raises an objection Jesus has the opportunity to back-pedal, to say "no, no, no, you're taking me too literally; this is just an image, just symbolic, not to worry!" But instead Jesus just pours it on all the more; in effect, "If you have a problem with that, wait till you hear this!" A problem with eating his flesh? "Amen, amen I say to you, if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood you have no life in you!" Jesus knows what he's saying and he means what he's saying — now the ball's in our court! |
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Third Sunday of Easter, Year A 2023 Published: Sunday, April 23, 2023 He was there all right, really present, but they didn't know it. It is only when he said the blessing, broke the bread and gave it to them that their eyes were opened to the presence of the one who had been with them all along, whereupon he vanished from their sight. |
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Friday of the Second Week of Easter 2023 Published: Friday, April 21, 2023 Come to Jesus and you will never lack anything you really need because he will give you what you need, which of course is not necessarily everything we might desire, since often we desire things that in his wisdom God knows are actually not for our ultimate good or the good of others. |
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Divine Mercy Sunday 2023 Published: Sunday, April 16, 2023 Jesus speaks words of peace to us, frees us from our fears, forgives us our sins, restores peace to our broken and remorseful hearts, breathes into us the eternal life of God's new creation and then sends us forth to bring to others the same peace and reconciliation that we ourselves have so undeservedly received. |
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Friday of the Octave of Easter 2023 Published: Friday, April 14, 2023 To fulfill our mission effectively, we need to receive the Lord’s forgiveness ourselves, and be ready to suffer adversity as the cost of being faithful to God, embracing possible martyrdom like Jesus; our love stronger than our fear. |
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Easter Sunday 2023 Published: Sunday, April 9, 2023 Easter is the day when we renew our baptismal promises and at the same time incorporate new members into the Church, initiating them into Jesus’ death and resurrection through the sacraments of baptism, Eucharist and confirmation. |
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Easter Vigil 2023 Published: Saturday, April 8, 2023 We know that in the end the light is stronger than the darkness, and we are sons and daughters of the light. |
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Good Friday of the Lord's Passion 2023 Published: Friday, April 7, 2023 His last seven words in this life have a lot to say to us who must now take up our crosses and follow him. |
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Holy Thursday Mass of the Lord's Supper 2023 Published: Thursday, April 6, 2023 Jesus emphasizes that though his plan of salvation is glorious in a cosmic sense, it can be accomplished in our lives (just as in his) only through un-glorious, self-sacrificing service, only at the cost of humble and sometimes even humiliating death to self. |
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Chrism Mass 2023 Published: Monday, April 3, 2023 So today, as we bless the oils to be used throughout the coming year, let us recall that all the sacraments of the Church — and not just those in which use these oils — all the sacraments are intended to be moments of personal encounter with the mercy and love of Jesus Christ, including every time we gather around this altar to celebrate the Eucharist. |
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Palm Sunday 2023 Published: Sunday, April 2, 2023 Jesus calls us to continue his work of building the Kingdom of God here and now, and therefore the pope reminds us that we cannot remain on the sidelines in the fight for justice. |
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Fifth Sunday of Lent, Year A 2023 Published: Sunday, March 26, 2023 “Jesus wept." These two words tell us so much about God, namely that since God's very nature is love, God feels. God's heart not only can be moved, it is moved, all the time, because he takes a personal interest in us. |
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First Sunday of Lent, Year A 2023 Published: Sunday, February 26, 2023 Temptation is an attraction to sin, but it is also an invitation to holiness. No one becomes holy without first facing and overcoming temptation. |
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Ash Wednesday 2023 Published: Wednesday, February 22, 2023 In prayer they discovered intimacy. In fasting they found solidarity with the poor. And in almsgiving they found the security that had eluded them all those years when they had clung to their possessions like a security blanket. |
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Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A Published: Sunday, February 19, 2023 The sun shines its warm rays on everyone, and we are called to do the same. |
