The Key to the kingdom of God

The key to the kingdom of God

Good morning/evening every one. I am so happy to welcome you all to celebrate today’s holy Mass. My special welcome to all our parishioners, summer parishioners, cottagers, visitors and every one who is here today, and I would like to thank you all for coming out today to celebrate Jesus. Dear friends, every time we come to church, we join the apostles and say, “Jesus you are the only Son of God. You are the beginning and end and everything comes from you and goes to you alone. We cannot live without you. Every time we come to church, we come to know the importance and value of the keys of the kingdom of God and every time we come to church we come to know that we ourselves are the key to the kingdom of God.



Once a priest went to give anointing of the sick to an old lady. Then the old lady thanked the priest and said, “Father, soon I will be rocking in the bosom of Moses”. The priest said, ‘It is not the bosom of Moses. It is the bosom of Abraham”. The old lady then said, ‘at this age, I do not care whose bosom it is”.

Then the next day, she saw her name of the local newspaper’s obituary. So she called up her friend and said, ‘did you see my name in the obituary”. Her friend so frightened and shivering voice said, ‘yes, I did. Where are you calling from, heaven or hell?’

When the old lady died, the funeral director looked at the man and said, ‘do you want your mother in law embalmed, buried or cremated? The man said, “Please do all the three and I do not want to take any chances.



1. Dear friends, in today’s gospel, Jesus who was at a non-Jewish place called Caesarea Philippi asked his disciples who did people say that He was and they told Him all about what people said about Him. Then the Lord looked at them and asked, “Who do you say that I am?’ Simon Peter who came forward in the name of all the other disciples and said, “Your are the Messiah, The Only Son of God. You are the saviour, the Lord. You are the beginning and the end. Every thing comes from you and goes to you alone. We will not have life without you”. Jesus then said, “you can not say on you own all these things unless you are given divine awareness from by Father. You are highly blessed by my Father. One day a man went to a spiritual Master and said, “Master, I want to be enlightened under your guidance, please help me”. The Master looked at him and asked, “By the way, before entering into the house, where did you leave your shoes, on your right or left?’ The man was confused and went away. Because he did not have full awareness or divine awareness to be enlightened. In today’s gospel, the apostles had the divine awareness and deep faith and thus they could courageously proclaim that Christ is the Messiah. Dear friends, these days we see the Holy Bible everywhere. There are more than two bibles at every home. But people can even open the bible only if they have divine blessings and divine awareness. One day I visited a family and they were using the Bible as the door stopper and the sad thing was I was the one who gave the bible to them. If we have divine awareness, then we too join the apostles and say, “Jesus you are the Messiah”.

2. When the apostles proclaimed that Christ was the Messiah. Jesus gave the keys to the kingdom of God to Simon Peter. Key means responsibility. It is a special call to suffering and difficulty. It is a special call to accept humiliation and criticism in the name of Christ and His kingdom. One day a spiritual Master went to a town to preach the good news. In the beginning, every one came to him to listen. When he preached with love and kindness, they clapped their hands and when he said jokes, they laughed and laughed. But eventually their enthusiasm and happiness disappeared. They one by one left him. He was alone preaching finally. Then one day a man came to him and said, “now there is no one here and why are you still preaching”. The Master said, ‘I preached before so that people would change and now I preach so that they would not change me”. I know a woman who went to talk to here grand child and bring her back to church but unfortunately the grand child changed here now this grand mother has more than 400 online friends via face book and she stopped coming to church and spent more time online.

3. Dear friends today we are the key to the kingdom of God. Every time people see they should come to know the love and kindness of God our father. They should come to know that they are not alone but Christ is with them. We should help them to unlock their divine grace and blessing. Amen.