Homily for the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time
Ezekiel 33:7-9; Psalm 95; Romans 13:8-10; Matthew 18:15-20
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Happy Father’s Day to all the dads. Today can be more than a commercial opportunity for the sale of lots of socks. Let’s all recall our own fathers whether they be living or dead. In today’s second reading Paul tells the Romans: ‘Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.’ ‘Love does no evil to the neighbour; hence, love is the fulfillment of the law.’ Many of us are blessed to have a loving Dad. Let’s give thanks for that. Those of you who are fathers know that you are blessed when you can show love for your children and when they demonstrate their love for you. We are all called to obey the law of love.
Less than half of Australia’s families are couples with children. Almost 40% of our families are now couples without children. About 10% of families are single parent families with dependent children.[1] So Father’s Day can mean very different things in different families. Most families have a dad; some have two; others have none.
‘There were 97,800 Family and Domestic Violence (FDV) offenders recorded by police in the 2024–25 financial year, up 8 per cent from about 90,700 offenders in 2023–24. This was the largest annual increase in FDV offenders since national reporting began in 2019–20.’[2] More than three quarters of offenders are male with a median age of 35 years. This means that an increasing number of fathers in our society are violent. It’s a national scandal.
Paul Keating once said: ‘I had a grandmother who worshipped the ground I walked on and the same with my mother, and I think my father, but less so with fathers because they’re busy and tied up with doing things. So I had a great sense of self-worth… a sense that you’re important and that you belong to something: this is a very powerful thing.’[3] Father’s Day is a good day for reflection on whether we are too busy and tied up with things that matter less than our responsibilities and duties of fatherhood.
During the week, I heard an interview with author Jeff Sparrow who has written a biography of Australian poet Lesbia Harford.[4] Harford came from a well to do Catholic family and attended the Loreto Convent at Ballarat in Victoria. Sadly her father was alcoholic and left the family. He crossed the continent and bred camels in the Pilbara.[5] Harford wrote a poem Fatherless:
I’ve had no man
To guard and shelter me,
Guide and instruct me
From mine infancy.
No lord of earth
To show me day by day
What things a girl should do
And what she should say.
I have gone free
Of manly excellence
And hold their wisdom
More than half pretence.
For since no male
Has ruled me or has fed,
I think my own thoughts
In my woman’s head.
She gave up her Christian faith and Catholic practice. Having studied law at Melbourne University, she left the law behind her and worked in a factory during World War I. Facing death at an early age she wrote a poem I’m no mystic:
I am no mystic. All the ways of God
Are dark to me.
I know not if he lived or if he died
In agony.
My every act has reference to man.
Some human need
Of this one, or of that, or of myself
Inspires the deed.
But when I hear the Angelus, I say
A Latin prayer
Hoping the dim incanted words may shine
Some way, somewhere.
Words and a will may work upon my mind
Till ethics turn
To that transcendent mystic love with which
The Seraphim burn.
On this Father’s Day, let’s pray for all fathers, that they might gracefully guard and shelter, guide and instruct. Let’s pray that all fathers in our church will profess and live an ethics which reveals that transcendent mystic love which was the promise of their children’s baptism. Let’s pray that all our children will learn to think their own thoughts, grateful for their parenting and opportunities in life.
On this Father’s Day, we give thanks for Jesus’ declaration in today’s gospel: ‘For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.’ Perhaps today is the opportunity to gather around the family meal table, putting right whatever has been wrong amongst us.
If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Come, let us sing joyfully to the LORD;
let us acclaim the rock of our salvation.
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;
let us joyfully sing psalms to him.
If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Oh, that today you would hear his voice:
‘Harden not your hearts as at Meribah,
as in the day of Massah in the desert,
where your fathers tempted me;
they tested me though they had seen my works.’
If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
If today, you see your Dad, give him a hug. If today you fathers hear your children, give thanks and celebrate their lives and your hopes for them. Happy Father’s Day.
Fr Frank Brennan SJ AO, Adjunct Professor of Thomas More Law School at ACU and Adjunct Research Professor at the Australian Centre for Christianity and Culture, is a former Rector of Newman College, University of Melbourne, and CEO of Catholic Social Services Australia (CSSA). His latest books include Pope Francis: the Disruptive Pilgrims Guide (ATF Theology, 2025), and Equality, Reconciliation and Social Cohesion: The Inspiration of Sir William Deane (Connor Court, 2026).
[1] See https://aifs.gov.au/all-research/facts-and-figures/families-and-family-composition
[2] See https://www.abs.gov.au/media-centre/media-releases/family-and-domestic-violence-offenders-rise-8-cent
[3] Curran, James, Grand Ambition: Paul Keating’s global vision for Australia, Simon & Schuster, 2026, 26.
[4] Jeff Sparrow, Somewhere Here the Future’s Hid: The Extraordinary Life of Lesbia Harford, Monash University Publishing, 2026.
[5] Listen at https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/latenightlive/ian-dunt-radical-life-of-writer-lesbia-harford-jeff-sparrow/107028042, commencing at 16:40 -.
