Sermon Notes – July 14, 2024 – “That’s All I can Stands, I can Stands No More”

“That’s All I can Stands, I can Stands No More”

Father Peter Fitzgibbons

July 13 – 14, 2024

Gospel:  Mark 6:7-13


On Thursdays, if I remember, I go to the IDT (Inter-disciplinary Team) meetings.  Doctors, nurses, psychologists, social workers, physical therapists, dieticians, and chaplains attend this meeting to discuss Hospice patients.   We were discussing this one patient who is 47 years old and who is refusing treatment.  With treatment, he could be cured, so his doctor wasn’t sure what to do.  To complicate matters, this patient is also schizophrenic.  He was trying alternative holistic medicine, such as crystals, which was not working, and he was getting progressively worse.  The staff was trying to get him to talk to the oncologist.  I asked the psychologist, “Do you think that perhaps he is afraid?”  Nobody hears anything after doctors say “cancer.”  They shut down, and the conversation is over.  Although it could be stage 1, after they hear the “C” word, they stop listening.  That is especially true if you have another condition like schizophrenia.   He was afraid and stopped taking his medicine.  He could only control what he could control.  When you are a patient in the hospital, everything is out of your control, and privacy is a joke.  That is the nature of the business. 

We have to be careful about what we say.  Paul said, “Only speak of what builds people up.”  Be good to people.  The sin of slander is akin to murder in Scripture.  In the hierarchy of sins, slander and murder are equal.  We have to be very careful about what we say because we have no idea of the fragility of people.  They could be a lot more fragile than we think they are.  Sometimes they have the “Popeye” syndrome.  Do you know what that is?   “That’s all I can stands, I can stands no more.”   Someday, when they’ve had just one thing too many happen, they go postal.   We don’t know, so say good things that will help people and not evil things.   All that evil speech comes from inside the person saying it.  Speak words of kindness and love, not evil. 

In the Gospel, our Lord sent the Apostles out without any money, food, or anything, and all I could think was, “Are You kidding me?  Lord, do You have any idea what you are asking them to do?”   People who went to college and studied the dictionary would call that counterintuitive.  No – it’s stupid!  But our Lord wouldn’t tell us to do things that are impossible.  That goes against His nature.  The Apostles did what the Lord asked them to do.  Our Lord gives us these things to do so that we can show our love for Him.  “If you love Me, you will keep my Commandments.  My Commandments are not burdensome.”  Oh, I don’t think so.  My lack of faith in eating fish is just terrible.  What a terrible cross I have!  I have to obey my doctors.  That’s the Fourth and Fifth Commandments, by the way.  “I know the commandments.”  I don’t think so . . . but keep learning.  Remember what John Wayne said, “Life is tough; it is tougher when you’re stupid.”  “The Commandments are too hard.”  Not really.  Otherwise, our Lord wouldn’t have said, “My yoke is easy and My burden light.”   It may be unpleasant, but when we start saying the Commandments are hard, how are the young supposed to remain pure?  How are the old supposed to remain pure?  Have you ever heard about the Villages?  Do some research on that.   Ask any police officer, and they will tell you there is a lot of stupid out there manifesting itself.   We have the King Baby Syndrome; “I want what I want when I want it. So, I will change the Word of God to justify what I want to do.”   Our Lord tells us what to do and gives us the means to do it.   He does not tell me to do Misfit work because I’m incompetent.  I don’t fly airplanes for a reason – because I don’t have the ability.  But God doesn’t require that of me.  God gives me the means to do what He requires of me for my vocation as He does for us all.  He offers that to us all. 

So, the hardship of keeping God’s Commandments is negligible.  “Oh!  Do you mean I have to go to Mass every Sunday?”  Well, you catch all the Panthers games, don’t you?   Oh yeah.  Keeping His Commandments is not as hard as we think because He gives us the tools to do so.  The devil on our shoulders tells us how hard it is and how much we will miss the great side of life.  No, you won’t.  You will not miss the Four Horseman:  guilt, fear, shame, and remorse. 

I see people all the time who walk in misery and sadness.  We don’t always have to like what our Lord asks us to do.  I never saw a time in which He asked for someone’s opinion about one of His Commandments.  He said to keep His Commandments.  You don’t have to like them.  Just do what you are told, and it will work out well.  It worked out for the Apostles, and it will work out for us.  We are not the newest kids on the block or the brightest bulb in the box, but our Lord told us exactly what we need to do to have the greatest amount of happiness possible in this life and eternal happiness in the next.  All we have to do is what He tells us to do and to use the means He gave us.  Our lives would be so much better.  Perfect?  No.  I always have to pay for my pizza.  So, perfect?  No.  But it would be so much more hopeful, joyful, and peaceful.   

How will you apply this message to your life?  _______________________________________

You can read all of Father Fitzgibbons’ sermons by going to AnnunciationCatholicAlbemarle.com, clicking on “Blog” then “Categories” and then “Sermon Notes.”  On a cell phone: click on “Blog” and then “Menu.”  Scroll to the bottom and click on “Categories.”  Sermon Notes are also available on the Church’s Facebook page at OLA.Catholic.Church.  Click on “Groups” and then “Sermon Notes.”


Matthew Kelly: When Life Changes in a Single Moment

Life can change in a single moment. This is not just the stuff of movies and fairy tales. Your life really can change in an instant, for better or for worse.

I remember sitting at breakfast in New York City, at the Athletics Club overlooking Central Park, the day I made my first publishing deal. John F. Kennedy Jr. was sitting at the next table. I can still taste the fresh cut slices of pineapple. Later that morning I walked into a publishing meeting that changed my life forever. A few short years later, I watched the news that John F. Kennedy Jr.’s plane had gone down off Martha’s Vineyard. A single tragic accident had ended his life.

Some life-changing moments lift up our hearts and make us feel like we are on top of the world, but others are soul-crushing. I was experiencing the soul-crushing variety.

Life can change in the blink of an eye, but most of the significant changes in our lives build over time before compounding into something wonderful or devastating. Anyone who has loved an addict or narcissist knows this all too well. As does anyone who has worked their whole life to develop a talent only to be discovered in an unexpected place at an unexpected time.

I have had more than my fair share of everything good that life has to offer. But it’s the unexpected nature of the worst experiences of our lives that exacerbates the way they devastate us. Something happens and because of it everything changes. You will never be the same, your life will never be the same, your heart will never be the same, but life presses on with or without you, relentlessly pushing you toward the unknown future.

Three times before I was forty, I sat in a doctor office and was told I had cancer. The first time I was thirty-five. I remember leaving the doctor’s office in a daze, my life had just changed in an instant. I was face to face with my mortality for the first time. I sat in my car for about twenty minutes before I even started it, and I have vivid memories of the whole world swirling around me. What seemed important an hour ago no longer mattered. People rushing here and there, going about their lives, oblivious to the fact that the whole direction of my life had just shifted. It’s a lonely feeling. The second time I was thirty-eight and the third time was the following year. The third encounter led to the removal of a large portion of my right kidney.

But nobody gave me cancer. It just happened. It was just part of life. There was nobody to blame, no one to harbor anger and resentment toward. That makes it easier.

It’s when a person intentionally hurts you, changes your life in an instant, that you face the darkest parts of yourself. It’s when a group of people decide to harm you, collectively or one at a time, that your faith in humanity is tested.

Matthew Kelly

From Life is Messy


God is Your Healer

A body riddled with cancer. A heart loaded with grief. A mind addicted to prescription medication. A soul attached to gambling. A heart restless, seeking purpose. A relationship torn apart.

THIS WEEK’S GOSPEL IS MARK 7:31-37

Where do you need healing in your life? Today, Allen reflects on something we all need: God’s healing power.


Did Somebody Call a Doctor? God is Your Healer

What Part of Your Life Needs Healing?

A body riddled with cancer. A heart loaded with grief. A mind addicted to prescription medication. A soul attached to gambling. A heart restless, seeking purpose. A relationship torn apart.

Where do you need healing in your life?

Today, Allen reflects on something we all need: God’s healing power.

//Dynamic Catholic//


What Cancer Taught Me About Life

Mari Pablo shares the lessons she learned from cancer.

Want more Mari? She’s featured in Ascension’s upcoming program Connected: Catholic Social Teaching for This Generation. Sign up for updates here: https://tinyurl.com/yf59qsdc

Almost all of us have shared some kind of experience with the devastating effects of cancer. Either we’ve known someone diagnosed with it, lost someone to it, or have had it ourselves. Regardless of how cancer has made its way into your life though, it’s impacted each of us in a specific way.

Today, Mari shares 4 personal stories about people in her life who’ve fought cancer, and what she learned from each one.