July 25, 2026
Paulist Fr. Rich Andre preached this homily on July 25, 2026 at Old St. Mary’s Catholic Parish in Chicago, IL. As Old St. Mary’s is the Archdiocesan Shrine for San Pedro Calungsod, we have held a special novena in the days leading up to a special memorial Mass for San Pedro. We chose the following readings: Wisdom 4:7-11a; Psalm 116; Romans 10:9-15; and Matthew 13:3a, 10-12, 16-17, 31-33, 44.
Until very recently, I felt embarrassed that I wasn’t familiar with San Pedro Calungsod. He was canonized in the first year I was a priest. I surely read a brief biography of him back then, which I don’t remember. I just remember it was the same day as the canonization of Paulist patron saint Kateri Tekakwitha.
But then I learned that a lot of devout Catholics who live in the Philippines aren’t familiar with San Pedro, either. Many of the people most excited about him are Filipinos who were living overseas as teens or young adults when he was beatified in the year 2000 or when he was canonized in 2012!
Little is known about San Pedro Calungsod, except that around the age of 14, he traveled to the Mariana Islands to minister to the native peoples as a catechist. He was martyred on Guam before the age of 18. We have chosen scriptures today that reflect on his youth, his martyrdom, his ministry, and his devotion to God.
Let us celebrate that with God, there is kindness, redemption, and mercy.
Lord Jesus, you call us to boldly witness to your Gospel. Lord, have mercy.
You inspire us to seek out the lost. Christ, have mercy.
You welcome those who lay down their lives for you into the heavenly kingdom, Lord have mercy.
The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure in a field that a person finds and then out of joy sells all that he or she has to be able to buy the field.
How do we translate that into our own lives? How do we “sell all that we have” for the greater good? I think of the following words which have been attributed to Fr. Pedro Arrupe, a former missionary general of the Society of Jesus:
Nothing is more practical than
finding God, that is, than
falling in love
in a quite absolute, final way.What you are in love with,
what seizes your imagination,
will affect everything.It will decide
what will get you out of bed in the morning,
what you do with your evenings,
how you spend your weekends,
what you read,
whom you know,
what breaks your heart,
and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.Fall in love,
stay in love,
and it will decide everything.
We can apply these words to our relationship with God. We can easily apply them to our careers as well, as well as to our relationship with a life partner. (As a wedding gift, I have sometimes bought framed copies of these words printed in fancy calligraphy.)
The poet David Whyte has written a fantastic book arguing that we should strive to “sell all that we have” in all three of these spheres of our lives. The book is called The Three Marriages, because ideally, we can have an ongoing, ever-changing life-long relationship with our partner, with our career, and with our God. We are fools if we ever think that we will completely understand our partner, our career, or our God. Each relationship will enrich us, challenge us, and change us.
In the year 1668, around the tender age of 14, Pedro Calungsod had already sold all that he had to attain a relationship with God and to devote himself to a career as a missionary catechist. He followed the Jesuit priest Diego Luis de San Vitores to the Mariana Islands to be an evangelist. What confidence! What risk! What devotion! Someone who knew at such a young age who God was calling him to be, and martyred for it before the age of 18.
It’s been said that for someone to be a saint, they need to be either a model of Christ — helping us to see what Christ would do in a similar situation — or a mirror — leading us to a closer relationship with Christ. For teens and young adults, San Pedro shows us that we don’t have to wait to fall in love with Christ. And the fact that he was a Filipino, and traveled away from his native land? A lot of us gathered here today can relate to that, too.
Nothing is more practical than
finding God, that is, than
falling in love
in a quite absolute, final way.What you are in love with,
what seizes your imagination,
will affect everything.It will decide
what will get you out of bed in the morning,
what you do with your evenings,
how you spend your weekends,
what you read,
whom you know,
what breaks your heart,
and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.Fall in love,
stay in love,
and it will decide everything.
San Pedro Calungsod, inspire us anew! Help us to hear God’s invitation to be agents of God’s live-giving and life-changing love!