Please read the passage before the homily:
I have heard that the twenty-first day of the seventh month of the second year of the reign of Darius was 17 October 520 BCE. The temple had not been rebuilt. The people seem to have succumbed to disappointment and discouragement. The Word of the Lord, at that time, came to Haggai with a word of encouragement and command.
It is the God who had led the people out of Egypt who spoke; it is the God who led the people into the Promised Land; it is the God who would shake the treasures of the nations and fill the house with glory who commands them to work. God promises future glory and peace.
I find it striking that this God of great power and wealth and who does not need people tells us to work. We must work, ostensibly to rebuild the temple, but, more importantly, to rebuild our relationship with God. For us, likewise, this is not the time for discouragement and lament. It is time for us to work, to do positive things to foster our relationship with God. God does have the power to save us, but God wants us to respond in positive ways to God’s will.
It is now the twenty-sixth day of September 2025. We have not finished the projects God has assigned us. We remember the days of old when we and God together made our journeys through the deserts of the past to the glory of fulfilment. Now since this same God is with us and has not deserted us, it is time we for us to get to work, “and in this place God will give us peace”.