Bad homilies

The inimitable Father Z has a typically good answer to a reader who asks what lay Catholics should do about bad homilies. I would add only two thoughts: 1) homilies aren't very terribly important and 2) because of the invitation to vanity that comes with the homily, it isn't much wonder that there would be bad ones. But, really, of all the parts of the mass, the homily is the least important. The sign of the cross that begins the mass is more important than the homily. I would cheerfully sit through a thousand bad homilies as the price for having a priest who doesn't rip through the sign of the cross like it was some meaningless formality that has to be gotten over to get to the real stuff. Ditto for a priest who would say the Nicene Creed slow enough that we can all follow what it is that we are professing rather than rushing through it because the homily was too long again.