Reading today in Matthew of yet another lack of communication between the chief priests and the elders and Jesus is a reminder of how difficult true communication and connection is for us. The longer we live out our experience of life the more we savor the moments of true communication and communion and the more we suffer so often when we remain at a distance and disconnected from others, even those we most desire to know and be known by.…[read more]
The last week of the Church year has, for much of my life, been my least favorite time, liturgically speaking. There is a relentlessness to the themes of catastrophe, destruction, violence, and death. There is the constant reminder, as we hear in the gospel today, that “the days will come when there will not be left a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down” (Luke 21:6). The reminders of the limits of humanity’s potency and effectiveness have always easily evoked my personal psychic sense of and fears of futility. One of the hardest but truest spiritual directives…[read more]
But what profit did you get then from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been freed from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit that you have leads to sanctification, and its end is eternal life. For the…[read more]
Orpah kissed her mother-in-law good-bye, but Ruth stayed with her.Naomi said, “See now! Your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and her god. Go back after your sister-in-law!” But Ruth said, “Do not ask me to abandon or forsake you! For wherever you go, I will go, wherever you lodge I will lodge, your…[read more]
For what profit comes to us from the toil and anxiety of heart with which we have labored under the sun? All our days sorrow and grief are our occupation; even at night our minds are not at rest. This also is vanity. Ecclesiastes 2: 22-23 There is perhaps no more “counter-cultural” text in the…[read more]
Now the works of the flesh are obvious: immorality, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, rivalry, jealousy, outburst of fury, acts of selfishness, dissensions, factions, occasions of envy, drinking bouts, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the Kingdom of God. In…[read more]
Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his…[read more]
“She has done what she could, She has anticipated anointing my body for burial. Amen, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed to the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her.” . . . . . “My soul is sorrowful, even to death.” Mark 14:8-9, 34 As…[read more]
Who can ascend the mountain of the Lord? / or who may stand in God’s holy place? / The one whose hands are sinless, whose heart is clean, / who desires not what is vain. Psalm 24:3-4 As Advent draws toward its conclusion, the figure of Mary becomes more and more focal. She is first…[read more]
Reading today in Matthew of yet another lack of communication between the chief priests and the elders and Jesus is a reminder of how difficult true communication and connection is for us. The longer we live out our experience of life the more we savor the moments of true communication and communion and the more we suffer so often when we remain at a distance and disconnected from others, even those we most desire to know and be known by.…[read more]
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