Freedom and Responsibility

The people contended with Moses, exclaiming, “Would that we too had perished with our kinsmen in the Lord’s presence!  Why have you brought the Lord’s assembly into the desert where we and our livestock are dying?  Why did you lead us out of Egypt, only to bring us to this wretched place which has neither[read more]

A Shared Inheritance

But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth.  He will not speak on his own, but he will speak what he hears, and will declare to you the things that are coming.  He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to[read more]

Pathos and Responsibility

Both the Lord in Genesis and Jesus in Mark’s gospel are presented in today’s readings as apparently frustrated. In the very anthropomorphic presentation of God in Genesis, the Creator is presented as experiencing regret for having created free human beings. In Mark’s description of Jesus’ attempting to teach his disciples to avoid the hypocrisy and self-alienation of the Pharisees and Herod, we hear of the pain that the disciples’ obduracy evokes in him. It is striking to ponder the fact that Jesus and God might experience the pathos that is so painful an aspect of our own experience. It is[read more]

Faith and Healing

So [the blind man who was begging] shouted out, “Jesus, Son of David!  Show mercy to me!” Those in front began to rebuke him into silence, but he shouted even more, “Son of David! Show mercy to me!” Jesus stood still. He ordered that the man be brought to him. When he had come close,[read more]

Poverty and Life In Common

Take care to guard against all greed, for though one may be rich, one’s life does not consist of possessions. Luke 12: 15   In the Working Paper on Life Form that is part of the Xaverian Charism Study, we read: The Xaverian expression of the life of the evangelical counsels has always included a[read more]