According to St. Paul when we get to heaven we shall see God “face to face,” called in the tradition the “beatific vision.” Artists and poets have imagined what that might be like — their images are, literally, out of this world. Maybe Philip was thinking along those lines when he said to Jesus, “Master,… Read More »

John 14 is the gospel assigned for today and for Sunday. Since the Weekday and Sunday Readings are on a completely different cycle this is a coincidence … or a providence.  God wants us to notice this reading .  Jesus says, “I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I… Read More »

St. Paul begins his first missionary sermon this way: The God of this people Israel chose our ancestors. He then proceeds to tell the story of the people as the way to introduce the new thing God is doing in Jesus. If you don’t know where you’re coming from you don’t know where you are. That… Read More »

Rick Warren, pastor of a megachurch, talked about a revelation that he had looking at the Bible more closely.  “I found 2,000 verses on the poor. How did I miss that? I went to Bible college, two seminaries, and I got a doctorate. How did I miss God’s compassion for the poor?” A powerful reminder… Read More »

St. Luke in the Acts of the Apostles portrays St. Peter, as the head of the fledgling church, opening up the fellowship to include non-Jews, Gentiles, to become followers of Jesus. He did so as a result of a direct revelation from God. Since Jesus, Mary, the Apostles, and all of the first followers of… Read More »

“I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly.”  The measure for the success of the mission of Jesus is found in us — do we possess the more abundant life that he came to give us? We have more abundant life when we are not filled with fear and anxiety… Read More »

In the Bread of Life Discourse Jesus described the gift of the Eucharist. “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life.” According to St. John many of his disciples found this saying hard and no longer walked with him. Since I have experienced the real presence of Jesus in my life in… Read More »

The readings assigned for today seem, at first, to be very different. The first lesson is the story of St. Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus. The gospel is the highlight of the Bread of Life discourse in John 6 where Jesus declares Whoever eats my Flesh and drinks my Blood remains in me… Read More »

The Acts of the Apostles is a story of the message of Jesus gradually rippling out. From the initial community in Jerusalem it spread into Samaria. Next we are told it went to African in the person of the Ethiopian Eunuch. (The Coptic Church looks on him as their founder.) Note that Acts reports that… Read More »

According to the Acts of the Apostles after the martyrdom of St. Stephen, “there broke out a severe persecution of the Church in Jerusalem, and all were scattered throughout the countryside.” On the one hand this was a terrible tragedy. No one wants to be persecuted. However, God uses everything, even negative things. Because of the… Read More »