Jesus said to his disciples: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!” Have we lost the sense of urgency that Jesus felt? Think of St. Francis Xavier and other missionaries who left home and family never to see them again because they felt the need… Read More »
OCTOBER232024
“Much will be required of the person entrusted with much, and still more will be demanded of the person entrusted with more.” This saying of Jesus caused a friend of mine a great deal of anxiety. He felt like God had given him so much — intelligence, an excellent education, good health — and he… Read More »
OCTOBER22204
When astronauts talk about their experience of seeing the earth from space they comment on the interconnectedness of everything. The borders and divisions which are so important in the political realm have no place in the big picture of the life of the planet. St. Paul also is urging us to have a big picture… Read More »
OCTOBER212024
The student radical in the play, Fiddler on the Roof, says the riches are a curse. The poor milkman exclaims, “May the Lord curse me with it and may I never recover.” The relationship between riches and poverty has a convulted relationship in the Bible. If you think of it, the sin of Adam was… Read More »
OCTOBER202024
I wonder if we face the mystery of the Incarnation — that Jesus was fully a human being while at the same time remaining fully the Son of God — in all its implications. Do we think of Jesus as possessing the complex set of emotions and feelings that characterize us as human beings or… Read More »
OCTOBER192024
Don’t you love this saying from St. Paul: May the eyes of your hearts be enlightened. The “eyes of the your hearts” gives us the image of seeing beyond the surface, the obvious, and instead seeing what love reveals. There is a similar thought in The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery.“And now here is… Read More »
OCTOBER182024
The Lord Jesus appointed seventy-two disciples whom he sent ahead of him in pairs. I think it was Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Lutheran pastor killed by the Nazis in 1945, who said that the reason Jesus sent out the disciples two by two was so that they would have someone to forgive. Whenever you have two… Read More »
OCTOBER172024
The Church starts reading today from St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians. This letter is much less personal (and combative) then the recently concluded Epistle to the Galatians. Paul is giving an expansive vision of how the faith operates in our lives. [God] chose us in [Christ], before the foundation of the world, to be… Read More »
OCTOBER162024
Thomas Aquinas says our behavior is driven by two powers: the irascible appetite and the concupiscible appetite. Since Freud society has put most of its attention on the concupiscible appetite, i.e. the desire for pleasure, satisfaction, comfort. St. Paul was certainly aware that this appetite is a “work of the flesh; immorality, impurity … drinking… Read More »
OCTOBER152024
A coat of arms had its origin in war! The shields of the knights would be decorated with signs and symbols that indentified them in battle. In time, when the shields were hung in the manor hall, decorations were placed around them including “the banner,” a scroll at the bottom where the family motto would… Read More »
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