The Apostles

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This Sunday is the 11th Sunday of Ordinary Time. The gospel is from the opening verses of the Matthean Missionary Discourse. From the first verses one should notice a change in vocabulary as Jesus “summoned his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits to drive them out and to cure every disease and every illness. The names of the twelve apostles…” (Mt 10:1-2) Up until this point those who follow Jesus have been referred to as “disciples.” Continue reading →

Christian saltiness

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Salt is important. It has its own Wiki page and even has a history book (Mark Kurlansky: Salt: A World History.)  Yup, you heard it correctly. A whole history of the world written in the context of salt.  As the author writes, “from the beginning of civilization until about one hundred years ago, salt was one of the most sought-after commodities in human history.”  And you took salt for granted. Continue reading →

The Galilee Mission

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This Sunday is the 11th Sunday of Ordinary Time in Liturgical Year A. The gospel is taken from Matthew 9:36 – 10:8 which falls in a section that is part of the Galilee ministry, but towards the end with a third cycle of Jesus’ mighty acts (9:18–34) which reveals his power over death and chronic illness, blindness, and speechlessness. The Galilee ministry ends with essentially a summary verse: “Jesus went around to all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and curing every disease and illness.” (Mt 9:35, a virtual repeat of Mt 4:23) Continue reading →

Ordinary Time

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This Sunday (2023) we return to Ordinary Time in the liturgical sense. Ordinary Time includes the days not part of the Advent, Christmas, Lent or Easter seasons. The Easter season extends to and includes Pentecost Sunday. Ordinary Time starts the Monday following Pentecost. Apart from special feast days and memorials, the liturgical color is green, but you may have noticed the two Sundays following Pentecost used white as the liturgical colors. Still, the Solemnity of Holy Trinity (9th week) and Corpus Christi (10th week) are part of Ordinary Time. Continue reading →

You can call me Al

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During the week before Pentecost Sunday, early one morning on my way to prepare a cup of tea, I noticed something attached to the front door of the refrigerator. In a household with children I would not be surprised to see drawings, report cards, pictures, and whatnot on the refrigerator door, but this was a friary with four ordained brothers, all…shall we say, a bit past the half-century mark. So, I stopped to see what was posted. Continue reading →

Words of Life

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This coming Sunday is the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ.  In Jn 6:60, some of the disciples of Jesus react negatively saying ‘This saying is hard; who can accept it.’  Are they referring just to the immediately preceding passages (vv. 51-59) or are they referring to all of Jesus’ claim in v.42, ‘I have come down from heaven.’?  Jesus’ own words give us the context, “Do you take offense at this?  Then what if you were to see the Son of man ascending where he was before?”  That a man from Nazareth should claim that he is a life-giving revealer sent down from God, from heaven, is “hard” to take and only faith can overcome the “offense” or stumbling-block of the Incarnation.  But if his words are too hard to take, then a worse shock awaits them when they see him raised on the cross and then it will be a real test of their faith to believe in his death and resurrection. Continue reading →

Eucharistic Life

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This coming Sunday is the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ.  Where the principal focus of the previous section is the bread of life as the divine revelation given to men by and in Jesus, Jn 6:51 moves the focus to a clearly Eucharistic theme – ‘I am the living bread come down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.‘  While some argue the words are metaphor, the Jews clearly understand.  Jesus is referring to eating of his flesh.  Continue reading →

Flesh for the life of the world

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This coming Sunday is the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ. With all that in mind (the previous posts) we come to the gospel passage for the feast.

51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.” 52 The Jews quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us (his) flesh to eat?” 53 Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him. 57 Just as the living Father sent me and I have life because of the Father, so also the one who feeds on me will have life because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven. Unlike your ancestors who ate and still died, whoever eats this bread will live forever.”  

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Turning to God

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The first reading today is again from the Book of Tobit, as are all the first readings from this 9th Week of Ordinary Time. Tobit has fallen on hard times. His property has been confiscated, he has been blinded by bird droppings and is now four years blind, his wife has been put to work, his mood is sour and melancholy, and his wife questions what has become of his righteousness and charity. Continue reading →