The Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
Isaiah 56:1,6-7  +  Romans 11:13-15,29-32  +  Matthew 15:21-28
August 16, 2026

The woman in today’s Gospel Reading represents you and me inasmuch as we are sinners.  She is a Gentile.  Up to Jesus’ day, God had promised salvation only to the Jews.  Gentiles were—by definition—outsiders.  Even though we have been adopted by God through our baptism, when we sin, we move outside of God’s grace.  So when we sin, we are like the woman in today’s Gospel Reading.  However, whenever anyone finds himself outside of God’s grace, the first step towards God is always the virtue of faith.

Faith is the doorway through which all of God’s other gifts find their true meaning in our lives.  Nonetheless, faith is always a gift, which some people do not accept.  Perhaps some days when you wake up, you’re not sure whether you do either.  Nonetheless, it’s a gift that’s always “on offer” from God.

The fact is, though, that you cannot make someone believe in God.  Jesus preached in public for three years, but He did not spend His time offering to people proofs of God’s existence.  Today’s Gospel Reading shows just how down-to-earth Jesus could be regarding the faith of others.

More to the point, today’s Gospel Reading shows us how God can test our faith.  This dialogue—we might almost call it “banter”—between Jesus and the Gentile woman shows how God relates to us.  It also shows how He wants us to relate to Him in our daily lives, and over the long course of many years.

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Have you ever prayed to God and felt He was not listening?  The evangelist tells us that “a Canaanite woman”—that is, an outsider—came to Jesus.  She “called out, ‘Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David!’”  This woman, despite not being a Jew, nonetheless knew who Jesus was, and cried out to Him for help.  But what happened next?

Jesus did not say a word in response.  Not a word!  Here is a woman whose daughter is being tormented, and Jesus did not say even a word in answer.  If you have ever prayed intensely about a serious problem, and felt that God did not answer, you can identify with this woman.

But can you identify with what the woman does next?  Her faith is not shaken.  She goes now to Jesus a second time, and simply says, “Lord, help me.”  But how does Jesus respond this time?

Jesus speaks in a way that can strike us—at first hearing—as an insult.  He says to this outsider, “‘It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.’”  The “children” Jesus is referring to are the children of Israel.  By contrast, this woman is an outsider, and in that sense is a “dog”.  However, the woman’s response shows that she understands what Jesus is up to.  But do you understand what He is up to when He challenges you in your spiritual life?

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God knows you better than you know yourself.  God demands faith from us, even when we believe we have nothing left.  He is willing to draw our faith out of us.  We might even say that He is willing to test us, in order to purify and strengthen our faith.  Jesus knows what sort of faith the woman in the Gospel Reading has.  He is willing to draw it out, because without faith on this woman’s part, He will not choose to work a miracle for her.

Faith is always necessary for God’s plan for our lives to reach its goal.  Whenever you read in the Gospel about Jesus not working a miracle that seems needed, it’s not because He is unable.  The fact is that without faith on our part, God’s grace would be taken for granted.  Of course, that begs the question:  exactly what kind of faith does God want from us?

The faith that God wants from us is not passive; it’s active.  God does not want from us the sort of faith that just says, “God is going to take care of everything, so I can sit back and coast.”  That is not our Catholic understanding of faith.  Faith is something active on our part.  It demands constant prayer.  It demands the sort of dialogue, and even the sort of banter, that we hear between Jesus and the Gentile woman.  We might even say that God wants us to challenge Him in our prayer, as the woman in today’s Gospel passage does.

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The bottom line is that above all else, God wants us to have an active faith.  He wants us to have a persevering faith.  This is the faith that turns to Jesus as the Lord of our lives, and trusts Him to give us not what we want, but what we truly need.

The Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
I Kings 19:9,11-13  +  Romans 9:1-5  +  Matthew 14:22-33
August 9, 2026

After the fire there was a tiny whispering sound.

references to the Catechism of the Catholic Church cited for this Sunday by the Vatican’s Homiletic Directory:

CCC 164: faith experiences testing
CCC 272-274: only faith can follow mysterious ways of providence
CCC 671-672: in difficult times, cultivate trust that all is subject to Christ
CCC 56-64, 121-122, 218-219: history of covenants; God’s love for Israel
CCC 839-840: the Church’s relationship to the Jewish people

Every one of you has been lonely at some point in your life.  Sometimes the feeling of loneliness is caused by distance.  Many recent high school graduates will leave soon for college.  They will look forward to new friends and experiences. But many of them will experience homesickness, which is one type of loneliness.

There are many types of loneliness, and they have many different causes. Once, a mother told me how lonely she felt on the morning she dropped off her youngest child on his first day of kindergarten.  She had taken her older children to their first days of kindergarten, as well.  But this was different.  On that August day, without knowing exactly why, she felt that her loneliness was from crossing a threshold in her life.  She felt that she’d never again be needed by others in the same way.

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These different examples of loneliness raise a question.  What is the difference between loneliness and “aloneness”?  They’re definitely not the same.  It’s true that a person who is alone can also be lonely.  But on the other hand, a person can feel lonely in the midst of a room full of friends.

One difference between the two is that loneliness is inside us, while aloneness is outside us.  Aloneness is easy to spot:  if we notice someone who has no one else around him, it’s obvious that he’s alone.

But loneliness, on the other hand, is not as easy to spot.  Because loneliness is inside a person, you could only see loneliness in another if you could see into his or her soul.  It’s true that sometimes the state of a person’s soul becomes visible.  This might happen by an expression on a person’s face, or tears running down the person’s cheeks.  But often, we do not see those signs, sometimes because the loneliness is hidden, or maybe we’re not being attentive to others.

So how does all this about loneliness and aloneness relate to today’s Scriptures?  They’re shown by two persons in today’s Scriptures.  There is Elijah in the First Reading, and Our Lord Jesus at the start of today’s Gospel passage.

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The First Reading’s portrait of Elijah is a detail of a much larger canvas.  Reflect on the context that surrounds Elijah today.  You would have to read the verses leading up to today’s First Reading to learn that Elijah is in flight, for fear of his life.  Elijah was the enemy of King Ahab, the wicked king of Israel.  Among his evil deeds, Ahab and his wife Jezebel had every prophet of Israel murdered by the sword, except Elijah.

At the start of the chapter from which today’s First Reading comes, Jezebel vows to end Elijah’s life within a day’s time.  Although Israel’s prophets often faced death threats, Elijah acts very humanly and flees.  He prays “that he might die, saying, ‘It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life…’” [I Kings 19:4].  At the start of today’s First Reading, Elijah has fled for his life for forty days and forty nights.  Elijah has hidden himself in a cave inside the mountain of Horeb.

So with Elijah in mind, consider a time in your own life that resembles Elijah’s darkness.  Elijah is in a dark place, both in his physical surroundings, and within his soul.  But what happens next foreshadows what God offers you at times of darkness.  It’s within Elijah’s darkness that the Lord God chooses to speak to Elijah.  In your own life, the Lord promises you that when you are in darkness, He will speak to you. But will you be able to hear Him?

Sacred Scripture reveals to us the obvious fact that God can speak however He wishes.  He can speak through “a strong and heavy wind” [I Kings 19:11]:  remember the day of Pentecost [Acts 2:2].  He can speak through an “earthquake” [I Kings 19:11]:  remember the death of Jesus [Matthew 27:51].  He can speak through “fire” [I Kings 19:12]:  recall the descent of the Holy Spirit [Acts 2:3].  God can choose to speak through signs that are loud and eye-catching.  But He can also do the opposite, speaking through “a tiny, whispering sound.” This is how God the Father speaks to us in times of darkness.

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At the beginning of today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus “went up on the mountain by Himself to pray.  When it was evening He was there alone.”  We have to be alone in order to hear the whispering of God the Father. The aloneness that God the Father demands also includes the silencing of electronic devices.  Jesus was willing to listen for, and listen to, the voice of His Father in Heaven.  He was not afraid of doing what the Lord asked of Him, even if this meant carrying and dying on the Cross.  He was not afraid because He knew that the love of His Father is stronger than death.

It’s easy to notice the fires, earthquakes, and driving winds that God the Father sends your way.  But what about the whispers?  What are you missing by not listening for—and not listening to—your Father whispering to you?

The Transfiguration of the Lord [A]
Daniel 7:9-10,13-14  +  2 Peter 1:16-19  +  Matthew 17:1-9
August 6, 2026

Today the Church celebrates the Feast of Jesus’ Transfiguration.  Within this scene that the Gospel Reading describes, there are three icons for us to attend to.  Each icon symbolizes a different experience of our spiritual life.  These three icons are:  the tent; the cross; and the glory.  What do these three symbolize?

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The first icon is the tent of which Peter speaks.  He says to Jesus, “If you wish, I will make three tents here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.”  Peter wants to make tents so they can stay there and prolong their experience on the mountaintop.

Peter is a beginner in the spiritual life.  He is a child in the spiritual life.  He’s like a child who wants to start supper with dessert.

God does not want His pastors to encourage Jesus’ disciples to be like Peter.  The tent symbolizes what is man-made.  It cannot fulfill man.  It can be used on the journey like a tool, but when substituted for what is God-made, it turns the Faith inside-out.

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The second icon is the Cross of which Jesus speaks.  He charged the three apostles, “Do not tell the vision to anyone until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.”  Today’s Gospel Reading comes from St. Matthew’s account of the Gospel.  In St. Luke’s account of the Transfiguration, we hear that Jesus, Moses, and Elijah “spoke of [Jesus’] exodus that he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem.”  This exodus is the Way of the Cross.

Jesus is the Master of the spiritual life.  He is God the Father’s “beloved Son, with whom [the Father is] well pleased”.  The Father bids us to listen to him because He is the Father’s own divine Word.

The world encourages us to build tents to rest in fleeting pleasures.  The Lord commands that we take up our own crosses and follow Him to Calvary.  The world spins in circles, leading nowhere.  The Cross leads to death, and through Christ, to eternal life.  This is why the motto of St. Bruno’s Carthusian order is “stat crux dum volvitur orbis”:  “the cross stands while the world turns”.

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The third icon is the glory of the Father.  This is the glory of the Father’s only-begotten Son.  This glory is a gift to the apostles to fortify them against the roadblocks along the Way of the Cross.

This glory is not man-made.  It is divine, yet it is fleeting.  It is not something in which the apostles can rest, but a gift for which to give thanks as they continue to follow Jesus.  This glory shines forth twice in this scene.  The Father’s glory shines forth first in His Son.  Jesus “was transfigured before them; his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light.”  The Father’s glory also shines through the cloud as He speaks:  “behold, a bright cloud cast a shadow over them, then from the cloud came a voice that said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.’”

The Father wishes that we would gaze upon His beloved Son, and listen to Him as calls us to follow Him to Calvary.  This brief gift is a means to a much greater end.  Sharing in the gift of the Cross is the only means by which to experience the Father’s glory without end in Heaven.

The Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
Isaiah 55:1-3  +  Romans 8:35,37-39  +  Matthew 14:13-21

… he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, who in turn gave them to the crowds.

references to the Catechism of the Catholic Church cited for this Sunday by the Vatican’s Homiletic Directory:

CCC 2828-2837: give us this day our daily bread
CCC 1335: miracle of loaves prefigures the Eucharist
CCC 1391-1401: the fruits of Holy Communion

What do you think is the meaning of Jesus feeding a crowd of more than five thousand people with only a few loaves of bread and a couple of fish?  Was Jesus simply showing his power to work a miracle:  demonstrating his power over material things?  Of course, that was part of it.  But this miracle of feeding the five thousand has far more to tell us about Christ than just this.

Being compassionate, Jesus was certainly concerned with the physical well-being of the people who had come to hear Him preach.  Just how deep Christ’s compassion was is made obvious when we consider again something the first verse of this passage tells us.  Jesus is told about the hunger of the crowds right after hearing of John the Baptist’s death, and withdrawing by boat to a deserted place by Himself.  If we were to imagine this, we would see just how human Christ was, responding in grief and perhaps anger at the murder of His cousin.  He withdrew from others to be by Himself.  Yet even at this point in His life, the needs of others pressed upon Him.  His response was that of God Himself:  He turned to help those in need.

We could look at this compassion of Jesus and see in it an example for ourselves.  As Christians, we are called to walk in the footsteps of Christ and imitate Him.  We are especially to imitate the sort of self-sacrifice that He shows in this passage, the sort of self-sacrifice that came to full expression in His death on the Cross.

But this passage is not chiefly about our need to imitate Christ.  We all have our limits.  Very likely, if we learned of the murder of a close relative, we’d be of little help to others.  None of us can expect to match the depth of Christ’s self-sacrifice.

But again, that’s not the chief point of this passage.  Within this event, the example that ought to be our chief focus is not the response of Jesus, but the request of the crowds.  The crowds seek out Jesus because they know that they are in need.  But exactly what kind of need do they have?

Being compassionate, Jesus was certainly concerned with the physical well-being of the people who had come to hear Him preach.  But He knew the people in the crowds better than they knew themselves.  Christ had a much deeper concern for their spiritual well-being.  He had reminded them that their ancestors, whom God had fed in the desert by sending bread in the form of manna, had died.  His divine Father, Jesus told them, had sent Him to be their spiritual bread which would allow them to live forever.  If they would eat this bread by accepting Him and following His commandments, they could enter into God’s eternal kingdom of love.

In today’s First Reading, Isaiah says in the name of the Lord, “Come to me heedfully, listen, that you may have life.”  This is the same message which Jesus conveyed to those people gathered near the Sea of Galilee.  He brought His meaning home to them in a concrete way by giving them physical bread to satisfy their bodily hunger.  But at the same time, He revealed that He was the spiritual bread which God had sent to bring them eternal life.  His miracle used what was physical in order to point towards what is spiritual.

The crowds naturally had a spiritual hunger.  Perhaps some of them were not even aware of this hunger inside their souls.  Unfortunately, many of us today also are not aware of the hunger in our souls.  Instead, we are distracted by many things such as our work, our leisure, and our possessions.  We are worried about many things without giving heed to the one needful thing.  Jesus, then, calls us first to recognize the greatest hunger in our lives, and then to seek the One who alone can fill it.

Multiplication of the Loaves and Fish by Ambrosius Francken I (1544–1618)

The Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
1 Kings 3:5,7-12  +  Romans 8:28-30  +  Matthew 13:44-52 [or Mt 13:44-46]
July 26, 2026

references to the Catechism of the Catholic Church cited for this Sunday by the Vatican’s Homiletic Directory:

CCC 407: cannot ignore wound of sin in discerning human situation
CCC 1777-1785: moral decision making in rapport with God’s will
CCC 1786-1789: seeking will of God in divine law in difficult circumstances
CCC 1038-1041: separation of good and evil at Judgment
CCC 1037: God predestines no one to hell

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Many years ago, an elderly lady in Scotland was so poor that the local townspeople had to support her.  Her son had gone off to America, and become very wealthy.  The neighbors often whispered to each other, “Why doesn’t John help his old mother?”

One day a neighbor suggested that she ask her son for help.  The mother defended her son, saying:  “John is thoughtful, but needs all his money.  He’s a good boy.  He writes to me every month, and with every letter he sends me postcards of America.”  The mother reached for her Bible, saying to her visitor, “I save all his letters and put the postcards in the Good Book.”

These “postcards” displayed various scenes from the United States.  One pictured Independence Hall in Philadelphia.  Others showed the White House, the U.S. Capitol, and the U.S. Treasury.  On the front of the “postcards” were portraits of famous Americans such as Benjamin Franklin, Ulysses S. Grant, Andrew Jackson, and Alexander Hamilton.  Between the leaves of this mother’s bible, these “postcards” were in fact American currency worth thousands of dollars.  She had a treasure but did not recognize it.

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Our lives are so crowded by activities and possessions that we often do not recognize the first of God’s great gifts to us:  the human soul.  People often don’t pay much attention to the soul because it’s unlike anything else in the world.  It’s not red and shiny, it doesn’t glitter, and it doesn’t draw attention to itself.  The greatness of the human soul is not its appearance.  The greatness of the human soul is its capacity.

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The human soul is capable of bearing God’s grace.  Grace is what allows us to share directly in the life of God.  But if we don’t prioritize the life of grace, our lives will lack the order needed to be a strong Christian.

About 1,500 years ago, St. Augustine cried out to God that our human souls are restless, until they rest in Him.  Many persons—even many Christians—spend years pursuing all sorts of material goods and pleasures.  However, if we were wise like King Solomon in today’s First Reading, we would learn from experience after experience that nothing finite can satisfy infinitely.

Closer to our day than St. Augustine, the British author C. S. Lewis wrote about the blessing of God’s gift of wisdom.  Through this divine wisdom, human persons can recognize—Lewis wrote—that “creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists.  A baby feels hunger,” Lewis explains, “[and] there is such a thing as food.  A duckling wants to swim, [and] there is such a thing as water.  …”  And so, Lewis concluded, “if I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.”

The human soul is great because it is capable of bearing God’s grace.  The human soul is a gift from God.  God infuses the soul within the human person at the moment of conception.  That soul, created in the Image and likeness of God, makes it possible for that person to receive God’s graces, each grace being a further gift from God.  However, on our part, each of us has two responsibilities.  Each of us must keep our soul in order, and each of us must seek out God’s graces.

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I’m sure that many of you watched the World Cup this summer.  Competitions at that level of professionalism are awe-inspiring.  We admire the talents of such athletes, although of course each victory represents years of tireless effort.  Athletes spend hour after hour in practice, perfecting their athletic abilities and their mental concentration.  Athletes don’t just hope that they’re going to achieve victory.  They work hard to allow their gifts to bear fruit.

The spiritual life requires from you a similar level of dedication.  God does not simply pour grace into your soul in the way that you pour gasoline into a car.  You are not a machine.  You, as a human person created in God’s Image and likeness, have to consciously make the decision to devote yourself each day to your spiritual life.  God means for you to do this prayer, penance, the practice of the virtues, and devout reception of the sacraments.  Our lives have to be oriented towards that treasure of grace—that pearl of great price—that share in God’s life.

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So this next week, as you spend time in prayer and reflection, keep these three points in mind.  First, your human soul is the first of God’s gifts to you.  Second, your human soul is a dwelling place for God’s grace.  Third, your human soul must be kept in order.

The first of these two are truths to be grateful for, and are reasons to give thanks to God, especially each time you participate in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  The third point—devotion to prayer, penance, the virtues, and worthy reception of the sacraments—makes demands of us.  But that effort, when fortified by God’s grace, greatly deepens our share in the life of Jesus Christ.

“The Judgment of Solomon” from The Hours of Catherine of Cleves (c. 1440)
The Morgan Library & Museum, MS M.917/945, p. 53

The Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
Isaiah 55:10-11 + Romans 8:18-23 + Matthew 13:1-23 [or Matthew 13:1-9]
July 12, 2026

Jesus is a teacher.  But He differs from most teachers.  Most teachers prepare their students to leave them.  That’s such a basic fact that we take it for granted.  In a classroom setting, there is literally a “term” of study.  (The word “term” comes the Latin “terminus”, meaning “end”.)  The teacher knows that she has only a school year, or in college just a semester, to teach the students in her classroom.  So she teaches accordingly, with the end in mind.

Something similar is true with parents.  Parents, of course, are the first and best teachers of their children in the ways of Faith.  Parents also have to teach their children many practical lessons about how the world works, for both good and ill.  Parents have eighteen years during which to teach their children.  Maybe for a few more years after high school, parents can help teach their children less directly.

But in most cases, the day comes when the child starts living his or her own life.  For most, that start is their wedding day.  In Matthew 19, Jesus quotes the Book of Genesis in order to teach us that “‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’” [Mt 19:5].  Parents therefore parent their children with this leave-taking in mind.

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Jesus is a teacher.  But Jesus is a teacher for the sake of being a Savior.  Jesus is not our teacher for a term, or a semester, or even for a few decades of our youth.  Jesus teaches in order for us to follow him more closely, not less.  Jesus teaches us not in order for us to stand on our own two feet, but to abide in Him, as He taught at the Last Supper [Jn 15:1-17].

We need to keep that goal of Jesus in mind whenever we listen to Him teach.  During the three years before His death, Jesus engaged in public ministry:  both teaching and working miracles.  During these three years, Jesus taught in many different ways.  Jesus often taught in parables.  Parables engage the imagination with their use of symbols and images.

In today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus does something that He rarely does.  He explains the parable that He has just taught.  Most likely, Jesus explains this parable because it is the heart of His teaching ministry.  This parable is about sowing the Word of God.

At the end of the Gospel Reading, Jesus explains something that helps us apply this parable to our own lives.  He says that “the seed sown on rich soil” is “the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit”.  The “seed sown on rich soil” is the goal that Jesus is striving for in everything He does.  The “seed sown on rich soil” is what He spoke about about His Last Supper:  Jesus abiding within your life.  Jesus explains what makes for “seed sown on rich soil”.  The “seed sown on rich soil” is “the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit”.  Jesus is pointing your attention to three actions that you need to be carry out.

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Focus first on what to “hear the word” means and demands.  It demands that we know exactly what “word” Jesus is speaking about.  What “word” is this?

St. John the Evangelist tells us in the first chapter of his Gospel account.  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. … / And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth”…. / And from his fulness have we all received, grace upon grace.” [Jn 1:1,14,16]

The Word is Jesus.  The Word is not a book.  The Word is a divine Person:  the Second Person of the Trinity.  The Word of God is God the Son.  The Father speaks through His divine Word, Who is His Son.

This divine Word speaks to man by different means.  The Word of God speaks to us through Sacred Scripture.  Yet St. John, who says in the very first verse of his Gospel that Jesus is the Word, says something else that’s key in the very last verse.  In the very last verse of St. John’s account of the Gospel, he writes this:  “There are also many other things that Jesus did, / but if these were to be described individually, / I do not think the whole world would contain the books that would be written” [Jn 21:25].

This dovetails with what St. Paul wrote in his Second Letter to the Thessalonians.  St. Paul wrote about the Church handing down the Word of God, exhorting the Thessalonians in these words:  “brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by our letter” [2 Thess 2:15].  For 2000 years, the Church has handed down the Word of God by “word of mouth” and by “letter”:  through Tradition and Scripture.  Our part as Christians is to take the time to sit ourselves down to hear the Word of God, both through Scripture and Tradition.

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So once we have heard the Word of God, we have to understand it.  Despite what some claim, the Bible does not explain itself.  Nor does praying to the Holy Spirit for enlightenment guarantee a truthful understanding of Scripture.  That’s proved by the existence of thousands of Christian denominations with contradictory beliefs.

Some 2000 years ago, Jesus gave His Church a special gift so that the Church could authentically understand the Word of God.  Jesus gave to His Church apostles, who were entrusted with teaching authority.  Through apostolic succession, bishops have continued to carry out that authority for generation after generation.  The word “bishop” literally means “overseer” or “supervisor”, and the Church’s teaching ministry is one area where bishops oversee.  They don’t carry out all of the Church’s teaching ministry.  But they oversee the teaching carried out by others within the Church.  That overseeing includes stepping in to make correction when it’s needed.

Now in our day and age we are very blessed, both with devoted catechists, and with insightful teaching resources.  The Church and our Faith are some 2000 years old, so it does not matter how old you are:  there’s more to learn about the Faith!  The Ignatius Catholic Study Bible is the best study bible available today, and the same series also offers individual books of the bible for reading and study.

But there are also online resources that are faithful means of understanding the Word of God.  Father Mike Schmitz, the Newman Center chaplain at the University of Minnesota in Duluth.  He’s well known online for hosting the Bible in a Year as well as the Catechism in a Year.  Both are available as podcasts and also on YouTube.  Another online resource is a priest from Austria, Fr. Johannes Schwarz.  He has a series of three-minute illustrated videos on YouTube, the series being called simply “3 Minute Catechism”.

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So that brings us to the third action that Jesus teaches us to carry out.  It’s not enough to hear the Word of God, and it’s not enough to understand it.  You also must bear fruit.  By bearing fruit, Christ abides in us, we abide in Christ, and we have hope for abiding in God’s Presence forever in Heaven.

We bear fruit when we allow the Word of God to guide us in our vocations.  We bear fruit when we carry out the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy in our parish and diocese.  During His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus teaches us about the necessity for us to hear Him, understand Him, and to bear fruit:  “You will know them by their fruits.  …  So, every sound tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears evil fruit.  A sound tree cannot bear evil fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.  Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.  Thus you will know them by their fruits.” [Mt 7:16,17-20]

In the Eucharist, the Word of God becomes flesh.  The Word becomes Flesh and dwells among us on the altar, but He also invites us to receive Him in order for us to be strengthened.  The strength of the Eucharist makes it possible for the Word of God to become flesh within us and to bear abundant fruit.

The Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
Jeremiah 20:10-13  +  Romans 5:12-15  +  Matthew 10:26-33
June 21, 2026

The Bible can be overwhelming.  But there’s an old saying by Pope St. Gregory the Great that offers hope.

The Bible “is… a kind of river… both shallow and deep, wherein both the lamb may find a footing, and the elephant float at large.”[1]  God’s Word makes His Love clear both to the simple and to the profound.

However, sometimes we expect more of ourselves than God does when it comes to His holy Word.  Jesus does not ask you, as His disciple, to memorize entire passages of the Bible.  He does not ask you to learn the names of all the books of the Bible.  He asks you instead to listen to Him when He speaks to you through His written Word.

But what is the chief setting where God speaks His Word to you?  It’s commendable if you read the Bible privately each day.  But that’s not the chief setting in which God means for His written Word to enter your life.  It’s commendable if you participate in a Scripture study group, like the one held here this past Lent.  But that’s not the chief setting in which God means for His written Word to enter your life.

The chief setting in which God means for you to hear His written Word is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  Passages, verses, and phrases from the Bible are proclaimed all throughout the Mass.  For example, shortly before receiving Holy Communion, the priest holds up the Sacred Host.  Then he says, “Behold the Lamb of God, behold him who takes away the sins of the world.  Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb.” 

The first part of that acclamation is from the first chapter of St. John the Evangelist’s Gospel account.  St. John the Baptist proclaims those words as he points out Jesus.[2]  The latter part is from the nineteenth chapter of the Book of Revelation, also written by St. John the Evangelist.  St. John in this verse records an angel describing Heaven as “the supper of the Lamb.”[3]

What about the next words at Mass, which the entire congregation speaks?  Those words echo the cry of the centurion to Jesus in the eighth chapter of St. Matthew’s Gospel.  The centurion speaks about Jesus healing his servant, but you and I speak about Jesus healing our soul by receiving Holy Communion:  “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”[4]

The celebration of Holy Mass is filled with example after example of verses and phrases taken from the Bible.  They’re woven into the fabric of the Mass so seamlessly that it’s easy to forget that they come from the Bible.

More directly taken from the Bible are the antiphons and readings of the Mass.  Some missalettes and hymnals do not include the antiphons in their pages.  This is in spite of the fact that the antiphons, unlike hymns, are specifically assigned by the Church to each Sunday.  The antiphons are very helpful to helping us appreciate God’s Word, for a reason I’ll circle back to in a few moments.

All of the Scripture readings at Mass follow a progression, building up to the Gospel Reading.  We stand for the Gospel because Jesus Himself speaks and acts directly, for us to learn from and to be inspired by.

In this Sunday’s Gospel Reading, we hear from the tenth chapter of St. Matthew’s Gospel account.  The whole passage is Jesus speaking to His Twelve Apostles, and consists of ten sentences.  The challenge in hearing and pondering this passage is that there’s so much to take in.  This is the biggest challenge for most Christians:  not to be overwhelmed by the Bible.  This is one reason that the Church, as a good mother, portions the Scriptures for Sunday Mass over three years.

When we’re considering a given Sunday’s Scripture readings, there’s a simple practice that can help keep us from being overwhelmed.  When you are listening to or reading God’s written word in Sacred Scripture, pray to the Holy Spirit.  Ask the Holy Spirit to draw your attention to, and to focus your attention upon, one particular part of God’s written Word.  It may be a single verse, or it may be a phrase, or it may even be a single word within a verse.

This is why the antiphons of the Mass—the Entrance Antiphon, Offertory Antiphon, and Communion Antiphon—are helpful.  They’re very brief, and because of their brevity, they’re easy to focus on.  But with the Holy Spirit’s help, you can focus on a single verse, or phrase, or even a single word within any Reading at Mass.

This past week as I read and re-read this Sunday’s Scripture readings, one verse stood out.  It’s from Jesus’ words to the Apostles in the Gospel Reading:  “Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father.”  How does Jesus speak to you and me through these words?

One point that stands out is the humility that Jesus’ words evoke.  He explains that if someone acknowledges Him before others, He will acknowledge that person before before God the Father.  Conversely, if someone does not acknowledge Jesus before others, He will not acknowledge that person before before God the Father.

One way to reflect upon any given verse, phrase, or word of Scripture is to hold it up in the light of other similar scripture passages.  In the case of Jesus’ words about acknowledging Him, a passage from the Sermon on the Mount sheds some light.  This passage is actually going to be proclaimed at weekday Mass this coming Thursday.

During the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus declares:

“‘Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.  Many will say to me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name?  Did we not drive out demons in your name?  Did we not do mighty deeds in your name?”  Then I will declare to them solemnly, “I never knew you.  Depart from me, you evildoers.”’”[5]

Jesus is very specific here about His reason for saying about someone, “I never knew you.”  The reason is that someone not carrying out the will of God the Father.  This drives home the hard truth that you cannot coast through life thinking that being baptized will guarantee your salvation.  Doing the will of Jesus’ Father is key.

That relates directly to Jesus’ words in today’s Gospel Reading:  “Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father.”  God the Father wills that you acknowledge Jesus before others.

Each of you must pray and discern for yourself how this ought to be taking place in your lives.  What are the places, and the circumstances, and the ways in which God is calling you to acknowledge Jesus before others?  Faith in Christ is not authentic if it’s only private, hidden from others.  Each of you must pray and discern for yourself about the places, the circumstances, and the ways in which God is calling you to acknowledge Jesus before others.

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[1] Saint Gregory The Great, Moralia in Job, Prefatory Letter to Leander of Seville, IV [https://www.ecatholic2000.com/job/untitled-05.shtml].

[2] John 1:29.

[3] Revelation 19:9.

[4] Cf. Matthew 8:8.

[5] Matthew 7:21-23.

The Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
Exodus 19:2-6a  +  Romans 5:6-11 +  Matthew 9:36—10:8
June 14, 2026

In the First Reading, God makes a promise to the Israelites.  If they listen to His word and keep their covenant with Him, He would hold them as a special possession. 

But then God’s promise went further.  He promised that they would be dearer to Him than all other people, though all the earth is His. 

Finally, He concludes His promise with a surprising statement.  He declares “You shall be to me a kingdom of priests, a holy nation.”  This statement is as true of the Church today as it was of the Israelites in their day.  The Church to which you belong is “a kingdom of priests”. 

We owe it to ourselves to unpack this phrase:  “a kingdom of priests”.  In the Church, Jesus is our High Priest on the Cross.  From the power of the Cross flow two forms of priesthood:  the ordained priesthood and the baptismal priesthood.

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It’s true that ordained priests play an important—and, in fact, essential—role in the life of the Church.  However, it’s also true that every Christian, by virtue of her or his baptism, is a priest.  This baptismal priesthood is central to living in the world as a disciple of Jesus Christ.

St. Paul in the Second Reading reminds us that Christ Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice for us on the Cross.  While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.  Christ is our High Priest.  He is not like the priests of the Old Testament who offered goats and bulls as sacrifices.  Christ offered Himself as a sacrifice.  This is a key difference between the Old Testament priesthood and the priesthood of Jesus.

Jesus offered Himself on the Cross as the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world.  So in imitation of Jesus, every baptized Christian offers herself or himself in sacrifice out of love of God and neighbor.  As the members of Christ’s Mystical Body—the Church—we are all together a kingdom of priests.

We learn how to sacrifice through the example of those who guide us in our lives.  Chief among these examples is Christ, of course.  The Church looks to the example that Jesus Christ gave us on the Cross.  However, the Cross is not the only example which Jesus gives us.  In fact, the entire life of our Lord shows us the love He has for us. 

In today’s Gospel Reading, we see that Jesus was not willing to let any need go untended.  Jesus couldn’t stand to see the suffering experienced by those with unclean spirits and diseases.  So he gave His twelve apostles a share in His own authority, so could share in His work of healing.

In giving His healing power to the apostles, Jesus showed the same concern that He shows today in the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick.  Only ordained priests may confer the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick.  However, every baptized Christian is called to carry out the corporal works of mercy. 

God calls the baptized to feed the hungry and give drink to the thirsty, to visit the sick and imprisoned, and to clothe those who are without.  He calls us to shelter the homeless, and to bury the dead.  By means of these sacrifices, we imitate our Lord Jesus.  The corporal and the spiritual works of mercy are key ways in which we live out our baptismal priesthood.  We make a sacrifice from the heart in order to care for the needs of others.

But consider another reason why we need to take the baptismal priesthood so seriously.  Our lives—for good or ill—set examples for others, most especially for our youth.  Christ did  not only give His followers a mandate to care for others.  He also commanded them to pray that others down the road would join the work of God’s harvest. 

That latter command is addressed to us in our day and age, as well.  Jesus declares:  “The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest.”  Clearly the “vocations crisis” is not something unique in Church history.  It was even present in Jesus’ own day.

Of course, the most important source of strength for living out the baptismal priesthood is Jesus’ Body and Blood in the Eucharist.  We cannot fully carry out God’s will for our lives without the strength that comes from the Eucharist.  That leads us to the importance of the ordained priesthood.

We are blessed in our diocese when it comes to vocations to the ordained priesthood.  Many bishops from other dioceses have asked why our diocese is so blessed.  You might say that—in a good sense—it’s a matter of the chicken and the egg.  Which blessing comes first?  Is the stewardship of rank and file baptized Christians so strong in our diocese because we have such an abundance of ordinations?  Or do we have such an abundance of vocations because of the examples of sacrificial stewardship that young people see growing up?  The answer is “Yes”, and “Yes”.

It’s also important to note the sacrifice of time that so many members of our diocese make in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament.  The prayers offered in Eucharistic Adoration throughout our diocese are an essential reason for the blessings in our diocese.  This is especially true of the vocations to the ordained priesthood that God is perpetually calling forth from our parishes.

When we care for others, and when we pray to God, we recognize that we are small.  We exist and we live in this world in order to serve others.  That service prepares others and ourselves to see more clearly that this world here below is not all there is.  In this world, we prepare others and ourselves for the life to come, which God wills to be our eternal inheritance.  Every gift that we have received, we are to give as a gift.

The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ [A]
Deuteronomy 8:2-3,14-16  +  1 Corinthians 10:16-17  +  John 6:51-58
June 7, 2026

“In the beginning”, God created man in an earthly paradise.  God meant this earthly paradise to serve mankind throughout history.  You might call this God’s “Plan A”.

However, man freely chose to bring sin into this world.  Through human free will, fallen man transformed the world into a place filled with death and sin.  Fallen man stopped God’s “Plan A” in its tracks.

So at that point, God had a choice to make.  What would He do about fallen man and this world of sin and death?  God had several options.

In all justice and fairness, God could have abandoned man.  In that case, man would surely have fallen even further into chaos.  Thanks be to God, God did not choose to abandon us.

As an alternative, God had the choice of coming down to earth to deal with the mess man made.  However, even in that case, God had many different options.

For example:  God could have descended to earth and dealt with fallen man as a strict disciplinarian.  He could have used the proverbial rod to reform mankind.  Or He could have come to earth as a harsh judge who was only interested in punishing, rather than reforming, man.

Thanks be to God, neither of those is the “Plan B” that God chose.  Today’s feast helps us reflect upon God’s actual choice, which as Christians we call “salvation history”.  The heart of salvation history is God the Father sending His divine Son into our world of sin as a merciful Redeemer.  The love which this Redeemer bestows on fallen man is so abundant that it’s difficult to appreciate it fully.  One of the abundant blessings that the Redeemer gives God’s adopted children is the gift of the Eucharist.

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To appreciate what the Son of God accomplished, there are two names He has that we ought to reflect on.

The first of these names has a connection to one of our former bishops.  Bishop Eugene Gerber, when he was made a bishop, chose an episcopal motto consisting of a single word.  This is the Hebrew word “Emmanuel”.  In the first chapter of his Gospel account, St. Matthew the Evangelist quotes from the Old Testament prophet Isaiah.  The prophet Isaiah foretold that a virgin would bear a child, and the child’s name would be “Emmanuel”.  This name means “God with us”.

Another name for the Son of God also comes from the first chapter of Matthew.  St. Matthew narrates how “the angel of the Lord” announced the Incarnation to St. Joseph, and says about Mary:  “She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.”

The Holy Name of Jesus literally means “God saves”.  But we should never take that truth for granted.  God never had to save fallen man.  He certainly could, in justice and fairness, have condemned fallen man instead of saving him. 

Think about this.  God could have chosen to enter our world in order to condemn us.  In that case, God still would have been “God with us”, but He would have been “with us” in order to condemn us.  In and of itself, God being “with us” is not the Good News.  The Good News is that God is with us in order to save us.

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But today’s feast of Corpus Christi also rejoices in the truth of how God chooses to save fallen man.  God—being divine and therefore all-powerful—could have chosen to save us in many different ways.  God could have chosen merely to snap His fingers and forgive fallen man.  God could have chosen to redeem fallen man by destroying all other creatures on the planet as a scapegoat sacrifice.  God could have employed an infinite number of ways to save fallen man.  But what means did He choose?

God sent His own divine Son down from Heaven to become human.  God the Son became human so that He could offer up His Flesh and Blood, soul and divinity on the Cross.  That’s the Good News.  That’s the way in which—and the key reason why—God chose to be “God with us”.  He is with us so that by Jesus dying, you might have life, and have it more abundantly.  That is the heart of God’s “Plan B”.  But God’s love does not stop there.

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The mystery of today’s feast of Corpus Christi celebrates God’s abundant goodness.  God manifests His goodness not only in redeeming fallen man instead of rejecting him.  God manifests His goodness not only in choosing to redeem him by means of His Son’s death on the Cross.  God also manifests His goodness in gifting to His Church the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist.  This gift makes Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross present to us.

Some Christians do not believe that the Eucharist is a gift from God.  Some even claim that it’s idolatry to believe that Jesus is truly and substantially present in the Most Blessed Sacrament.  How would you respond if someone stated that the Mass is an insult to what Jesus accomplished on Calvary?

Each of us needs to be able to respond to those claims.  We need to be able to respond not only to help others draw closer to the fullness of the Christian Faith.  We also need to be able to respond for our own sake.  Each of us needs to understand the mystery of the Eucharist better, so that we can love the Eucharist better.

The Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist does not, in truth, add anything to Jesus’ victory on Calvary.  The Sacrament of the Eucharist makes Jesus’ victory present:  here and now.  As God the Father chose to send His Son down from Heaven into this fallen world, so the Son of God chooses to make His self-sacrifice present to us in our own fallen age.  The Eucharist is God with us.

Every Mass brings Jesus’ death to the altar on which the Sacrifice of the Mass is celebrated.  Within this sacred celebration, Jesus invites you to accept Him as “Emmanuel”.  Jesus invites you to receive Him as “Emmanuel”, so that His life might be your life.  He wants you to be strengthened by the Eucharist so that you can serve as a member of His Mystical Body, the Church.  The Eucharist is “God with us” in order to strengthen us for our days in this world.