St. John Chrysostom, Bishop and Doctor of the Church
Colossians 3:1-11  +  Luke 6:20-26
September 13, 2017

“Woe to you when all speak well of you.”

“Woe to you when all speak well of you.”  These words of Jesus seem at first hard to reconcile with the honors we confer on the canonized saints of the Church.  If we took the words of Jesus literally, then the praise given the saints would be wrong.  And what of our speaking well of Christ Himself? Continue reading →

The Most Holy Name of Mary
Galatians 4:4-7  +  Luke 1:39-47

“Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”

“From the rising to the setting of the sun is the Name of the Lord to be praised.”  The Third Eucharistic Prayer alludes to this verse of Psalm 113, when the priest prays to the Father: “you never cease to gather a people to yourself, so that from the rising of the sun to its setting a pure sacrifice may be offered to your name.”  “…to your name.”

This liturgical allusion to Psalm 113 is echoed—and magnified—in another passage of Scripture which the Church prays in the Sacred Liturgy.  Every evening, at the setting of the sun when we as individuals grow tired and admit our need for rest, we gather to pray Vespers, during which we offer to God the words that Our Blessed Mother spoke at the time of her Visitation to her cousin.

Mary echoes Psalm 113, where the Psalmist prays that the Lord “raises up the lowly from the dust; from the dunghill he lifts up the poor.”  Mary echoes these words of the Old Testament when she praises the One whom she calls “God my savior, [who] has looked with favor of His lowly servant”, and again later praises Him who “has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.”  Thanks be to God for lowliness, through which we can see more clearly our need to praise the greatness of the Lord!

In our lowliness we may bless the Name of the Lord for ever.  Mary our Mother calls us, her child, to her side to pray in her words of the Magnificat.  The Lord has looked with favor on His lowly servant.  And she continues to lead us in prayer in these words:  “From this day all generations will call me blessed:  the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is His Name.”

All generations will call me blessed.”  At every moment, the sun is setting somewhere on the face of the earth.  At every moment, Vespers is being prayed by Mary’s children, and speak her words from the Magnificat:  calling her blessed because of the great things that the Almighty has done for her.

Mary’s Name is holy because of the great things that the Almighty has done for her.  Mary’s Name is Most Holy because the Almighty chose her to bear in her soul and her body the Incarnate Word of the Father.  May her Most Holy Name be praised!  May our Mother draw us closer to herself, so that she might lead us in blessing the Name of the Lord for ever!

Monday of the Twenty-third Week in Ordinary Time [I]
Colossians 1:24—2:3  +  Luke 6:6-11

In God is my safety and my glory.

We might want to reflect at today’s Mass on our nation commemorating the anniversary of terrorist attacks against our country.  It’s astonishing that religion was a driving force in the hearts of those who committed mass murder.  We ask ourselves how the murder of innocent people could be carried out in the name of God.  It seems like religion turned completely inside out. Continue reading →

The Twenty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time [A]
Ez 33:7-9  +  Rom 13:8-10  +  Mt 18:15-20
September 10, 2017

Oh, that today you would hear his voice:  “Harden not your hearts as at Meribah….”

Today’s Responsorial Psalm comes from Psalm 95.  It’s the last section of today’s Responsorial that ties most directly to the rest of this Sunday’s scriptures.  The refrain of today’s Responsorial comes from this section, and is a paraphrase of Psalm 95:7-8:  “If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts.”

One notable feature of this sentence is that it speaks in the plural.  Its command is to “harden not your hearts”, not “your heart”.  This is a “community psalm”, to use a modern phrase.  As so many of the psalms make clear, they were composed for liturgical worship, which by its nature is communal rather than individualistic.  This is good to remember when we as Christians are tempted to reduce our faith to being simply between “me and Jesus”.  Just as in Jesus both the divine nature and a human nature fully dwell, so living one’s faith in Jesus means fully loving God, and fully loving one’s neighbor.  As soon as we prefer one of these to the other, our faith is no longer focused in Christ.

This leads us to ask why Psalm 95 exhorts us to harden not our hearts when we hear the Lord’s voice.  What about the Lord’s voice could tempt us to do so?  The answer is two-fold.  The first is His command to love Him with faith.  During the Exodus, God’s people demanded signs from God of His power.  This is what Psalm 95 is referring to directly.  In our own lives each of us sins when we lose faith in God’s providential love, in which all things—even sin and evil—work together for good, in the words of Saint Paul. Continue reading →

St. Peter Claver, Priest
Colossians 1:21-23  +  Luke 6:1-5
September 9, 2017

…persevere in the faith, firmly grounded, stable, and not shifting from the hope of the Gospel….

Following yesterday’s majestic hymn about the transcendent Christ, Saint Paul in today’s First Reading from Colossians speaks plainly to sinners.  Just as Paul addressed the Colossians as those who had been redeemed in Christ but who were—at the time of his writing—struggling to remain faithful, so we also are addressed today:  we who know very well the experience of sin, and its consequent forms of alienation. Continue reading →

The Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Micah 5:1-4  +  Matthew 1:1-16,18-23
September 8, 2017

“She will bear a son and you are to name Him Jesus….”

The story is told about a priest who had the opportunity to visit Mother Teresa of Calcutta often.  This priest was 6’1” in height, and one time, on returning again to Calcutta and seeing Mother Teresa, who was about 4’8”, he said to her, “You know, Mother, I think you grow smaller every time I see you.”  Mother Teresa said in response, “Yes, one has to grow very small indeed to fit into the Sacred Heart of Jesus.” Continue reading →

Thursday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time [I]
Colossians 1:9-14  +  Luke 5:1-11

“But if you say so, I will….”

In spite of Peter’s knowledge and experience in fishing, and in spite of his having been up all night long, Peter and his fishing partners had caught absolutely nothing.  Sometimes in what we do, also, we try our best, even at things we’ve done before and know a lot about, but things don’t work out for us.  That’s a natural part of life in this fallen world. Continue reading →

Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time [I]
Colossians 1:1-8  +  Luke 4:38-44

…we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus….

Today the Church at weekday Mass begins to proclaim Saint Paul’s Letter to the Colossians.  We will hear from this letter over the next eight days, and will hear from the first three of its four chapters.

Most of St. Paul’s letters have introductions similar to one another, following a format that was common in Paul’s day for letter-writing.  But with greater scrutiny we notice unique touches with which Paul foreshadows the kernel of each letter.  One of these touches that he paints in today’s reading evokes the three divine virtues. Continue reading →

Tuesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time [I]
1 Thessalonians 5:1-6,9-11  +  Luke 4:31-37

…they were astonished at His teaching because He spoke with authority.

Astonishment is evoked by the fact that Jesus teaches with authority.  Why is there this astonishment, and what does it mean for Jesus to teach with authority?

In the culture that surrounds us, every person believes himself to be his own authority.  In effect, this wide-spread belief means that no real authority exists.  In our society there is a great need for clarity about the meaning and purpose of authority. Continue reading →