St. Clare, Virgin
Deuteronomy 4:32-40  +  Matthew 16:24-28
August 11, 2017

“‘What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life?’”

Our souls need nourishment and healing before we spend our selves trying to solve the problems of our own lives and those of the world.  We must be willing to admit, first of all, that we are sinners, and that our sins seriously wound our souls.  Our souls need not only the nourishment of prayer, but the healing that comes from the forgiveness of our sins.  After all, it is in this regard that Jesus is our Messiah, our Savior.  God the Son became human not to save us from the Caesar, or from the IRS, or from our neighbors:  Jesus died to save us from the snares of the Devil.  God the Son became human not to take away our worries, financial debts, or arguments with others:  Jesus died to take away our sins. Continue reading →

St. Lawrence, Deacon and Martyr
2 Corinthians 9:6-10  +  John 12:24-26
August 10, 2017

“‘…whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.’”

In the year of Our Lord 258, Saint Lawrence offered the wealth of the Church to those who had nothing of their own.  Lawrence was the chief deacon—the arch-deacon—of the Diocese of Rome.  Part of the responsibility of a deacon is to proclaim the Word of God, to look after the material goods of the Church, and to care for the poor, and so as the chief deacon of a diocese as large as Rome, Lawrence held a great deal of responsibility. Continue reading →

Wednesday of the Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time [I]
Numbers 13:1-2,25—14:1,26-29,34-35  +  Matthew 15:21-28
August 9, 2017

“‘Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.’”

When the Israelites entered the Promised Land after the Exodus, they met up with the Canaanites, whom they considered to be wicked and godless, a race of people that they should exterminate.  This outlook persisted until the time of Jesus.  In today’s Gospel passage, Jesus explains that this outlook cannot be held by His followers. Continue reading →

St. Dominic, Priest
Numbers 12:1-13  +  Mt 14:22-36 or Mt 15:1-2,10-14
August 8, 2017

“Those who were in the boat did Him homage, saying, ‘Truly, you are the Son of God.’”

The Church bears a rich treasury of interpretation of Sacred Scripture.  By that I don’t simply mean that the Church has accumulated many different, though equally insightful, interpretations of Scripture from the writings of her many members (although that’s true).  The Church’s treasury of Scripture interpretation is based upon a four-fold view of the Holy Bible. Continue reading →

Monday of the Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time [I]
Numbers 11:4-15  +  Matthew 14:13-21

“…His heart was moved with pity for them….”

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 He had heard of the death of John the Baptizer, and had withdrawn by boat to a deserted place by Himself.  If we were to take time to imagine this, we could very clearly see just how human Christ was, responding in grief and perhaps anger at the death of His own cousin.  He withdrew from others to be alone.  And yet, even at this point in His life, the needs of others pressed upon Him.  His response was that of God himself:  he turned away from Himself, and towards those in need. Continue reading →

The Transfiguration of the Lord [A]
Dn 7:9-10,13-14  +  2 Pt 1:16-19  +  Mt 17:1-9
August 6, 2017

“‘Do not tell the vision to anyone until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.’”

It’s rare that the vestments of the priest and chalice are not green on a Sunday during Ordinary Time.  But August 6^th is the date of the Transfiguration of the Lord on Mount Tabor.  This fourth of the Luminous Mysteries of the Rosary is so important for understanding our faith in Jesus Christ that the 18^th Sunday in Ordinary Time will not be celebrated this year.

In today’s account of the Transfiguration, we have a miniature of the entire Gospel, and a miniature of the manner in which God has always made His Divine Revelation known.  God, like any loving parent, wants us to share in His love, but at the same time He wants us to enter into that love as freely as possible.  In other words, God wants us to come to Him of our own accord, because the more freely we come to Him, the more we grow in His love.

But as a loving parent, God knows we are often weak and need His help.  God gave us an intellect by which we could of our own power reason that God exists, that He loves us, and that He wants us to imitate that love.  God also gave us a free will by which to imitate Him.  Our human intellect and will are often very weak, however, and so God constantly gives us signs of His presence, in order to remind us of Who God is and how much He loves us. Continue reading →

Saturday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time [I]
Leviticus 25:1,8-17  +  Matthew 14:1-12

“His head was brought in on a platter and given to the girl, who took it to her mother.”

On August 29, the Church celebrates the Passion of St. John the Baptist, and on that memorial we hear his passion narrative according to Saint Mark.  Today’s Gospel Reading offers us this narrative according to St. Matthew the Evangelist. Continue reading →

St. John Vianney, Priest
Leviticus 23:1,4-11,15-16,27,34-37  +  Matthew 13:54-58
August 4, 2017

“‘A prophet is not without honor except in his native place….’”

The last sentence of today’s Gospel passage presents something of a conundrum.  No matter how we interpret the fact that Jesus “did not work many mighty deeds there because of their lack of faith”, we are challenged. Continue reading →

Thursday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time
Matthew 13:47-53

“The angels will go out and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.”

Every so often in the history of the Church, there arises interest in what’s called “universalism”.  This is the belief that all human persons will eventually be saved.  There’s an even broader version of this belief which claims that all spiritual persons (that is, both human and angelic) will eventually be saved.  The consistent teaching of Christ’s Church, however, draws upon His clear preaching about both the afterlife in general and the Last Judgment more specifically.

Today’s Gospel passage is taken from St. Matthew’s Gospel account, which is the longest of the four.  In this account, most of Jesus’ teaching about eschatology (that is, the “Four Last Things”:  Heaven, Hell, death, and judgement) is found at the end of His public ministry, shortly before Holy Week begins and Jesus approaches His own death.  The Church proclaims Jesus’ teaching about the Last Things especially in the final weeks of the Church year, leading up to the feast of Christ the King.

However, today’s Gospel passage comes from Chapter 13 of Matthew, in the midst of His three years of public ministry.  Here, also, Jesus makes clear the sort of judgment that will take place.  The Lord does not use conditional language, but instead declares:  “The angels will go out and separate the wicked from the righteous”.  This teaching is sobering, yet at the same time it highlights the importance of the One who offers wicked humans the gift of salvation during their earthly days.