Diligent Faith Around this time five years ago, our first granddaughter was baptized. Public gatherings were troublesome in pandemic days. Events that should have brought great rejoicing were muted by the fear of disease. Our pastor offered a private ceremony in which ten masked family members could attend. We stressed over who the ten should be. Our immediate family was [...]
The story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus is a story about the human heart. As the two disciples walked away from Jerusalem, they were talking about Jesus. They could not stop speaking about him, because he had filled their lives with hope, meaning, and joy. But now he was dead, and his absence left them sad and [...]
A Well of Mercy How I wish I could be Thomas at the moment when Jesus says, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side” (John 20:27). Thomas touched Divine Mercy when he touched Christ’s side. Jesus invited him to put his hand into the very wound from which blood [...]
The Gospel presents to us Jesus’ appearance in the Upper Room after the Resurrection. In this sacred moment, wonderful things unfold through his liberating presence. His first words are simple yet powerful: “Peace be with you.” This greeting brings deep joy and true peace: joy that dispels the fear and isolation of the Apostles, and peace that opens the door [...]
Beginning with the Easter Vigil, we celebrate the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the day when Jesus broke the chains of death and rose in triumph from the grave. He did this not for himself alone, but for all of us. He invites us to share in his great victory over sin and death, as Saint Paul [...]
Good Friday is the darkest and most solemn day of the Church’s year, a day that draws many people to the Lord. We come carrying the burdens of our hearts: our sorrows and our joys, our experiences of death and of life. We bring before God our own lives, often marked by pain, mystery, and the struggle between dying and [...]
This day marks the beginning of the Sacred Triduum, opened by Jesus’ commandment at the Last Supper: the commandment of love, which stands at the very heart of his entire ministry. This mission flows from the Father’s great plan of love, revealed through the Incarnation: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in [...]
A Week to Feel His Profound Love Today’s Gospel reading reveals the depths of divine love through Jesus’ suffering and sacrifice. This passage is enormously long! As we stand to listen to the Gospel proclaimed during Mass, you may feel your knees buckle a little or your back begin to ache. Small children in the pews will fiddle and whine. [...]
Today we begin Holy Week, the most solemn week in the Church’s year. It opens with the procession of palms, recalling Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem not as an all-conquering warrior, but as a gentle and humble bearer of the Good News. Jesus comes in glory, but it is not the kind of glory the people expected. They were looking for [...]
Jesus’ Timing Jesus loved Mary, Martha, and Lazarus, so He waited. This is such a difficult passage to swallow. Like Martha, who cries to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died,” we, too, cry out to Jesus when the answers we seek are long in coming. I found the disciples' reaction to Jesus’ decision [...]