Our starting point in anything, especially in life, is so important. Experts say that 80% of our personality is formed by the time we are five years old. That’s probably why therapists are so interested in our childhood or the household we grew up in. That was our starting point, and it was so formative. Coincidentally, 80% of your image of God has to do with parental imagery. If your parents were punitive, cold, distant, and just waiting for …
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You’ve probably heard about the “Sermon on the Mount” in the Gospel of Matthew. Well, this version is from the Gospel of Luke and doesn’t happen on a mountain. It happens after Jesus comes down the mountain and stood on a level place, a plateau perhaps. That’s the opening line of today’s gospel reading, “Jesus came down the mountain with the twelve and stood on a level place.” Luke tells us that Jesus spent the entire night on a …
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I don’t know if you guys know this, but my late mother wrote the entire Bible. That’s not true, but when I read the Word of God, it often feels like it’s absolutely true. It’s programmed into mothers all over the world and from the beginning of time to say, “If I told you once, I told you a thousand times.” Similarly, Scripture repeats itself in the hopes that if we didn’t get it the first 99 times, maybe …
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On the last Sunday of the Christmas Season we had a story about the adult Jesus being baptized. Today, three weeks after the Christmas Season, we are back to the baby Jesus. Go figure.Today’s feast, traditionally called the Feast of the Presentation was also called the Feast of the Encounter. Simeon and Anna, in their old age, have a powerful encounter with Jesus, a baby who is anything but powerful. Yet, isn’t that what everyone of us wants, not …
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Six years ago, in 2019, Pope Francis estabished this Sunday, the third Sunday in Ordinary Time, as “Word of God Sunday.” By doing so, he invites us to devote more time in our lives to the celebration, the study and the spreading of the Word of God. He feels that the Word of God is a word of hope. I agree. If Jesus is the Word of God made flesh, then naturally he is also a word of hope …
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We can spend a lot of time surmising about how the universe was created, about how old the cosmos is, and about the sheer awesomeness of God’s creative love. To think of creation, from our little perspective, is mind-blowing and humbling at the same time. What I’m trying to spend more time with lately is “re-creation,” how God’s creative power—which is nothing less than the power of love—is still at work in the world. I don’t believe creation was …
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The gospel we just heard begs the questions: “Who is this Jesus being baptized?” And if he is the sinless one, then why is he undergoing a baptism that we traditionally believe was for the forgiveness of sins?” I think if we can answer the first question—who this Jesus is—we’ll also have the answer as to why he’s in these baptismal waters at all. Who Jesus is and why he’s being baptized have implications for our lives, otherwise, it’s …
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For the longest time I would get confused between the terms “astronomy” and “astrology.” I knew they both had to do with the stars, but after that the confusion set in. Astronomy is the scientific study of space, the universe, the cosmos. It’s based on math and science, and it’s goal is to help explain phenomena. Astrology, on the other hand, is not a science, but a pseudoscience that tries to explain human behavior based on the position of …
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This gospel story, from Luke, is the continuation of the story we heard on Christmas Eve. As you recall, on Christmas Eve, we heard how an Angel appeared to the shepherds and told them, “I bring you good news of great joy for all the people; to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Christ, the Lord.” The angel doesn’t force the shepherds to believe this, nor does the angel drag …
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A little caution as we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Family: Don’t dismiss Jesus, Mary and Joseph, too quickly, as the “model family” because you are convinced they look nothing like your family. All families are holy, no matter what they look like. There are a lot of families out there, like my own, that put the fun back into dysfunctional. If you read the first chapter of Matthew’s Gospel, and shake Jesus’ family tree that you find …
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