Our first reading this week is very familiar to us as it is the second reading every year at the Easter Vigil. The story of God calling Abraham to take his only son, Isaac, and go on a three-day journey to Moriah to “offer him there as a burnt offering” always stirs up a lot of questions in me. For instance: At any time in those three days, did Abraham have second thoughts? Did he ever think that this just ...
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The last line of today’s gospel, “repent, and believe in the good news” are the words that every Lent starts with when we receive the ashes each Ash Wednesday. To repent means to change our minds. To turn 180 degrees. That is not easy to do. It is now believed that the number one addiction in all of us is that we are addicted to our thoughts, our way of thinking. We think things have to be this way and ...
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This first Sunday of Lent is a time to reinvigorate ourselves as Catholics. It enables us to step back from the usual habits and distractions and give particular attention to God. It leads us to the Easter Sunday celebration of our risen Christ. It is a time for prayer (justice towards God), fasting (justice towards self) and almsgiving (justice towards neighbours).
Common practice for me when I was a child was giving up sweets, candy, trying to attend daily Mass, putting ...
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While the classic disciplines of Lent prayer, fasting and alms giving offer us pathways to a deeper spirituality and deeper sense of social justice, they can easily get highjacked. In other words, we can crank up pray, fasting and charity without any cost or any real letting go or any real transformation of ourselves. And when we are not transformed, it is really hard to transform the world without looking, as Jesus says, like a hypocrite. Hypocrites always want to ...
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There is an expression that says: “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” It’s a little play on words, but there is a lot of truth packed into that expression. What does Jesus care about? Doing the will of God. And what is at the center of God’s will? God’s will–God’s great desire–is that we, individually and collectively, be made whole. That we be restored in our relationship with God, with neighbour, with ...
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Hearts, flowers, chocolate, wine, jewelry, poetry, love songs, romantic movies … today is Valentines’ Day and all around us attention is focused on love. But even when our attention is on love, even when we are contemplating extravagant acts of devotion, we often neglect the expressions of love to which today’s readings call us. Perhaps that’s because they point us toward sacrificial love rather than reciprocal love. Today’s scripture readings aren’t about the kind of extravagant Valentines’ Day love that ...
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If we look for justice, on this side of heaven, we will probably die very disappointed. Whenever I hear of a child born with a permanent disability or born into an abusive household, or a child robbed of their childhood, or a child raised in squalor or a war zone, or in a refugee camp, it simply does not feel fair or just. Some things should be and can be corrected if we took the gospel seriously and loved our ...
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The Book of Job is one of the most interesting books in the Old Testament. Most scholars agree that the person of Job didn’t exist but that he represents every person who has ever suffered undeserved hardship. Job had everything: wealth, health and a large family to ensure his future legacy. He assumed his life was good because God had rewarded him for being loyal and for having lived a good and righteous life. (Satan argues that Job is only ...
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A question we may ask ourselves today is, who is Jesus, and especially, who is Jesus for me? Who do I think Jesus is? We remember that Jesus asked that question of his disciples just before he turned to go to Jerusalem and the fulfillment of his mission. It is the crucial question, and much depends on our answer. In the first reading from the Book of Deuteronomy, Moses is giving his last speech to the people before they enter ...
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Epiphany (from Greek for “appearance”) used to be one of the Great Feasts of the Liturgical calendar, along with Easter and Pentecost. The weeks following January 6th were called the Sundays “after Epiphany” and the season extended to Ash Wednesday. This is my excuse for still writing about Epiphany, the feast that traditionally celebrated St. Paul’s mission to the Gentiles. Paul’s mission was fiercely opposed by some of the other apostles who wanted to cling to the rites and traditions ...
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