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The first reading came from a book within the Bible called the Acts of the Apostles and written by the same author who wrote one of the four gospels, the Gospel of Luke. The opening line in Acts, Luke writes, “In my first book, Theophilus.” The first book refers to the Gospel of Luke. Acts of the Apostles his second book. So, think of the Bible not as a book but as a collection of books or a mini library.

Who is this Theophilus? Probably a high-ranking ...

If you are keeping track, you know that we have not gathered for Sunday Eucharist since March 15^th, the third Sunday of Lent. I half-jokingly suggested we were celebrating our “Last Supper” not realizing then that my words would become a self-fulfilling prophecy. We are all waiting, including Bishop Vienneau, for the health authorities to open churches for limited gatherings like we see in some sectors of society. Throwing the doors of the church wide open, though, will probably not happen until a universal vaccine is available. Until ...

Elie Wiesel (1928-2016) authored 57 books during his lifetime, but perhaps his most notable work was his book entitled Night. Read it if you have not already. Wiesel was born in Transylvania which was annexed by Hungary in 1940 and subsequently invaded by the Nazis in 1944. Although only about 100 pages long, Night is a powerful telling of the horrors that he and his family went through in the Nazi-run concentration camps. Elie’s mother and sister were murdered in Auschwitz. Elie and his father were imprisoned ...

Back in the summer of 2001, five years after I had moved away from the Ottawa Valley, the City of Ottawa hosted the Francophone Games. Immediately after the Games closed over 100 participants, from abroad, decided they were not going back home to their country but instead were seeking refugee status in Canada. The next day, a popular radio talk show host (akin to Rush Limbaugh) began his show with a roar. He came out with guns firing. Calls immediately came in about what it means to ...

I am not sure if this story is in any of Fr. Richard Rohr’s numerous books or not, but he does tell it on a C.D. retreat talk entitled “Fire from Heaven.” It goes like this.

“There is a story that an artesian well had sprung up in the middle of the desert, and it was a marvelous well with clear, nourishing, and copious water. People began to come and to drink and to celebrate their wonderful discovery of a well in the desert. Gradually ...