Sunday’s Readings: 1 Kings 19:9A, 11-13A; Psalms 85:9, 10, 11-12, 13-14; Romans 9:1-5; Matthew 14:22-33 NOTHING TO FEAR A rabbi was asked why God sends trials and troubles into human lives. “Because God gets lonely for his people” was the reply. There is some resonance with this wisdom in today’s Gospel, as Jesus makes his disciples…
Sunday’s Readings: Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14; Psalms 97:1-2, 5-6, 9; 2 Peter 1:16-19; Matthew 17:1-9 EYEWITNESSES Today, the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord, is a day of eyewitness accounts. The first, a vision reported by the prophet Daniel, was well known to Jesus and his apostles. The vision ac-count was written in quite mystical and…
Sunday’s Readings: 1 Kings 3:5, 7-12; Psalms 119:57, 72, 76-77, 127-128, 129-130; Romans 8:28-30; Matthew 13:44-52 LISTEN TO YOUR DREAMS God visits Solomon in a dream, and the scrip-ture story nowhere tells us that Solomon awoke to have this conversation with God! So, still in his dream, Solomon answers God’s question about what he desires most, and God grants…
Sunday’s Readings: Wisdom 12:13, 16-19; Psalms 86:5-6, 9-10, 15-16; Romans 8:26-27; Matthew 13: 24-43 THE MERCY, POWER, AND LOVE OF GOD The first reading today, from the book of Wisdom, makes its point over and over, at least five times in five verses! God is mighty, but lenient to all. God’s power is shown in kindness…
Sunday’s Readings: Isaiah 55:10-11; Psalms 65:10, 11, 12-13, 14; Romans 8:18-23; Matthew 13:1-23 FRUIT OF THE WORD The seed is the word of God. The agricultural meta-phors in all of today’s readings give richness to the message that the word of God, cultivated in our hearts, bears much fruit in our lives. Creation itself awaits the…
Sunday’s Readings: Zechariah 9:9-10; Psalms 145:1-2, 8-9, 10-11, 13-14; Romans 8:9, 11-13; Matthew 11:25-30 A HUMBLE KING Like a tonal center in music, the note to which we keep returning in today’s readings is humility. We wait in joyful expectation for the coming of our Lord as King. But what we are told to expect and…
Sunday’s Readings: 2 Kings 4:8-11, 14-16A; Psalms 89:2-3, 16-17, 18-19; Romans 6:3-4, 8-11; Matthew 10:37-42 THE RICHNESS OF LIFE IN CHRIST Today we have the beautiful story of the woman promised a child, the wonderful exhortation about life in Christ, and a powerful instruction from Jesus. An embarrassment of riches? Not if we take Jesus’ words…
Sunday’s Readings: Jeremiah 20:10-13; Psalms 69:8-10, 14, 17, 33-35; Romans 5:12-15; Matthew 10:26-33 FEAR NOT How do people find hope in the face of suffering and death? That is the question addressed by today’s scriptures. We hear of the suffering of Jeremiah and the psalmist. We hear of the death that “reigned from Adam to Moses”…