Grounded: On this 31st Sunday of Ordinary Time Jesus exclaims that “whoever exalts himself will be humbled; but whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” The word ‘humility’ is derived from the Latin word ‘humus,’ which means ‘grounded’ or ‘from the earth.’ Pope Francis remarked that, “Christian humility is not within the virtue of saying: ‘I […]
Pop Quiz: Today Jesus is tested by a scholar who asks him, “Teacher, which commandment is the greatest?” Jesus responds “you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall […]
Caesar and God: In today’s Gospel Jesus is showed a coin and asks whose image is on it. They reply “Caesar’s.” He replied, “Then repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” Whose image are we? We are made in the image of God, so we give everything to […]
Invited: In today’s Gospel we hear how the King (God the Father) has a wedding banquet for his Son (Jesus). However, some people refused to come. Others ignored the invitation. Others are too busy or have other things to do that seem more important so they don’t attend the wedding banquet either. At every Sunday […]
Wicked: In this Sunday’s Gospel we hear another fascinating parable where Jesus tells us what the kingdom of God will be like. The owner of the vineyard sends his servants to the tenants. But the tenants kill the servants. Then he sends his son. But the tenants kill him too. This parable is often called […]
Yes and No: The Gospel for this weekend presents us with the father who had two sons. When the father asks his first son to work in the vineyard he says “no,” but later changes his mind and goes. The second son says “yes” but decides not to go. Pope Francis remarked that all of […]
The Last one in: In this weekend’s Gospel Jesus tells the parable of the landowner who pays the same amount of wages to a person who worked only one hour as he did with the ones who worked eight hours. He asked the question, “Are you envious because I am generous?” The basic message of […]
Mercy: This weekend’s Gospel presents a tremendous challenge to us. We are forgiven by God in the measure that we forgive others. I highly recommend a book titled “Everybody Needs to Forgive Somebody” by Allen Hunt. Deacon Jack: We lost our beloved Deacon Jack Daunt on September 9. He was a pillar of our community […]
The Christian Way: In today’s reading Jesus tells us, “If your brother sins again you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.” This is in direct contrast to what many of us do: go and tell everyone else someone’s sin. This gossip can be really harmful. Pope Francis said that if […]
Get behind me: In this weekend’s Gospel on the 22nd Sunday of Ordinary Time, Jesus tells Peter to “get behind me Satan.” That’s quite a slap in the face. In fact, Jesus told that to Satan himself during the temptation in the desert. Last weekend we heard how Peter got the answer right, that Jesus […]