During this season of Lent our natural focus is on repenting of our sins and finding healing from all that still separates us from receiving the fullness of God’s love. Thus, like the repentant tax collector, we feel our unworthiness and cry out with him: O God, be merciful to me a sinner. Accordingly, it […]
Wednesday, Lent Week 2
Desiring (like the sons of Zebedee) to be close to Jesus is, obviously, a good thing—one we have all desired. Yet, like James and John, we perhaps underestimated just what getting close to Jesus demands. With experience and sober hindsight, we have come to know a little more about what we were asking, and just […]
Friday of the 1st Week of Lent
In an interesting interpretation of Jesus’ admonition that we settle with [our] opponent quickly while on the way to court, the Desert Father, Isaiah the Solitary, identifies the “opponent” with conscience. As we know, in the long spiritual journey towards becoming truly holy (by our being conformed to Christ), conscience can be experienced as an […]
Friday of the 4th Week
Sin can, at times, seem so personal and private that we can perhaps presume that it is only offending God and not affecting others. King Herod’s sins (and those of his family) remind us that this is really never true—our sin always negatively impacts our fellow human beings. Herod’s moral weakness, lack of inner discipline, […]
Memorial of St. Thomas Aquinas
Saint John Chrysostom offers an interesting reflection on Jesus’ image of the kingdom of God being like a mustard seed. He identifies the mustard seed with Christ and thus comments: “O seed by which the world was made, through which darkness was dispersed and the Church brought into being! In this seed hanging on the […]
The Protection of the Unborn
On this special day as we pray for the protection of the unborn and honor God’s gift of Life, we remind ourselves that Life is so much more than just physical life. Indeed, it is every individual’s ensoulment at the moment of conception that renders abortion so tragic and indefensible. And it is the immortal […]
Saints Maur and Placid
Good beginnings don’t always translate into positive and successful endings. Saul, who seemed at his anointing to be such a promising future king, ended his days in ignominy—taking his own life rather than be killed by his enemies on Mount Gilboa. In contrast, Matthew begins his Christian discipleship with the disadvantage of being a despised […]
CHRISTMAS NIGHT 2021
After a good washing, our monastic robes can appear dazzlingly white and contrast dramatically with our black scapulars. However, on more than one occasion when I have been out in the snow, I have not failed to notice that our otherwise white robes appear to be a definite off-white, cream, color in comparison with the […]
Friday of the 3rd Week of Advent
Although the genealogy of Jesus, we have just heard, is more representative and symbolic than literal, it nevertheless reminds us that God is perfectly aware of each one of our genealogies. As such he is familiar with every single influence (transmitted through our forebears), that made us the persons we were at our birth—genetically, physically, […]
Saturday of the 34th Week
Whatever pleasures are associated with drunkenness and carousing, these ignoble pursuits are not infrequently indulged in the effort to escape the present moment. The vigilance enjoined upon us by Christ can thus be thought of as being attentive to the present moment—even when it bears with it thoughts, feelings, and demands that are aversive and […]