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The Feast of the Chair of Saint Peter the Apostle
Today we celebrate the feast of the Chair of Saint Peter the apostle. This is a feast that commemorates Jesus giving the servant authority of the Church to Saint Peter, as we heard in today’s Gospel. This is a special day of prayer for the Pope, the successor of Saint Peter among us. It’s important…
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Monday of the Sixth Week of Ordinary Time
Today’s readings St. James today encourages us to consider it all joy when we experience trial. I don’t know about you, but that’s not the emotion I usually find in frustrating or fearful circumstances. And considering that the people to whom James was writing were probably being persecuted, they probably weren’t overjoyed at their trials…
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Saints Cyril and Methodius
You might have been expecting to celebrate Saint Valentine’s Day today, but we don’t actually have that feast on the modern Liturgical calendar. Instead today we have the feast of two brothers: Saints Cyril and Methodius. They lived in the ninth century in an area of Greece inhabited by many Slavs, and eventually they became…
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Thursday of the Fifth Week of Ordinary Time
Today’s readings The women in today’s Liturgy of the Word give us contrasting views of the spiritual life. In our first reading, the women give us the example of what not to do. Solomon, known for his wisdom and dedication to God by building the temple, is soon seduced by the foreign women he had…
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Our Lady of Lourdes / World Day of the Sick
Bernadette Soubirous was a sickly young woman. But on February 11, 1858, her entire life changed when a beautiful lady, clothed in white, with a rosary over her arm and a yellow rose on each foot, appeared to her and said, “I am the Immaculate Conception.” In the years since, the site of those wonderful…
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Saint Scholastica, Virgin
We are told in the Gospel today that “Mary has taken the better part and it will not be taken from her.” Much the same could be said about St. Scholastica, whose memorial we celebrate today. St. Scholastica is known as the sister of St. Benedict. Some traditions speak of them as twins. St. Gregory…
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Saturday of the Fourth Week of Ordinary Time
Today’s readings In today’s first reading, King Solomon is asked a question that seems to me something like the fabled question that people get asked when they find a genie in a bottle. Make a wish, and it’s yours. Solomon has a relationship with the Lord, and so he treats the opportunity as something quite…
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Friday of the Fourth Week of Ordinary Time
Today’s readings We’ve been listening, these last couple of weeks, to the story of the rise and fall of good King David. Yesterday, in our first reading, we heard the story of his peaceful death and the transfer of the kingship to his son, Solomon. Today, Sirach the Wisdom writer tells us about David in…
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Saint Paul Miki and Companions, Martyrs
Today’s readings We have been hearing from the martyrs a lot this week. On Tuesday, we remembered Saint Blase, a bishop and martyr who is the patron saint of those with illnesses, specifically of the throat. Yesterday, we remembered Saint Agatha, a virgin and martyr who was put to death in the third century. Today…
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Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Ordinary Time
Today’s readings There is a lot of anguish in the readings today, isn’t there? Most markedly is the anguish of King David, mourning the death of his son Absalom. His anguish was most surprising to his army, because they had been fighting Absalom’s thugs who were helping him to overthrow the government of David. But…
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