Category: Uncategorized

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Gospel: John 5: 17-30

Jesus answered the Jews: 
“My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.”
For this reason they tried all the more to kill him,
because he not only broke the sabbath
but he also called God his own father, making himself equal to God.

Jesus answered and said to them,
“Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son cannot do anything on his own,
but only what he sees the Father doing;
for what he does, the Son will do also.
For the Father loves the Son
and shows him everything that he himself does,
and he will show him greater works than these,
so that you may be amazed.
For just as the Father raises the dead and gives life,
so also does the Son give life to whomever he wishes.
Nor does the Father judge anyone,
but he has given all judgment to the Son,
so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father.
Whoever does not honor the Son
does not honor the Father who sent him.
Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever hears my word
and believes in the one who sent me
has eternal life and will not come to condemnation,
but has passed from death to life.
Amen, amen, I say to you, the hour is coming and is now here
when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God,
and those who hear will live.
For just as the Father has life in himself,
so also he gave to the Son the possession of life in himself.
And he gave him power to exercise judgment,
because he is the Son of Man.
Do not be amazed at this,
because the hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs
will hear his voice and will come out,
those who have done good deeds
to the resurrection of life,
but those who have done wicked deeds
to the resurrection of condemnation.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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Perhaps the most famous love story in literary history is William Shakespeare’s, Romeo and Juliet.

You may remember the famous balcony scene when Juliet gazes down upon Romeo and says, “Romeo, the more I give to you, the more I seem to have.”

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Juliet learned to see the world through Romeo’s eyes.

She dreamt her lover’s dreams and sought to please her lover’s needs, because the happier Romeo was, the happier Juliet became.

The more she gave, the more she had.

That’s the essence of love.

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Jesus is describing a similar love with his Father in today’s Gospel.

“I do not seek my own will,” he says, “but the will of the one who sent me.” 

Everything Jesus says and does is to glorify his heavenly Father.

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The same is true for us.

The more we give ourselves to God – the more we pray, the more we love him, the more we serve him in our neighbor – the happier we become.

So, in what ways can I love God today?

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Image credits: (1) Women of Faith (2) Fine Art America (3) Cristalina Evert, Twitter

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Gospel: John 5: 1-16

There was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem.
Now there is in Jerusalem at the Sheep Gate
a pool called in Hebrew Bethesda, with five porticoes.
In these lay a large number of ill, blind, lame, and crippled.
One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years.
When Jesus saw him lying there
and knew that he had been ill for a long time, he said to him,
“Do you want to be well?”
The sick man answered him,
“Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool
when the water is stirred up;
while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me.”
Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk.”
Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked.

Now that day was a sabbath.
So the Jews said to the man who was cured,
“It is the sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.”
He answered them, “The man who made me well told me,
‘Take up your mat and walk.'”
They asked him,
“Who is the man who told you, ‘Take it up and walk’?”
The man who was healed did not know who it was,
for Jesus had slipped away, since there was a crowd there.
After this Jesus found him in the temple area and said to him,
“Look, you are well; do not sin any more,
so that nothing worse may happen to you.”
The man went and told the Jews
that Jesus was the one who had made him well.
Therefore, the Jews began to persecute Jesus
because he did this on a sabbath.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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“After this, Jesus found him in the temple area.”

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The Gospels are filled with miracles like the one today – the blind see, the deaf hear, the dead are raised. Often these miracles are the conclusion of the story; we don’t know what happens to a person after being healed.

Today is different.

The Gospel tells us that Jesus found the man in the temple area. Meaning, the first thing that he did with his fresh set of legs was walk – or probably run – to the temple to give thanks to God.

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Gratitude.

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I’m sure we’ve all had a prayer answered by Jesus.

It may have been something minor like finding a lost set of keys or being forgiven after a family spat. Or, perhaps, something major like being healed from an illness or accepted into our top college.

When a prayer is answered, where do we go afterwards? Or what do we do?

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The best place to be is where Jesus found this formerly crippled man – in the house of God.

Perhaps we can recall something we’re grateful for, then visit the Lord’s house to thank him today.

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Image credits: (1) Believers Portal (2) crosswalk.com (3) Pinterest

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Matthew 1: 16-24

Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary.
Of her was born Jesus who is called the Christ.

Now this is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about.
When his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph,
but before they lived together,
she was found with child through the Holy Spirit.
Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man,
yet unwilling to expose her to shame,
decided to divorce her quietly.
Such was his intention when, behold,
the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said,
“Joseph, son of David,
do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home.
For it is through the Holy Spirit
that this child has been conceived in her.
She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus,
because he will save his people from their sins.”
When Joseph awoke,
he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him
and took his wife into his home.

The Gospel of the Lord.

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 Today we celebrate the life of a man we know almost nothing about.

Joseph was the foster father of Jesus. But we only hear about Joseph in the early years of Jesus’ life. Even in the scriptures, one could argue that Joseph is largely forgotten.

What, if anything, can be said about him?

Joseph lived in an small village…He was married to a young, peasant girl named Mary… He spent his life as a carpenter, earning his daily bread by the sweat of his brow. 

He knew the twinge of hunger, aching muscles from a long day’s work, and the value of a few cents.

He was an ordinary man.

Joseph never went to college. He never wrote a book. He never owned shares in the stock market. He never held public office. He never made the news. He never lived in a major city or even journeyed far from his home.

The only time he left his country was to flee to Egypt as a refugee because King Herod wanted to kill Jesus. And the child wasn’t even his.

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On the surface, Joseph did nothing extraordinary in the world’s eyes. He was uneducated; a peasant; a refugee. 

A nobody.

Yet 2,000 years have come and gone and we still honor his life. Out of the billions of people who’ve lived and died, Joseph is one of the few our world still remembers… 

And celebrates.

Maybe that’s because we all see something of ourselves in him. 

Joseph worked hard. He loved deeply. He was a faithful husband. A devout father. And he was faithful to the tasks God entrusted to him.

That’s what counts in the end.

Being faithful. Humble. And responsible for the tasks God has given us. If we do these things, then we, too, will be blessed in the eyes of God. Saint Joseph, pray for us!

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Image credits: (1) sspx.org (2) Saint Joseph with the Infant Jesus, Reni (3) thestationsofthecross.com, Pinterest