A reflection for the 5th Sunday of Easter, Year B. The readings are: Acts 9:26-31,
Psalm: 22; 1 John 3:18-24 and John 15:1-8.
There have been a few difficult times in my life, when I have had the Grace (yes, absolutely it’s because of Grace!) not to pray for the outcome that I want, but to pray for a good outcome. I didn’t even pray for God’s will, but that, whatever the resolution to the crisis, it is one that is good for all those affected by it. I suppose that what God thinks is good may be different from what I think is good, but at least I’m pretty sure that whatever God wants is good (whether I agree with it or not).
And so I am comforted to read today’s Gospel – to hear Jesus say that if we remain in him we will bear much fruit. That means that Jesus wants us to be fruitful. He wants the outcome of all things to be good.
That’s what being fruitful means: leading to good things. When we are fruitful, what we say and do always lead to good things. When we abide in Christ, it always leads to good things – it leads to good fruit.
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A reflection for the 1st Sunday, Lent, Year B. The readings are Genesis 9:8-15; Psalm 25; 1 Peter 3:18-22 and Mark 1:12-15.
When you think of Lent, what do you think of? Do you think of feasting or fasting? Do you think of partying or penance? I tend to think of Lent as a time of preparation – we have 40 days to prepare for Easter, which is the most important feast for Christians. Easter is more important than Christmas; it’s more important than any other feast because that’s when we celebrate the Resurrection. That’s when we celebrate that Christ, through his passion, death and resurrection, destroyed death forever, so that you and I can go and be with him in Heaven.
So we are preparing for Heaven.
And, as with anything that is important, preparing means hard work: it means doing things that we don’t feel like doing and not doing things that we feel like doing. It means sacrifice. That’s why it’s a time of penance – that’s why we emphasize prayer, fasting and alms-giving.
Read more…A reflection for the 3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B. The readings are Jonah 3:1-5, 10; Psalm 25; 1 Corinthians 7:29-31 and Mark 1:14-20.
Last Saturday I went to visit my friend Lara. She has ALS – Lou Gehrig’s disease, which is a degenerative disease that affects the nervous system and nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. ALS affects muscle control and the symptoms get worse over time. ALS begins by causing muscle twitches or spasms, or maybe slurred speech. Eventually the patients have difficulty walking and then cannot walk, they cannot speak, have difficulty swallowing. Most ALS patients die when they simply cannot breathe. Lara was diagnosed 9 months ago – most people live with ALS about 5 years, but some can live 10 years.
We had a very nice visit. She told me about what she wanted for her funeral. I told her she didn’t have to make some of those decisions yet; she still has time. She can still walk, she can still talk and eat. I gave her Communion. We prayed. I asked her if she wanted to receive the Sacrament of the Sick and she said she would think about it. I told her to let me know if she needed help with that. On Monday, her husband called me to say they had left messages with the priest so Lara could receive the Sacrament of the Sick but had not heard back, so I called the priest and helped arrange it. On Tuesday morning Lara received the Anointing of the Sick.
A reflection for the 3rd Sunday, Advent, Year B. The readings are Isaiah 61:1-2a, 10-11; Luke 1:46-54; 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24 and John 1:6-8, 19-28.
Always, at this time of the year, I am struck by how the days get so much shorter. I grew up in Panama and there, the times of the sunrises and sunsets are very regular – there is very little variation depending on the time of the year. No matter what time of the year is, the sunrise is always anywhere between 6 and 6:30am and the sunset is anywhere between 6 and 6:30pm. But here in Canada it’s very clear that this time of the year is a time of darkness. The sunrise this morning was 7:50am and the sunset tonight will be at 4:40pm.
It reminds me of a story about a wise teacher who asked his students to tell him how they new when the dawn had arrived; to tell him how they knew the precise moment when it was no longer night and it was now day. One student put up her hand, “I know teacher. I know that the dawn has arrived when there’s just enough light that I can see an animal 200 ft away and I know if it’s a small deer or a large dog.” “That’s very good”, said the teacher, “but it’s not the answer I am looking for.” Another student put up his hand, “Teacher, I know. I know that the dawn has arrived when there’s just enough light that if I see a tree, 500 feet away, I can tell if it’s a pine tree or a spruce.” “That’s also very good”, said the teacher, “but it’s also not the answer I am looking for.” And so, other students tried to come up with the answer that the teacher was looking for.
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deacon pedro 