A reflection for the 19th Sunday, Ordinary Time, Year B. The readings are 1 Kings 19:4-8; Psalm 34; Ephesians 4:30-5:2 and John 6:41-51.
I recently read an article by Fr. Ron Rolheiser in which he quoted a story by Christian de Cherge, the Trappist Abbot who was martyred in Algeria in 1996, who said that on the day of his First Communion he said to his mom, “I don’t understand what I am doing.” His mother replied, “It’s OK, you don’t have to understand it now. Later you will understand.” Fr. Rolheiser goes on to say that he imagines this exact conversation at the Last Supper. Jesus says, “This is my body, this is my blood, take and eat, take and drink. Do this in memory of me”. The apostles say, “We don’t understand what we are doing” and Jesus replies, “It’s OK, you don’t have to understand it now. Later you’ll understand.”
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A reflection for the 17th Sunday, Ordinary Time, Year B. The readings are 2 Kings 4:42-44; Psalm 145; Ephesians 4:1-6 and John 6:1-15.
What did you bring to Mass today? I’ll tell you what I brought: my insecurities, my doubts, my fears; my frustrations from work this week. I also brought my hopes and dreams and my joys of this week. I brought them so I can offer them up, place them here at the foot of the altar, so that Christ can multiply them, just as he multiplied the loaves and the fishes.
Today’s story of the feeding of the multitudes is the only miracle that appears in all four Gospels. In fact, in Mark and Matthew it appears twice in each. So that tells us that it’s important. In John, which is the one we heard today, the miracle happens just before the Passover and it takes place in the same chapter where later Jesus is going to declare, “I am the bread of life.” This is in John chapter 6, in what we call the “Bread of Life discourse”. In fact, this whole year we’ve been reading from the Gospel of Mark, but starting today, for five weeks, we’re going to be reading from the sixth chapter of the Gospel of John. So, it’s like we’re getting the gift of a little summer retreat on the Bread of Life. For John the whole Bread of Life discourse begins with this story of the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and the fish.
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A reflection for the 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time, year B. The readings are Amos 7:12-15; Psalm 85; Ephesians 1:3-14 and Mark 6:7-13.
Today Jesus give us the tools that we need for the mission. So we need to first ask ourselves one question: “What is the mission?” What is our two-fold mission? Our mission is, first, to get to Heaven and second, to take others with us. We don’t go alone; we go together.
If you’re still unsure about that, just re-read the beginning of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians: God chose us to be holy and without blemish before him. And we have already received the first installment of our inheritance, the Holy Spirit. So no excuses. If you had the secret to the cure for cancer, wouldn’t you share that with everyone? Well, we have something better: the secret to life, to abundant life, to eternal life; the secret to eternal joy and satisfaction; the secret to holiness; the secret to getting to Heaven! No excuses like we heard last week with Ezekiel being sent to a rebellious people who didn’t listen to him (Ez 2:2-5). If people don’t listen to you, so what? Proclaim the Good News anyway. If people don’t recognise you, as happened to Jesus that he wasn’t even recognised in his own town (Mark 6:1-6). If people don’t recognise you; proclaim the Good News anyway. And no excuses about being weak, as we heard from Paul (2 Cor 12:7-10). No excuses about being weak, or not being prepared or being a sinner. Proclaim the Good News anyway!
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A reflection for the 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B. The readings are, Wisdom 1:13-15, 2:23-24; Psalm 30; 2 Corinthians 8:7, 9, 13-15 and Mark 5:21-43.
God did not make death. That’s what I kept thinking last Saturday. You see, I was in Poland and last Saturday I had the chance to spend the day at the memorial at the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camps. All I kept thinking was, “God did not make death.” But there was a lot of death at Auschwitz.
Between 1940 and 1945, some 1.2 million men, women and children were brought by the Nazis to the extermination camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau in Nazi-occupied Poland. Of these, 90% were killed and of those who were killed, about 90% were Jews. People would be brought to Auschwitz in box train cars (for cattle). When they arrived, they would be forced off the trains and separated by gender: men to one side and women to the other. Then they would be separated again: Those who were deemed suitable for work and those not suitable for work. If you were found not suitable for work, you would be sent directly to the gas chamber. 75% of the people who arrived in Auschwitz never stayed there; they went straight from the train into the gas chamber. Among them, a Jewish woman converted to Catholicism by the name of Edith Stein and her sister Rosa. Edith Stein was a Carmelite Sister and is now known as St. Teresa Benedicta of Cross.
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deacon pedro 