While good intentions can drive one to overactivity and even to misguided zeal, the Scriptures defend human activity and good works as essential to salvation. For interpreting today’s scripture readings we must keep in…
Today’s texts deal with divine reversals. Sometimes we may resemble Jonah who attempted to use the sea to flee away from the God of earth and sea. But God has wonderful ways of bringing us back to our senses,
The church is the choice vineyard of the Lord, planted for a noble and productive purpose. We pray that our lives may never be soured by bitterness or disillusionment.
There are reassuring words in God’s Word this Sunday, with Paul reminding believers that there is no need to worry (see Philippians 4:6-9). As they gather for worship, they hope that if there is anything they need, they can pray for it and God’s peace will be theirs.
The secret stirring of the heart comes marvellously to the surface in Jesus’ prayerful rejoicing in the Holy Spirit, “what you have hidden from the learned and the clever, you have revealed to the merest children.”
Today’s text from Baruch dates to the Babylonian exile (587-539 B.C.), and the verse immediately preceding refers the autumnal feast of Tabernacles. A collection was being taken up, to be sent to Jerusalem for sacrifices and for helping the poor in the holy city
A parish’s harvest thanksgiving can take the form of a special Eucharist or an ecumenical Service, or it can take place over the varied liturgies of a weekend. Relevant local people can be involved in in planning this event: in rural areas, members of organisations like the IFA or Macra might participate. Schoolchildren decorate the church for the celebration, reflecting all the beautiful elements of creation.
This excerpt from a homily on the Gospels (Hom. 32, 8-9: PL 76, 1250-1251) by St Gregory the Great is used in the Catholic Office of Readings for the Feast of the Archangels …
Neh 2:1ff. The Persian king, Artaxerxes I allows the Jewish nobleman, Nehemiah, to go to Jerusalem, on a mission to rebuild its walls and restore the ancestral graves.
Lk 9:57ff. Jesus responds to prospective followers by a series of stern statements.
In career terms, Nehemiah had it made
Today we are invited to share in a journey to Jerusalem and the holy temple, there to worship God with many others. The spirit with which we travel forms the spirit with which we join in prayer at our gathering in church. This spirit, as we learn from the three readings, is not a generic
Children remain the key to reflection through today’s readings and give a glimpse of the new Jerusalem, Zechariah pictures the city with “boys and girls playing in the streets” and in the gospel Jesus turns to children to teach about the “greatest in the Kingdom of God.”
Jesus warns that prostitutes and tax-collectors may be closer to God than the religious leaders. Our social or religious standing gives us no exclusive rights to the mercy of God. The parable of the two sons, neither of whom does what he says he will do, highlights the dictum that “actions speak louder than words.”
Christians believe God’s love is displayed in the life and death of Jesus. At the Sunday Eucharist they rejoice in this love, and celebrate the victory over sin and death won for them. God’s challenging word is read and the Bread of Life shared by all who gather.
Today’s Scriptures send out two quite different signals about the future. Zechariah’s prophecy is strong in symbolic expressions of hope, while Jesus speaks bluntly and sternly about his death. Without the sobering reminder of death, the hopes expressed by the prophecy might deserve the
All of life’s stages are represented in today’s texts. Even though each of us individually may identify with only one of these stages at this particular moment, we must come to a peaceful acceptance of our past and we need to prepare in advance for what lies ahead. Moreover as each of us lives in
People can be faced with economic confusion, as reflected in the prophecy of Haggai; or again their religion may consist of mere curiosity, born of moral confusion, as was the case with Herod the tetrarch. But no situation is hopeless, for the Bible is not the story of sin and hell but of sin and conversion.
Eph 4:1-7,11-13. Of the many gifts of God to the Church, the apostles are of the foremost importance for the spread of the faith.
Mt 9:9-13. The call of the tax-collector, to be an apostle.
Today’s Reading shows in what a variety of ways the will of God is made known and accomplished. Ezra refers to imperial decrees from the Persian kings Cyrus and Darius, messages of the prophets Haggai and Zechariah (which will begin later this week), and financial help from Persian taxes, as supporting the sanctuary liturgy and the functions of priests and Levites.
Jesus’ word about the lampstand is clear, though startling in its implications; his next word, however, about having and gaining, or not-having and losing even that little, is enigmatic and baffling, like so many of the best proverbs in the sapiential literature.
“Seek the Lord while he may be found” is one side of today’s readings. The other facet of the coin is that God’s mercy is beyond measure, so that even those who come late to his vineyard will be welcomed by his infinite love. We all have some reason to identify with those workers of the eleventh hour,
