This was actually to be posted yesterday and yesterday’s was supposed to be for today. Still not a 100% as you can see!

Asked by the Pharisees when the Kingdom of God would come, Jesus said in reply, “The coming of the Kingdom of God cannot be observed, and no one will announce, ‘Look, here it is,’ or, ‘There it is.’ For behold, the Kingdom of God is among you” (Lk 17:20-21).

Many of the Pharisees were scrutinizing Jesus’ every word and action, unfortunately, with a hard heart. They were closed to the reality present before them because they were looking for ways to accuse him, to catch him, to have cause to show him to be a fraud. They were closed to the actual events happening around Jesus that the blind saw, the deaf heard, the lame walked, lepers, were healed, the dead had arisen, and the poor had the good news proclaimed to them (cf. Matthew 11:5).

They missed the very reality that the Kingdom of God was in their midst. We see this very much today through the mental posturing of “scientism”, the belief that the only reality is that which can be measured empirically, through the five senses. Scientists have brought about many advances and innovations that we enjoy today, yet there is a reality beyond the physical. This is the spiritual, which transcends the three-dimensional reality that we experience and are aware of through our senses. We understand the world around us better when we embrace both science and theology, the physical and the spiritual, as well as embrace the gifts of our reason and our faith.

If our mind is closed to an idea, a reality, and/or a belief we will not only resist believing, we will also seek rationalizations to explain it away as did some of the Pharisees. From a hypersensitivity to accept only the physical, we can brush off acts of synchronicity as mere coincidence. Yet, if we are open to the spiritual reality of interconnectedness beyond that which we can measure finitely, these incidences can be termed, God-incidences.

We cannot solve or prove God like a problem because God is not in the genus of being, he is not an animal, a human, an angelic, spiritual, or even a supreme being. There are no words to adequately describe God. This is why pronouns are woefully inadequate as well, for God is neither male nor female. We can say more about what God is not than what or who God is! The best attempts we have are that God is an Infinite Act of Existence or to use the phrasing of St Thomas Aquinas, Ipsum Esse Subsistens – The sheer act of ‘to be’ itself, or as God said to Moses, “I am, who am” (Exodus 3:14). God is completely transcendent, beyond categories, beyond the genus, beyond the grasp of our finite minds, yet we can experience him because God is closer to us than we are to ourselves.

We will not encounter God by forcing God to come to us on our own terms, by attempting to force-fit God into our finite conceptions. God meets us where we are and as we are, on his terms. As we open ourselves to his presence, accept his invitation, he then helps us to expand, to experience more broadly, who we, others, and our world are. We experience this best when we truly love, when we go out from our own self-centered stance to will the good of another, to love. We become more when we follow what truly brings us joy and fulfills us. We encounter God through embracing the wonders of his creation!

As Jesus said to Philip, “Whoever has seen me, has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9). The Kingdom of God is among us because Jesus is who he said he is. Jesus is fully God and fully man in our midst. By his very presence, he shows us that there is no opposition or competition but a union between heaven and earth. We will never fully comprehend God, but we can come to know and understand God, ourselves, and the world around us better when we breathe with both lungs of faith and reason, embrace our intellect as well as our spirit. As St. John Paul II stated, “Faith without reason is superstition” and as attributed to Albert Einstein, “Reason without faith is boring.”

Photo: Georges Lemaître, priest and astrophysicist, father of the Big Bang theory. 

Link for the Mass readings for Thursday, November 11. 2021

In today’s Gospel account, Jesus continues to answer the Pharisees’ question about “when the kingdom of God would come” (Lk 17:20). Jesus reminds them about how during the time of Noah and during the time of Lot many were eating and drinking, marrying and being given in marriage, buying, selling, planting, building (cf. Lk 17:26-29). In effect, other than Noah and Lot, and those few listening to them, no one else had any clue about the impending calamity or wanted to know. They were so absorbed in their own pursuits and desires they did not heed the warnings of Noah and Lot.

Another focal point was on those who were attached to only material and finite things. When the final hour came, people on the rooftop or in the field were directed not to go back and get their possessions. Jesus pointed out succinctly, “Remember the wife of Lot” (Lk 17:32). Lot left Sodom with his wife, she did so physically, though she could not resist looking back, she was too tied to what she was leaving behind, and so she lost herself to her attachments.

Spending time speculating when the end will come is a pointless pursuit. What is more important is being aware of the kingdom of God in our midst, developing a relationship with God now. Matthew shared in his gospel account that Jesus stated only the Father knows the time or the hour as to when the end will come (cf. Mt 24:36). If we are only going to prepare at the final hour, we may be too late.

Asking, “When will the kingdom of God come?” also misses the point of what Jesus is teaching us. There is an intrinsic value in developing a relationship with God and one another, now, growing and maturing as a disciple, now, instead of fulfilling our own self-centered-interests. Jesus shared this truth in the first words of his public ministry, that the kingdom of God is at hand (cf. Mk 1:15). All we need to do is reach right out and grasp his extended hand of invitation and walk with him.

For many of the Pharisees, this meant letting go of their own power and prestige and participating instead in the living reality of God in their midst. So many of us are caught up in the day to day affairs of existing that we are barely living. We can also be distracted by false lures and attractions of security and gratification, wealth, power, pleasure, and honor, that we miss what is for our highest hope and good. Jesus is inviting us to wake up, to breathe deep, to slow down, and to be aware that he walks among us. Jesus calls us, as Lot called his wife, to keep our focus on God and the things of heaven.

Lord Jesus, help us to recognize when we are caught up in distractions and diversions, when we are choosing to put our self first, and where we are attached and bound up to empty pursuits. Guide us, such that we, in the words of Pope Francis, “understand what faith means when we open ourselves to the immense love of God that changes us inwardly and enables us to see our lives with new eyes” (Costello 2013, 12). Eyes that see the kingdom of God in our midst and the promise of which is our eternal home.

Photo: JoAnn, Jack, and Christy hiking ahead of me during our California visit in December 2015. Little did any of us know then that we would be back in 2019 for JoAnn’s walk with Jesus going ahead of us into the eternal Kingdom of God.

Costello, Gwen. Walking With Pope Francis: Thirty Days with the Encyclical The Light of Faith. New London, CT: Twenty Third Publications, 2013.

Link for the Mass readings for Thursday, November 11, 2021

Jesus said in reply, “Ten were cleansed, were they not? Where are the other nine? Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God?” Then he said to him, “Stand up and go; your faith has saved you” (Lk 17:17-19).

Bloodline doesn’t matter, gender doesn’t matter, nation doesn’t matter, ethnicity or race doesn’t matter. Ask Mary the mother of Jesus, ask Mary Magdalene, ask the woman who suffered from hemorrhages for twelve years, ask the Roman centurion whose slave was dying, ask the Samaritan leper what matters. Each of them will share with us that what matters is our faith in Jesus the Christ.

The lifeblood of Christianity is our belief in and developing of our relationship with Jesus, the Son of God, who made his dwelling among us. St Irenaeus of Lyons (born in Smyrna about 135-140 AD and died about 202-203 AD) in his work Against the Heresies wrote: “The Word of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, who did through His transcendent love, become what we are, that he might bring us to be even what He is himself.”

That Jesus became one with us in our humanity so that we can be one with him in his divinity is something to be thankful for! Many times when we are feeling down, maybe it is because we are focusing on what we do not have or who is not in our life instead of being thankful for who or what we do have. A way to adjust our perspective is to think about three things we are grateful for.

The leper from today’s Gospel helps us to take the next step. Once we become aware of what we are thankful for, we are to reach out and thank the one who made what we have possible. Our time on earth is too short to allow the temptations of indifference and complacency to take hold. May we be more aware and take action to reach out to those who are important in our lives and tell them how thankful we are that they are in it, how much they mean to us, and how much we love them. Make some time to thank God today for his constant presence, the wonderful gift of the invitation of Jesus to share in his divinity, and the Holy Spirit who leads us to love one another as he loves us.

Photo: I am thankful for the best day of my life, our wedding day and grateful for the twenty-three years we had together!

Link for the Mass readings for Wednesday, November 10, 2021

When I ask my students if Jesus ever sinned, inevitably, someone references the account from today’s Gospel. In these verses, we read how Jesus, “made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area” (Jn 2:15). Jesus is not sinning here, rather, he is acting in line with the prophetic tradition. Jesus is making a bold spectacle to drive home the point that the temple is not a marketplace but is to be a place of worship and right praise to his Father.

Greater still than the temple, is the people of God. Further down in the text, when those present ask for a sign to justify this act, Jesus said: “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up” (Jn 2:19). Clearly, he was pointing to his body as the temple of God and referring to his Resurrection to come.

The temple, the house of God, believed to be the corporal presence, the very seat of God among his people, Israel, was destroyed in 70 AD by the Romans. This left a tremendous spiritual vacuum. Two groups that were intimately tied to the sacrificial cult of the temple, the Sadducees and the Essenes, very soon after the destruction, ceased to exist as a sect within Judaism. The Pharisees, who already were moving to a practice of home worship that mirrored the worship in the temple, would survive and be the ancestral root of Judaism today. Another sect would also arise as the followers of the new way of Jesus which became the Church, the Body of Christ.

Each of us has a unique part to play in the Church. We are called to bear witness and practice, in our own unique way, our faith in our everyday experiences. We may be the only Bible someone ever reads. This call to put our faith into action is not an invitation to be overwhelmed by nor an excuse to assume a posture of elitism. We are no better than anyone else.

Pope Francis wrote: “Believers should not be presumptuous; rather, truth leads to humility. We know it is not ourselves possessing truth, it is truth that embraces and possesses us” (Costello 2013, 14). We are to seek and follow Jesus, the Truth, and allow his truth to shape our lives. We need to resist being defensive and rigid. Instead, we are called to be flexible and open to dialogue, sharing our stories and experiences, and inviting others to do the same. When we are willing to encounter and walk together, we learn and grow from one another. In this way, we become less other and more human to one another.

We need to resist all that contributes in any way to the dehumanization, hate, and violence that is rampant in our country and the world by rooting ourselves in Jesus, the living Temple. We all fall short of the glory of God and on our own, we are limited in how far we can go. We need to be willing to be conformed to God’s will through spending consistent time in silence, prayer, meditation, study, worship, and service to be empowered by the love of Christ to be instruments of peace, contemplatives in action, and advocates for healing and reconciliation in a wounded and weary church, politics, country, and world.

Photo: Exiting Mass from Mission del Rey, Oceanside, CA. One of the ways we are dismissed after Mass is to “Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by our life.”

Costello, Gwen. Walking With Pope Francis: Thirty Days with the Encyclical The Light of Faith. New London, CT: Twenty Third Publications, 2013.

Link for the Mass readings for Tuesday, November 9, 2021

“If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he wrongs you seven times in one day and returns to you seven times saying, ‘I am sorry,’ you should forgive him” (Lk 17:3-4).

Forgiveness is one of the foundational principles of our faith tradition as Christians. If we question or struggle with the degree of forgiveness we engage in, we are in good company with Peter. Thinking he was being generous, Peter asked Jesus how many times should he forgive, seven times? Jesus responded, “I say to you, not seven times but seventy-seven times” (cf. Mt 18:21-22).

Luke records the exchange of the disciples asking Jesus to teach them to pray. He taught them the Our Father or Lord’s Prayer. While reciting this prayer often each day or multiple times each day, we say, “Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us” or “forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors” (Mt 6:11-12).

One of the barometers of being a faithful disciple of Jesus is that we are people who practice the sacred act of forgiveness. To forgive does not mean in any way that we justify the offense or even necessarily forget. We are to hold people accountable and lead them to respect our dignity and the dignity of others.

Holding on to grudges, seeking revenge, being unwilling to forgive, can be incapacitating, debilitating, and can lead to a premature as well as eternal death. What can be of help is if we can choose to be more mindful of our thoughts and actions. At the moment we experience discomfort from what someone says or does, instead of giving in to the temptation to react or to let our mind run with the offense, we need to take some deep breaths and relax our shoulders. As the negative thoughts attempt to rise again, don’t fight or feed the thoughts, just return to being aware of our breath and ask Jesus to help us be more understanding and forgiving.

Often we project onto others our own stuff, but we also rarely know what another is going through or dealing with. This is not a justification for the harm done, but a way to see a different perspective than our own limited point of view, and possibly bring us a few steps closer to being more understanding and supportive instead of defensive. In this way, we can provide an opportunity of healing for the one who has inflicted us.

We may struggle with being forgiving because we may not have sought forgiveness ourselves. Advent is coming. It is a season to prepare to celebrate the coming of Jesus into our lives. This season provides a wonderful opportunity to participate in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Forgiveness is a healing gift of God’s grace. Once we have felt the healing balm of forgiveness, we might be more willing to forgive others.

A good practice to engage in is to go to a place of quiet, ask God to help you to forgive, even if your prayer begins, “God, I cannot forgive, I hurt too much, but help me to let go, please help me to forgive, (insert name).” Return each day until you can bring yourself to say, “I forgive, (insert name).” Visualize yourself saying that you forgive the person face to face and imagine a healing between each of you. If the opportunity presents itself you may want to say that you forgive the person directly, send an email, or write a letter – even if you do not press send or mail it.

With the intent to forgive and asking for the help of Jesus who has forgiven us, even if in the beginning we are unwilling, with time, reconciliation is possible. Depending on the hurt that has been inflicted you may not reach out to the other person as it may be healthier to stay apart. Forgiveness will help you to heal and not allow the person who has hurt you to continue to do so. In our willingness to forgive, there is freedom. Let us remember: “Forgive and you will be forgiven”.

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The quiet of the morning is a good time to seek forgiveness and begin the day renewed. Photo from retreat a few weeks back at Our Lady of Florida Spiritual Center.

Link for the Mass readings for Monday, November 8, 2021

It appears like our church, society, and government is coming apart at the seams.

What is an answer and what can we to do?

First and foremost, we need to acknowledge that we are suffering. We can’t hide, run, shop, drink or medicate our problems away. We need to realize that we need help and that we are not alone in our suffering and pain. God is present in our midst, we can find support in him and one another as well as be support for one another.

We also need to resist buying into fear, hopelessness, or hate.

To be a faithful disciple, we will turn to and align our will with God, know and live our faith in action.

We are to trust as did the widow of Zarephath from our first reading and the poor widow giving her last two coins to the temple treasury in the Gospel,“…she, from her poverty, has contributed all she had, her whole livelihood” (Mk 12:44). Each of these women were practicing a spiritual physics that defied what appeared to be the reality before them. Each had barely anything, one her last meal and the other two coins, yet they gave all they had, trusting that God would provide for them. They trusted in God’s providential care.

Each of us, the baptized, are the Church. Each of us have a unique and particular part to play in God’s plan. Gathering together each week to worship, to be encouraged, to learn about our faith, to become holy in our participation in the life of Jesus, and to pray for the needs of our world is a significant counter to the culture of death.

As people of faith we are to aspire to care for one another and creation, to resist the temptation to divide, demean, and define people as other and instead see each other as God sees us, as brothers and sisters. Elijah and the widow of Zarephath saw each other as human beings not people of different ethnicity or faith traditions. Each were in need, trusted in God, and supported one another.

Fr. Matt Malone in the October 29, 2018 issue of America Magazine, wrote about an account of his pilgrimage to northern Spain. At one stop, the mountaintop shrine of Our Lady of Arantzazu, he met Brother Antonio a man of quiet faithfulness who is the keeper of the keys. He leads tourists to experience the shrine and has been doing so for 68 years. What impressed Fr. Malone was his humility, faithfulness and wonder. His smile radiated to such an extent that it appeared that he was seeing the Marian statue for the first time.

We can also experience the joy expressed by Br. Antonio when we also resist the urge to curve in upon our self from fear or despondency, and instead reach out of our comfort zones and be willing to risk accompanying others in acts of kindness, love, and service. In this way, we can come to see that we are not alone in our suffering. When we are willing to share our struggles and trials, our agreements and disagreements, our joys and successes we can grow our bonds of relationship such that what we face does not weaken us, but helps us to grow stronger.

We are also able to notice God more and be present to others when we pray. For it is in the silence of our heart that we hear God speak. It is in the silence of our heart that we can feel his gentle leading toward a particular ministry, small group for support, and will be more apt to notice another in need and have the courage to reach out in small acts of kindness and love.

A boy named Mark exemplifies this awareness. He was walking home one day and noticed that a boy had fallen. Books, a bat and glove, a few sweaters, and small tape recorder were scattered about. Mark went to the boy and offered to help. The two middle school students realized they were heading for home in the same direction so Mark offered to help the boy carry some of his things.

As they walked Mark discovered that the boy’s name was Bill. The pair arrived at Bill’s house first and Bill invited Mark in for a Coke and to watch some TV. Mark ended up staying the afternoon, they talked, laughed and enjoyed their time together. Mark and Bill would interact on occasion at school, have lunch once in awhile and then graduated middle school. They would go on to attend the same high school together and would have some brief interactions over their four years together.

Three weeks before graduation Bill reminded Mark of their first encounter and asked if Mark wondered why he was carrying all that stuff home that day? He then went on to tell Mark, “You see, I cleaned out my locker because I didn’t want to leave a mess for anyone else. I had stolen some of my mother’s sleeping pills and I was going home to commit suicide. But after we spent some time together talking and laughing, I realized that if I had killed myself, I would have missed that time and so many others that might follow. So you see, Mark, when you picked up my books that day, you did a lot more. You saved my life” (see Schlatter 1993, 35).

How do we address our current challenges, the problem of violence, and the hyper polarization in our country and Church?

One approach is to follow the path that the two widows, Br. Antonio, and Mark took as shared in the accounts above which is to become contemplatives in action. We not only learn about our faith but we are to live our faith, put it into action, trust in and allow ourselves to be transformed by the God of Jesus Christ who is love incarnate. We are to turn to God in prayer and follow his lead to accompany one another, as brothers and sisters, living out our faith in quiet, yet determined ways, by countering darkness with light, hate with love, by being welcoming, offering a smile, holding each other accountable with mercy, step by step and hand in hand on the grand adventure and journey we call life.

Photo credit: Exercise in trust!

Schlatter, John W. A Simple Gesture in Chicken Soup for the Soul: 101 Stories To Open the Heart and Rekindle the Spirit. Edited by Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen. Deerfield Beach, FL: Health Communications, 1993.

Link for the Mass Readings for Sunday, November 7, 2021.

“No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon” (Lk 16:13).

Jesus consistently emphasizes the priority of making God primary in our lives. Anything that moves into the slot of preeminence before God is idolatrous. Anything, even family, as we heard a few days ago. We cannot have two firsts, because either we will “hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other.” This balancing act is not an easy discipline.

It becomes especially challenging when we look at mammon, money, or material wealth. Many of us seek our security in having a home, insurance policies, savings, retirement plans, market investments. Setting up this security is often considered prudent. The problem is when material security becomes the foundation of our life, our fulfillment, our god.

This has certainly influenced the Church at times with movements governed by a prosperity gospel. The approach to a faith life that is not so much building up a relationship with our loving God and Father, but one of seeking God as a holy investor. There is a perspective offered on verses such as the Parable of the Sower (cf. Mark 4, Matthew 13, and Luke 8) in which the primary intent in giving is to reap a financial return of ten, twenty, or a hundredfold. God certainly wants us to be good stewards, and he will indeed bless us and wants us to be generous and cheerful with our giving, but again, if in our giving the primary intent is to receive more of our treasure, we are serving Mammon and not God.

Following are two scriptural verses and two Church Father quotes that may help us to see that in giving away and not accumulating the material, thus trusting in God for our security is the prudent path:

“If one of your kinsmen in any community is in need in the land which the Lord, your God, is giving you, you shall not harden your heart nor close your hand to him in his need. Instead, you shall open your hand to him and freely lend him enough to meet his need” (Deuteronomy 15:7-8).

“For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me” (Matthew 25:35).

“When giving to the poor, you are not giving him what is yours; rather, you are paying him back what is his” (St Ambrose of Milan, 340-339).

“If each one of us took only what is necessary for his sustenance, leaving what is superfluous for the indigent, there would be no distinction of rich and poor” (St Basil of Caesarea, 330-379).

Our reactions to the above can be a barometer as to whether we are putting gold first or God first. God is to be our source and our fundamental option. The blessing we receive, the hundredfold we seek, is to be measured in love, mercy, and generosity received and given. Pope Francis, in a 2013 address, expressed his concern “that some homeless people die of cold on the streets [and this] is not news. In contrast, a ten-point drop in the stock markets of some cities is a tragedy. A person dying is not news, but if the stock markets drop ten points it is a tragedy! Thus people are disposed of as if they were trash. Consumerism has led us to become used to an excess and daily waste of food, to which, at times, we are no longer able to give a just value, which goes well beyond mere economic parameters” (Vatican Insider).

Do we place our trust, faith, and security in Mammon, or God? Do we build up treasure for ourselves at the expense of or indifference toward others or build up our treasure in heaven, aware of and reaching out to those who are in need? Were someone to observe us objectively, and closely would they say about us, “There goes someone that lives their life believing: In Gold we Trust.” Or would they say, “There goes someone that lives their life believing: In God we Trust?”

Photo: pexels.com by Quang Nguyen Vinh

Link for the Mass readings for Saturday, November 6, 2021

In the Parable of the Dishonest Steward, the steward who is on the block to lose his job for squandering his lord’s property comes up with a plan to settle his lord’s accounts. He lessened the amount owed with the intent to gain some support from those indebted to his master. Most likely he was giving up his own profits in settling these debts, much like a real estate agent or car salesman today would forego their commission to make a sale.

The prudence or cleverness of the steward is commended by the lord because the dishonest steward had utilized foresight, which was a better quality to develop than the original squandering that landed him in this predicament in the first place.

Jesus commenting on this parable also acknowledged those who were clever in worldly ways, thinking and acting with prudence. Being shrewd and having the foresight to navigate potential conflicts to acquire the desired goal is admirable. Jesus then shared the insight that we as “children of the light” ought to act with prudence as well. The difference being, the application is not for personal gain but applying cleverness in evangelization. As we spread the Gospel, we do so, not in a one size fits all approach. We are to be present and adjust to each person’s uniqueness.

Many in the Church have gone before us aware of the needs of those people in their midst and coming up with creative ways to minister to them. Often they too, utilized the model of the steward’s prudence in today’s Gospel, giving up their opportunity for immediate gain to provide for the needs of others.

St. Francis of Assisi, lived his youth, not as a faithful steward, but as a pampered troubadour, part of the social elite. Then as his transformation began to take hold, he began to sell off his father’s cloth and gave it to the poor. He would ultimately renounce his family name as well as all material possessions, and give all to follow Jesus.

St. Mother Teresa, left her home at eighteen, never to see her family again to become a missionary in India with the Loretto Sisters. She became a school teacher in Calcutta, by no means squandering what the Lord gave her, but she too was called to go deeper. She left the convent to serve the poorest of the poor in the streets, those in the most deplorable of conditions.

Jesus has a unique call for each of us. We too are called to be faithful stewards, to be holy, and to be saints. What needs do we see in our midst? In what ways can we be more prudent? Each of us is invited into a deeper embrace of the Gospel. “We experience faith and encounter God in our own particular time in history, and faith lights up our journey through time. Faith must be passed on in every age” (Pope Francis, 20). Jesus, please deepen our faith and help us to put it into practice in the unique way you call us to serve.

Photo: Statue of St. Francis in our rosary garden at St Peter Catholic Church in Jupiter, FL.

Walking With Pope Francis: Thirty Days with the Encyclical The Light of Faith. New London, CT., Twenty Third Publications, 2013.

Link for the Mass readings for Friday, November 5, 2021

In our Gospel account today, Luke records that Jesus is critiqued for eating with tax collectors and sinners. Jesus responds to the criticism of the Pharisees and the scribes by sharing three parables, two of which we read today, and the third, the Prodigal Son, is often reserved for reading on Sunday during this liturgical cycle of readings.

The two parables we are given today display the love that God the Father has for his children. Though we may not find being compared to a sheep or a coin endearing, the imagery of the shepherd going to find the one lost sheep and the woman searching all over her house for the one lost coin is a message well worth meditating on.

Someone hearing this parable might say, “Why bother looking for the one sheep when you have ninety-nine other sheep or why bother looking for one insignificant coin when you have nine other ones?” But if we reflect upon this parable for a bit we might recall a time or feel right now that we may be lost or insignificant. What Jesus is telling us is that we matter, that God loves us more than we can ever imagine, and he is constantly seeking us out. God is the creator of the vast expanse of the cosmos yet he cares for each and every one of us individually. He cares for you as if you were the only person in the world.

We do not need to look for God so much as we need to just stop, be still, and notice he is already waiting for us. If we feel a bit worn, misunderstood, lost, lonely or underappreciated, rest assured that we are not alone. God cares and he is present, yes, even in the midst of any conflicts, trials and/or tribulations that we may be going through. Even if we have separated ourselves from him through our sin, God loves us more than we can ever mess up and he is the shepherd that watches over us and seeks us out even when we walk away from him. Return to him and feel the healing balm of his forgiveness.

I have experienced his forgiveness, mercy, and love when I participate in the Sacrament of Reconciliation and I invite you to do the same when you can. In the meantime, allow yourself to let go in the loving embrace of Jesus today. Breathe slowly, rest, cry, or vent. Receive the gift of his love so as to share it with someone today who also needs to know they matter, that they have dignity, that they are not alone, and that they are loved.

Photo: One of my favorite pencil drawings by Kathryn J. Brown, 1982

Link for the Mass readings for Thursday, November 4, 2021

I can visualize the opening scene of today’s Gospel in my mind’s eye. Jesus striding along with a gathering of people walking, talking, and moving about, and then he just stops and turns. Those closest to Jesus pull up to a stop with him, others continue right past, while at the same time others bump into and trip over those who had stopped before them. The subtle hum of random conversation then slowly comes to a halt, a stillness ripples through the crowd, and then there is silence. The dust begins to settle. Those closest have their eyes locked on his, while those further back are craning their necks, moving left and right to get a better look, others are cupping their ears to catch the sound of Jesus’ voice.

These crowds most likely consisted of some disciples, while the greater majority were those on the periphery gathering because of curiosity, intrigue, and maybe even wonder. Jesus then begins to speak, “If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother, wife or children, brothers and sisters, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple” and then finishes with  “In the same way, everyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple” (cf. Lk 14:25-33).

Those who may be hearing these words second hand, as they were further away from the point of direct hearing, may not believe that the message was transmitted to them correctly. These words cut to the quick, just as surely as when Jesus shared about eating his flesh and drinking his blood, and when he told another follower, who wanted to bury his father to let the dead bury their dead. Luke does not say, but I am sure that many of those gathered around him were just as shocked and began to walk away.

The familial bond for ancient peoples was strong. Though the invitation of salvation that Jesus offers is for all to be saved, he is not going to dumb down or sugar coat his message just to get numbers. Jesus presents, time and again, that the way to live a life of fullness and wholeness, to restore that which has been lost, is to put God first in our lives. God must be the primary focus, the primary relationship in our life, nothing else can have priority of place before him. When we do so, all other things will fall into their proper place.

We need to ask ourselves if we want to be an onlooker, just someone looking at Jesus from a distance, or a disciple, willing to be his servant sent forth to share the Gospel and invite others into relationship with him? Are we attached to any possessions, false substitutes, even members of our family, such that we place them before our relationship with God? Idols are anything that we put before God and will distract us from the very flow of his life force that fuels our existence. If we are willing to walk the path of discipleship, we must be willing to surrender our will to God, place him first in our lives, and be open to being transformed by his love.

Jesus is to be the interpretive key that opens our understanding to all else. All that which is material and finite in our lives find meaning in relation to him. Only when we are able to let go of the attachments to the things of this world will we then truly begin to be free, to be other-centered, to be more patient, understanding, and willing to love and be more present to our father and mother, husband, wife or children, brother and sister, and even our very self and our neighbor.

Photo: In the chapel at St Ignatius Cathedral, just prior to my ordination Mass, September 2013. To my left, long-time friend Fr. Ed O’Brien, a true disciple! Photo Credit: Deacon Michael Miller

Link for the Mass readings for Wednesday, November 3, 2021