Reflections on the Gospel Reading for the Day

We are invited, and then invited to invite others.

One of those at table with Jesus said to him, “Blessed is the one who will dine in the Kingdom of God.” He replied to him, “A man gave a great dinner to which he invited many. When the time for the dinner came, he dispatched his servant to say to those invited, ‘Come, everything is now ready'” (Lk 14:15-17)

Judaism was far from unified during Jesus’ time. The Sadducees, Pharisees and scribes, Samaritans, Zealots, and Essenes all felt they were the authentic expression of Israel. Jesus not only addressed this division by sitting down to break bread with as diverse a population as possible but he also shared parables around the same idea of the invitation to share in the celebration of a feast, as we read today.

Jesus is the man who was inviting people to a great dinner, his servant, is the one who is sent, an apostle, to invite others to share in this great banquet. Those invited in the first wave were those of the Israelites that were rejecting Jesus’ invitation, the second invitation were for those of the people of Israel that were within, but at the same time on the outside:  the poor, cripple, blind, and the lame. The final invitation went out to those outside of Israel, meaning the Gentiles. Thus, Jesus’ invitation of salvation and participation in the eternal banquet to come is to all of humanity, first to the Chosen People, and then to the Gentiles. Only those who rejected the offer would not be admitted.

Each encounter that we are blessed to partake in is an invitation to experience relationship. We have the opportunity to engage in person, face to face, or through the myriad of social media outlets. We can choose to demean, degrade, dehumanize, gossip, and defame or we can embrace the opportunity to treat each other with dignity, respect, kindness, and understanding, and yes, even when we disagree.

We all have wounds. Each of us have suffered or are suffering, and we have or are experiencing anxieties, overwhelm, and/or insecurities in some form or fashion. We all seek to belong, to be a part of, and to be accepted. We need God and each other. When we acknowledge these, and turn to God with them, we begin to heal and can also be more understanding. Yet, as Fr. Greg Boyle, SJ, wrote, “If you’re a stranger to your own wound, then you’re going to be tempted to despise the wounded.”

When we are willing to see our own wounds, and offer them in our poverty to Jesus, he will help. When others are not respectful, we can be less reactive, breathe, and resist reacting in kind. When someone serves up harsh words, we can resist the defensive retort and instead ask if there is any way we can help. To will each other’s good does not mean that we condone the inappropriate act or word, it means we genuinely seek their good and their healing. When we can be advocates of healing, we can then be God’s servants of invitation.  Jesus invites us to the feast of community and sharing, to prepare us for the eternal feast. Are we willing to attend and are we willing to invite others?

———————————————————————–

Photo: As we heal and experience the light of Jesus, we can receive his light and reflect it to others!

Link for the Mass for Tuesday, November 4, 2025

We pray, love, and serve because we are loved by the One who is Love.

“[W]hen you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you” (Lk 14:13-14).

Jesus means what he says here, though I am not sure many of us are ready to live this Gospel out. If we are going to get to the point where we can, we must understand the deeper point that he is making. The words of Jesus above give us an example of what it means to love unconditionally. We are to resist the temptation of doing anything with the primary purpose of receiving thanks or praise. We are to instead reach out to those in need because they are in need seeking nothing in return. We embrace our dignity as human beings when we recognize the inherent dignity of another and serve them without hesitation, without holding anything back.

This is the root of what we mean when we say that we are believers in the God of Jesus Christ. God is a divine community of persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The Father gives all that he is to the Son perfectly, infinitely, holding nothing back. The Son receives all that he has been given perfectly, infinitely and returns, in like fashion, what he has received back to the Father, holding nothing back. The infinite love shared between the Father and the Son is the Holy Spirit.

The Son of God became incarnate, one with us in our humanity, and he also gave all of himself to us on the cross, holding nothing back. He conquered death, rose from the dead, ascended to the Father so that we now can participate in that same divine love given and received between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We do not give of our time, talent, and treasure, so that we will receive more of each. We give, we love, we will the good of each other, because we have been loved into existence and are continually loved more than we can ever imagine by God. We are to receive his love and love in return because that is who he created us to be.

The very fact that we exist, that we have life, is a gift, yet we are not meant to merely exist. Jesus teaches us that the height of our humanity is to allow him to love us and through us, love others unconditionally. When we look into the eye of each and every person we meet, we are to see a brother, sister, mother, father. With each smile, each embrace, each listening ear, each act of invitation to walk not ahead, not behind, but with another, and by simply being present, we reaffirm to each other that we have dignity. This is true because each and every one of us has been created in the image of God, who is Love.

——————————————————–

Photo: St. Martin de Porres lived out this gospel literally. From the Dominican monastery in Lima, Peru, he fed several hundred people a day, provided healing, financial support, and began a school for street children. St. Martin, pray for us that we also may be people of prayer and service.

Link for the Mass readings for Monday, November 3, 2025

The will of God is that all of humanity will be saved through his Son, Jesus.

“For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who seeks the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day” (Jn 6:40).

This is our hope and what we believe, that we who encounter Jesus, believe in, know him, and follow him shall have eternal life. God’s will, what he created all of us for, is to be in communion with him and one another in this life and the next. A word of assurance that I often lean on is from the book of Wisdom from our first reading today, “The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them. They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead; and their passing away was thought an affliction and their going forth from us utter destruction. But they are in peace” (Wisdom 3:1-3).

The miracle of Jesus raising the daughter of the Roman official, Jairus, embodies these verses from Wisdom. As Jesus entered the home of the official many were “making a commotion” and Jesus dismissed them stating: “Go away! the girl is not dead but sleeping.” He was ridiculed by the crowd but paid them no heed. He went to the girl, took her hand, “and the little girl arose” (cf. Mt 9:18-26).

Jesus assured his followers as he assures us today that the will of his Father is that all will be saved. Experiences like the raising of Jairus’ daughter, the son of the widow from Nain, and Lazarus, were not only seeds of hope planting the promise of his resurrection to come but a foretaste of the raising of humanity on the last day. His disciples witnessed Jesus’ actions and words, and not only kept these experiences in their hearts but shared them.

Through the Gospels we are able to enter into and experience the encounters Jesus experienced with others again and again. We also experience Jesus each time we pray, participate in the sacraments, communal worship, and in our willingness to love one another through concrete actions of sacrifice and service. In each of these moments, we are conformed and shaped into who we have been created and called by God to be in this life and the next.

This All Souls Day we celebrate the gift that Jesus was victorious over sin and death, not only for himself but for all of us. Unlike those he raised from the dead and died again: “We know that Christ, raised from the dead, dies no more; death no longer has power over him” (Romans 6:9). The difference between All Saints yesterday, and the commemoration of all souls today, is that we pray for those who have died still in need of the purifying fire of God’s love. Just as “gold in the furnace” (Wisdom 3:6) is purified, so God purifies those in purgatory. Let us pray for them today that they may be freed from any stain of sin so to also join the communion of Saints!

“Merciful Father, hear our prayers and console us. As we renew our faith in your Son, whom you raised from the dead, strengthen our hope that all our departed brothers and sisters will share in his resurrection, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, God, forever and ever” (Prayer for All Souls, from the Liturgy of the Hours).

Photo: For All Saints, we ask the saints to pray for us, for all souls, we pray for them that they may be saints. I pray for JoAnn and many each day. Who are you praying for?

Link for the Mass readings for Sunday, November 2, 2025

May the saints help us to arise from our slumber.

“Blessed are they who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Mt 5:4).

Mourning here can certainly mean the grief one experiences at the death of a loved one. It can also mean mourning for the evil and unfaithfulness in the world. Another word for blessed is happy. How are we to feel blessed, or happy in reference to the death of those close to our hearts? Blessed or happy for the injustice, violence, warfare that plagues our word? From a theological sense, one interpretation can be that Jesus spoke from the perspective of the eschatological event, his second coming at the end of time and that we can rely on the hope that Jesus died for us all and we will rise with him on the last day. We will be not only freed from the atrocities of this life, but also freed from death.

This is our hope and this is true, but also Jesus may also have been speaking about our day to day experiences as well. Jesus said, as is recorded in Mark 1:15, “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand.” Jesus, is the kingdom at hand, just an outstretched arm away. Those of us who mourn and suffering will be blessed, will find comfort when we resist running away, or denying the agony and pain that threatens to overwhelm us and instead allow ourselves to experience the grief and the suffering of our loss and our fallen world. It is in the very embracing of our pain and suffering that we encounter Jesus waiting for us there with his arms wide open.

When we turn to Jesus, and with him face the sorrow, grieve and mourn for those who have died, as well as for the injustice, violence, and sin of our world, he will help us to release the unbearable weight we have been carrying. Jesus, who suffered the agony, loss, pain, and hurt in his passion and death on the cross, understands what we are feeling. His presence and closeness will be the strength we need to guide us through the many ups and downs, fits and starts, of our emotional roller coaster and also be able to offer help.

Today, we celebrate the gift of the Communion of Saints on this All Saints Day. The saints understood and lived the message and truth of the Gospel that Jesus has risen. They dedicated their lives to the call that Jesus extended to them and have gone before us to the true land of promise, our heavenly home, and from there they cheer us on, encourage, and intercede for us. They remind us that we will be blessed when we resist being attached to the things of this world and instead follow the will of God.

Jesus suffered and persevered the agonizing pain of the cross, then experienced, and conquered death. He lights the way and leads us back to the Father. We need not fear the fallen world nor death because through our life in Jesus, neither has any power over us. St Paul of the Cross, taught: “The world lives unmindful of the sufferings of Jesus which are the miracle of miracles of the love of God. We must arouse the world from its slumber.” When we turn to God with everything, we will experience God’s comfort, peace, and healing to rise from our slumber, and reflect the light of Christ to help others to rise from their slumbers.

Photo: Tapestry of saints hanging in the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angeles, Los Angeles, CA.

The source for the quote is from St Paul of the Cross

Link for the Mass readings for Saturday, November 1, 2025

A prayerful pause can make a big difference.

“I have great sorrow and constant anguish in my heart” (Romans 9:2). Paul is sharing his great pain because his own people are rejecting the gospel of Jesus. Paul can certainly relate because he not only rejected but persecuted anyone who followed Jesus, the person he came to believe is truly the Messiah.

Jesus also experiences the same aguish as he is meeting yet again opposition as he heals a man with dropsy, a condition in which some part of his body was suffering with swelling. Instead of recognizing and rejoicing in the healing just witnessed, the people judge Jesus for healing on the sabbath.

In response, Jesus points out the obvious by asking, “Who among you, if your son or ox falls into a cistern, would not immediately pull him out on the sabbath day” (Luke 14:5)? No answer but crickets… Jesus, as he often does, builds his case from the lesser to the greater. Just as he did with the parable of the unjust judge who made a just verdict, and an unwilling neighbor gave bread to his persistent friend in the middle of the night, how much more will God provide for his children? He wants all of us to be saved. The healings of Jesus are invitations to the ultimate healing we all seek which is the restoration and reconciliation of our relationship with God.

We need to be careful that we don’t fall into the tunnel vision of some of the scribes and the Pharisees by limiting Jesus in our own lives because we are choosing our fears, insecurities, or doubts over his guidance. I have done both. I have resisted, chosen not to act, beaten myself up over it (which does not work because we are still focused on ourselves and not Jesus), and prayed to improve the next time. I have followed without hesitation. I have also hesitated and then acted. Each time I was willing to risk and follow Jesus, I have experienced his consolation and our relationship has grown stronger.

I invite you to listen to Jesus today and ponder where he might be leading you and in what way to act regarding yourself or another who may be in need of healing. Grant yourself a quiet moment to examine where you may be resisting his invitation no matter how small, trust him, and take the risk to love. With each thought we entertain, choice we make, word we speak, may each go through the filter of the Holy Sprit. Ask, God is this what you want me to think, choose, or say? If yes, go forward. Instead of a knee-jerk reaction, let us give ourselves a prayerful pause with the Lord.

Photo: There are some great views we receive when we stop and look up with a prayerful pause!

Link for the Mass readings for Friday, October 31, 2025

God increase our faith.

Some Pharisees came to Jesus and said, “Go away, leave this area because Herod wants to kill you” (Lk 13:31).

Even with this warning, from some Pharisees no less, Jesus continued to teach openly and publicly as well as performed healings and cast out demons. He did not fear the threat of retribution even from the likes of Herod who had killed John the Baptist. He willingly surrendered all to his Father and would continue to do so, especially not being deterred from continuing his march toward Jerusalem.

It is interesting that there are those Pharisees that are attempting to help him. Could they have been moved by the courage of Jesus? His undeterred persistence for his mission and courage makes him a very dangerous man. He cannot be controlled, threatened, or coerced. Jesus is sure of what God has sent him to do and he is going to follow through with his Father’s plan even to the point of giving his life.

Many, even those like the centurion, who did not believe in him, after he ran his spear through his side, admired his courage, and something happened in that moment such that he came to believe that he was the Messiah (cf. Mark 16:39). Many of the first-century martyrs who followed Jesus to their own deaths were a big reason for those who came to believe and also became followers of this One who died on a Cross. Tertullian, one of the early Church Fathers, living from 155 – 220 AD, went so far as to say that: “The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.”

We are all called by God to be martyrs, not necessarily by shedding our blood. Martyr literally means witness. Each one of us is called by Jesus to bear witness to what we believe and the One who we believe in. Faith is a gift. If we feel that we are weak in our faith, we are in good company, because Jesus said on more than one occasion to his Apostles, the ones he would send out as his witnesses, “Oh, you of little faith.”

The Apostles continued with the little faith they had. They trusted in Jesus and continued to move forward. It is in growing our relationship with Jesus that gives us our strength. If we feel like our faith could use a little shoring up, let us not choose the path of Judas who isolated himself from the forgiveness of Jesus. Let us instead ask God to increase our faith, to allow the Holy Spirit to dwell within us and transform us, and be open to opportunities to follow his will.

Jesus, please help us to be still and hear the Father calling us, challenging us, to resist indifference and be his witnesses in our everyday lives and to be more open to follow the stirring of the Holy Spirit and put his guidance into action. Each time we say yes to the will of God, our clarity, courage, and faith increase.

Photo: We can have confidence that when we turn to the Holy Spirit, he will guide us through any storm.

Link for the Mass readings for Thursday, October 30, 2025

We enter the narrow gate by growing in love.

He answered them, “Strive to enter through the narrow gate, for many, I tell you, will attempt to enter but will not be strong enough” (Lk 13:24).

Jesus offered this answer to the person who asked him, “Lord, will only a few be saved?” Jesus’ parables about it being easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven (cf Mt 19:24) and the rich man and Lazarus (Lk 16:19-31) also reveal to us that what we say and do in our lives regarding the welfare of others matter. Are we building walls or bridges regarding our relationship with God and one another, are we including or excluding?

There are many distractions, diversions, and temptations that pull at us. When we give in to them, we can strain or even break our relationships. Jesus said many will not be strong enough, and on our own he is right. St Paul also realized this, for he wrote, “I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil that I do not want” (Romans 7:19). How many of us could say the same?

Relationships are not easy in the best of circumstances, this is true on the human level as well as the spiritual. St Teresa of Avila, the 16th-century Spanish saint and doctor of the Church, shared openly and honestly with Jesus once after being thrown from a carriage into a mud puddle, “If you treat your friends so poorly, it is no wonder that you have so few!” I relate to the honesty of this quote. My maternal grandparents had the same kind of open, unfiltered relationship with each other. To an outsider looking in, they would have missed the depth of love they had developed for one another for over sixty years and which continued to grow into their last days.

Authentic relationships demand that we go through the narrow gate of love. Love is more than mere sentiments, emotions, or feelings. We must grow in our willingness to sacrifice, be committed, understanding and forgiving, to be present, patient, willing to risk being vulnerable, honest, respect boundaries, and share who we truly are with one another, free of any pretense or masks. On our own, we are not strong enough to persevere, often our insecurities seek to keep us unbalanced, but with God, we will remain faithful and grounded.

Regarding marriage, my grandmother told me to take the time we needed to get to know each other, but once we knew, not to wait too long. We didn’t. JoAnn and I were married six months after we started dating. Each of us brought our own baggage, wounds, and made plenty of mistakes, into our relationship, yet each year was better than the one before because we remained committed to God and to each other. We became more patient and understanding, we empowered and were there for each other. Each of the crossroads that arose over our twenty-three years, we chose the narrow gate. We loved Jesus and each other and that made all the difference.

Jesus is the relationship we need to develop first and foremost. That means other people and things will not be able to remain. This is good news, because that which will not remain is not for our good. Growing in our relationship with Jesus takes time and commitment, and doing so will help us to properly order our other relationships as well as all aspects of our lives. Our Father is our foundation and strength and the Holy Spirit is our guide. God continually invites us with his tender chords of love to draw closer into relationship with him and so to better grow closer in relationship with one another.

Photo: Because our relationship and commitment with Jesus grew, so did our relationship and commitment with one other.

Link for the Mass readings for Wednesday, October 29, 2025

Jesus went up to the mountain to pray, we can join him.

Jesus went up to the mountain to pray, and he spent the night in prayer to God (Lk 6:12).

Jesus spent the whole night in prayer to God. What did that look like? We don’t know. Since the traditional practices of prayer we have learned from Jesus we can speculate that he spent some time in vocal prayer, speaking with his Father. He most likely then spent some time in quiet meditation. But my feeling is that he spent much of his time in contemplation. A deep, intimate communion between him, his Father, and a deep experience of the love between them the Holy Spirit.

We can surmise vocal prayer because when the Apostles asked Jesus to teach them to pray, he taught them the words of the Our Father. He would have also spent some time in dialogue with his Father because when he came down in the morning, he “chose Twelve, whom he also named Apostles” (Luke 6:13). Jesus would have meditated, thought about his choices of who he would have picked, and then prayed, dialogued with his Father for his confirmation. That he spent time in contemplation we can speculate because he knew the Father and the Father knew him. You don’t know someone intimately unless you spend time together.

How about us? Are these forms of prayer possible? Yes. If you want to pray, you have already begun. The desire in and of itself to pray is prayer. The originator of our prayer does not begin with us but is an invitation from God to spend time together. As the desire arises, we are now acknowledging God’s invitation. He will, if we allow him to get through all the noise, distractions, diversions, and temptations leading us away from praying with him, get through.

When we want to learn about something, our first instinct is to read and study about it. A good first step. The danger though regarding reading about prayer is that we think we are praying. In the turning of a page, the completion of a chapter, even reading the Bible, we can feel as if we are accomplishing something, but we are only imagining how prayer can be. “It is tempting to remain in the comfortable theater of the imagination instead of the real world, to fall in love with the idea of becoming a saint and loving God and neighbor instead of doing the actual work, because the idea makes no demands on you” (Peter Kreeft, Prayer for Beginners, 12).

The other trap is when we are praying words, reading the Bible, being present at Mass, but only doing these practices. We don’t do prayer, we speak, meditate, pray, and listen to a Person. We allow God to do, through us. Is God an idea or a real Person? This is a very important distinction. When we pray even the Sign of the Cross, when done properly, we invoke each Person of the Holy Trinity: the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. When we pray in this way, we invite God to be with us and in us!

There is a myriad of ways to pray and each practice will match each of our unique personalities and temperaments. The key to prayer is to make a commitment to a time and a place to pray each day, show up at that time and place, then pray. Start with a timeframe, such as five minutes that you know you can do. Depending on the discipline of prayer you practice, your family, school, work, and/or ministerial demands will be indicators as to how much you might be able to increase the time you pray once you have built a consistent practice.

The amount of time that we dedicate to prayer is not as important as our commitment to spend time with God each day. We need to schedule daily our non-negotiables for prayer first and build around that. Again, this will depend on our station in life. Young parents’ non-negotiables are their infant whereas someone who is retired will possibly have some more time.

Mass, the liturgy of the Hours, reading the Bible, sitting or walking quietly outside, at the morning table with a favorite devotional, the Rosary, Chaplet of Divine Mercy, spiritual reading, and imagining ourselves sitting with Jesus on the mountaintop in silent meditation and contemplation are all practices that can help us to grow in our relationship with God. When the Holy Spirit invites us to close our eyes and be still though, is our invitation to listen to God and begin to learn his language of silence.

St Therese of Lisieux offers us a good approach to prayer: “For me, prayer is a surge of the heart; it is a simple look turned toward heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy” (CCC, 2559). No matter how we pray, our goal is that we don’t seek to bend God’s will to our’s but to allow our lives to be conformed to Jesus, that we encounter and build a relationship with him and each other, such that our experience of prayer matches St Augustine’s: “True, whole prayer is nothing but love” (Foster, 1). We pray, so we can fall in love with God who made us for himself.

Photo: Heading now to spend some time with Jesus on the mountain praying with our Father. Please join us!

Foster, Richard J. Prayer: Finding the Heart’s True Home. NY: HarperCollins, 1992.

Kreeft, Peter. Prayer for Beginners. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2000.

Link for the Mass readings for Tuesday, October 28, 2025

Jesus sees us and comes close to heal us.

I lost track of how long ago this happened, almost twenty years ago now, I woke up one morning and realized that I could not stand up straight. Each time I tried, I felt a searing pain in my abdominal area. I hadn’t made any lesson plans so I did not feel that I could call in sick. I decided to go into the shower and see if I felt any better but didn’t. I did not want to disturb JoAnn and continued my morning routine hoping and praying that whatever was going on would release.

When it didn’t, I figured I would see if I could walk to the car and sit to drive. I was able to do so as long as I did not sit all the way back. I drove to school figuring that I would get everything set up, put together some lesson plans, request a substitute, and get to the doctor. As I arrived, pulled into my parking spot, and then got out of the car, I attempted to stand and still could not. It was hard to walk because I was leaning so far forward to keep the pain in check. As I was getting things set up in my classroom, all of a sudden it released.

I don’t know what caused the pain, I haven’t experienced anything like that nor has it ever happened again. I was able to stand up straight, was grateful and thanked God that I was pain free, and able to teach that day.

What I experienced was only a few hours. The woman in today’s gospel account suffered with her condition of being “crippled by a spirit” for eighteen years. Then one day while listening to Jesus teach in the synagogue, he saw her, and said, “Woman, you are set free of your infirmity.” He laid his hands on her, and she at once stood up straight and glorified God (Luke 13:12-13).

 Jesus sees us this morning and wants to heal us as well. Read the gospel account a few times, enter the scene yourself, and imagine encountering Jesus as this woman did. Allow Jesus to look at you and call, “You are set free of your…” Fill in the blank. Receive his call and allow him to come close so that you too, may feel his hands on your head. For where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. I pray that you may experience the consolation, freedom, healing, joy, rest, and love that you seek of Jesus today!

Photo: Received this view of the waxing crescent moon last night returning to the rectory after my holy hour. When we schedule the time to be still and quiet with Jesus, our relationship with him will grow a little more each day and we will experience our rest in him which brings healing.

Link for the Mass readings of Monday, October 27, 2025

Acknowledging our sins is the antidote to our pride.

“…whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted” (Lk 18:14).

From the Christian perspective, humility is not false modesty. Where someone thanks us for doing something and we say something like, “Oh, it was nothing.” This response is often a conditioned response that, consciously or unconsciously, is given to elicit more praise and to keep the focus on ourselves and what we have done. “Sure it was something, you did all that work…” The more appropriate response would be, “You are welcome.” Then the topic of conversation can move on to other matters.

Humility has to do with our primary focus. Are we focused first and foremost on ourselves and placing the focus and energy in boosting our ego, jockeying for a position that is front and center? Or are we focused first and foremost on establishing that God is the core and foundation of our every thought, word, and deed and we are thankful to him for each breath we take?

We are nothing without God. Without him, we would cease to exist. We may bristle at such statements because our cultural influences often promote that what we have and achieved has come because of our own hard work and merit. There is some truth to the effort and energy we may have expended to achieve what we have, but if we think back, many others also had a part to play in where we are today, including God.

From a heightened sense of self-exaltation, we also tend to have less empathy or mercy for those who may have less or are struggling financially, emotionally, psychologically, morally, or spiritually. We might look down our nose at others thinking or saying outright, “What is wrong with them and why don’t they get their act together?”

Where in point of fact, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.” Situations in life, whether we are up or down, can change quickly. The point Jesus is making clear in today’s Gospel is that we are far from how perfect we think we are. We are all sinners and fall short of the glory of God. Recognizing this reality is a good place to be, as Jesus points out. Being willing to recognize our sinfulness is the first step to freedom.

The contrite tax collector “went home justified” because he came to terms with his sinfulness and confessed it so he could be forgiven, healed, and restored by God. The Pharisee who felt he needed no help because he “was not like the rest of humanity” closed himself off from the healing balm and reconciliation that he truly needed. His prayer was actually to himself and not to God. He did not see himself as a sinner, because of his own pride and arrogance, and so cut himself off from the love and mercy of God.

Our spiritual life does not begin to mature until we utter the prayer of the tax collector. “O God, be merciful to me a sinner”. If we don’t believe we need God, we keep ourselves at a distance. Until we acknowledge our dependence upon God and allow his light to shine in us to reveal our sins, we are in danger. Our own self sufficiency and reliance skews the view that we are sinners and are in need of forgiveness. “The antidote to pride is the total abandonment to the mercy of God and total trust in his grace to empower us to turn from sin and live charity” (Bergsma, 263).

Photo credit: The light of Jesus shines in our darkness when we are willing to receive him.

Link for the Mass readings for Sunday, October 26, 2025

Bergsma, John. The Word of the Lord: Reflections on the Sunday Mass Readings for Year C. Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Road Publishing, 2024.