love

May we experience the love of God, so we can know him and each other better.

“Now this is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ” (Jn 17:3).

This is our goal, to know God. Eternal life, or heaven, is not only experienced when we die. Through experiencing the life of Jesus we can have a foretaste of heaven now. We can experience this as the joy that rises up from within, that is not merely pleasure, which is a response from the stimulation of our senses and which dissipates once the experience ends. Nor is joy even happiness which comes from the lasting memories of these pleasurable experiences. The experience of joy is not based on external situations and sensations, joy comes from an encounter with the living God who is present to us, closer to us than we are to ourselves.

We often first experience this joy, this closeness to God when we experience love exchanged between ourselves and another. Even a love that begins in infatuation is a drawing out of ourselves toward another. The hope is that this love matures and develops into a friendship.

This maturation happens when we spend time getting to know each other’s interests, goals, and dreams. We experience another as a person, and with time and continued trust, we begin to risk and allow our masks to be taken off. Inevitably, when relationships begin to mature, they will go through times of miscommunication, misunderstanding, and conflict. The relationship will come to a crossroads, but this does not mean that the relationship will come to an end. If the relationship devolves into abuse, dehumanization, and self-gratification alone, the relationship will end. But if there is a willingness to forgive, to work together, to meet each other with humility and seek mutual understanding, relationships will grow stronger and deeper. This is the fertile soil where love grows.

Our first experience of developing relationships is in our families. None of us are perfect, so none of us have had a perfect family life. Familial relationships develop in a similar fashion as listed above. We all go through ups and downs. The more that we can be present to one another, support one another, communicate and love one another, the more likely our familial relationships and friendships will also mature and grow.

Many of us hope to attain a place within where we can accept and love ourselves and develop mature relationships with a core group of family and friends. Most of us could be quite happy with that. Even as Jesus invites and guides us to reach this point of development, he continues to press us to strive to love beyond family, friends, and tribe. All of us are ultimately called to an unconditional love that sees in others a brother and sister seeking to be better stewards of God’s creation. This is not some utopian philosophy. Love happens through one concrete encounter, one person at a time. As we love God and one another, we lift all of humanity and creation up.

This will not happen through our own will power or discipline alone. Placing self over God and others, isolates and disconnects us from the True, the Good, and the Beautiful. God is not some transcendent, impersonal force, nor is God an omnipotent, tyrannical overlord. The God of Jesus Christ is a God of love, for “God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him” (1 John 4:16). Jesus invites us into a relationship with him and his Father to experience the love of the Holy Sprit. When we assent to this invitation, we come to know and experience a foretaste of heaven on earth.

Jesus, please help us to experience the love of God by coming to know you, and in truly knowing you come to better know each other. May we see each other as God our Father sees us, as a unique gift that has never been nor ever will be again. Help us resist reacting to the rough edges and exterior projections of our inner wounds and instead guide us to be more compassionate and understanding, and willing to see the truth and fullness of the potential of each person. Help us to allow God to love others through us today, one person and one encounter at a time.

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Photo: “The Father does not love us any less than he loves his only-begotten Son. In other words, with an infinite love” – Pope Leo from his Sunday, June 1, 2025 homily. (credit fromDaniel Ibáñez/CNA/ EWTN accessed from ncregister.com).

Link for the Mass readings for Tuesday, June 3, 2025

We are never alone, the Father is always with us.

The disciples are beginning to have a better understanding that Jesus is who he says he is, that “he came from God.” Jesus does not rest on or savor this insight and affirmation, but shares with them how, they still do not fully comprehend. He lets them know how each will leave him alone in his most desperate hour. They will do just that. Those he takes with him into the Garden of Gethsemane will fall asleep. When Jesus asks them to watch and pray with him, to be a support for him as he receives the crushing will of the Father that leads him to the cross, they fall asleep multiple times. When the guards come to arrest Jesus, led by Judas, the disciples would flee. Peter will then betray him three times.

What is interesting is that just as Jesus shares with them, that even though they, his most intimate followers, his closest friends would betray him, he says: “I am not alone, because the Father is with me. I have told you this so that you might have peace in me. In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world.” 

These words are words of comfort and hope. Comfort and hope for his disciples then as well as for us today! No matter if we betray or are betrayed ourselves, we let others down or are let down, we see and experience the devastating effects of our fallen world and fallen human nature, from without and within; no matter what conflict, challenges, or tribulations rise up before us, we do not need to succumb to cynicism, hopelessness, and despair.

What is important is that we resist the temptation to curve in upon ourselves and drink from the poison of shame. In doing so, we cut ourselves off from the very source of our life and being. Having the humility to acknowledge where and when we have caused harm in any form requires embracing a healthy sense of guilt which is good. Then, instead of beating ourselves up, we are to seek forgiveness and reconciliation as well as be understanding and willing to forgive.

We also need to remember that in those times when we feel misunderstood, betrayed, or are facing the unbearable in life, we are not alone! Jesus, who experienced the same. reveals to us the way to his Father because Jesus is the Way! Seeking affirmation from the culture or the world is not the way. Our priority instead is build our relationship with Jesus, who will lead us to the Father so to experience the Love of the Holy Spirit!

Jesus is the light that shines in the darkness, and he will not be overcome by it, for he has conquered death, and has overcome the world. We are an Alleluia people because through our participation in the life of Jesus the Christ we will overcome as well when we trust in and experience the love of the Father. As an Alleluia people, we are to resist being shaped by the culture and the world, and are to instead evangelize it by authentically living out the Gospel and will of our Father as Jesus did; by sharing the light, joy, peace, and love of Christ we have received in each our interactions with one another.

Photo: The more we slow down and breathe, receive, rest, and abide in the love of God, we will know no matter what we are experiencing, we are not alone.

Link for the Mass readings for Monday, June 2, 2025

The Holy Spirit will help us to heal from the grief that fills our hearts.

At some point in our lives, we experience the death of someone we love. If we live a long life, we will experience even more of the pain of losing those close to us. I remember my maternal grandfather sharing with me when he was around ninety that he had outlived most of his siblings and friends. Unfortunately, for too many in our world, death is a daily event through violence in all its forms. Grief during time of loss is a natural human response. It is certainly not an emotion to be suppressed.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus shared: “But because I told you this, grief has filled your hearts” (Jn 16:6). Jesus was preparing his disciples for his suffering and death on the cross, but also letting them know that they would not be left alone. Even after his death, his resurrection and again time with his disciples, he would then at his ascension return to the Father. And better for his disciples that he would return to his Father. The Father will transform Jesus through his suffering, death, resurrection, and ascension. Jesus will assume his glorified body and the Holy Spirit will proceed from the Father and the Son to empower the apostles. They too will be transformed. No longer afraid, no more falling short of the glory of God but fulfilling and actualizing who Jesus called them to be from the beginning.

Of course, the Apostles were not able to understand what Jesus was talking about. Who can blame them? They had no point of reference for someone dying and rising again, let alone that he would ascend to the Father and send the Third Person of the Holy Trinity to be with them. The Apostles would not only feel the grief of the loss of Jesus they would also experience the fear that the same persecution that took him would take them. Jesus predicted no less. To be his follower, they would need to be willing to give their own lives as Jesus was about to do.

They did not get off to a great start. Even though Jesus foretold them of what was to happen, in Jesus’ final hour, they betrayed and abandoned him. And yet, except for Judas, because he had taken his own life, Jesus came to them again after his resurrection. He did not condemn but forgave them. Jesus would in a short time ascend back to the Father as we will celebrate next Sunday, and the disciples, with Mary, would experience the love and grace of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

Empowered by the Holy Spirit, they faced what was before them head-on, even to experience their own violent deaths, except for John. The fear of death had no more power over them, their grief and their fear were turned into joy from their encounter with the Risen Jesus and the Love of the Holy Spirit they experienced first hand.

For us, as with the Apostles, grief is real, because death is a loss, it is a change in our present reality. Yet, we celebrate this Easter Season for fifty days for a reason. Death has lost its sting because Jesus has died, entered into the fullness of everything that death threw at him, and he conquered it. Jesus died for each and everyone of us so that we can also rise with him, and be with him, and our loved ones again for all eternity.

We can believe in our minds that death does not have the final answer, yet we will still feel the grief, the pain of loss. We need to be honest with our emotions, and not stifle them, thinking by showing grief that we are in some way less a person of faith. Jesus himself wept at the tomb of his friend Lazarus. In allowing ourselves to enter into our pain, we will experience the Risen Christ who is waiting to embrace us and help us to heal. The key is to allow ourselves to experience and feel our grief, but just not to stay there.

To experience our grief and allow it to rise up when it comes is healthy and necessary but we do need to be careful that it does not define and overwhelm us. After seven months of caring and accompanying JoAnn to her death, visiting with family and friends through Thanksgiving and Christmas, I returned home, and had some time alone for the first time. I had a two day period where I was able to experience the weight of my grief and was hit pretty hard. I was beginning to sink into a dark place. Fortunately, I received a phone call from my friend, Theresa Frettered, and she invited me to a diocesan event. I didn’t want to go, but said yes. Terry was a messenger of the Holy Spirit. She invited me to leave the despair and come up for some air.

The time of grief is different for each person. “There is a time to weep, and a time to laugh; A time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). We place our hope in Jesus, the first born of the new creation, and pray that those we remembered yesterday for Memorial Day, all those we hold close to our hearts in this moment, and those who have no one to pray for them, who have left this life, are now experiencing the gift of eternal life that Jesus won for us on the cross. Our time will come too.

This is not a morbid thought. Pondering our own death helps us to not take the time we have left for granted and choose to live our lives more intentionally, with greater purpose. In doing so, we can experience a foretaste of heaven, God’s tender care for us, even on this side of heaven. When our hearts and minds are open to slow down, to invite the Holy Spirit to come close so that we may experience his love for us. For a brief moment we will get a glimpse, that death really does not have the final answer. The loving embrace of Jesus does.

Photo credit: Losing someone we love is like experiencing an amputation. We will live, but it will never be the same. Allowing the Holy Spirit to accompany and heal us will help us to learn to fly again!

Link for the Mass readings for Tuesday, May 27, 2025

As we participate in the life of Jesus we experience the love of the Holy Spirit.

What is common to all of us is that we experience some expression of loneliness to varying degrees consciously, or mostly unconsciously. We are social beings, we want to belong, to be part of, and this is why we are communal. We may do, say, or turn a blind eye to behaviors that go against our conscience just to be accepted, acknowledged, and/or noticed. This behavior further feeds our loneliness, because though we may be “accepted”, we become more alienated from our true self. We are not be accepted for who we are but who we portray ourselves to be.

At the core of our being, what we all seek is to be loved, and to love in return. We strive from the moment of our conception not only to exist but to actualize the fullness of who God is calling us to be. Through our time of gestation, we are not potential human beings, we are human beings actualizing out potential. A difference between me typing this now and when I was in my mother’s womb is that before and after my birth, I was smaller and more vulnerable.

We as human beings are a living, craving hunger and desire to be in communion with God and one another from the moment of our conception until our natural death and continuing on into eternity. This is true to the believer and the atheist alike. Until we embrace this deepest of needs and desires, we will be restless, anxious, and unfulfilled. We can feel isolated and alone, even in the midst of a hundred people or daily likes on social media. As St. Augustine shared in the introduction to his autobiography, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in thee.”

God has made us for himself and constantly invites us to be in a relationship with him and with each other because he is the foundation and source of our being. Sin is the turning away from that invitation, a curving, or caving in upon oneself away from God and others. It is also the unwillingness to bother or care, to reach out toward another in need. For what we do to the least of our brothers and sisters, we do to Jesus. We are not just to be pro-birth though, we as Catholics are to be pro-life, and we are invited to promote a consistent ethic of life.

Jesus became human in his Incarnation. He too, as we did, developed in the womb of Mary to show the importance of the dignity of the person and that our dignity is grounded in our relationship with God our Father, meaning we are all brothers and sisters. We are his beloved daughters and sons, just by who we are not by what we do. Jesus was not a plan B, but he was always the primary plan. In the fullness of time, when God so willed, he sent his Son to become one with us in our humanity so that we can become one with him in his divinity. Jesus is the face, hands, and body of God. He came that we might see and experience God. Jesus experienced all we experience except for sin because he never in any thought, word, or deed rejected or said no to his Father. His whole life was a, “Yes” to the will of God. Jesus is the bridge, the way to love and be loved, authentically.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus continues his farewell discourse. He prepares his disciples for the reality that he will be returning to the Father, and yet at the same time, he will not leave us alone. He will be with us for all ages. This is so because as the Son of God made man, in his Ascension, he returned to the Father not just in his divinity as the Son, but also in his humanity. God created all of humanity and his creation as interconnected, and because of that, we all experience this transcendent act of the Ascension when Jesus returned to the Father in his glorified, human body.

Jesus shared with his disciples: “When the Advocate comes whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, he will testify to me. And you also testify, because you have been with me from the beginning” (Jn 15:26-27). Jesus is talking about the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, the infinite Love experienced and shared between the Father and the Son. We become sharers in this divine love and communion of the Holy Trinity through our participation in the life of Jesus.

As we experience the love of the Holy Spirit and develop a relationship with him we begin to feel alive, we begin to heal and to feel whole, because we have experienced the love we have been made for. We have experienced being loved for who we are and as we are. We no longer have to say, do, or accept those actions that we don’t agree with that go against our conscience, to belong. St. John Henry Cardinal Newman has stated that our conscience is the “Aboriginal Vicar of Christ”. Jesus dwells within us, to guide and lead us, to help us to develop a well formed conscience. He encourages us to also say, “Yes” to his Father as he has and continues to do.

We share in the trinitarian love when we grow our relationship and participate in the life of Jesus. This great gift of grace will continue to grow as we testify to this love and share it with others. The greatest gift of God, his love that he gives us, expands as we give his love away. The more we give, the more we will receive. That does not mean fixing others or their problems. We are called to be present, to accompany, and journey with others, meeting them as Jesus met others and meets us, as and where we are. We are to laugh with, to cry along, to encourage, empower, and support, but above all to be present, to allow the love of the Holy Spirit to happen through us.

Jesus has not left us as orphans. His return to the Father through his Ascension has given us a greater and more intimate access to the Holy Spirit. By trusting in his love, we free ourselves from the tendrils of fear and anxiety. We are not alone when we say, “Yes”, to God’s will and develop our relationship with him. As we do so, we continue to actualize the fullness of our potential, become truer to ourselves, and who we are created to be. We experience that peace that surpasses all understanding and develop relationships with others based on authenticity and integrity, regardless of external pressures and experiences. We are loved and we love in return, which is what we all seek, which is who we are called to be.

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Photo credit: Some quiet time and prayer during priest convocation May 7.

Link for the Mass readings for Monday, May 26, 2025

We can experience Jesus’ peace even in our greatest challenges.

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you” (Jn 14:27). The peace that Jesus is talking about, the peace that he gives us is a peace the surpasses all understanding, because it does not come from this world but from the love of the Trinity. This peace Jesus can give because he has received this peace from the relationship that he has with his Father. “It is a supernatural peace that arises from a total love for the Father” (Martin and Wright, 252).

God is an infinite communion of Love. There are three Persons, yet one God, because of their infinite nature. There is a complete, perfect, and infinite giving and receiving between the Father and the Son and the love that is shared between them who is the Holy Spirit. We experience this peace because of Jesus, in his becoming one with us in our humanity, we become one with him in his divinity. Because of our union with Jesus, we too then share in the love of the Holy Spirit and experience also the peace of the Holy Spirit. This peace is not just an absence of stress, anxiety, violence, and war, but a receiving, resting, abiding, and sharing in his trinitarian communion of love. Jesus seeks to share the love and peace he has received from his Father with each of us.

Jesus does not promise with the bestowal of his peace a life of perfection and peace. We still live in a wounded, dark, and fallen world and there will be challenges, trials, tribulations, and tragedy, yet through all matter of what we encounter, we can tap into the infinite well spring of the love of the Holy Spirit. He is present and accompanies us in the midst of any and every situation we invite him into. There may be chaos all around, but as we turn to Jesus and trust in him, we will experience his peace.

Today, would have been JoAnn and my 29th anniversary. I can still remember the day we received the news of JoAnn’s diagnosis of pancreatic cancer during the Wednesday of Holy Week. From that moment, our life entered a non-stop whirlwind and flurry of activity. There was so much we had to prepare and plan for even beyond dealing with the diagnosis. Despite everything, there was a peace that was consistently present for both of us. Jesus sustained us through every step leading up to her death, the time of grieving and mourning that followed, and learning how to live again without her.

Nothing this side of heaven is permanent. At best, all God has created is good, but finite. The one constant we can place our hope and trust in is Jesus’ love and support for each one of us. This is why we are an alleluia people because even death does not have the final say, Jesus does. The veil between heaven and earth is so thin at Mass because Jesus is present with us in his word proclaimed, in his Body and Blood, in each of us who gather on earth as the angels and saints gather in heaven. Jesus seeks to enter our lives and to share with us his love and peace in every situation, are we willing to open the door and let him in?

Photo: Thanks for 23 blessed years and for your help and intercession these past five and a half years. Happy 29th my heart and my love!

Martin, Francis and Wright IV, William M. The Gospel of John. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2015.

Link for the Mass readings for Sunday, May 25, 2025

May we pray that we will be more willing to help “one another to walk in love and truth.”

When Jesus said to his disciples: “If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first”, Jesus was not proposing an-us-verses them mentality, for he had just spoken to them about loving others as he loves them. Falling into an-us-verses mentality for those suffering from persecution is an understandable posture. It is just not the stance that Jesus proposes for us to take. We are to love our enemies, we are to love those who hate us and persecute us. Impossible? On our own will power alone, yes, for apart from Jesus we can do nothing, but with him all things are possible, even loving our enemies, haters, and persecutors.

Jesus is making it plain to his disciples that they need to be prepared, that they will face the same that he did. They will be persecuted, mocked, imprisoned, and many will give their lives just as Jesus did. The gospel message is a challenge. We are challenged to have a change of mind and heart and not to think in the ways of the fallen world. Our minds are instead to be transformed by and conformed to the love of Jesus the Christ. This means that our focus must shift away from being self first and foremost to putting God first. God is to have the primary place in our lives.

We know we are putting God first instead of our fallen nature when we react less and love more. Reactions are based in fear, defensive, and slipping into an-us-verses them mentality. “They”: are responsible for the state I am in, are taking my jobs, are not allowing me to worship or speak in the way I want to, it is all their fault, they made me do it. These are all reactive thoughts that lead to uglier statements and actions. Jesus invites us to assume the disposition resisting the temptation of reaction and instead choosing intentional action grounded in God’s love for us and making our decisions from God’s guidance and not our reactions.

The way we can be more intentional and less reactive is to spend more time making friends with silence, being more still to pray and meditate with God’s word in the Bible and also in his word of creation. Much of our reaction comes from our harried pace, keeping us from being in touch with our deep-seated wounds, fears, and prejudices. We run from the mirror Jesus holds up to us. It is important to stop and pray regularly. When we do and we are willing to face the sin in our hearts, we can identify them and let them go. We can bring our struggles, pain, and areas in need of healing to Jesus for healing. A way to begin to turn away is by taking some deep breaths and ask Jesus to shine the light of his love in our hearts so that we can see what lies hidden in those dark corners. Then we can identify those sins, renounce, let it go, be forgiven of them, and set free.

Embracing the humility to confess our sins and to die to our sinful ways helps in our healing. We are not only forgiven, Jesus gives us the grace to grow in our relationship with him and each other and we are strengthened to resist temptations. We become more patient, understanding, and truer to who Jesus calls us to be, which is people who love. We will each other’s good by treating each other as brothers and sisters. We are better able to accept that we are all imperfect, make mistakes, experience loneliness, and just want to belong, and be loved.

Pope Leo encouraged us in his Regina Caeli address on May 11 to, “ask our Heavenly Father to assist us in living in service to one another, each according to his or her state of life, shepherds after his own heart, (cf. Jer 3:15) capable of helping one another to walk in love and truth.”

Jesus and Pope Leo show us the way to the Father is to ask him for help. Let us ask God, our Heavenly Father to help us to live more consciously and pray to renew and conform our lives to the Jesus who gave his life that we might be free from the grip of our own sins, prejudices, and darkness. May we allow the love of the Holy Spirit to guide and flow through us, so as to dissolve attitudes of hate and division, and instead soften our hearts that they would be more open to dialogue and healing.

May we no longer turn away from the temptation of revenge and fueling contempt, hate, and dehumanization, and instead choose to pause, breathe, receive, rest, and abide often in Jesus’ love for us. Empowered and embodied by his love, obeying God’s will and his commandments, we will be empowered to resist the easy and impulsive reaction so as to not retaliate in kind, but instead choose to intentionally respond in ways that are understanding, compassionate, and loving. In this way, we can heal and help others to heal and to “walk in truth and love.”

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Photo: Pope Leo offering his first Regina Caeli address on May 11, 2025. Vatican News photo credit.

Link for Regina Caeli Pope Leo

Link for the Mass readings for Saturday, May 24, 2025

“Love one another as I love you.”

Jesus said to his disciples: “This is my commandment: love one another as I love you” (Jn 15:12). This verse is foundational to our faith as we seek to live as disciples of Jesus. Love is what Jesus lived, modeled, taught, and commanded, but even more so, love is who, as the second person of the Trinity Jesus is. Jesus is love because: “God is love” (I John 4:8). By becoming human, as one of us, and embracing the Paschal Mystery: his suffering, crucifixion, death, Resurrection, and Ascension into Heaven, the Son of God opened up the reality for us that we can also participate in the very same love he shares with his Father.

We are capable of loving others because Jesus has loved us first. How did he love us? Jesus gave his life for you and me, each and every person, for those who believe in him and those who don’t, he gave his life for the good and the bad alike. Jesus was willing to suffer the scourging, agony of his carrying the cross, crucifixion, and death. He was not just going through the motions, his divine Person was not somehow hovering over his body. Jesus felt the rejection, the betrayal, the physical torment of the nails, because, “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (Jn 15:13).

Some of us may have heard this verse so many times that we do not fully appreciate the impact of it. The gift of the liturgical seasons is that the readings of Scripture are offered again and again so we can experience their telling again and again. We just need to slow down and ponder the significance of this reading, breathe in the reality of this passage, so that it becomes the living Word of God, not just a dead letter. As we do so, we will be less apt to take our lives for granted, the life we have been given at such great cost. In coming to realize the gift that Jesus gave for us, and meditating on that reality, hopefully, we can see others in our lives who we may have taken for granted. Those who have loved us, have been there for us, have been there when maybe when no one else has been.

What is our response to the love of Jesus that we have been blessed with? Jesus answers: “This I command you: love one another” (Jn 15:17). Jesus ends today’s Gospel as recorded by John where he began at the beginning, he invites us to love. Jesus loves us more than our worst mistakes or our most grievous of sins; he loves us more than we can ever hope or imagine. This is important to not only hear but to allow the reality of this grace to fill us to overflowing, such that we seek to love others as well in the same fashion.

In embracing the love of Jesus, his invitation of friendship, and with a heart full of gratitude, maybe just maybe, we too will love others a little more today than we did yesterday, and a little more tomorrow than today. Love is not a willingness to love each other only when everything is going well. Love is being willing to do so one conflict at a time, one interruption at a time, one inconvenience at a time, one heartbreak, and even one betrayal at a time. We are able to truly love when we are willing to see each other as Jesus sees us, as friends: as human beings endowed with dignity. When we are willing to do so, we are ready to love, one encounter, one moment, one person at a time.

Photo: A quiet moment to breathe, receive, rest, and abide in God’s love.

Link for the Mass readings for Friday, May 23, 2025

We love well when we are willing to dialogue well.

“This is my commandment: love one another as I love you” (Jn 15:12).

God created us from the abundance and outpouring of his trinitarian love to be loved, and to love him in return. The love that Jesus is talking about is unconditional and not just relegated to those closest to us, although, hopefully, in our families and friendships is where we first experienced being loved and learned to love in return.

The love that Jesus commands that we are to participate in as his followers, is a going out from, a giving of ourselves to, and a willingness to sacrifice for one another. We are not to seek in return, but are to empty and give ourselves away. The return we get is from experiencing the infinite wellspring and source of the Holy Spirit that rises up within us. The more we hold back, the less we receive, the more we give, the more we experience. We are to resist withdrawing our love and assuming a selfish posture that leads to us becoming more like a stagnant pool. Instead, we are to remain open so as to allow the living stream of God’s infinite love to flow through us.

The love Jesus commands cannot be done on the fly. Love is accepting the interruption and choosing to be present. Love means stopping, setting aside our agendas, and accompanying another. Love is also not coercion and manipulation, it is accepting another as they are and where they are. Love is sharing the journey of life together. St Thomas Aquinas has written it best: Love is to will the good of the other as other. This is more than mere emotion, feeling, or sentiment but actually wanting the best for someone else and rejoicing in their becoming fully alive. Nor does this mean that we become doormats or enablers of dysfunctional or abusive behavior. We hold people accountable – for to love is also to be clear about respecting our’s and another’s dignity.

This practice of love is also not exclusive but universal. Yes, we are to love those in our family, community, place of worship, tribe, political party, and nation, while at the same time we must be willing to go out from our comfort zones and protected bubbles to risk opening ourselves up to those who we feel are different, those who do not see the world as we see it, and even those we consider our enemies. This does not mean we have to agree or even like someone else. Jesus commands us to love, to respect the dignity of the person as our starting point. This is the love he offers us and calls us to do the same.

A dialogue grounded in love is a wonderful way to grow in relationship. Speaking and listening with a heart and mind open to the love of God is also a good way to participate in the divine communion of love that is shared between the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Authentic communication happens when we state clearly our beliefs, our thoughts, and dreams, and also allow others to do the same. Even though we may differ in our points of view, we can still grow together in love for one another.

When we talk at and over one another, demean, belittle, and/or are condescending, we dehumanize each other. Pope Leo has invited us to be “a Church that builds bridges and encourages dialogue, a Church ever open to welcoming”.  We welcome and build such bridges of such dialogue when we are willing to resist staying at a distance and are more willing to come close, to love, and respect one another. From that starting point we are better able to encounter the person and free ourselves from prejudicial caricatures and labels that hopefully will dissolve through our interaction and respectfully engaging with one another.

Instead of keeping each other at arm’s length, when we are willing to love as Jesus loves us, we will better be able to listen with patience and understanding. We will learn to embrace and grow from one another. From a place of mutual, loving dialogue, we can recognize and remember again who we are, beloved daughters and sons of God our Father, friends, brothers and sisters together on this journey we call life.

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Photo: Making some time to be in quiet conversation with Jesus, to receive his love and love him in return. Giving ourselves time to experience loving dialogue with Jesus helps us to better enter into loving dialogue with each other.

Pope Leo XIV quote from his May 8 Ubi et Orbi message

Link for the Mass readings for Thursday, May 22, 2025

“Peace be with you all!”

Why so much violence? So many countries are and have been consistently embroiled by the ravages of war. Many countries, including our own, were founded on the taking of lands by force and oppression of aboriginal peoples. Too many of our youth and citizens die from gun violence and mass murders. So many examples of road rage, domestic abuse, human trafficking, terrorism – foreign and domestic, and the myriad of random acts of violence that continue daily.

We may hear goodwill speeches shared after each atrocity, participate in the petitions and intercessions ringing from our ambos and pulpits in our places of worship, and pray personally and in prayer groups, participate and/or witness demonstrations, marches, and votes for change. All the while, there are those working in the trenches of communities throughout the world, putting their own lives at risk, matching their words and prayers with their deeds. And yet, do any of these efforts make a difference?

There is a constant temptation of cynicism and despair biting at our heels, but let us never give in. There is a light the shines in the darkness of our fallen world, and there is hope that we can pray with and rest in from  Jesus’ Gospel from John: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you” (Jn 14:27).

This peace that Jesus promises to leave with his apostles is a peace that is not of this world, a peace that surpasses all understanding (cf. Philippians 4:7), and this peace has been and continues to be offered to us as a gift. Many have indeed said, “If there is a God, well then, why doesn’t he do anything?” He did and he has. God sent his Son the King of kings and the Prince of Peace. The peace that God shares through his Son and the love of the Holy Spirit is offered to one person at a time. This is why when Jesus resurrected he only appeared to those he chose and not the whole world.

Jesus is to be encountered and his relationship is built one person at a time in each generation. Each of us have the invitation to accept or reject his invitation to believe in him, but so much more. Jesus invites us to be his disciples. Learning from and putting into practice his teachings, as did the original apostles and saints who in each generation have done just that, is the way we are to follow. We do this best when we surrender our minds and hearts and the very depths of our souls to the love and peace that Jesus offers and teaches.

Pope Leo XIV chose to do continue to offer our war worn and weary world Jesus’ peace with his first words as Pope: “Peace be with you all!” This “is the peace of the risen Christ. A peace that is unarmed and disarming, humble and persevering. A peace that comes from God, the God who loves us all, unconditionally.”

This peace of God that the risen Jesus offers is not some abstract formula and the command to love is not some pie in the sky universal love for all. The teachings and acts of peace and love that Jesus shares throughout the Gospels are very concrete, individual, and personal. Jesus interacts with people as people, not as numbers. He engages and directs us to do the same, by encountering, accompanying, and loving a person. The real question is not why isn’t God doing anything? The real question is why have we left the gift of God’s peace offered to us unwrapped?

If we want peace in our world or even our corner of the world, our hearts and minds must be open to receive God’s love. We must be still and receive, savor, and embrace the love he wants for give and then share with others what we have received and as he directs us to give. To receive and embrace the peace of Jesus, we must be willing to let go of our own weapons of hate, prejudice, cynicism, racism, division, selfishness, and the like. God created us as beings who are interconnected, which means that what one does affects all, for the sun rises and sets on the good and the bad alike.

If we want peace, as I believe all of us really do, we need to be more aware of and choose more intentionally our thoughts, words, actions, and even the expressions of our faces. The thoughts that we feed are the ones that bear fruit in our words and deeds. Figuratively and literally, we need to be willing to “beat our swords into plowshares and our spears into pruning hooks” (cf. Isaiah 2:4).

This verse becomes real in our lives when we choose to resist the temptation to react and choose instead to seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit. In the concrete, we can choose to disagree with someone without being  disagreeable or disrespectful. When we make a mistake and resist beating ourselves up over the process and instead learn from our misstep, and begin again. We also do so when we are willing to seek and offer forgiveness, acknowledge we need to be healed, are willing to be more patient and understanding and we can do none of these alone. We need a Savior, to heal us, save us, and lead us from our own darkness into his light.

Can we really bring about world peace? In some abstract form, for all people, for all time, no. What we can do is make a daily commitment to spending time with Jesus to receive his love, study, pray, meditate with and learn from him. Then we can begin to put into practice what we have learned and received. We can share the love and peace of Jesus with each other one person at a time.

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Photo: Pope Leo XVI’s first appearance praying for the Church and the world that we may receive and share the peace of the risen Christ. Credit: Dylan Martinez from Reuters 

Quotes of Pope Leo from full Urbi et Orbi message.

Link for the Mass readings for Tuesday, May 20, 2025

“Brothers and sisters, this is the hour to love!”

“Whoever has my commandments and observes them is the one who loves me” (John 14:21).

Especially in our modern western mind set, the idea of commandments and love are bristled at. Mostly this is because of abuse of power, abuse in relationships, and a weakening of trust in secular and religious institutions is still present for many.

Jesus though is clearly bringing commandments and love together, as he is sharing with his apostles in these beginning stages of his farewell discourse before his crucifixion, what he feels is most important to leave. His testament that he not only wants to share, but these final words he wants to impart upon them in such a way that they continue to learn and receive his teachings, put them into practice, and perpetuate them.

As commandment can lead one to bristle, love has many more superficial meanings than what Jesus means. One reason is that, even though the English language has a plethora of words to utilize and choose from, there is only one word for love and it is interpreted in many ways. In Ancient Greek, there are four words that are used to connote love. There is eros, which has to do with attraction. It is the beginning stage of love because we are drawn out of ourselves as we are attracted to another. The next word for love is philia, which aligns with friendship, a wanting to be together, to share between friends. If our love matures it moves from attraction or infatuation to friendship. The third word, storge, is the deeper love shared with family members which can be through blood or a deepening of friendship. The fourth word is agape, which is unconditional love, a sacrificial love.

When Jesus shares that we are to follow the commandments, he is not demanding that we do so as a tyrant would. He is providing the boundaries and parameters for us to grow and mature as people who love, who, in the words of St Thomas Aquinas, will the good of the other as other. As humans, we are social beings. We want to belong, to be accepted, and to be a part of. We seek meaning, purpose, and fulfillment in our lives. This is best done through cooperation and collaboration with God and with one another, striving to love unconditionally, agape.

As a good son of St. Augustine, Pope Leo XIV quoted Augustine in his inaugural Mass as Pope Sunday: “Lord, you have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you (Confessions, I: 1,1).” We are made by God to be loved and to love in return. Nothing we seek of this world will satisfy this deepest hunger that we all have in our soul besides the love God has for us. Unfortunately, we succumb to many disordered affections in pursuit of the love we seek. We are led astray by apparent goods that leave us hungry, thirsty, and wanting for more.

If we operate from a self-centered posture in which we are only turned in upon our self, and we only seek to manipulate and get from others, instead of working for consensus and sharing a common vision with others, we will ultimately be empty with the exchange on any level, because even in our relationships as with material things, we will be left wanting more. This is true because once the immediacy of the stimulation, whether material, personal, or sensual, ends, so does the experience of the feeling. Some happiness may linger from the effect, but we will never be filled or satisfied with that which is finite. We will continue to seek more and more until the pursuit of instant and constant gratification ensnares us and we are entangled in a web of addiction.

God’s commandments, grounded in love, are meant to provide boundaries for us, training wheels, and to keep us free from enslavement to sin, while at the same time help us to mature as persons moving away from being self-centered to becoming other-centered. Discipline in this way is meant to be a means of freedom for excellence such that we can become who God calls us to be and who we truly desire to be. God is not in competition with us. He is our biggest fan. As St Irenaeus wrote, the glory of God is the human being fully alive!

Commandments and morality imposed indiscriminately, without reason or an end goal is a bludgeon. Love and mercy without accountability and justice can be enabling. Jesus’ invites us to receive and observe his commandments so that we may be freed from disordered affections and so properly order and discipline our affections and passions to be free to love. Jesus knows what will truly fulfill and give us deeper meaning. May we trust in and learn from the deposit of faith passed on from Jesus to the Apostles, to each successive generation, as well as the ongoing guidance of the Holy Spirit who the Father sent in his name (John 14:26).

Pope Leo XIV continued to carry on Jesus’ teachings yesterday: “Brothers and sisters, this is the hour for love! The heart of the gospel is the love of God that makes us brothers and sisters.” We are brothers and sisters, disciples of Jesus, when we receive, rest, and abide in the love that Jesus offers us and come to realize that we do not do walk alone. As we receive and put into practice Jesus’s commandments, we love him and his Father, are given the discernment to reveal the lies of the enemy, we grow, and mature in our spiritual lives.

Let us allow the tender chords of the Holy Spirit’s love to draw us deeper into intimacy with him so that we can be transformed by his love, healed by his love, and freed from the false lures and promises that seek to divert us from being the beloved daughters and sons of God our Father that we have been created to be. As we allow ourselves to be loved, we, are “called to offer God’s love to everyone, in order to achieve that unity which does not cancel out differences but values the personal history of each person and the social and religious cultures of every people” (Pope Leo XIV).

Photo by Alberto PIZZOLI / AFP accessed from Catholic Herald

Quotes above from Pope Leo XIV from: Transcript of Pope Leo XIV’s Inauguration Mass

Link for the Mass readings for Monday, May 19, 2025