Parish News

April 30, 2023

Our Gospels for the next few weeks are taken from Jesus’ farewell discourse at the Last Supper in John’s Gospel. Today Jesus reassures that all we have to do is focus on knowing and believing in him, and we will find the way. It will not be easy to do, but that is why we have our community with us, to help us.

April 23, 2023

Jesus says “Love One Another as I have loved you.” We all have days when that commandment feels difficult — yet if we see with clarity God’s love for us, we have a chance of extending that love to those we sometimes don’t like.

April 16, 2023

Two thousand years ago “on the evening of the first day of the week,” when the disciples hid behind locked doors, Jesus did three things. He stood in their midst. He gave gifts of peace and Holy Spirit. He sent them out. Jesus is still in our midst, still doing the same. Every Sunday Mass makes it so. In our midst in Word and Eucharist. Gifting us with peace and Spirit. Telling us to “Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life.”

• Who am I and who are we locking in or locking out? 
• Because peace is a gift given and shared, what will I do this week?
• To whom will I go; what will I do?

April 9, 2023

Easter Sunday of the Resurrection of the Lord: Alleluia! Christ Is Risen! There are 25 readings chosen for the vigil and day of Easter. There are so many we can feel overwhelmed. The gospel acclamation gives this summary: 

Christ, our paschal lamb, has been sacrificed; let us then feast with joy in the Lord. As paschal lamb, Jesus, who died for us, is the Risen Christ. For us all! We feast with joy!

• What needs to be dead in me so I can live in Easter joy?
• What fills me with joy?
• How will I joyfully behave? 

April 2, 2023

When our lives imitate the pattern of Christ’s life — when we offer ourselves in humility and in sacrifice for the sake of others — we are truly proclaiming that Christ is Lord.

March 26, 2023

Both Martha and Mary express great conviction in Jesus’ healing power: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” Their conviction, however, was tied to their human experience of the fragility of sickness and the finality of death. Jesus’ action surmounts human experience and reveals something entirely new: “everyone who lives and believes in [him] will never die.” Belief in Jesus unties us from the limits of human experience and frees us for the eternity of risen Life.

March 19, 2023

In making clay from his own saliva and smearing it on the blind man’s eyes, Jesus re-creates the man by transferring something of his own being to the man. The man is anointed by Jesus as “I am” and comes to be a stalwart, believing disciple. Not even the powerful Pharisees can sway him from his testimony to the work of Jesus in him. In baptism we, too, encounter Jesus and become a new creation in him. Are we as stalwart and believing as the blind man?

March 12, 2023

The story of the Samaritan woman unfolds the growing insights of the Woman as she changes what title she uses to name Jesus. May we all search through our lives and find the living water offered to all who seek Christ in our lives.

March 5, 2023

Every year on the Second Sunday of Lent, we hear the story of Jesus’ transfiguration from one of the Gospels. With our Lenten journey so briefly under way, we may need the encouragement of what lies ahead that the Transfiguration story gives us. As Jesus was transfigured and ultimately triumphant over death, so may our prayer today be that we too will be transformed.

February 26, 2023

In these scriptures, Jesus was tempted three times in the desert, and ends up reminding us all that “only God is God.” Why are we tempted to be so much more than we are … beloved children of God? How can we respond to temptation in our lives?

February 19, 2023

During some homily or in some class or discussion group, we have all probably been asked the rhetorical question, “If you were on trial for being Christian, would they find enough evidence to convict you?” It’s a good question worth asking ourselves every now and then.

February 12, 2023

Most of us can recall a time when we did only what was absolutely necessary to get by. When it comes to our Christian life, however, Jesus calls us to a higher standard. As we gather for worship today, perhaps our prayer can be for the grace and the courage to go beyond the letter of the law in order to live according to a higher law — the law of love!

February 5, 2023

Our focus on discipleship continues in today’s readings. We who were called to live the Beatitudes last week are now encouraged to let our light shine. Let us ask God to strengthen our faith so that we can truly believe that the presence of Christ in each of us has the power to light the darkness of racism, fear, hunger, oppression and all the other evils in our world.

January 29, 2023

As we gather at God’s invitation, we continue our Ordinary Time reflections on discipleship with Jesus’ teaching of the Beatitudes. How blessed are we to know that God loves even the least of us and wants all of us to live by the law of love. May our prayer today be for the grace to live the Beatitudes as Christ desires that we do.

January 22, 2023

Our first reading from Isaiah sounds as if we were still in the Christmas season: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light.” But paired with today’s Gospel, which repeats that phrase, it makes a powerful prelude to the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry and the calling of the first apostles. Jesus’ response to John the Baptist’s arrest is to begin his announcement of the kingdom of heaven. How can the word of God help us to respond to adversity?

January 15, 2023

“Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world,” the Baptist says. But, “I did not know him.” Why did he identify an ordinary human being in this way? After John pointed Jesus out to the crowds, they wanted to know more about him, e.g., where did he live. If you had been in the crowd, would you have wanted to follow Jesus? Why was John so certain about Jesus when he said, “Behold the Lamb of God”? Was John watching for the Spirit? Do you watch for the Spirit in your life? Can you find and trust this Spirit of God?

January 8, 2023

Today’s feast is filled with ironies for us. It celebrates those from afar who early acknowledged the Christ child and reminds us of those nearby who were threatened by him. Living in a current political climate that debunks globalism and challenges the meaning of Christianity, we must ask: “How do we make Christ’s presence known?” Who do we accept into our communities and our lives regardless of their origins? Christ’s coming has always turned things upside down.

January 1, 2023

What are the things Mary reflected on “in her heart”? Both marvelous events such as the angelic message relayed by the shepherds, and the painful circumstance such as a birth in a stable. Mary grappled with both sides of the mystery of Jesus’ birth: the miraculous and the everyday, the joyous and the painful, what was already unfolding and what was yet to be revealed. In all this she was really pondering the mystery of God’s presence and thus sublimely models how we too can recognize the Word being made flesh and dwelling among us.