This Palm Sunday, the proclamation of the Passion is from the Gospel of Mark. This is the Gospel that often presents crowds of people pressing on Jesus to be healed. Jesus heals many people in this Gospel, but then he directs them, “Tell no one...
The days are coming when I will write my law deep within their hearts. All of them, from the least to the greatest will know that I am their God. (Jeremiah 31:31-34) The Prophet Jeremiah spoke about a time when God’s people would be so united to God...
I was blessed as a child to be exposed to good art. My Mom worked for a book distributer who dealt with Harry N. Abrams among other publishers. Abrams was then and still remains one of the main publishers of books on art and artists. When I went to...
The Gospel for the Third Sunday of Lent puts Jesus’ knowledge of our human nature so clearly: He really knew what was going on in men’s hearts. He knew what they thought. He saw what they did to the Temple. The Temple was a place of...
The grave purple colors, the ashes and sticks, the lack of flowers, crosses everywhere, all remind us that this week we begin Lent. “Here we go, again,” we might think. “No, not already,” we might protest. Maybe we’ll look into our religious...
When I visit a hospital or a nursing home, I often will come upon a room with a warning on the door. It will say, “Infection. All visitors must check with nurses station and then use mask, gloves and gown.” When I did this for a while, I became use...
The readings for the Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time can raise a number of eyebrows. My first reaction is: “What in the world was that all about?” The first reading begins with a horrible quotation from the Book of Job (7:1-4, 6-7). “Is not man’s life...
On the Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time, the Sacred Writer, the Holy Spirit, speaks about the authority of the Lord. The reading is taken from the first chapter of the earliest of the Gospels, the Gospel of Mark (1:21-28). Jesus begins to teach in...
