The reading of the Passion is from the Gospel of Matthew. The imagery is simple and brutal. It is that of a human being taunted and tortured by other human…

One of the most striking things about the Gospel is how many times the people involved, even the apostles, even Christ’s close friends, Martha and Mary, tried to tell Christ…

This Gospel reading is one of the relatively few incidents that is recorded in each of the four Gospels. But where Matthew, Mark, and Luke report the event, and incorporate…

This Gospel reading we have just heard is one of the longest, richest, and most complex readings to which we are exposed during the course of the liturgical year.  As…

I hope that everyone of us has at one time or another had the experience of being struck with the fact that, at the heart of it all, things are…

The Gospel, like the first reading this weekend, is a story of temptation, the temptation of Christ himself. St Matthew’s account is a series of invitations that Satan offers to…

The first reading is taken from Sirach, also known as Ecclesiasticus, and contains the clearest statement in the Old Testament concerning the God-given freedom of the human will. It exonerates…

Reform is never a simple process. Sometimes it is outright painful. Certainly, each period of reform in the history of the Church has been costly in terms of membership. It…

The liturgical readings shift focus now, and we are confronted with the image not of a child but of a full-grown man.  The revelation now is not so much who…

New Year’s can be a hectic time of the season. There is always a lot of frantic celebrating that is as often as not done out of a sense of…