Q: I am a longstanding vegan, so when Lent comes each year there’s nothing for me to skip; no meat is already my regular routine. But at age 70, and even if I wasn’t vegan, is it true that seniors are no longer bound by Lenten fasting and abstinence requirements? A: The short answer is…
Jos 5:9a, 10-12 Ps 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7 2 Cor 5:17-21 Lk 15:1-3, 11-32 We usually forget about the running. When we consider this Sunday’s scripture and the heart-stopping story of the prodigal son, we tend to overlook or just brush aside this extraordinary detail. We shouldn’t. As Luke describes it in the Gospel: “While he…
I was raised a Roman Catholic and essentially inhaled the religious ethos of Roman Catholicism. I went to the seminary, earned theological degrees, and taught theology at a graduate level for several years before I ever started making a distinction between ‘Jesus’ and ‘Christ’. For me, they were always one and the same thing, Jesus…
There are times when our world unravels. Who hasn’t had the feeling? “I’m falling apart! This is beyond me! My heart is broken! I feel betrayed by everything! Nothing makes sense anymore! Life is upside down!” Jesus had a cosmic image for this. In the Gospels, he talks about how the world as we experience…
Genesis 15:5-12, 17-18 Psalm 27:1, 7-8, 8-9, 13-14 Philippians 3:17 – 4:1 or Philippians 3:20 – 4:1 Luke 9:28b-36 This Sunday’s readings seem to be all about wonder – in Genesis, we hear about a sky filled with countless stars, and then in Luke, we learn of Christ’s radiant transfiguration on a mountaintop. There…
Several years ago, a friend of mine made a very unromantic type of marriage proposal to his fiancé. He was in his mid-forties and had suffered several disillusioning heartbreaks, some of which by his own admission were his fault, the result of feelings shifting unexpectedly on his part. Now, in mid-life, struggling not to be…
Dt 26:4-10 Ps 91:1-2, 10-11, 12-13, 14-15 Rom 10:8-13 Lk 4:1-13 On this first Sunday of the new Lenten season, the Church, as always, presents the narrative of the three kinds of temptation that the Lord faced in the wilderness (Luke 4:1-13). The differing approaches of the Devil symbolise the various efforts the…
One of my friends, Fr Michael Brady, devoted much of his life to missionary work in Brazil, offering his service for around 50 years. Recently, he shared with me that when he began his missionary journey, others mentioned a small fact about a tiny fruit. He remarked, “Most people wouldn’t really eat the fruit because,…
God has visited his people. He has fulfilled the promise he made to Abraham and his descendants. He acted far beyond all expectation – he has sent his own ‘beloved Son’. We believe and confess that Jesus is the eternal Son of God made man. For ‘the Word became flesh and dwelt among us’, full…
Jer 17:5-8 Ps 1:1-2, 3, 4 & 6 1 Cor 15:12, 16-20 Lk 6:17, 20-26 If anyone was expecting Jesus to deliver this sermon from a mountain, they got a shock. The first thing we notice in this Sunday’s reading from Luke is this detail: “Jesus came down with the Twelve and stood on a…
Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Fr Dominik Domagala
Renata Milán Morales