Mark 10:28-31... Hundredfold Reward
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Posted:Jun 17, 2007 10:51 pm
Last Updated:Jun 17, 2007 10:52 pm 2368 Views
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Mark 10:28-31
Hundredfold Reward
Peter began to say to [Jesus], “We have given up everything and followed you.”
Jesus said, “Amen, I say to you, there is no one who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or or lands for my sake and for the sake of the gospel who will not receive a hundred times more now in this present age: houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and and lands, with persecution, and eternal life in the age to come. But many that are first will be last, and [the] last will be the first.
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365 Days with the Lord
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Mark 10:17-27... The Rich Man... Reflect
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Posted:Jun 16, 2007 10:54 pm
Last Updated:Jun 16, 2007 10:55 pm 2372 Views
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Mark 10:17-27... The Rich Man... Reflect…
Perhaps some of us might think that because they do not possess great wealth, our gospel reading does not apply to them. But Jesus call to detachment is not a call addressed exclusively to rich people. It is a call addressed to all those who are threatened by greed–the excessive desire to possess either things or power or people. And in an era of frantic advertising like ours, greed is a real danger for all of us.
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365 Days with the Lord
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Mark 10:17-27... The Rich Man
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Posted:Jun 16, 2007 10:49 pm
Last Updated:Jun 17, 2007 6:02 am 2942 Views
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Mark 10:17-27
The Rich Man
As [Jesus] was setting out on a journey, a man ran up, knelt down before him, and asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
Jesus answered him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone. You know the commandments: you shall not kill; you shall not commit adultery; you shall not steal; you shall not bear false witness; you shall not defraud; honor your father and mother.”
He replied and said to him, “Teacher all of these I have observed from my youth.”
Jesus looking at him, loved him and said to him, “You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to [the] poor and you will have treasure in heaven, then come, follow me.” At the statement his face fell, and he went sad, for he had many possessions.
Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, “How hard it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God!”
The disciples were amazed at his words.
So Jesus again said to them in reply, “, how hard it is to enter the kingdom of God! It is easier for a camel to pass through [the] eye of the needle than for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”
They were exceedingly astonished and said among themselves, “Then who can be saved?”
Jesus looked at them and said, “For human beings it is impossible, but not for God. All things are possible to God.”
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365 Days with the Lord
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The Soul of the Church
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Posted:Jun 16, 2007 3:40 am
Last Updated:Jun 16, 2007 4:06 am 2360 Views
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The Soul of the Church
The apostle Paul describes the effect the Holy Spirit has on the body of the Church it creates a variety of functions which harmoniously contribute to the overall good of the ecclesial organism. That is why the Holy Spirit has traditionally been considered the soul of the Church. Like the soul of a human being, the Holy Spirit cannot be seen, measured, weighed, or imagined. But it can be understood as doing in the Church what the human soul does in the human body. It is the prime inward principle of all life and unity in Christ’s body. This comparison between the role of the Holy Spirit in the Church and the role of the human soul in the body goes back to St. Augustine. After a relative eclipse during the Middles Ages, this traditional comparison has resurfaced in the Church’s documents, especially in the 1943 encyclical of Pius XII on the Mystical Body.
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John 14:15-16, 23b-26 ... The Advocate
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Posted:Jun 16, 2007 3:32 am
Last Updated:Jun 16, 2007 3:34 am 2387 Views
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John 14:15-16, 23b-26
The Advocate
[Jesus said to his disciples,] “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father; and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always.
Whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him. whoever does not love me does not keep my words; yet the word you hear is not mine but that of the Father who sent me.
I have told you this while I am with you. The Advocate, the holy Spirit that the Father will sent in my name–he will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you.
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365 Days with the Lord
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John 21:20-23... The Beloved Disciples... Reflect
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Posted:Jun 14, 2007 4:17 pm
Last Updated:Jun 14, 2007 4:20 pm 2388 Views
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John 21:20-23... The Beloved Disciples... Reflect
Our gospel reading contains the very last verses of John’s gospel. This gospel ends by predicting the different fates of Peter and John. That of Peter was presented in yesterday’s gospel reading. There Jesus predicted that Peter would die a martyr’s death. And Peter did suffer martyrdom in Rome some 30 years later, namely between the years 64 and 67 AD. As for John, he died a natural death at an advanced old age sometime between 90 and 100 AD. Because he lived on to be so old, many Christians believed that he would not die before the return of Christ at the end of the world. This belief was based on Jesus mysterious words to Peter, “What if I want him to remain until I come? What concern is it of yours. You follow me.” These words, the evangelist explains, were not at all a promise. The Christians who understood it that way were mistaken, Jesus had only said, “Suppose that…” He was only telling Peter to mind his own business. In other words, Jesus saw in Peter’s question about John’s fate not so much fraternal concern as idle curiosity.
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365 Days with the Lord
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John 21:20-23... The Beloved Disciples
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Posted:Jun 14, 2007 4:08 pm
Last Updated:Apr 27, 2024 10:4 pm 2347 Views
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John 21:20-23
The Beloved Disciples
Peter turned and saw the disciple following whom Jesus loved, the one who had also reclined upon his chest during the supper and has said, “Master, who is the one who will betray you?”
When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about him?”
Jesus said to him, “What if I want him to remain until I come? What concern is it of yours? You follow me.”
So the words spread among the brothers that disciples would not die. But Jesus had not told him that he would not die, just. “What if I want him to remain until I come? {What concern is it of yours?]”
It is this disciple who testifies to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony are true. There are also many other things Jesus did, but if these were to be described individually, I do not think the whole world would contain the books that would be written.
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365 Days with the Lord
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John 21:15-19... Jesus and Peter... Reflect
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Posted:Jun 12, 2007 6:08 pm
Last Updated:Apr 27, 2024 10:4 pm 2335 Views
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John 21:15-19... Jesus and Peter... Reflect
This gospel episode is quite inexhaustible in terms of depth of meaning, richness of teaching, level of symbolism. Among many aspects of it which come to mind, one is the fact that it happened a very short time–at most, a few weeks–after Peter denied Jesus three times on the night of his interrogation by the Jewish tribunal. Yet, that betrayal in no way dissuades Jesus from building his Church on Peter. Not that Jesus ignores the betrayal. He does not. In fact, he is very careful to give Peter a chance to nullify his betrayal with three protests of love. For Jesus know that Peter’s betrayal, by making him more humble, can be positively integrated into Peter’s total destiny. Because God uses even our past sins and mistakes for our own good–if we sincerely disown them.
Psychologist Adrian van Kaam, in his book The Dynamics of Spiritual Self Direction, explains how this all works out:
“God can help us,” he writes, “to make the of the past so that nothing is wasted in our lives. During the years that we were perhaps not yet totally in line with our true self direction, we have been gathering experience, information and understanding, both of ourselves and of the secular society around us. God used that growing awareness to lead to this point of dissatisfaction and of discernment of new and better possibilities of life. We should show our gratefulness and trust in him by not lamenting what has been while wasting the possibilities of today and tomorrow. Nobody can change the past as such; everybody can change the impact of the past on the future. Even the negative experiences of the past can help us to prevent similar mistakes in our life direction, nothing in our lives is wasted” (pp. 266-267 ).
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John 21:15-19... Jesus and Peter
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Posted:Jun 12, 2007 5:46 pm
Last Updated:Jun 14, 2007 4:01 pm 2433 Views
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John 21:15-19
Jesus and Peter
When [Jesus and the disciples] had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, of John, do you love me more than these?”
He said to him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
He said to him, “Feed my lambs.”
“He then said to him a second time, “Simon, of John, do you love me?”
He said to him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
He said to him. “Tend my sheep.”
He said to him in the third time, “Simon, of John, do you love me?” Peter was distressed that he had said to him in the third time. “Do you love me?”
and he said to him, “Lord, you know everything you know that I love you.”
[Jesus] said to him, “Feed my sheep.
Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. And when he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.”
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365 Days with the Lord
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John 17:1-11a... The Prayer of Jesus... reflect
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Posted:Jun 11, 2007 6:00 pm
Last Updated:Jun 11, 2007 6:07 pm 2450 Views
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John 17:1-11a
The Prayer of Jesus... reflect
The gospel reading presents the first third of a sublime prayer of Jesus on behalf of all his present and future followers. Since the 16th century, it has been called the High-Priestly Prayer, because in it Jesus speaks to himself as a priest about to offer a sacrifice. In his case, of course, the sacrifice he offers is his own life. In this prayer, Jesus speaks directly to his Father in the presence of the apostles, thus intentionally giving them a glimpse into his relationship with his Father. The occasion is solemn and strangely moving.
One of the things Jesus says in this prayer–and he says it twice, once at the beginning and once at the end–is this formula: “I revealed your name.” Here, of course, the name stands for the person, as is often the case in Semitic thought. Jesus is therefore saying that essentially his mission consists in making perceptible, understandable, manifest the reality of the Father through what he says, does, and is. Jesus task is to make the Father transparent, as it were.. John has a marvelous verb he uses in the Prologue of his gospel in this connection. He writes: “The only …has revealed him”–exegesato, the verb from which are derived the English terms exegete and exegesis. In other words, Jesus is the “exegete” of the Father, the one who explains the Father as a teacher explains a difficult text.
An example of this work of Jesus is very simple. Think of the Parable of the Prodigal . In itself alone, that story tells in a nutshell what kind of God is our God. He is a loving Father. Nothing else. He is our Father.
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