Today’s Thoughts: “Something greater than the temple is here.” A line from our Gospel today (Matt. 12:1-8) and we might be tempted to think it was meant only for those to whom Jesus is speaking. But it is meant for us here and now. We might not have Jesus standing in our midst but we have his Spirit with us and it is greater than any temple, any church or any cathedral. The challenge is the same for us as it was for those who gathered to listen to Jesus; we have to recognize the presence and the Spirit of God in our midst.
Jesus gives us a clue on how to make sure that we don’t miss the presence of God. The clue is to be people of mercy. People a tune to and compassionate towards the struggles, challenges, difficulties and failings of others and ourselves. People willing to help and not judge; people willing to be compassionate and not self-righteous. People willing to include not exclude. Living life from a stance of compassion and mercy is not always easy; it can be difficult and challenging. However, being a compassionate and merciful person does help us to be ready and open to encounter something greater than ourselves the presence and friendship of God. Have a great Friday everyone!
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Today’s Thoughts: In the Gospel today (Matt 11:28-30), Jesus reminds all of us that we should always come to him, that we should always come to God, when we are troubled and find life burdensome and difficult. Jesus will give us comfort and rest. With Jesus, with God, the struggles, difficulties and burdens of life can easy. What makes them easy is having faith in our relationship with Jesus.
A few years ago, I ran across a definition of faith that went something like this – Faith is staking your life on the promises of God. Think about that for a moment – staking your life on the promises of God. In the Gospel Jesus promises that if we have faith we will always have comfort and rest even in the midst of troubles and challenges. Having faith is the key. Life is never easy and each new day brings challenges, struggles, burdens and difficulties but knowing where and with whom to stake our life can make all the difference. So, my friends in the midst of all that the world throws at us, let us continue to walk by faith trusting in our friendship with God and staking our life of God’s promises. Have a great Thursday everyone. Today’s Thoughts: A friend of mind often says, “It is hard when you are the smartest man in the room!” His point is that people with smarts often have a hard time with those of us who don’t. They believe they know it all or at least they know more than everyone around them and they find it frustrating when things don’t go their way or at least the way they think things should go.
I thought of this today in terms of our Gospel (Matthew 11: 25-27). Jesus says, "I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the child like.” In other words, sometimes the smartest, the wisest, the most learned among us have no clue! We are all aware of just how open children are. They want to learn. They want to experience new things and they haven’t yet decided what the right way to do things is. They are open to trying new ways, learning new things and exploring life around them. I think the point that Jesus is getting at in our Gospel today is that if we are open to the word, the experience and the presence of God in our lives just like children are then we will have a better chance of hearing, encountering and recognized God in our life. Intelligence, smartest, knowledge and wisdom are wonderful gifts however they can get in the way of God’s presence in our life. It is often better to be like a child rather than the smartest person in the room. So, let us live, let us embrace today in a childlike way so that we don’t miss any of what God sends our way. Have a great Wednesday everyone. Today’s Thoughts: We might say our Gospel today is about missed opportunities. In the Gospel (Matt. 11:20-24) the cities of Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum have missed their opportunity to encounter the presence of God, they have missed their opportunity to be people of faith.
I think if we all stop and think about our lives we can look at moments when we to missed opportunities. Perhaps we missed an opportunity to help another person, we missed an opportunity to be a compassionate friend, we missed an opportunity to help someone with their struggles or we missed a moment when God was truly present in our life. In looking back at our life, we probably recognize many opportunities that we missed. Now in looking back at our life we have two choices; we can choice to learn from our missed opportunities or not. In the Gospel today, the towns of Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum chose not to learn from their missed opportunities. These three towns no longer exist; there are just piles of rocks, archeological digs sitting in the hot sun waiting for people to come and walk through them. There is no life in any of these towns today. Perhaps we might take on the challenge of today’s Gospel by learning from our encounters with God rather than not learning from them and finding ourselves like Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum today. Our challenge today is to ask ourselves if we as individuals, as families, as communities, as Church, as cities, as nations, as a culture and society are willing to learn from our mistakes, our missed opportunities? If we chose not to our fate will be like the fate of the three towns in the Gospel. What choice will we make? Have a great Tuesday everyone! Today’s Thoughts: Over the last week or so we have been reading a section of Matthew’s Gospel that is a directive for discipleship. Jesus tells the disciples to trust in God by taking nothing with them on the journey, to depend of the hospitality of others, and to offer peace and to proclaim the Kingdom wherever they go. Jesus also tells them that the journey of discipleship will not be easy, that they will be rejected and at times the peace they offer will not be accepted. And in today’s Gospel Jesus also tells the disciples that the struggles of discipleship may even start within the family and friends that they love.
In a number of ways, the picture Jesus paints of discipleship in Matthews Gospel today (Matt. 10:34-11:1) is one that seems impossible to embrace let alone live. The thought of being at odds with mother, father, sister and brother would make me wonder why I would want to journey down that road. I think Jesus’ purpose for this instruction is simply to make it clear that if we get on broad it is not an easy ride. The journey of a disciple is not the journey of a fairy tale; it is not the journey of “happily ever after.” The journey of a disciple is a difficult road with many challenges, many struggles, many difficulties and often a great deal of change. It is a journey of choices and decisions that are not always easy. Discipleship is the journey of the Cross and Jesus wants those who take it up to understand the consequences along with the joys and hopes. Have a great Monday everyone! Today’s Thoughts: Our parable in today’s Gospel is a very familiar one, “The Sower and the Seed.” If you read the long form of today’s Gospel you will hear Jesus explain the parable to his disciples. On the one hand, we can use Jesus’ interpretation and look at the different soils that the sower faces while trying to plant the seed as people we encounter in life. Some of whom do not allow God in for some reason and so faith cannot grow or mature.
However, I sometimes look at this parable a little differently. I look at the different conditions of the soil that the sower encounters not as people but as conditions of our own hearts. Sometimes our hearts don’t allow the grace, the presence, the mercy, the compassion, the forgiveness, the healing, the love of God to take root, to grow. We sometimes have hardness of heart (foot path). We sometimes have rocks and boulders, (sins) that get in the way of the seed. We sometimes have weeds and thorns (the stuff or things of our lives) that choke of the presence of God. These different conditions of our hearts can be obstacles to God’s presence or in one case “the good soil” our hearts can be open to the presence of God in our life. The good soil allows God’s word, presence, grace, mercy, forgiveness, healing and love to take root and grow. Perhaps Jesus is asking us today to look at the condition of our own hearts. Are they ready to allow God to take root and grow or is there hardness, rocks and boulders, and weeds and thorn bushes in the way? Have a blessed and holy Sunday everyone! Today’s Thoughts: In our first reading today Joseph’s says to his brothers, "Have no fear. Can I take the place of God? Even though you meant harm to me, God meant it for good, to achieve his present end, the survival of many people. Therefore, have no fear.
I will provide for you and for your children." With these words Joseph embraces the spirit of Jesus’ words in the Gospel this morning that he was important to God. God knew everything about him, all the hairs on his head. Joseph knew that God valued him far more than a couple of sparrows. With this understanding, with this knowledge of God Joseph was able to move forward, to volunteer for the journey of a life time. Perhaps the challenge of our scriptures today is to look at our own life, to acknowledge our own sinfulness and to trust in the presence, the care and the love of God all the while moving forward, to volunteer for the journey of a life time with God. Yes, there is an evil one lurking out there ready to claim our body and soul but we must trust in God’s care, concern and love to guide us through the challenges and the struggles that come our way. We need to trust that we, like Joseph, are important to God. As we journey through this day let is ask God for the strength to believe more deeply in God’s love for us so that we can live more peacefully in God’s presence around us! Have a great Saturday everyone! Today’s Thoughts: “For it will not be you who speak but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you” (Matthew 10:20). There is great comfort in these words from the Gospel today especially for someone like me, a preacher. However, they are words that are also demanding. They demand dependence not independence. They demand dependence on God, a willingness to let go and let God.
Now before I go any further with my reflection I would just like to say something about this phrase “let go and let God.” I know I use it often and at times people have commented that they don’t quite understand it. When I use the phrase “let go and let God” what I am referring to is the human condition known as being in control. We all like to be in control, to call the shots. We all like to have a sense that we have got things covered, that we know best. However, if we pay close attention to Jesus in the Gospel we are reminded time and time again that it is about God not about us. Jesus often asks the disciples to trust, to not depend on themselves but the presence of God in their lives. It is not easy and the disciples often fail. It is when they are able to let go of their way and trust in God that they find themselves on the right path. Letting go and letting God simple means that life is not about “me” it is about God. It is about letting go of the enticements of the world and letting God be present to us as we journey through life. This theme of trust, of letting go has been an ongoing theme in our scriptures this week. We have been reminded of God’s unrelenting, unconditional love for Israel through the stories from the Book of Genesis. We have been told of the great power that the disciples have been given in order to proclaim the Kingdom of God in the Gospel. And we have been directed in many different ways through the responsorial psalm that our focus in life should always be God. Thomas Merton wrote, “You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.” Jesus remind us today of exactly the same thing. It is through the courage of our friendship with God that we will always be able to bring the Kingdom of God to each moment of life. So, as we make our way through this day let us have the courage to let go and let God because we trust in God’s unrelenting love for us, a love that impels us to proclaim the Kingdom of God because the Spirit of God speaks through us! Have a great Friday everyone! Today’s Thoughts: Perhaps today’s thought or focus might be the response from today’s responsorial psalm, “Remember the marvels the Lord has done.” Certainly, the two readings, the continuing story of Joseph and his family and Jesus’ sending of the twelve remind us of some of the marvels that God has done over the centuries.
However, more importantly for us today it might not be a bad idea to pause and just remember of the marvels of God in our own life. We all have experienced wonderful, awesome, and marvelous things in our life, things that if we stop and think about can tell us about God’s presence in our life. Take a few moments sometime today and think about your life, remember the marvelous things God has done for you, children, spouses, friends, experiences, occasions and moments that mean something special to you. Think of the wonderful and awesome places you have been and the people who journeyed there with you. Yes, God has done marvelous things for us and sometimes it is good to stop, remember and give thanks for them! Have a great Thursday everyone! Today’s Thoughts: “A [person] knows when he [or she] has found his [or her] vocation when he [or she] stops thinking about how to live and begins to live.” (Thomas Merton) I think this is a good quote for our Gospel reading today. The 12 apostles (Matt. 10:1-7) begin to live today and in doing so they find out what God has in store for them.
Isn’t this true for all of us? In living we uncover, we find, we experience, we become who God calls us to be. A verse from John’s Gospel came to mind as I reflected upon today’s Gospel, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit – fruit that will last” (John 15:16). The twelve were chosen by Jesus and in the Gospel today they take their first steps in living out that call, they bring the gift of God to the people that they encounter. The challenge today for us is – Are we living out our call? And what gifts are we offering the world today? Have a great Wednesday everyone! |
Fr. Paul R. Fagan, C.P. "Preacher on the Run"Just a few thoughts to help you on your journey through life...let me know from time to time what you think... Archives
May 2023
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