When God chooses David as King of Israel, despite being the youngest and most humble of the sons of Jesse, he says through Samuel the prophet: “the Lord sees not as man sees; man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”
The parable we hear today strikes many as unjust.
Some people worked all day under the hot sun, and they only got paid the same amount as everyone else, even those who only worked for one hour.
Aug. 30 — Mt 16:21-27
The tomb of St. Peter in the city of Rome is, from the standpoint of natural reason, in a strange place.
After Simon gives his famous profession of faith in Jesus, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” Jesus immediately declares him blessed and gives him a new name: “And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church.”
I have grown over the years in my appreciation of the truth and beauty present in today’s passage from Matthew’s Gospel. When I was younger, it bothered me that Jesus appeared to be unusually harsh with the Canaanite woman who approached him with such faith.
Most of us are very familiar with the natural order of things.
Water is wet, objects fall to earth because of gravity, and so on. On the whole, people also behave in predictable ways as creatures of habit. While it’s true that we may occasionally surprise each other.
Aug. 2 — Mt 14:13-21
The Gospel for this Sunday presents us with one of Christ’s miracles of feeding, multiplying five loaves and two fish so that they might feed more than 5,000 people.
A young adult man was thinking about the apostles as he walked to Mass one day. He reflected on how amazing it was that, when Jesus called them, they left everything behind immediately: fishing nets, boats, family, and friends.
Our Gospel this Sunday contains Matthew’s classic parable of the sower and the seeds scattered on different types of soil. Sandwiched in the middle, between the parable itself and the interpretation given by Our Lord, is a fascinating little dialogue that begins with the question given to Jesus: Why do you speak to them in parables?
One sympathizes with Jesus in our Gospel today, looking out upon the crowds of the world and seeing them troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd. All it takes is a glance at the morning or evening news to realize that our world still needs Christ and his appointed shepherds, perhaps now more than ever.
