“This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die.” So often we can just gloss over our Lord’s words because we have become accustomed to hearing them. We lose sight of the incredibly surprising nature of our Lord’s promises. He tells us today that if we […]
Read more "So You May Eat It and not Die"“Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” As Catholics, when our Lord speaks about the food that He will give us that endures for eternal life, our minds should go directly to the Eucharist. However, we could be […]
Read more "Working for the Food of Eternal Life"Today’s Gospel contains a familiar story: the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. It is a miracle story that reminds us of our Lord’s power over nature. We have probably also heard it used as a launching point for discussing the importance of sharing. I would like to take a closer look today at an […]
Read more "Giving Thanks for So Little"God wants to do incredible things in your life! Today we hear the stories of two people’s whose lives were profoundly altered by coming into contact with Christ: the woman with the hemorrhage and the daughter of the synagogue official. These two miraculous healings show us the incredible power of Christ to triumph over every […]
Read more "Bumping into Jesus"“Then [Moses] took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, saying, ‘This is the blood of the covenant that the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words of his.’” This culmination of the story of the ratifying of the covenant between God and the Israelites in the first reading today […]
Read more "The Eucharistic Sacrifice"“God has created [you] to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to [you] which He has not committed to another. [You] have [your] mission. [You] may never know it in this life, but [you] shall be told it in the next. [You are] a link in a chain, a bond of […]
Read more "The Heart of a [Future] Shepherd"On this great night, Christ does something old, something traditional. He gathers with his Apostles for the celebration of the Passover feast. They prepare and eat this supper according to the precise instructions given centuries before by Moses. For the Jews, this was not merely a memorial meal, but actually made the Passover present to […]
Read more "The New Sacrifice of the Eucharist"“Call no one on earth your father; you have but one Father in heaven.” These enigmatic words of our Lord are a challenge for interpretation. Does our Lord really mean that we should not call anyone, “father,” “dad,” “daddy,” or so forth? No, this is not what He means. Rather, our Lord’s injunction to call […]
Read more "Calling God our Father"Two weeks in a row now, the Gospel has ended with this haunting phrase, “Whoever has ears ought to hear.” So what are we supposed to hear? Each of the past two weeks we have heard a long and complicated parable in which our Lord explains what the Kingdom of Heaven is all about. Last […]
Read more "God only needs a little seed"“Remember how for forty years now the LORD, your God, has directed all your journeying in the desert … He … let you be afflicted with hunger, and then fed you with manna, a food unknown to you and your fathers.” In these lines from the first reading, Moses is reminding the Israelite people of […]
Read more "Being Spiritually Full"
Father Gregerson 