At the beginning of Mass, we joined the people of Jerusalem shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” as Jesus entered into the Holy City. There’s excitement; there’s hope; there’s joy. And then, only a few moments later, we hear the Passion. Jesus has been arrested, whipped, beaten, put on trial. And we find ourselves…
What chains weigh us down? What sins have we grown comfortable with in our lives? Is it battling against the sin of pride, falling into the sin of gluttony, struggling with lust, embracing laziness? Or is it cursing too much, lying to get ahead, harboring hate toward someone? What chains weigh us down? So often…
The Gospel from today is one that we have probably heard hundreds of times in our lives and, because of that, it’s easy for us to just gloss over it. But, at the same time, it’s one that I think is important for us to remember. The story of the man born blind really almost…
The Gospel today brings us to a well, a place where people came every day to draw water and carry it home. It was such an ordinary part of life. Yet, in the middle of that routine moment, we see this encounter between Jesus and this Samaritan woman. And what begins as a simple conversation…
The Transfiguration is weird. It’s strange. Think about it: Jesus takes Peter, James, and John up a high mountain. As He stands there before them, His face begins to shine as bright as the sun. His clothes become dazzling white. Moses and Elijah appear. A bright cloud overshadows them. The Father’s voice speaks, taking us…
The most revealing detail in today’s Gospel isn’t the hunger, or the desert, or anything to do with the specific temptations themselves; the most revealing part is the way the devil begins the conversation. For some context on this passage, Jesus has just come from the Jordan River, He has just been baptized by John,…
Prayer. Fasting. Almsgiving. The Church places these three practices before us every Lent not as some random suggestion, but as a way of reorienting our hearts. They’re meant to help us turn back to God, to clear away what distracts us, and to make room for Him to work more deeply in our lives. Prayer…
There are very few days on the liturgical calendar as hauntingly beautiful as today. The Church is stripped bare. There is no ornamentation around the altar. The music for today is subdued and glum. There is a silence settling over not just this place, but over the whole world. It’s meant to remind us of…
I want to point out something that’s a little unsettling in our Gospel today. At first, it might seem like this is just a story about some poor woman caught in a moment of deep sin – and that is certainly true. But if we look a little bit deeper, we realize: she wasn’t the…
Today, we hear the Parable of the Prodigal Son. It is one of the most well-known and, honestly, more powerful stories in all of Scripture. And at this point, most of us have heard it many times, and yet, there is always something really beautiful about it and we always take something fresh from it.…
Fr. Tom Pringle 