Jesus Christ is such a strange King. It would be much more convenient if Jesus was just a king like any other king. We could overthrow him for good. We could draw borders and forbid him from ever crossing them. We could assure ourselves that he is in his castle far far away. We could […]
Our gospel this weekend, of course, comes from the very end of Mark’s version of the story of Christ. Jesus has risen from the dead and is about to ascend to the Father. But before he goes, he instructs the apostles, and by extension, he instructs us as well: “Go into the whole world and […]
Tonight, we take a breath. A deep breath. We need it. We need to make the time to breath in the Lord’s power and presence, especially here as we continue to adore Him in the Blessed Sacrament. The Eucharist looks so still — and yet it is alive and breathing. It is alive because He […]
“What did ya expect? They’re only human…” We say this sort of thing all the time, don’t we? We use the term ‘human’ to lower the bar… It’s sort of a nice excuse. To be “only human” means everybody can just go ahead and lower their expectations. I have to wonder: What lies behind that […]
It’s really common to hear people talk about Jesus as a great teacher, a good moral figure in history — someone with some admirable ideas about how to live and how to love people. And I guess at the very least, it seems from this pretty common thing to hear, that Jesus remains a pretty […]
I was recently watching a tv show called “The Good Place,” and without giving any spoilers… I got to the part where the characters make it to… the “Good Place,” i.e. Heaven. The only problem is, it’s a very uninspiring version of Heaven. In fact… it’s a straight up boring, monotonous, Godless Heaven. Now thankfully, […]
Feast of St. Vincent de Paul, Patron Saint of the Diocese of Richmond Vincent de Paul was always a decent, upright man. From an early age, he lived a basically good life. But it might surprise you to learn that Vincent’s original motivation for becoming a priest was really quite worldly and superficial. It’s well […]
When I was in high school, I worked at Shoney’s as a waiter. And if you’ve ever waited tables, you’ll know — you have to work really hard for tips. You have to scratch and claw your way for every single dollar you make. I remember vividly, at the end of a long shift, as […]
I had dinner with some friends the other night who have five young children — four boys and one girl. I asked the oldest boy: “So, on an average day, how many times do you have to forgive your brothers? Maybe like seven times a day?” He giggled hysterically and corrected me: “Noooo… a LOT […]
My parents recently set off their house alarm by accident. There was no intruder this time, and thankfully they were able to disarm the system before the cops and firetrucks descended on their house to apprehend the imaginary invader. But this image helps me make a very simple point: We want security systems for a […]