REFLECTIONS TODAY In biblical times, as in our own, salt is seen as a necessity of life. It is used as a condiment to give taste to food and to preserve food from decay and corruption. It also has medicinal purposes: it was a custom to rub salt on a newborn child. Lastly, salt was associated with...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Today we start Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, the first and the most important of the five Great Discourses in the Gospel of Matthew. It begins with the Beatitudes, Jesus’ declaration of who truly are macarioi—happy or blessed—of human beings. The Beatitudes turn the usual...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Gospel • Mark 3:20-35 Jesus came home with his disciples. Again the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat. When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.” The scribes who had come from Jerusalem said,...
REFLECTIONS TODAY As a biblical image, “heart” (Hebrew leb, Greek kardia) is the seat both of human emotion and of mind and will. The “immaculate heart” of Mary refers to her whole person and harks back to her “immaculate conception,” that special gift which is the fruit of her election...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Gospel • John 19:31-37 The brutal act of smashing the legs would be an act of mercy, for it hastened the death of the crucified man who could agonize for a much longer time. Since Jesus is evidently dead, his legs are spared. John presents Jesus here as the new Passover Lamb....
REFLECTIONS TODAY Gospel • Mark 12:18-27 After the Pharisees and Herodians failed to ensnare Jesus with their question on paying taxes to Caesar, it is now the turn of the Sadducees to test him. The Sadducees—the priestly aristocracy during Jesus’ time—were, ironically, skeptics in...
REFLECTIONS TODAY While recognizing the legitimacy of civil authority, Jesus sets it in its proper place, that is, covering only a part of life, and insists on the basic and ultimate supremacy of God who governs the whole life. One’s duties toward God and civil authority, although distinct, are...
REFLECTIONS TODAY The parable of the Tenants reflects the social background of Galilee close to Jesus’ time, with landed estates belonging to absentee owners who were living abroad. This would allow the conduct of dispossessed land-hungry peasants who cultivated the land as tenant-farmers. The...
REFLECTIONS TODAY GOSPEL • Mark 14:12-16, 22-26 On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, Jesus’ disciples said to him, “Where do you want us to go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?” He sent two of his disciples and said to them,...
REFLECTIONS TODAY The religious authorities in Jerusalem—the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders— would claim their authority to serve and to teach in the Temple from Moses, and through him, from God. They are incensed that Jesus cleansed the Temple by driving out those selling and...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Gospel • Luke 1:39-56 When Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth, the Logos (Word) has become flesh in her womb because of the power of the Holy Spirit. Elizabeth calls her “the mother of my Lord” (v 43), referring to the Son of the Most High she is carrying. In this sense,...
REFLECTIONS TODAY For the third time Jesus has intimated to his disciples that he would be rejected and condemned to death in Jerusalem, but the message has not registered in the mind of the Twelve. They are on their way to Jerusalem and the disciples probably think that Jesus will declare himself...
