REFLECTIONS TODAY The main church in a diocese is the cathedral, and every cathedral has a cathedra, a bishop’s seat or chair, which symbolizes his authority as teacher and leader of the Christian community. In the Gospel, Jesus speaks of the Pharisees who have taken their seat on the “chair of...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Thomas Cardinal Wolsey, Lord Chancellor of King Henry VIII, once held the highest ecclesiastical and political position in England. However, his failure to persuade Pope Clement VII to grant Henry an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon caused his fall from...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Pope Benedict XVI begins his first encyclical with a lapidary statement, “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction” (Deus Caritas Est, 1). It...
REFLECTIONS TODAY When one has a problem with his sight, one does not see clearly, only shadows of people and objects moving. The blind man who sees only partially after Jesus has put spittle in his eyes sees people looking like trees and walking. Only when Jesus lays his hands on his eyes is...
REFLECTIONS TODAY The miracles that Jesus performed do not suffice for the Pharisees, and so they ask Jesus for a sign from heaven, which is God’s confirmation of Jesus’ authority and claims. Jesus sees this as their “leaven” of unbelief, hardness of heart, and hostility towards him. Now,...
REFLECTIONS TODAY There is a proverb which states, “There are none so blind as those who won’t see.” Another proverb runs, “The hardest to awaken is the person who pretends to be asleep.” If one’s mind is set on one direction, it will be almost impossible to convince him of...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on the call to holiness in today’s world is entitled Gaudete et Exsultate—“Rejoice and leap for joy” (Lk 6:23)—taken from Jesus’ proclamation of the Beatitudes. “Beatitudes” comes from the Latin beati, which translates the...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Jesus finds himself in the district of Tyre and then in the district of the Decapolis, both Gentile territories. The cure of the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman and the deaf man with speech impediment are favors bestowed on those considered lo-ammi, those who are “not...
REFLECTIONS TODAY In the 2021 movie CODA (“child of deaf adults”), Ruby, the only hearing member of her family, helps her family’s struggling fishing business while pursuing her own aspirations of being a singer. When she decides to forgo college and join the business full-time,...
REFLECTIONS TODAY The kosher laws of the Jews that mark what is “clean” and “unclean” did not just cover food; the Jews also had nothing to do with “unclean people”—the pagans around them and the schismatic Samaritans whom they looked down as only half-Jews. These people were not...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Various religions forbid the consumption of certain types of food. For example, most Hindus do not eat beef, and some Hindus apply the concept of ahimsa (nonviolence) to their diet and consider vegetarianism as ideal. Islam divides foods into haram (forbidden) and halal...
REFLECTIONS TODAY Fittingly, the memorial of Our Lady of Lourdes is celebrated as the World Day of the Sick, for the spring in the Grotto of Massabielle which the Virgin Mary pointed to Bernadette Soubirous has become a famous pilgrimage site for those who ask for physical and spiritual...
