23 August 2026 - passing keys

Today's Readings
(Audio)

"Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" 
They replied, "Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah,
still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.

The popular consensus about Jesus is never going to tell us the whole story, even when it contains aspects that are true. When we ask the least informed people they may suggest that Jesus was merely fictional, mythological, like characters in so many other poetic stories. Of people who answer in this way, some may assert that the stories about him were at least noble ideals. Others may hold a grudge for the ways, some of which are indeed admittedly negative, that the story of Jesus has changed the history of the world. But the position that there was no historical reality to Jesus is not historically tenable. 

One who is asked about the identity of Jesus must provide some concrete rationale for how a poor and insignificant rabbi became so important. Closer to the truth than those who say that Jesus didn't exist at all are those who suggest that he was merely a good moral teacher whose identity was later exaggerated by his followers. Or others may suggest that he was a political revolutionary whose identity took on the shape of a legend in the years after his life. 

None of these common theories can provide a compelling account of the data we have from history about Jesus. One might say that Jesus was like the earlier prophets, that he so provocatively called Israel to account for her failure to put love of God and as her first priority that people desired to put him to death in order to silence him. But this doesn't explain the categorical difference between his impact and that of earlier prophets. It doesn't explain the split between early Christians and Jews in the practice of such traditions as the celebration of the Sabbath and keeping kosher food laws. It doesn't explain the meaning of the immediate and constant emphasis on the resurrection of Jesus as the central historical fact on which the faith of Christians was built. 

Jesus did speak prophetically and incited much opposition in doing so. But much of this opposition was precisely because of the central place his own person played in his message, to the degree that, if it were not true it would certainly be blasphemous. None of the other prophets spoke of themselves as exciting before Abraham or as greater than Solomon, much less as one with the Father, the sole person capable of revealing him to the world. But Jesus did say and was hated for saying these and similar things. Yet, unlike the other prophets, his message was uniquely vindicated through the resurrection, the Father signing the testimony of the Son with his own divine power. Even the life of an authentic prophet could not account for the historical truth about the person of Jesus. Much less so the life of a merely political revolutionary, who would quickly have been forgotten along with so many other violent messianic figures of the time.

He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" 

Even if we ask other Christians about Jesus they can only answer by telling us about Jesus. Even if we can repeat with exactitude what they have told us, correctly stating that he is fully human and fully divine, it does not mean that we have internalized those truths, or that we know him in the way he wants to be known. It is one thing to say truly that Jesus is Lord. But it is something else to experience the truth of who he is through a revelation that transforms our lives. What others can't convey through mere words the Father desires to reveal to us through his Spirit. It is important to help Christians to know true doctrine about Jesus. But it is even more important to point them to a personal encounter with him.

"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, Benedict XVI

The role Peter was given in the Church as a guarantee against the forces of the netherworld is unique to him and his successors, the popes. But the guarantee is built on his faith in the revelation of the Father precisely to signal that the Church will always be a rock were the truth can be found. The voice of Peter calls through the centuries, not only teaching us truths about Jesus, but calling each of us to have our own encounter with him. She does this perhaps most perfectly in the mass, where she not only presents to us Jesus as an object of faith, but invites us to come and receive the Eucharistic Lord.

DC Talk - Mind's Eye

 

22 August 2026 - works of chairity

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

 

 

The scribes and the Pharisees
have taken their seat on the chair of Moses.
Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you,
but do not follow their example.

It is a perennial problem that those in positions of authentic religious authority are sometimes scandalous in their example. They may be the source of legitimate teaching of doctrine and the application thereof without first applying it to their own lives. This does not necessarily invalidate their authority or make them any less necessary sources of religious knowledge. In short, we can't necessarily ignore or avoid them just because they are bad people. Ideally we will find teachers whose lives and whose message coincide, teachings whom we can know by their fruit. But if we can't find such teachers we still need access to authentic doctrine. We still need to stand under the authority of the chair of Peter in the Church. If we should not entirely oppose even hypocritical leaders how much less should we choose to disregard such valid teaching as they do provide merely because of from whom it comes? If a teacher instructs us of the importance of charity but himself fails to be charitable it doesn't mean that the teaching itself was invalid. We can too easily use bad examples of religious leaders to confirm our bias against teachings with don't appeal to us, which we don't like, and which we would prefer to be false. Just because a liberal priest was caught up in a scandal doesn't necessarily invalidate everything he ever said. The same goes for a conservative priest. But we cherry pick such examples to feed our own confirmation bias. This too we must avoid.

For they preach but they do not practice.
They tie up heavy burdens hard to carry
and lay them on people’s shoulders,
but they will not lift a finger to move them.

We do not want to follow the example of teachers who are happy to expound endless fine points of doctrine without concern for those who receive it. They are those who are fascinated with their own image as religious people, and not actually interested in the spiritual well-being of those to whom they preach. If anything, they tend to enjoy the sense of superiority they get from saying so many true things about areas in which they believe others are failing. They tend to feel that merely by talking about it they are succeeding in those areas themselves. But often they aren't. Moreover those to whom they preach may often be in better spiritual positions, living a more simplistic, authentic, and integral approach, without being lost in the doctrinal nuance of religious showmanship. 

Rather than the scribes and the Pharisees we want to be like Jesus himself, whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light, light precisely because he helps his followers to carry it. We need not allow the condemnation of those who don't share this approach to unsettle our emotional well-being. If others (or even our inner voices) are hypercritical of our practice it need not lead us to desperation or despair. It should help us to rely more on Jesus and less on ourselves or others for the strength we need to live our call as Christians. When and only when we rely on Jesus for what we need we become able to help others in turn with what we ourselves have first received.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God (see Second Corinthians 1:3-4).

The image we present to others is not a reliable motivation for our Christian life. Only our desire to share the mercy we have first received is sufficient to the task. If we focus on self-image we will quickly be content with a superficial approach to religious like that of the scribes and the Pharisees. We will feel the need to increasingly visible in our good works and noticed for our religious practices. This will in turn make us hard for us to love in the many small and often invisible ways that really matter. We will think that the only scale of action that matters is one that could be noticed by others. But such an attitude ultimately directs our piety, not toward God, but to the idol of popular opinion.

Let us listen to the call of our one Father in heaven, and follow the example of our one master, the Christ. Let us become humble servants rather than tyrannical leaders, just as Christ himself "came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (see Matthew 20:28).

Brotherhood Of Hope - To Love You And To Make You Loved

 

21 August 2026 - connections

Today's Readings
(Audio) 

When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they gathered together, and one of them,
a scholar of the law, tested him by asking,
“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?”

This question was more of an actual test than a trap like the previous questions from the Sadducees. All of those attempts to trip him up had failed. That must have made this scholar of the law  sufficiently curious to finally give Jesus an opportunity to explain his own perspective. Asking which commandment was greatest was implicitly also asked how all of the commandments were interrelated. What was the proper hierarchy of importance in all of the many rules and regulations of the law? We know that this was an important question because we see elsewhere that there were many who set commandments in opposition to each other, using some as an excuse to ignore others. For instance, people would use their obligation toward God as an excuse to shirk their duty toward their parents. Or they would use minute points of emphasis in order to discredit their opponents. And there were many other such similar abuses, all of which resulted from making human will, and not the intention of God the final arbiter of values.

He said to him,
“You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart,
with all your soul, and with all your mind.

The first part of the answer of Jesus was not shocking in itself. It was quite obvious that the Shema prayer, the first of the commandments, the one which people literally wore on their bodies in their phylacteries, was the most important. But knowing this was not sufficient for the Pharisees who often used the importance of that commandment in order to avoid obligations toward the neighbors, and even to justify their own vicious attitudes of hostility and envy toward them. 

Neither was it shocking for Jesus to list love of neighbor as the second highest on the list of divine priorities. Between these two commandments he covered the two tablets of the law given to Moses by God. The aspect of the answer of Jesus that was the most unique and important was said so casually that it might have been easy to miss. He introduced love of neighbor by stating that the "second is like it". If one truly processed in understood the way in which the second was like the first it would no longer be possible for those two commandments to be set against one another. If one took the idea seriously human reasoning could no longer use the law to justify selfish behavior. 

Love of God required love of one's neighbor whom God himself had created in his own image. Love of God, who was invisible, could not be fully demonstrated without loving the neighbors whom one could see (see First John 4:20). The tight connection of these two realities came to a head in Jesus himself. When people failed to love Jesus they demonstrated both a failure to love their neighbor, which was more obvious, but also a failure to love the God who had become incarnate in his person. 

Unlike using God as an excuse, which is relatively easy, it is more difficult to love neighbor in a way that causes us to fail in our obligations toward God. But it is possible. Most often this happens when what that to which we direct our love is not really neighbor, but self. We tell ourselves we love our neighbor when we are choosing something that is really for our own convenience or comfort rather than doing the hard work of loving them as God would have us love them. An example would be not sharing the Gospel for fear of upsetting them, or not intervening in destructive behavior such as addiction in order to help keep them superficially happy. But if our love of neighbor is truly like our love of God we can't be content to love only by half measures. Our own love for neighbor must become like his love for us. It must be the sort of love that seeks and saves and chases down the very last of the lost sheep, bringing others not finally to ourselves, but to the Lord. After all, he himself is the only true hope we have to offer, the only lasting love we have to give.

Then you shall know that I am the LORD,
when I open your graves and have you rise from them,
O my people!
I will put my spirit in you that you may live,
and I will settle you upon your land;
thus you shall know that I am the LORD.

Bob Fitts - Hear O Israel

 

20 August 2026 - guest list

Today's Readings
(Audio)

The Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king
who gave a wedding feast for his son.
He dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the feast,
but they refused to come.

When the guests refused to come at first he tried to appeal to them, explaining that the feast he had prepared was extremely desirable. The ones whom he sent to persuade them were messengers like Ezekiel who conveyed the overwhelming goodness of his plan.

I will give you a new heart and place a new spirit within you,
taking from your bodies your stony hearts
and giving you natural hearts.

Some simply ignored this second invitation, preferring the mundane tedium of their farms and businesses to a transformative celebration. But others responded with unexpectedly intense intense hostility, laying hold of his servants, mistreating them, and killing them. These were people who found the message of the prophets to be intolerable. They didn't want new hearts because they were convinced the ones they had were fine, and took offense at the suggestion that there was anything wrong. They were so attached to the current state of affairs in their lives that they found the invitation to the banquet to be threatening. The responded violently in an attempt to silence that invitation, trying to mute the voice of their conscience which resonated with its urgency.

Go out, therefore, into the main roads
and invite to the feast whomever you find.’
The servants went out into the streets
and gathered all they found, bad and good alike,
and the hall was filled with guests.

Not everyone responded negatively to the invitation to the banquet. Those who were not already living lifestyles of smug self-satisfaction saw the invitation for the amazingly generous offer that it was. They knew that they had done nothing to deserve it. It had come to them entirely unexpectedly, as sheer grace. Yet even among this group not everyone could be bothered to make an appropriately complete response. 

He said to him, ‘My friend, how is it
that you came in here without a wedding garment?’
But he was reduced to silence.

One person thought he could enter the feast unchanged from his daily life in the world. He couldn't be bothered to avoid soiling his garments with sin en route. He seemed to assume that this sort of worldly contamination would not be a problem, even though a wedding was cause to wear the one's best and finest. He didn't realize the necessity of being robed in holiness and clothed with good works. He was like a Christian who failed to bring his baptismal robe unstained into God's Kingdom. The point, of course, is that it was within the realm of possibility for him to keep his clothing clean or to have it cleaned if necessary. And so too for us. Grace makes it possible for us to be cleansed from all of our impurities, as Ezekiel said. What we cannot do is attempt to proceed to the banquet of the Lamb while ignoring the gradually thickening accretion of sin on our spirits. The individual particles of dirt may seem minor. But the indifference that leads us to ignore them shows contempt for the host of the feast.

We may not be among those who are hostile to God's messengers (though it sometimes depends on what and how they preach to us). But many of us are tainted by lukewarm indifference. We take our daily life of farm and business to be primary and God's invitation to be something to be slotted in eventually, when it fits. But the opposite should be true. Even when we do initially recognize the importance of the invitation we still tend to overlook our own need for transformation, preferring to ignore the stains on our souls rather than to address them. Perhaps we do this because the cleaning process seems difficult. But we don't have to do the scrubbing ourselves. Rather we are meant to come to the living water we find in the sacraments to be washed clean therein. Then we use the grace we have received to make our lives correspond to our stated repentence by living in a way that befits guests invited to the heavenly banquet.

A clean heart create for me, O God,
and a steadfast spirit renew within me.
Cast me not out from your presence,
and your Holy Spirit take not from me.

Housefires - Come To The River

19 August 2026 - hiring strategy

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

 

The Kingdom of heaven is like a landowner
who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard.

This landowner was both odd and provocative. He went to the the market obsessively, again and again looking for people to work in his vineyard. It seemed that he did this because he cared both about his vineyard and especially about the laborers themselves. It pained him to see some standing there "idle all day" because he understood that their dignity was worthy of a higher purpose.

'Summon the laborers and give them their pay,
beginning with the last and ending with the first.'

The only explanation for the specific instructions for the order that the laborers were paid is that the landowner wanted to be intentionally provocative so as demonstrate something that would not have been otherwise obvious. He was clearly more interested in being generous than in the strict demands of justice. The demands of justice were met, but he was willing to go beyond them when necessary to make sure that no one would be lacking at the end of the day. But he must have had the last receive first because he knew that those hired first would have difficulty accepting it. They assumed on the basis of comparison with what those hired last that they deserved even more than the price on which they had agreed with the landowner. However, there were two things that were true, neither of which was always obvious to the workers. The first was that the landowner desired to employee everyone insofar as possible. If didn't hire them sooner he would keep looking until he could find and hire them eventually. The second was that the landowner desired to give all of them a certain amount, independent of the effort the expended. He did value the work they did in the vineyard, else he would not have engaged them in doing it. But he valued the individuals even more and wanted to make sure that, at the end of the day, no one suffered privation. 

What if I wish to give this last one the same as you?
Or am I not free to do as I wish with my own money?
Are you envious because I am generous?

We may wonder if such a hiring methodology and payment strategy is truly practical. Wouldn't the word get out, with the result that people would take advantage of his generosity, presenting themselves to his service only at day's end? But notice, he did interrogate those who had been idle all day. Had he discovered that they were trying to take advantage of him we may assume he would have been less eager to set such ones to work in his enterprises. The parable definitely doesn't describe a capitalist system, but neither does it represent a welfare state. It represents something higher than either extreme where the dignity of the individuals involved reigns supreme. 

 

It is precisely this, his concern for the treatment of the workers, that is the thread that connects the Gospel with the first reading, wherein the Lord refuses to tolerate the abuse of the sheep by other shepherds. Whether we are workers in the vineyard or sheep of his pasture his desire is look after and tend us himself. The shepherd who seeks even the one lost sheep is the same Lord whom Jesus represents as the vineyard owner hiring at the last hour. He is relentless in his love for us, refusing to abandon us, and obliterating all obstacles between us. This even includes obstacles in our own hearts, such as greed and envy, that can make us reluctant to allow him to do so. Being and remaining his sheep requires not finding his pastures offensive or intolerable and bolting. We must have hearts like his to receive all that he desires to give us. We must be docile to his care.

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
In verdant pastures he gives me repose;
Beside restful waters he leads me;
he refreshes my soul.

 

Shane And Shane - Psalm 23 (Surely Goodness, Surely Mercy)

 

18 August 2026 - threading the needle

Today's Readings
(Audio) 

 

Amen, I say to you, it will be hard for one who is rich
to enter the Kingdom of heaven.

One who is too tethered to this world by attachments may end up like the young man about whom we read yesterday, who was able to live a generally moral life, discover the truth about Jesus, and yet remained unable to take the final steps forward into the freedom offered to him by Jesus. We may think that the problem was with the young man specifically. If so, we underestimate the difficulty of what was asked. The fallen ego is simply too large and the way proposed is far too narrow. Camels are massive. And they are meant to be used precisely to carry other things. Even unladen they aren't going to fit through any knitting needle. Unladen they also all but lose their purpose. The only thing intended for the eye of a needle is a thread. Thus, our egos need a complete transformation from one sort of thing to another if they are to enter the Kingdom of God. The question of the disciples and the response of Jesus makes clear that this is not something that is within our natural capacity.

“Who then can be saved?”
Jesus looked at them and said,
“For men this is impossible,
but for God all things are possible.”

The point then, as it were, is not about merely removing a few things we are carrying. It is about being transformed by God into threads of the beautiful tapestry of the Kingdom he is creating. Rather than receptacles for worldly things we become docile to the higher purpose of unleashing beauty in the world. This does mean leaving behind things to which we were formerly attached. We recognize that doing so can often leave us feeling sorry for ourselves, with a scarcity mindset.

“We have given up everything and followed you.
What will there be for us?”

This is how things look from the perspective of the self-protective ego that always wants to know, 'What about me?'. But from the perspective of the Kingdom we see things differently. This new perspective begins in baptism and will be brought to completion "in the new age" which will be inaugurated when our Lord returns. In the new age worldly realities will be revealed as mere shadows of deeper and more profound truths existing within the Church, the Mystical Body of Christ. The disciples themselves did have had to renounce many earthly goods, and any claim on earthly authority, but their authority as the first leaders of the Church was, if less immediately evident, more important in the grand scheme of history. We may have to give up things or even relationships for the sake of the Kingdom. But even here on earth we already receive compensation that is far greater, if we have but the eyes of faith to see it.

everyone who has given up houses or brothers or sisters
or father or mother or children or lands
for the sake of my name will receive a hundred times more,
and will inherit eternal life.

Jesus himself had divine riches beyond all telling and yet allowed himself to become poor so that he could enrich us by his power and presence among us. This gives us confidence that what is impossible for man is possible for God, for whom "all things are possible". What was first accomplished in Jesus can also be accomplished in us. We can have among ourselves "this mind" that is ours in Christ Jesus (see Philippians 2:5). May the Holy Spirit come and help us to experience the renewal of our minds (see Romans 12:2) so that we can live, no longer as beasts of burden, but as citizens of the Kingdom. 

 

 

Matt Maher - Lay It Down

 

17 August 2026 - There is only One who is good

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

 

Why do you ask me about the good?
There is only One who is good.

Sometimes it is good to ask clarifying questions about why we have come to Jesus. Yes, he is good. But what does that mean? Have we understood the full ramifications of that fact? If it is true that Jesus is good, but that there is only One who is good, how do we respond? Are we content to make Jesus one source of advice and information among others? Do we defer to his teaching when it suits our fancy? Do we enthrone him partially, but not more highly than various idols in our lives? If we are to truly hear the words of Jesus we can't interpret them as if they were merely human words. If we are to be his disciples we must give him the central place in our lives that his goodness deserves.

If you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments."
He asked him, "Which ones?"

The young man knew that he needed more than a mere external obedience. He sensed that there was a deeper issue that could not be corrected by superficially observing the commandments directed toward love of neighbor. No doubt he had truly believed that he observed all of those things, and yet still felt unsatisfied. He knew that even in obeying them there was something missing, some central unifying element that he lacked. He may have felt as though his efforts were insufficient, diffusing inadequate energy toward multiple unattainable goals. Without being able to put it into words, he may have sensed that he was not adequately able to practice love of neighbor, because his life was not properly ordered to the love of God as expressed in the other tablet of the commandments to which Jesus did not directly refer, but was conspicuous exactly for that reason. Had he been drawn to Jesus precisely because in Jesus he sensed the possibility of making this connection and at last ordering his life toward something eternal? There was a sense in which the second tablet of the law was superficially easy to obey, whereas the first seemed more nebulous. But the presence of Jesus, properly understood, made the first tablet concrete. In doing so it also added a new depth of meaning to the second tablet, since love of neighbor became a way to love Jesus himself. It was in fact the case that Jesus was the missing connection and central point that the young man desired.

Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be perfect, go,
sell what you have and give to the poor,
and you will have treasure in heaven.
Then come, follow me.

It wasn't so much the heroic selling of his goods that was essential. That preamble was just to remove some final obstacles that apparently still tied him down. The main thing the young man needed was the same as the one necessary thing, the better portion that Mary had chosen: Jesus himself. The otherwise abstract and unsatisfying nature of the first tablet of the law took on concrete form in the command to follow Jesus. This was not merely a performance or a ritual. It required giving Jesus the central place in his life, of allowing Jesus to reign in him, giving him the authority to direct his choices, not just once, but in an ongoing way. But sadly, as we so often do, the man chose comfort and familiarity over obedience. He did this even though the he immediately experienced the choice to be sad. We know that when people do decide to put Jesus first they experience just the opposite, as did Zacchaeus, who "received him joyfully" (see Luke 19:5) into his home. Let us not choose sin and disobedience when we know they lead to sadness. Let us instead make our constant choice to put Jesus himself on the throne of our hearts. This is the path, the only path, to eternal life, and lasting joy.

 

Newsboys - He Reigns