Friends, in our Gospel today, we find two stories tensely intertwined together—and both contain great suffering and great healing. Through this passage, we are reminded that even in the midst of confusion and frustration with God, we are called to trust in the Lord and his timing.

Friends, the book of Job is one of the most profound and most challenging books in the entire Bible. In today’s reading, we see that God does not hand-wave away Job’s suffering. Rather, the Lord places profound hurt and heartache in an infinitely greater context—into his loving providence. We mus...

Friends, in our Gospel today, Christ paints a picture of a growing mustard tree, under whose shade all people are invited to dwell. Jesus speaks here, using a parable, about the reign and rule of God. Even now, the kingdom of God—the kingdom that finally matters and endures—is spreading far and w...

Friends, for this feast of Corpus Christi, today’s readings run red, dripping in sacrificial symbolism. When we gather together for Mass, we are not calling to mind some disconnected historical incident. Rather, we spiritually and physically participate in the re-presentation of Christ’s Body, Bl...

Friends, Trinity Sunday serves as a wonderful opportunity to unpack the life-giving relationship between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Every time we make the sign of the cross, we invoke the power of the Trinity, thereby linking ourselves to the love that God is.

Friends, we come today to the marvelous feast of Pentecost, a celebration of the Holy Spirit, the Church, and evangelical preaching. Pentecost reverses the cacophonous confusion at Babel. We see various languages, cultures, and identities come into concordance under God. In the same way, we must ...

Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus makes extraordinary observations about discipleship. He speaks about being enraptured by God, having exuberant joy, accepting scorn from persecutors, and being consecrated into truth.

Friends, with these fabulous readings for the sixth Sunday of Easter, we discover an embarrassment of riches through the exploration of God's care and concern for us. In this sermon, I delve into these marvelous texts and explicate three fundamental truths:
- God is love
- God has loved us first
...

Friends, in our Gospel passage today, Jesus proclaims that he is the vine and we are the branches. There is give and take in this divine relationship. Not only are we rooted in Christ’s mystical body, but he endeavors to cultivate his love and mercy within our bodies. In this analogy, we find a p...

Friends, in today’s first reading, we hear from St. Peter that it is only through the name of the Lord that we may be saved. Whatever elements of truth there are to be found in various religions, these partial elements participate in the fullness of truth found in Jesus. In Christ and through Chr...

Friends, Christ is risen from the dead, and heaven and earth have collided! Despite this grand, reorienting truth, our culture seems to miss the point of the Resurrection. The world tries to domesticate Easter, but this is impossible. There’s no other reaction than to accept the life-changing rea...

Friends, this Sunday's Gospel reveals, in miniature, the whole of the Christian spiritual life. Up until this point in the narrative, Jesus’ ministry involved a small, select group who closely followed him. Now, however, he breaks through our locked doors and sends us forth to breathe his spirit ...

Friends, I want to wish a very blessed and peaceful Easter to you.

In today’s victorious and triumphant Gospel, we hear the fanfares announce in the most unambiguous way that God, the sworn enemy of death, has overcome the powers of sin through his sovereignty: Jesus has risen from the dead.

As...

Friends, in this sermon for Palm Sunday, I explore three peculiar images in Mark’s account of Christ’s Passion and death, and how these details inspire us to live faithfully in the light of our Lord’s sacrifice.

Friends, today’s readings contain within them the theme of God’s covenants with his people. God has made the whole of creation, but out of the totality of the nations on earth, he chose a particular people—the Israelite nation—to be “peculiarly his own,” forming them through a series of covenants...

Friends, today’s Gospel reveals the essence of Christianity. To believe in Christ means much more than to accept a set of propositions. Christianity involves entering into the space opened up by the death of the Son of God to receive his saving love. When you do this, you are born again; when you...

Friends, one of the best things we can do during Lent is to go to confession. In the first reading today, we are given the Ten Commandments, one of the most fundamental parts of the Christian faith. But how thoroughly have we internalized them? In this video, I go back to the basics and discuss e...

Friends, in our first reading today, we find ourselves face-to-face with an awful story which seems to harshly juxtapose God’s loving nature with an appalling request: that Abraham sacrifice his own son. We should not read this as a story about the arbitrary and capricious “testing” of Abraham, b...

Friends, we come now to one of the most important periods of the liturgical year: Lent. During this time of preparation, the Church asks us to cultivate a deeper friendship with God through prayer, to control and reorder our desires for physical goods through fasting, and to show our love in the ...

Friends, our Gospel this Sunday focuses on a leper kneeling before Jesus, saying, "If you wish, you can make me clean." A lot of us, in our sin, feel like a leper; we feel we are unclean, ostracized, and unworthy of forgiveness. Nonsense! The Gospel invites us to confidently approach Jesus, and t...

Friends, in this Sunday's reading, St. Paul affirms what stands at the center of his life: preaching the glad tidings that God has won the victory over sin and death, thereby liberating all creation. Paul's whole life revolved around this good news, and so it must be for us.

Friends, Moses is, without a doubt, the greatest figure in the Old Testament. He heard the voice of God from the burning bush; he was chosen to lead the people Israel to freedom; he was given the Ten Commandments; he was permitted to speak with God as a friend. Every teacher within ancient Judais...

Friends, this Sunday we hear the story of Jonah, a narrative about the acceptance (or rejection) of God’s mission. What would happen if every single person in our society commenced to embrace his or her mission from God? Jonah converted the entire city, from the King to the very animals. Imagine ...

Friends, as we return to Ordinary Time, today’s readings have a very practical and timely message. We find, in the first reading, the prophet Samuel and his mentor, Eli, working together to understand the call of the Lord. We, too, need to work to discern his call through our deafness and the noi...