In the Scriptures, Matthew and Luke furnish a legal family history of Jesus, tracing ancestry to show that Jesus is the culmination of great promises. Not only is his mother’s family neglected, we also know nothing factual about them except that they existed. Even the...
Just a few Sundays ago, the gospel reading from Mark recounted a moment from early in the public ministry of Jesus. He and the disciples had been to many towns and villages in Galilee and in the neighboring Decapolis region. There Jesus had cured many, cast out...
Did you know that Mary Magdalene is mentioned 12 times in the gospels, more than most of the Apostles? She was present at the crucifixion and was the first witness to the Resurrection (John 20 and Mark 16:9). She was the “Apostle to the Apostles”, an...
Last week all of our first readings were from the Prophet Hosea. Any one of the reflections could have begun: “In today’s first reading the Northern Kingdom of Israel is being warned about the choices they have made and are making – and the consequences of those...
When I was a year or two short of being a full-fledged teenager, I was invited to attend my first funeral. It was not a Catholic funeral – and as I came to know – nothing like a Catholic funeral. It was a fundamentalist, born-again, raucous affair for a...
