The Sadducees did not believe in eternal life; therefore, they were sad, you see.

Last weekend, the deacon preached.  -- If we think about sin, we must also think about mercy, forgiveness, and healing.

Prayer is not for the sake of controlling God.  We must immerse ourselves in prayer so that we may discover how to be united with our God.

The story of Naaman inspires us to consider failures of imagination and the concept of local gods.

Again, the homilist must have forgotten to record September 18.  Too bad; it built on an earlier Sunday's pronouncement that life is not a game.  On September 25, the deacon preached.  -- We need to become more comfortable with the statement "We are unprofitable servants" so that we will wait actively for "the vision."

The weekend of September 4, the homilist was in Paris and North Arm while their priest made a Mission Co-op appeal in the homilist's parishes on behalf of his diocese in Rwanda.  -- The stories of Luke 15 can be revisited countless times, and they do not get old.  God's mercy does not make sense -- but we know we need it.

Jesus is not giving an etiquette lesson.  He is asking us why we are so concerned about status when people who cannot gain any such status need to be responded to.

The homilist must have failed to record August 14, shortly after his mother's funeral.  -- Anyway, LIFE IS NOT A GAME and is, in fact, BETTER than a game.

The homilist preached on the short form of the Gospel, seeing no need to talk about beatings.

After three weeks away, because of a visit to Guatemala and the souvenir he brought back (Covid), the homilist returns and considers the vanity-content of our lives.

Do you think that perhaps Jesus was seeking new recruits because he was having second thoughts about James and John?

The return to Ordinary Time and a consideration of vocation was somewhat overshadowed by a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision and its implications.

This separate celebration of the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist can never be separated from Holy Thursday and the Passion of Jesus.

Two persons of the Trinity are called "Father" and "Son."  Therefore I decided to stick with family relationships.

We, the Christian community, can work through our problems together.

The Christian people began with a small number; Revelation promises that this nucleus will grow into a vast throng.

We as Christian community must be fed by the Sacred Scriptures.

The gift of resurrection is the foundation of our Christian community.

What sort of conversation can be held among three people condemned and dying?  Saint Luke's Passion gives us an example, and it is the opposite of futile.

Our lives are not games.  We must not manipulate people.  We must treasure the gift of forgiveness which our God has given us, and allow that gift to make us compassionate.

The story of the father and his two sons never fails to agitate us as we marvel at the behaviors therein portrayed.

The "problem of evil" is best addressed by our looking at the evil within our own hearts, and opening ourselves to conversion.

How are promises to be fulfilled?  What is our reaction if we simply see no way to fulfillment?

Beware the polarities of "I am God" and "I am nothing."  If we understand ourselves as God's beloved creatures, we will be less likely to succumb to temptation.

The Third and Fifth Sundays of Easter, and the Ascension, are missing.  In the case of the first two, I had left the recorder at home and did not feel like running back for it.  The Ascension marked the return of Deacon Bob Crosby, who preached.

As I recall, on the Third Sunday of Easter, I preached about our need as Christian community to grow comfortable with one another -- which Peter obviously was not when he discovered himself to be in the presence of the risen Jesus.  On the Fifth Sunday of Easter, I focused on the word "elder" in the Acts of the Apostles and the fact that I am technically a presbyter or "elder," and became an elder before I had turned 26.

There was a lot to talk about, including the Russian attack on Ukraine, in light of the image of having a block of wood in your eye.

It was a crazy day, and what I have here is a summary.  Love your enemies.

"Blessed are you who are poor": may there be no obstacles to our accepting this promise of Jesus.  (This file runs a little long; I remembered to turn off the device after I dismissed our catechumen.)

I don't like to be startled.  Peter, I suppose, needed to be startled.  I trust in God's gentle revelations to me of his presence.

St. Paul's meditation on love anchors us in a sense of what is valuable.

How clear is St. Paul's "analogy of the body"!

The Magi, the baptism of Jesus, the wine at Cana: all these are connected with Epiphany, the manifestation of Jesus to the world.

In the midst of uncertainty, we have a "theophany" -- God showing himself to us.  Sorry, this file runs a little long; I forgot to turn off the device.

We see very clearly that the human family is a global community.

There are tensions even within the Holy Family.  We must not be surprised at the tensions within ours.

The account of the visit of Mary to Elizabeth is crowned by the Canticle of Mary, the Magnificat.

John the Baptist speaks of elementary, immediate acts of social justice.

Luke very deliberately fixes the time of the emergence of John the Baptist.

We lift up our heads with confident expectation of what God is giving us.

This is a king whom Pilate cannot fathom.

As we try to appreciate the gift of everlasting life, we find that anything having to do with love will help us.