Readings for the Solemnity of the Ascension, Year B About Liturgy Why do some places celebrate Ascension on Thursday while others move it to the following Sunday? The Synoptic Gospels give us the tradition of placing the Ascension forty days … Read More
Readings for the Sixth Sunday of Easter, Year B Anyone who has been in a long-term relationship knows that loving another person is as much about daily reconciling as it is about feeling love. Perhaps that is why Jesus today … Read More
The first time I realized that the Church has something to say about the dignity of work was when I first read Lumen Gentium, Gaudium et Spes and Pope John Paul II’s Laborem Exercens. Those documents helped me see that … Read More
Readings for the Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year B About Liturgy We know well that to be disciples we are to be witnesses for Christ. Yet we are also called to be witnesses for one another, speaking on behalf of … Read More
You won’t find his feast day on your liturgical calendar, but four days after tax day in the U.S. is always a great day to remember this apocryphal saint. And to paraphrase what we say about good stories, all saint … Read More
Readings for the Fourth Sunday of Easter, Year B One unfortunate outcome of connecting the image of the Good Shepherd from today’s Gospel so heavily to priesthood is that the Fourth Sunday of Easter has at times been overshadowed by … Read More
Readings for the Third Sunday of Easter, Year B About Liturgy Let us continue our mystagogical reflection on the symbols of Easter. We see in today’s gospel the risen Christ ask for something to eat, and he eats what is … Read More
Readings for the Second Sunday of Easter, Year B We’ll never know if Thomas put his finger into Jesus’s nail marks or touched the open wound at his side. John’s gospel today never says he did, although many artists have … Read More
Prayer When You Have Nothing Left to Give Lord, I have nothing left to give. I’m exhausted and worn out. Yet so many still ask for more. Grant me that last ounce of strength that sustained you on the cross … Read More
As liturgists, we can sometimes fall into the sin of rubricism disguised as reverence. However, we cannot follow the Gospel by becoming legalists, nitpicking the rules and measuring piety by the number of rubrics followed. Rather, we only truly obey … Read More