Do your faith formation classes teach people about prayer or form people as pray-ers? Yesterday marked the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)’s annual “Catechetical Sunday”–an unofficial kick-off to the new academic year of catechesis in parishes across the United States….
Catechesis and Prayer: “The Faith Prayed”
A Lesson in Stewardship
Sunday Readings for September 18, 2016, the 25th Sunday in Ordinary Time Our society tolerates religion, as long as it keeps to itself. After all, America is about the separation of Church and state, right? Education, entertainment, employment, politics are…
Jesus is revealed in the Gospels
For Christians, the Bible is a special book because it tells us the great story of God and his love for us. The pinnacle of God’s love for us is Jesus, God come into the world to save us. This…
Let the Dead bury the Dead
In a Luke 9:51-62 Jesus said these words in response to a person who wanted to bury their father first before following Jesus. Talk about being put in your place by Jesus. BAM! To another who wanted to say goodbye…
The Golden Calf and Prodigal Son
Sunday Readings for September 11, 2016 the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time Everyone knows the bible stories of the Prodigal Son and the Golden Calf. But they don’t usually put the two together as this Sunday’s readings do. So what…
An Integration of Church and State
I don’t often post political pieces. In fact, this may be a first. But as I sit at my desk writing this, I find myself deeply troubled by our current state of affairs. In our nation, the term, separation of Church and…
Book Review – Proclaiming the Message of Life by Fr. Frank Pavone
How often have you been to Mass, listened to the readings and homily and heard a clear message about the sanctity of life and why abortion is wrong? Or how the Church can help those who have suffered with the…
Shaped by Fire
Deep in each of us there exists a concept, a personal image of what Jesus looks like. That image was created by a lot of things. It comes from what we have heard, what others have modeled what people have…
Me? An evangelist?
Did you know that when you were baptized, you were anointed to be an evangelist? Yes, you and I, and every Christian are meant to bring others into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. How do we do that? There…
When to Not Imitate Jesus
As disciples of Jesus, we seek to follow Jesus–to be like him as much as possible while on earth. This conformity to Christ is a foretaste of future glory, when, as John writes, “we shall be like him, for we…