Reflections for Ordinary Time

This week we hear Mark’s version of the story of Jesus calling his first disciples (Mk 1:14-20). This includes the familiar line “I will make you fishers of men”. But it has the same sense of immediacy as we got from John last week. The picture of the fishermen just dropping everything and running after […]

One of the striking things about the story of Jesus calling his disciples is that there is no discussion, no questioning, they simply up and follow. In John’s version (Jn 1:35-42) it isn’t even Jesus who initiates the process. It’s John the Baptist who says something that triggers the first two disciples to turn and

The parable of the talents is always a bit of a head scratcher (Mt 25:14-30). Jesus so often asserts the value of the weak, the poor, the inadequate, and wants us to recognize that the typical values in any society which glorifies wealth and strength and power are not the values that will bring us

This week we have a nice simple parable: “Be prepared.” (Mt 25:1-13) But there is a little more to it. What are we to be prepared for? We don’t really know, when or even how whatever will happen will happen. Waiting overnight for the bridegroom is one thing. Waiting millennia for the return of Jesus isn’t

Over the last few weeks we’ve heard Jesus go back and forth with the scribes, the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Herodians, and just about everyone who was anyone in the government of the time. Today we hear his summary (Mt 23:1-12). Basically he says, don’t trust them. They may talk the talk, but they don’t

Which of our laws are most important? Sometimes it’s easy – a law against murder is more important than a law about fraud, and we really don’t care much about a law regarding speed limits. Some tie us in knots. Is a law protecting freedom of speech more important than one that prevents riots, or

I grew up with a version of Christianity that had no political content whatsoever. If anyone had suggested there was any relationship between religion and politics I think the reaction would have been bafflement. As I grew older I became aware of the many linkages between Catholicism and politics, historic and current, from the close

This week Isaiah is at his most exuberant: “a feast of rich food and choice wines, for all peoples” as God “wipes away the tears from every face” and “destroys death forever”. (Isa 25:6-19a) This is followed by the caressing tranquility of Psalm 23.  But in our reading from Matthew’s gospel (Mt 24:1-14), Jesus continues

Our readings this week may seem harsh. God is going to tear down his vineyard, the house of Israel, because of the way the people have behaved. In the gospel Jesus is again going after the “the chief priests and the elders of the people”, the leaders both religious and secular. Last week he told

This week Ezekiel joins in with the theme of how God is unfair, or not. The question he’s addressing concerns individual responsibility (Ez 18:25-28). And he clearly didn’t have much impact on Jewish thinking, since we still hear in Jesus’s time how the general attitude was that people’s misfortunes were a result of their parents’