October 26, 2025
I spoke a few weeks ago on the dangers of pride, and this is certainly another parable that demonstrates that for us. The Pharisee can only think about his own positive attributes, whereas the tax collector simply begs for God’s mercy for his sins. To be fair to the Pharisee, he at least seems to recognize that all of the good things he lists do come from God. However, he never moves beyond that, he never asks God for help to grow. All he can do is think about himself and recognize all the praiseworthy things about his life. He doesn’t recognize any need for growth.
Now, we don’t want to take away from this parable the message that we shouldn’t thank God for our gifts. We certainly should, because everything good we have ultimately comes from Him. However, the danger arises when the Lord’s gifts become an occasion for us to exalt ourselves. “Look at me and how great I am.” As St. Paul writes to the Corinthians, “What do you possess that you have not received? But if you have received it, why are you boasting as if you did not receive it?” When we start to attribute the Lord’s gifts to our own supposed greatness, this often leads to complacency. We can think that we’re so great that we don’t need to grow or change. Rather, than allowing the Lord’s gifts to cause us to take pride in ourselves, we should instead recognize all the more how much we depend on the Lord.
This is further drawn out by the presence of the tax collector. He is the one who goes home justified, not the Pharisee. His prayer is very simple: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.” This is a prayer that all of us should pray every day, and at the heart of this prayer is the implicit desire to change. It would be rather audacious for someone to ask for mercy if they just intended to continue doing the action that put them in need of mercy in the first place. Someone who says, “I’m sorry,” but has no remorse for what they’ve done and doesn’t plan to change their ways really isn’t sorry. Someone who asks for mercy should be repentant; that is, they should have some desire to change their ways, even if they’re not sure if they’re that they’ll actually be able to change. They should at least want to try.
This is an attitude that we all should have, because every one of us needs the Lord’s mercy. No doubt, each of us is in a different place in the spiritual life. A person who has been able to grow close to the Lord through prayer and able to live a morally upright life can certainly thank the Lord for that, but we must never become complacent. That’s one of the biggest problems for the Pharisee in the parable. He never recognizes his faults. He doesn’t seem to recognize any need to change and grow. This is a trap that we don’t want to fall into; because no matter how far we advance in the spiritual life, we can always grow closer to the Lord. We don’t just want to slide into Heaven by the skin of our teeth, we want to be able to have the greatest capacity to enjoy Heaven that we possibly can when we finally meet the Lord face to face. That means that we should always be working to root out sin. Of course, we should prioritize eliminating grave sin, that is, serious sin. However, when we get to a point where we don’t habitually commit grave sin, we shouldn’t be satisfied with that. We can thank the Lord for it—after all, it’s only by His grace that we got there in first place—but once we root out, we should continue by trying to root even minor sin.
Because, although, thanks to the Lord’s mercy, we don’t need to be perfect when we die in order to get to Heaven; nonetheless, we won’t be able to enter Heaven until we become perfect. That’s why the Lord gives us Purgatory; so that any minor imperfections, any minor attachments to sin that remain when we die can be purified away. After all, if the souls in Heaven weren’t perfect, well, then it wouldn’t be Heaven.
Now, although it is a great mercy to be able to receive purification in Purgatory, we don’t want to plan to go Purgatory. We want to do our best to be as perfect as we possibly can when we die; by God’s grace, we want to try to go straight Heaven if we can. For one thing, if you aim for Heaven and fall a little short, you can still fall back on Purgatory. On the other hand, if you aim for Purgatory and fall short; well, it’s only downhill from there. Moreover, though, being purified in Purgatory doesn’t profit us like purifying ourselves here on earth does. To help us understand, we can draw an analogy: sin, in some ways, is a disease of the soul, so we can compare it to having a diseased limb. Working out our sins here on Earth, while we’re still alive, is like undergoing some therapy to get rid of the infection; perhaps an antibiotic. On the other hand, having our sins purified in purgatory is more like having the limb amputated; it gets rid of the problem, but it’s certainly not the cure you were hoping for.
Here’s why that is: while we’re still here on Earth, we still have the ability to grow in love. We can still increase our love for the Lord, the very thing we were created for. However, once our soul is separated from our body when we die, the love in our heart becomes fixed. However much love we have when we die, that’s the amount of love we’ll have for eternity. So, for those souls in purgatory, they are still truly purified from their sins; but that purification is not causing them to grow in love for the Lord like it would for those of us still here on Earth. That’s why eliminating sin now, while we’re still alive, is so much more to our profit than waiting until we get to purgatory.
So, my brothers and sisters, let us beware the trap that Pharisee from the parable has fallen into. Let us never become complacent with our progress in the spiritual life. All of us still have room to grow. Let us rather, be more like the tax collector: begging for God’s mercy and striving to amend our ways, even though it is difficult and our progress is slow sometimes. These efforts increase the love for the Lord in our hearts, and that love will be our capacity to enjoy Heaven for all eternity. By His grace, let us love the Lord as much as we possibly can.

October 26, 2025
Esta parábola demuestra los peligros del orgullo. El fariseo solo puede pensar en sus propios atributos positivos, mientras que el publicano simplemente implora la misericordia de Dios por sus pecados. Para ser justos con el fariseo, parece reconocer que todas las cosas buenas que enumera provienen de Dios. Sin embargo, nunca dice más; nunca le pide ayuda a Dios para crecer. Todo lo que puede hacer es pensar en sí mismo y reconocer todas las cosas dignas de elogio en su vida. No reconoce la necesidad de crecimiento.
Ahora bien, esta parábola no significa que no debamos agradecer a Dios por nuestros dones. Ciertamente deberíamos hacerlo, porque todo lo bueno que tenemos proviene de Él. Sin embargo, el peligro surge cuando los dones del Señor se convierten en una ocasión para exaltarnos. “Mírenme y cuán grande soy”. Como escribe San Pablo a los corintios: “¿Qué tienes que Dios no te haya dado? Y si él te lo ha dado, ¿por qué presumes, como si lo hubieras conseguido por ti mismo?” Cuando empezamos a atribuir los dones del Señor a nuestra supuesta grandeza, esto a menudo nos lleva a la autocomplacencia. Empezamos a pensar que somos tan grandes que no necesitamos crecer ni cambiar. En lugar de permitir que los dones del Señor nos hagan enorgullecernos, deberíamos reconocer aún más cuánto dependemos del Señor.
Esto se acentúa aún más con la presencia del publicano. Él es quien bajó a su casa justificado, no el fariseo. Su oración es muy sencilla: “Dios mío, apiádate de mí, que soy un pecador”. Todos deberíamos orar esto todos los días, y en el centro de esta oración está el deseo implícito de cambiar. Sería bastante audaz que alguien pidiera misericordia si solo pretendiera seguir pecando. Alguien que dice “lo siento”, pero no se siente remordimiento por lo que ha hecho y planea cambiar, en realidad no lo siente. Quien pide misericordia debe estar arrepentido; es decir, debe tener el deseo de cambiar, incluso si no está seguro de poder hacerlo. Al menos debería querer intentarlo.
Todos deberíamos tener esta actitud, porque todos necesitamos la misericordia del Señor. Sin duda, todos estamos en un punto diferente en la vida espiritual. Quien se ha acercado al Señor mediante la oración, y ha logrado vivir una vida moralmente recta, sin duda debe agradecerle al Señor por esto, pero nunca debemos caer en la autocomplacencia. Este es el mayor problema del fariseo de la parábola. Nunca reconoce sus faltas. No reconoce la necesidad de cambiar y crecer. No queremos caer en esta trampa; porque, por mucho que avancemos en la vida espiritual, siempre podemos acercarnos más al Señor. No queremos simplemente entrar al Cielo por un pelo, sino que queremos tener la mayor capacidad posible para disfrutar del Cielo. Esto significa que siempre debemos esforzarnos por erradicar el pecado. Por supuesto, debemos priorizar la eliminación del pecado grave. Sin embargo, cuando llegamos a un punto en el que no cometemos habitualmente pecados graves, no deberíamos conformarnos con esto. Debemos agradecerle al Señor por esto —después de todo, es sólo por su gracia que llegamos aquí—, pero cuando los erradiquemos, debemos seguir intentando erradicar incluso los pecados menores.
Porque, aunque no necesitamos ser perfectos al morir para ir al Cielo; sin embargo, no podremos entrar al Cielo hasta que seamos perfectos. Por esto, el Señor, en su misericordia, nos da el Purgatorio; para que cualquier pequeña imperfección, cualquier pequeño apego al pecado que quede al morir, pueda ser purificado. Después de todo, si las almas en el Cielo no fueran perfectas, bueno, entonces no sería el paraíso.
Ahora bien, aunque es una gran misericordia poder recibir la purificación en el Purgatorio, no queremos planear ir al Purgatorio. Queremos hacer todo por ser lo más perfectos posible cuando muramos; por la gracia de Dios, queremos intentar ir directamente al Cielo si podemos. Por un lado, si aspiras al Cielo y te quedas un poco corto, aún puedes recurrir al Purgatorio. Por otro lado, si aspiras al Purgatorio y te quedas corto; bueno, de ahí solo es cuesta abajo. Además, sin embargo, ser purificado en el Purgatorio no nos beneficia como lo hace purificarnos aquí en la tierra. Porque mientras estemos en la tierra, aún tenemos la capacidad de crecer en amor. Aún podemos aumentar nuestro amor por el Señor, para lo cual fuimos creados. Sin embargo, cuando morimos y las almas se separan del cuerpo, el amor en nuestro corazón se fija. La cantidad de amor que tengamos al morir, esta será el amor que tendremos por la eternidad. Así pues, las almas en el purgatorio sí están verdaderamente purificadas de sus pecados; pero esta purificación no las está llevando a crecer en amor por el Señor como lo haríamos con quienes aún estamos en la tierra. Por esto, eliminar el pecado ahora, mientras aún estamos vivos, nos beneficia mucho más que esperar hasta llegar al purgatorio.
Entonces, queridos hermanos, cuidémonos de la trampa en la que se cae el fariseo de la parábola. Nunca nos conformemos con nuestro progreso en la vida espiritual. Todos podemos crecer. Seamos como el publicano: implorando la misericordia de Dios y esforzándonos por eliminar el pecado de la vida, aunque a veces sea difícil y nuestro progreso sea lento. Estos esfuerzos acrecientan el amor al Señor en nuestros corazones, y este amor nos permitirá disfrutar del Cielo por toda la eternidad. Por su gracia, amemos al Señor tanto como podamos.

October 19, 2025
In the Gospel today, Jesus tells us about the importance of praying always. However, I think this parable is almost deceptively straightforward; I think it’s easy to miss the Lord’s full point here. When most people think of prayer, they often just think of asking the Lord for things; what we might call petitionary prayer. This certainly genuine prayer; but if I may be so bold, it’s the least important form of prayer. That’s not to say it’s unimportant, just that other forms of prayer are more important.
You see, prayer at its most basic, is simply lifting your mind and heart to God. It doesn’t always need to involve words; which is a good thing, because if prayer just meant saying things to God, I don’t know how we’d ever “pray always without becoming weary.” Honestly, I think even the Lord might get a little tired of it if we were just talking at Him all the time. After all, the Christian life is supposed to be about fostering a relationship with the Lord. Can you imagine a relationship where one person did all the talking without ever letting the other person get a word in edgewise? Even worse, can you imagine a relationship where one person always just asked the other person for things without ever listening to what they had to say? Our relationship with the Lord—our prayer life—should not just consist of us talking at Him or asking Him for a favor once in awhile when the going gets rough. Every relationship is supposed to be a two-way street, including our relationship with the Lord.
Now, unlike with human relationships, we don’t normally hear the Lord speaking with our ears; not unless He gives us a very special grace. However, the Lord still speaks to us, and the first way He does so is through His Word. I hope that everyone here takes some time to pray with the Scriptures every day, because that is the Lord’s love letter to you. And you’ll notice, I didn’t say read the Scriptures every day, because reading it is just step one. We should pray with the Scriptures every day. In this instance praying means letting Him talk to us.
One common way to do that is called lectio divina, which is Latin for ‘divine reading.’ Every day, choose a short passage from Scripture to pray with—the Mass readings for the day usually provide a good option for this. As you start, ask the Lord to speak to you; and then just read through it very, very slowly. As you read, something might jump out at you; if that happens, stop and meditate on it for a few moments. That’s probably the Holy Spirit trying to get your attention. Listen in your heart for what the Lord is trying to say to you. On the other hand, if you make it to the end of the reading without anything jumping out at you, that’s alright, just pick something to meditate on from the reading. After a few moments of praying with it in silence, pick up the passage and read through it slowly again. Something different might jump out at you this time; once that happens or once you make it to the end, stop and meditate on it again. The typical advice is do that a total of three times; and it doesn’t need to be long, 5 or 10 minutes a day is enough. The idea is to give the Lord room to speak to you through His Word, to allow some time of silence so that you can listen to Him. If during this process you want to say something to the Lord or ask Him a question, that’s fine; but the important thing is to listen to what He is saying.
Now one of the beautiful things about praying with Scriptures like this is how it teaches to listen to the Lord; because when we set aside that time dedicated to doing that, we start to grow more attentive to when the Lord speaks us throughout the day. For all of us who are in a state of grace, the Lord dwells in our souls; and He is always calling us closer to Himself. He is always speaking to us. Sadly, though, in our phrenetic world we are so bombarded with noise and stimulation of every kind that it becomes difficult to listen to the Lord. It’s easy to let Him get drowned out. By carving time out of our day specifically dedicated to being with Him, to letting Him speak, we grow attuned to hear His voice whenever He might speak to us. He’s always with us, of course, as long as we don’t cast Him out; but through fostering a life of prayer, we grow more aware of that presence throughout the day. We can recognize His presence with us more easily.
In addition, it becomes easier for us to lift our minds to God throughout the day. That can certainly include asking Him for things, but more than that it should include offering everything we do to the Lord. Our work, our play, our rest, all of these things are good, and we should recognize the Lord’s presence with us through them all, and offer them to Him as a prayer. It doesn’t need to be complicated, as you begin some task you can simply say to the Lord, “I offer this to you.” After all, we were made precisely to know and love Him, and thus everything we do should begin and end in Him. This is a concrete way of carrying His presence with us consciously throughout the day.
Now, back to our Gospel parable for the day. As I said, it’s almost deceptively simple. The widow going to the judge almost certainly wouldn’t have been engaged in the petty sort of lawsuits that we see all the time today, where someone, perhaps both parties, are just trying to make a quick buck. Probably, the widow was being deprived of something necessary. A common scenario would have been for someone rich to start maliciously encroaching on her land, or withholding a wage that she had earned, or something like that. She is almost certainly begging the judge to help her with something that she truly needs. Jesus isn’t saying to us, “Just keep asking God for something and eventually you’ll get it.” After all, often we ask for things that wouldn’t be good for us, whether we realize it or not. Jesus is saying, you don’t need to worry about whether your needs are going to be met, even if someone else treats you unjustly. You can trust the Lord. He loves you, and He wants what’s best for you. Do you think He would not care for someone who truly loves Him in return, who a fosters a relationship with Him, who offers everything to Him? Really that’s the most important thing. As long as we pray always, as long as we practice the presence of God throughout the day, everything else is gravy. The Lord is the One we are created for, He is the One we truly need; He is the one thing necessary. If we don’t make time for Him, everything else is a waste; because nothing else matters more than Him. If we do foster our relationship with Him, though, we need not worry about anything else.

October 19, 2025
En el evangelio hoy, Jesús nos habla de la importancia de orar siempre. Sin embargo, creo que esta parábola es casi engañosamente sencilla; creo que es muy fácil pasar por alto el punto completo del Señor aquí. Cuando muchas personas piensan en la oración, a menudo sólo piensan en pedirle cosas al Señor; lo que podríamos llamar oración de petición. Esto es ciertamente una oración genuina; pero si me permiten el atrevimiento, es la forma de oración menos importante. No digo que no sea importante, pero otras formas de oración son más importantes.
Verás, la oración, en su forma más básica, es simplemente elevarte la mente y el corazón a Dios. No siempre necesita incluir palabras; lo cual es bueno, porque si la oración simplemente fuera decirle cosas a Dios, no sé cómo podríamos “orar siempre y sin desfallecer”. Honestamente, sospecho que incluso el Señor se cansaría un poco si solo le habláramos todo el tiempo. Después de todo, la vida cristiana se supone que consistir en fomentar una relación con el Señor. ¿Te imaginas una relación en la que una persona sea la única que hable sin dejar que la otra intervenga jamás? Peor aún, ¿te imaginas una relación en la que una persona siempre le pide cosas a la otra sin escuchar nunca lo que tiene que decir? Nuestra relación con el Señor —nuestra vida de oración— no debería consistir solamente en que nosotros le hablemos o simplemente le pidamos un favor de vez en cuando si las cosas se ponen difíciles. Cada relación debe ir en dos direcciones, incluida nuestra relación con el Señor.
Ahora bien, a diferencia de las relaciones humanas, normalmente el Señor no nos habla con palabras que escuchamos con los oídos; a menos que nos conceda una gracia muy especial. Sin embargo, el Señor de verdad nos habla; y la primera manera en que lo hace es a través de su Palabra. Espero que todos los presentes nos tomemos un tiempo para orar con las Escrituras todos los días, porque esta es la carta de amor del Señor para ti. Y da cuenta de que no dije leer las Escrituras cada día, porque leerlas es solamente el primer paso. Debemos orar con las Escrituras todos los días. En este caso, orar significa dejar que Él nos hable.
Una forma común de hacerlo se llama lectio divina, que en latín significa ‘lectura divina’. Cada día, elige un pasaje corto de la Escritura para orar; las lecturas de la misa del día suelen ser una opción buena. Al comenzar, pídele al Señor que te hable y luego léelo muy, muy despacio. Mientras lees, puede que algo te llame la atención; si esto sucede, detente y medita sobre eso unos momentos. Probablemente sea el Espíritu Santo tratando de llamar tu atención. Escucha en tu corazón lo que el Señor intenta decirte. Por otro lado, si llegas al final de la lectura sin que nada te llame la atención, está bien, simplemente elige algo de la lectura para meditar. Después de unos momentos de orar en silencio, retoma el pasaje y léelo de nuevo lentamente. Puede que algo diferente te llame la atención esta vez, o posiblemente la misma cosa; cuando esto suceda o cuando llegues al final, detente y medita otra vez. El consejo típico es hacer esto un total de tres veces; y no necesita ser largo, cinco o diez minutos al día son suficientes. La idea es darle espacio al Señor para que te hable a través de Su Palabra, para permitirle un tiempo de silencio para que puedas escucharlo. Si durante este proceso quieres decirle algo al Señor o hacerle una pregunta, está bien; pero lo importante es escuchar lo que Él dice.
Una de las cosas hermosas de orar de esta manera es que nos enseña a escuchar al Señor; porque cuando dedicamos el tiempo para hacerlo, empezamos a estar más atentos a cuando el Señor nos habla por el día entero. Para todos los que estamos en estado de gracia, el Señor nos mora en las almas; y siempre nos llama a acercarnos a Él. Siempre nos habla. Lamentablemente, hoy en día estamos tan bombardeados por ruido y estímulos de todo tipo que se nos hace difícil escuchar al Señor. Es fácil dejar que el Señor se ahogue. Al dedicarnos tiempo del día específicamente a estar con Él, a dejar que nos hable, nos entrenamos para escuchar su voz cuando quiera que nos hable. Él siempre está con nosotros, por supuesto, siempre y cuando no nos lo echen de las almas; pero al cultivar una vida de oración, nos hacemos más conscientes de su presencia por el día entero. Podemos reconocer su presencia con nosotros más fácilmente.
Además, nos resulta más fácil elevarnos la mente a Dios por el día. Esto puede incluir pedirle cosas, sin duda, pero más que esto, debería incluir ofrecerle todo lo que hacemos. Nuestro trabajo, nuestra diversión, nuestro descanso, todos son buenos, y debemos reconocer la presencia del Señor con nosotros en todos y ofrecérselo en oración. No tiene que ser complicado; al comenzar una tarea, simplemente dígale al Señor: “Te ofrezco esto”. Después de todo, fuimos creados precisamente para conocerlo y amarlo, y, por lo tanto, todo lo que hacemos debe comenzar y terminar en Él. Esta es una manera concreta de llevar su presencia conscientemente con nosotros por el día entero.
Ahora, volvamos a la parábola del Evangelio de hoy. Como dije, es engañosamente simple. La viuda que acude al juez seguramente no estaría involucrada en los pleitos insignificantes que vemos a diario, donde alguien, quizás ambas partes, solo intenta ganar dinero fácil. Probablemente, la viuda era privada de algo necesario. Una situación común era cuando alguien rico comenzara a usurpar maliciosamente sus tierras, o a retener un salario que ella ganó, o algo por el estilo. Casi seguro que le está rogando al juez que la ayude con algo que realmente necesitaba. Jesús no nos dice: “Sigue pidiéndole algo a Dios y con el tiempo lo conseguirás.” Después de todo, a menudo pedimos cosas que no nos harían bien, nos demos cuenta o no. Jesús dice que no tenemos que preocuparnos por si nuestras necesidades serán satisfechas, incluso si alguien nos trata injustamente. Podemos confiar en el Señor. Él nos ama y quiere lo mejor para nosotros. ¿Crees que a Él no le importaría alguien que lo ame de verdad, que cultive una relación con Él, que se lo ofrezca todo? En realidad, esto es lo más importante. Mientras oremos siempre, mientras practiquemos la presencia de Dios por el día entero, todo lo demás será ganancia. El Señor es para quien fuimos creados; Él es lo único necesario. Si no dedicamos tiempo a Él, todo lo demás es un desperdicio; porque nada importa más que Él. Sin embargo, si cultivamos la relación con Él, no tenemos que preocuparnos por nada más.

October 12, 2025
I think a little historical context would help us understand the Gospel passage for today. The Samaritans are mentioned plenty of times throughout the Gospels, but I suspect most people don’t really know who they were. The Samaritans were Israelites, just like the Jews. Originally, under King David all 12 tribes of Israel were united as one kingdom. However, King David’s grandson Rehoboam was such a cruel king that 10 of the tribes broke off from him, so Israel was split into the 10 tribes of the Northern Kingdom, and the 2 tribes of the Southern Kingdom. The Samaritans were from Samaria, part of the Northern Kingdom; and the Jews were from Judea, the Southern Kingdom. Now, the Samaritans and the Jews basically hated each other, even though they were brothers, in a sense.
However, for these ten lepers in the Gospel, it seems that the hatred between Jews and Samaritans has dissolved in the midst of the desperate situation that they’ve found themselves in. You see, to contract leprosy in Ancient Israel was basically to be dead to the world. Now, the word that we translate as leprosy in the Bible probably doesn’t only refer to Hansen’s disease, what we call leprosy today. In the Bible, it seems to refer to a variety of skin conditions, and not all of them seem to be as deadly or debilitating as modern leprosy. Still, contracting leprosy meant that you became an outcast; you had to live away from the rest of society, and you had to cry out “unclean, unclean” if anyone started coming near you. Perhaps the worst part of leprosy in Biblical times was the isolation it brought. It seems only natural, then, that the ten lepers in the Gospel today have formed their own group, despite the hostility between Jews and Samarians.
When this group sees Jesus, they see a sign of hope, a sign that they might not be forced to remain in this wretched state for the rest of their lives. They shout out to Him from afar, “Jesus, Master! Have pity on us!” And of course, He heals them. This healing provides a metaphor for all of us. Just as lepers were dead to the world, so too all of us were born spiritually dead, in that state of separation from God that we call Original Sin. Without God’s help, we could never have been saved from this spiritual death. That is why Jesus took pity on all of us, as He did on the lepers. He allowed Himself to die, even though death had no claim on Him, so that all of us might be raised to life. He gives us that life through Baptism, a Baptism into His death. As St. Paul says in the second reading today, “If we have died with Him we shall also live with Him.” By entering into Jesus’ death in Baptism, we also enter into new life with Him. That’s what Jesus’ healing offers to the lepers today: a new life. Interestingly, though, only one of the lepers comes back to thank Jesus: the Samaritan.
Now, another important detail that underlies this story is that the Samaritans were idolaters. You see, the Jewish Temple was in Jerusalem, in the Southern Kingdom. When the Northern Kingdom first broke off, the northern citizens—the Samaritans—were still going down to Jerusalem in order to fulfill their religious duties. However, the first Northern King, Jeroboam, was worried that these three yearly pilgrimages to the Southern Kingdom would eventually lead his subjects to stay down there. So, he established two temples of his own in two different corners of the Northern Kingdom. He set up golden calves in each temple, and told his subjects that the calves were their God. In other words, Jeroboam instituted an idolatrous religion, which was practiced in Samaria right down to Jesus’ day. When Jesus tells the lepers, “Go show yourselves to the priests,” it’s probable that the Samaritan was going to the idolatrous Samaritan priests; not the authentic Jewish priests. However, despite his false religion, he is the only one who comes back to thank Jesus for the gift of being healed. I think this, too, can provide a metaphor for us Catholics.
You see, when Jesus initially founded the Church, there was only one Church, united under St. Peter. Sadly, over the centuries, many groups have broken off of the one true Church. Some have maintained valid sacraments, but the majority have not; at least not all seven. Thanks be to God, most Christian denominations have maintained a valid Baptism, and so we can rejoice that we all are still cleansed from our sins, just like all ten lepers were healed in the Gospel today. However, despite the objectively greater grace that we have available to us in all seven sacraments as Catholics, many of our Protestant brothers and sisters are more on fire with love for the Lord than we are. Many of them strive to foster a closer relationship with Christ than we do. I fear that having such easy access to the Lord’s grace through the sacraments has caused many of us to take the Lord’s love for granted. Hopefully it goes without saying that this isn’t a trap we want to fall into, and one of the biggest ways we can avoid it is by following the example of the Samaritan leper today: by practicing gratitude. Let us all take a moment to examine our conscience: do I thank the Lord for all the great graces He has given to me? Do I thank Him for dying on the Cross for me? For saving me through Baptism? For coming to me in Holy Communion every Sunday? For giving me such easy access to His forgiveness in sacramental Confession? The sacraments always impart grace; but thanking the Lord is a great way to further dispose ourselves to receive that grace, and to allow that grace to continue to bear fruit in our lives beyond the initial moment of its reception. On the other hand, if we don’t thank the Lord, we risk letting our souls grow cold toward Him; we risk taking for granted the very One Whom it is our destiny to love forever.
My brothers and sisters, let us always strive to be grateful to the Lord for all He has done and for all the grace He continues to give; because He never had to do any of it. The Lord does not owe us any of this, but He freely gives it out of love. Since He gives Himself so completely to us in the sacraments, let us always be grateful to Him in return. Let us always thank Him for the graces that He gives us, and let us too strive to gives ourselves completely to Him in the way we live our lives.

October 5, 2025
“If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you would say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you.” No doubt, this saying of Jesus gives us pause; I suspect that for most of us, if we went around commanding trees to be uprooted we wouldn’t get very far. In order to understand this saying better, I think it would be helpful to look at the verse that comes just before the Gospel reading for today: “If [your brother] wrongs you seven times in one day and returns to you seven times saying, ‘I am sorry,’ you should forgive him.” This might seem unrelated to the Gospel today, but suppose your brother really did sin against you seven times in one day. Perhaps after the first time or two, it would be easy enough to say, “I forgive you.” But seven times? Honestly, even after the third time I’m beginning to question the genuineness of his sorrow. Forgiving him seven times seems almost impossible. In fact, for our fallen human nature, I dare say it is impossible.
It is at hearing this command of Jesus that the Apostles ask Him to increase their faith; because they recognize that without faith, such a radical willingness to forgive is as impossible as commanding a tree to be uprooted from the ground all on its own. As Jesus indicates, though, with even the smallest amount of faith the impossible becomes possible. This brings us to an important question, though: what, exactly, is faith? I think most people have an idea, but I’m not sure that everyone has the same idea. Faith is a word that gets thrown around a lot, and I think it can be easy to take for granted that we’re all talking about the same thing. Some people think that faith means believing something with no evidence, or even believing something despite all evidence to the contrary. These things are certainly not Christian faith. You see, as Christians, we know that the Lord has created us with intellects; and when He gives us something, He expects us to use it. The Lord would not ask us to violate the gift of rationality that He has given us by asking us to accept something that all evidence seems to suggest is not true. Rather, He has given us our reason, as one means by which we can approach Him, Who is Truth Himself. True faith would never ask us to accept something that is irrational or illogical—such things lead us away from God, not toward Him. However, Fatih does sometimes ask us to accept things that are beyond what reason can attain on its own. I think we can all see, though, that there’s a big difference between accepting something that reason suggests ought to be false, and accepting something that reason simply can’t verify on its own. The first is foolishness, only the second is faith.
Genuine Christian Faith recognizes that God is Truth Himself, and that Truth cannot lie. Faith is the choice, made with the help of grace, to accept what God has revealed on the grounds that what God tells us cannot possibly be false. To put it very simply, faith is taking God at His Word. Faith isn’t accepting something on no evidence at all, it’s just accepting something without personally seeing the whole picture. As Jesus tells St. Thomas, “Blessed are those who have not seen ad have believed.” And if you think about it, we exercise a similar kind of faith all the time in our personal lives. For example, when our mother tells us she loves us, we don’t ask her to prove it, we just trust that she wouldn’t lie about that. When we buy food at the grocery store, we don’t personally verify that it contains every ingredient that the box says it does; we usually just trust that the manufacturer is labelling its products accurately. When we learned in science class that the earth is round and not flat, we couldn’t directly observe that ourselves. We just trust that our teacher is giving us accurate information. In most cases, if someone we know tells us something, we just trust that they’re telling us the truth.
My point is, if we want to be normal, functioning members of society, we can’t possibly scrutinize every piece of information that we receive. For the vast majority of things that we ‘know,’ we’re just trusting what someone else has told us. This is a kind of faith, and it gives us a direct analogy to understand Christian Faith properly. As I said already, God is Truth itself; and what Truth says must be true. We don’t need to doubt what God reveals to us. The only question that remains is how to tell whether a proposed revelation from God is genuine. After all, there are many religions in the world that all claim to have revelation from God. And while they do often overlap on a lot of points in their teaching; sometimes different religions say different things that can’t both be true. How do we know whom to trust? Well, as Jesus tells us in the Sermon on the Mount, “by their fruits you will know them.” Jesus Christ claimed to be the definitive revelation of God, because He was God Himself; and He vindicated that claim by rising from the dead. Now of course, none of us was there when He did; we can’t personally verify that He rose from the dead. But He appeared to His disciples for forty days afterwards; and nearly all of them died because they would not deny that Christ rose from the dead. Most of them accepted martyrdom for the claim that Christ was Who He said He was. They passed on that message to others, and it been passed right on down to us; with many, many others gladly choosing to surrender their lives for Christ along the way. My brothers and sisters, you don’t accept death for something that’s a lie; especially not the torturous deaths that most of the Apostles endured. Upon their witness, we can trust that Jesus Christ was and is Who He said He was. Jesus Christ is the definitive revelation of God, truth Himself. We can have Faith that the Christian message is true. Armed with this faith, the Apostles changed the world. And with this Faith, we too can move mountains. Perhaps not by physically uprooting trees from the earth, but at least first and foremost by uprooting the trees of sin and unforgiveness in our own hearts. We cannot possibly do this on our own; we need Christ, and Faith is the first step to inviting Him into our hearts. Lord, increase our Faith.

September 28, 2025
My brothers and sisters, I think that as Americans, this reading should prick our consciences a little. You might not be the richest person that you know, but I suspect that almost none of us in this church is worried about where our next meal is coming from. And we can give thanks to God for that; food security is not a bad thing by any means. However, I’m sure we all know that there are people right here in our own city who don’t always know where their next meal is coming from. How often have we looked the other way when we see someone in need, as the rich man in the parable today? How often have we even refused someone when they come to us specifically asking for help?
Now, I’ll grant you that people of our own day struggle with some things to a much greater degree than they would have in Jesus’ day. An obvious example that comes to mind is drug addiction; habitual drunkenness was certainly around even in Jesus’ time, but I suspect that they didn’t have the same drug epidemic that we do today. Many people are understandably worried that if they give cash to someone who asks for it on the street, the person might just spend it on drugs. To be honest, I don’t know for sure that just refusing them is necessarily the best thing to do, but all things considered it doesn’t seem entirely unreasonable to me either. And for that matter, shoving a dollar bill in someone’s face because they make you uncomfortable and you just want to make them go away isn’t necessarily the most virtuous motivation either.
Having said that, while it’s fine to be concerned about how the person will use the money that you might give them, that’s not an excuse to refuse them help entirely. After all, this person is a fellow human being, called to the same eternal life of happiness with God that we all are. Arguably, the failure to recognize the dignity and humanity of Lazarus was the rich man’s biggest sin in the parable. Lazarus lay at his door every day, and the rich man just ignored him. Even after they both die, the rich man seems to think that Lazarus is just there to do whatever he wants Lazarus to do. He says, “Father Abraham, have pity on me. Send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue.” And later he says, “I beg you, father, send him to my father’s house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them.” Throughout the whole Gospel passage, the rich man fails to see Lazarus as an equal in any sense, even when he finds himself in Hell.
I fear that many of us fall into a similar trap with our brothers and sisters around us who are in need. It can be so easy to look on others as inferior, to judge them by thinking that it’s their own fault that they’re poor, or to think that they don’t deserve our help. It may be the case that the person lacks money through some fault of their own, but it might also be the case that they’re not going to get out of their poverty without someone else’s help. Perhaps they don’t deserve it, but we shouldn’t let that stop us. The English Catholic thinker G. K. Chesterton once said, “It is true that there is a thing crudely called charity, which means charity to the deserving poor; but charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them.” And if you don’t find that convincing, never forget that we did not deserve to have Christ die on the Cross for us. I dare say that if we start demanding that people only receive what they deserve, every one of us would soon find ourselves in Hell.
Of course, that still leaves the concern of some people that just giving a person cash on the street might not really be the best way to help them. If they do indeed go and spend it on drugs, they’re no better off than before they came to you. So, if you do prudently decide that giving them cash isn’t the best thing, alright; but most of the time we can still do something to help them. If you’re not just going to hand out cash, then decide what you are going to do. Perhaps next time you can offer to buy them lunch, or point them to a charitable organization that could help them better than you can. For that matter, if you’re not comfortable giving cash to the person directly, you can at least get into the habit—if you’re not already—of giving to organizations that specialize in helping people in need: food cupboards, homeless shelters, addiction recovery programs, etc. We all ought to do what we can to help the poor.
Finally, I would be remiss if I did not mention the more spiritual side of this parable. Each of us here is no doubt in a different place when it comes to material wealth; but all of us here are rich beyond compare with spiritual wealth. Every one of us has been saved from sin in Baptism, and many of us have been sealed with the Holy Spirit in Confirmation. We can eat the Body and Blood of Our Lord every single day if we want to; we can literally have God Almighty dwelling within us. My brothers and sisters, every person that we meet is hungry for what we have; because every person was created for a life of communion with the Lord. We dine sumptuously on these gifts every week, some of us every day; and yet there are many all around us who are spiritually starving. The trouble is, most people don’t know what they’re missing when it comes to the spiritual life; they might recognize that something’s missing from their life, but a lot of people don’t recognize what, or rather who, it is that they’re hungry for. That is why it is incumbent upon every one of us to evangelize to those around us; to share the spiritual riches that we have received from the Lord, to invite others to this banquet with us. It’s their choice whether to come or not; but we will be held accountable for the way we shared the Good News.
Let us always strive to be generous with the riches that the Lord has given to us, both material and spiritual; because the Lord identifies Himself very closely with the poor throughout the Gospels. We are called to love Christ in them, and we will be judged accordingly.

September 28, 2025
Queridos hermanos, creo las conciencias de muchos que vivimos en los Estados Unidos deberían remordernos un poco cuando escuchamos esta lectura. Puede que no seas la persona más rica que conoces, pero sospecho que a muchos en esta iglesia no nos preocupa de dónde vendrá nuestra próxima comida. Y podemos dar gracias a Dios por esto; la seguridad alimentaria no es algo malo en ningún sentido. Sin embargo, estoy seguro que todos sabemos que hay personas aquí en nuestra cuidad que no siempre saben de donde vendrá su próxima comida. Posiblemente, algunas están en esta iglesia. ¿Cuántas veces hemos mirado para otro lado cuando vemos a alguien necesitado, como el hombre rico de la parábola hoy? ¿Cuántas veces hemos rechazado a alguien que viene a nosotros pidiendo específicamente ayuda?
Ahora bien, les concedo que la gente de nuestros días lucha con algunas cosas en un grado mucho mayor que en los días de Jesús. Un ejemplo obvio es la adicción; la embriaguez habitual ciertamente existía en el tiempo de Jesús, pero sospecho que ellos no tenían la misma epidemia de drogas que tenemos hoy. Es entendible que a muchas personas les preocupe que si le dan dinero a alguien que se lo pide en la calle, esa persona pueda gastarlo en drogas. No sé con seguridad si simplemente rechazarla sea necesariamente la mejor decisión, pero considerando todo, tampoco me parece del todo irrazonable. Y, también, darle efectivo a alguien porque te hace sentir incómodo y solo quieres que se vaya tampoco es la motivación más virtuosa.
Dicho esto, aunque está bien preocuparnos sobre como una persona va a usar el dinero que le demos, no es excusa para negarles cualquier tipo de ayuda. Después de todo, esta persona es un ser humano, llamado a la misma vida eterna de felicidad con Dios que todos estamos llamados a vivir. Podría decirse que la falta de reconocimiento de la dignidad y humanidad de Lázaro fue el mayor pecado del hombre rico en la parábola de hoy. Lázaro yacía a la entrada de su casa cada día, y el hombre rico simplemente lo ignoró. Incluso después de que ambos mueren, el hombre rico todavía parece pensar que Lázaro está allí sólo para hacer lo que él quiere que Lázaro hague. Dice, “Padre Abraham, ten piedad de mí. Manda a Lázaro que moje en agua la punta de su dedo y me refresque la lengua.” Y luego dice, “Te ruego, entonces, padre Abraham, que mandes a Lázaro a mi casa, pues me quedan allá cinco hermanos, para que les advierta.” Por el pasajero entero, el hombre rico no logra ver a Lázaro como un igual en ningún sentido, incluso cuando se encuentra en el infierno.
Me temo que muchos caigamos en una trampa similar con otras personas que están en necesidad. Es muy fácil considerar a los pobres como inferiores, juzgarlos pensando que es su culpa ser pobres o pensar que no merecen nuestra ayuda. Sí, puede ser que la persona carezca de dinero por su culpa propria, pero también puede ser que no pueda salir de su pobreza sin la ayuda de otra persona. Quizás no la merezca, pero no dejes que eso te detenga. Chesterton dijo una vez, “Es cierto que existe algo que suele llamarse caridad, y que equivale a la caridad que se ejerce con los pobres, que se lo merecen. Pero la caridad ejercida con quienes la merecen no es en absoluto caridad, sino justicia. Son quienes no la merecen los que la necesitan, y el ideal, o bien no existe en absoluto, o bien existe del todo para ellos.” Si esto no te convence, nunca olvidemos que no merecíamos que Cristo muriera en la cruz por nosotros. Me atrevo a decir que si exigimos que las personas sólo reciban lo que merecen, todos nosotros pronto nos encontraríamos en el infierno.
Pro supuesto, esto aún deja con la preocupación de algunas personas de que simplemente darle dinero a alguien en la calle podría no ser realmente la mejor manera de ayudarlo. Si de verdad lo gastan en drogas, en realidad no estarán en mejor situación que antes de acudirte. Entonces, si prudentemente decides que darle efectivo no es lo mejor que puedes hacer, está bien; pero la mayoría de las veces al menos podemos hacer algo para ayudarlo. Si no vas a darle efectivo, entonces decide lo que sí vas a hacer. Quizás le ofrezca comprarle la almuerza o indicarle una organización benéfica que podría ayudarlo mejor que tú. De hecho, si no te sientes cómodo dándole dinero directamente a la persona, al menos puedes adquirir el hábito (si aún no lo haces) de donar a organizaciones que se especializan en ayudar a personas necesitadas: bancos de alimentos, refugios para indigentes, programas de recuperación de adicciones, etc. Todos debemos hacer lo que podamos para ayudar a los pobres.
Por último, yo sería negligente si no mencionara el lado más espiritual de esta parábola. Sin duda, cada uno de nosotros aquí está en un lugar diferente en lo que respecta a la riqueza material; pero todos aquí somos ricos más allá de toda comparación con la riqueza espiritual. La mayoría de nosotros fuimos salvados del pecado en el Bautismo, y muchos fuimos sellados con el Espíritu Santo en la Confirmación. Podemos comer el cuerpo y la sangre de Nuestro Señor cada día si queremos; literalmente podemos tener a Dios Todopoderoso morando dentro de nosotros. Queridos hermanos, cada persona que encontramos tiene hambre por lo que tenemos; porque cada persona fue creada por una vida de comunión con el Señor. Nos banqueteamos espléndidamente en estos regalos cada semana, algunos cada día; y sin embargo, hay muchos a nuestro alrededor que están hambrientos espiritualmente. El problema es que muchas personas no saben lo que se pierden en lo que respecta a la vida espiritual; posiblemente reconocen que les falta algo en su vida, pero no reconocen quó, o mejor dicho, quién, es lo que anhelan. Por eso, cada uno de nosotros necesitamos evangelizar a quienes nos rodean, compartir las riquezas espirituales que recibimos del Señor, invitar a otros a este banquete. Depende de ellos elegir se vienen no, pero seremos responsables de si compartimos o no las Buenas Nuevas.
Entonces, procuremos siempre ser generosos con las riquezas que el Señor nos ha dado, tanto materiales como espirituales; porque el Señor se identifica muy estrechamente con los pobres en los Evangelios. Estamos llamados a amar a Cristo en ellos, y Él nos juzgará en consecuencia.

September 21, 2025, 2025
The parable that we hear in the Gospel today is probably one of the most difficult to understand in all of Scripture. It sounds like Jesus is commending the steward in the story for stealing from his master. Of course, we know that can’t be correct. The Ten Commandments very clearly forbid stealing, and an important principle when trying to understand the Bible or anything else in the Church is that what is more clear should interpret that which is less clear, not the other way around. It is very clear that stealing is wrong. It’s not immediately clear exactly what Jesus is commending here, because all He says is that “the master commended that dishonest steward for acting prudently.”
In order to better understand what Jesus is trying to teach us here, let us look as what He says when He finishes the parable: “For the children of this world are more prudent in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. I tell you, make friends for yourselves with dishonest wealth, so that when it fails, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.” A clearer way to translate the latter sentence would be: “Make friends for yourselves by means of the wealth of unrighteousness.” First of all, He’s not saying become friends with the wealth, He’s saying use it to make friends; this is the action that the master in the parable praises, not the stealing. He is praising the unfaithful steward’s prudence for making friends, despite his wickedness in stealing the money. Second, Jesus is not instructing that we should strive to obtain wealth dishonestly, He’s just applying the term ‘dishonest’ or ‘unrighteous’ to earthly wealth in general. Thus, Jesus is exhorting us to use the earthly wealth that we have—unrighteous though it is—to make friends for ourselves, so that when the unrighteous wealth fails, we will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.
Now that we hopefully understand what Jesus is saying to us in this passage, I don’t think it should come as any surprise to us. After all, the thing that determines whether we will go to heaven or not is the love that’s in our hearts. Our wealth and our material possessions are ultimately nothing; and when we die they will turn to dust and ashes. The love that is in our hearts, though, that will last for eternity; and indeed, the amount of love in our hearts is what will determine our capacity to enjoy Heaven for eternity. Because Heaven is nothing more or less than loving God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. The person with more love in their heart when they die will be able to love more in Heaven. That’s why Jesus exhorts us in the Gospel today to make friends by means of unrighteous wealth. The wealth has an expiration date; true friendship and true love do not.
Jesus goes on to say, “The person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matters is also dishonest in great ones.” I think this is a lesson that we often fail to take to heart. In fact, we tend to believe almost the opposite. We tend to think that we can cut corners with small things as long as we do what’s right when it ‘really counts,’ so to speak. In reality, though, every choice we make is when it really counts, because every choice we make disposes our heart either to love God and neighbor more or to love God and neighbor less. In keeping with the Gospel today, let’s take the example of generosity. Whenever we make use of our material possessions, what we do with them shapes our relationship to them. If we use our possessions generously for our neighbor and temperately for ourselves, our hearts will be more disposed to love God and neighbor. On the other hand, if we use our possessions selfishly, our hearts will just be more disposed to love our stuff. The more attached we are to material things, the less disposed we are to love God and neighbor. As Jesus says in the Gospel, “No servant can serve two masters. He will either hate one and love the other or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and mammon.” That’s why it’s important to be generous with what we have; the more we use our wealth for the wellbeing of our neighbor, the more generosity and detachment we foster in our souls. In other words, the more we teach our hearts to love.
On a related note, it strikes me as a happy coincidence that today also happens to be the feast day of St. Matthew the Apostle. As I’m sure most of us know, St. Matthew was a tax-collector before Jesus called Him to be His Apostle, and tax-collectors were notorious in Jesus’ day for demanding more money than was really owed. You see, the tax collectors were just responsible for getting the money that Rome demanded. Anything that they could collect beyond that they were free to keep for themselves. When Jesus calls Matthew to be His Apostle, He invites Matthew to stop depending on what he can extort from others, and instead to start focusing on what he can give to others. When St. Luke recounts the call of Matthew’s, he says that Matthew left everything behind to follow Jesus and even threw a large banquet for Him. We can notice here that when Mattew responds to the call of Jesus, he stops taking and he starts giving, even giving lavishly. This is always the proper response to an invitation from Christ. Christ invites us not to focus on ourselves but to focus on others. As St. John Paul II said, “Man cannot fully find himself, except through a sincere gift of himself.” Being generous with our possessions is the first, small way that we can start to do this.
So, let us always strive to use our possessions in the way that God intended us to. We are meant to love people and use things; not to love things and use people, as so many do today. In order to do this, we need to be detached from our material possessions, which is most easily accomplished by being generous with them. When we are truly detached from stuff, our hearts are more free to live the life that God created us to live. Our hearts are more free to love God and neighbor.

Septiembre 21, 2025
La parábola que escuchamos en el evangelio hoy probablemente es una de las más difíciles de entender de todas las Escrituras. Parece que Jesús elogia al administrador de la parábola por robarle a su amo. Por supuesto, sabemos que esto no es correcto; los Diez Mandamientos prohíben muy claramente robar. Y un principio importante al tratar de entender la Biblia o cualquier otra cosa en la Iglesia: lo que es más claro debe interpretar lo que es menos claro, no al revés. Es muy claro que robar está mal. No está completamente claro qué es lo que Jesús recomienda aquí, al menos a primera vista; pero sabemos que no puede ser robo.
Para entender mejor lo que Jesús nos enseña aquí, miremos lo que dice cuando termina la parábola: “Pues los que pertenecen a este mundo son más hábiles en sus negocios, que los que pertenecen a la luz. Y yo les digo: Con el dinero, tan lleno de injusticias, gánense amigos que, cuando ustedes mueran, los reciban en el cielo”. De esto, podemos ver que el amo en la parábola recomienda al administrador por usar dinero para ganarse amigos, no por robarlo. Elogia la prudencia del administrador infiel por hacer amigos, a pesar de su maldad al robar el dinero. Además, Jesús usa la frase “lleno de injusticias” para describir todo dinero; no nos dice que obtengamos dinero injustamente. Entonces, Jesús nos exhorta a usar las riquezas terrenales que tenemos —aunque sean injustas— para hacernos amigos, para que cuando las riquezas injustas falten, seamos bienvenidos en las moradas eternas.
Con esta comprensión de lo que Jesús dice en este pasaje, no creo que esta enseñanza debería sorprendernos. Después de todo, lo que determina si iremos al cielo o no es el amor que hay en nuestros corazones. Nuestras posesiones materiales, nuestro dinero, en última instancia no son nada; y cuando morimos, serán polvo y cenizas. Sin embargo, el amor que hay en nuestros corazones durará por la eternidad; y, de hecho, la cantidad de amor en nuestros corazones es lo que determinará nuestra capacidad de disfrutar del Cielo por la eternidad. Porque la vida en el Cielo no es nada más ni menos que amar a Dios con todo tu corazón, mente, alma y fuerzas. La persona con más amor en su corazón al morir podrá amar más en el Cielo. Por eso Jesús nos exhorta en el Evangelio a ganar amigos por medio de las riquezas injustas. La riqueza tiene caducidad; la verdadera amistad y el verdadero amor no.
Jesús sigue diciendo: “El que es fiel en las cosas pequeñas, también es fiel en las grandes; y el que es infiel en las cosas pequeñas, también es infiel en las grandes”. Creo que esta enseñanza, a menudo, no la tomamos en serio. De hecho, tendemos a creer lo contrario. Tendemos a creer que las cosas pequeñas no son muy importantes, siempre y cuando hagamos lo correcto cuando ‘realmente importa’, por así decirlo. Pero en realidad, cada escogimiento que hacemos realmente importa; porque cada escogimiento que hacemos dispone nuestro corazón a amar más a Dios y al prójimo o a amar menos a Dios y al prójimo. Siguiendo el Evangelio de hoy, tomemos el ejemplo de la generosidad. Siempre que usamos nuestras posesiones materiales, lo que hacemos con ellas moldea nuestra relación con ellas. Si usamos nuestras posesiones generosamente para nuestro prójimo y templadamente para nosotros mismos, nuestros corazones estarán más dispuestos a amar a Dios y al prójimo. Por otro lado, si usamos nuestras posesiones egoístamente, nuestros corazones simplemente estarán más dispuestos a amar nuestras cosas. Cuanto más apegados estamos a las cosas materiales, menos dispuestos estaremos a amar a Dios y al prójimo. Como Jesús dicen en el evangelio: “No hay criado que pueda servir a dos amos, pues odiará a uno y amará al otro, o se apegará al primero y despreciará al segundo. En resumen, no pueden ustedes servir a Dios y al dinero”. Por eso es importante ser generosos con lo que tenemos; cuanto más usemos nuestra riqueza para el bienestar del prójimo, más generosidad y desapego fomentaremos en nuestra alma. En otras palabras, más enseñaremos a nuestros corazones a amar.
Una nota relacionada: me parece una feliz coincidencia que hoy también sea el día de la festividad de San Mateo Apóstol. Estoy seguro de que muchos aquí sabemos que San Mateo era un recaudador de impuestos antes de que Jesús lo llamara para ser su apóstol, y los recaudadores eran conocidos en aquellos días por exigir más dinero del que realmente se debía. Los recaudadores solo eran responsables de conseguir el dinero que Roma exigía. Todo lo que pudieran recolectar más allá de eso, eran libres de conservarlo para sí mismos. Cuando Jesús llama a Mateo para ser su apóstol, lo invita a dejar de depender de lo que puede extorsionar y, en cambio, a comenzar a centrarse en lo que puede dar a otros. San Lucas nos dice que cuando Mateo responde al llamado de Jesús, deja todo para seguir a él, e incluso le organizó un gran banquete. Notemos que cuando Mateo responde al llamado de Jesús, deja de tomar y comienza a dar, incluso dando generosamente. Esta es siempre la respuesta adecuada a una invitación de Cristo. Cristo nos invita a no centrarnos en nosotros mismos, sino a centrarnos en los demás. Como San Juan Pablo II dijo, “el hombre no puede encontrar su propia plenitud si no es en la entrega sincera de sí mismo a los demás”. Ser generosos con nuestras posesiones es una pequeña manera en que podemos comenzar a hacer esto.
Entonces, siempre usemos nuestras posesiones en la manera que Dios quiere. Estamos destinados a amar a las personas y usar las cosas; no a amar las cosas y usar a las personas, como muchos lo hacen hoy en día. Para lograr esto, necesitamos desapegarnos de nuestras posesiones materiales, lo cual se logra más fácilmente siendo generosos con ellas. Cuando estamos verdaderamente desapegados de las cosas, nuestros corazones son más libres para vivir la vida que Dios nos creó para vivir. Nuestros corazones son más libres para amar a Dios y al prójimo.

September 14, 2025
Today we celebrate the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross. It’s one of the few feasts on the calendar that is important enough to outrank the normal Sunday liturgy if it happens to fall on a Sunday. Today’s feast originates from the early 300s. As you may know, in the 320s St. Helena, the mother of Emperor Constantine, while she was in the Holy Land found the True Cross on which Jesus hung. It was then erected on Mount Calvary, where Jesus was crucified, so that Christians could come and venerate it; and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was also built at the site. The date for today’s feast was chosen in relation to the dedication of the church.
Another event related to this feast day occurred a few centuries later. Emperor Khosrow II of the Second Persian Empire stole the True Cross in the year 614 when he invaded and captured Jerusalem during his war with the Byzantine Empire. When the Byzantine Emperor Heraclius sent ambassadors to Emperor Khosrow to negotiate for peace—basically saying “you win, we’ll give you whatever you want”—Emperor Khosrow was so thirsty for war that he rejected the terms and arrested the ambassadors. Well, it took Heraclius several years, but after turning to the Lord in prayer and fasting he was able to rally, and his army defeated three of Khosrow’s armies. In the wake of these great defeats, Khosrow was killed by one of his sons, who then became Emperor Kavad II. Kavad very quickly sent a contingent to Heraclius to negotiate for peace, the terms of which included returning the True Cross. This return of the True Cross caused today’s feast day to become even more widely celebrated.
According to legend, as Emperor Heraclius tried to bring the True Cross back to Calvary, he was unable to enter the gate. Some invisible seemed to be holding him back. The Patriarch of Jerusalem, named Zacharias, said that it was because he was dressed like an emperor and a conqueror, and didn’t imitate closely enough the poverty and humility of Jesus. Heraclius is then said to have taken off his kingly garments and his shoes, and wearing just his simple clothes underneath he was able to climb Calvary and replace the Cross without a problem.
Perhaps that last story is true, perhaps not, but it serves as an important reminder that Jesus Christ did not live among us as a conquering king. He lived and died as a suffering servant. He allowed Himself to experience one of the most excruciating and humiliating forms of death known to history. Today, though, we remember that far from being a source of shame, the Cross for us Christians is a source of rejoicing. And that doesn’t only mean we should rejoice because Jesus died on the Cross for us, although it certainly includes that. It also means that we Christians should rejoice when we carry our own Cross. Because of what Jesus has done for us, we can rejoice any time we experience suffering in this world, because through the grace of our Baptism we can unite our sufferings to Jesus’ sufferings on the Cross. Because of Christ, our suffering is not meaningless; quite the contrary, our suffering is meritorious.
In Catholic households, it can be something of a joke that when someone stubs their toe, or something, someone will tell them to offer it up for their sins. In a certain sense, though, it’s no joke. Really, offer it up for your sins! That suffering is too valuable to let it go to waste. Our temporal pain can merit for us an eternal reward. But wait, there’s more! We don’t have to wait for trials to find us, we can deliberately choose to take on suffering to merit grace for ourselves or someone else—we usually call that doing a penance, or mortifying our desires.
Of course, that doesn’t mean we should do something that’s dangerous to our health; in fact, quite often if we’re going to choose a penance to offer up, it’s best if it’s something small and unnoticeable. Large penances can easily become a source of pride; “oh, look how holy I am, I do all this hard penance.” That’s not as likely to happen with small penances, though. In fact, I heard it said once that you should choose penances that aren’t penances for other people. For example, if you like to put salt on your food for dinner, maybe go without the salt once in awhile. It’s something small and not likely to be noticed by someone else, and not everyone would find going without salt all that penitential. If you like your salt, though, you might be surprised just how penitential going without it can be. Little things that are almost unnoticeable to anyone else can be veritable treasure house of grace if you just give it a try.
St. Thérèse of Lisieux, probably one of the holiest people in recent history, had a practice in her family where each of them would have a little chaplet they would keep in their pockets that they would use to count different mortifications that they would practice throughout the day. Little Thérèse would quietly rejoice every time she found a way to mortify her desires so she could offer it to the Lord. She often tried to get through as many of those chaplets as she could. She loved the Lord so much that she wanted to offer Him as much as she possibly could, so she sought out ways to mortify herself in order to multiply her offerings to the Lord. And I think with all of this it’s important to remember that that should be the emphasis: love for the Lord. If you don’t have that, then you might as well not bother. The point isn’t to make life harder for ourselves, the point is to draw closer to Jesus who suffered so much for us. Jesus is the key to all of this.
Many people today think that suffering is meaningless, but if that’s true then Jesus died on the Cross for nothing. I hope no one here thinks He died for nothing; “for God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.” We are saved through Jesus precisely because of His suffering; if His suffering is redemptive, then ours can be too as long as we are united to Him.
So, my brothers and sisters, let us truly rejoice and exalt in the Cross. Let us rejoice that Jesus died on the Cross to save us from our sins, and let us rejoice when He offers us the opportunity to share in the Cross with Him. Perhaps most of all, let us rejoice that because of Jesus our suffering is not meaningless but invaluable. Through the Cross, our suffering accepted out of love can merit grace for ourselves and for others, and it can draw us closer and closer to Jesus who gladly suffered for us. To finish with a quote from St. Catherine of Siena, “He will provide the way and the means, such as you could never have imagined. Leave it all to Him, let go of yourself, lose yourself on the Cross, and you will find yourself entirely.”

September 7, 2025
Jesus’ words in the Gospel today probably seem a little startling to us. How can Jesus command us to hate our father and mother? After all, doesn’t the Fourth Commandment say, “Honor your father and your mother?” Jesus seems to contradict that commandment here. Well, I think we can gain some understanding by taking a closer look at the original Greek word. The most literal translation is hate, and it is used with that meaning many times throughout the New Testament; but the word could also take on some extended meanings that are probably more applicable here. In Ancient Greek, the word was sometimes used to mean “to love less,” or even “to renounce” one choice in favor of another. One of those meanings is probably what Jesus intends here. “If anyone comes to me without loving his father and mother less than me,” or “If anyone comes to me without renouncing his father and mother for me, he cannot be my disciple.”
Let us bear in mind that at the beginning of the passage, we’re told that Jesus was addressing the great crowds who were following Him. He wasn’t just speaking to the Apostles or His other disciples who had already uprooted their lives to follow Him. He was speaking to those who had probably heard Him speak in their nearby hometowns and were starting to follow Him around because they liked what they heard. He is warning them that if they want to truly be His disciple, He needs to come first in their lives; no other earthly relationship should get in the way. And that’s why He addresses the parables of the man building the tower and the king going to battle. Just as a man wouldn’t start building a tower if he knew that he couldn’t afford the whole cost, and a king shouldn’t go to war if he knows that he has no prospect for success, so we too are called to assess what being a disciple of Christ truly requires of us.
Of course, the most basic cost is giving up our sinful habits. I think that kind of goes without saying, but it’s also much easier said than done. After all, most of the time we only commit sin in the first place because we derive some pleasure from it or at least get something out of it. I wonder, though, how many of us have actually taken a moment to consider our sinful habits and say to ourselves: being a disciple of Christ means that this should have no more place in my life. This applies to any vice that we might struggle with: hatred of others, laziness, unchastity; following Christ means that we need to eliminate these things from our lives. And that’s not because Jesus wants to be a tyrant over our lives or He wants per se to take things away from us that we enjoy, but it’s because He knows that we were created to know and love Him. He is the one thing that will truly satisfy us. After all, anyone who sins isn’t really seeking to do something bad, they’re seeking something good in a bad way. In fact, a writer once said, “The young man who rings the bell at the brothel is unconsciously looking for God.” Of course, he’s doing so in the wrong place, and so what the young man finds there or what we find on the back end of any sin always leaves us dissatisfied and empty, perhaps even ashamed, because we didn’t find Jesus where we sought Him.
Sadly, although sin doesn’t ultimately satisfy us, often it does bring some initial pleasure with it. And when we feel that emptiness afterward, rather than realizing that the sin didn’t really have what we were looking for, it’s common for us to turn back to it to seek out the pleasure again. As long as we keep up this cycle, we prevent ourselves from finding what we’re truly seeking: Jesus. That’s why it is important to root out our sinful habits, so that we stop turning to the things that are preventing us from living the purpose that we were created for.
Of course, that’s not always easy, and our progress might be slow. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and bad habits don’t turn into good habits overnight; but bad habits don’t turn into good habits at all if you don’t put in the effort. In order to foster good habits, we need to start making good choices. As disciples of Christ, this is a cost that we are called to pay: to give up all of our vices, and to work toward turning them into virtues. That might sound difficult or unpleasant, but fear not: as has hopefully become clear by now, the things that Jesus asks us to give up are the things that ultimately aren’t really worth having.
All that being said, it’s not enough just to give up sin. That’s just the beginning. You see, in addition to eliminating those things from our lives that drive Jesus out or prevent us from seeking Him, we also need to order everything else in our life such that it’s centered around Jesus. He needs to have first place before everything else. That includes parents, friends, careers, and any other good thing you can think of. And unlike sin these are good things that I’m talking about, and they should have their own place in our lives; but again, we shouldn’t try to give them the place in our lives that is proper to Jesus—the first place. All of these others things need to be rooted in Him and ordered toward Him either implicitly or explicitly. Because while it’s possible to incorrectly seek fulfillment though sinful habits, it’s also possible incorrectly seek fulfillment through things that still aren’t Jesus. These too, though, don’t have the ability to completely satisfy us, because they start isn’t the one thing that we were created for. We were created to Jesus, love Himself dwelling in our souls; nothing else, no matter good it is, will be able to fill that infinite hole in our hearts. As St. Augustine famously said to the Lord, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in thee.”
So, my brothers and sisters, let us never forget that Jesus must occupy the first place in each of our lives; we must fit everything else in around Him. That means eliminating entirely those things that are sinful and keeping everything else in its proper place. When we’re able to this, then we will truly be living as disciples of Jesus are called to live.

August 31, 2025
“What is too sublime for you, seek not, into things beyond your strength search not.” How hard it is to follow this exhortation from the first reading today. Like the Pharisees in the Gospel today, we often seek out the highest places of honor. We want others to know how great we are, or even to think that we are greater than we really are. My brothers and sisters, this is a great danger. Pride is one of the most serious vices of all; in some sense it is at the root of all other sins. Pride is what caused the devil to fall, and it can cause our downfall as well. How important it is, therefore, to practice the virtue of humility. The humble person is not someone who thinks of himself as less than he really is. In some ways, making yourself out to be less than you are can secretly be another form of pride. Have you ever met someone who makes themselves out to be the greatest of all sinners, or such a bad person that they could never be forgiven, or something like that? Well, this person has given into a kind of pride; rather than thinking that they’re great with virtue or worldly honors, they think that they are great with sin. No, the humble person does not think of themselves as less than they really are, the humble person simply thinks of themselves less.

And boy is that hard. I suspect I don’t need to convince anyone of that, but if for some reason you don’t believe me, try to go a whole day without talking about yourself or intentionally drawing attention to yourself. It usually doesn’t take long for someone to forget to say “thank you,” or to pass us by in some way, or to attribute ill motives to one of our actions before we feel the need to assert or defend ourselves. So often we feel the need to correct someone because they have hurt our pride. Now, I’m not saying that being humble means you need to be a doormat, but there’s a big difference between correcting someone because you’re trying to help them grow and correcting someone just because you feel slighted. Sometimes the line between the two can be blurry; but a good litmus test can be to ask yourself: “Do I feel the need to say something because I love the other person, or just because I love myself?”

In the Gospel today, Jesus shows us how foolish it is to seek out the esteem of others. The man who seeks out the place of honor at the banquet in Jesus’ Parable is quickly humbled despite himself, because a more distinguished guest than him was invited. He has to get up and take, not just the next place down the list, but the lowest place. Doesn’t something like this often happen to us? As soon as we start bragging about our skills or our gifts, someone comes along who’s better at whatever it is than we are. And that doesn’t mean that we’re the least skilled person in the room, but it’s certainly a much bigger blow to our pride than if we hadn’t said anything in the first place.

There is a known and studied psychological phenomenon regarding people’s self-perceived expertise regarding any subject. Those who know nothing or close to nothing about a subject will usually readily admit that. However, those who know a little something about a subject—for example, those who have done a little reading about it online—will often vastly overestimate their level of expertise. Whereas those who are truly expert in a subject—those who have spent years studying it—they will often vastly underestimate their expertise. The simplest explanation for this is that the true expert is much more profoundly aware of how much more there is to know about the subject than what he knows himself. The guy who searched it online often doesn’t have that understanding. And yet, when the true expert tries to downplay his expertise, if he has a friend in the room, the friend will often build him up. They’ll often affirm that the expert is actually quite skilled at the subject in question. “Every one who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Now, it’s worth mentioning that the humble person doesn’t refrain from acting just to go out of his way to be humble. This would be especially important in an emergency. The one who would fail to act when action is required is probably practicing a form of that false humility that I mentioned earlier. Rather than thinking about others’ needs, the person is only thinking of themselves. Again, the humble person thinks of himself less. He doesn’t worry about whether he is self-deprecating enough, or something like that. If he sees someone in need, and knows that he’s capable of helping, then he goes and helps. He doesn’t worry about what other people will think or whether his efforts will be sufficiently recognized, he simply goes out of his way to love the other person.

Now, I think genuine humility has a certain natural attractiveness to it. When you see someone doing it right, you recognize that their humility is a quality that we ought to try and imitate. However, if you remain unconvinced, let us never forget that Jesus is the most humble of all; and we always ought to strive to imitate Jesus. He is God almighty, and yet He allowed Himself to be slain for our sins. He is God all-knowing, and yet He allowed Himself to remain unknown in obscurity for 30 years before He started His public ministry. He is God omnipresent, and yet He allows Himself to remain hidden in a special way here in this church and every Catholic church around the world under the appearance of bread. He allows Himself to be dropped on the floor, received by the ill-disposed, even sometimes stolen and profaned, just so He can remain with us in our churches. No one is more humble than our God, than our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. He waits here for you to come to Him, and He calls us to imitate Him as closely as possible. Let us never forget that He God and we are not. Everything that we are and everything that we have comes to us from Him. As St. Paul tells us, “What do you possess that you have not received? But if you have received it, why are you boasting as if you did not receive it?” If Jesus Christ is so capable of humbling Himself, how much more should we humble ourselves as well; for without Him we are nothing.

In conclusion, I’d like to share with you probably the scariest prayer I’ve ever come across. It’s called the Litany of Humility.

O Jesus, meek and humble of heart, Hear me.
From the desire of being esteemed, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being loved, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being extolled, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being honored, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being praised, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being preferred to others, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being consulted, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the desire of being approved, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being humiliated, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being despised, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of suffering rebukes, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being calumniated, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being forgotten, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being ridiculed, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being wronged, Deliver me, O Jesus.
From the fear of being suspected, Deliver me, O Jesus.
That others may be loved more than I, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be esteemed more than I, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That, in the opinion of the world, others may increase and I may decrease, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be chosen and I set aside, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be praised and I go unnoticed, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be preferred to me in everything, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may become holier than I, provided that I may become as holy as I should, Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

August 24, 2025
“Lord, will only a few people be saved?” I find it interesting that the Lord doesn’t answer this question directly; probably because no good can come from knowing the answer. Think about it: suppose, for the sake of argument, that Jesus said most people will be saved. Most people would probably say to themselves, “Alright, I guess I’m all set.” Honestly, even if He said only half of all people would be saved, I kind of suspect that most people would say to themselves, “Yeah, I’m better than half the people I meet, I should be alright.” On the other hand, if He said only a few would be saved, I think most people would say, “Well, I’m going to Hell, might as well do what I want.” Jesus doesn’t directly answer this question, because He knows that the person who asks it is the person who is trying to gauge how lazy they can afford to be in the spiritual life. Of course, as soon as we start being lazy in the spiritual life, that’s when things start to fall apart. Either you’re walking toward Jesus, or you’re walking away from Him; there’s no standing still for very long.
Of course, we must always strive to walk toward Jesus, to attain to the salvation that He offers us; we must always strive to “enter through the narrow gate,” as Jesus says in the Gospel today. And make no mistake, the narrow gate is not simply ‘being a nice person’ or something like that. The narrow gate is Jesus Himself; Jesus is the one and only way to salvation. As He tells us in John’s Gospel, “Whoever does not enter a sheepfold through the gate but climbs over elsewhere is a thief and a robber. … I am the gate for the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved.” And later on in John’s Gospel He also says, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
Jesus excludes the possibility of Christianity being merely one valid religion among many. He demands total and exclusive allegiance. That’s not to say that there’s no hope for those who, for example, never had the opportunity to hear about Christ, but anyone who ultimately gets saved will only be saved by Jesus Christ. The Lord desires that all be saved; but each person needs to accept that salvation for him- or herself, and the way we live in this life affects our capacity to accept Jesus’ invitation of salvation when we die. Only a person with love in their heart will be able to say “yes” to God Who is love Himself when they meet Him face-to-face.
And love only enters a person’s heart in the first place as a grace from God. Now, the Lord can certainly offer grace to anyone He wants at any time He wants, but He has given us the sacraments as the ordinary means by which He imparts sanctifying grace to us—that is to say, the grace that saves us. The sacraments are how He most wants to save us. The ordinary means by which we first receive the love of God, and indeed, by which we receive Jesus Christ dwelling within us, is baptism. Jesus gave us this sacrament so that we be assured of sanctifying grace, of His presence in our souls. It would be difficult to overstate how great a gift this is. We don’t have to worry about whether the Lord will answer our prayer to receive His grace, He has guaranteed that His sacraments do impart grace.
This is why, as Christian believers, it is incumbent on us to evangelize. Jesus tells us, “Go… and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” We have been given this great gift, and it would be selfish of us not to share it with everyone we can. It is possible for the Lord to save someone outside of the sacraments, but the sacraments are the gifts He has given us as the surest way to salvation. Someone who has received sanctifying grace through Baptism is more likely to have a soul disposed to love God than someone who hasn’t.
Now, I don’t want to leave you with the impression that all you need to do is get baptized and then you’re home free. It is possible to cast God’s love out of your heart, by committing mortal sin. In effect, one would be saying, “I know this is seriously wrong, but I’m going to do it anyway.” It’s not that God is taking vengeance on you, or something, it is that you have chosen to turn your back on God; but that is why he also gives us the sacrament of Confession, so that we can turn back to Him, and have sanctifying grace restored to our soul.
To deliberately refuse these ordinary means of salvation, given to us so generously by God, would be the sin of presumption. In effect, one would be saying, “Well the sacraments are nice; but I don’t need that, God will save me anyway.” One would be refusing the way that the Lord has chosen to offer His love and grace. It’s one thing if a person has never had the Gospel preached to them, but it would be another thing entirely if you believed the Gospel and you didn’t do what Jesus asks of us.
It’s not enough just to come to Mass every Sunday, although we should be doing that. In the Gospel today, those cast out from the kingdom said to the Lord, “We ate and drink in your company and you taught in our streets,” and he replies, “I do not know where you are from.” The reason He does not know where they are from despite His frequent time in their presence is because they don’t have the life and love of God dwelling in their souls. We must have and preserve the love of God in our soul. We first receive this in Baptism, we preserve it by living a life of virtue, and if we lose it through mortal sin, we can have it restored through sacramental confession. The Lord can choose to save people through other means, but these are the ordinary means that He has given us. This is the narrow gate by which we can enter the Kingdom of Heaven: Jesus Christ, love Himself, dwelling in our souls.

24 de agosto de 2025
“Señor, ¿es verdad que son pocos los que se salvan?” Me interesa que el Señor no responde esta pregunta directamente; probablemente porque no puede surgir nada bueno de saber la respuesta. Piénsalo: supongamos, por el bien del argumento, que Jesús dijera que la mayoría de la gente será salvada. Muchas personas probablemente les dirían a sí misma: “Está bien, estoy listo”. Honestamente, incluso si Él dijera que sólo la mitad de todas las personas se salvarían, sospecho que la mayoría de la gente se diría a sí mismas: “Soy mejor que la mitad de la gente que conozco; estaré bien”. Por otro lado, si dijera que sólo unas pocas personas se salvarían, creo que muchas personas se dirían: “Bueno, me voy al infierno, mejor hago lo que quiero”. Jesús no responde directamente a esta pregunta, porque la persona que la hace es la persona que intenta evaluar qué tan perezosa debe ser en la vida espiritual. Por supuesto, cuando empezamos a ser perezosos en la vida espiritual, muchas cosas se desmoronan. O caminas hacia Jesús o te alejas de Él; no es posible permanecer inmóvil por mucho tiempo.
Por supuesto, siempre debemos esforzarnos a caminar hacia Jesús, para alcanzar la salvación que nos ofrece; debemos siempre esforzarnos en “entrar por la puerta, que es angosta”, como dice Jesús en el evangelio hoy. Y no te equivoques, la puerta que es angosta no es simplemente ser una buena persona o algo así. La puerta angosta es Jesús; Jesús es el único camino a la salvación. Como Jesús nos dice en el evangelio de San Juan: “El que no entra el redil de las ovejas por la puerta es un ladrón y un bandido. … Yo soy la puerta por donde pasan las ovejas. Todos los que vinieron antes de mí, fueron unos ladrones y unos bandidos; pero las ovejas no les hicieron caso. Yo soy la puerta: el que por mí entre, se salvará.” Más adelante en el evangelio de Juan, Jesús dice también: “Yo soy el camino, la verdad y la vida. Solamente por mí se puede llegar al Padre.”
Jesús excluye la posibilidad de que el cristianismo sea simplemente una religión válida entre muchas. Él exige lealtad total y exclusiva. No digo que no haya esperanza para aquellos que, por ejemplo, no tienen la oportunidad de oír acerca de Cristo, pero cualquiera que finalmente sea salvo, sólo será salvo por Jesucristo. El Señor desea que todos sean salvos; pero cada persona necesita aceptar la salvación, y la manera en que vivimos en esta vida afecta nuestra capacidad de aceptar la invitación de Jesús a la salvación cuando morimos. Sólo una persona con amor en su corazón podrá decir “sí” a Dios, que es amor mismo, cuando lo encuentre cara a cara.
Y el amor sólo entra en el corazón de una persona en primer lugar como una gracia de Dios. Ahora bien, el Señor ciertamente puede ofrecer gracia a quien Él quiera en cualquier momento que Él quiera, pero nos ha dado los sacramentos como el medio ordinario por el cual nos imparte la gracia santificante—es decir, la gracia que nos salva. El medio ordinario por el cual recibimos por primera vez el amor de Dios, y de hecho, por el cual recibimos a Jesucristo que mora en nosotros, es el bautismo. Jesús nos dio este sacramento para que tengamos la seguridad de la gracia santificante, de su presencia en nuestras almas. Sería difícil exagerar lo grandioso que es este regalo. No tenemos que preocuparnos de si el Señor responderá nuestra oración para recibir Su gracia; Él ha garantizado que Sus sacramentos sí imparten gracia.
Por eso, como creyentes cristianos, nos incumbe evangelizar. Jesús nos dice: “Vayan… a las gentes de todas las naciones, y háganlas mis discípulos; bautícenlas en el nombre del Padre, del Hijo y del Espíritu Santo”. Dios nos da este gran regalo, y sería egoísta de nuestra parte no compartirlo con todos los que podamos. Es posible que el Señor salve a alguien fuera de los sacramentos, pero los sacramentos son los dones que Él nos da como el camino más seguro hacia la salvación. Alguien que sí recibe la gracia santificante a través del bautismo tiene más probabilidades de tener un alma dispuesta a amar a Dios que alguien que no la recibe.
Ahora bien, no quiero dejarles con la impresión de que todo lo que hay que hacer es recibir el bautismo y ya está todo listo. Es posible expulsar el amor de Dios de tu corazón, cometiendo un pecado mortal. En efecto, uno diría: “Yo sé que esto es muy malo, pero lo voy a hacer de todos modos.” No es que Dios se esté vengando de ti, o algo así, es que has elegido darle la espalda a Dios; pero por eso también nos da el sacramento de la Confesión, para que podamos volver a Él y recibir la gracia santificante restituida en nuestras almas. Rechazar deliberadamente estos medios ordinarios de salvación, que Dios nos da tan generosamente, sería pecado de presunción. En efecto, se diría: “Bueno, los sacramentos son bonitos, pero no los necesito, Dios me salvará de todos modos”. Rechazaría el camino que el Señor elige para nos ofrecer Su amor y Su gracia. Una cosa es que a una persona nunca le hayan predicado el Evangelio, pero otra cosa totalmente distinta sería que creyera en el Evangelio y no hiciera lo que Jesús nos pide.
No basta con venir a misa todos los domingos. En el evangelio hoy, los expulsados del reino dijeron al Señor: “Hemos comido y bebido contigo y tú has enseñado en nuestras plazas”; sin embargo, Él responde: “No sé quiénes son ustedes”. La razón por la que no sabe quiénes son es porque no tienen la vida y el amor de Dios morando en sus almas. Debemos tener y conservar el amor de Dios en nuestras almas. Lo recibimos al principio en el Bautismo, lo conservamos viviendo una vida de virtud y, si lo perdemos por el pecado mortal, podemos recuperarlo mediante la confesión sacramental. El Señor puede elegir salvar a alguien a través de otros medios, pero estos son los medios ordinarios que Él nos da. Esto es la puerta angosta por la que podemos entrar en el Reino de los Cielos: Jesucristo, el amor mismo, morando en nuestras almas.

August 17, 2025
Jesus’ words in the Gospel today probably seem rather startling to us. “Do you think that I have come to establish peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division.” Certainly in the popular imagination, Jesus was all about peace: love your neighbor, be a good person, be nice to each other, and so on. I think it’s fair to say that Jesus’ words today don’t fit very well with that image of Jesus.
The popular imagination aside, though, Jesus’ words today can even sound startling to us Christians. I think most of us would not claim Christianity to be a war-mongering religion; and neither would the Church, for that matter. How, then, are we to understand Jesus’ words? Well, I think we can reasonably say that Jesus is using hyperbole here; that is to say, He is speaking strongly to emphasize His point: namely, that Christ will be a source of division. Not because He desires division, but because there will be some who refuse to accept Him.
And this is nothing new now that Christianity is on the scene. The same thing happened in the Old Testament as well. We hear in the first reading that the princes of Jerusalem were saying to the king, “Jeremiah ought to be put to death; he is demoralizing the soldiers who are left in this city, and all the people, by speaking such things to them; he is not interested in the welfare of our people, but in their ruin.” What had Jeremiah been saying that the princes found so demoralizing? The LORD had revealed to Jeremiah that the Chaldeans, who had recently attacked Jerusalem, would return and destroy the city. Jeremiah was telling the citizens and soldiers of Jerusalem that anyone who remained in Jersualem would perish, but anyone who went out and surrendered to the Chaldeans to be taken into exile would live. Contrary to what the princes were saying, Jeremiah was more interested in the welfare of the people than they were. The princes, though, were not interested in whether Jeremiah’s prophecy was true or not. The prophets employed by the king had recently prophesied for him that Chaldea would not attack Jerusalem. He listened to them, but when their prophecy proved false he did not turn and listen to Jeremiah. Instead, when Jeremiah prophesied that Babylon would come and overthrow King Zedekiah, the king had him thrown in prison.
Are not the people of our day the same? How many people spurn any kind of correction? How many people call someone a hater just because that person says things they disagree with? To quote Gandalf from the Lord of the Rings, “To crooked eyes truth may wear a wry face.” It is not hateful to tell someone they are sinning, in fact, doing so is an act of love. Now, of course, we should always do so with the greatest charity possible. As Pope St. John Paul once said, “Do not accept anything as the truth if it lacks love. And do not accept anything as love which lacks truth! One without the other becomes a destructive lie.” We are called to correct our neighbor from time to time; but that doesn’t mean that we should be jerks about it. It doesn’t even mean that we need to call someone out every time they do something wrong. Sometimes it’s genuinely not the right moment. However, I suspect that today, people—especially Christians—err much more often on the side of not saying something when they should. Often we’re scared of what others will think of us or how they’ll react; that’s why encouraging someone to step away from sin is such a great act of love. It means you love someone enough to tell them what’s best for them, even when it’s uncomfortable; and it means that you believe they can do better.
As King Solomon tells us in the Book of Proverbs, “A wise son loves correction, but the scoffer heeds no rebuke.” If a person is wise, they are often grateful to be corrected. Sadly, despite all the charity we offer, some will not accept correction. Despite the best witness to a Christian life we can give, some will not accept Christ. And really, that’s the division that Christ speaks of today. Further, for someone who has set their hearts on finite goods, the Christian witness only serves as a reminder of how broken their hearts are. We were created to know and love God, and I think everyone has a sense of that deep down. People long for more than this world can offer them. When someone refuses to accept Jesus, though, often they can’t stand to be around those who do accept Him. Some people find Christianity such a painful a reminder of everything they’re missing out on, that its very existence is intolerable to them. Such people are to be pitied more than anything.
This is one of the most frustrating things about evil. No matter how much we try to analyze it, no matter how many reasons someone might give, when you get right down to it evil is absurd. There’s no rational explanation or logical motives you can use to figure it out; ultimately, it doesn’t make sense. Sometimes people will reject Christ and even reject you because of Christ; and there’s nothing you can do. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try in the first place, though. If we never invite someone to get to know Christ, how can they even be expected to consider it? They might say no, and that’s too bad; but even then, we can always pray for them. As Mother Teresa once said, “We are not called to be successful, but faithful.” And as Jesus says in the Gospel, “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!” This fire that Jesus came to set, is the fire of love of Him; the fire that should be blazing in all of our hearts. He entrusts us with the task of spreading that fire to the ends of the Earth. Some will resist us, some will choose to keep their hearts as cold as ice, and we can’t change their mind for them; but we can always try, and we can always leave the door open for them if they have a change of heart on their own.

17 de agosto de 2025
Las palabras de Jesús en el evangelio hoy probablemente nos parecen bastante sorprendentes. “¿Piensan acaso que he venido a traer paz a la tierra? De ningún modo. No he venido a traer la paz, sino la división.” Ciertamente, en la imaginación popular, Jesús era todo paz: Ama a tu prójimo, sean amables el uno con el otro, etcétera. Las palabras de Jesús hoy no encajan con esta imagen de Jesús.
Dejando la imaginación popular de lado, las palabras de Jesús hoy incluso podrían sonar sorprendentes para nosotros cristianos. Creo que la mayoría de nosotros no diríamos que el cristianismo es una religión belicista; y la Iglesia, por cierto, tampoco lo diría. ¿Cómo debemos, entonces, entender las palabras de Jesús? Bueno, Jesús usa hipérbole aquí; es decir, habla con fuerza para enfatizar su punto. Su punto es que Cristo será una fuente de división. No es porque desee división, sino porque algunos se negarán a aceptarlo.
Esto no es nada nuevo, ahora que el cristianismo está aquí. La misma cosa ocurrió en el Antiguo Testamento. La primera lectura nos dice que los jefes de Jerusalén dijeron al rey: “Hay que matar a Jeremías, porque las cosas que dice desmoralizan a los guerreros que quedan en esta ciudad y a todo el pueblo. Es evidente que no busca el bienestar del pueblo, sino su perdición.” ¿Qué decían Jeremías que parecían a los jefes tan desmoralizante? El Señor ha revelado a Jeremías que los caldeos, que recientemente habían atacado Jerusalén, regresarían y la destruirían. Jeremías decía al pueblo y a los guerreros que cualquiera que permaneciera en la ciudad perecería, pero cualquiera que saliera y se entregara a los caldeos para ser llevado al exilio viviría. Al contrario de lo que decían los jefes, Jeremías buscaba el bienestar del pueblo más que ellos. Sin embargo, a los jefes no les interesaba si la profecía de Jeremías era verdadera o no. Los profetas empleados por el rey habían profetizado recientemente que Caldea no atacaría a Jerusalén. Sin embargo, cuando su profecía resultó falsa, no escuchó a Jeremías. En cambio, cuando Jeremías profetizó que Babilonia vendría y derrocaría al rey Sedecías, el rey lo hizo meter en prisión.
Las personas de nuestros días son iguales, ¿no? ¿Cuántas personas rechazan la corrección? ¿Cuántas personas llaman a alguien ‘odiador’ solo porque esa persona dice cosas con las que no están de acuerdo? Pero no es odioso en absoluto decirle a alguien que está pecando; de hecho, hacerlo es un acto de amor. Por supuesto, siempre debemos hacerlo con la mayor caridad posible. Como el papa, san Juan Pablo dijo una vez: “No acepten como verdad nada que carezca de amor. Y no acepten como amor nada que carezca de verdad. El uno sin la otra se convierte en una mentira destructora.” Estamos llamados a corregir a nuestro prójimo de vez en cuando; pero esto no significa que debamos ser idiotas al respecto. Ni siquiera significa que tengamos que llamar la atención a alguien cada vez que hace algo mal. A veces realmente no es el momento adecuado. Sin embargo, sospecho que hoy muchas personas—especialmente los cristianos—con mucha más frecuencia cometen el error de no decir algo cuando deberían. A menudo tenemos miedo de lo que los demás piensen de nosotros; esto es porque animar a alguien a alejarse del pecado es un gran acto de amor. Significa que se ama a alguien suficiente como para decirle lo que es mejor para él, incluso cuando es incómodo; y significa que se cree que él puede hacer mejor.
Como el rey Salomón nos dice en el libro de los Proverbios: “El hijo sabio acepta la corrección del padre; el insolente no hace caso de reprensiones”. Si una persona es sabia, a menudo está agradecida de recibir corrección. Lamentablemente, a pesar de toda la caridad que ofrezcamos, algunos no aceptarán la corrección. A pesar del mejor testimonio de vida cristiana que demos, algunos no aceptarán a Cristo. De verdad, esto es la división de que Cristo habla hoy. Además, para alguien que ha puesto su corazón en los bienes finitos, el testimonio cristiano sólo sirve para recordarle cuán roto está su corazón. Fuimos creados para conocer y amar a Dios, y creo que todos tenemos un sentido de eso en lo más profundo. Todos desean más que este mundo puede ofrecernos. Pero cuando alguien se niega a aceptar a Jesús, a menudo no soporta estar cerca de quienes sí lo aceptan. Para algunas personas, el cristianismo es un recordatorio tan doloroso de todo lo que se están perdiendo, que su mera existencia les resulta intolerable. Esa clase de gente es la que más merece lástima.
Ésta es una de las cosas más frustrantes del mal. Por mucho que intentemos analizarlo, por muchas razones que alguien pueda dar, a fin de cuentas, el mal es absurdo. No hay ninguna explicación racional ni motivos lógicos que puedas utilizar para entenderlo; en última instancia, no tiene sentido. A veces algunas personas rechazarán a Cristo e incluso te rechazarán a ti por causo de Cristo; y no hay nada que puedas hacer. Sin embargo, esto no significa que no debamos intentarlo en primer lugar. Si nunca invitamos a alguien a conocer a Cristo, ¿cómo podemos esperar que siquiera lo considere? Podrían decir que no, y esto es una lástima; pero incluso entonces, siempre podemos rogar por ellos. Como Madre Teresa dijo una vez: “No estamos llamados a ser exitosos, sino fieles.” Como Jesús dice en el evangelio: “He venido a traer fuego a la tierra, ¡y cuánto desearía que ya estuviera ardiendo!” Este fuego que Jesús vine para traer es el fuego del amor de Él, el fuego que debería arder en todos nuestros corazones. Él nos confía la tarea de difundir ese fuego hasta los confines de la Tierra. Algunos se resistirán a nosotros, algunos elegirán mantener sus corazones tan fríos como el hielo, y no podemos hacerles cambiar de opinión; pero siempre podemos intentarlo, y siempre podemos dejarles la puerta abierta si cambian de opinión por sí solos.