Third Sunday of Lent (A)

Ex 17:3-7
Ps 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9
Rm 5:1-2, 5-8
Jn 4:5-42 or Jn 4:5-15, 19b-26, 39a, 40-42

What are you thirsty for? Thirst is what happens when we lack something vital. Water is essential for our physical survival, and our bodies signal us when it's time to drink fluids to stay healthy.

Likewise, water is necessary for our spiritual survival, albeit a different sort of water – the LIVING water, the baptismal water that purifies us for eternal life, the holy water that enables us to have abundant life in Christ now.

The Holy Spirit is the Giver of Life. One of the biblical symbols that represents the presence of God's Spirit is life-giving water. Therefore, we can surmise that Jesus wanted to give the gift of the Holy Spirit to the Samaritan woman. Why? It would still be a while before the Holy Spirit descended at Pentecost.

She needed the truth; the Holy Spirit IS Truth, and Jesus wanted to give her whatever she needed to repent and receive salvation and then share this new life with the people around her.

We only get thirsty when we haven't had enough to drink. Spiritual thirst comes in many forms: loneliness, despair, frustration, self-indulgence – any feeling or behavior that's caused by lacking something we need or want.

And why would we lack anything spiritually? Because, like the woman at the well, we are sinners and need to healing from God as he pours his love into us in all sufficiency.

Reflect & Discuss:

1. In the first reading, why did a physical thirst turn into a sin? How does this still happen today?

2. In Romans 5, grace and hope are mentioned as gifts we receive when we have been “justified by faith” (i.e., when we've repented of our sins and sought forgiveness through Jesus). How do grace and hope quench our thirsts? How do they help us resist sin? How is this a result of God's love being poured into our hearts?

3. The woman at the well eagerly received what Jesus said. Even though he confronted her about her sins, she drank it all in and then, without shame, excitedly told others about her encounter with the Messiah. What need was filled by the truth? What does this teach about how we can help others hear the truth?

Question for the Journey:
What sin or unhealthy habit do you need to overcome so that he is free to quench your thirsts? What will you do this week to hand it over to Christ?

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Hello, I’m Franciscan Father Greg Friedman, and this is the "Sunday Soundbite" for the Third Sunday of Lent.

For my hometown of Cincinnati, the Ohio River is an ever-present reality: the river brings commerce, recreation, drinking water. It also brings destructive floods.

Water is a powerful sign; that's why it's used in Baptism, symbolizing our entry into the life and death of Jesus.

Our Lenten readings today relate to Baptism. We hear a story from Exodus, where the people complain because they have run out of water. God, through Moses, responds with a life-giving stream of water. From John's Gospel we have the drama of Jesus and the woman at the well. The early Church used this story in its Lenten liturgy.

The woman at the well represents a believer who reluctantly comes to faith. She needs Jesus, his insights into her life, and his promise of "living water," to slowly win her over.

But isn't that the way it is for most of us? We need time to be convinced; we face contradictions and faulty choices in our lives. Nevertheless we thirst for what God offers us. And, in the end, when we've tasted new life in Christ, we just have to tell others about it. Believers become apostles.

Our Lenten journey may find us thirsty for living water. Let's listen closely to the Lord's invitation.

Scripture:

•Was it just to have us die here of thirst with our children and our livestock? (Exodus 17:3b)

•Harden not your hearts (Psalm 95:8a)

•For Christ, while we were still helpless, died at the appointed time for the ungodly. (Romans 5:6)

•Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to finish his work.” (John 4:34)

Reflection:

•Does every person have a spiritual hunger/thirst that needs to be filled? Does everyone have a longing to know God’s love that must be satisfied?

•If thirst for God’s love is not filled, then is it possible to turn to sinful pursuits in an attempt to fill this hunger?

•Is the food that Jesus speaks of, the spiritual food of doing God’s will?

•Is dying on the cross for unbelievers the ultimate spiritual act?

•Is the spiritual search the need to give and receive eternal love?


It is love which must determine man’s actions, love which must give unity to what is divided. Love is the synthesis of contemplation and action, the meeting point between heaven and earth, between God and man. I have known the satisfaction of unrestrained action and the joy of the contemplative life in the desert, and I repeat again St. Augustine’s words: “Love and do as you will.” Do not worry what you ought to do. Worry about loving. Do not interrogate heaven repeatedly and uselessly saying, “What course of action should I pursue?” Concentrate on loving instead.

Published by Jacob Soo
Credites to Americancatholic.org and Good News Ministries

Chair of Peter the Apostle

This feast commemorates Christ’s choosing Peter to sit in his place as the servant-authority of the whole Church (see June 29).

After the “lost weekend” of pain, doubt and self-torment, Peter hears the Good News. Angels at the tomb say to Magdalene, “The Lord has risen! Go, tell his disciples and Peter.” John relates that when he and Peter ran to the tomb, the younger outraced the older, then waited for him. Peter entered, saw the wrappings on the ground, the headpiece rolled up in a place by itself. John saw and believed. But he adds a reminder: “..[T]hey did not yet understand the scripture that he had to rise from the dead” (John 20:9). They went home. There the slowly exploding, impossible idea became reality. Jesus appeared to them as they waited fearfully behind locked doors. “Peace be with you,” he said (John 20:21b), and they rejoiced.

The Pentecost event completed Peter’s experience of the risen Christ. “...[T]hey were all filled with the holy Spirit” (Acts 2:4a) and began to express themselves in foreign tongues and make bold proclamation as the Spirit prompted them.

Only then can Peter fulfill the task Jesus had given him: “... [O]nce you have turned back, you must strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:32). He at once becomes the spokesman for the Twelve about their experience of the Holy Spirit—before the civil authorities who wished to quash their preaching, before the council of Jerusalem, for the community in the problem of Ananias and Sapphira. He is the first to preach the Good News to the Gentiles. The healing power of Jesus in him is well attested: the raising of Tabitha from the dead, the cure of the crippled beggar. People carry the sick into the streets so that when Peter passed his shadow might fall on them.

Even a saint experiences difficulty in Christian living. When Peter stopped eating with Gentile converts because he did not want to wound the sensibilities of Jewish Christians, Paul says, “...I opposed him to his face because he clearly was wrong.... [T]hey were not on the right road in line with the truth of the gospel...” (Galatians 2:11b, 14a).

At the end of John’s Gospel, Jesus says to Peter, “Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go” (John 21:18). What Jesus said indicated the sort of death by which Peter was to glorify God. On Vatican Hill, in Rome, during the reign of Nero, Peter did glorify his Lord with a martyr’s death, probably in the company of many Christians.

Comment:

Like the committee chair, this chair refers to the occupant, not the furniture. Its first occupant stumbled a bit, denying Jesus three times and hesitating to welcome gentiles into the new Church. Some of its later occupants have also stumbled a bit, sometimes even failed scandalously. As individuals, we may sometimes think a particular pope has let us down. Still, the office endures as a sign of the long tradition we cherish and as a focus for the universal Church.

Quote:

Peter described our Christian calling in the opening of his First Letter, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead...” (1 Peter 1:3a).

Published by Jacob Soo
Credits to Americancatholic.org

Second Sunday of Lent (A)

Gn 12:1-4a
Ps 33:4-5, 18-19, 20, 22
2 Tm 1:8b-10
Mt 17:1-9

Atop Mount Tabor, the pure light of Christ was revealed, as seen in next Sunday's Gospel reading. The Father said, "This is my beloved Son; LISTEN TO HIM." The transfiguration is repeated every time we listen to him and allow our faith to be enlightened. However, now it is WE who are transfigured.

During Lent, as we repent of our sinfulness, we let his light consume the darkness within us. Then, the people around us will see Jesus when they look at us. We will shine with him.

By Christ's transfiguration, we are transformed into OUR true identity. What is our true identity? It's our innermost being, which was created in the image of God!

Jesus left his mountaintop experience to enter into his ministry of suffering. When we are transfigured by the light of Christ, we leave our mountaintops to reveal him to the world. Although there is, as the reading from Timothy points out, hardship in sharing the gospel, we are comforted by the fact that after every Calvary there is always an Easter.

First, we have to spend time on the mountain. We need to stay there long enough to pray and receive "the strength that comes from God." Up there, we are prepared, we are encouraged, and we are restored, so that we can deal with the hardships in the valley.

Listen. Can you hear what God's saying about you? It's the same words he spoke about Jesus on Mount Tabor: "This is my beloved child; listen to him/her." Some folks will listen, some will not, but our ability to shine with the love of Jesus is not based on how many will listen to us. We are transfigured because Jesus saved us and has called us to a holy life.

Reflect & Discuss:

1. As you read the passage from Genesis, how does it feel to think that others could "find a blessing in you"? How does Jesus bless others through you?

2. Timothy reminds us of our holiness. Recall a time when you were enlightened by a new understanding of the faith. How did that change your behavior? How did this make you shine like Jesus?

3. In the Gospel story, because the Father was so pleased with his Son, he affirmed him publicly. How do you know when the Father is pleased with you?

Question for the Journey:

Name one area of your life that you would like Jesus to transfigure. What will you do this week to expose it to Jesus' healing light?

**************************************************

Hello, I’m Franciscan Father Greg Friedman, and this is the "Sunday Soundbite" for the Second Sunday of Lent.

One of the most dramatic scenes in Catholic liturgy comes at the Easter Vigil when adults are baptized, come up out of the water, dripping wet, and after leaving to change re-enter the church in their white baptismal robes.

Now, in my parish, the baptismal moment at the Easter Vigil is a lot less dramatic, but I always like to look at the faces of the newly baptized. There's always a special glow seemingly inside as well as out as these new Christians experience the transformation that comes to them.

Only later, I suspect, do they begin to realize all the implications of that change. Perhaps that's why our liturgy gives us today's first reading, the story of the call of Abraham, to leave his homeland and his family, and set out for a promised land. Abraham's response transformed his whole life. He began a long journey perhaps leading him at times to wonder if he was on the right path.

In Baptism we, too, say yes to God, a choice that transforms our lives, setting us on a journey of faith that continues to this day. As we "journey" through this Lent, let’s recall our baptismal commitment and let it reflect in our words and deeds and even in our faces at times.

Scripture:

•“…All the communities of the earth shall find blessing in you.” (Genesis 12:3b)

•Our soul waits for the LORD, who is our help and our shield. (Psalm 33:20)

•…through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus, who destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. (2 Timothy 1:10)

•…Jesus took Peter, James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them; (Matthew 17:1,2)

•…they saw no one else but Jesus alone. (Matthew 17:8b)

Reflection:

•Why does Jesus bring the disciples to the mountaintop to see Him transformed?

•What is the disciples’ experience of Jesus before and after the transfiguration?

•How does the transfiguration prefigure the crucifixion of Jesus?

•How do you experience Jesus in the transfiguration?

Christ’s humility, which is love, brought him to descend toward the lowly, not because the lowly had some special value, but to look for the one who was lost in order to help raise himself up. Let us therefore avoid indulging ourselves with dreams of grandeur, but rather enter willingly into humble thoughts. The Holy Spirit brings us to understand all these things, and this can break the chains that bind us. The spirit is freedom, and we are still held captive by many bonds that freeze in us the spontaneity of the gift of love. We ask Our Lord to free us a little more from all forms of slavery, so that the gift of ourselves, the gift of love for God and for others, may, according to Christ and his example, develop in us more freely, more spontaneously, and more generously.

Published by Jacob Soo
Credits to Amerciancatholic.org and Good News Ministries

Our Lady of Lourdes

On December 8, 1854, Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in the apostolic constitution Ineffabilis Deus. A little more than three years later, on February 11, 1858, a young lady appeared to Bernadette Soubirous. This began a series of visions. During the apparition on March 25, the lady identified herself with the words: “I am the Immaculate Conception.”

Bernadette was a sickly child of poor parents. Their practice of the Catholic faith was scarcely more than lukewarm. Bernadette could pray the Our Father, the Hail Mary and the Creed. She also knew the prayer of the Miraculous Medal: “O Mary conceived without sin.”

During interrogations Bernadette gave an account of what she saw. It was “something white in the shape of a girl.” She used the word aquero, a dialect term meaning “this thing.” It was “a pretty young girl with a rosary over her arm.” Her white robe was encircled by a blue girdle. She wore a white veil. There was a yellow rose on each foot. A rosary was in her hand. Bernadette was also impressed by the fact that the lady did not use the informal form of address (tu), but the polite form (vous). The humble virgin appeared to a humble girl and treated her with dignity.

Through that humble girl, Mary revitalized and continues to revitalize the faith of millions of people. People began to flock to Lourdes from other parts of France and from all over the world. In 1862 Church authorities confirmed the authenticity of the apparitions and authorized the cult of Our Lady of Lourdes for the diocese. The Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes became worldwide in 1907.

Comment:

Lourdes has become a place of pilgrimage and healing, but even more of faith. Church authorities have recognized over 60 miraculous cures, although there have probably been many more. To people of faith this is not surprising. It is a continuation of Jesus’ healing miracles—now performed at the intercession of his mother. Some would say that the greater miracles are hidden. Many who visit Lourdes return home with renewed faith and a readiness to serve God in their needy brothers and sisters. There still may be people who doubt the apparitions of Lourdes. Perhaps the best that can be said to them are the words that introduce the film Song of Bernadette: “For those who believe in God, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not believe, no explanation is possible.”

Quote:

“Lo! Mary is exempt from stain of sin, Proclaims the Pontiff high; And earth applauding celebrates with joy Her triumph, far and high. Unto a lowly timid maid she shows Her form in beauty fair, And the Immaculate Conception truth Her sacred lips declare.” (Unattributed hymn from the Roman Breviary)

We pray, no longer silently but as a great number....
We enlighten each other.
We carry each other along.
We depend on our faith in Jesus... - Pope John Paul II

First Sunday of Lent (A)

Gn 2:7-9; 3:1-7
Ps 51:3-4, 5-6, 12-13, 17
Rm 5:12-19 or 5:12, 17-19
Mt 4:1-11

How do you deal with temptation? That's the personal challenge given to us by the Word of God on the first Sunday of Lent. And so we begin our journey with Jesus, traveling to the holiest place we can reach at this point in our lives.

This Lent is like no other Lent. Last year, you had different needs, different areas of growth, different levels of insight and understanding. Much has happened since then, and all of it is a preparation for what the Lord is going to do in your life now.

What victory do you need this year? What needs to be resurrected? To get there, your path will lead through the cross, into the tomb, and out into God's light where his love provides healing and new life.

During Lent – and every time we make sacrifices and connect our sufferings to the Passion of Christ – we follow Jesus to the cross and to resurrection. This requires accepting and embracing our own crosses, for the Calvary Road is the only way to reach the victorious new life that we yearn to experience.

If we want Easter to be more than just a holiday of pretty eggs, chocolate bunnies and big dinners, we have to make Lent more than just 40 days of enduring an annoying, obligatory sacrifice, eating meatless pizza on Fridays, and going to an occasional extra event at church. If we want to experience the power of resurrection, we have to experience the power of mourning and repenting from our sinfulness. In other words, we have to experience the powerlessness of death – the death of our selfishness, the death of our worldliness, the death of our behaviors that are not Christ-like.

Reflect & Discuss:

1. In the story from Genesis, what did Adam and Eve need to die to (let go of, put aside, reject) in order to resist the Original Sin? Why didn't they?

2. In the reading from Romans, we hear about the abundant grace and the gift of justification that Jesus provided to each of us when he died on the cross. How does this grace and justification give us life? In other words, how does God help us to resist sin?

3. Looking at the Gospel passage, what did Jesus have to die to in the desert so that he could say no to temptation?

Question for the Journey:

Name one thing you can do this week to die to self. How does that make it easier to resist sin? For example, think of good deed you can do that's the opposite of what your selfishness wants you to do.

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Do you recall comedian Flip Wilson's famous phrase: "The devil made me do it!"? That line hits home because human beings often make excuses when we give in to temptation. But in reality, no one "makes" us sin we choose it, just as we freely choose to do good.

Today's Scriptures present Adam and Eve, faced with a choice for good or evil: They choose to reject God and give in to the temptation to "be like God"—in the words of the serpent-tempter.

Another temptation scene comes in the Gospel. This time, Jesus, facing the choice to accomplish his ministry in selfish, power-hungry ways, rejects the temptation and affirms his true identity as God's Son.

Our Christian identity is a choice we affirmed (or which was affirmed for us) at our Baptism. But we must re-affirm that choice again and again in the face of temptation.

It's fitting that the temptation scene in the Gospel is set in the desert. In the Bible, the desert is often a place of testing, of choices. The season of Lent is like a "spiritual desert" where we hope to rediscover our identification with Christ, leading to a renewal of Baptism at Easter. Let our choices this Lent be directed by the example of Jesus in the face of temptation.

Scripture:

•But the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is evil.” (Genesis 3:4b,5)

•For if by that one person’s transgression the many died, how much more did the grace of God and the gracious gift of the one person Jesus Christ overflow for the many. (Romans 5:15)

•Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was hungry. The tempter approached and said to him, “If you are the Son of God…” (Matthew 4:1-3a)

Reflection:

•How are you tempted?

•The seven deadly sins are pride, envy, anger, sloth, avarice (greed), gluttony and lust. Is anyone injured by these “deadly sins?”

•How are these sins different from the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes?

•Do these sins deaden the spirit to receive the gifts of God’s love?

For each person the movement away from the threat of enslavement to the capital sins will involve growth in some basic virtues: humility that recognizes God as the basic healer; patience with one’s own gradual but steady journey towards holiness; and compassion for the weakness of others. Although the complex reality that is sin cannot easily be fit into seven specific categories, the survival of capital sins as a spiritual theme points to the presence of patterns of evil that threaten to dissipate life in any age.

Published by Jacob Soo
Credits to Americancatholic.org and Good News Ministries

Ash Wednesday

Today's Readings:

Joel 2:12-18
Ps 51:3-6, 12-14, 17
2 Cor 5:20 -- 6:2
Matt 6:1-6, 16-18
http://www.usccb.org/nab/020608.shtml

How healing will your Lent be this year?

What victory do you need? What needs to be resurrected?

For Easter to be more than just a day of colored eggs, chocolates and big dinners, Lent needs to be more than just 40 days of obligatory sacri-fices like meatless pizza on Fridays. To experi-ence the power of resurrection, we have to experience the power of mourning and repentance. We have to experience the powerlessness of death: the death of our selfishness, the death of our worldliness, the death of our behaviors that are not Christ-like.

In today's first reading, God beckons: "Return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping, and mourning." Fasting is powerful only if it improves our self-discipline so that we can resist sin and grow in holiness. We're hypocrites, like Jesus describes in the Gospel reading, if fasting produces no inner changes.

What are you doing for Lent that will promote your spiritual growth? Here's a suggestion: Identify one fault — just one — and choose an activity or an abstinence for the duration of Lent that will help you overcome it.

God is beckoning: "Return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping, and mourning."

Both the reading from Joel and Psalm 51 remind us that God is merciful toward those who recognize their sinfulness and regret it so much that they're truly motivated to change. Dealing with our need to change can feel overwhelming and shameful, but if we keep our eyes on God's mercy, we feel helped, healed, and resurrected.

By identifying and working on just one sinful tendency (especially one that's been difficult to overcome), choosing one selfish behavior or one fear or one flaw or one unloving habit as our Lenten project, we can give it to Jesus, nail it to his cross, and hear him offer it up to God as he cries out, "Father forgive them ....!" It will die with Jesus, and we'll be resurrected to a new life, a new level of holiness with Jesus.

Today as we receive and wear our ashes, let us do it fully awake and aware of our sinfulness, with the goal of overcoming a significant sin by Easter. Why do we keep the black smudges on our foreheads all day? Not to win the approval or acceptance or admiration of others. It's a sign that we know we need to change! But if we have even a tiny bit of a desire to be noticed, we should do as Jesus said: "When you fast, see to it that you ... wash your face" so that no one but God will know what you are doing.

Published by Jacob Soo
Credits to Americancatholic.org

Presentation of the Lord

At the end of the fourth century, a woman named Etheria made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Her journal, discovered in 1887, gives an unprecedented glimpse of liturgical life there. Among the celebrations she describes is the Epiphany (January 6), the observance of Christ’s birth, and the gala procession in honor of his Presentation in the Temple 40 days later—February 15. (Under the Mosaic Law, a woman was ritually “unclean” for 40 days after childbirth, when she was to present herself to the priests and offer sacrifice—her “purification.” Contact with anyone who had brushed against mystery—birth or death—excluded a person from Jewish worship.)

This feast emphasizes Jesus’ first appearance in the Temple more than Mary’s purification.

The observance spread throughout the Western Church in the fifth and sixth centuries. Because the Church in the West celebrated Jesus’ birth on December 25, the Presentation was moved to February 2, 40 days after Christmas.

At the beginning of the eighth century, Pope Sergius inaugurated a candlelight procession; at the end of the same century the blessing and distribution of candles which continues to this day became part of the celebration, giving the feast its popular name: Candlemas.

Comment:

In Luke’s account, Jesus was welcomed in the temple by two elderly people, Simeon and the widow Anna. They embody Israel in their patient expectation; they acknowledge the infant Jesus as the long-awaited Messiah. Early references to the Roman feast dub it the feast of St. Simeon, the old man who burst into a song of joy which the Church still sings at day’s end.

Quote:

“Christ himself says, ‘I am the light of the world.’ And we are the light, we ourselves, if we receive it from him.... But how do we receive it, how do we make it shine? ...[T]he candle tells us: by burning, and being consumed in the burning. A spark of fire, a ray of love, an inevitable immolation are celebrated over that pure, straight candle, as, pouring forth its gift of light, it exhausts itself in silent sacrifice” (Paul VI).