Mark 7:, 31-37, 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time I’ve shared this story before but in a different context with a different Gospel. It’s a great anecdote told to me by a Josefino two years ago. As soon as the Uber driver knew that it was a seminarian who hopped into his car, the driver started…
Category: Author
The Heart of the Matter – John Foley, SJ
Mark 7:1-23, 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time The people in this week’s Gospel are quarreling about who has and who hasn’t washed his hands for dinner. If you were a follower of the Jewish custom in that time, you would know that every person was required to wash up before eating. The rule was “a…
Externals – Jett Villarin, SJ
Mark 7:1-23, 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time Appearances can be deceiving. When it sets, the sun becomes a very big red balloon. So too when it rises rose-tinted on the horizon. Overhead, it is smaller and whiter. And yet it is the same sun. In the Scripture readings today, we are warned about the appearances…
Do’s and Don’ts – Arnel Aquino, SJ
Mark 7:1-23, 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time It happened again last week. I heard from a friend yet another story of a priest who refused to bless the body of a troubled teenager who took his own life. The mother pleaded with the priest desperately and tearfully, my friend said. The young man had always…
Memory – Mark Aloysius, SJ
John 6:60-69, 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time There is this urban legend which states that goldfish have a memory span of about three seconds. If one were forced to live in such a small glass bubble, perhaps amnesia might be the only means of coping. These days I wonder if our collective memory span would…
Avatar – Arnel Aquino, SJ
John 6:63-68, 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time I was watching a talk show the other night. The host did his usual stand-up comedy routine to open the show. He started out, making jokes about Trump and his addiction to Twitter. Then he joked about people who made the stupid mistake of posting pictures on Facebook…
Hook, Line and Sinker – Johnny Go, SJ
John 6:51-58, 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time Last night someone who had gone to an anticipated Sunday Mass bumped into me and surprised me with his reaction. He said: “The Bread of Life?! Again?!” He’s right. This is the third Sunday that the Gospel reading has been about the Bread of Life–and what he doesn’t know yet…
Communion – Arnel Aquino, SJ
John 6:41-51, 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time My maternal grandfather was an inveterate sabungero. Unlike our lola who went to mass daily, he went to church only on Christmas. The rest of the Sundays, “nagsisimba siya sa sabungan,” his own children joked. Kung sa bagay. In every sabungan (cockfight) was a man called “Kristo.” He…
Hunger in a Time of Abundance – Johnny Go, SJ
John 6:24-35, 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time Our Gospel today is literally good news. Our Lord makes us an important promise: “Whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” Jesus is not talking about physical hunger or physical thirst, obviously. Rather, he is referring to an existential hunger…
Signs – Arnel Aquino, SJ
John 6:24-35, 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time I saw something pleasantly strange in the first reading. “The Lord said to Moses,” the reading said, “’I will now rain down bread from heaven for you. Each day the people are to go out and gather their daily portion. In that way, I will test the Israelites…
Hunger – Jett Villarin, SJ
John 6:24-35, 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time “Sir, give us this bread always.” That’s what anyone would ask when told that another sort of manna, come down from heaven, would satisfy our hunger for good. For good. For always. For good sounds too good to be true. What is for always, what never goes away…
The Call – John Foley, SJ
John 6:1-15, 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time If today has been “one of those days” for you, meaning stressful and tiring, maybe you could let the readings for Sunday bring you home for a while. Look especially at the Second Reading, taken from the letter to the Ephesians. It calls us to • live with…
One Lost Sheep 