Our Best Friend
Fifth Sunday after Easter Amen, amen, I say to you: if you ask the Father any thing in my name, he will give it to you. Hitherto, you have not asked any thing in my name (Jn 16:23-24). With these few brief words opening today’s Gospel passage, we have summarised the whole message that Holy […]
Blunt Truths and True Joys
Fourth Sunday after Easter A few days ago, the Holy Father, in a discourse to the Diplomatic Corps, reminded us that “the Church can never be exempted from speaking the truth about humanity and the world, resorting whenever necessary to blunt language that may initially create misunderstanding. Yet truth can never be separated from charity, […]
Just a Little While
Third Sunday after Easter In this time between Easter and Ascension, the Church reminds us of the words spoken by Our Lord at the Last Supper when He told the apostles of His impending death and resurrection. In just a little while, Our Lord will leave us, but in another little while, we shall see […]
The Blood of the Shepherd
Good Shepherd Sunday Today’s liturgy offers one of the best-known passages of the Gospel, the Good Shepherd, to our meditation. The image is a tender one, that of a man who looks after his sheep with great care and does not want any of them to be lost. The Good Shepherd is not like a […]
Thank You, Holy Father!
Low Sunday The two essential points of meditation offered to us on this Octave of Easter are the importance of faith and mercy. In the epistle, St John insists that it is our faith that conquers the world, faith in the Son of God Incarnate who came to reconcile us with the Father. In the […]
Regina Coeli, Laetare!
Easter Sunday It took them a while to figure it out. The Apostles had come a very long way. From their initial encounters with the Rabbi from Nazareth, through the three years of their formation with Him, the witnessing of the miracles and the learning of all the lessons He taught with His words and […]
The Harmony of God’s Plan
Paschal Vigil On this holy night on which Holy Mother Church gives us such a rich and diverse selection of sacred texts and holy rituals, it would be easy to miss seeing the forest for the trees. To be true, the liturgy of this night is so grandiose that for those who are not familiar […]
Behold the Man – Behold the Church
Good Friday When Pilate had Our Blessed Lord brought out to the people and pronounced the well-known words: Ecce Homo – Behold the Man, the Saviour had become unrecognisable. This may have been precisely what inspired the words in the first place. As Psalm 21 reminds us, Our Lord appeared more like a worm than […]
Loving to the End
Maundy Thursday More than the other evangelists, St John seeks to help us penetrate inside Our Lord’s dispositions as He prepares Himself to suffer His passion. He commences his description of the last hours of Our Blessed Lord’s life with these words: Jesus, knowing that His hour was come, that He should pass out of […]