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September 22, 2018 Saturday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time Reading 1 1 Cor 15:35-37, 42-49 Brothers and sisters:Someone may say, "How are the dead raised? With what kind of body will they come back?" You fool!What you sow is not brought to life unless it dies.And what you sow is not the body that is to bebut a bare kernel of wheat, perhaps, or of some other kind. So also is the resurrection of the dead.It is sown corruptible; it is raised incorruptible.It is sown dishonorable; it is raised glorious.It is sown weak; it is raised powerful.It...

Some horrific news is emerging out of Kenya after two Christians were murdered in cold blood by militants belonging to Islamic terror group Al-Shabaab. According to International Christian Concern, last Friday a group of militants stopped a bus that was headed for the North Eastern province city of Garissa. The terrorists then ordered the passengers of the bus before demanding to see their identification, in order to try and determine which of them were Christians and which were Muslims.

1 Rebuke not an elder, but intreat him as a father; and the younger men as brethren; 2 The elder women as mothers; the younger as sisters, with all purity. 3 Honour widows that are widows indeed. 4 But if any widow have children or nephews, let them learn first to shew piety at home, and to requite their parents: for that is good and acceptable before God. 5 Now she that is a widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth in God, and continueth in supplications and prayers night and day. 6 But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while...

Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia has published a wide-ranging criticism of the Instrumentum Laboris (a kind of introduction or preamble) for the upcoming Synod on the Young People, the Faith, and Vocational Discernment. In an introductory paragraph, Chaput explains that the analysis was “received from a respected North American theologian”. The article, which appears in First Things, warns that the Instrumentum veers dangerously close to heresy – specifically the heresies of naturalism, Lutheranism, and relativism. It begins by criticizing its “naturalist” understanding of modern sexual dysfunction: widespread promiscuity, online pornography, and the like. “The document laments only its ‘disfiguring the...

New York City, N.Y., Sep 1, 2017 / 01:07 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Catholic outreach to LGBT individuals must always include the truth about Catholic teaching and chastity, Cardinal Robert Sarah said in an article responding to Jesuit priest Fr. James Martin. “The Catholic Church has been criticized by many, including some of its own followers, for its pastoral response to the LGBT community,” Cardinal Sarah wrote in an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal Sept. 1. “This criticism deserves a reply, not so much to defend the Church’s practices reflexively, but to determine whether we, as the Lord’s disciples, are...

As Christians, we are new creations. Our hearts of stone have been turned into hearts of flesh. In this metaphor, flesh is used as a positive figure, not a pejorative one. Where once my heart was cold and recalcitrant, dead and inert to the things of God, now it throbs and pulsates with spiritual life. Once I was biologically alive but spiritually dead. Now I am biologically alive and spiritually alive as well. I am a new person. There is radical discontinuity between my new self and my old self. This radical discontinuity, however, is not total discontinuity. A link...

September 21, 2018 Feast of Saint Matthew, Apostle and evangelist Reading 1 Eph 4:1-7, 11-13 Brothers and sisters:I, a prisoner for the Lord,urge you to live in a manner worthy of the call you have received,with all humility and gentleness, with patience,bearing with one another through love,striving to preserve the unity of the Spiritthrough the bond of peace:one Body and one Spirit,as you were also called to the one hope of your call;one Lord, one faith, one baptism;one God and Father of all,who is over all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each of...

1 Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils; 2 Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron; 3 Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth. 4 For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving: 5 For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. 6 If thou...

"Take the helmet of salvation" (Eph. 6:17). Discouragement and doubt are deflected when you know you’re secure in Christ. The Roman soldier's helmet was a crucial piece of armor designed to deflect blows to the head—especially the potentially lethal blow of a broadsword. Soldiers of that day carried a swift and precise dagger designed for close- quarter hand-to-hand combat. But they also carried a giant broadsword, which was a two-edged, three to four-foot long sword. It had a massive handle that, similar to a baseball bat, was held with both hands. With it they could take broad swipes from side...

“In order that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit” (Romans 8:4). If the Holy Spirit resides within us, we will be able to fulfill the demands of God’s law. Augustine once said, “Grace was given, in order that the law might be fulfilled.” When God saves us He, by His Spirit, creates within us the ability to obey His perfect law. Because we now live “according to the Spirit”—walking by the Spirit and being filled with the Spirit—we are able to do the...

The story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde could be an allegory for the Christian life. There is a war in our members, a constant conflict between the old and the new, between vice and virtue, sin and obedience. We seem to be moral schizoids. It is a struggle between what the Bible calls the “old man” and the “new man.” Whenever I hear an evangelist declare, “Come to Jesus and all your problems will be over,” I cringe because I am hearing false advertising. I cringe because this promise conflicts with my experience and my spiritual pilgrimage. In one...

September 20, 2018 Memorial of Saints Andrew Kim Tae-gon, Priest, and Paul Chong Ha-sang, and Companions, Martyrs Reading 1 1 Cor 15:1-11 I am reminding you, brothers and sisters,of the Gospel I preached to you,which you indeed received and in which you also stand.Through it you are also being saved,if you hold fast to the word I preached to you,unless you believed in vain.For I handed on to you as of first importance what I also received:that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures;that he was buried;that he was raised on the third day in accordance...

"In addition to all, [take] up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming missiles of the evil one" (Eph. 6:16). Don’t elevate Satan’s will above God’s will in your life. In Ephesians 6:13 Paul characterizes Satan as "the evil one" who attacks believers with flaming missiles. The Greek word translated "evil one" literally means "bad," "vile," or "wretched." All are apt descriptions of the archenemy of our souls, who seeks to maim and destroy us spiritually. The term "flaming missiles" pictures one of the Roman weapons of Paul's day: arrows that had...

“Be subject to one another in the fear of Christ” (Ephesians 5:21). Spirit-filled believers will submit to one another. To the world, submission implies personal weakness or the coercive dominance of one person by another stronger, more intimidating individual. Such perspectives, however, are unbiblical. The noted expositor Martyn Lloyd-Jones describes submission’s original meaning in a military context, which helps us understand its scriptural definition: It is the picture of soldiers in a regiment, soldiers in a line under an officer . . . and if he [the soldier] begins to act on his own, and independently of the others, he...

1 This is a true saying, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. 2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach; 3 Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous; 4 One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity; 5 (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of...

Forty-nine times the Bible mentions a perfect, pure blue, a color so magnificent and transcendent that it was all but impossible to describe. Yet, for most of the last 2,000 years, nobody has known exactly what “biblical blue” — called tekhelet in Hebrew — actually looked like or how it could be re-created. At the time of the Second Temple, which towered above Jerusalem until it was destroyed by the Romans, a blue dye of the same name was used to color the fabric used in the clothing of the high priests. Jewish men are still commanded to use a...

When Abraham arrived in Canaan, it was by no means a great nation. But he dwelt there, living in tents. God may have prepared a mansion for him in heaven, but in Canaan all he had was a tent. The only parcel of Canaan he ever actually owned was his burial plot. Most importantly, Abraham waited. This is perhaps the hardest test of faith. Unrealized expectations make for bitterness and despair in many people’s lives. But Abraham waited in faith, just as God later required of the prophet Habakkuk, when He said: “Write the vision and make it plain on...

September 19, 2018 Wednesday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time Reading 1 1 Cor 12:31-13:13 Brothers and sisters:Strive eagerly for the greatest spiritual gifts. But I shall show you a still more excellent way. If I speak in human and angelic tonguesbut do not have love,I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.And if I have the gift of prophecyand comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge;if I have all faith so as to move mountains,but do not have love, I am nothing.If I give away everything I own,and if I hand my body over so that I...

"In addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming missiles of the evil one" (Eph. 6:16). Intense spiritual warfare calls for intense trust in God. An on-duty Roman soldier was always dressed for battle but didn't employ his shield, helmet, and sword until the fighting started. But we as Christians must be ready for battle at all times because our enemy is relentless. We can't afford to overlook a single piece of armor or slip into complacency or neglect. In that regard, Ephesians 6:16 says in effect, "Now...

“Always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God, even the Father” (Ephesians 5:20). Sincere thanks to God will result at all times if we are truly filled with the Spirit. I’m convinced that gratitude is the single greatest act of personal worship we can render to God. And today’s verse plainly asserts that thankfulness should be a well-rounded, consistent response to whatever God allows to happen in our lives (see 1 Thess. 5:18). Such a thankful attitude is impossible in our own strength, but as the Holy Spirit indwells us, He graciously...