There’s a lot that could be said about today’s Gospel, but we can consider just two points: first, what Christ says about heaven and hell, and, secondly, the importance of the little things we do as religious.

​Regarding the first, we’re reminded that Christ “wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth” (1 Tm 2:4). Jesus tells those who have acted well to “inherit the kingdom prepared for [them] from the foundation of the world” (Mt 25:34). This is man’s ultimate goal, his happiness, and it has been prepared for him from all eternity. 

As some of you might know, this year is the first year since 1945 that Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday have coincided. At first, it might seem that the two celebrations couldn’t be any more different, since Valentine’s Day has become the rather worldly, sentimental, and saccharine carnival of earthly, emotional love, and Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the Lenten season, with its somber liturgies, fasting, abstinence from meat, almsgiving, and the like.  
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Yet, as strange as it might seem, Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday are closer than we might think: both point us beyond that one day, on towards the greatest love that there is. 

​“They begged Jesus that they might touch only the tassel on His cloak” (Mk 6:56). If we meditate on the request of the citizens of Gennesaret, there are two truths that emerge. First, notice that, out of all the things the citizens of Gennesaret could’ve asked Jesus for, they asked only to touch His cloak, and not even the whole cloak, but just the tassel, the smallest part. They could’ve asked for spiritual healing, or salvation, or to love Him more, but they didn’t. Now, it’s not evil to ask to touch His cloak, and clearly they had enough faith in Jesus for Him to be able to work miracles for them, but Mark gives us the impression that they’ve missed the point: it’s as though they’ve forgotten which was greater: the tassel, or the One wearing the clock. 

In today’s first reading, King David lays dying, and his last pieces of advice to his son Solomon include an injunction that is useful for us too. David tells his son: “Take courage and be a man.”

In the Latin Vulgate, it’s esto vir. Esto vir: be a man, and it’s linked to practicing the virtue of courage (or fortitude). In fact, Saint John Paul II said just that: “To be men we need fortitude.”[1] “To be men we need fortitude.”

​Courage has to be at the heart of Christian and priestly life. 

How well do you know Jesus Christ? After hearing this Gospel, we should all take a moment to seriously ask ourselves this question. Our condition as religious, or even as Christians for that matter does not guarantee that we have a living faith in Jesus Christ.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus’ “very own”, “his fellow countrymen” hardly knew Him at all.
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Sure, they knew His profession, they knew His mother, they knew His relatives—they knew Him “superficially” from the outside—but they did not know Him—true God and true man.

Fr. Theodore Trinko, IVE
29th Sunday in Ordinary Time - World Mission Sunday
Preached at The National Shrine of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton

“Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” This is the response which stumped the Pharisees’ minions. We didn’t read it today but the very next verse describes how these henchmen were “amazed” or dumbfounded at the response. They attempted to corner Jesus with a moral conundrum only to be taught a profound lesson which requires some attention from us: give to each what is his due. The lesson of the dual citizenship.

While the US Government might not formally recognize any dual citizenship, it’s good for us that God above does. Not only are we citizens of this earth, with earthly homes, earthly connections, and earthly duties, but we are also citizens of heaven.

Fr. Theodore Trinko, IVE
Memorial of St. Paul of the Cross
Preached at The National Shrine of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton

Just like every Sunday of the year we celebrate Christ’s Resurrection, every Friday has traditionally been seen as a day to commemorate the Passion of Our Lord. This is particularly highlighted in Lent when we all are required to fast from meat on Friday. Therefore, it is particularly appropriate that we are celebrating today St. Paul of the Cross since he, as his name should indicate, had a great devotion to the cross of Christ. But a devotion for the cross is not something which is ought to be reserved to any particular group of Christians or guys with special names, but rather ought to be something present in all of our lives.

We cannot call ourselves Christians unless we take up our crosses.

 The cross has always been a symbol of our faith.[1] To the Corinthians, St. Paul wrote that he was determined to speak of nothing but Jesus Christ and Him crucified (cf. 1 Cor 2:2). No Christ without the cross nor cross without Christ. St. Rose of Lima stated that there is no other ladder to heaven than the cross.[2] Fulton Sheen taught that saints are formed in the shadows of the cross.[3] As Christians we are all called to be holy, to be saints; but it’s a dogma proclaimed by the church in the catechism that there is no holiness without renunciation, “the way of perfection passes by the way of the cross.”[4] Echoing the words of our Savior, who said that all His disciples had to take up their daily cross and follow Him (cf. Lk 9:23), the Second Vatican Council also taught that all Christians must be prepared to “follow Christ along the way of the cross, amidst the persecutions which the Church never lacks.”[5] To call ourselves Christians, teaches St. Paul, we must crucify our flesh with its passions and desires (Gal 5:24).

Moreover, the cross serves as an example to us as to how we are to live our lives. St. Augustine said we should model our lives after the cross.[6] In the words of St. Thomas Aquinas “Whosoever wishes to live with perfection should do nothing other than to despise what Christ despised [on the cross] and to desire what Christ desired [on the cross].[7]

Perhaps the greatest reason for the importance of the cross in our lives, is based on that which it accomplished 2000 years ago. It was the price of our salvation. Before that fateful day on Calvary, heaven’s gates were closed and none entered into paradise. But now, through uniting ourselves to the cross, we are able to ascending into heaven. Think about this, the cross is always in an elevated position, we look up to it. By lifting up our heads we direct our attention to that heavenly realm to which we are called. But it is only possible to get there because the cross with its vertical beam has pierced the heavens and thus opened up a way for us to pass into our Father’s house.

Now, we have to ask, how do we unite ourselves to the cross? Fundamentally this takes place in baptism where we die with Christ by being submerged in the water only to rise with him upon emerging. That sacrament we receive only once, but on a daily basis we have the opportunity to unite ourselves to it in the Sacrifice of the Mass.[8]

This is the most important part of the Mass, the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.[9] Not that Jesus is sacrificed again, but rather that same sacrifice He made 2000 years ago on Calvary’s hill is made present anew on the altar of the Mass. It is the same sacrifice made present under sacramental forms in an un-bloody manner. The vertical beam of the cross is planted on the surface of the altar at the moment of the double consecration. We can see this sacrificial aspect in a few moments surrounding the consecration.

1) Have you ever wondered why the bread and the wine are consecrated separately? It’s to represent death. When a man’s blood is separated from his body, that man is dead. So too with the sacrifice of the Mass, at the consecration there is a real making present again of the death of Christ on the Cross. 2) After the consecration the priest sings “The mystery of Faith,” and everyone responds, “We proclaim your death O Lord.”  
3) If we listen to certain Eucharist prayers attentively (all the part which takes place when we kneel down), we’ll hear the consecrated Body and Blood called a victim, a holocaust, an offering, and a sacrifice.

And we are all called to spiritually unite ourselves to this sacrifice. Place ourselves spiritually on the cross with Christ out of love for Him who put Himself on it for love of me. Or in the words of St. John de Brébeuf, whose feast we celebrated yesterday, “Jesus you died for me, I want to die for love of you.”

And so today, at the moment of consecration, let us recall that we are at Calvary, we are at the foot of the cross of Christ. What would we say to Jesus if we were there 2000 years ago? What would we feel? What would we do? We cannot travel back in time, but the cross will come to us now, so we can say, and feel, and do all that we would have had we been there. May the Blessed Virgin Mary obtain for us the grace to have those same dispositions she had when she was at the foot of the cross. Amen.

Fr. Christopher Etheridge, IVE
Memorial of Sts. Isaac Jogues, John de Brebeuf, and Companion Martyrs

Have you ever trembled a little on the inside before assuming a responsibility or responding to that vocation that you know for sure God is asking you to say yes to? Or, have you ever trembled, physically or spiritually, in the face of present or future suffering?

If so, then don't worry, you are in the company of many other Christians of good-will, even saints. On the occasion of the memorial of Sts. Isaac Jogues, John de Brebeuf and Companion Martyrs, I would like to share with you some inspiring words from a letter that St. Isaac Jogues wrote to his superior admitting to the fact that he himself "trembled" before God's will. 

Today we are celebrating the feast day of a saint whose name we’ve heard on a daily basis in the Mass for several months: St. Luke. Almost every day the Gospel reading regarding Our Lord’s life is taken from the account which this evangelist wrote. As an author of one of the four Gospels, St. Luke is one of the most popular saints in religious art. Many Churches, such as this Basilica, depict the four evangelists on the four main columns holding up the dome of the Church to represent how the Church is founded in the Word of God. Here we can note that Luke is represented with an ox for two reasons:

Fr. Nathaniel Dreyer, IVE
Tuesday of the 28th Week in Ordinary Time

In today’s Gospel, Jesus continues with His rebukes of the unbelieving Pharisees. Here, a Pharisee invited Him to partake of a meal at his house, and is astonished when Jesus doesn’t perform the ceremonial washing of hands as prescribed by the law.

The word Luke uses to describe the Pharisee’s reaction is ἐθαύμασεν (ethaumasen); it means to be awestruck or even astonished out of one’s senses, but it’s a word that’s usually used to describe the reaction that people have to Jesus’ miracles or His grace-filled words.[1] Here we can see just how backwards the Pharisees have understood things: