“Store up treasures in heaven.” I took these words of Jesus literally when I was younger and tried to do the things — rosaries, litanies, novenas, etc. — that would give me spiritual “treasure.” Having such spiritual treasure would enable me to buy my way into heaven or so it seemed. The more practices I… Read More »

When we think of God we notice God’s creative or saving power. But the Bible teaches us that one of things God does best is forgive. God never gives up on the chosen people but again and again calls them back to fidelity. When Jesus taught us the Lord’s prayer he reminded us that God… Read More »

“When someone strikes you on your right cheek, turn the other one to him as well.” This saying of Jesus has challenged Christians throughout the ages.  Some have taken it as a clarion call to pacifism. Dr. Martin Luther King saw it as a strategy of love. He rejected those who characterized non-violence as “passive… Read More »

There seems to be something in the human spirit that responds to making a list of the things to do. You go in the office each day and schedule the day. Wives are famous for providing their husbands a “honey-do” list. At the beginning of each semester students create a calendar on when each paper… Read More »

In the business world they call it succession planning — grooming the next generation of leadership. Elijah “groomed” Elisha as a prophet — letting him shadow his prophetic work for some time before, literally, passing on the mantle. The Church, on the other hand, seems to thrust people into positions of leadership with little or… Read More »

The experience of Elijah provides a valuable lesson in prayer. He ended up in the cave on Mt. Horeb because of the great troubles he was enduring. He was striving to be faithful to God and still one difficulty after another overwhelmed him. Sound familiar? We must learn as Elijah did that we meet God… Read More »

Jesus spoke of not abolishing the law but of fulfilling it. We see what he means in the Sermon on the Mount when he contrasts the kind of minimalist thinking that can characterize a “law-abiding” citizen with the maximal thinking that is the hall mark of the gospel life.  We have obeyed the law, the… Read More »

The early Church had to wrestle with the role that the Jewish law would play in the life of the followers of Jesus. St. Paul was adamant that it was faith, not the law that mattered. In St. Matthew’s Gospel Jesus stresses the eternal significance of the law. “Amen, I say to you, until heaven… Read More »