Daily Catholic Reflection: Saturday, March 8. 2025, Saturday after Ash Wednesday

LENT SERIES DAY 4: SATURDAY AFTER ASH WEDNESDAY (Why We Can't Sing Alleluia in Lent) Br Wilson - YouTube

Is 58:9b-14.

Ps 86:1-2, 3-4, 5-6

Lk 5:27-32                          Full Readings

Saint John of God

It is the Sick who Needs a Doctor

Living in denial is a terrible misfortune. No Christian should be there. The scribes and Pharisees, in their holier than thou attitude, categorised the tax collectors and others as sinners undeserving of the company of Jesus. Jesus, however, retorts that it is not those who are well who need the doctor, but the sick. The church is both a gallery of saints and a hospital for sinners. Let us ask ourselves today: Am I so wrapped up in my virtue, like the Pharisees, that I feel I do not need Jesus? Do I feel I do not need to go to confession? Am I resolved to be less judgmental of others who sin differently? Am I resolved to respond more promptly, like Levi, to the invitation of Jesus to follow him?

Daily catholic Reflection: Thursday, March 6, 2025, Thursday after Ash Wednesday

LENT SERIES DAY 2: THURSDAY AFTER ASH WEDNESDAY (Significance of Purple Color During Lent) Deacon Wilson (youtube.com)

Dt 30:15-20

Ps 1:1-2, 3, 4, 6

Lk 9:22-25                Full Readings

Saint Mary Ann of Jesus Paredes

Choose Life or Death

Brethren, today's readings present to us the fundamental choices we have to make as Christians: to choose Life or Death as we see in the first reading, and to choose the world or to choose to save our souls, as presented in the Gospel. With the former, choosing life means following God's commandments, and choosing death means disobedience to God, who is the source of life. Moses sets out the two ways of the covenant. Choosing to love the Lord is the path to blessing, but turning away from the Lord to serve idols leads to curses. Moses urges the people to choose life and enjoy the blessing of living in the Promised Land. The two ways are echoed in the Responsorial Psalm, which “sets forth the two ways of life – the way of the righteous, which follows God’s Law and leads to prosperity (Psalm 1:1-3), and the way of the wicked, which is dominated by sin and ends in divine judgment (1:4-6)." (Ignatius Catholic Study Bible: Old and New Testament, 833). The wicked, who follow the path of foolishness, are like dried-up vegetation (chaff) that the wind easily blows away. The righteous person, who follows the path of wisdom, is like a tree planted near running water that yields fruit, thrives, and prospers.

Daily Catholic Reflection: Wednesday, March 5, 2025, Ash Wednesday

LENT SERIES: DAY 1: ASH WEDNESDAY, With Deacon Karugaba, MHM (Why Do we Mark Ourselves with Ashes) (youtube.com)

Joel 2:12-18,  

Ps 51:3-4, 5-6ab, 12- 13, 14,

2 Corinthians 5:20–6:2,

Matthew 6: 1-6, 16- 18                  Full Readings

Saint Joseph of the Cross 

The Forty Days of Lent

Brethren, today we start our annual observance of the Lenten period, a period of forty days—a time for intense preparation of our hearts (and bodies) to receive the light of the risen Christ on Easter. The Forty Days of Lent is the annual retreat of the people of God in imitation of Jesus' forty days in the wilderness while he was being tempted. Forty is a significant number in the Scriptures. Moses went to the mountain to seek the face of God for forty days in prayer and fasting. The people of Israel were in the wilderness for forty years in preparation for their entry into the promised land. Elijah fasted for forty days as he journeyed in the wilderness to the mountain of God. We are called to journey with the Lord in a special season of prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and penitence (expressing true sorrow for sin and wrongdoing) as we prepare to celebrate the feast of Easter, the Christian Passover of Jesus' victory over sin, Satan, and death. Augustine of Hippo, 354–430 AD, teaches us, "Christians must always live in this way, without any wish to come down from their cross—otherwise they will sink beneath the world's mire. But if we have to do so all our lives, we must make an even greater effort during the days of Lent. It is not a simple matter of living through forty days. Lent is the epitome of our whole life." (Excerpt from Sermon 205, 1)

Daily Catholic Reflection: Tuesday, March 4, 2025, Tuesday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time

Sirach 35:1-12

Psalm 50:5-6, 7-8, 14, 23

Mark 10:28-31                          Full Readings

Saint Casimir

Give up Everything and Follow Me

Brethren, Today also marks the end of our semi-continuous reading of the Book of Sirach. The passage we read describes worship that is acceptable to God. The author equates several actions to the temple sacrifices: keeping the law and the commandments are equated to an oblation and the sacrifices of a peace offering; works of charity are equated to the cereal offering (Leviticus 2:1-16); giving alms is equated to the thank offering (Leviticus 7:12); and refraining from evil and avoiding injustice is equated to an atoning sin-offering. We are encouraged to glorify the Lord generously and give generously to the Lord, who will repay us generously sevenfold.

Daily Catholic Reflection: Monday, March 3, 2025, Monday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time

Sirach 17:20-24

Psalm 32:1-2, 5, 6, 7

Mark 10:17-27                          Full Readings

Saint Katharine Drexel

Sell Everything and Follow Me

Brethren, Jesus today is stressing the danger of possessions for everyone who strives to enter through the narrow gate into heaven of eternal life. It is a curious fact that for many people, the more they have, the more they want and most probably the more stingy they become because they want everything for themselves. Conversely, the less people have, the more generous they are, knowing the value to other needy people of the little they have. But this does not merely mean that we need to be free of the preoccupations and distractions of wealth. Wealth can be a good preoccupation if the worry comes from awareness of the responsibility it brings. But making it our sole treasure, that is, allowing it to take possession of our hearts, is what Jesus warns us against: ‘How hard it is for those who have riches to enter the kingdom of God!... It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.’

Daily Catholic Reflection: Sunday, March 2, 2024, Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Rime Year C

Sirach 27:4-7

Psalm 92:2-3, 13-14, 15-16

1 Corinthians 15:54-58

Luke 6:39-45                           Full Readings

Saint Agnes of Bohemia

A Good Tree

Brethren, today's central message, especially from the first reading and the gospel, is that the good tree bears good fruits, and obviously no good fruits come from a bad tree. This is how an authentic Christian too can be judged. A genuine Christian will be seen by his fruits: how one lives his Christian life, his way of talking and behaving, and how one is able to live in harmony, peace, and love of not only himself but also his fellow neighbours. These are the fruits of an authentic Christian. One of the important ways of knowing if one is a good tree or a bad tree is through speech. The wise sage of Jerusalem tells us that we should not praise anyone before he or she speaks. This is how to judge how one is. One shall surely be known from his fruits, especially from his or her speech.