Posted by Carol Johnson on 4/07/25
Out of natural curiosity, we would all like to know what the Lord wrote on the ground in the episode of the adulterous woman. The Pharisees and scribes were evil people. They must have secretly followed this woman for a while. They bring her into the presence of the ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 3/31/25
At the Last Supper, the Lord speaks to his disciples about his heavenly Father. “From now on you know him and have seen him” (John 14:7). The Apostle Philip says to the Lord, “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us” (John 14:8). The Lord ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 3/23/25
Are our sufferings retribution for our guilt? The greater our guilt, the greater our suffering? Job's friends, in the famous Old Testament book, answered those questions with a resounding yes. The Lord, in today's Gospel reading, categorically says "no" to these beliefs. The Psalmist had already said, "God does ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 3/17/25
In Abraham's time, covenants or formal agreements were made the way the Book of Genesis tells us today. An animal (usually a lamb or a calf) was sacrificed, split in half, and the two parts were placed facing each other. The two parties making the covenant passed through the ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 3/10/25
We hear the Gospel of the Temptations of the Lord on the first Sunday of Lent every year. Lent follows the pattern of the forty days that the Lord was in the desert fasting. The Holy Spirit was the one who led the Lord to this retreat with the ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 3/10/25
Today we Christians begin the sacred season of Lent. Today's Gospel reading gives us the three practices of Lent: prayer, fasting and almsgiving. The question we ask ourselves again today is, why these three evangelical practices?
Why do we need to pray more during this time? Well, for the ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 3/03/25
Today, the Lord invites us to reflect on the way we look. He warns us, “Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own?” (Luke 6:41). Isn’t it interesting that it is easier to pay more attention to ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 2/23/25
The Lord tells us in today’s gospel, “To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well” (Luke 6:29). Turning the other cheek is one of the Lord’s most misunderstood teachings.
To understand the Lord’s teaching, we need to imagine the physical action the ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 1/21/25
After Mass I congratulated a very young reader, still a teenager, on how well he had proclaimed one of the readings at that Mass. It was his first time reading at a Sunday liturgy. In his response to me, intending to highlight that it was his first time as ... Read More »
Posted by Carol Johnson on 1/13/25
Being a complete unknown in Israel at the time, the Lord traveled 80 miles from his hometown of Nazareth to Bethany beyond the Jordan to be baptized by St. John the Baptist. The baptism of the Lord is the first event in which the Gospels present the Lord as ... Read More »