There is a certain repetition when it comes to the weekday Gospels. Yes, we have a three-year cycle, but the daily Gospels follow a more frequent cycle, sometimes repeating the same Gospel multiple times in the same calendar year, even on the same day of the week.

Today’s Gospel is one such. I have written on it many times. One might look at the repetition and get bored or frustrated with it. To a degree, the individuals who write these Gospel reflections may even encounter the same Gospel they have previously written on and find a bit of frustration. That’s fair. It can be difficult to write on the same thing multiple times. But there is a preciousness that comes with repetition. A preciousness that is found in God’s unrelenting call to us through the Scriptures. A call to constancy with Him, a constancy in interior intimacy with the Lover of our Soul.

Today’s Gospel, and indeed the repetition of it in the Lectionary, is a call to return to our interior room. Not a specific room in our house, but the room of our Interior Castle, our soul. It is in the depths of our souls that we encounter the living God. We are not meant to only reflect on this inner room one day a year or on a three-year cycle. This is a sacred space we are meant to enter daily. The Lord is patiently waiting at the door to your inner room, knocking softly, anticipating union with the Beloved. The issue that so many of us face is that we are so preoccupied with what is happening on the outside that we miss that knocking. And then, when we have quieted the external noise, we enter into conversation with the Ego. We talk to ourselves through that inner monologue we all have. That is the default.

Today is a reminder that we need to put aside the default. Put aside the inner monologue and open the door to your soul and allow the Bridegroom to enter. Set a place for Him at the dinner table. Enter into intimate conversation with Him.

On the subject of repetition, for those who pray the Liturgy of the Hours, probably the most repetitious day is Sunday, Week I. The Church has us pray this set of Psalms every four weeks on the usual rotation, but also on every Solemnity and other high feast days, as well as usually throughout an Octave, etc. Very repetitious. Again, there is a constancy there that we must rest in. The first Psalm recited on Sunday, Week I, is Psalm 63:

The common prayer of the Church reminds us of this necessary constancy. We are so often returned to the idea that our whole person, body and soul ought to pine for God. We are to thirst as if we are dying to be united to Him.

We must return daily to this interior room, thirsting for the living God, the Lover of our Soul. If we constantly come back to God in our thirst, it will be satisfied as Our Lord tells us in John:

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For more from Dr. McGovern, visit his Substack at A Thomist, Dedicated to the Theological tradition of St. Thomas Aquinas. Exploring Thomas’ Spiritual Theology and topics in Christology and Mariology.

Ahab is in the vineyard.

He has wanted this vineyard for a long time - it was next to his palace in Jezreel, and he wanted it for a vegetable garden, and Naboth would not sell it because it was his ancestral inheritance. So Jezebel arranged for Naboth to be falsely accused and stoned to death. And now Ahab has gone to take possession.

This is where Elijah finds him.

The indictment is clear and total: murder, theft, idolatry, leading the entire nation into sin. The text has already told us that “no one gave himself up to the doing of evil in the sight of the LORD as did Ahab.” Elijah’s pronouncement of judgment is proportionally severe - the dynasty, the house, the future, all of it forfeit. The dogs will lick Ahab’s blood where they licked Naboth’s.

Ahab says: “Have you found me out, my enemy?”

Yes, Elijah says. And then pronounces the sentence.

And then Ahab tears his garments and puts on sackcloth. He fasts. He sleeps in the sackcloth. He goes about subdued.

And the LORD says to Elijah: “Have you seen that Ahab has humbled himself before me? Since he has humbled himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his time.”

This moment deserves our attention.

Ahab is not repentant in any deep sense. He does not make restitution to Naboth’s family. He does not renounce Jezebel or her methods. There is no conversion of life recorded, no public confession, no undoing of the damage. He tears his garments and puts on sackcloth - the outward gesture of mourning and humility - and goes about subdued. That is all.

And God sees it and responds to it.

The judgment is deferred, not cancelled. The house of Ahab will still fall. But God, who sees even this much, does not treat even this inadequate gesture as nothing. He receives it and accommodates to it. He does not demand that Ahab become a different man before extending a measure of mercy to the man he is.

This is the God Jesus is describing in the Sermon on the Mount: the one who makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust. Ahab is the bad. He is the unjust. And the sun rose on him anyway. And when he put on sackcloth - inadequately, incompletely, barely - the God who sends rain on the unjust received even that.

Jesus says: “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”

The structure of the command is important. Jesus is not adding a heroic counsel for the spiritually advanced. He is describing what it means to be a child of the heavenly Father - to act in the world the way the Father acts, which is to say, without calculating the merit of the recipient before extending the gift.

The Father does not check whether the field belongs to a just man before sending rain on it. The sun does not rise later for the wicked. The creation is sustained in its existence by a love that does not first verify that the creature deserves sustaining. To love your enemy is not to achieve a height of moral heroism - it is to begin to imitate, at the creaturely level, the most basic characteristic of the God in whose image you were made.

Jerome, in his commentary on this passage, pushes back against those who treat the command as impossible: “Many measuring the commandments of God by their own weakness, not by the strength of the saints, hold these commands for impossible.”1 The impossibility, he suggests, is an accusation against the giver of the command, not an honest assessment of what grace can do in a person. The same sun that rose on Ahab can rise in us.

Aquinas, commenting on “Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect,” identifies the teleios - the Greek word translated “perfect” - with the perfection of charity: the love that has reached its proper end, which is God himself, and which therefore loves as God loves, without remainder, without exception.2 The perfection is not moral flawlessness. It is the completion of a love that has been ordered all the way to its source, and which therefore flows back from that source without checking credentials at the door.

Remigius makes the connection explicit: “Because the utmost perfection of love cannot go beyond the love of enemies, therefore as soon as the Lord has bid us love our enemies, He proceeds, ‘Be ye then perfect.’”3 The love of enemies is not one application of the command to be perfect. It is the definition of it. The sun that rises on the bad and the good is the image of a love that has arrived at its completion.

This week the country stands in the days after the national consecration to the Sacred Heart. It is fitting that the readings place before us this particular image of the Father - the one whose sun rises without discrimination, whose rain falls on the unjust, who received even Ahab’s sackcloth as something worth responding to.

The Heart of Christ is the Heart of this Father made flesh. The love that poured itself out on the cross did not first consult a list of the deserving. It was given to the unjust, for the unjust, while we were yet sinners - which is to say, in the condition of Ahab, in the condition of the enemy. To be consecrated to that Heart is to be formed by that love. And to be formed by that love is, slowly, over years of sackcloth and grace, to begin to let the sun rise on people we would rather leave in the dark.

The hardest application of this command is rarely geopolitical. It is domestic.

The enemy Jesus is asking about is almost never an abstract distant adversary. It is the person who wronged you in a way that still comes up when you try to pray. The family member who took what was yours. The colleague who arranged your undoing and went about subdued afterward, offering the smallest possible gesture of regret. The neighbor who has made your life difficult for years and shows no sign of changing.

Pray for those who persecute you. Not tolerate them. Not manage them from a safe distance. Pray for them - which means bringing them before the God who makes the sun rise on them anyway, and asking him to do for them what he is trying to do for you.

Augustine, reflecting on this passage, observed that the love of enemies overflows from the joy of the persecuted - that the person who has been given enough of the Father’s love will find that it does not stop at the boundary of the self but spills over, the way rain falls without checking where the property lines are.4 The household that prays together, that brings its enemies before God by name, is practicing this overflow. Not always feeling it. Not always managing it. But practicing the gesture - which, as Ahab reminds us, is something God receives.

The sun rises on the bad and the good, on the just and the unjust, on the vineyard-stealers and the vineyard-keepers alike. This is not an injustice. It is the most demanding thing God has ever asked of us: to become children of a Father whose love we cannot outrun, even when we try.

Domus Formation offers tracks of daily prayer and formation for families, men, women, teens, and those in the second half of life. The first school of faith is the home, and every member of it deserves to be formed. WeAreDomus.com

If Catholic fiction that takes the Communion of Saints seriously - as doctrine, not sentiment - is what you are looking for, I am writing two things. Lux Perpetua is a serial novel publishing weekly in two tracks, set in Alton, Illinois, at the edge of the Mississippi - a story of custody and fidelity and a flame passed forward across centuries. And Two Lamps is a weekly short story on Substack, each one braiding two saints from different centuries into a single imagined meeting. Both are for the kind of reader who believes the imagination is also a faculty of faith.

Deacon Michael Halbrook is husband to Suzanne, father of four sons, and a permanent deacon of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois. He serves at St. Elizabeth Parish in Granite City. He is the founder of Domus Formation, a collection of Catholic prayer and formation resources for every stage of life, and he writes at DeaconMichael.net.

As Jesus tells us that the Father’s house has many dwelling places, we see a beautiful imagery of the marriage covenant (John 14:2-3). In this time period, part of a betrothal (which was similar to what we see as engagement today) consisted of the groom finding a dwelling place for his bride before they officially moved in together; he searched for a dwelling place so his bride could be where he also was. Christ is the bridegroom for the Church; He makes a place for us to dwell so we can be with Him forever.

When asked by Thomas where the way would be to get to these dwelling places, Jesus responds by saying “I am the way, and the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). And, this is precisely where we are particularly confronted with a profound choice to make. Regarding Jesus, C.S. Lewis expresses the idea of “aut Deus, aut malus homo” - either he is God or he’s a bad man. Jesus does not just claim to know the way, and he does not simply claim to want to share that way with his followers; rather, he claims that He is the way. He does not just claim he wants to spread the truth and guide His followers to life this way; He claims that He is the truth and that He is the life. Because of the nature of these statements of His, Lewis explains that Christ cannot just be a good moral teacher. He would either have to be who He says He is, or He would be guilty of making the most heinous claims of any historical figure - He was claiming to be the way to eternal life; He was claiming to be God. Therefore, He either really is God, or He is crazy. So, when we read these verses, we are called to make the choice to believe that Christ is who He says He is. The fact of the matter is this: Jesus doesn’t leave room for indecisiveness in today’s Gospel. He tells us plainly that He is the way to life; therefore, if we want life, we must follow Him.

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36 And seeing the multitudes, he had compassion on them: because they were distressed, and lying like sheep that have no shepherd.

37 Then he saith to his disciples, The harvest indeed is great, but the labourers are few.

38 Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he send forth labourers into his harvest.

1 And having called his twelve disciples together, he gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of diseases, and all manner of infirmities.

2 And the names of the twelve apostles are these: The first, Simon who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother,

3 James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, Philip and Bartholomew, Thomas and Matthew the publican, and James the son of Alpheus, and Thaddeus,

4 Simon the Cananean, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him.

5 These twelve Jesus sent: commanding them, saying: Go ye not into the way of the Gentiles, and into the city of the Samaritans enter ye not.

6 But go ye rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

7 And going, preach, saying: The kingdom of heaven is at hand.

8 Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out devils: freely have you received, freely give.

(Matthew 9:36-10-8 DRA)

Among other things, the readings for this Sunday focus on one shared theme: the distinction between the ministerial and common or universal priesthood. The same distinction existed in the Mosaic covenant that now exists in the new covenant established by Christ. This is why, in the first reading, God calls the Israelites in general “a kingdom of priests”, even though only the Levites have a priestly ministry in the Tabernacle.

In the new covenant of the Church, the same structure exists: Christ is our true Shepherd and High Priest, the new Moses; St. Peter is His vicar on Earth, the new Aaron; the bishops and priests of the Church carry on the role of Aaron’s descendants, those who ministered as priests in the Temple; and deacons assist in the Levitical ministry of service to the clergy and laity, acting as a kind of bridge between the two priesthoods. The priests of the Church stand in for the bishops, who themselves stand in for Christ as the shepherds of the Good Shepherd, just as the priests of the Temple acted with the authority of Aaron who was himself the proxy of Moses.

The common or universal priesthood applies to the all the baptized, just as it once applied to all those who received circumcision, the Old Testament prototype of Baptism. We are not ministerial priests, and this distinction, which tends to be muddied in the Novus Ordo, should be clearly emphasized, so that only those with holy orders (or children not yet culpable for sin) minister in the sanctuary, touch what is sacred (particularly the consecrated Host and Chalice) and communicate the Sacraments to the faithful, just as it was in the Temple.

Nevertheless, all the baptized faithful, those confirmed in the one true Church of Rome and in a state of grace, are capable of a true priestly service to God, with the same features that once characterized the original priesthood of Adam and Eve. In St. Paul’s words, we can “present [our] bodies a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing unto God, [our] reasonable service” (Rom 12:1). We do this by offering to God all that we do, every suffering we endure without succumbing to sin and each good work we accomplish by His grace. This is what it means to “Pray without ceasing” (1 Thess 5:17), as St. Paul exhorted, so that our entire lives become a prayer to God.

The greatest expression of our baptismal priesthood, however, comes at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass – not through the ‘active participation’ of external busyness popular today but in the ‘actual participation’ (participatio actuosa) championed by the early proponents of the Liturgical Movement. These figures emphasized what they called ‘liturgical piety,’ which involves praying interiorly in union with the priest at Mass, offering ourselves on the altar when the species of the Eucharist are consecrated.

The offering of everything in our lives, good and bad, to God that we do every day is raised to a sacramental level when we join this offering to the priest’s oblation of the Eucharist, and this liturgical piety can then flow into our daily life through what David Fagerberg calls ‘mundane liturgical theology’, the consecration of the world to God. We thus fulfill Adam’s original vocation to offer Creation back to God through prayer, virtue and subcreation.

The clergy of the Church truly are the ministerial priesthood of the new covenant, empowered by Holy Orders to act in the person of Christ (in persona Christi) for us. Their role in the Church is vitally important, most of all for the transmission of Tradition and the distribution of the Sacraments. But the Church is not simply synonymous with the clergy, no more than the “kingdom of priests” was limited only to the Levites. Lay Catholics are also “a chosen generation, a kingly priesthood, a holy nation, a purchased people” (1 Pt 2:9), called to the ‘reasonable service’ St. Paul commanded. By performing the spiritual and corporal works of mercy, studying Scripture and Tradition every day and praying without ceasing, we are sanctified and conformed into a perfect likeness of Christ our High Priest.

This is what it really means to be a disciple of Christ, to be a member of His Mystical Body the Church and to become a saint.

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St. Anthony was born in 1195 to a noble Portuguese family. He was baptized Fernando but took the name Anthony when he entered the Order of St. Augustine at the age of fifteen. After venerating the remains of five Franciscans who had just been martyred for their faith, St. Anthony decided to leave the Augustinian Order and become a Franciscan. He received permission to travel to Morocco and preach the Gospel where the Franciscan martyrs had just given their lives for Christ, but his health required him to return home soon after arriving.

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St. Anthony was then sent to preach throughout Italy and France, making some 400 trips throughout his short life. He chose to visit areas with a large presence of heretics in order to show them, through his preaching, the truth, beauty, and goodness of Christianity. St. Anthony died at the age of 36, but he was already being hailed as a saint by thousands of people who had heard his preaching and received the sacraments from him.

Perhaps St. Anthony’s most famous legacy pertains to finding lost objects. According to a pious legend, St. Anthony owned a book of the Psalms in which he had written notes for use in his preaching and to help form young religious. One day, a novice stole the book and fled from the monastery. St. Anthony was distressed at having lost his book, so he prayed not only for its return but also for God’s mercy on the young man who stole it.

While running away from the monastery with the stolen book, the novice met the devil in the form of a monster. The devil told the novice to return the stolen book immediately, or else the monster would drown him in the river. The terrified novice returned the book, apologized to St. Anthony, and resumed his life in the monastery with a repentant heart.

The Gospel reading for today’s Feast of St. Anthony fittingly recounts how Our Lord sent the seventy-two disciples to preach the Gospel, a commission that St. Anthony of Padua truly answered in his own life. As a sign of his eternal reward for so tirelessly working to spread the Gospel, St. Anthony’s tongue and lower jawbone remain incorrupt, a visible reminder to the faithful of the promise that awaits us all if we remain faithful to Christ’s teachings and seek to lead others to Him. On this Feast of St. Anthony of Padua, may he pray for us, that we might tirelessly devote ourselves to the unique callings God has given us, in order to attain Heaven for ourselves and also lead many others to salvation as well.

St. Anthony of Padua, ora pro nobis!

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In verse 27, Jesus explains that He and the Father are greatly intertwined: “No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.” First of all, we can understand that this relationship between the Father and the Son signals their oneness within the Blessed Trinity. Jesus truly is God among us, and every time we receive Him in the Eucharist at Mass, we are receiving our Lord. Second, we can understand that He desires to reveal the Father to us. If we exist, it is no accident; it is because God has willed that we may know Him. The fact that we are made in His image and likeness, thereby reflecting Him, means that we are made to know His heart.

Jesus tells us, “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). We are truly made to rest in God’s love. As we have seen, that comes from faithfully following His will to love Him and the other people around us. St. John Chrysostom commented on this verse in his “Homilies on Matthew,” saying that Christ is calling us not to reprimand us, but to do away with our sins so that we may have salvation in Him. When we fall into sin, Jesus wants us to repent, but He does not point the finger to accuse us and make us feel bad. He calls us so that we may experience His immense mercy and love. When we follow Him and learn from Him, we will find rest (Matthew 11:29). If we place full trust in Christ to show us what obedience to the Father looks like, we will experience freedom and joy. Christ Himself modeled perfect obedience as He knew He was about to be unjustly crucified yet still submitted fully to the Father’s will (Matthew 26:39). If He can trust the Father so much as to willingly die a brutal death out of love for us, surely we can trust Him to show us that love. Jesus tells us that His yoke is easy and His burden is light (Matthew 11:30). That yoke is never one of burden; it is always one of love and mercy. On this Solemnity of His Most Sacred Heart, give yourself up to Him so that He can envelop you in the yoke of His loving heart.

Acts 11:21-26; 13:1-3

21 And the hand of the Lord was with them: and a great number believing, were converted to the Lord. 22 And the tidings came to the ears of the church that was at Jerusalem, touching these things: and they sent Barnabas as far as Antioch. 23 Who, when he was come, and had seen the grace of God, rejoiced: and he exhorted them all with purpose of heart to continue in the Lord. 24 For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Ghost and of faith. And a great multitude was added to the Lord. 25 And Barnabas went to Tarsus to seek Saul: whom, when he had found, he brought to Antioch.

26 And they conversed there in the church a whole year; and they taught a great multitude, so that at Antioch the disciples were first named Christians.

1 Now there were in the church which was at Antioch, prophets and doctors, among whom was Barnabas, and Simon who was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manahen, who was the foster brother of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. 2 And as they were ministering to the Lord, and fasting, the Holy Ghost said to them: Separate me Saul and Barnabas, for the work whereunto I have taken them. 3 Then they, fasting and praying, and imposing their hands upon them, sent them away.

Last night, a Protestant lady told me that she had been “anointed by the Holy Spirit into all understanding.” I asked who anointed her? She answered that she had been anointed by the Blood of Christ. Of course, being Protestant, she has never received either the Body or Blood of Christ in the Eucharist. But, like all Protestants, she opens the Bible, chooses a random verse out of context and claims that it applies to her. In truth, Jesus was speaking to specific individuals. To His Apostles, alone, He gave the power of the Holy Spirit. We see this clearly in the first reading. Although these were Baptized Christians who had full faith in Jesus as Lord, the Holy Apostles had to come in person and lay hands on them, anointing them in the Sacrament of Confirmation, for them to receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit. That the Sacraments are administered by the priests of the Catholic Church is the commandment of Jesus. As I always ask, if you love Jesus why not just do as He commands?

Judson Carroll is the author of several books, including his newest, A Daily Catholic Devotional, Reflections on the Daily Mass Readings July - December, 2026 It is Available in paperback on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GRGY1D15

A Daily Catholic Devotional, Reflections on the Daily Mass Readings January - June, 2026 It is also available in paperback on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GDK16N45

and

Confirmation, an Autobiography of Faith: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C47Q1JNK

His podcast is The Uncensored Catholic https://www.spreaker.com/show/the-uncensored-catholic

I have written a few times on this Gospel. No doubt, the fulfillment of the law part is very important. I wrote on that here:

For today, however, I want to simply and briefly look at the second half of this Gospel. This second half is an exhortation to obedience. Amidst the great Sermon on the Mount, Our Lord commands that HIs disciples ought to keep all of these commandments. Here, He is not merely referencing the Decalogue, though certainly those are intended, but He is referencing the Beatitudes and all the rest that He teaches. Not only are we to keep it, but we are to teach it as well, meaning that we pass it on to our children, etc.

At the heart of this command is one of obedience. Surely, we ought to see this as a recapitulation of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.1 They were instructed in only one thing: do not eat of the fruit of a certain tree. Not simply because of the nature of the fruit, but because obedience to that one law was the way that our first parents showed God they loved Him.

Today in the Church, much can be commented on when it comes to obedience. We ought to be obedient to God rather than man, etc. Many rest in this truth. And while it is true, we have to remember that it only applies when our lawful superiors are commanding something contrary to God’s law. In all other things, as an act of love for God, we are to be obedient to our lawful superiors.

This past Saturday, I attended the ordination of my youngest brother to the priesthood of Jesus Christ. Of the ordination ritual, much is striking, but the one part that really stuck out to me was when he knelt in front of his bishop and vowed obedience to the Bishop and his successors.

Even if we are not priests, we are still commanded by the spirit of obedience as one of the Evangelical Councils. We are to be obedient to our shepherds, and especially, to the Holy Father. Obedience to our shepherds is an act of love for God.

Reflect today on how we can be obedient. Not just in the great things but in the small things as well. Can we be obedient by accepting today’s cross? Can we be obedient by caring for the poor? Can we be obedient by instructing the ignorant or admonishing the sinner?

If we are obedient in both great and small things, we will be called great in the kingdom of Heaven.

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For more from Dr. McGovern, visit his Substack at A Thomist, Dedicated to the Theological tradition of St. Thomas Aquinas. Exploring Thomas’ Spiritual Theology and topics in Christology and Mariology.

Note: Today also marks the Optional Memorial of Saint Ephrem, Deacon and Doctor of the Church - a fitting day to reflect on how the ordinary and the domestic become sites of grace.

The brook has run dry.

Elijah has been hiding at Cherith, fed by ravens, drinking from the stream - and now the stream is gone. The drought he called down on Ahab has consumed even his own hiding place. God sends him further, deeper into enemy territory: to Zarephath, in Sidon, the homeland of Jezebel herself. And there, at the gate of the city, he finds the woman God has designated to provide for him.

She is gathering sticks.

She has a handful of flour and a little oil. She is preparing what she believes will be the last meal for herself and her son. She tells Elijah this with the flat clarity of someone who has exhausted hope: “When we have eaten it, we shall die.”

And Elijah says: Do not be afraid. Go. Make the cake.

But first make me a little cake and bring it to me.

First. Before herself and her son. Before the certainty of tomorrow’s hunger. Before any visible sign that the promise is true. She is asked to give away the last of what she has on the word of a stranger - and to do it first.

She does.

The jar of flour did not go empty, nor the jug of oil run dry.

The miracle is quiet and domestic. Not fire from heaven, not parting waters. Just a jar that, when she reached into it the next morning, still had something in it. And the morning after. And the morning after that. For a year, she reached into the jar and it was not empty. The abundance was invisible until the moment of need, and then it was simply there.

The early Church read this scene as a figure of inexhaustible grace. The widow’s son gathering sticks was seen as a type of Christ carrying the cross; his later raising from death by Elijah as a prefiguration of the resurrection.1

But the miracle of the jar and the jug carries its own typological weight: it is the image of a household sustained by an unseen hand, renewed daily, never running out - the logic of manna in the desert pressed into the ordinary space of a kitchen.

The hinge is that single word: First.

Elijah does not ask the widow to share what she has after she has secured herself and her son. He asks her to give first, on the promise alone. This is the logic of the Kingdom turned into a domestic act. The household that orders its life toward God before securing itself - that gives first, prays first, opens its table first - is the household the promise is made to. Not because it earns the abundance, but because the giving first is itself the act of faith that opens the jar.

Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, says two things about his disciples that are presented not as commands but as declarations of fact.

You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world.

Not “try to be” or “you might become.” You are. The identity precedes the task. St. John Chrysostom, preaching on this passage, notes that the salt-and-light calling is not given for the disciples’ own sake but for the world’s: “It is not for your own sake but for the world’s sake that the word is entrusted to you.”2 The disciples are not told to become something. They are told to be what they already are, visibly, without concealing it.

Chrysostom also notes the paradox of the light under the basket: it is possible to have the light and choose not to let it reach anyone. Not through malice but through a kind of self-protection, a domestication of the gift. You keep the jar sealed, the lamp covered, the flour for yourself. And what was meant to give light to all who are in the house illuminates nothing.

The widow of Zarephath did not keep the flour sealed. She opened the jar first, for a stranger, on a word she had no human reason to trust. And the jar did not go empty.

This week, on Thursday, the Church in the United States gathers for the national consecration to the Sacred Heart of Jesus - a consecration that follows nine days of prayer beginning on the feast of Pentecost and culminating on the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart. It is fitting that these readings fall in this week.

The devotion to the Sacred Heart is, at its center, the contemplation of a love that gave itself first - not after we had made ourselves worthy of it, not in response to our merit, but poured out from the poverty of the cross before we had done anything to deserve it. Pius XII, in Haurietis Aquas, described the Heart of Christ as “the love of God for the human race which He has taken upon himself” - a love that empties itself not from surplus but from the inexhaustible gift of a self that holds nothing back.3

This is the jar that does not go empty. Not because it is always full, but because what pours from it is not measured by what remains. The widow gave from poverty. Christ gave from poverty. And in both cases, what was given first became the ground of an abundance no one could have calculated.

The household that consecrates itself to the Sacred Heart is making the same gesture as the widow of Zarephath - turning first toward the one who asks, before the morning’s supply is confirmed, on the word of a promise. Not with certainty about the outcome, but with the quiet daily act of reaching into the jar and trusting that it will not be empty.

Salt does not announce itself. Light does not explain itself. The jar of flour does not display a miracle - it simply, each morning, has enough. The domestic church that prays together, that opens its table, that raises its children in the faith, that stays faithful through the long dry seasons when the brook has run dry - is doing all of this. And the abundance it passes forward is often invisible until someone reaches for it and finds it there.

Lord, let your face shine on us - the Psalm refrain today, which is also the prayer of every household that has ever reached into a jar and hoped.

Domus Formation offers tracks of daily prayer and formation for families, men, women, teens, and those in the second half of life. The first school of faith is the home, and every member of it deserves to be formed. WeAreDomus.com

If Catholic fiction that takes the Communion of Saints seriously - as doctrine, not sentiment - is what you are looking for, I am writing two things. Lux Perpetua is a serial novel publishing weekly in two tracks, set in Alton, Illinois, at the edge of the Mississippi - a story of custody and fidelity and a flame passed forward across centuries. And Two Lamps is a weekly short story on Substack, each one braiding two saints from different centuries into a single imagined meeting. Both are for the kind of reader who believes the imagination is also a faculty of faith.

Deacon Michael Halbrook is husband to Suzanne, father of four sons, and a permanent deacon of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois. He serves at St. Elizabeth Parish in Granite City. He is the founder of Domus Formation, a collection of Catholic prayer and formation resources for every stage of life, and he writes at DeaconMichael.net.

Painting by Cosimo Rosselli, 1482.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus goes up a mountain, sits down, and starts to teach. A great crowd has gathered around Him. Some have come to be healed. Others are curious, wanting to know more about this new rabbi. All are eager to know what He will say.

And then—

“Blessed are the poor in spirit.”

“Blessed are they who mourn.”

“Blessed are the meek.”

Those Jesus talks about are not people the world necessarily considers blessed. After all, society admires strength, wealth, influence, and success. We instinctively assume those who have everything are the fortunate ones. Yet Jesus still opens His most famous sermon by praising those in need.

But why? Well, the Beatitudes are not merely a collection of virtues. They reveal who is ready to receive God. The poor in spirit understand they can’t save themselves. Those who mourn recognize the brokenness wrought by sin. Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness know that nothing in this world can truly give them what they seek.

In this way, the Beatitudes overturn nearly everything we think we know about happiness. You see, Christ doesn’t say, “blessed are those who are comfortable and certain of their own righteousness.” He calls blessed those who know they need Him!

This is why the first Beatitude carries such weight: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.” So, before we can be filled by God, we must first recognize our emptiness. Before we can receive His mercy, we must acknowledge our need for it. The saints grasped this well. The closer they drew to God, the more aware they became.

But it is the last beatitude that is, perhaps, the most memorable: “Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness.” Most perceive persecution as a mark of failure; Christ sees it as a mark of fidelity. The prophets and the Apostles endured it. And Christ Himself would endure it upon the Cross. We must do so, as well.

The Beatitudes, then, are a portrait of Christ Himself, and to truly live them is to become more like Him.

As we reflect on God’s word, perhaps the most important question is not whether we possess these virtues perfectly, but whether we recognize our need for Him. For it is often those who come before the Lord, humble and empty-handed, who end up with the greatest treasures! The Kingdom of Heaven belongs not to the self-sufficient, but to those who know they cannot reach it without Him.

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51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven.

52 If any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever; and the bread that I will give, is my flesh, for the life of the world.

53 The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying: How can this man give us his flesh to eat?

54 Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.

55 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day.

56 For my flesh is meat indeed: and my blood is drink indeed.

57 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, abideth in me, and I in him.

58 As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth me, the same also shall live by me.

(John 6:51-58 DRA)

I wouldn’t describe myself as an avid movie-goer or movie-watcher, but I’ve watched quite a few movies in my time, and I have to say that the worst movie I’ve ever watched (not including TV shows, like Game of Porn or Rings of Trash) is Star Wars: The Last Jedi. I know I’m not alone in this view, or even in total agreement with every Star Wars fan, but within a few minutes of the movie starting, I knew: this movie is terrible. As scene followed scene, this impression was further solidified, and by the end, I knew: I’ve never watched a movie this bad before.

But what made it so bad exactly? I didn’t understand it at first, but upon reflection I realized: the true problem with this movie is the director Rian Johnson’s favorite filmmaking method, which he and others call ‘subverting expectations.’ Throughout the long story, he repeatedly brought up plot points which fans hoped would go a certain way – only to pull the rug out from under us, not merely by surprising us but by doing the exact opposite of what we expected.

This was not the surprise factor of a eucatastrophe, as Tolkien explained and mastered, but a frontal assault against what worked and made sense for the story itself. From the pointless space chase to the meaningless Jedi training of Rey by the sarcastic mockery of Luke Skywalker to the absurd death of the archvillain Snoke to the epic duel between Luke and Kylo Ren that turned out to be a fight against a Force projection – all of this and more ruined every plot point, including those from the previous movie, The Force Awakens, and even Johnson’s own storylines in the movie itself.

But even though subverting expectations is a terrible method for storytelling, except perhaps in farcical comedies and parodies, it is one of God’s favorite methods for His providential orchestration of salvation history. From His preference for younger over older heirs in Genesis and beyond to His Temple rites which directly subverted the sacrifices of pagans to His anti-worldly wisdom in the prophets and wisdom books, He continually went against what everyone expected Him to do. Finally, in Christ and the New Testament, God’s plans culminated in His greatest subversion of expectations ever: not only His Incarnation as a mere man, a shocker in itself for the Jews, and the countercultural laws of the Gospel, but also His Passion, Crucifixion and Resurrection, all of which, although prophesied in the Old Testament, were utterly surprising to Jew and Gentile alike.

Nothing, however, subverts expectations more than what we celebrate for this Solemnity of Corpus Christi: the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist, when Jesus tells us to eat His flesh and drink His blood. When the Jews are shocked at this, reacting as Protestants do today and really as all of us would if we thought about it deeply enough, Jesus doesn’t deny what He said but doubles down on it, using His ‘Amen, Amen’ formula of emphasis and switching from merely saying ‘to eat’ His flesh to the even more visceral ‘to gnaw’ it. Even though He later says, “It is the spirit that quickeneth: the flesh profiteth nothing” (Jn 6:64), this doesn’t negate His previous words but only proves that the Eucharist is an unbloody sacrifice of His spiritualized, resurrected Body – but still a real and true eating of His flesh and drinking of His blood.

We must ask then: why did God do this? Didn’t He tell the Israelites repeatedly in the Old Testament that cannibalism of human flesh and drinking of any blood whatsoever are wrong? Well, we could also ask, why did He die on a cross, when He previously said, “he is accursed of God that hangeth on a tree” (Dt 21:23)? It may seem obvious to us now – ‘because He took the curse of our sin onto Himself, of course!’ – but this was not obvious to the first Christians or Our Lord’s Jewish audience.

Why, indeed, did He become human at all, when we are all wicked sinners and He knew that we would just persecute Him and finally kill Him? Why did He continue to seek after His people throughout history ever since the Fall, no matter how many times we betrayed Him and wasted His promises? Why did we hear in last Sunday’s Gospel, “For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16)?

One answer is: because God loves subverting our expectations. He hates what the world loves; He punishes what the world ignores; He rewards what the world despises; He loves those whom the world ignores; and He chose to save us through the very things from which we need salvation, namely, sin and death. In all of these, He subverts our expectations and shows that He is, while never contrary to reason, still infinitely beyond it and our earthly assumptions.

The Eucharist is truly a mystery. Even the pagan Romans charged the early Christians with cannibalism because of it. The Protestants revived the same accusation against us centuries later. And now, Catholics disbelieve in the Real Presence largely for this reason: because it subverts their expectations. The Eucharist is embarrassing. We’re ashamed of it, of Him. How can we tell others that every Sunday or even more often, we gather together to reenact and participate in the murder of our God, all so we can have a ritual feast wherein we consume His flesh and blood, and that by doing so, we receive His salvation and eternal life through incorporation into His Mystical Body? The lamb-feast of the Passover and the mass slaughter of animals in the Temple sacrifices look triflingly ordinary by comparison. And yet, as Christ said, “For he that shall be ashamed of me and of my words, of him the Son of man shall be ashamed, when he shall come in his majesty, and that of his Father, and of the holy angels.” (Lk 9:26)

So, on this Corpus Christi, each one of us should ask ourselves: am I ashamed of Christ? If He subverts my expectations, will I respond with the revulsion and frustration I felt after watching The Last Jedi? Will I be like those disciples in John 6 who left Him after His Bread of Life discourse? Or will we throw away our worldly expectations and let ourselves be surprised by His wondrous plan? As J.R.R. Tolkien once wrote,

It takes a fantastic will to unbelief to suppose that Jesus never really ‘happened’, and more to suppose that he did not say the things recorded of him – so incapable of being ‘invented’ by anyone in the world at that time: such as ‘before Abraham came to be I am’ (John viii). ‘He that hath seen me hath seen the Father’ (John ix); or the promulgation of the Blessed Sacrament in John [vi]: ‘He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life’. We must therefore either believe in Him and in what he said and take the consequences; or reject him and take the consequences. I find it for myself difficult to believe that anyone who has ever been to Communion, even once, with at least right intention, can ever again reject Him without grave blame. (However, He alone knows each unique soul and its circumstances.) (Letter 250)

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Today’s Gospel shows the importance of obeying the precept to contribute to the support of the Church. However, there is also a beautiful mystical meaning to this passage. In the words of St. Bede the Venerable, “[T]e poor widow…[symbolizes] the simplicity of the Church: poor indeed, because she has cast away the spirit of pride and of the desires of worldly things” (Catena aurea).

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As members of the mystical Body of Christ, the Church, this symbolism also refers to us as well. To fully live the life of grace, we must cast aside the spirit of pride and our desire for worldly things. Pride is commonly referred to as the root of all evil, and worldly things only distract us from the ultimate Good, which is God. We were made for union with God, the infinite Good, and we must imitate the widow by giving up everything to fully attain this union with Him.

In today’s Epistle, St. Paul tells St. Timothy that he was being “poured out like a libation.” By the grace of God, St. Paul converted countless people throughout his life, but he knew that errors would continue to persist and that the Church would continue to be attacked by those obstinate in their unbelief. To encourage St. Timothy, St. Paul writes that he must remain faithful to his priestly ministry at all times, giving everything in his work to spread the Gospel and win souls for Christ.

In our own vocations and states of life, we are also called to imitate Saints Paul and Timothy and the widow in today’s Gospel by giving everything in our pursuit of Christ. In the modern world, we are surrounded by error and hostility that seeks to lead us from the truth. If we permit ourselves to be distracted by the temporary things of this world, we can easily be led astray, for our focus is not on God but on lesser things that change and lure us into a false and fleeting sense of fulfillment.

While most of us are not called to radically renounce the world and live the evangelical counsel of poverty as a consecrated religious, we can still practice simplicity and detachment, striving to live in the world but not of it. We can and should make use of the things of this world in order to provide for the spiritual and physical needs of ourselves and those under our care. However, this use should always be guided by the virtues of prudence and temperance, with the glory of God as our constant goal.

As we prepare to celebrate the glorious Feast of Corpus Christi tomorrow, may we seek to do so with a renewed simplicity of heart, so that we can adore Christ’s Body and Blood with hearts empty of any worldly attachment so that we can be filled more fully with the grace and love of God.

We are invited today to understand that Jesus is not just a king in the line of David, but he is also the Son of God. This Gospel was not only applicable to the scribes at the time of Christ but also to us now. We have a duty to believe in Christ as the Messiah who fulfilled all of Scripture’s promises and who continues to reign in love over our lives every day.

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2 Timothy 2:8-15

8 Be mindful that the Lord Jesus Christ is risen again from the dead, of the seed of David, according to my gospel. 9 Wherein I labour even unto bands, as an evildoer; but the word of God is not bound. 10 Therefore I endure all things for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation, which is in Christ Jesus, with heavenly glory.

11 A faithful saying: for if we be dead with him, we shall live also with him. 12 If we suffer, we shall also reign with him. If we deny him, he will also deny us. 13 If we believe not, he continueth faithful, he can not deny himself. 14 Of these things put them in mind, charging them before the Lord. Contend not in words, for it is to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers. 15 Carefully study to present thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.

I chose to write on the first reading today because it makes an interesting point: “but the word of God is not bound.” It would be easy to gloss over this point, considering that we are reading it in the Bible. Bibles are so common now qs to be almost universal in America. We may read, “the word of God” and think, wow, yeah the Bible has spread throughout the world! But, that is not the intent of this sentence, at all. Nor, is it a reference to Christ, who is the Word of God incarnate. It is specifically in regard to the teachings of Jesus as given to us through the Holy Apostles.

Again, our Lord did not leave us a Bible. He left us a Church authorized to teach in His stead, who gave us the Bible. Recently, a Protestant told me that the Bible is the Word of God (true) and that it is eternal (true) but also that it has been available as the only reliable and authoritative testament to Christianity “to all generations and for all time”.... absolutely false! Saint Francis de Salles gives us a very succinct history:

The Council of Trent gives these books as sacred, divine and canonical: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Josue, Judges, Ruth, the four Books of Kings, two of Paralipomenon, two of Esdras (a first, and a second which is called of Nehemias), Tobias, Judith, Esther, Job, 150 Psalms of David, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, the Canticle of Canticles, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Isaias, Jeremias with Baruch, Ezechiel, Daniel, Osee, Joel, Amos, Abdias, Jonas, Micheas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sophonias, Aggeus, Zacharias, Malachy, two of Machabees, first and second; of the New Testament, four Gospels, S. Matthew, S. Mark, S. Luke, S. John, the Acts of the Apostles by S. Luke, fourteen Epistles of S. Paul, to the Romans, two to the Corinthians, to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians, two to the Thessalonians, two to Timothy, to Titus, to Philemon, to the Hebrews—two of S. Peter, three of S. John, one of S. James, one of S. Jude, and the Apocalypse. The same books were received at the Council of Florence, and long before that, at the third Council of Carthage about 1,200 years ago.

These books are divided into two ranks. For of some, both of the Old and of the New Testament, it was never doubted but that they were sacred and canonical, others there are about whose authority the ancient fathers doubted for a time, but afterward they were placed with those of the first rank.

Those of the first rank in the Old Testament are the five of Moses, Josue, Judges, Ruth, four of Kings, two of Paralipomenon, two of Esdras and Nehemias, Job, 150 Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Canticles, the four greater Prophets, the 12 lesser Prophets. These were formed into the canon by the great synod at which Esdras was present, and to which he was scribe, and no one ever doubted of their authority without being at once considered a heretic, as our learned Genebrard fully proves in his Chronology.2°2 The second rank contains the following: Esther, Baruch, a part of Daniel (the history of Susanna, the Canticle of the Three Children and the history of the death of the dragon in the 14th chapter), Tobias, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Machabees 1 and 2. And as to these there is a great probability in the opinion of the same Doctor Genebrard2%that in the meeting which was held at Jerusalem to send the 72 interpreters into Egypt, these books, which were not in existence when Esdras made the first canon, were placed on the canon, at least tacitly, because they were sent with the others to be translated, except the Machabees, which were received in another meeting afterward, wherein the preceding were again approved. But however the case may be, as the second canon was not made so authentically as the first, this placing on the canon could not procure them an entire and unquestionable authority among the Jews nor make them equal with the books of the first rank.

Coming to the books of the New Testament, I say that in the same way there are some of the first rank, which have always been acknowledged and received as sacred and canonical. These are the four Gospels, S. Matthew, S. Mark, S. Luke, S. John, all the Epistles of S. Paul except that to the Hebrews, one of S. Peter, one of S. John. Those of the second rank are the Epistle to the Hebrews, that of S. James, the second of S. Peter, the second and third of S. John, that of S. Jude, the 16th chapter of S. Mark, as S. Jerome says, and S. Luke’s history of the bloody sweat of Our Lord in the garden of olives, according to the same S. Jerome; in the eighth chapter of S. John there has been a doubt concerning the history of the woman taken in adultery, or at least some suspect that it has been doubted, and concerning verse seven of the last chapter of S. John’s First Epistle. These are, as far as we know, the books and parts of books concerning which it appears there was anciently some doubt. And these were not of undoubted authority in the Church at first, but as time went on they were at length recognized as the sacred work of the Holy Spirit, and not all at once but at different times. And first, besides those of the first rank, whether of the new or of the Old Testament, about the year 364 there were received at the Council of Laodicea24 (which was afterward approved in the sixth general Council22), the book of Esther, the Epistle of S. James, the Second of S. Peter, the Second and Third of S. John, that of S. Jude, and the Epistle to the Hebrews as the fourteenth of S. Paul. Then some time afterward at the third Council of Carthage2°® (at which S. Augustine assisted, and which was confirmed in the sixth general Council inTrullo), besides those of the second rank just mentioned, there were received into the canon, as of full authority, Tobias, Judith, First and Second Machabees, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus and the Apocalypse. But of all those of the second rank, the book of Judith was first received and acknowledged as divine, in the first General Council of Nice, as S. Jerome witnesses in his preface to this book. Such is the way in which the two ranks were brought together into one, and ever made of equal authority in the Church of God, but progressively and with succession, as a beautiful morning rising, which little by little lights up our hemisphere.

Thus was drawn up in the Council of Carthage, that same ancient list of the canonical books which has ever since been in the Catholic Church and which was confirmed in the sixth general Council, at the great Council of Florence 160 years ago for the union of the Armenians by the whole Church both Greek and Latin, in our age by the Council of Trent, and which was followed by S. Augustine. Before the Council of Carthage they were not all received as canonical by any decree of the general church. I had almost forgotten to say that you must not therefore make a difficulty against what I have just laid down because Baruch is not quoted by name in the Council of Carthage. For since Baruch was secretary of Jeremias, the book of Baruch was reckoned by the ancients as an accessory or appendix of Jeremias, being comprised under this, as that excellent theologian Bellarmine proves in his Controversies. But it is enough for me to have said thus: my brief outline is not obliged to dwell on every particular. In a word, all these books, whether of first or second rank, with all the parts, are equally certain, sacred and canonical, and are received in the Catholic Church.

In truth, Christians had no Bible for about twice as long as America has been a nation. For centuries after that, Bibles were hand copied and very rare. And, until recently, most people were illiterate. Christians had the word of God as is referenced in today’s first reading. They had the teachings of the Apostles through the Catholic Church. The Bible is wonderful and essential. But, it is not self explanatory. Today, just as was true 2,000 years ago, we need the teaching of the Holy Catholic Church to know the word and the WORD of God.

Judson Carroll is the author of several books, including his newest, A Daily Catholic Devotional, Reflections on the Daily Mass Readings July - December, 2026 It is Available in paperback on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GRGY1D15

A Daily Catholic Devotional, Reflections on the Daily Mass Readings January - June, 2026 It is also available in paperback on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GDK16N45

and

Confirmation, an Autobiography of Faith: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C47Q1JNK

His podcast is The Uncensored Catholic https://www.spreaker.com/show/the-uncensored-catholic

Today’s Gospel bears witness to the Communion of Saints. Our Lord is questioned by the Sadducees, who were a sect of Jewish leaders who specifically denied the resurrection of the dead. In an attempt to prove their claims contra the Pharisees, they came up with an elaborate scenario in which a woman marries a man and his six brothers, in succession, as each one died according to the Law of Moses.1 “In the resurrection, whose wife will she be? For seven had her as wife.”2

The Sadducees are very smug in their thought that they trapped Jesus, and by extension, the Pharisees. Our Lord clarifies two very important truths:

The first of these truths gives us an understanding of the nature of marriage as a sacrament. Marriage is an earthly institution. While it certainly is a preparation and foretaste of heaven, it is not meant to cross the threshold of death. The gift of self found within the marital bond is a foreshadowing of the gift of self that the beatified soul has with the Trinitarian God. Just as a husband and wife give themselves, without reserve, to one another, we find a glimpse of the pouring of the essence of God into the beatified soul in heaven. It is this absolute unity with God that gives reason why the marital bond ends at death. The beatified soul must be free to give itself entirely to God and to be filled by Him alone. Thus, the marital vows are kept “until death do us part.”

The second pertains to the actual resurrection of the body, in particular, the Communion of Saints. Our Lord cites the Theophany of the burning bush when God speaks to Moses and identifies Himself as “The God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.”3 Our Lord uses the Books of Moses to show the Sadducees that their belief is wrong. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are not dead but are very much living! They are alive in God, awaiting the resurrection of the body at the end of time.4 Our Lord Himself is the one who puts forward this exegetical interpretation. By extension, this applies to all those who have departed this life in friendship with God. They are not dead but living! Thus, the saints in heaven, by the power and providence of God, are there to bear witness to the coming resurrection. It is here that we find the tradition of invocation of the saints.

These two truths fall among two equally important claims as well:

I have always placed a lot of emphasis on this first line. Have you not read? This is a question that is asked in a fair bit of irony. This is because they have very clearly read, but they have not understood. These are two very different things. The Sadducees and Pharisees were among the most educated and well-read groups in 1st-century Jewish society. And yet, both groups missed so much because they read without understanding.

Finally, Our Lord very plainly tells them, You are quite wrong. Not only were they wrong about the nature of marriage, but they were also wrong about the resurrection of the flesh. More than that, and I think this is where Our Lord emphasises the modifier of quite wrong. They were wrong about the very nature of God and His desire for mankind. The very nature of God is life. To deny the resurrection, the immortality of the soul, eternal life, the intercession of the saints, etc., is to deny the very nature of God Himself as the sustainer of all existence. It is to deny God as eternal life itself. Those who depart this life in a state of grace move on to a participated eternity and thus are incorporated into the divine life of God.

We do not want to become modern-day Sadducees and deny these essential truths of the faith. We may read, but do we truly understand? Our God is not a God of the dead. Those in heaven are not silent, sleeping, detached souls who have no connection to us. Our God is a God of the living. His saints live and act through Him. He has providentially ordered each prayer by the saints to be efficacious for those who ask for it.

He is not a God of the dead but of the living.

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For more from Dr. McGovern, visit his Substack at A Thomist, Dedicated to the Theological tradition of St. Thomas Aquinas. Exploring Thomas’ Spiritual Theology and topics in Christology and Mariology.

They have come together for one purpose and it is not good.

The Pharisees and Herodians were not natural allies. The Pharisees despised Roman taxation as an affront to Jewish sovereignty under God; the Herodians supported it as the practical price of political stability.

But they agreed on this: Jesus needed to be silenced. And so they come together, with their flattery carefully prepared: “You are a truthful man, you are not concerned with anyone’s opinion, you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth” - and their trap set beneath it. If he says pay the tax, he offends Jewish religious sensibility. If he says refuse it, he can be handed to Rome.

Jesus sees through it immediately: “Why are you testing me?” He does not pretend the flattery is sincere. And then he asks for a coin.

“Whose image and inscription is this?”

Caesar’s, they say. Of course it is. The denarius bore the image of Tiberius and the inscription Tiberius Caesar Divi Augusti Filius Augustus - Tiberius Caesar, son of the divine Augustus. The coin itself was a small act of imperial theology, a claim about who held ultimate authority over all things.

“Repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.”

They were utterly amazed. And well they might be - because Jesus has not answered the question they asked. He has asked a different question, one they cannot unhear.

Tertullian, writing to the persecuting empire around the turn of the third century, drew out what Jesus left implicit: “The image of Caesar which is on the coin is to be given to Caesar, and the image of God which is in man is to be given to God.”1 The logic is precise. Whatever bears an image belongs to the one whose image it bears. The coin is Caesar’s because Caesar’s face is on it. The human person belongs to God because God’s image is stamped on every one of them - “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him” (Gen 1:27). The eikon of Genesis is the same Greek word Mark uses when Jesus asks whose image is on the coin. The parallel is not accidental.

This means the question Jesus asks of the coin is the question he is simultaneously asking of every person in the crowd - the Pharisees, the Herodians, the bystanders, and everyone who has read the passage since: Whose image is this? The coin belongs to Caesar. The person belongs to God.

Second Peter closes with a phrase that lands differently in this light: “Grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and savior Jesus Christ.” It sounds like a devotional encouragement - and it is - but it is also a description of what it means to render to God what belongs to God. The imago Dei stamped on every human person is not static. It is not a fixed mark like a face on a coin. Aquinas, following Augustine, distinguishes three levels of the image in man: by nature, possessed by all rational souls; by grace, present in those who actually and habitually know and love God; and by glory, perfected in the blessed.2 To grow in grace and knowledge is to let the image become more fully what it already is - more legible, more luminous, more clearly oriented toward the one whose face it bears.

The patience of the Lord, Peter says, is salvation. We are given time - the seventy years the Psalm counts, or eighty if we are strong - to grow into what we already are. The image is not something we acquire. It is something we allow grace to clarify in us, year by year, until it is recognizable.

“Let your work be seen by your servants and your glory by their children.”

Psalm 90 is Moses’s prayer, the oldest psalm in the collection, written by a man who spent forty years watching a people learn - slowly, badly, with enormous resistance - what it meant to belong to God rather than to Egypt. He prays that the work will become visible, that the children will see the glory the servants could only glimpse, and that the image, clarified across a generation, will be legible to the next one.

This is the domestic question the readings give us. The household is where the image of God in persons is either tended or allowed to blur. Not because families are the only site of formation, but because they are the first, and the most sustained, and the one that runs deepest.

The parent who prays beside a child is doing something more specific than teaching a religious practice. They are orienting a person stamped with the image of God toward the one whose image they bear, returning to God what belongs to God, in the most ordinary and irreplaceable way available to them.

The spouse who remains faithful through difficulty, the grandparent who keeps praying when the grandchildren cannot see why, the household that gathers at the table and blesses the food and names the God who gave it - these are all acts of rendering. Small, daily, mostly invisible. The image clarified one morning at a time.

The Pharisees and Herodians came to trap Jesus with a question about money. He gave them back a question about persons. They walked away amazed and, Mark says, left him alone. They had no answer for what he had asked.

We do. Or we are given the grace to grow into such an answer.

Whose image is this? It is God’s. And what belongs to God is to be given back to God - in grace, in knowledge, in the slow faithful work of a household that knows what it bears.

Domus Formation offers tracks of daily prayer and formation for families, men, women, teens, and those in the second half of life. The first school of faith is the home, and every member of it deserves to be formed. WeAreDomus.com

If Catholic fiction that takes the Communion of Saints seriously - as doctrine, not sentiment - is what you are looking for, I am writing two things. Lux Perpetua is a serial novel publishing weekly in two tracks, set in Alton, Illinois, at the edge of the Mississippi - a story of custody and fidelity and a flame passed forward across centuries. And Two Lamps is a weekly short story on Substack, each one braiding two saints from different centuries into a single imagined meeting. Both are for the kind of reader who believes the imagination is also a faculty of faith.

Deacon Michael Halbrook is husband to Suzanne, father of four sons, and a permanent deacon of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois. He serves at St. Elizabeth Parish in Granite City. He is the founder of Domus Formation, a collection of Catholic prayer and formation resources for every stage of life, and he writes at DeaconMichael.net.

Painting by Marten van Valkenborch, ca. 1680-1690.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus turns to the Pharisees and tells them a story: the parable of the Wicked Tenants.

At first, it sounds like just another tale, but they quickly realize He’s talking about them. The vineyard Christ speaks of belongs to God. The servants sent to collect its fruit are Israel’s prophets. And the owner’s beloved son is, of course, Jesus Himself.

Yet despite everything the tenants do, the owner is still patient. He keeps sending servants even after the first have been beaten, humiliated, and killed, and instead of bringing down judgment right then and there, he offers them another chance to turn back.

You see, the vineyard’s owner sends his son, thinking they’ll respect him, but greed and pride win out, and they seize him, kill him, and throw him out of the vineyard. And to those of us who know how the story goes, we know Jesus is foretelling His Passion here. After all, those standing before Him are already plotting His death, refusing to receive the Son the Father has sent.

And while yes, it is easy to condemn the tenants, we often reject Christ the same way we did. Every time we cling to sin or place our own will above His, we too reach for the vineyard, seeking to make it our own. That is, in the end, the nature of pride. You do not need God, it whispers. You are the master of your own life!

But Jesus still offers us a word of hope. “The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.” He would be rejected, condemned, and crucified, but none of it ended in defeat. It ended in triumph and victory!

This is often how God works within us as well. The things that appear weak, broken, or beyond repair can become beautiful in His hands. Our failures, sufferings, and the crosses we never would have chosen for ourselves are not wasted when they are brought to Christ. He brings new life from what we had already given up for dead.

So, on this feast day of St. Justin Martyr, may we ask ourselves: are we truly allowing Christ to be the foundation upon which everything else is built? Justin himself gave his life rather than renounce that, and his witness endures even today!

May we welcome the Son and return to the Father’s Vineyard. Everything we have is His to begin with!

16 For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting.

17 For God sent not his Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by him.

18 He that believeth in him is not judged. But he that doth not believe, is already judged: because he believeth not in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

(John 3:16-18 DRA)

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, the central mystery of our Faith. This is a mystery transcending human discovery or comprehension, known by us only through revelation in Christ, and while it is possible to explain the Trinity in rational, philosophical terms, to show that the doctrine is not contrary to reason (nor is any other Catholic doctrine), it remains impossible for human reason to realize or grasp the truth of the Trinity by itself. It can only be accepted by faith on the authority of God who reveals it to us.

The two most controversial non-moral teachings of the Catholic faith are the Trinity and the Incarnation of Christ. No other doctrines have generated more confusion, heresy and opposition from Christians and non-Christians alike. For the Trinity, even many well-catechized Catholics today would find themselves at a loss if asked to explain the Trinity even in basic terms, beyond the formula ‘one God in three Persons,’ and the understanding of the Trinity by non-Catholics is often woefully inadequate or even erroneous, turning the Trinity into merely one Person expressed in three ways (the heresy of Sabellianism) or even as three separate gods united in some non-essential way, such as shared purpose or knowledge (the heresy of tritheism, held in one form by Mormons).

So-called ‘strict monotheists,’ like Jews and Muslims, object to the Trinity as a kind of veiled polytheism, caricaturing it according to the tritheist misrepresentation. Some, again, will treat the Persons of the Trinity as subordinated to one another, as though the Son is less than the Father and the Holy Ghost less than the Father and the Son, or, on the other hand, as though there is no origination in the Trinity at all, so that the Persons are ultimately indistinguishable.

The truth of the Trinity, however, as professed and explained by the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, is far more subtle, profound and, to use a colloquial term, mind-blowing. It hinges on the development of the term ‘person’ (persona in Latin, originally meaning ‘mask,’ or hypostasis in Greek, a more accurate term better rendered in Latin as subsistence, or that which ‘stands under’ or underlies superficial distinctions), which is a uniquely Christian term, defined specifically to explain the Trinity. The Trinity is the one, simple divine essence, without any division, parts or inequality, which is shared equally by three Persons, the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, all of whom ‘subsist in’ the divine essence and are indistinguishable from this essence.

The Persons of the Trinity simply are God – not gods or different ‘expressions’ of God but only one true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Each Person possesses and simply is the single divine essence, sharing the same divine attributes, even though certain divine attributes can be applied in a special way to particular Persons according to the usage of Scripture, such as Power to the Father, Word to the Son and Love to the Holy Ghost. (To show the adaptability of this, the Epistle today calls the Father ‘Love,’ the Son ‘Grace,’ and the Holy Ghost ‘Fellowship,’ since each Person properly possesses all of these attributes in their shared divine nature.) This is based on the human mind, which cannot grasp the pure oneness and simplicity of the divine essence and the convertibility of all the divine attributes. For us, Power, Word and Love, like justice and mercy, are distinct things, even though in God they are all one, His simple divine essence.

In His essence, God is pure Being itself, what St. Thomas Aquinas called ipsum esse subsistens, or being itself subsisting, and all of the divine attributes we can distinguish, such as omnipotence, omniscience, omnibenevolence, etc., are only logically or virtually distinct in our minds. In God, they are only Being. This is why St. Thomas considered the greatest name of God to be the one He revealed to Moses: YHWH, the Tetragrammaton, translated in English as I AM who AM, a name Christ assigned to Himself multiple times in the Gospels (e.g. Jn 18:4-6) and which, as God, also applies to the Holy Ghost.

Don’t feel bad if this seems hard to wrestle with. It is! No one has or can ever fully comprehend it, and thankfully, God allows us to believe in it by faith and to be in communion with Him through grace even without perfectly understanding it. But rational explanations, like the brief one given above based on St. Thomas, helps to show that the doctrine of the Trinity is both rational and authentically monotheistic. We do not believe in three gods. The Son is the Word perfectly reflecting and sharing the divine nature of the Father and, analogous to the word in our mind, remains within God, while the Holy Ghost is the impression of love which, like our interior act of love, remains within God and perfectly expresses Him. Since each Person is divine, they are true Persons, unlike the words and loves in us, but analogous to our words and loves, the Persons share the same divine nature. As St. Augustine wrote in his autobiography The Confessions,

I could wish that men would consider three things which are within themselves. These three things are quite different from the Trinity, but I mention them in order that men may exercise their minds and test themselves and come to realize how different from it they are. The three things I speak of are: to be, to know, and to will. For I am, and I know, and I will. I am a knowing and a willing being; I know that I am and that I will; and I will to be and to know. In these three functions, therefore, let him who can see how integral a life is; for there is one life, one mind, one essence. Finally, the distinction does not separate the things, and yet it is a distinction.

The Persons of the Trinity are not distinguished from one another in essence but only by opposed relations of origin: the Father is underived, the Son is eternally begotten of the Father as His Word, and the Holy Ghost proceeds through spiration from the Father and (or through) the Son. These processions are ‘opposed’ because they are logically contrary to one another, i.e. to be ‘unoriginated’ is logically contrary to being ‘begotten’ or ‘spirated’; this is the only way that the Persons differ from one another, but this causes no division in the one simple divine essence. (The image attached below shows this especially well.) These processions are not discrete events that happened at one point in time but eternal acts within the dynamic, living inner life of the Godhead.

The Son’s eternal procession is called ‘begotten’ not because of the Incarnation, which caused no change in God but only in Christ’s human nature, but rather because He proceeds from the Father, called ‘begetting’ because the Father, who is the underived Source of the Godhead, speaks the Word within Himself as a perfect likeness to Himself, like the son of a human father but infinitely more so. This is why St. Paul says, “For this cause I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom all paternity in heaven and earth is named” (Eph 3:14-15). Likewise, the Holy Ghost’s procession is called ‘spiration’ because He is the Breath of Life, who “moved over the waters” (Gen 1:2) at the beginning of Creation. Christ showed these two types of procession in the Gospels, calling the Father “Abba” with familial affection (Mk 14:36) and after His Resurrection, He “breathed on [the apostles]; and he said to them: Receive ye the Holy Ghost.” (Jn 20:22)

The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity should be the greatest object of contemplation for all of us, alongside the Incarnation of Christ, throughout our lives. We can never exhaust our study, prayer, meditation, and application of it in our lives. Reading the saints’ reflections on the doctrine of the Trinity reveals its infinite transcendence, its visibility throughout the natural world and in human nature, and the clarity it provides for all of reality precisely through its seemingly paradoxical nature.

Today, may we pray that the Holy Ghost, whose confirmation of our Baptism we celebrated last Sunday, will enlighten our minds and uplift our hearts to understand and to love the Trinity more perfectly, inspiring us to long more and more to see Him one day in the Beatific Vision.

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St. Jude begins by identifying God’s ability to preserve man from sin. We know from our experience that every fallen human being—that is, except for Our Lord and Our Lady—commits a multitude of sins in his life. This experience does not contradict St. Jude’s words here but rather confirm the harmful mentality that leads to all sin, namely, the prideful rejection of divine grace. Pride causes us to reject God’s knowledge of our objective and ultimate good, which is union with Him. When we rely on God’s grace rather than our own fallen desires and erroneous idea of our good, we are able to resist even the greatest of temptations. When we do this, our souls remain in the state of grace, and we will be able to stand before Christ our Judge with joy rather than fear.

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St. Jude refers to the “only God our Saviour through Jesus Christ our Lord.” This is not a heresy denying Christ’s divinity; rather, as the 18th century Bishop Challoner explains in his biblical annotations, St. Jude is referring to a beautiful reality and facet of our faith in the Trinity. We know there to be three divine Persons in one God; the three divine Persons are co-equal and co-eternal, sharing the same divine nature. As such, all three divine Persons participated in the redemption of mankind. While Christ gave His bodily life as the price of our redemption, the entire Blessed Trinity is the first cause of His doing so, as all three divine Persons participated in the Incarnation and inspired Christ to give His life for man (see Summa theologiae, III, q. 45, a. 5, respondeo).

St. Jude ends his epistle with the beautiful prayer for God to receive “glory and magnificence, empire and power, before all ages, and now, and for all ages of ages.” As we prepare to liturgically honor the Blessed Trinity tomorrow, may we make this our prayer too, filling our hearts with gratitude to the three divine Persons of the Blessed Trinity for Their infinite love by which we are able to attain eternal salvation.

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Next, we see Christ cleansing the temple, telling those who were buying and selling within it that they have made it a den of thieves when it was meant to be a house of prayer for all (Mark 11:17). This declaration of Christ’s can be especially applicable to us today. Society in 2026 is largely focused on feeling; people largely decide whether or not they want to do any particular act based on how it makes them feel, whether it is doing chores, working, going to school, or even going to church. However, we are especially prohibited from viewing worship of the Lord in this way. When we go to church, we are not going so we feel good; we are going to worship God. We are human; sometimes we cannot help but feel that a certain Mass, or other church service, is boring or dreary. However, our feelings really do not matter in this scenario. We are not there to serve ourselves; we are there to give reverent worship to God. The moment we begin to serve our own desires in church is the moment we have it all wrong. And, in acts like doing chores or helping others, we must also deny ourselves. The help we provide can ease stress for another, and as one community of children under God, we are willing to help our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Finally, in the last section of today’s Gospel reading, Peter notices that the fig tree which Jesus cursed has withered (Mark 11:21). Jesus responds by telling him and the others to have faith in God; He says that if we truly believe in our hearts that He can do what we ask for in prayer, then it will be done for us (Mark 11:22-23). A reason why many of us are scared to use our gifts, and therefore scared to bear fruit, is because we don’t believe God can really use us; it stems from an inadequate view of one’s self-worth. However, this is certainly not how God sees us, so we must not view ourselves this way either. We must see ourselves with the dignity that God has bestowed upon us, and that means trusting that He can use us for good. We must bear fruit by trusting God. And, it is no accident that the temple scene was placed in between this one and when Jesus initially curses the fig tree in today’s Gospel; He wants us to know that in order to fully trust God, we must deny the desire to take control of our own lives.