Yesterday, I presented a day-long retreat on the Parable of the Prodigal Son to a group of friends and alumni of the Aquinas Institute of Theology, where I received my training in spiritual direction and now serve as a trustee. I ended the day with this new prayer of blessing, a reminder of the four important life lessons embedded in the parable that lead to a deeper understanding and experience of God’s extravagant love for us — Stop. Turnaround. Be …
Category: Scripture
All in all, Joseph gets pretty short shrift in the Gospel Christmas narratives, and very little is said about him after that. He’s the quiet guy standing in the back by the shepherds and the sheep. We don’t know how long he lived but it seems clear that he did not live to see Jesus begin his ministry. He’s not mentioned after Jesus’ “missing years,” even when Mary is. But I like to imagine the role he played in raising …
Written below (and in the video at bottom…keep scrolling) are three short monologues written from the perspectives of three men whose encounters with Jesus surely changed their lives, or at least I imagine they did, for sometimes scripture tells us a part of the story and leaves the rest to our imaginations. In Matthew 7:31-37, we find a deaf and mute man whose intimate encounter with Jesus heals him and opens up a new world of sound and communication. In …
This morning, up early and sitting on my porch, I am watching my little piece of the world recover and dry out from a beating of rain and wind and lightning last night. We needed the rain, to be sure, but the wind, thunder and lightning were there for what effect? To remind us of our smallness in the face of it all? Maybe so. A parable embedded in a storm. It’s peaceful now, the birds and squirrels noisy in …
“The child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom; and the favor of God was upon him.” Luke 2:40 The older I get, it seems, the more I want to look backwards, to see through the clouds of time and remember — even if imperfectly — the people and events that shaped me. It’s an exercise in time travel, of sorts, a chance to go back and pay more attention. For example, I would like to go back and listen …
After everything that happened and everything I witnessed, all I wanted to do was sleep, but I couldn’t. The day kept flashing through my mind… I heard his last words from the cross: “It is finished.” I saw the spear pierce his side and what looked like water and blood pour from him. I stayed close by not because I was brave but because I couldn’t take my eyes from him. But if you asked me why I wouldn’t have …
The teacher had been arrested in Gethsemane and brought here to the high priest. A few of his disciples followed but others snuck off into the night. I guess I could hardly blame them. So much happened so quickly and there was a growing mob calling for violence against him. I didn’t get it. Had they never met him? He had done nothing to deserve this. I was young and small so people paid little attention to me. Now the …
A number of years ago, when I was praying my way through the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, I “met” someone in my prayer, and he made his way into my journals. He was a younger version of myself, maybe 12 or 14 years old, and for some reason he allowed me to see in new and clearer ways just what was going on (or at least what was going on in me) in the stories of the life, …
The story from John’s Gospel of Jesus meeting the Samaritan woman at the well is important for a number of reasons, not the least of which is just that it happened in the first place — that Jesus had this intimate, telling conversation with a non-Jewish woman, that he would ask for her help, that he would open up for her a new understanding of God. That he would offer to change her life. But obviously it’s a story for …
Artwork above courtesy of the artist, Steve Tadrick. It’s the first of the beatitudes. It comes easily to mind and rolls effortlessly off our tongues: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” But what exactly does it mean? Jesuit priest and author James Martin writes: “If you ask a practicing Christian if he should be charitable, he will say yes. If you ask if he should be “poor in spirit,” he might say, “huh?” “Blessed are the poor in Spirit” …