A People Formed by Manna
The Bible Project shared a podcast last year that focused on the story of the manna in the book of Exodus. In chapter 16 of Exodus, God’s people are in the desert, just a few days out from crossing the...
Category: Reflection
Evangelization Requires Presence
“And recently we held a flash sale and gave all the proceeds to Planned Parenthood,” my interviewee recounted proudly. “Because I support women’s rights.” The old familiar sadness welled up in my heart, paired with professional restraint, and I carefully...
How Can We Become Supernatural When We Aren’t Even Natural?
There is a growing realization that Christians need community. As Pope Francis wrote in Fratelli Tutti: “No one can face life in isolation… We need a community that supports and helps us, in which we can help one another to...
Of White Meat and Baptismal Sponsors
Do you know what white meat is? Of course you do! It’s the edible flesh that comes from poultry. At least, that’s what it means in modern English. If you were to travel back to England the 1400s, however, “white...
How to Get What I Want
Recently, Michael Sean Winters published an article entitled “How will a synodal church embody the virtue of obedience?” He shows that the Paschal mystery is accomplished through the obedience of Jesus, and indeed, the Church itself exists in through the...
When the Church Refuses God’s Love
In late July 2021, I attended Mass at Our Lady of Peace Parish in Santa Clara, California, with my teenage family members. I literally and figuratively grew up at that church as my mom worked as a secretary there for...
“Make Haste” to Share the Good News
“Christ is Risen; he truly is risen!” Pope Francis spoke these words to an audience of over 100,000 in St. Peter’s Square on the morning of Easter Sunday, 2023, encouraging the faithful to believe in the message St. Mary Magdalene...
Forgetting God and the Consequences
Friends, I don’t know if you noticed, but we all walked into a bare Church. Silence greeted us. The altar is stripped of all its decorations. It is a skeletal altar that confronts us with the reality of death. God...
The Gospels Are Not Dry and Boring, They Are Human Like Us
Contemplating the human experience of Christ’s first followers can help us to better understand his ministry. I find that we often take the lives of the apostles for granted whenever we recount a scene in the New Testament, be it...
The Will of God and the Passion of Christ
Many people find the Christian doctrine of Redemption rather difficult to accept. Various questions are typically raised against it. Does God demand suffering in satisfaction for sin? Does God inflict suffering on the innocent? Does the divine mission of Christ...
The God Who Abandons Us
“The God who is with us, is the God who abandons us.” These words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer are so ironic. The God who is with us, who stands in solidarity with our human realities of pain and suffering, is the...
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