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Today we have the second of Mark’s three prediction/misunderstanding/clarification pericopes explaining what it means to die with Jesus. (Afraid we’ll have to wait until the Twenty-ninth Sunday of the Year to learn Jesus’ third way.) Though the disciples’ misunderstanding is implicit in this... more
Christianity is a rather simple to understand faith: If you die with Christ, you rise with Christ. The problem comes in the definition of terms – especially what it means to die with Christ.
Counter to popular wisdom, gospel miracles aren’t supposed to prove Jesus is God; the evangelists provided them to us to convince us what kind of a God he is. If the communities for whom the gospels were originally written weren’t already convinced this unique Palestinian carpenter was God, they... more
The Vatican II reforms opened my eyes to people’s confusion over what are God laws, and what are human laws. Having been brought up in a church which prided itself on never changing, a lot of people – surprisingly more middle age than old - had huge problems when the Council bishops started... more
For many of us, our faith has consisted in very few choices. Brought up Catholic, we’ve simply stayed in that configuration of beliefs our whole life. We’ve never experienced a compelling reason to change anything. Yet the authors of today’s Joshua and John readings presume there are times when we’... more
It’s important to understand that different biblical authors not only disagree with one another, sometimes they actually debate the contradictory characteristics of their various theologies. This is certainly the case with Scripture’s well-known “wisdom debate.” On one side we often have the author... more
Glad to read in today’s gospel pericope that Jesus “is the one who is from God” and “has seen the Father.” Much of what we Christians know about God comes through Jesus, who according to John is one with God.
Whenever we come across grumbling and griping during the Exodus, we know that particular passage comes from the “Yahwistic source.” That particular author had to deal with a fair amount of grumbling and griping in her own community. Somehow they felt left out of Yahweh’s salvation history. Though... more
Regular readers of this commentary know what to expect today. Every three years I begin the same way. This is the Sunday which reminds me of a unique experience.
When John McKenzie wrote his now classic Authority in the Church in the late 60s, he shook up lots of Catholics, pointing out that our sacred authors are much more concerned with the authority sins of our leaders than those of the general populace. Followers of God should be more conscious of how... more
The historical Jesus wasn’t a one man show, literally. One of the reasons our evangelists composed their gospels was to demonstrate how the individuals this Galilean carpenter inspired were to work together in expanding his ministry. From the beginning, he shares his dream and his ministry with his... more
Why would anyone choose to be weak, especially when they could choose to be strong? Yet for some weird reason that’s precisely what the risen Jesus calls on his followers to do.