Catholic Daily Reflections

Read Online Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You have faith in God; have faith also in me.” John 14:1 In John’s Gospel, Chapters 14–17 present us with what is referred to as Jesus’ “Last Supper Discourses,” or His “Final Discourses.” These are a series of sermons given by our Lord to the disciples the night He was arrested. These discourses are deep and filled with...

Read Online When Jesus had washed the disciples’ feet, he said to them: “Amen, amen, I say to you, no slave is greater than his master nor any messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you understand this, blessed are you if you do it.” John 13:16–17 During this, the Fourth Week of Easter, we return to the Last Supper and will spend a few weeks considering the discourse Jesus gave that Holy...

Read Online “It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you.” John 15:16 After Judas betrayed our Lord, the Apostles gathered together to pick someone to succeed him. They decided it should be someone who had been with them from the beginning. They prayed for guidance and cast...

Read Online Jesus walked about in the temple area on the Portico of Solomon. So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long are you going to keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” Jesus answered them, “I told you and you do not believe.”  John 10:24–25 Why is it that these people did not know that Jesus was the Christ? They wanted Jesus to speak “plainly” to them...

Read Online “But whoever enters through the gate is the shepherd of the sheep. The gatekeeper opens it for him, and the sheep hear his voice, as the shepherd calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has driven out all his own, he walks ahead of them, and the sheep follow him, because they recognize his voice.” John 10:2–4 Do you recognize the voice of the Shepherd? Does He lead you...

Read Online Jesus said: “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand.” John 10:27–28 The image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd is an endearing image. Many artists have depicted the gentleness of Christ as He leads His sheep or carries a straying lamb on His shoulders. We are given this image today...

Read Online As a result of this, many of his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer walked with him. Jesus then said to the Twelve, “Do you also want to leave?” John 6:66–67 Today’s Gospel concludes the beautiful and profound sermon on the Bread of Life (see John 6:22–71). When you read this sermon from beginning to end, it is noticeable that Jesus moves from more general sta...

Read Online “Amen, amen, I say to you, unless you eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my Flesh and drinks my Blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my Flesh is true food, and my Blood is true drink.” John 6:53–55 On a philosophical level, it’s useful to consider various things that appear to be “competing for...

Read Online I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my Flesh for the life of the world.” John 6:51 Jesus was starting to stir up the emotions of some within the crowd. They began to ridicule Him because He had said that He was the “bread that had come down from heaven.” Thus, many of those who had sought Jesus o...

Read Online “For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day.” John 6:40 Do you believe in Jesus? Unquestionably the answer is “Yes.” However, to believe in our Lord is something that must deepen with every passing day. Therefore, if you do have faith in Jesus, you can also admit that you do not have...

Read Online So they said to Jesus, “Sir, give us this bread always.” Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.” John 6:34–35 Imagine if you were to never grow hungry or never thirst again. On a natural level, this would be an interesting reality. Of course, if you never had physical hunger or thirst, then you m...

Read Online “Rabbi, when did you get here?” Jesus answered them and said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” John 6:25–27 What do you work for in life? That which ultimately perishes? Or that...

Read Online When it was already dawn, Jesus was standing on the shore; but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus. Jesus said to them, “Children, have you caught anything to eat?” They answered him, “No.” So he said to them, “Cast the net over the right side of the boat and you will find something.” So they cast it, and were not able to pull it in because of the number of fish. John 21:4–...

Read Online Philip said to Jesus, “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?” John 14:8–9 Today’s liturgical feast is in honor of two of the Apostles, Philip and James the Lesser.  Little is known about...

Read Online “Gather the fragments left over, so that nothing will be wasted.” So they collected them, and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves that had been more than they could eat.” John 6:12–13 John’s Gospel is filled with much symbolic meaning. The passage above concludes the story of the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. After feeding t...

Read Online The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him. John 3:35 It’s interesting to note that the words of today’s Gospel appear to be from Saint John the Baptist, since they come within the context of his testimony to Jesus. Some commentators, however, suggest that they are words that were actually spoken by Jesus and that the Evangelist inserts them here as a continuation of...

Read Online “God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.” John 3:16 We continue, today, to read from the conversation that Jesus had with Nicodemus, the Pharisee who ultimately converted and is venerated as one of the early saints of the Church. Recall that Jesus challenged Nicodemus as a way of helpi...

Read Online Nicodemus answered and said to him, ‘How can this happen?” Jesus answered and said to him, “You are the teacher of Israel and you do not understand this? Amen, amen, I say to you, we speak of what we know and we testify to what we have seen, but you people do not accept our testimony.”  John 3:9–11 As we reflected upon yesterday, Nicodemus is one of the only Pharisees who ultimately co...

Read Online There was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. He came to Jesus at night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God, for no one can do these signs that you are doing unless God is with him.” John 3:1–2 Nicodemus, a Pharisee and a ruler of the Jews, is mentioned three times in the Gospel of John. The passage above comes from the first time...

Read Online Today is the Feast of all Feasts! It is the Feast of Mercy! This Feast originated from the private revelations given to Sr. Maria Faustina Kowolska, a Polish cloistered nun who died in 1938. In the year 2000, she was canonized by Saint Pope John Paul II, and the Feast of Mercy was instituted as a universal Feast of the Church. To better understand this Feast, let’s read some of the pri...

Read Online When Jesus had risen, early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons. Mark 16:9 The first person recorded in Scripture to whom Jesus appeared was Mary Magdalene. Notably, she was the one out of whom Jesus cast seven demons. Being possessed by seven demons has traditionally been understood to mean that she was completely p...

Read Online Jesus said to them, “Come, have breakfast.” And none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they realized it was the Lord. Jesus came over and took the bread and gave it to them, and in like manner the fish. This was now the third time Jesus was revealed to his disciples after being raised from the dead. John 21:12–14 The appearances of Jesus after His Resurrection w...

Read Online Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. And he said to them, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.” Luke 24:45–48 Jesus once again appears to a group of His di...

Read Online And it happened that, while he was with them at table, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight. Then they said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?” Luke 24:30–31 Two of Jesus’ disciples had...

Read Online Jesus said to her, “Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” John 20:17 Mary of Magdala was one of the first persons to whom Jesus appeared. She was deeply devoted to Him, especially because of the great mercy He offered her when He forgave her manifest sins...