The BreadCast

(Jer.18:18-20;   Ps.31:5-6,14-17;   Mt.20:17-28)   “Can you drink of the cup I am to drink of?”   Do you know what He asks, brothers and sisters?  And do you know where it leads? In our gospel today, Jesus is very deliberate in His instruction to His apostles.  As He starts out “to go up to Jerusalem,” where the chief priests and scribes “will condemn Him to death” and the Romans crucify Him, He t...

(Is.1:10,16-20;   Ps.50:8-9,16-17,21,23;   Mt.23:1-12)   “To him that goes the right way I will show the salvation of God.”   “Put away your misdeeds from before my eyes; cease doing evil; learn to do good.”  For it is only following in the way of the Lord we shall be saved; for mere words, vain pretense, the Lord has no patience. Indeed it is so, what Isaiah proclaims: “Though your sins be like s...

(Dn.9:4-10;   Ps.79:8-9,11,13,103:10;   Lk.6:36-38) “Deliver us and pardon our sins for your name’s sake.” It is a cry for forgiveness our psalmist makes to our compassionate God.  “Remember not against us the iniquities of the past,” he begs, seeking release from sin’s prison for himself and his people.  And Daniel does the same; acknowledging with full throat the sins of Judah and all Israel, he...

(Dt.26:16-19;   Ps.119:1-2,4-5,7-8;   Mt.5:43-48)   “You will be a people sacred to the Lord, your God.”   The promise made to the Israelites through Moses is also a command, and is fulfilled in the command of Jesus. In our first reading Moses tells the people the Lord will raise them “high in praise and renown and glory above all other nations,” but makes it clear that this shall be so only as lo...

(Ez.18:21-28;   Ps.130:1-8;   Mt.5:20-26)   “Settle with your opponent while on your way to court with him.”   We are all on our way to court, brothers and sisters.  The judgment of the Lord awaits us all on the Last Day, and the Last Day is upon us here at the end of the age.  There is no time to lose; we must be “reconciled with [our] brother”; we must turn from sin today and find the Lord’s gra...

(Est. C:12,14-16,23-25;   Ps.138:1-3,7-8;   Mt.7:7-12)   “My Lord, our King, you alone are God. Help me, who am alone and have no help but you.”   In our gospel we have today a few of our Lord’s most famous words: “Ask, and you will receive.  Seek, and you will find.  Knock, and it will be opened to you.”  Jesus encourages us to faithfulness in prayer, assuring all that our “heavenly Father [will]...

(Jon.3:1-10;   Ps.51:3-4,12-13,18-19;   Lk.11:29-32)   “At the preaching of Jonah they reformed.”   Let us learn from the people of Ninevah, who heeded the message of repentance given Jonah.  At Jonah’s cry they “believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth.”  Even the king “laid aside his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in the ashes” in hop...

(Is.55:10-11;   Ps.34:4-7,16-19;   Mt.6:7-15)   “Give us today our daily bread.”   Our daily bread comes from the mouth of God; it is His Word that nourishes us.  His Word “water[s] the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, giving seed to him who sows and bread to him who eats.”  By His Word our spiritual lives are anointed with holiness; the breath of His mouth makes us whole, and so we become f...

(Lv.19:1-2,11-18;   Ps.19:8-10,15,Jn.6:63;   Mt.25:31-46)   “As often as you did it for one of my least brothers, you did it for me.”   “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  Such is the golden rule and the second of the greatest commandments, which is like unto the first: Love God.  And the union of the two is made evident by Jesus in our gospel today; He makes clear that what we do to othe...

(Is.58:9-14;   Ps.86:1-6,11;   Lk.5:27-32)   “Repairer of the breach,” they shall call you, “restorer of ruined homesteads.”   “Levi gave a great reception for Jesus in his house,” but it is Jesus who invites him, and all sinners, “to a change of heart” and to join Him in the home He makes for us all in heaven.  As Levi (or Matthew) has done, so must we all: we must leave our “customs post,” that...

(Is.58:1-9;   Ps.51:3-6,18-19;   Mt.9:14-15)   “Would that today you might fast so as to make your voice heard on high!”   Brothers and sisters, in this day of fasting and penance, first we must “acknowledge [our] offense” as David in our psalm.  We must cry out to our God: “Against you only have I sinned, and done what is evil in your sight.”  This is our leaven of truth.  “A contrite spirit, a h...

(Dt.30:15-20;   Ps.1:1-4,6,39:5;   Lk.9:22-25)   “The Lord watches over the way of the just, but the way of the wicked vanishes.”   In our first reading, Moses makes clear the choice we all must face: “I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse.”  “By loving the Lord… heeding His voice, and holding fast to Him,” the Israelites will be blessed with “long life” in the Promised...

(Jas.1:12-18;   Ps.94:12-15,18-19;   Mk.8:14-21)  “He wills to bring us to birth with a word spoken in truth.” But how deaf we are to His speaking. The disciples exhibit a remarkable degree of ignorance in our gospel today.  It would be comical were it not so usual, were it not such a defining trait of us humans.  Preoccupied with their forgetfulness to bring bread for their journey, when the Lord...

(Jas.1:1-11;   Ps.119:67-68,71-72,75-77;   Mk.8:11-13)  “Count it pure joy when you are involved in every sort of trial.” How well James explicates the wisdom of the cross.  First he encourages us to “realize that when [our] faith is tested this makes for endurance,” and then to “let endurance come to its perfection so that [we] may be fully mature and lacking in nothing.”  This is the wisdom of o...

(1Kgs.12:26-32,13:33-34;   Ps.106:4,6-7,19-22;   Mk.8:1-10) “Whoever desired it was consecrated and became a priest of the high places.” For this sin “the house of Jeroboam… was to be cut off and destroyed from the earth.”  Not only will their king be so punished, but the whole Israelite nation will find the wrath of the Lord for such idolatrous action.  Not learning from their forefathers, whom t...

(1Kgs.11:29-32,12:19;   Ps.81:9-15;   Mk.7:31-37) “My people heard not my voice, and Israel obeyed me not; so I gave them up to the hardness of their hearts.” The Lord has said, “There shall be no strange god among you nor shall you worship an alien god,” but the people did not listen.  Led by their corrupted king, “they walked according to their own counsels” and took to themselves the perverse g...

(1Kgs.11:4-13;   Ps.106:3-4,35-37,40;   Mk.7:24-30) “It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.”  Jesus speaks these words to a foreign woman, a pagan Greek, who “beg[s] Him to expel the demon from her daughter.”  They seem harsh.  Some may interpret them so.  After all, in our gospel we find Jesus traveling to the northernmost part of Israel where “He retired to a...

(1Kgs.10:1-10;   Ps.37:5-6,30-31,39-40;   Mk.7:14-23) “The mouth of the just man tells of wisdom and his tongue utters what is right.” Today in our readings we have a passage to illustrate the great extent of the wisdom and riches of King Solomon.  “The queen of Sheba, having heard of Solomon’s fame, [comes] to test him with subtle questions.”  She had not believed the report she’d heard of him, b...

(1Kgs.8:22-23,27-30;   Ps.84:2-5,10-11;   Mk.7:1-13)  “Can it indeed be that God dwells among men on earth?” Well does Solomon do in stating, “If the heavens and the highest heavens cannot contain you, how much less this temple which I have built!”  For though the Lord will heed Solomon’s prayer and “listen to the petitions of [His] servant and of [His] people Israel which they offer in this place...

(1Kgs.8:1-7,9-13;   Ps.132:6-10;   Mk.6:53-56) “Let us enter into His dwelling, let us worship at His footstool.” “Advance, O Lord, to your resting place, you and the ark of your majesty.”  Yes, in our first reading, “the elders of Israel and all the leaders of the tribes” come to bring the ark of the Lord into the temple Solomon has built in Jerusalem.  “For the occasion [they] sacrificed before...

(1Kgs.3:4-13;   Ps.119:9-14;   Mk.6:30-34)  “He began to teach them at great length.”  “Who is able to govern this vast people of yours?” Solomon asks in his plea to God for wisdom.  And “upon disembarking Jesus saw a vast crowd” who “were like sheep without a shepherd,” our gospel tells us.  The apostles have just “returned to Jesus and reported to Him all that they had done and what they had tau...

(Sir.47:2-11;   Ps.18:31,47,50-51;   Mk.6:14-29) “Herod feared John, knowing him to be an upright and holy man.” O how the Lord has given power to His great men.  It is He who “gave great victories to [the] king.”  David “called upon the Most High God, who gave strength to his right arm”; and as David “made sport of lions as though they were kids,” as he “slew the giant” and his “tens of thousands...

(1Kgs.2:1-4,10-12;   1Chr.29:10-12;   Mk.6:7-13)  “Yours, O Lord, is the sovereignty; you are exalted as head over all.” Solomon begins his reign, and the apostles begin their mission.  But how different is their manner of rule.  Solomon sits in sovereignty upon a throne, while the apostles are sent in poverty to all towns.  Solomon’s reign is of the physical universe, with the riches of the world...

(2Sm.24:2,9-17;   Ps.32:1-2,5-7,   Mk.6:1-6) “I acknowledged my sin to you; my guilt I covered not.” The Lord can heal only those who believe in Him, who turn to Him in their guilt to be saved. David has sinned against the Lord once again.  His kingdom had been blessed by the Lord and was flourishing in His sight.  Rather than accept the blessings the Lord poured upon him and so find their increas...

(2Sm.18:9-10,14,24-25,30-19:3;   Ps.86:1-6;   Mk.5:21-43) “Hearken, O Lord, to my prayer, and attend to the sound of my pleading.” Today in our readings we hear of desperate pleas made to the Lord.  In our gospel there are at least two “earnest appeal[s]”: Jairus “fell at [the] feet” of Jesus and begged Him to heal his dying daughter; and without words the woman “who had been afflicted with a hemo...