Feast St Bonaventure Fr Paul reads the Gospel from Matthew (11: 25-27) and shares a little about the life of St Bonaventure, whose feast we celebrate today. St Bonaventure was born around 1218, became a Franciscan in 1243 and studied theology and philosophy at the University of Paris. He became a famous [...]
Jesus laments for the unrepentant towns In today’s Gospel from Matthew (11: 20-24) we hear Jesus lamenting over towns such as Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum. He laments because he has worked many miracles in these towns, which the people have witnessed and yet still they fail to heed the message to repent; they [...]
The Gospel today comes from Matthew (10: 34 -11:1) and, like Saturday, our reading is at the end of the second set of Jesus’ sayings. On Saturday the theme was divine protection; today Jesus is challenging his disciples and us, as the readers of the Gospel, to give serious thought to what [...]
Feast of St Benedict Today we celebrate the memorial of St Benedict, who was born in 480 in Nursia in Italy and died in 547. After our Gospel from Matthew (10:24-33) we will learn a little bit more about St Benedict and his life. In his life Benedict studied in Rome and [...]
Jesus sends the twelve as sheep among the wolves In today’s Gospel (Matthew 10: 16-23), like the last couple of days, Jesus is instructing the disciples for their missionary work. Fr Paul says when we hear these instructions we need to be aware of 3 levels: The first level is that Jesus [...]
Jesus instructs his disciples Yesterday we began the mission discourse of Jesus with the naming of the twelve. Today in Matthew’s Gospel (10: 7-15) we are hearing of Jesus’ instructions to them as the commissioning of the twelve continues. Fr Paul says yesterday they were named and today they get their job [...]
Jesus names the twelve Today we move on to Chapter 10 of Matthew’s Gospel and Fr Paul says we need to be aware that Matthew’s Gospel is made up of five collections of the sayings of Jesus, or discourses as they are called. Yesterday we came to the end of the first [...]
The harvest is plenty but the labourers few Fr Paul says that in today’s Gospel (Matthew 9: 32-38) we hear of the completion of the ten miracles (or wonders) we began talking about last week. Matthew is stressing that Jesus is the Saviour of Israel and that people are in awe because nothing like [...]
Jesus cures two women Today’s Gospel is from Matthew (9:18-26) and like our reading and reflection on Saturday Fr Paul says there are a set of two things happening. Today we hear of two women being cured and through these healings two things are evident; firstly, the faith of the two women; [...]
Yesterday’s readings were replaced with those for the Feast of St Thomas so we missed hearing about Jesus eating with tax collectors and sinners in the readings for Ordinary time, in which Fr Paul says, Jesus was showing his love, care and compassion rather than sticking to the strict laws imposed by the Pharisees. In [...]