Category: QUESTIONS

“CAN YOU LET YOUR SHADOW TAKE THE CREDIT?”  (Mt 23:1-12):  19 February 2008 (Tueday)

Today’s Readings

There is an ancient story about a man who was so good that the angels asked God to give him the gift of miracles.  God wisely told his angels to ask the man first if that was what he wanted.

So one day the angels visited this holy man and offered him the gift of healing by hands.  But the saint—for that was what he was—refused.   Then they offered him the gift of converting souls.  Once again the good man refused.  Finally, they offered him the gift of granting virtues.  The good man smiled politely, but again he turned the angels down.  The angels insisted that he choose a gift or they would choose one for him.

“CAN WE MODERATE OUR GREED?”  (Lk 6:36-38):  18 February 2008 (Monday)

Today’s Readings

Today our Lord says something that will surely get him fired from Donald Trump’s boardroom in “The Apprentice.”  Why?  He gives us very bad business advice.

He says, “Good measure pressed down, shaken together, running over, will they pour into the fold of your garment.  For the measure you measure with will be measured back to you.”

“WHERE ARE YOUR HIDING PLACES?” (Mt 17:1-9): 17 February 2008 (Second Sunday of Lent)

Today’s Readings

In today’s gospel, our Lord goes to one of his favorite hiding places: the mountain.  As we may have noticed in the gospels, every time the Lord gets too tired from his work, or whenever he needs to pray or to be alone, he often goes up a mountain to hide there, away from the crowds, bringing with him only his three closest disciples:  Peter, James, and John.  

“ARE YOUR WINGS TOO ENORMOUS?” (Mt 5:43-48):  16 February 2008 (Saturday)

Today’s Readings

Gabriel Garcia Marquez, best known for his novels One Hundred Years of Solitude andLove in the Time of Cholera, has a bizarre short story called “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings.”  It’s about an aging angel who literally fell from the sky.  A couple found him struggling to get out of the mud.  A neighbor pointed to the man’s enormous wings and told the couple that it had come to take their sick child away.  Frightened, the couple locked the angel up in a chicken coop, but naturally, word quickly spread, and the entire village came to see the angel.  The couple started charging an entrance fee and got very rich in the process.

“SHOULD I LEAVE THE CHURCH?” (Mt 5:20-26): 15 February 2008 (Friday)

Today’s Readings

As  though she wasn’t controversial enough, Madonna came up with an allegedly sacrilegious music video for her song “Like a Prayer” in 1989.  The video caused such a stir because aside from the usual display of Madonna’s sexuality, it used a lot of Catholic iconography like the crucifix, statues and pictures of saints, the stigmata, bleeding statues, and many others.  Can’t really blame them.  The video included one scene suggesting Madonna making love to a statue of a saint that came to life!