Pastor’s Column 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time July 26, 2020 “The Kingdom of heaven is like a merchant searching for fine pearls. When he finds a pearl of great price, he goes and sells all he has to buy that pearl.” from Matthew 13:44-52 Jesus offers two truly haunting parables this Sunday. In one, a man happens to find a treasure in a field, and with great joy, buys that field with every cent that he has. This man has stumbled upon the most valuable of all possessions by accident while doing his job. The other person is actually searching for a really valuable pearl, and when he finds it, he too goes out and buys it at the cost of everything he has. Yet what is striking is that in both p

Pastor’s Column 16th Sunday Ordinary Time July 19, 2020 One of the biggest challenges to our faith is always the question: why is there evil in the world? Why is it sometimes hard to recognize evil at first? Jesus offers a partial answer to these questions in this parable of the weeds among the wheat (Matthew 13:24-43). In our gospel, a farmer plants good seed by day, but at night an enemy comes in and scatters weeds in his field. This tactic was so common in the ancient world that the Romans had laws forbidding it. The problem is that the “weed” that was sown, called bearded darnel, looks almost exactly like the good wheat until it actually begins to go to seed. By the time you can recogn

Pastor’s Column 15th Sunday in Ordinary Time July 12, 2020 “A sower went out to sow his seed” Matthew 13:1 The Lord is the sower in this Sunday’s gospel (Matthew 13:1-23) and he scatters seeds everywhere, especially in these challenging times. He even plants seeds in areas where there is very little chance of growth, in case we might find them there. Every farmer knows that if a seed grows into a valuable plant, it is wealth. Let’s see what chokes off the “wealth” Jesus is trying to grow in our lives. Some seed fell on stony ground. Much of the ground around Israel was shallow with a layer of stone under the soil. Seeds scattered here would not be able to have deep roots. Though they s

Pastor’s Column 14th Sunday Ordinary Time July 5, 2020 “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; And you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden light.” Matthew 11:28-30 This wonderful passage is read every year on the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart, the very day our church was opened to more parishioners, and every three years on Sunday, so we are blessed to hear this Scripture twice in two weeks. But what does it mean? Jesus begins his talk (Matthew 11:25-30) by praying to the Father; then he talks to his disciples; finally, he, as it were, looks up from the