By replacing [anxiety] with thoughts of truth, honor, justice, purity, loveliness, and graciousness, we begin to secure the perimeter of our hearts and minds with the peace of God himself.

We as a parish community can cultivate a culture of connection. One key to connectedness is good communication,

If we lived by our ways, we’d alienate those who wrong us. We’d delay tithing until our bank accounts were impenetrable. We’d prefer vindication to unity. But the landowner teaches us differently. We’re called to be radical with our love today.

Because the decision to forgive defies our instincts of self-defense and preservation, it takes a lot of practice. Like any act of moral courage and conviction, we’re far more likely to choose forgiveness if we’ve already made it a habit of heart and mind, and that requires good training.

At best, technical compliance is insufficient; at worst, it’s a thin veneer for ruination. Our far more challenging task is to love our neighbors as ourselves. 

In short, the school exists to help form students into human beings who flourish into their full potential in mind, body, heart, and soul. That responsibility takes on countless shapes and sizes, from Euclidean geometry to gym class, from our House system to the artwork hanging in our hallways.

I take heart in knowing that we are together in prayer, gathered under the mantle of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. We pray especially that Our Lady, whose good counsel we implore, will lead us and keep us ever hopeful in the days ahead.

We should demonstrate similar perseverance in our own prayer lives. We too have much on the line every single day; like this woman, we should never, never, never give up begging Jesus to order our hearts and lives to himself.

As a result of your generous hospitality, we’ve never been more vibrant, and one manifestation of our growth is the need to build a new home for our Montessori preschool.

And in the midst of that extraordinary revelation that had understandably scared Jesus’ closest friends out of their wits, they were given only two directives: “listen to him” and “be not afraid.”

The “Grow” section of our parish website details a number of practical ways we can nurture this sacred friendship, and I invite you to check it out.

No matter how you participated in last Sunday’s festivities, you bore God’s image to those you met. I can’t think of a more fitting way to honor Our Lady than that.

We have been knitted together by God’s love, and it is for us to walk together in solidarity as he moves and works among and through us for the good of his whole world. This is our chance to manifest our commitment to him and express our willingness to let his peace, generosity, and love flow through us to everyone we meet.

As we take part in our own parish revelry, we take time to remember that Mary is with us every step of the way as we journey towards her beloved son. Our devotion to her inflames our love for Jesus, that our lives might similarly manifest the power and benevolence of God to everyone we encounter.

This weekend’s Gospel passage has Jesus preach one of the central paradoxes of Christian life. He says to his apostles, “Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” Put another way, we discover who we are by going all in on Jesus.

What I’d offer is that we’re meant to be living lives of eternal purpose. What do I mean by that? I mean that, here and now, we are meant to be about God’s work in the world. As humans, made to be God’s image bearers, we need to be about the work of bringing earth to heaven (as priests) and bringing heaven to earth (as kings).

As it relates to fatherhood - in its manifold conceptions - it’s probably best to start with God as Father. From there, we can say that all fatherhood is related to God; that our fatherhood is real and good inasmuch as it reflects and embodies God’s fatherly love. In that sense, I pray and strive to be worthy of the name.

That Jesus’ faithful followers can be identified with the Eucharist is remarkable. It also just makes a lot of sense. The Council of Trent declared that “the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained” in the Most Blessed Sacrament.

There are many reasons why knowing God, as he is in himself, is important. The one that always comes to mind for me is the fact that we are made in the image and likeness of God. If we want to know who we are, then we must in some measure know who God is.

In the Gospel author’s account of the first Christian Pentecost, we should see - 50 days after the new and definitive Passover - that the Apostles’ being filled with the Spirit and bringing people to trust and follow Jesus is like the bundle of wheat offered to God as a sign of the abundant harvest to come.