Joseph stood alone at the entrance to the cave and saw the first light of dawn touch the eastern horizon. It had been a long night. The child had been born some six hours ago. The shepherds had come and gone, and now his wife Mary was in the
Read moreWoe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of filth. Even so, on the outside you appear righteous, but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing. –Matthew
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Help Me, My daughter, to save souls. Join your sufferings to My Passion and offer them to the Heavenly Father for sinners. –Jesus’ instruction to Saint Faustina (Diary #1032)– “Dad, can I drive the car?” This request did not spring from the lips of an eager adolescent with
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Homily delivered on the 50th wedding anniversary of Anna Marie & Richard Culver 20 November 2015 Our Lady of Perpetual Help Chapel, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania “Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain
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“Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means “God is with us.” –Matthew 1:23– Some years ago, I was fortunate enough to travel in Scotland along with three other priest friends. As our rented minivan bumped along the highland
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You are the light of the world. –Matthew 5:14– Imagine you are setting up luminaria for Christmas Eve. You have carefully positioned dozens of alternating red and green paper bags along your driveway and sidewalk, each bag containing a little sand and one candle. Now the sun is down. You
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For years now, we Christians have been told by the secular world that the use of the temporal designations “Anno Domini” (A.D.) and “Before Christ” (B.C.) is utterly insensitive to the feelings of those who do not happen to worship Jesus. Instead, we are all but forced to replace
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For at the resurrection they will neither marry nor be given in marriage, but will be as angels of God in heaven. –Matthew 22:30– What? No marriage in the afterlife? The greatest bond of love a man and woman can know on earth will not survive into the hereafter?
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Another Lent is already upon us. It hardly seems possible. When we think of Lent, we usually think of “giving up” something. We ask each other, “What are you going to give up for Lent this year?” Yet I believe this approach somehow misses the mark. Lent is not a
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I taught sophomores at Bethlehem Catholic High School for twenty-four years. To this day, I sometimes have doubts as to whether I accomplished anything at all through my teaching. Did my students learn anything from me? I am uncertain. Back in those days, it sometimes seemed that the only tangible
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