Throughout Salvation History, we find God acting in unusual ways, calling us to rethink our priorities and expectations as he works to lead us back to himself.  Today’s readings give us good examples of this.  We begin about 1,000 years before the time of Jesus with God’s surprising choice of the boy David to be Israel’s king.  In a society that prized the firstborn, warriors and wise men, Samuel had to accept God’s unusual choice of the last of Jesse’s sons – a mere shepherd – to be anointed as […]

“Is the Lord in our midst or not?”  What a question to ask after God had freed them from their slavery to the Egyptians and led them through the Red Sea to escape the Egyptian army.  And yet, just a month later, we hear the Israelites grumble:  “Is the Lord in our midst or not?”

As much as we may be tempted to look back on the Israelites and wonder at their doubt in our first reading, if any of us have ever been truly thirsty, we will be moved to […]

With winter storm Hernando bearing down on us, I’m sure we’re all looking forward to spring.  And, as you all know, the word “Lent” means “spring.” It comes from an Old English word that spoke of the lengthening of daylight hours.  I don’t know about you, but I’m enjoying the earlier sunrises and the later sunsets.  They are harbingers of the new life that spring will bring.  So, as we begin another season of Lent, our readings speak powerfully about God who gives and sustains our lives and the temptations […]

God called Abraham to leave behind everything he knew – his family, his friends, his land – and set out on a difficult journey to a new land.  He wasn’t told where he was going.  All he was given was a promise of future blessing.  We heard that in today’s first reading.  Notice how Abraham responded.  He went as the Lord directed him.  And, we all know the end to that story.  Abraham was, indeed, blessed: he became the father of the Jews, Christians and Muslims.

As we heard in today’s […]