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January 4 2019 Memorial of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, Religious Reading 1 1 Jn 3:7-10 Children, let no one deceive you. The person who acts in righteousness is righteous,just as he is righteous. Whoever sins belongs to the Devil,because the Devil has sinned from the beginning. Indeed, the Son of God was revealed to destroy the works of the Devil. No one who is begotten by God commits sin,because God's seed remains in him;he cannot sin because he is begotten by God. In this way,the children of God and the children of the Devil are made plain;no one who...

“Of this man’s offspring God has brought to Israel a Savior, Jesus, as he promised.” - Acts 13:23 When we find ourselves in distress, we are happy when someone rescues us. Whether it is as minor as having a tow truck save us from having to spend the night on the side of the road when our car breaks down or as significant as having a police officer rescue us from a criminal, we are glad when someone comes to help us. In times of hardship, we look for a savior. One of the fundamental claims of the Christian faith...

“John tried to prevent Him, saying, ‘I have need to be baptized by You, and do You come to me?’” (Matthew 3:14). John the Baptist’s initial reluctance to baptize Jesus is a testimony to Jesus’ sinlessness—and John’s awareness of his own sinfulness. In effect, John said to Jesus, “I’m a sinner, just like everyone else I baptize, so why should You, the sinless Son of God, want me to baptize You?” In an indirect yet definite fashion, John agreed with the later description of Christ by the writer of Hebrews, “One who has been tempted in all things as we...

January 3 2019 Christmas Weekday Reading 1 1 Jn 2:29–3:6 If you consider that God is righteous,you also know that everyone who acts in righteousnessis begotten by him. See what love the Father has bestowed on usthat we may be called the children of God. Yet so we are.The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.Beloved, we are God's children now;what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him,for we shall see him as he is.Everyone who has this...

1 Then Pilate therefore took Jesus, and scourged him. 2 And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe, 3 And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote him with their hands. 4 Pilate therefore went forth again, and saith unto them, Behold, I bring him forth to you, that ye may know that I find no fault in him. 5 Then came Jesus forth, wearing the crown of thorns, and the purple robe. And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the man! 6 When the...

“Then Jesus arrived . . . coming to John, to be baptized by him” (Matthew 3:13). In the original text of this passage, the wording “to be baptized” emphasizes purpose in this momentous appearance by the Lord Jesus. But it was extremely difficult for John the Baptist to understand why the God-Man would need to be baptized. John’s baptism was for the confession of sin and repentance (3:2, 6, 11), but Jesus as the Lamb of God (John 1:29) had no need for such a baptism. It is hard to see why One who would take away sin would need...

by For many Christians, the Sunday gathering of the church is the most eagerly awaited event of the week. The preaching, the sacraments, the praying, the singing, and the fellowship are life-giving. But there are those Sundays when we feel as though we are not ready for worship. Our hearts are cold, our week was fraught with failure, and the idea of “going to church” seems to be an exercise in futility if not an act of hypocrisy. Somehow, we believe the lie that it is better to stay home and try again next week when our hearts will be...

January 2 2019 Memorial of Saints Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen, Bishops and Doctors of the Church Reading 1 1 Jn 2:22-28 Beloved:Who is the liar? Whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Whoever denies the Father and the Son, this is the antichrist. Anyone who denies the Son does not have the Father,but whoever confesses the Son has the Father as well. Let what you heard from the beginning remain in you. If what you heard from the beginning remains in you,then you will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise...

The Hiding Place Hail, sovereign love, which first began The scheme to rescue fallen man! Hail, matchless, free, eternal grace, That gave my soul a Hiding Place! Against the God who built the sky I fought with hands uplifted high, Despised the mention of His grace, Too proud to seek a Hiding Place. Enwrapt in thick Egyptian night, And fond of darkness more than light, Madly I ran the sinful race, Secure without a Hiding Place. But thus the eternal counsel ran: "Almighty love, arrest that man!" I felt the arrows of distress, And found I had no hiding place....

When Jesus had spoken these words, he went forth with his disciples over the brook Cedron, where was a garden, into the which he entered, and his disciples. 2 And Judas also, which betrayed him, knew the place: for Jesus ofttimes resorted thither with his disciples. 3 Judas then, having received a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees, cometh thither with lanterns and torches and weapons. 4 Jesus therefore, knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth, and said unto them, Whom seek ye? 5 They answered him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus saith...

“Then Jesus arrived from Galilee at the Jordan” (Matthew 3:13). There is something majestic about Jesus’ baptism that brought all the previous events of His earthly life into focus. Here He came fully onto the stage of the gospel story and His work and ministry truly began. Following an eternity past in heaven and thirty years of obscurity in Nazareth, God presented the Savior publicly to the world. John the Baptist, as “the voice of one crying in the wilderness,” had heralded the coming of the Messiah (3:3; cf. Isa. 40:3), and now He was fully and publicly prepared to...

January 1 2019 The Octave Day of ChristmasSolemnity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God Reading 1 Nm 6:22-27 The LORD said to Moses: "Speak to Aaron and his sons and tell them: This is how you shall bless the Israelites.Say to them:The LORD bless you and keep you!The LORD let his face shine uponyou, and be gracious to you!The LORD look upon you kindly andgive you peace!So shall they invoke my name upon the Israelites, and I will bless them." Responsorial Psalm Ps 67:2-3, 5, 6, 8. R. (2a) May God bless us in his mercy.May...

1 These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: 2 As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. 3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. 4 I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do. 5 And now, O Father, glorify...

"Assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the descendant of Abraham. Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted" (Heb. 2:16-18). Jesus came to sympathize with us, so He could be our merciful and faithful High Priest. In his letters to...

“[Christ] is also head of the body, the church; and He is the beginning, the first-born from the dead; so that He Himself might come to have first place in everything. For it was the Father’s good pleasure for all the fulness to dwell in Him” (Colossians 1:18-19). Christ has preeminence in everything. The apostle Paul presents four great truths in Colossians 1:18 about Christ’s relation to the church. The first is that Christ is the head of the church. This concept looks at the church as a living organism, inseparably tied together by the living Christ. He controls every...

December 31, 2018 The Seventh Day in the Octave of Christmas Reading 1 1 Jn 2:18-21 Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that the antichrist was coming,so now many antichrists have appeared. Thus we know this is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not really of our number;if they had been, they would have remained with us. Their desertion shows that none of them was of our number. But you have the anointing that comes from the Holy One,and you all have knowledge. I write to you not because...

1 These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not be offended. 2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service. 3 And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me. 4 But these things have I told you, that when the time shall come, ye may remember that I told you of them. And these things I said not unto you at the beginning, because I was with you. 5 But now I go...

"Since . . . the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil; and might deliver those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives" (Heb. 2:14-15). Christ came to break the power of Satan which He did by conquering death. To be free to live with God and share in all His blessings, someone had to shatter Satan's death grip on us. Sin is what gives Satan his powerful hold on...

“[Christ] is before all things, and in Him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17). The eternal Christ sustains His creation. When the universe began, Christ already existed. The apostle John spoke of Christ’s eternal existence this way: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him; and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being” (John 1:1-3). Christ Himself testified of the same truth when He told the Jews, “Before Abraham was born, I...

1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit. 3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. 4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. 5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and...