Category: Prayers

“Look around among your own number, brothers, for seven men acknowledged to be deeply spiritual and prudent.” –Acts 6:3 Mass Readings: April 29 First: Acts 6:1-7; Resp: Psalm 33:1-2,4-5,18-19;Gospel: John 6:16-21 Listen to the Mass Readings “They presented these men to the apostles.” –Acts 6:6 Did you notice that the leaders of the early Church placed the responsibility for finding deacons on the “community of the disciples”? (Acts 6:2) That’s us! We are to be on the lookout for those who would make good leaders in the Church. This was new for the early Christians. Jewish priests and Levites were...

Jesus “knew well what He intended to do but He asked this to test Philip’s response.” –John 6:6 Mass Readings: April 28 First: Acts 5:34-42; Resp: Psalm 27:1,4,13-14; Gospel: John 6:1-15 Listen to the Mass Readings Jesus plans to test us. He will present us with humanly impossible situations (see Jn 6:5) to see whether we will walk by faith or by sight (2 Cor 5:7). He will test us to see whether we will judge by God’s standards or by men’s (1 Sm 16:7; Mt 16:23). We may even be tested by persecution. Will we do the natural thing:...

“Make us responsible for that Man’s blood.” –Acts 5:28 Mass Readings: April 27 First: Acts 5:27-33; Resp: Psalm 34:2,9,17-20; Gospel: John 3:31-36 Listen to the Mass Readings The high priest accused the apostles of being determined to make the religious leaders “responsible for that Man’s blood.” However, most of the religious leaders refused to take responsibility for Jesus’ execution. Otherwise, they would not have called Jesus “that Man” but “the Savior of the world.” The apostles were determined to make responsible for Jesus’ blood not only the religious leaders but everyone, including themselves and us. They said that God told...

“We found the jail securely locked and the guards at their posts outside the gates, but when we opened it we found no one inside.” –Acts 5:23 Listen to the Mass Readings The Sanhedrin thought the apostles were locked in jail, but actually they were in the Temple preaching “to the people all about this new life” in Jesus (Acts 5:20). The public school system thinks it has its teachers’ faith and prayers locked up in a jail of laws forbidding evangelization and prayer in public schools. However, some public school teachers, and even principals, are obeying God rather than...

“The church that is in Babylon, chosen together with you, sends you greeting, as does Mark my son.” –1 Peter 5:13 Listen to the Mass Readings During the Easter season, the Church presents to us a gallery of resurrection-witnesses. We see Mary Magdalene, Thomas, Stephen, Philip, Peter, and now Mark. Each of these people were in the tomb of sin but miraculously rose from the dead into the risen light. We know (John) Mark was a dropout, someone manipulated by fear rather than walking by faith. He left Paul’s first missionary journey (Acts 13:13). Although Paul refused to let him...