Happy Easter! This is truly a day to rejoice and be glad. In fact, the Catechism tells us that Easter is not simply one feast among others, but the “Feast of feasts.” It is the day that we look forward to all year long, in much the same way that we look forward to Heaven our whole lives long. Today we celebrate what Jesus has done for us and the ultimate destiny he won for us this day. Easter is all about Heaven!
We cannot discover who we truly are and what we are here for—we cannot become perfectly ourselves—amid the noise and confusion of the world. It is times in silence, stillness, and solitude that allow us to make sense of all that is life.
You cannot avoid problems and suffering, but you can avoid the lessons they have come to teach you. This is wasted suffering. It is like a man who goes to the gym and lifts weights for hours every day but does not know the proper shape and form each exercise should take. He puts in the hours, he suffers, but he is worse off than before he started because he has done damage to himself.
This Sunday we find ourselves at a crossroads. As we approach the great mystery of Christ’s Death and Resurrection, we are coming to the end of our Lenten journey. It is a time to both look back and reflect, and to look forward and prepare. Holy Week is a unique time in the Church calendar where we are suddenly walking minute by minute with Jesus as he goes through his Passion, Death, and Resurrection. Starting today with Palm Sunday, we enter into Jesus’s life in “real time.” The way God works in time during this week can really help us to enter into friendship with Jesus as we walk with him in his sufferings.
How often we hear people say, “Worrying won’t help” or “Worrying is not going to change anything.” As true as these words are, they don’t empower people to turn around and say, “You’re absolutely right. I won’t worry anymore.”
Contribute or perish—this is one of the fundamental and guiding principles of the universe. We observe it in a thousand ways in nature, and we witness it in the lives of people. The question we must all ask ourselves is this: What will my contribution be?
PALM SUNDAY! A Sunday with two events: Palms of Triumph and Cross of the Passion but melted into one celebration – DIVINE PASSION! This Divine Passion is the gateway to Holy Week! It looks beyond our sinfulness that hides our holiness. It enjoins us to accompany Jesus in his divine journey, especially on HOLY THURSDAY, GOOD FRIDAY and EASTER
The surest way to find yourself is to stay just where you are. You don't need to take some exotic trip to a distant land—you are exactly where you are right now for a reason.
The happiest people I know are people who have a sense of mission. They have a joy that nobody can take away from them. The joy of their lives is linked not to the worldly scope or scale of the mission, but to the belief that they are uniquely suited to that role and the conviction that they have been called to it. They have a sense that they are in the right place at the right time doing the right thing. Are you at peace with who you are, where you are, and what you are doing?
Is there a question that you need to answer? Is there a choice that you need to make? Is there an opportunity that you need to pursue or that you need to turn your back on? Is there a relationship that you need to throw yourself into or walk away from? What is clouding your judgment? Why all the confusion?
Many of us fear death. It brings sadness and an unknown. We may have experienced the grief of losing a loved one, and we may be angry that God allows death. But today’s Gospel lends itself to hope. Jesus tells us that we must die in order to have new life. What a strange command. Let’s pause a minute though to reflect on the nature around us. Every year, we see death come to the plants around us. The weather becomes cold and often gloomy and the trees are bare and flowers unfound. As we wait though, we slowly notice the days warming, the sun shining, and new life springs forth. There’s a hustle and bustle with the birds chirping and the plants coming back to life with their colorful vigor. So too with us. We must experience a death of things in our lives that hold us back from blooming into the creation God has called us to be. We must allow these parts of ourselves to be put to death so that we may bloom in full color as we become fully alive, the man or woman God created us to be.
Jesus fasted for 40 days in the wilderness at the outset of his ministry. He was tempted by the devil and exemplified self-control. He personally demonstrated the path to self-mastery and liberation. How can fasting help you?
Most of us tell ourselves that we don’t have any of the big, serious addictions. For us it might be “just” cigarettes, chocolate, diet soda, or coffee. But as the great Spanish mystic and monk, St. John of the Cross wrote, “A bird, whether it is tied down by a thread or a chain, still cannot fly.” What’s tying you down?