christianity

SUNDAY 25 JANUARY 2026: THE THIRD SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME.

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Fishing in the Sea of Galilee, Library of Congress: Matson (G. Eric and Edith) Photograph Collection, between 1898-1914.

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“As he was walking by the Sea of Galilee, (Jesus) saw two brothers, Simon who is called Peter, and his brother Andrew, casting a net into the sea; they were fishermen. He said to them, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” At once they left their nets and followed him.       Matthew 4:18-20.

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Today’s gospel comes from the fourth chapter of Matthew’s gospel, so it is early in Jesus’ mission following the revelations at his baptism. He had emerged from his 40 days and nights in the desert with a much clearer idea of what God wanted him to do, what God’s vocation for him was. He was aware of the prophesy in Isaiah, today’s first reading, that “the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; upon those who dwelt in the land of gloom a light has shone. You have brought them abundant joy and great rejoicing…” – in the land north of Jerusalem. He possibly moved from Nazareth to Capernaum in order that the “light” he was to bring them would shine on more people there! It is estimated that Nazareth in his time had a population of maximum 400, whereas Capernaum was estimated at about 1000-3000 strong. His new message would certainly reach a larger number of people there. Also, perhaps he thought there was a greater likelihood of finding those who would become his faithful followers, which turned out to be the case. His message clearly required a close-knit set of apostles….. And remember that Jesus’ experience of Nazareth later in his ministry was bitter. Perhaps he anticipated that right at the beginning of his mission and moved elsewhere in anticipation. Additionally, it is thought that Capernaum had a mixed Jewish/Gentile population, and Jesus’ message would have been heard by both groups. Although he clearly aimed his message to a Jewish audience, it was not long after his ascension that Gentiles began to be attracted to it. Perhaps one last thing should be noted. Fishing has always been, and still remains, a very dangerous activity. In other words, the men who worked on that Galilean shore were brave, persistent and and strong, all qualities that would be needed in the life Jesus was calling them to. The Lord knew exactly the type of people he was looking for, and he found them!

So Jesus’ mission began in Capernaum, not Nazareth. Indeed the floor of the synagogue where he most certainly walked is still there:

The remains of the synagogue in Capernaum, 2018. The dark large stone level is thought to have been the floor of the synagogue in Jesus’ day. 

And that theme of faithful followers is clearly taken up in today’s second reading. Paul’s first letter to the Christians in Corinth addresses that concern directly. He focusses clearly on the goal of the early Christians – to direct all attention to the Lord and him alone. There is a strong human attraction to create competing teams to see who is “the best”. We have it in sports teams, in car races, in horse racing and even countries. Paul says quite definitely, “no!” to all that. The aim and the goal is simply to be that person the Lord, and no-one and nothing else, wants us to be.

So perhaps the lesson today is to re-examen our priorities and ensure they are correct. Are we still faithful to Christ to the end? Do we have the strength, especially inner strength, to face the challenges that we will meet if we insist on doing the right thing, as taught by Jesus, even if those around us accuse us of being a Holy Joe or something equally insulting? Do we have the inner strength to explain quietly and from conviction that we wish to do the right thing? 

Additionally, is there anything or anyone else standing in the way? Are our own worries such that we exclude the very one who could bring us peace and clarity? Returning to roots, what are our priorities today? What makes life good, rewarding and stable? Where does the Lord fit in there? Is God the central focus of our life so that the way we react to and with others reflects God’s goodness? Jesus had to adapt all his feelings, message and reactions to that simple goal. Can each of us do the same? Can we be fishers of those around us?

Coming to Light, Christian Living Devotionals.

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SUNDAY 18 JANUARY 2026: SECOND SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME.

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The Lamb of God: Triumph and Salvation, Stained Glass Inc., Greenville, Texas, USA.

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John the Baptist saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.      John 1:29.

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The Old Testament is very clear about the sacrificial offerings to be made to the Lord. Among many other instructions, every day, one lamb, spotless, without blemish, was to be offered in the morning, and one to be offered in the evening. On the Sabbath, two were to be sacrificed in the morning, and two in the evening. The lamb was chosen presumably symbolizing purity and innocence, offered as an atonement for the sins which we humans have committed. Originally these sacrifices were to be made outside the Tent of Meeting during the 40 years wandering in the desert, then in the Temple in Jerusalem (which was discontinued after its destruction by the Roman army in AD70). Certainly there is something about lambs gamboling about in the joy of life. They are an expression of innocence and vivacity! It is entirely possible that the  crucifixion of the Lord took place at the time when the Passover lambs were being sacrificed in the Temple, preparing for the Passover celebration… So, for John the Baptist to have declared Jesus to be the Lamb of God certainly has a depth of meaning which is astonishing. Jesus, like the lambs, was utterly innocent of any crime or misdemeanor yet underwent a death as brutal as can be imagined. We Christians say that he was punished for our sins in order for us to be liberated and live as the children of God. We have no excuse in that case for any sins we might commit; in a sense we add to the suffering of the Lord when we sin. That thought should at least give us pause before entering upon a sinful pathway. So, instead of lambs being offered as atonement for our sins, God’s Only Son offered himself in their place. The wages of sin are death; Jesus dying for us in a sense changed that – we now can enter heaven when we leave this world having followed his teaching and, especially, his example. After all, he conquered death itself! And that echoes the blood of the lamb marking the homes of the Hebrews in Egypt when the 10th plague was visited upon the country, the death of the first-born sons. Those homes with the blood of the sacrificed lamb were spared death – so the sacrificed lamb’s blood meant life. So imagine, how much more, the blood of Christ, the Anointed One, THE Lamb of God, allows us to live lives pleasing to God, with sins forgiven and our soul’s life spared.

John the Baptist, in today’s gospel, states that he was witness to the Holy Spirit descending on Jesus at his baptism, and that was, indeed, the very reason he had been called by God – to bear such witness to the arrival of God’s Son, the longed-for Messiah. Isaiah’s teaching in today’s first reading is, as it were, a premonition of that event. That Jesus was, indeed, the light to the nations, and that God’s message would be extended to all the nations of the world, even to the Gentiles. And today’s second reading, to the Christians in Corinth, was one of salvation: “called to be holy, with all those everywhere who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,” quite a message to a rough and ready port city. Typically ports at all times and places were, and are, not exactly places of peace and quiet but are often rough and ready places of vice of every kind. The message and power of Christ took root even there! There is something to be said of peace, hope and the happiness of clean living!

The Lamb of God, AI Generated, unknown provenance.

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SUNDAY 11 JANUARY 2026: THE BAPTISM OF THE LORD.

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The Baptism of the Lord, Fra Angelico c.1440, Convent of St. Mark, Florence, Italy.

After Jesus was baptized, he came up from the water and behold, the heavens were opened for him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and coming upon him. And a voice came from the heavens, saying, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”    Matthew 3:16-17.

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The baptism of the Lord marks the beginning of his ministry, the reason why God, his and our Father, had sent him to earth. It is possible that Jesus until then had no real idea what God expected of him. He was probably a carpenter as was the man who had adopted him; that would be normal. But on hearing the activities of John, the wild one living on “locusts and wild honey” both specifically permitted in the book of Leviticus 11:22: “All kinds of locusts, bald locusts, crickets, and grasshoppers” and Leviticus 20:24, and God’s promise of a land flowing with milk and honey, he and many others had traveled into the wilderness to see what this man was all about. But it was all unusual, even then. So I imagine that people became intrigued at this strange man, and came just to see what all the fuss was about, perhaps even Jesus (after all, John was his cousin!). Some must have thought John was the promised Messiah, as he was so intent on making sure that they did NOT think that by saying “I am not the Messiah” (John 1:20). But some did indeed follow him even down to today, an ethno-religious group called the Mandaeans. But Christian scripture is quite clear that he was not the Messiah, but all this does suggest that he did have a following. Into this mix of the curious came Jesus from Nazareth. And when John baptized him, everything changed, as you can see above, in the quotation from Matthew, today’s gospel. Two things happened. God’s Holy Spirit descended on him “like a dove”. And there came a voice from the heavens proclaiming that this man was “My beloved Son with whom I am well pleased.” Two events then, each highly significant. The Spirit of God anointed Jesus. In Hebrew the word is Messiah, and in Greek the word is Christos, both meaning “Anointed One”. Jesus therefore received his Vocation at that moment – he was the Messiah! Now it was his vocation to fulfill all the prophecies concerning the Messiah as proclaimed down through the centuries. The Messiah had, at last, appeared. Not only that, but the Voice from Heaven, clearly God’s voice, declared him to be his Son… Jesus then received his Identity. He was God’s Son clearly with the powers of God prove it! Not surprisingly Jesus had to figure out what had happened to him and what it all meant, hence the desert experience of 40 days and 40 nights. 

Among the thoughts and feelings and revelations and realizations that he must have gone through at that time, today’s first reading from Isaiah must have become real:

I, the LORD, have called you for the victory of justice,
I have grasped you by the hand;
I formed you, and set you
as a covenant of the people,
a light for the nations,
to open the eyes of the blind,
to bring out prisoners from confinement,
and from the dungeon, those who live in darkness.

– today’s first reading. And all the other prophecies must have presented themselves to him, including those of the Suffering Servant also in Isaiah. The glory and the suffering, the challenges and the fulfillment are all to be found in Scripture, and for a man tutored in the Scriptures of the Old Testament, such as Jesus, he would now apply them all to himself. His identity and vocation, both given to him by his Father and confirmed by the Holy Spirit, were  clear. 

One further revelation was present at Jesus’ baptism, that of the Blessed Trinity. Until that moment God was thought of as a single Omnipotent Being clearly responsible for all creation. At the moment of Jesus’ baptism, three clear elements, or persons, appear, utterly unknown until that time: Father (the Voice from heaven), Son (declared to be such by the heavenly Voice, hence had to be the Father) and the Third Person, “as of a dove” descending upon the Lord, the Holy Spirit of God, anointing him as the Messiah. Thus began two thousand years of debate, controversy and argument as to the Nature of God following this event and the other allusions to it in Jesus’ history. Suddenly, God was revealed to be Three Persons, yet One God. This was an utterly new reality, unique in Judeo-Christian thought, rejected by the other Abrahamic faiths, but completely intelligible, though challenging, to Christian reality. The God of Love was at last revealed, the all-powerful generative essence of the Father and Spirit showing forth forever in the Son. This revealed Almighty God as the essence of Love. And we are, each and every one of us, is invited to respond in kind.

The Holy Trinity, ©LPi

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SUNDAY JANUARY 4 2026, THE EPIPHANY OF THE LORD.

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The Three Magi, J.C. Leyendecker, Success Christmas 1900, Diocesan Library of art.

When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews?   Matthew 2:12.

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The question which might spring to mind today could be: “Who or what on earth are Magi”? Every year on this feast day we might well ask the same question. That word never seems to come up in any other context except today’s feast. You might think that today is the only time such a question arises. But that would be technically wrong. The word “magic” comes from the same source! The word crept into English through a complicated history. The origin is not Latin or Greek; it comes from an ancient Persian word maguš, pronounced magus, or, some scholars say, mayus. It originally referred to the priestly caste in the ancient religion called Zoroastrianism, currently called Parsees, possibly carrying a meaning of power or ability.  Read all about that here. So it seems as if the event of the Three Wise Men has been taken from an eastern tradition of wisdom and, as with many things centuries ago, astrology. Certainly with them following a star which rested above the stable where Jesus was born, strongly suggests a thorough knowledge of astronomy and the sky at night, plus a tradition of interpreting it all to a contemporary audience. And this may or may not be part of the “Three Kings” story in the Gospel. But clearly there was an expectation, which exists to this day, of “wisdom from the East” and, incidentally, to the clear, uncanny and evident skill of a good magician, able to do things which are apparently impossible and point to a skill and talent not often met with. And note in all this there is no mention of kings! That seems to have come from the apparent cost and quality of the three gifts (from which also comes the tradition of three visitors to the stable but again not actually mentioned in the Bible, and as for their gifts, look here. One more point; the visitors were clearly not Jewish and scholars have linked this to the universal message of Christ, open to all and inviting to all, from the very moment of his birth, from the best educated, the wise men, to the lowest station in society, the shepherds. No-one is excluded from the message of the Lord!

These themes are echoed in the other readings today, from Isaiah:

Nations shall walk by your light,
and kings by your shining radiance.
Raise your eyes and look about;
they all gather and come to you:
your sons come from afar….

to Paul’s letter to the Christians in Ephesus, that God’s grace….

has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit: 
that the Gentiles are coheirs, members of the same body,
and copartners in the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.

So all are welcome at the table of the Lord, no exclusions, no conditions, from the illiterate to the brightest in the land! It is an open invitation, but it does need those of us who cherish this life-saving call of goodness to spread the Word. We can do this above all by the example we set in daily living, in what we  say, in what we do and in being generous and open to all. If you want magic today, that is the way to do it, but not through trickery, but by the real demonstration of goodness in our life. And we are never alone in doing that. We have the Lord at our side, the Lord in our mind and heart, and in the strength we show in living as He wants us to live and gives us the strength to do it.

Anne Rice Quote: “People who cease to believe in God or goodness altogether still believe in the devil. I don’t know why. No, I do indeed know why. Evil is always possible. And goodness is eternally difficult.”

Anne Rice.

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SUNDAY 7 DECEMBER 2025: THE SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT.

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Spur Pruning Pinot Noir Vineyards Without Losing Crop Yield, American Vineyard, October 2019.

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“John the Baptist appeared, preaching in the desert of Judea and saying, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!’“        Matthew 3:1-2.

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In 2023 I was in the Sonoma Valley visiting a friend. It was in April, and as I looked out at the many vineyards in that part of the world, I saw a very similar sight to the one above. Those poor vines looked like they had been trimmed down – pruned – to almost nothing! I thought it would be miraculous for any of them to produce anything! That shows how much I know about vines: nothing! Had I returned to Sonoma later that year, before the grapes are harvested, this is what I would have found:

St. Francis Vineyards 2025, Sonoma Valley, California, USA.

Why this sudden interest in vineyard husbandry, or viticulture? Advent! What if we did all that pruning to our own life during this holy season, cutting our lives down to bare essentials to look like the pictures above? That would give us the chance to grow once more into the children that God wants all of us to be. The pictures above show the difference over perhaps three seasons of one year. We have four weeks. 

Alright – where to begin? Today’s first reading could be the start: “…a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom. The spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him: a spirit of wisdom and of understanding, a spirit of counsel and of strength, a spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD, and his delight shall be the fear of the LORD.” It could almost have been written with viticulture in mind! The “stump of Jesse” ties in well with the pruned vines above: it suggests an absolute start. We could begin with a simple goal, to clear one’s mind, to concentrate for a moment on what is essential to our lives, and what isn’t. People are essential! How have I treated those nearest and dearest? Could it be better? And we are off and running. Let us all hope we can trim our lives down the absolute essentials, and grow from there.

It might help to remember that tomorrow, December 8, is the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception and is a holyday of obligation, despite being a Monday. This feast is in recognition that Our Lady was conceived without stain of original sin, the only person so blest. Pope Pius IX declared this to be dogmatically true in 1854, meaning that all Catholics must accept this teaching as true. Hence Mary was prepared perfectly to receive God’s Holy Spirit and bear the Son of God. It is a teaching that goes back even to the 2nd century. Early writers compared Mary to Eve, one obedient to the will of God, the other disobedient. Remember that the angel greeted her as one “full of grace” which we say with every Hail Mary, meaning that Mary was full of the presence of God. The Eastern Church was the first to acknowledge this as a feast in the 7th century. Many years later Pope Pius formally declared this to be a true teaching of the church in 1854. Something intriguing happened just a few years later in 1858. In that year Our Lady appeared to Bernadette Soubirous in Lourdes in the French Pyrenees. This young girl had difficulties learning, was often sickly, and yet claimed a beautiful lady had appeared to her several times. Bernadette was asked time and again to find out the Lady’s name. Eventually the Lady said “I am the Immaculate Conception”, which Bernadette did not understand, but insisted that was the Lady’s answer. It went a very long way in convincing the church authorities that Bernadette was telling the  truth. There was no way this peasant girl would have been aware of the Pope’s declaration four years earlier or even understood it if she had! The resulting miracles which the church has recognized in Lourdes could be considered confirmation of all that. Although we all have not been perfect in the eyes of God, we can ask for guidance and strength in this Advent season to return to the beginning and like those pruned vines, start again. So – can we conceive of a life better, purer, more attuned to God’s will than our own, and in so doing become a stronger, better Child of God?

The Coronation of the Virgin, Velazquez 1635, Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain.

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SUNDAY 23 NOVEMBER 2025: The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe.

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Aeticon, The Thief on the Cross.

Then (the crucified thief) said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” He replied to him, “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”   Luke 23:42-43.

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The name of today’s feast puts everything into perspective, don’t you think? When you are styled “King of the Universe” there isn’t much left to be king of! Yet quite a few ancient monarchs styled themselves exactly that, the first being Sargon of Akkad about 4200 years ago, and the last was Antiochus I Soter, about 270 years  before the birth of Christ:

                                 

                                          Sargon                                  Antiochus

But apart from scholars of the distant past, who would know? Those remarkable titles seem to have died with them. So we celebrate the true King of the Universe today and bow before his majesty knowing that this title depicts the actual truth.

However, the King we celebrate is radically different from Sargon and Antiochus. They no doubt had their jewels and crowns and armies of servants catering to their whims. And there our King is radically different. When King Charles was crowned in 2023, the regalia was prominently displayed for all to see. The throne, the crowns (two of them), the magnificent robes, the congregation crying “God save King Charles” and so on. Now take a look at our King, suggested in the picture above. His crucifixion was his coronation. His robe was stolen by the soldiers. His greeting that day from the crowd, standing next to Roman governor, was “Crucify him!” And then afterwards they shouted “If you’re the Son of God, come down from that cross”. His crown was made of thorns, and his throne was the cross itself. This was not a King of pretension or apparent power; this was a King of stupendous suffering, who took all our sins on his bruised and bleeding shoulders that we might be free of sin and guilt and be made worthy of heaven. This was the ultimate sacrifice made solely for our salvation that we might be able to follow him through who-knows-what and still gain eternal happiness. So the goal is worth anything that fate, luck, circumstances, accidents, health etc., can throw at us. With our eyes fixed on the ultimate destination, we should be able to tolerate just about anything. Remember that Jesus went through what could be described as hell to ensure we received his message down to today. Also recall that he was utterly human, hence terrified of the fate which awaited him (he sweated blood in his terror, a rare condition called hematidrosis). He was also aware that he could repudiate everything he stood for by simply denying he had claimed he was the Christ, the Anointed One, and the Son of God, and gone back to Nazareth and act as though nothing had happened. But he didn’t. He considered his message to be critically important to us all, to be universally significant, eternally relevant and completely human, meaning anyone could adopt his teachings (and challenges), live happily and be accepted into the Kingdom of Heaven. He had made sense of the human condition and given an identity of what it means to be a human being in the world in ways pleasing to God our Creator. In a nutshell, he demonstrated that to be utterly human is to be completely acceptable to God our Creator. One step away from being human is a step in the wrong direction requiring correction. We are here to serve God, to serve each other, and develop our gifts in order to be able to do exactly that to the best of our ability. If we succeed in that, we can expect to be invited into paradise to live in joy and peace forever. It is in our power to do that. And so we should. Therefore when we are called from this life, we may justifiably expect to be invited to share in the happiness of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe forever. 

Suffer Little Children to Come Unto Me, Juan Urruchi 1854, Museo de Arte de Querétaro, Querétaro, Mexico.

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SUNDAY 16 NOVEMBER 2025: THE THIRTY-THIRD SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME.

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The Last Judgement, Jean Cousin the Younger 1585, Musée du Louvre, Paris, France.

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You will be hated by all because of my name, but not a hair on your head will be destroyed.    Luke 21:17-18

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Have you heard of Pyotr Kuznetsov? This gentleman is the leader of the True Russian Orthodox Church. There are no reliable membership figures for this church. It is not a part of the Russian Orthodox Church. Anyway, he predicted the end of the world would come in May, 2025. Because of that, 35 members of his church hid themselves in a cave 400 miles southeast of Moscow last November waiting for the day. He promised them that on that day, they would be the ones to decide who would get into heaven and who would end up in hell. When the event did not happen, many of his followers refused to come out of the cave, and threatened to blow themselves up if the authorities tried to get them out. There is also the danger that water from melting snow will result in the cave collapsing. Their leader, who had been held in a psychiatric hospital, was allowed to try and convince the remainers to come out. This was partially successful, but the majority remained inside. The authorities seem to have left it up to them to decide what to do. And none of this would not have happened if they had simply read – and believed – Jesus’ words in today’s gospel: “See that you not be deceived, for many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am he,’ and ‘The time has come.‘ Do not follow them!” And note this, there seems to have been over 20 predictions of the end of the world since the year 2000. It seems there is something irresistible in predicting this Last Day despite Jesus’ prohibition on trying to do so. And note also that those “in the know” are always counted with the righteous, the saved, a judgement, you would think, is reserved for God alone…..

Today’s gospel does exactly that. It is typical at this time of the church’s year as it comes to an end that the readings begin to talk of the end time, but absolutely do not even suggest when that might be because nobody knows! But, that being the case, we are all still cautioned that we should at least be ready for that moment. And today’s gospel seems to be an inauguration of such thinking. Things will become harsh, wicked and intolerable, Jesus says, and many will be persecuted because of his name, but he promises “not a hair on your head will be destroyed”, a strange thing to say of those martyrs who will be tortured, maimed and executed in the most brutal ways possible. But having lived through such degrading and humiliating punishment, a pure and glorified, undamaged soul will be welcomed into heaven. And then there is this fact: over 14,000 named individuals have been declared martyrs for the Faith over the centuries up to today. One of the latest martyrs, St. Edith Stein, canonized in 1998, died in the Nazi death camp of Auschwitz in 1942. Even more recently canonized martyrs (October 2025) were St. Peter To Rot, the first saint from Papua-New Guinea who died at the hands of the occupying Japanese troops in 1945, and St. Ignatius Maloyan who died in the persecution of the Christian Armenian people during the First World War in the Ottoman Empire. And there is, of course, St. Carlo Acutis, who died age 15 of leukemia but lived a life, extremely short as it was, of dedication to God. And even though he did not die a martyr, he died in the faith and love of God even though his life was cut horribly short due to leukemia. Who knows who is dying today for the faith with so many wars and so much hatred in so many places? Our saints displayed so great patience, tolerance and even love for their persecutors that they can stand beside the Lord as faithful followers to the end. Most of us, of course, will never face such hatred, so we can only guess how we would react, but we can hope that it would be worthy of a disciple of Jesus. But we can pray for those who are faced with impossible situations wherever in the world. Christians have been confronted with hatred for centuries, and one wonders why, as we pray for everyone, wish everyone good health and happiness and trust they will be happy and perhaps open to seeing the good in us Christians and wondering on what it is based. 

And also remember that each one of us will have to face a more intimate judgement when we are called from this vale of tears. There might not be trumpets braying or cymbals crashing, but we will certainly know that the time of reckoning for us, individually and alone, has come. We will stand before God and made to answer for our actions throughout our life. And today, unlike then, we can do something about those times when we failed the Lord, failed ourselves and ended up in a mess. Now is the precious time when we can make amends, show our true Christian identity and act accordingly. As the year ends, perhaps now is the time to make resolutions and strengthen our identity as a child of God and our vocation as Christ to the world. 

The Last Judgement, Michelangelo 1541, Sistine Chapel, Vatican City State.

(Note, by tradition, the bottom right hand corner of most depictions of the Last Judgement shows those who have not been faithful being thrown into Hell)

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SUNDAY 9 NOVEMBER 2025: THE FEAST OF THE DEDICATION OF THE LATERAN BASILICA IN ROME.

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The Church of St. John Lateran, March 2025, Rome, Italy.

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Do you not know that you are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?  1 Corinthians 3:16.

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Well, first things first. The full, correct name of the church pictured above is “The Major Papal, Patriarchal and Roman Archbasilica, Metropolitan and Primatial Cathedral of the Most Holy Savior and Saints John the Baptist and the Evangelist in Lateran, Mother and Head of All Churches in Rome and in the World”. So, given that, perhaps there is less amazement at this church being the center of attention for today’s Sunday Mass! It is, in fact, the most important Catholic church in the world, even more so than St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican City State. If you look closely at the picture above, you can glimpse the papal chair, or cathedra, behind the altar at the very back. Every cathedral in the world gets its name from the cathedra, or seat of the local bishop, that word coming from the Greek word for a chair, 𝜅𝛼𝜃𝛿𝜌𝛼 (kathdra); so every cathedral in the world will have that special chair, the cathedra, reserved exclusively for the bishop of that place alone. Hence the Bishop of Rome has a cathedra, and you will find it in the Church of St. John Lateran in Rome:

The Cathedra of the Bishop of Rome, Wikipedia, Church of St. John Lateran, Rome, Italy.

And, as you know, the Bishop of Rome is the Pope. And one little note: “Lateran” is the name of the land on which the church was built, once belonging to the Laterani, a Roman family whose palace once stood there. That has also given its name to several treaties and councils. The Lateran Treaty, for example, was the founding document of the Vatican City State, creating the smallest independent country in the world in 1929. Additionally, there are certain Catholic churches in Italy which are “extraterritorial”, meaning they are exempt from Italian taxes and other restraints. St. John Lateran is one of those sites. And note that the church’s title of “Most Holy Savior” allows this day to be considered a feast of the Lord, hence taking precedence over the 32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time. 

So what is this all about? All very interesting (perhaps) but why is this considered so important that we will be thinking and remembering a church today, even if it is beautiful and uplifting? But if you are intrigued by a building which stands on the ground of the first legal Christian church in the western world on land donated by the Roman Emperor Constantine shortly after his victory in AD 312 at the Milvian Bridge, click here. Meanwhile, let us ponder on the symbolism and significance that St. John Lateran should have for us today. Note that the term “Archbasilica” is used only for this church, indicating its importance and uniqueness. It is also the “Mother” church as it was the first legal, openly recognized Christian church in the western world, consecrated by Pope Sylvester I in AD 324, and all Catholic churches were born of this first “mother”. 

The first idea which occurs about this church and the world is the link it represents between all Catholic churches in the world and the essential bond they all have in recognizing the pope as the head of the church in his capacity as Bishop of Rome. The pope claims to be the successor of St. Peter whom Christ himself called the “rock” on which he was to build his church (Matthew 16:18). So, in a sense, this church is the first western legal “rock” which spread throughout the world down to today, when on this day we acknowledge that it all began, once it was open to the world, with St. John Lateran. And note there are many moments in Scripture which equate human experience with the surroundings in which we live.  For example, Jesus is called the “corner stone”, the essential element in a building upon which everything rests, especially in an arch. Or we ourselves are described as the “living stones”. Or Christ and the apostles as the “foundation” of the church, and so on. And remember that we hardly ever see foundations; they are usually buried from sight, but woe betide the building that does not have a solid foundation, as seen in Matthew 7:24-27. And the history of the church of St. John Lateran certainly has had its major ups and downs, including fires in 1309 and 1361, an earthquake in 897 which nearly destroyed it, the neglect it suffered during the  period of the Avignon exile 1309-1377, and in the the notorious Sack of Rome in 1527 by the troops of the Catholic Emperor Charles V (not to mention the earlier two sackings by Vandals in the 5th century). And in July 1993 it even suffered a Mafia bombing which damaged part of the church. Yes, this old church has shared in good times and bad, just as we have, both through the centuries and the parallels in our own lives. Yet it has survived and still carries out its obligations as our church’s foundational building, the mother church of the Catholic world. And so do we, through good times and bad, confident that the Lord stands beside us, as he has done with his Church, symbolized above all by the first church of the Catholic world, St. John Lateran.

Click here to see Pope Leo XIV, Bishop of Rome, take possession of his diocese in May 2025. 

Installation of Pope Leo XIV, Bishop of Rome, May 25, 2025.

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Reflections on next Sunday’s Mass Readings will be posted on Wednesday.

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SUNDAY 2 NOVEMBER 2025: THE COMMEMORATION OF ALL THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED: ALL SOULS DAY.

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“What is All Souls Day and…..” Colleen Pressprich October 2022, Brother Francis Store, McKinney, TX. USA.

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(Jesus said) “…..this is the will of my Father, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day.”  John 6:40.

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This Sunday is reminiscent of the feast of Saints Peter and Paul this year when the feast took precedence over the Sunday in Ordinary Time. Today we have another such upset of the regular progress of Sundays through the Church year. In the old days it was unthinkable that a day such as All Souls would take precedence over the regular Sunday, but the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s thought otherwise, and here we have the consequence. So today our thoughts and prayers turn to our beloved dead, to pray for them and to ask they be admitted into eternal happiness and peace. And perhaps a prayer could be offered for those who have no-one to pray for them. And today’s readings are designed to encourage us to intercede for our predecessors to ask for God’s mercy and love to envelope them and take them to heaven. It is our Christian duty so to do! 

Now in the first reading from the Hebrew Book of Wisdom, there is a clear hope expressed for the dead: “The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them.” This is a huge progression from an earlier, more traditional view, where all the dead went to Sheol, a place of gloom, with both good and bad people, all of them, no matter how they had lived their lives. It represents an advance towards our Christian point of view, and as such the Book of Wisdom, written very close to the Christian era, has a more “modern” view of the dead. Much more can be said of this book of the Old Testament, but not here. You will recall in the Apostles Creed, we recite that Jesus “descended into hell”, into Sheol, to release all the righteous but imprisoned there. The Catholic idea of purgatory is similar, though there we are imprisoned by our own sins, until cleansed. 

The Harrowing of Hell, Fra Angelico c.1442, Convent of San Marco, Florence, Italy.

Indeed, our Orthodox Christian brothers and sisters emphasize this idea of Christ liberating the righteous from Sheol rather than concentrating on the silent tomb during Holy Saturday. That is a much more active, positive idea, suggesting Our Lord was busy fulfilling his mission to the very end, liberating not only the living, but also the dead. Love, of course, was at the root of all this, as ever. To the Lord, the dead were as much to be served as the living, and the picture above is a representation of this. Note the flattened devil under the broken-down door through which the Lord is stepping! Nothing can stop the advance of divine love and its power! 

So how can we help our own beloved dead? This of course is the day of days to be conscious of that. Today we remember those who have been responsible for bringing us to God in one way or another. My own mother, born into the Anglican/Episcopalian Communion, promised to bring my sister and I up in the Roman Church, and she did. She was faithful to the promise she made, and ultimately joined us, becoming Catholic late in life. My father, traumatized by fighting in the Second World War, never really recovered from it, but I only understood all that later in life, after he had died. Now, instead of thanking him (which of course I should have done when he was alive) I can now at least pray for him, knowing God is much more understanding than any of us. So today, in a way, gives us a chance to acknowledge not only those who have gone before us, but also to acknowledge the influence they have had over us, challenges and all, and both be thankful and forgiving for all that. The thought that they might well have been doing the best that they could (even if it is not our best) might be a source of comfort to us as we pray for them. And for those unfortunate enough to have had parents or friends who have been damaged by them, then we could ask God’s love to descend on them and balance out the evil done to them. Christ forgave everyone, even his torturers. It is the hallmark of our faith, the ultimate expression of belief, of love. Forgiving is, as it were, the essential attribute of our faith. 

So today, when we remember those who have gone before us, whether marked with the sign of faith or not, are today the focus of our Christian attention. We are asked to be generous in forgiveness, generous in prayer and above all generous in love. After all, the God of love made us, and so we must have love as a basic constituent in our spiritual DNA makeup! As Christians we are required to recognize that fact, cultivate that reality and let it overflow into our lives, our thoughts, our actions and our very identity. And recognizing that, to remember those who have left us and who may need our help even now, and make sure they receive it. And remember, we are never alone; the Lord stands beside us in all that we do. It is up to us to hope and trust in that truth, and be generous in thought, word and deeds.

Perhaps a few words could be said about the two days preceding All Souls Day. Let’s face it, Halloween seems to have taken much of the glamor (if you can use that word) out of All Saints Day, on Saturday. Even the word “Halloween” means little to many people, when in fact it means the evening before All Saints: “(All) Hallows Even(ing)”, hallows being an old English word for saints, or that which is holy. We even say it every Sunday at Mass: “Hallowed be thy name” or, may your name be ever holy, addressing God the Father. And many Catholic countries have a public holiday on All Saints Day. And then there seems to be a vague linking of ghosties and long leggedy beasties at this time with an ancient pagan Celtic tradition. In all a strange combination of the holy and profane. In the UK it also seems to have overtaken a very old tradition, remembered on November 5th, of the Catholic Guy Fawkes trying to blow up King and Parliament, thus setting back by at least 100 years Catholic emancipation in Britain. You can read all about that here. “Remember, remember, the fifth of November: gunpowder, treason and plot….” But the main focus of these days must be the holy men and women who fought for truth, generosity and love, both the canonized and those we ourselves remember today who made our lives better and happier. Blessed are they… 

God of Love, Christianity.com

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Reflections on next Sunday’s Mass Readings will be posted on Wednesday.

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