Friends, the Lord Jesus Christ is not a teacher from a distant age, not someone from long ago we remember fondly, not a moral exemplar; rather, he is a field of force. We don?t just listen to him or imitate him; we live in him. Our Gospel for this Fifth Sunday of Easter gives us one of the most beautiful and powerful images for this truth: Jesus is the vine, and we are the branches. But there is a dark side to this wonderful organic imagery: the Father is the vine grower, and he is going to prune away all that is in us that is preventing the life of Christ from manifesting itself.

Friends, we come to the Fourth Sunday of Easter, known as Good Shepherd Sunday. Jesus says in the Gospel, ?I am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.? What is it about that image that sings to us across the ages, from the pages of the Bible to the present day? What I want to do is reflect on this image of the shepherd?first, in relation to Jesus, then second, in relation to leadership in the life of the Church.

Friends, this week, on the Third Sunday of Easter, we have a passage from that magnificent twenty-fourth chapter of Luke?one of the appearances of the risen Christ to the Apostles. When we?re talking about the Resurrection, we?re talking about the central point of Christian faith, the hinge upon which the whole of Christianity turns. So to understand what we?re dealing with here is exceptionally important. What I want to do is reflect on the different views about what happens to us when we die that were floating around the eastern Mediterranean in the first century?and how none of them is on offer here.

Friends, on the Second Sunday of Easter, we have the inexhaustible reading from the twentieth chapter of John?one of the accounts of the Resurrection appearances of Jesus. These are in many ways the core texts of our Christian faith, so it behooves us to spend some careful time looking at them. This week, I want to reflect on the shalom (peace) that the risen Christ offers his disciples?and the struggle of one disciple, who was not present, to believe.

Friends, a very happy and blessed Easter! We come to the climax of the Church?s year, the feast of feasts, the very reason for being of Christianity. Everything in Christian life centers around the Resurrection. And the Church gives us, every year, the account of Easter morning from the Gospel of John. I want to bring out just one feature that John especially draws attention to?namely, the burial cloths left behind in the tomb. These strange and wonderful cloths that opened the door to faith long ago could perhaps do the same thing today.

Friends, we have the great privilege on Palm Sunday of reading from one of the Passion narratives, and this year, we read from the Gospel of Mark?the very first one written. But what I want to do today is something a little bit different: instead of putting the focus on Jesus, I want to focus on a series of people around him as they react in different ways to the events of the Passion, putting ourselves in the scene. Who do we identify with in this story as Jesus comes toward his death?

Friends, on this Fifth Sunday of Lent, we hear one of the most pivotal passages in the Old Testament: Jeremiah 31:31. Jeremiah knew the long Israelite history of covenant and blood sacrifice, but he prophesies, ?The days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.? This passage will find its fulfillment about six centuries later at a Passover supper, where a young rabbi?the covenant in person?offers his own lifeblood for his people to drink.

Friends, the Gospel on this Fourth Sunday of Lent includes one of the most famous verses in the Bible: ?For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life? (John 3:16). In many ways, this verse is the Gospel in miniature. But we can isolate this line too much and miss the real import of it when we don?t attend to what happens right before?namely, Jesus? reference to the serpent in the desert.

Friends, on this Third Sunday of Lent, the Church asks us to look at one of the great texts in the Old Testament?namely, the Ten Commandments from the book of Exodus. Lent is a time of getting back to basics spiritually, and walking through the Ten Commandments is a great way to do it. Go back to this text in Exodus, commit the Commandments to memory if you haven?t, and use them to examine your conscience.

Friends, we come now to the Second Sunday of Lent, and we?re on both dangerous and very holy ground with the first reading from the twenty-second chapter of Genesis. The ancient Israelites referred to it as the ?Akedah,? which means the ?binding?: Abraham binds and is ready to sacrifice Isaac at God?s command. It?s hard to imagine another text in the Old Testament that has stirred up more puzzlement and opposition. I am with Søren Kierkegaard: if you don?t experience ?fear and trembling? having read this text, you have not been paying attention. And it?s naming something of absolute centrality in the spiritual life.

Friends, we come now to the holy season of Lent. The Gospel for this First Sunday of Lent is Mark?s laconic version of the temptation of Jesus in the desert. Mark does not give us the details we find in Matthew and Luke, but we do hear this mysterious observation: ?He was among wild beasts, and the angels ministered to him.? We are given here a kind of icon of the union of the spiritual and the material, the soul and the body, in the human being?both the glory and the agony of human life. And a really good way to pray through Lent is reflecting on our own struggles in light of that icon.

Friends, this week, our Gospel is the marvelous passage from Mark about Jesus curing a leper. These moments of healing stayed so deeply in the imaginations of the first Christians. What do we make of this particular healing of a leper? Let?s look at it from three angles: life on the margins of society, the shame of our own sin, and the absence from right worship.

Friends, the Gospel of Mark is a fascinating literary work. St. Mark seems to write in a breathless, staccato, even primitive manner, but the deeper you look, the more his Gospel appears iconic. He presents scene after scene in a very concentrated way, telling us some rather deep truths about the faith. Our Gospel for today from the first chapter is a good example of this. We see on clear display here what Pope Benedict described as the three essential tasks of the Church: it worships God, it serves the poor, and it evangelizes.

Friends, the first reading from Deuteronomy today is of signal importance. Moses, speaking to the people before they enter the Promised Land, says, ?A prophet like me will the LORD, your God, raise up for you from among your own kin; to him you shall listen.? These words haunted the mind of Israel. Moses was the supreme authority; there was no figure in the Old Testament more important. Who could be greater than Moses? We find the answer in the Gospel: Jesus of Nazareth, the Holy One of God, who speaks on his own authority.

Friends, though the book of Jonah is only a few pages long, there is something inexhaustible about it. It?s a biblical commonplace that God speaks to certain people and gives them missions, as he does with Jonah in our first reading. But God also speaks to us all the time, precisely in the voice of our conscience. Do you listen to the voice of God or not? Do you listen to what your conscience is telling you or not? If you do, you become a vehicle of grace for yourself and for all those around you. If you don?t, chaos ensues.

Friends, we commence now with the Second Sunday in Ordinary Time, and our first reading is one of my favorites in the Old Testament: the account, in the First Book of Samuel, of the call of Samuel, who as a young man hears the voice of the Lord for the first time. In the history of salvation, in the lives of the saints, occasionally God really does speak in a voice that can be heard, but I think what?s being described here is the word of God in the voice of the conscience, and what to do when we hear it.

Friends, we come to the wonderful Feast of the Epiphany and the great account in the Gospel of Matthew of the journey of the three magi. This marvelous, puzzling story, which has so beguiled the poets, artists, and preachers over the centuries, bears a very profound theological truth, and it has to do with the relationship of the national and the transnational.

Friends, we come to the wonderful Feast of the Holy Family. Over the years on this feast day, I?ve certainly preached on the dynamics of the Holy Family, on Mary, and of course on the Lord, but I don't think I?ve ever focused on St. Joseph. Well, that ends today. Let?s look at four dimensions to the holiness of this greatest male saint in the history of the Church.

Friends, we come to the fourth and final Sunday of Advent, falling this year on the very day before Christmas. And today, the Church invites us in our readings to think about David. Jesus is the fulfillment of the Torah, the fulfillment of the temple, the fulfillment of all of the longings of the prophets and patriarchs of Israel. And he is, perhaps above all, the new and definitive David, the King and Priest who will ?rule over the house of Jacob forever.?

Friends, for this Third Sunday of Advent, the Church asks us to focus on John the Baptist, who of course is one of the great Advent figures. It?s as though John stands on a kind of frontier or border: all of the human longing for God, in all its various expressions over the centuries and across the cultures, is summed up in this man. ?Among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist.? Yet what does he say? ?I am the voice of one crying out in the desert, ?make straight the way of the Lord.?? At the limit of human religiosity, summing up all that we can bring to the table, this figure looks to another.

Friends, great writers, from Aristotle to Shakespeare to Melville, put a lot into their opening line, which often sets the tone for the whole work. This week we have the privilege of hearing the very opening of the Gospel of Mark, which, by scholarly consensus, is the first of the Gospels written: ?The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ the Son of God.? In the manner of those great writers, this line matters a lot; in fact, every bit of it matters. And what sounds to us like familiar spiritual language was, in the first century, an edgy proclamation of the true Emperor to the powers that be.

Friends, we come to the First Sunday of Advent?the liturgical new year. I've said this before, but Advent is a time to get back to basics. Can I suggest we start with that familiar Advent hymn, ?O Come, O Come, Emmanuel?? Until we get into the spiritual space opened up by that hymn, we are not understanding Advent?and more to it, we are not understanding Christianity. We are beggars asking Emmanuel??God with us??to come and ?ransom captive Israel.? You're in chains; you?re held captive. What can you do to save yourself? Nothing?except to cry out, ?Come, come, someone, save me!?

Friends, Christ is the King of all things. His rule is characterized not by totalitarianism or despotism, but rather by loving kindness and sacrifice. He constantly reaches out his hands to defend the weak and sick, going to the limits of godforsakenness to bring back those who have wandered. We can cooperate with our King by being his ministers of mercy to the world.

Friends, we must develop a theology and spirituality of work. Meaningful labor awakens our desire to collaborate in God?s creativity. Viewing work in this way?as spiritual and moral action?conquers our melancholy, gives us dignity, and brings us into unity with the purposes of the Lord.

Friends, there?s a great temptation for us to turn the Lord into a distant spiritual entity or a difficult moral taskmaster. We incorrectly believe that we have to crawl our way to the divine by our own heroism, merit, and effort. But this is not the case. In actuality, God, in his wisdom, hastens to make himself known. He reveals himself to us, even before we?ve begun to see. In fact, our seeking is predicated upon the fact that we?ve already been found. To understand this is to understand the Bible as the story of God?s quest for us.

Friends, there?s only one real sadness in life?not to be a saint. But what does it mean to follow this path of righteousness? To follow the will of God, and God wills that we habitually direct our actions and thoughts to the good of others. Jesus says blessed are the merciful, the peacemakers, the pure in heart. Following Christ?s Sermon on the Mount leads to our beatitude; living in this way leads to sainthood.

Friends, the Books of Moses teach that the three types of Israelite law?liturgical law, ritual law, and moral law?shape and direct God?s people toward holiness and purity. While the liturgical laws have been carried over and the ritual laws largely set aside, the moral laws remain unchanged, for they represent those great abiding intuitions by which our lives should be structured.

Friends, a great theme of the Bible is that of God?s chosen people. At the same time, we also see that God?s salvific plan has to do with all of humanity?and indeed with all of creation. God chooses Israel?and the New Israel, the Church?precisely for the sake of the whole world. Remembering this helps us keep the delicate balance between bland spiritual relativism and a dangerous religious tribalism.

Friends, the mountain is a great image throughout the Bible. It is the place where we go up and where God comes down to meet us. Today?s first reading from Isaiah orients us to three holy mountains of the Lord: first, the historical Mount Zion; second, its fulfillment in the heavenly Mount Zion; and third, a sort of ?middle mountain? of the Mass, where we raise our minds and hearts to God, who comes to gather us, to speak his word, and to feed us. 

Friends, in biblical imagery, the vineyard symbolizes the people of God. The Lord nourishes us as our caretaker, but he desires (even demands) that we bear good fruit. The Mass, the Eucharist, the teaching office of the Church, priests and bishops?through these means and through the Church, God cultivates his vineyard.

Friends, our own wickedness and virtue belong to oneself. Though our communities and background stories affect our mind and will, nevertheless, the individual stands alone in the presence of God. We show God and the world who we are by the integrity of our moral acts. What we do defines who we are, and therefore we must cultivate the moral dimension of our life to avoid ethical calamity.

Friends, the parable at the heart of our Gospel today from Matthew 20 is one of those passages in the New Testament that really bothers people. It proves that this parable is not just conveying correct information about God; it is reaching into our souls and doing spiritual work, shining light upon a certain darkness in us that resists him. And in this case, the darkness is a false view of what heaven is all about.

Friends, today in our second reading, St. Paul says, ?None of us lives for oneself, and no one dies for oneself. For if we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord; so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's.? In many ways, the whole Bible, the whole of revelation, is summed up in this statement. Yet everything in our culture militates against this: it?s all about your life, your choice, finding your voice, asserting your prerogatives. When we live in this little world, we remain stuck in a kind of permanent adolescence; when we live for the Lord, we enter into the adventure of being truly human.

Friends, they say that fools rush in where angels fear to tread. Well, today I?m going to rush in to some stormy waters by looking at the central issue of the Protestant Reformation: this issue of faith and works, or faith and the law. Martin Luther famously said that what he discovered in Paul is that we are justified or saved by faith alone. But why does the same Paul, in our second reading, say that "one who loves another has fulfilled the law"? The witness of the New Testament is richly complex on this question, and the Catholic position honors that richness and complexity.

Friends, our first reading for this weekend is from the twentieth chapter of Jeremiah. There is so much spiritual wisdom in Jeremiah, but more than any of the other prophets, we come to know his personality and his life. And in this passage, all the texture of being a prophet is on display: both the terror on every side and a fire burning in the heart?both the opposition of those who refuse to hear the Word and the irresistible desire to announce it.

Friends, I do a lot of debating and dialoguing with agnostics and atheists, and very often, when they attack the faith, it's along the lines of: How could an all-knowing and all-good God allow (fill in the blank)? Why does he allow childhood leukemia, or natural catastrophes, or animal suffering? Much of the objection hinges upon the puzzle that is proposed by the existence of God. And we hear a classic answer from within the heart of our tradition today in our second reading from St. Paul to the Romans.

Friends, our Gospel today from Matthew 15, the famous story of Jesus and the Syrophoenician woman, is one of those Gospels that bothers and unnerves people. How should we read it? It is not that Jesus was grouchy after a tough day of ministry, and this plucky woman speaks truth to power to get what she wants. We are meant to read it in a much more subtle way. This story is driving at an issue that is central to the Bible?namely, the relationship between Israel and the other nations.

Friends, our Gospel for today is Matthew?s account of the calming of the storm and the walking on the water. This is an event that reached very deeply into the hearts and minds of the first Christians: we can find an account of it in all four Gospels. And the iconic representation in the Gospels shows us the theological and spiritual implications of this real event. It is an image of the Church, the barque of Peter, passing through the stormy times of life.

Friends, it?s a wonderful grace that the Feast of the Transfiguration this year falls on Sunday. The first reading the Church gives us from the seventh chapter of the book of Daniel might strike you as curious, but it?s very apropos. Daniel has a vision of four beasts rising from the sea, symbolic of four worldly kingdoms, each one being destroyed in preparation for a final kingdom?the kingdom of God. In Jesus? time, they read these four kingdoms as Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. If you think this is just wild speculation that had nothing to do with Jesus, think again.

Friends, our first reading is from the First Book of Kings, and it's one of my favorite passages in the entire Old Testament. If you're going on a retreat, spending a Holy Hour, or just wanting to get in touch with the Lord at the end of the day, it's a wonderful little passage to focus on. The setting is the early days of the reign of King Solomon, and the question it raises is this: If you could ask God for anything, what would you ask for?

Friends, we are reading during these weeks of summer from the thirteenth chapter of Matthew?s Gospel, which contains many of the great parables of Jesus. But I want to focus just on one today because it?s so rich both theologically and spiritually: the parable of the wheat and the weeds. Jesus? story shows us how evil, by its very nature, is a corruption of the good. It is a parasite?and we need requisite care and patience in dealing with it.

Friends, our first reading and our Gospel today are about the word of God, both from God?s side as he speaks, and then from our side as we receive. God has spoken through creation, the prophets, the Scriptures?and, in the fullness of time, the very Word of God. If you open your mind and heart to the power of God?s word, it will change you.

Friends, the Gospel for this weekend from the eleventh chapter of Matthew contains a passage that has been called ?Matthew?s most precious pearl.? ?No one knows the Son except the Father,? Jesus exclaims, ?and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal him.? We are on very holy ground here because we are being invited into the very inner life of God.

Friends, there is no religious figure anywhere in the religions or philosophies of the world who is stranger, more demanding, more relentless, and more unnerving than Jesus. And therefore the religion attached to Jesus is the strangest of them all. Exhibit A is our Gospel from Matthew 10. What Jesus says to his Apostles about himself, no other spiritual teacher would say. And you can?t be neutral about it: you have make a decision about Jesus.

Friends, the readings for today are really magnificent, and they are all about something central to the spiritual life?namely, fear. Years ago, I was on a retreat, and the retreat director said that there are two basic questions always to ask. First; Deep down, what do you want? Second: Ultimately, what are you afraid of? In a way, answering those two questions will tell you everything you need to know about yourself, spiritually speaking.

Friends, as we resume Ordinary Time, I want to talk to you about vocations?specifically, vocations to the priesthood. Our Gospel for today from Matthew shows us the call of the priest: to be a shepherd of lost sheep, a warrior against unclean spirits, and a healer of sin-sick souls?one that teaches and preaches and proclaims the kingdom of God. This summons from Christ has been the greatest joy in my life. If you are feeling the call, don?t ignore it; follow it.

Friends, we come now to the marvelous Feast of Corpus Christi, of the Body and Blood of Christ. What has been on my mind a lot recently is the famous story of the feeding of the five thousand?the only miracle, with the exception of the Resurrection, recounted in all four Gospels. Jesus multiplying the loaves and fishes to the feeding of this great crowd must have made a massive impression on the first Christians. With this feast in mind, let?s look at the earliest version of this story in the Gospel of Mark, because every part of it is worthy of meditation.

Friends, today we come to Trinity Sunday, which has been called ?the preacher?s nightmare.? But as you probably know from previous sermons of mine, I don?t agree with that at all. I think every Sunday is Trinity Sunday. The Trinity names what is most fundamental and basic in our whole theology and spirituality, and we should rejoice in talking about it! Today, let?s look at the Trinity through three lenses: the words of Scripture, an analogy from St. Augustine, and the viscerally real ?so what? of salvation.

Friends, we come to the great Feast of Pentecost?the feast, par excellence, of the Holy Spirit. A critique of the Western Church is that we don?t speak sufficiently of the third person of the Trinity, and there might be some truth to that. I?d like to follow Vatican II in trying to bring the Holy Spirit very much into the forefront. Our readings today show us the great power of the Spirit?a power that unleashes great saints, fiery speech, and a liberating unity. Surrender your life over to the Holy Spirit, and?trust me?you will tap into this source of power to change things for the better.

Friends, right at the end of the Easter season and in anticipation of Pentecost, we come to the great Feast of the Ascension of the Lord. We should do a theological reflection on this feast?how we should and shouldn?t understand the Ascension, and what it means for Christ?s work in the world?because it is key to understanding the dynamics of the Christian life.