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Today, before the astonished eyes of her children, the Church unfolds a superb display of her strength. She opens the heavens and, through the mouth of John, shows us a great multitude, impossible to count, of all peoples, tribes, and peoples, standing before the Lamb, clothed in white robes with palms in their hands. The apostle’s question also arises spontaneously for us: Who are they? Where do they come from? And how did they get here? The answer: They are our brothers, me

Se dovessimo riassumere il contenuto delle letture di oggi in una frase in un pensiero, credo, lo potessimo indicare come un annuncio di speranza e di gioia; un messaggio di consolazione di Dio al suo popolo. Già profeta Isaia dice: Dio toglierà il velo di lutto, fara sparire la morte asciugherà ogni lacrima. Passando alla lezione evangelica, ascoltiamo da Gesù la parabola evangelica sulla continuazione e realizzazione di questa promessa: il regno dei cieli è come un

In 1978, a man traveled to Cincinnati in USA to attend the funeral of Max Ellenbusch. Max had been like a father to this man for 20 years. Nothing unusual except that, as 15 year-old, this man had taken his mother’s car and struck and killed Max’s five-year old son. This was a week before Christmas in 1978. Soon after the accident, a surprised court heard Max asked that charges be dropped. Instead, he wanted to give the death-car driver a job and help toward his education. Ma

26 Domenica A 2026 Oggi voglio parlare di punteggio; di peccatori in colletto bianco e di semplici peccatori operai, di te e di me. Prima – di punteggio. Io amo gli sport. Mi piace guardali alla televisione, soprattutto il calcio, ma seguo anche Blue Jays, Tiger Cats oppure le squadre canadesi in hockey. Mi piace giocare il pallone, pallavolo, tennis o ping-pong. Sapete che i tifosi amano parlare delle loro squadre o giocatori preferiti. Gli piace mostrarsi esperti nei loro s

Today, Jesus tells a surprising story about a vineyard owner. The owner hires workers all through the day. Some work for twelve hours. Some work for only one hour. At the end of the day, the owner pays everyone the exact same daily wage. The workers who worked all day complain. They say it is not fair. But the owner answers, “Are you envious because I am generous?” God’s Math is Not Our Math. Human math is about earning what we deserve. We like scorecards, contracts, and rewa

Today’s readings are like very heavy cannons, aiming at the destruction of the stronghold of our human way of thinking. Saint Paul is more than clear about that, saying: “Do not conform yourselves to this age – it means to the mentality of the surrounding world - but renew your mind to discern the will of God.” There is something in our human mentality that goes against the will of God, it hinders us in discerning God’s will, and we have to make an afford to renew our mind to

“… and whoever does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it.” Matthew 10:38-39 My dear Family in Christ, I’d like to share two of my favourite commentaries on this Sunday’s Gospel. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do! G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy ‘Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. &#39

‘When He saw the crowds, He had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.’ (Matthew 9) Dear Family in Christ, As you may have heard, the Church traditionally calls us to honour the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus in a particular way during the month of June. As this Sunday falls more or less in the heart of the month, it is fitting that the Gospel tells us about the response of Jesus’ heart when He sees His people suffering: He h

‘Why do we on earth not strive to find rest with him in heaven even now, through the faith, hope and love that unites us to him? While in heaven he is also with us; and we while on earth are with him. He is here with us by his divinity, his power and his love. We cannot be in heaven, as he is on earth, by divinity, but in him, we can be there by love. He did not leave heaven when he came down to us; nor did he withdraw from us when he went up again into heaven.’ -St. Augustin

My Dear Family in Christ, Today, in addition to celebrating the 6th Sunday of Easter, we celebrate many of our grade two students making their first Holy Communion, and it just so happens that all of this coincides with the celebration of Mother’s Day. As a Christian, I have learned not to ignore such coincidences. At the heart of motherhood is the same sentiment that lies at the heart of the Eucharist: “This is my Body, given up for you. This is my blood, poured out for yo

Dear Family in Christ, “The thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly.” The words of Jesus’ Good Shepherd Discourse sum up the spiritual battle that all of us find ourselves in. God our Father, our Creator, and our Saviour, give us life- not merely existence, which the Greek distinguishes as Bios, incalculable as that gift may be. Rather it is the abundance of life that the Greeks called Zoe, meaning that vibrant, abund

My dear family in Christ, The third Sunday of Lent kicks off a three-Sunday campaign of beautiful Gospel readings that the Church offers particularly to those who are preparing for Baptism at Easter. Of course, they are also perfectly applicable to all of us preparing to renew our Baptismal vows on the same day. Each of these three Gospels focuses on a particular aspect of the gift of our Baptism, that we may not even know, or may just take for granted. The account of Jesus

“If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” My dear family in Christ, One of the most powerful scenes of all time (in my not-so-humble opinion) is ‘Mufasa’s Ghost’ from the 1994 Disney film ‘The Lion King’. If you haven’t seen it, or if it’s been too long, I give you permission to temporarily break whatever Lenten media fast you have made to remedy this as soon as possible. There is no need to send me a thank-you card after, just pay it forwa

“ You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled underfoot.” Dear Family in Christ, There is a metaphor that has become increasingly relevant. It goes by the name ‘Ant Wars’, and is attributed by some to American nature writer Henry David Thoreau. It goes a little something like this: Red ants and blue ants, when placed in a jar or a terrarium, coexist peacefu

When I was preparing myself for today’s homily I found a very interesting article on happiness by Scott Young. He asked: «How many times have you caught yourself thinking that you would be happy when/if? “I’ll be happy when I achieve my goal.” “I’ll be happy if I get more money.” “I’ll be happy when I have a boyfriend/ girlfriend/ spouse.” “I’ll be happy if I have better friends” ». Then he sharply observes: «The problem is that solving problems doesn’t make you happier. Happ

Today in our parish we celebrate the Solemnity of St Vincent Pallotti, the Founder of the Congregation of Pallottine Fathers, to which I belong. We will focus then on the mystery of his life and holiness. St. Vincent Pallotti’s road to sainthood began right at his birth in Rome on April 21, 1795. From his earliest years his devout parents took him to daily Mass and religious devotions in the many neighbourhood churches of Rome. St. Vincent Pallotti often used to say that God

Dear Family in Christ, What do we do when someone faints at Mass? I wanted to take this space and time to address a phenomenon that took place twice in our parish over the course of the past month. While relatively rare, these things do happen and it’s important to be prepared. As a church, we don’t exactly have clearly communicated protocols so it is important that we address this explicitly. I want to start by saying how impressed and proud I am of the way that we as a fa

As the Church celebrates the feast of the Baptism of Our Lord, it gives believers an opportunity to pause and remember their own baptisms. The majority of Catholics have no memories of their baptism, and that’s because they were baptized as infants. For some though, the memory is strong, as they were baptized as an adult after going through the RCIA process. Regardless of age, what do you know about your baptism? Let’s pause and remember the facts of our own baptism: the wher

This Sunday we celebrate the Solemnity of the Epiphany. Our focus today is on the magi. Who were these men, sometimes called kings? We don’t know a whole lot about them. The main thing we know is that they were not Jewish. And this is significant. A few days after the birth of the Lord, gentiles, pagans, were summoned to follow a star to Israel where the One the ages waited for was born. They followed the star because they were good men honestly seeking God’s will. It must ha

The Holy Family of Nazareth, Jesus, Mary and Joseph are put before us by the Church this weekend as a model for our families. We call them the ‘holy family’ but that does not mean that they did not have problems. Just as every family has to face problems and overcome them, or to put it another way, has to carry a cross, so also the holy family had to carry crosses. Their many crosses come to mind from reading the Scriptures. We can easily imagine how misunderstood both Mary a