The Nazareth Page - A gospel meditation for your home

July 26, 2026 – Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time  - Matthew 13:44-52

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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There are many references to “treasure” in the Bible. These images are used to emphasize what should be most important in our lives. Like what values get us up in the morning? When faced with decisions large and small, what moves us to make a good choice? What specifically do we judge as very important?

In the time of Jesus finding a treasure in a field would be considered extremely fortuitous.  Acquiring a large perfectly formed pearl would be a true blessing.  And Jesus implies in today’s gospel that we all have our own list of what we would consider genuine treasures.

The Nazareth Page - A gospel meditation for your home

July 19, 2026 – Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - Matthew 3:24-33

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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We seem to be living during a time where the act of judging goodness and evil in others is like an epidemic involving most all of us. Of course, this is especially witnessed in the political arena where judgments relating to political favorites and foes is commonplace. This also results in our dividing people into those who we think are good and those who are not. We label people and divide them into the good and the bad. Politically we do this by placing some on the right from some on the left. In fact, such judgments can consume our thoughts as we look upon others as either good or bad, right or wrong, dangerous or helpful. We think it’s our God-given right to make these judgments.

Today’s gospel somewhat addresses this matter of human judgment though a parable Jesus uses to describe how human judgment of each other’s goodness and evil can be deceptive and even very inappropriate.

The Nazareth Page - A gospel meditation for your home

July 12, 2026 – Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - Matthew 13:1-23

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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Today’s gospel contains one of the most recognizable gospel lines in the New Testament. “A sower went out to sow.” You likely know what comes next. It’s an image Jesus used to help us understand the process of learning and living the teachings he came to offer us. For me this directly relates to my own teaching career as a theologian.

Let me elaborate. The first group of students given to my care were first graders. I was a young seminarian, and I was assigned an opportunity to teach youngsters that offered little danger that I would corrupt the little ones assigned to my care. That was more than sixty years ago.

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

July 5, 2026 – Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - Matthew 11:25-30

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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We are in the midst of celebrating the 250th birthday of the creation of the United States of America. There are many unique qualities of life incorporated into the Declaration of Independence, but I want us to focus on one that in its time was perhaps the most revolutionary: All are created equal. No one is inherently better that anyone else. All are fully entitled to lives of opportunity, value and importance.  And all should be given a path and support to accomplish this.

 Now let’s place this revisionary idea next to today’s gospel where Jesus notes that God does not create some better than others. All are given life and opportunity. Even those considered “little” are created by God, loved by God and cared for by God. Again, we can call this idea as revolutionary then as it is now.

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

June 28, 2026 – Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time - Matthew10:37-42

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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My wife and I have been blessed with a large family. And for the last fifty or so years, I confess to spending a lot of time and energy worrying about our kids, helping them when they needed us, inquiring about how they were doing and generally trying to be helpful and reliable parents. I cannot judge whether as parents we were overly involved or not. I can only say, as many parents would, they have been a major source of our joys and difficulties over the years. We have loved them a lot!

Then I read the following line from Jesus in today’s gospel: “And whoever loves a son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” My first reaction to reading these words is that Jesus seems to be putting himself in competition with our children for our attention and affection. Then I notice the “more” word, an invitation to enter the gospel’s world of “both-and.” This is especially a comparison often found in Matthew’s gospel.

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

June 21, 2026 – Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time - Matthew10:26-33

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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Jesus advises us this Sunday not to be fearful. Yet during our time of public unrest and uncertainty, this may seem to be unrealistic advice. In fact, there are dangers around us. We can think globally or locally and list any number of reasons to be fearful. Is Jesus being unrealistic? I think not.

What I think he warns us about is not to allow fear to overwhelm us. To shut us down to the point where we are almost afraid to get out of bed in the morning. Or greet a passing stranger. Or to apologize when we have offended someone. In other words, we live life too passively,  

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

June 14, 2026 – Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time - Matthew 9:36-10:8

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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You might have noticed that there is a pattern in the way Jesus began his public ministry. It begins with Jesus and then his invitation to some close to him to help spread his message. Today’s gospel lists twelve individuals. Many see this as representing the twelve original tribes of Israel.

They seem simply a group of people close to him.  He did not seem to have a list of qualifications.  They came from varied backgrounds. After his resurrection and entry into heaven, they each (with the exception of Judas who was replaced by Mathias) moved out into the world enlisting new followers for Jesus.  They began locally and eventually included the whole world in spreading the gospel message and the healing power that accompanied it.

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

June 7, 2026 – Corpus Christi  - John 6:51-58

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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The longer I live, the more I am absolutely astounded and grateful by the realty and gift of life, especially my own. While this fascination begins with an increased awareness of my own life, it certainly doesn’t end there. I look around me and see life everywhere. I see life in the air I breathe. On the Earth I walk. I even see it on display in the movement of shoppers at Costco. Life is found across every surface of our planet, even in the vastness of the ocean depths.

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

May 31, 2026 – Trinity Sunday - John 3:16-18

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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To affirm that God is a mystery is a huge understatement. God is by far the biggest mystery of our lives, so any attempt to fully describe what God is like will always be incomplete. Yet we can know with some certainty a few aspects of God and this Sunday, Trinity Sunday we are given the opportunity to reflect and get some idea of who God is and what God is like. Of course, we face a limit as we are not issued much information about God.

To build a foundation for an understanding of God begins on a basic belief that we are created by God. Our existence is not rooted in a random process that “just happened” without any outside cause. Rather, the creator of all that exists in the universe, and the universe itself, is not part of creation, but exists as its “maker.”

St. Thomas Aquinas described who we call ‘God” is an uncaused cause. That may sound like doubletalk and in a sense it is. That also explains who any denial of God by science or other attempt to prove God’s existence, is not possible because God truly exists outside all that is.

The Nazareth Page  - A gospel meditation for your home

May 24, 2026 – Pentecost Sunday  - John 20:19-23

REFLECTION QUESTIONS:
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One of my earliest memories was when I went outside on a cold day in northern Indiana and saw my breath. I initially thought it was smoke, but after mentioning this to my mom, she informed my it was just my breath. Eventually I learned about water vapor and the process of water changing to ice, and the mystery of it all was set aside. But one lasting result was the matter of breathing. I came to know that it was necessary in keeping me alive. Especially during a time when while playing football and I received a body blow to my stomach, and the wind was knocked out of me. For a moment, I was really frightened.

Today we recall the time when Jesus, having risen from the dead, breathed on his disciples and informed them that with that gesture he was releasing God’s Spirit into them. God’s presence and God’s life-giving power would be in them directing their future.