Reflections
Fr. Jo's Reflection for the Fifteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr A, July 17, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 7/14/23
I confess that some of the best years of my life were spent in the arms of a woman who was someone else’s wife. That woman was my mother, Priscilla. (I’ll spare you from straying too far in thought). Compared to the soil on which the sower sowed the ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for the Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr A, July 9, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 7/07/23
It’s been three months since Palm Sunday, and the first reading today reminds us about a familiar event. At the entrance liturgy of Palm Sunday, we read from the prophet Zephaniah: “Rejoice heartily, O daughter Zion; shout for joy, O daughter Jerusalem! See, your king shall come to you, ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for the Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr A, July 2, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 6/30/23
I’ll do my best to explain simply what we signed up for when we became Christian: 1) We’ll love Jesus more than our father, mother, son, daughter, wife, girlfriend, boyfriend, brother, sister, nation, tribe; 2) We must love Jesus more than ourselves: personal needs, desires, comfort, and possessions; and ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for the Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr A, June 25, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 6/23/23
Dare to be a Jeremiah? You’ll become an object of vicious, merciless attack. Try saying that something considered evil or immoral ten years ago is still so, you’ll be scurrilously denounced by the enforcers of modern orthodoxy in the media and academia. The tyranny with which the new police ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for the Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr A, June 18, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 6/16/23
Nine out of ten funerals in which I have presided in the past ten years have had the song “On Eagle’s Wings” sung at the Mass or service. When Fr. Michael Joncas wrote the song, it was his way of consoling his friend Doug Hall, who got the news ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, Yr A, June 11, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 6/09/23
Every living creature seeks to assuage the hunger instinct. Humans, in addition, seek shelter and clothing. Birds, rabbits, and a few other creatures seek shelter as well, but have no interest in clothing. Several other animal species spend entire life doing nothing but search for food and drink. For ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for The Most Holy Trinity, Yr A, June 4, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 6/02/23
Around the year AD 200, one of the early Church Fathers, by name Tertullian used the word “Trinity” to describe God. 125 years later, at the Council of Nicaea, the Church adopted this term in expressing God’s nature as we proclaim every Sunday when we recite the Nicene Creed. ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for Pentecost Sunday, Yr A, May 28, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 5/26/23
It requires more than a course in public speaking to turn around minds and hearts caught in paralyzing fear. Several years after I became a priest, my mother revealed to me that one of her greatest concerns about my desire to become a priest was how her ‘Little Jo’ ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for The Ascension of the Lord, Yr A, May 21, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 5/19/23
We seem to have inside us a switch of rebellion turned on the moment someone tries to tell us what to do. Don’t we? We dislike the word “authority” and distrust or rather mistrust authority—from the authority of parents to those of teachers, the Church, the police, and, go ... Read More »
Fr. Jo's Reflection for the 6th Sunday of Easter, Yr A, May 14, 2023
Posted by John Wolf on 5/12/23
I recently learned from an episode in the History Channel something that baffled me: That right as we sit here today, there are coal fires burning underground in this country. Have you heard that before? It is said that some of the fires have burned for decades and there’s ... Read More »