Beads of Joy Blog II (2025 - 2026)

🌿 Saturday, March 14, 2026 The Pharisee and the Tax Collector Photo created by James Dacey, Jr. using Co-Pilot. Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II ✝️ Today's Mass Readings First Reading: Hosea 6:1-6 Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 51:3-4, 18-19, 20-21 Gospel: Luke 18:9-14 📖 The Gospel - Luke 18:9-14 Two men go up to the temple to pray. The Pharisee stands and lists his accomplishments before God, I fast twice a week, I pay tithes of everything I own, I am not like that tax collector. The tax collector stands far off, won't even raise his eyes to heaven, and beats his breast saying, God, be merciful to me, a sinner. Jesus says the tax collector went home justified. Not the other one. 🙏 Gospel Reflection This parable should make every person who prays regularly and lives a disciplined faith life a little uncomfortable. Because the Pharisee is not making things up. He really does fast twice a week. He really does tithe. He really is not a thi...

🌿 Friday, March 13, 2026 The Greatest Commandment Photo created by James Dacey, Jr. using Co-Pilot. Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Day of Abstinence • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II ✝️ Today's Mass Readings First Reading: Hosea 14:2-10 Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 81:6-8, 8-9, 10-11, 14, 17 Gospel: Mark 12:28-34 📖 The Gospel - Mark 12:28-34 A scribe approaches Jesus with the most important question in all of Jewish law: Which commandment is the first of all? And Jesus answers without hesitation. Love God with your whole heart, soul, mind, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments, He says elsewhere, the whole law and the prophets depend. 🙏 Gospel Reflection I love this moment in Mark's Gospel because of what happens at the end. The scribe listens to Jesus's answer and says, " You are right." And you are wise. And love is worth more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices in the world. And Jesus looks at him and says, ...

🌿 Thursday, March 12, 2026 A House Divided - Can Not Stand Photo created by James Dacey, Jr. using Co-Pilot. Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II ✝️ Today's Mass Readings First Reading: Jeremiah 7:23-28 Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9 Gospel: Luke 11:14-23 📖 The Gospel - Luke 11:14-23 Jesus drives out a demon, and the crowd immediately splits, some are amazed, others accuse Him of working by the power of Beelzebul. And Jesus cuts through the confusion with a line as sharp as a surgeon's scalpel, every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined. And then the line that leaves no middle ground: whoever is not with me is against me. 🙏 Gospel Reflection There is no neutral territory in today's Gospel. Jesus is absolutely clear about that. He doesn't offer a comfortable middle position where you can appreciate His teachings without really committing, or admire His example without following it, or respect His Mother with...

🌿 Wednesday, March 11, 2026 I Have Not Come To Abolish The Law I Came To Fulfill It Photo created by James Dacey, Jr. using Co-Pilot. Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II ✝️ Today's Mass Readings First Reading: Deuteronomy 4:1, 5-9 Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 147:12-13, 15-16, 19-20 Gospel: Matthew 5:17-19 📖 The Gospel - Matthew 5:17-19 Jesus makes a statement that must have shocked His listeners, do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. And not the smallest letter, not the smallest part of a letter, will pass away until all things have been accomplished. 🙏 Gospel Reflection There is a tendency in every generation to want a Christianity without demands, a faith that is warm and affirming and asks nothing difficult of us. And Jesus looks at that tendency straight in the eye and says, not the smallest letter will pass away. Not the tiniest stroke of the pen. The whole thing s...

🌿 Tuesday, March 10, 2026 Not Seven Times Jesus Says But Seventy Times Seven Photo created by James Dacey, Jr using Co-Pilot. Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II ✝️ Today's Mass Readings First Reading: Daniel 3:25, 34-43 Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 25:4-5, 6-7, 8-9 Gospel: Matthew 18:21-35 📖 The Gospel - Matthew 18:21-35 Peter comes to Jesus with what he clearly thinks is a generous question, Lord, how many times must I forgive my brother? As many as seven times? And Jesus looks at him and says, not seven times, but seventy times seven. And then He tells a parable about a servant forgiven an unpayable debt who immediately goes out and throttles a fellow servant over a few coins. 🙏 Gospel Reflection Seventy times seven. In the ancient Jewish understanding, that number wasn't meant to be calculated; it meant without limit, without counting, beyond all human reckoning. Jesus is not giving Peter a new quota to track. He is dismantling the qu...

🌿 Monday, March 9, 2026 Go Wash and Be Clean Photo created by James Dacey, Jr. using Co-Pilot. Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II ✝️ Today's Mass Readings First Reading: 2 Kings 5:1-15ab Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 42:2-3; 43:3-4 Gospel: Luke 4:24-30 📖 The Gospel - Luke 4:24-30 Jesus stands in the synagogue at Nazareth and says the thing that many don’t like: God has always reached beyond the comfortable and the familiar to heal the outsider, the foreigner, the unexpected one. And the crowd's reaction tells us everything about how hard that truth is to receive. 🙏 Gospel Reflection Naaman's story is a favorite of mine in Scripture because it is so completely human. Here is a great man who is a decorated military commander. Powerful, respected, used to getting things done his way, but he has leprosy. And a little slave girl, a captive, someone with no power whatsoever, tells him there is a prophet in Israel who can heal him. And eventu...