June 3

Our Lady of Sasopoli

Sts. Charles Lwanga and Companions, Martyrs
Today’s Gospel: Mark 12:18-27

Photo created by Google AI Image Creator.


They thought they had Him again.

The Sadducees walked up to Jesus with a ridiculous hypothetical: seven brothers, one wife, the resurrection. Whose wife will she be at the end of all things? It was meant to make resurrection sound absurd. They didn't believe in it. They never had.

Jesus didn't flinch.

You are badly misled. God is not the God of the dead. He is the God of the living.

One sentence. Case closed.

Charles Lwanga was 21 years old when King Mwanga gave him a choice: abandon your faith or burn. He had staked everything on the same truth Jesus spoke that day. Death was not the end. It was the door. He walked into the fire singing. The youngest of his companions was still learning his catechism. He walked in singing, too.

You don't sing walking into a fire unless resurrection is absolutely real to you.

I've tested that truth more than once. In 1983, when the Holy Spirit walked into my life like a fire I couldn't outrun, and my very first act in that prayer group was to demand they bring Our Lady's statue out from the corner where someone had hidden her. She didn't belong in the shadows. She belonged right there with us as we journeyed through our faith. She was a large part of why I came back and never left. And years later, when I lost my wife and had to find out whether what I believed would actually hold my weight in the dark, it did. It does. A living God is the calmest thing I know.

Our Lady of Sasopoli appeared to two young girls praying for their dying father on a hillside in Italy. She told them simply, "He is already healed. Go see for yourselves. They ran home. He was standing in the kitchen. She has never been the God of the dead either.

 

Something to sit with today:

Do you believe in the resurrection, or do you just say you do? And has life ever forced you to find out what you truly believe?

Sometimes we live on the surface of life, making sure we are seen. We should be living an internal life that deeply loves our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and His Most Blessed Mother. Your love for Him matters tremendously. Jesus looks at the heart of who we are, not at what the world sees. Everything in this life is temporary; our love for Jesus will be eternal. Surrender everything to our Lord right now; He knows your heart. 


 

Rosary Man Jim 🌹
Freely given. Freely shared.

Location: Tonawanda, NY 14150, USA

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