Wednesday in the Thirteenth Week of Ordinary Time, July 1, 2026

Matthew 8, 28-34

When Jesus came to the territory of the Gadarenes, two demoniacs who were coming from the tombs met him. They were so savage that no one could travel by that road. They cried out, “What have you to do with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the appointed time?” Some distance away a herd of many swine was feeding. The demons pleaded with him, “If you drive us out, send us into the herd of swine.” And he said to them, “Go then!” They came out and entered the swine, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea where they drowned. The swineherds ran away, and when they came to the town they reported everything, including what had happened to the demoniacs. Thereupon the whole town came out to meet Jesus, and when they saw him they begged him to leave their district.

The location of several cities and towns mentioned in the Scriptures remain unknown today.  “The territory of the Gadarenes”, one such locality, is usually placed by scholars on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee.  The names of certain towns in this direction have spellings that seem derivative of “the Gadarenes”, and if any of them is to be identified with the town St. Matthew mentions in today’s Gospel Reading, Jesus and the Apostles would have had to sail almost due south and then east, length-wise across the Sea.  This would seem to be confirmed by St. Mark, who speaks of sailing through “the strait” to a land facing Galilee.

St. Matthew spends seven verses to report on this miracle, by far the briefest of the accounts written by St. Mark (20 verses) and St. Luke (13 verses).  This is likely because for Matthew, the miracles validate the preaching, which is more important to him because, as a Jew, he saw the Lord as the successor of Moses, whose Law completes the Law given to Moses by God for Israel.  And so he gives over a significant portion of his Gospel to accounts of the Lord’s preaching as well as several parables.  The miracles are important too, of course, but they serve a function in relation to the body teaching: that of signifying the approval of the Father for what his Son has taught.  Mark and Luke, with their different approaches, provide a great many more details.  Matthew gets to the essence of the miracle right away.

St. Matthew also speaks of “two demoniacs” while Saints Mark and Luke speak only of one.  This could be because this was how he remembered this event.  It was still dark, and he heard the words, “What have you to do with us, Son of God?”  Matthew may not have had a good view of what was happening and he assumed from the use of “us” that more than one possessed man was present.  It is also possible that there was one possessed man and he was thrashing about so wildly that it seemed to Matthew, who was witnessing this, that there were two men.  It could also be that Mark and Luke, listening to the accounts of eyewitnesses, thought that only a single man was possesses.  Due to the greater detail in their reports, however, it seems safe to conclude that there was only one man.

“Two demoniacs who were coming from the tombs met him.”  Mark says, more specifically, that they/he “ran and adored him” (Mark 5, 6).  We might wonder why a demon would drive the person it possesses to the Lord rather than away from him, but at this point Satan still does not realize who Jesus is and desperately wants to find this out and defeat him, for whoever it is, he threatens his power.  The demoniacs were “coming from the tombs” because they made their home there.  The forces of evil, whether human or supernatural, are attracted to death and they engage in self-destructive actions, whoever else they harm.  “They were so savage that no one could travel by that road.”  St. Mark provides more detail: “No man could bind [them], not even with chains. For having been often bound with fetters and chains, [they] had burst the chains, and broken the fetters in pieces, and no one could tame [them]. And [they were] always day and night in the tombs and in the mountains, crying and cutting [themselves] with stones” (Mark 3, 3-5).

“What have you to do with us, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the appointed time?”  The demoniacs address the Lord as “the Son of God” in order to tempt him to reveal himself.  By “Son of God” they mean a prophet or other righteous man.  Satan could not conceive of a love so great that God would become man in order to save the human race and so it is beyond him that Jesus was divine.  The demoniacs also tempt him to reveal his mission to them by demanding to know if he has come to torture them “before the appointed time” — before the end of the world when their torment shall increase.  The Lord, however, treats them with the contempt which they deserve and does not answer them.

“Some distance away a herd of many swine was feeding.”  Traditionally, this had been the land allocated to the tribe of Gad at the time the Hebrews enter the Promised Land under Joshua, but the Israelites there had long ago been deported by the Assyrians and they never returned.  Other conquered peoples were moved there and remained afterwards so that the whole land was inhabited by the Gentiles.  This is how swine came to be herded in that place.

“If you drive us out, send us into the herd of swine.”  Matthew does not include how Jesus commanded the demon’s name and how the demon told him it was Legion, for many of them were present.  Legion pleads with the Lord not to send them back to hell where they will be mocked by the other demons for failing.  It would be better to inhabit the lowly swine than to be sent back.  “Go then!”  The Lord commands the demons to go into the swine in order to teach the Apostles the horror of the demonic power, which he prepared them for by allowing them to experience the power of the storm on the sea.  “They came out and entered the swine, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea where they drowned.”  Jesus had saved the Apostles who believed in him, thought their faith was weak, from the fury of the water.  Now he lets the swine who have been possessed by the demons be destroyed in it.  Thus, the Lord shows that he will save those who believe but allows those to be lost who are committed to evil. 

“The swineherds ran away, and when they came to the town they reported everything, including what had happened to the demoniacs.”  The day was dawning.  The swineherds gaped and then panicked, running the distance to the town.  They told what they had seen and heard in hurried, confused words, trying to make sense of it themselves.  As Gentiles, they had very little conception of demonic possession and they could not have understood what Jesus had done.  But the evidence of the two men sitting on the ground, coherent but as if waking suddenly from a hard sleep, and the bodies of hundreds of pigs in the water and on the coast, spoke to the violence that had taken place.  “Thereupon the whole town came out to meet Jesus, and when they saw him they begged him to leave their district.”  We do not know how these Gentiles came to decide that the cause of the stampede of the swine lay with Jesus.  The formerly possessed men, now in their senses, probably remembered little of the exorcism.  It does not seem likely that the swineherds could have known, from their field, what was going on between Jesus and the possessed men.  The Lord might have stepped apart from the Apostles to meet the oncoming crowd.  But once the crowd decided that Jesus had done something to terrify the pigs so badly that they went to their deaths in the sea, they begged him to leave.  They do not see the miracle of two men delivered from Satan; they feel threatened themselves.  They do not know Jesus, they have never heard of a messiah.  All they know is that some new and powerful force has come upon them.  

These townspeople are the Gentiles around us today. We pray for them as we bear them witness of Christ and his saving power that they may welcome him into their lives.

Tuesday in the Thirteenth Week of Ordinary Time, June 30, 2026

Matthew 8, 23-27

As Jesus got into a boat, his disciples followed him. Suddenly a violent storm came up on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by waves; but he was asleep. They came and woke him, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” He said to them, “Why are you terrified, O you of little faith?” Then he got up, rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great calm. The men were amazed and said, “What sort of man is this, whom even the winds and the sea obey?”

Matthew places the miracle of the calming of the sea just after he records the Sermon on the Mount, which leads to the idea that this occurred early in the Lord’s Public Life, even before Matthew was called to be an Apostle (cf. Matthew 99, 9). Mark also places this event early in his Gospel.  Luke places it later, even after the sinful woman anoints the Lord at the Pharisee’s house.  Probably Jesus performed this miracle later in his career than earlier.  It should be recalled that Matthew has less interest in strict chronology than in theme, and his account of the miracle fits in the aftermath of the healing of the centurion’s slave, of Peter’s mother-in-law, and a statement that Jesus cured a great many people who suffered from illness or demonic possession.  St. Mark wrote his Gospel from St. Peter’s reminiscences, so according to the order in which Peter spoke of his experiences with Jesus.  

In Matthew’s Gospel, the miracle of the calming of the sea comes as part of a series of miracles showing the Lord’s authority and power: power over both the natural and supernatural worlds.  This, in turn, shows the Father’s approval of his Son’s teaching contained in the Sermon on the Mount, which preceded this series of miracles. 

“As Jesus got into a boat, his disciples followed him.”  St. Mark gives a specific time when the Lord got into the boat to cross the Sea of Galilee: it was on the evening of the day on which he told the Parable of the Sower.  Both Matthew and Luke are less definite.  In their Gospels, Jesus embarked on the boat after some time had passed since the events that were described as coming before.  “Suddenly a violent storm came up on the sea, so that the boat was being swamped by waves.”  The Greek word translated here as “violent storm” is seismos, which can also mean earthquake.  This was an unusually violent storm.  The Greek word translated here as “swamped” means “to be enveloped” or “to conceal”.  The Greek gives a vivid sense of a fishing boat at sea suddenly blasted by a storm of ferocious power.  The Apostles could hardly have seen each other in the blinding rain and their attempts to bail proved pitiful.

“He was asleep.”  Considering how the boat was being hurtled about by the waves and the rain and sea were capsizing it, we ought to marvel that the Lord slept.  The fact that he slept bears testimony to his exhaustion from his relentless efforts in preaching and healing.  We should marvel more that he kept this up every day for three years.  We will never know how much our Redeemer suffered for us.

“Lord, save us! We are perishing!”  This cry may have been motivated more by panic than by faith, but it does amount to a prayer.  It is a prayer we ourselves have uttered probably more than once.  “Why are you terrified, O you of little faith?”  It is as though the Lord expected them to simply ride out the storm in all its fury.  And that is what he did expect.  They should have kept bailing and struggling, and he would have protected him.  The Lord wills for us to take some part in our own salvation and so he urges us on to perform good works and to grow in our faith.  If we do this, he will protect us.  The Lord rebuked the Apostles for having little faith in order to teach them that their faith had not attained the fullness that they may have thought.  He makes it clear to them that they have as yet far to go.

“Then he got up, rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was great calm.”  As sudden as the squall had arisen, so suddenly did it end.  The Apostles, as they gazed around, may have thought of how God bounded the sea in the beginning: “Who shut up the sea with doors, when it broke forth, as if it had issued out of the womb?  When I made the cloud the garment thereof,

and thick darkness a swaddling-band for it, and prescribed bounds for it, and set for it bars and doors, and said, Hitherto shall you come, but no further: and here shall your proud waves be stayed?” (Job 38, 8–11).

We can understand this miracle as telling us to keep calm when the circumstances of life turn against us, or when we are persecuted for our faith, but also when we suffer inner turmoil and confusion.  Even when it seems the Lord is absent or asleep, he is there, protecting those who trust in him.

The Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, Monday, June 29, 2026

Matthew 16, 13–19

When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

The first evidence for the existence of this feast comes from a calendar of Church holy days produced in the fourth century.  This calendar notes that from the year 258 the dual feast of Peter and Paul was celebrated on June 29.  The date commemorates the transfer of the remains of the Apostles, originally buried near the sites of their executions, to one of the catacombs.  The fact that from very early on the two Apostles were venerated together is confirmed by similar feasts in the East, though on different days than June 29.  

Even as young men, neither Simon of Capernaum nor Saul of Tarsus could have imagined how their lives would turn out.  Simon, a successful fisherman, probably married, would have expected to live out his days near the Sea of Galilee.  Saul, an unmarried Pharisee who studied under the wise Rabbi Gamaliel, would have expected to spend the rest of his life in Israel, teaching the Law to others.  But first Simon, and about ten years later, Saul, discovered the Lord Jesus.  Simon met him through his brother Andrew.  Saul, through a vision while persecuting the first Christians in which the Lord Jesus spoke to him.  After long years of service to Jesus, both have up their lives in Rome, where they had brought the Gospel, in the year 67.

Of the two, Simon, whose name the Lord changed to Peter (“rock”), was the more impulsive of the two.  The Evangelists show him numerous times acting and speaking abruptly, making decisions quickly.  His speaking up and confessing that Jesus is the Son of God is part and parcel of this characteristic.  Later, as a further example, when he hears that the Lord has been raised from the dead, Peter (and John) jump up at once and run at breakneck speed to the tomb.  Paul had more reserve and was better educated, so that he could deaf and write.  Paul tended to plan his actions out ahead of time, as we can see from the plans he forms for his missionary journeys.  Both possessed enormous energy and zeal for Christ.  Both men so loved the Lord that they held nothing back in their service to him in their missionary work.  Paul’s touching words of his love for Jesus could have been spoken by Peter, too: “For to me, to live is Christ: and to die is gain” (Philippians 1, 21).  Likewise, Paul’s words towards the end of his life could have been Peter’s: “I have competed well; I have finished the race; I have kept the faith.”  The prize for winning the race was Jesus himself.

We ask Saints Peter and Paul to intercede for us, that though, in awe of the Lord’s glory, we might wish to say, “Leave me Lord for I am a sinful man” (Luke 5, 8), we might say instead, “I count all things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ, my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ” (Philippians 3, 8). 

The Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, June 28, 2026

Matthew 10, 37–42

Jesus said to his Apostles: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me. Whoever receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever receives a righteous man because he is a righteous man will receive a righteous man’s reward. And whoever gives only a cup of cold water to one of these little ones to drink because the little one is a disciple — amen, I say to you, he will surely not lose his reward.”

“Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me.”  To clarify this verse a little we can consider an alternative translation from the Greek: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me does not deserve me.”  That is, does not deserve his friendship.  God does not owe us his friendship.  He offers it to us out of his love for us.  Friendship with him does not benefit him but benefits us immensely in every way.  The Lord’s saying that “whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me” does not go against the generosity of his offer, but enables a person to grow in his capacity to receive the Lord’s friendship.  We must desire his friendship with all our hearts in order to ready ourselves for it.  Loving him more than father or mother or children or one’s spouse does not mean we stop loving these others.  In fact, by placing him first in our lives we love other better.  We love them for their own sake and not for our sake.  We also love them for the Lord’s sake, for he loves them too.  And by loving him more than anyone else in our lives we simply reciprocate, to a small degree, his love for us, for in giving himself up to a brutal Death for our sake, he showed that he loves us more than himself.  And we are not innocent lambs that he should die for us.  St. Paul reminds us: “For why did Christ, when as yet we were weak . . . die for the ungodly?  For hardly for a just man will one die: yet perhaps for a good man some one would dare to die. But God commends his charity towards us when as yet we were sinners” (Romans 5, 6-8).

“And whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me.”  This “cross” can rightly be understood in various ways.  Certainly, the Lord is speaking of a commitment to love and follow him unto death, just as the Lord himself did.  In speaking of loving him more than mother and father, he means the intensity of love for him.  In speaking of taking up one’s cross, he means the perseverance of this love.  We might say that the Lord is speaking of the “width” and “length” of love.  The “cross” also means anything that hinders us in our work in spreading the Gospel or in living a virtuous life.  It is not a suffering which we have caused ourselves through wicked actions: “For one is approved if, mindful of God, he endures pain while suffering unjustly.  For what credit is it, if when you do wrong and are beaten for it you take it patiently? But if when you do right and suffer for it you take it patiently, you have God’s approval” (1 Peter 2, 19-20).  In taking up his cross, one gives up one’s life — or, “loses” it: “Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”  The lover of Jesus gives up his life in order to receive life with the Lord.  To “lose” one’s life means to hold the Lord above all people and things and to follow him wherever he leads, conforming our will to his.  This can be accomplished only with the help of grace, for which we must pray.  We can compare “leaving” this life for the Lord with the Hebrews leaving Egypt.  They left a land and life they knew, “when we sat over the fleshpots, and ate bread to the full” (Exodus 16, 3), for a land of which they knew only through the promises of Moses, a land supposedly flowing with milk and honey.  At times, on their journey there they regretted having left the familiar if hard life in Egypt, but they rejoiced when they arrived and they could see what they had given everything up for.

“Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.”  If, through grace, we are conformed to Christ and he gives us a share in his life, we become his ambassadors, his other selves, just as he represents the Father.  We then spread the Gospel through our works, words, prayers, and even by our presence.  Those who are attracted  by these are attracted to Christ.  They “receive” him.  In order for them to receive him they need us to go to them, even as we needed God to come down from heaven to save us.  In going to them, we show that we are committed to Jesus above all things, that we love him more than life itself, and we carry out his will no matter who or what tries to hinder us.

Saturday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 27, 2026

Matthew 8, 5-17

When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him and appealed to him, saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.” He said to him, “I will come and cure him.” The centurion said in reply, “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him, “Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith. I say to you, many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven, but the children of the Kingdom will be driven out into the outer darkness, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.” And Jesus said to the centurion, “You may go; as you have believed, let it be done for you.” And at that very hour his servant was healed.  Jesus entered the house of Peter, and saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever. He touched her hand, the fever left her, and she rose and waited on him. When it was evening, they brought him many who were possessed by demons, and he drove out the spirits by a word and cured all the sick, to fulfill what had been said by Isaiah the prophet: He took away our infirmities and bore our diseases.

St. Matthew’s account of the Lord’s cure of the centurion’s slave differs markedly from that of St. Luke, the only other Evangelist who gives it.  St. Luke provides a little more detail and emphasizes that the Jews interceded on behalf of the centurion.  Both accounts report the centurion’s remarkable declaration that he is not worthy for the Lord to come into his house to heal the slave and that he believe the Lord can heal even from far off.  Both accounts recount the Lord’s praise of the centurion’s faith, but Matthew goes further and presents the Lord comparing the lack of faith by the Jews to that shown by the Gentiles, and that the former will be lost and the latter will be saved.  It is quite a remarkable statement to read, as it must have been to hear.  This Gospel Reading also includes the healing of Peter’s mother-in-law and subsequent healings he administered in Capernaum.

“When Jesus entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him.”  St. Luke tells us that the centurion did not speak directly to Jesus but through intermediaries.  This does not necessarily contradict Matthew’s account because “centurion approached him” could just as easily mean that he approached him through the Jews who spoke for him.  “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.”  Luke tells us that the slave was sick and about to die while we learn in Matthew that he was also paralyzed.  There is no contradiction here either since each Evangelist tells us part of what was said but not the whole, which we can reconstruct: “My slave is paralyzed, suffering dreadfully, and is about to die.”  

“I will come and cure him.”  The Lord acts as though the centurion were doing him the favor of asking him to heal the servant, so willing is Jesus to go to him.  We can see in this the eagerness of the Son of God to be made man in order to die for our sins.  But we allow his very willingness to take what he has done for us for granted or to minimize it.  “Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof; only say the word and my servant will be healed.”  Luke lets us know that the centurion loved the Jewish nation and built the town’s synagogue.  We can infer from this that he knew that Jews were not allowed by the Law to go into the houses of Gentiles.  This may explain in part his reticence to have Jesus come to him, but he also makes an act of faith: “For I too am a man subject to authority, with soldiers subject to me. And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes; and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”  We should note that the centurion says, “I too am a man of authority.”  While the Jewish leaders challenge him and consider him an inferior, the Roman honors him as  an authority.

“Many will come from the east and the west, and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven.”  The Israelites had been oppressed by many nations from the east, especially the Babylonians, who destroyed the Temple.  The Romans came from the west.  These represent the Gentiles.  They will recline at the banquet in heaven with the founders of the Jewish people, namely, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  “But the children of the Kingdom will be driven out into the outer darkness, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.”  Those who complacently believed that their status as descendants of Abraham. Isaac, and Jacob entitled them to recline with them at the banquet but who did not possess the faith of their forefathers, would not only miss out on it, but be driven into hell.  They were positioned for glory, chosen by God, and they rejected him.  They preferred to return as slaves in Egypt and eat their meals there to the heavenly banquet.

“And at that very hour his servant was healed.”  Both the Hebrew and Greek words for “hour” can mean an unspecified time.  The sense is that the slave was healed at that time.

“He touched her hand, the fever left her.”  This healing contrasts with that of the centurion’s pagan slave in that the Lord healed him from afar, and he heals the Jewish mother-in-law through touching her.  The mother-in-law shows the response the Jews should have made to the Lord in his coming to them: “She rose and waited on him.”  

We must take great care that we not fall into complacency, thinking that we have done enough in our service to the Lord, but we should take the attitude of servants in the parable: “We are unprofitable servants; we have done only that which we ought to do” (Luke 17, 10).

Friday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 26, 2026

Matthew 8, 1-4

When Jesus came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him. And then a leper approached, did him homage, and said, “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.” He stretched out his hand, touched him, and said, “I will do it. Be made clean.” His leprosy was cleansed immediately. Then Jesus said to him, “See that you tell no one, but go show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them.”

“When Jesus came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him.”  This occurs immediately following his account of the Sermon on the Mount and so it acts as a sign of divine approbation for it.  The first verse seems to confirm the idea that Jesus had preached only to his disciples — whether Matthew meant by this his Apostles or the larger group of disciples — and not to the crowds.  If this were true, than the crowds waited for him to descend to them, and they followed him once he did.

“And then a leper approached, did him homage.”  Because large crowds were following Jesus, the leper must have approached him coming from in front.  Matthew says he “approached” Jesus, meaning that he came as near as he dared, considering his ailment rendered him unclean.  But Jesus must have walked right up to him because Matthew also tells us that he “stretched out” his hand to him.  The crowd behind may not have seen this but the Apostles around him would have shuddered in horror at the sight of their Lord drawing near to the repulsive sight of the leper.  The stench would also have nearly overpowered anyone in the proximity of the man.  But more than that, they would have felt anxiety that Jesus was putting himself in the position of becoming unclean himself.  

“Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.”  This can also be translated, “Lord, if it is your will, you are powerful to make me clean.”  The leper has heard of the Lord’s ability to heal.  He knows that it is merely a matter of whether it is the Lord’s will to make him clean.  We can understand this as the leper speaking for all of us, confessing his power and acknowledging his will.  The leper does not directly ask to be healed, but puts forward this statement which makes his healing (or not) a personal matter between the Lord and him.  It is as if he were asking, Do you want to heal me?  We ought to pray this way when we ask him to forgive our sins, for in praying “Lord, you have the power to forgive me” we explicitly state our belief in his power, whereas, “Please forgive me” only implicitly achieves this.

“He stretched out his hand, touched him.”  All who witnessed this touching would have gasped out loud at this.  Even the leper might have instinctively drawn back.  The Lord touched him without any warning, any hesitation.  Probably he touched his hand, but he might have touched his face.  We can try to imagine the leper’s feelings.  He had probably not felt a human touch in many years.  The Lord looked directly into his eyes, through his eyes, and into his soul.  The leper would have felt the Lord’s heart touching his as he looked at him.  The compassion in the Lord’s eyes alone would have melted away the putrefied sores.  In the precise instant the Lord touched him, he was healed: “His leprosy was cleansed immediately.”  St. Mark tells us that when the woman with the hemorrhages touched the Lord, “she felt in her body that she was healed of the evil” (Mark 5, 29).  Who can doubt that the leper felt the Lord’s power surging through him as well? 

“I will do it. Be made clean.”  This is better translated, “I will it.  Be cleansed.”  Jesus is saying that he it is his will for the leper to be cleansed.  It is not simply an agreement to do something.  It is the will of God that he be free from his leprosy.  It is the will of God that we be freed from our sins.  All we need do is to come before him with contrition and to confess that he has the power to do this.

“See that you tell no one.”  The Lord often told those whom he cured to tell no one of how it was done.  Here, he may have done so as a test of the man’s obedience towards the one who healed him, or it may have been in order to prevent him being overwhelmed by people seeking cures so that he had no time to preach. Sadly, in his report of the cure, St. Mark tells us, “He being gone out, began to publish and to blaze abroad the word: so that he could not openly go into the city. but was without in desert places. And they flocked to him from all sides” (Mark 1, 45).  

“But go show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them.”  It is unclear from Mark’s telling of the aftermath of the fire whether the former leper followed through with this or not.  According to the detailed instructions in the Book of Leviticus, only the Temple priests could declare a man cleansed of leprosy and grant that he return to his family.  This might have taken the form of a signed written notice.  The cleansed man was instructed to give as a gift “two living sparrows, which it is lawful to eat, and cedar wood, and scarlet, and hyssop” (Leviticus 14, 4).  The priest would examine the man for the tiniest sign of the disease.  Having presented the offering and survived the examination, the man would wash his clothes, shave all his hair, and wash himself.  He would return to his town, but could not enter his house for seven more days.  For us, when we ask for the forgiveness of our sins, this amounts to the performing of a penance.

The Lord looked into the man’s eyes and touched him with his hand.  May he one day look into our eyes and take us by the hand and lead us into heaven.

Thursday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 25, 2026

Matthew 7, 21-29

Jesus said to his disciples: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name? Did we not drive out demons in your name? Did we not do mighty deeds in your name?’ Then I will declare to them solemnly, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, you evildoers.’  Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. But it did not collapse; it had been set solidly on rock. And everyone who listens to these words of mine but does not act on them will be like a fool who built his house on sand. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house. And it collapsed and was completely ruined.”  When Jesus finished these words, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.

With this reading from the Gospel of St. Matthew, we come to the end of the Lord’s Sermon on the Mount.  He has laid before us his moral teachings and will shortly confirm them through a series of powerful miracles.  Here, he speaks of the consequences of those who do not follow his teachings though pretending to be his followers.  And in the Sermon’s concluding words, the Lord teaches how following his laws provides his true followers a sure foundation for us to reach heaven.

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven.”  It is easy to call for help when we find ourselves in grave danger.  Likewise, it is easy to call Jesus “Lord” when he is about to judge us. But only those who served Jesus on earth as his servants will enter the Kingdom of heaven: “Only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.”  To enter heaven after we die we must serve the King of heaven while we live.  He will recognize us as his servants and will invite us in.  More than that, “He will gird himself and have them sit at table, and he will come and serve them” (Luke 12, 37).  “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name? Did we not drive out demons in your name? Did we not do mighty deeds in your name?”  However, they did not.  Or, for personal gain some people fake their Christianity and act as go through the motions of prophesying — preaching — and performing good works, but these, coupled with immoral living — insult God and do him no honor at all.  Instead, “their god is their belly” (Philippians 3, 19).  

“I never knew you. Depart from me, you evildoers.”  That is, he never knew them as his followers, his servants.  They never came to him to learn of him.  In the end, they call upon him merely to stave off their condemnation: he is nothing more for them than a means to an end.  He calls them evildoers because he knows them for their godlessness.

“Everyone who listens to these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock.”  This means that the builder sinks the principal beams that will hold his house together into the rock, the deeper the better.  He must use solid wood, preferably a hardwood, or even with such a rock as the foundation the house will not last long.  The “rock” is the Church, which preserves and advances the teachings of the Lord.  The “wood” the builder uses is his intellect and free-will.  Grounded in this rock, these beams will fixedly hold together the house of this man’s hope for heaven.  “A fool who built his house on sand.”  It is relatively easy and cheap to build a house on a foundation of sand, but it will not endure.  Sand does offer much in the way of stability but is quickly scattered by the wind and washed away by water.  In the spiritual life, “sand” signifies our neglect of prayer, the Sacraments, Holy Mass, and a perverse trust in our own abilities.  “The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and buffeted the house.”  Trials, tribulations, health failures, the weakness of old age do not trouble those who have given themselves entirely to God, but will mean disaster for those who have not: their house will collapse and be completely ruined.  

“When Jesus finished these words, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes.”  Throughout his Sermon, the Lord declared to the people, “I say.”  Here is your understanding of the Law, or the understanding of the scribes, but I say to you, etc.  The Lord Jesus came to complete and to fulfill, and to reveal the deeper demands of the Laws given to the people through Moses, which can now be carried out with the help of God’s grace.Through our adherence to the commandments of Christ we build our house on rock, looking forward to the day when we will dwell in God’s eternal dwellings.