Tag: Susan Ciancio

In today’s gospel, Luke tells the story of Jesus healing ten lepers. All the lepers walk away, and only one returns to thank Him. Jesus says to him, “Ten were cleansed, were they not? Where are the other nine? Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God?”

Imagine being given such a gift and not thanking God for it!

We’re sometimes like the other nine lepers, aren’t we? God has given us so many gifts that we can’t even count them. Our gifts come in varying sizes. Some are tiny, some are huge, and some are in between. Yet we often get so bogged down in our daily lives that we go off and do things and forget to “return” to thank God for all He has given us. 

As we approach Thanksgiving and Advent, let us try something new. Just as we do an examination of conscience before confession, let us do a daily examination of blessings. Maybe we do this every morning, during an afternoon break, or before bed. Or better yet, maybe we keep a notepad nearby and jot down ideas throughout the day. But the point is to focus on the many, many blessings God has given us—and then to simply say “thank You, Lord.”

And as we focus on our blessings, let us also examine our difficulties and thank God for them too, for we can ask Him to help us use them for good. If we let them, our sufferings can turn into blessings. We can use them to grow closer to God. We can use them to grow spiritually or emotionally. We can offer up our sufferings for someone else to lessen his suffering. 

When we open ourselves up to goodness, a whole world of possibilities is available.

And when we do so, our attitude starts to change. We are no longer greedy and seeking “wants” but appreciative that God has taken care of our needs. We no longer see trials and tribulations as things that make us angry or bitter, but as ways to strengthen our relationship with God, as we work together—as a team—to create good.

My parents have a painting that hangs in their kitchen that features an older man praying over a dinner that consists of a simple loaf of bread and some soup. The caption reads: “In everything, give thanks.”

Let that be the principle we live by—today and every day.

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Today, in the Gospel of Mark, we read that the scribes asked Jesus which was the first, or most important, of the commandments. To this, Christ responded: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. The second is this: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these.”

Love of God and love of our neighbors aren’t simply abstract thoughts or feelings. In order to truly love, we must show that love with our actions. That means that we put Christ first all day, every day. We wake up with a prayer on our lips. We ask God for His help when we need it, but we never forget to whisper prayers of joy, of thanks, or of happiness throughout the day as well. 

And part of showing our love for God is loving those we share the world with. We love our neighbor as we want to be loved. Our neighbors don’t just include the people we like. Our neighbors include every person we encounter. They’re the slow cashier at the grocery store. They’re the grumpy coworker in the next cubicle. They’re the irritable person down the street. 

God didn’t instruct us to be kind and love only our friends. That’s easy! He wants us to be kind to everyone. And when we do, we have the beautiful opportunity to change hearts and minds, to inspire, or to help someone feel important. Too often, people express their sadness or loneliness through negative actions. They’re grumpy or irritable because of something inside that really bothers them or because of the way they’ve been treated by others. It can be very difficult for them to break this cycle when people react to their negativity with negativity.

Sometimes, in order to make a change, people need just one person to treat them with kindness.

In To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch taught Scout an important lesson when he said that we never really understand someone until we “climb into his skin and walk around in it.”

Isn’t climbing into someone’s skin—seeing something from his point of view—putting love into action?

When we do this, we show people that they matter. 

As we approach the holidays and Advent, let us remember these two commandments, and let us reflect on the importance of loving others and treating them well. 

We all matter to God. We are all loved by God. And He calls us to help shine His love to others. 

So how will you put love into action today and every day?

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The Responsorial Psalm for today says: “I trust in the Lord; my soul trusts in His word. My soul waits for the Lord.”

Trusting in the Lord is often easier said than done. We live in a world filled with people who say things like “Your God must not care if He allowed [fill in the blank] to happen,” or “How could a merciful God allow [fill in the blank]?”

And then we begin to wonder Why does He allow that? It’s almost like those words take over our thoughts and stifle our faith. 

During the easy times in life, trusting in God is easy. But during the hard times in life, trusting in God is difficult. We wonder why He is allowing our suffering or the suffering of others. 

Realistically, suffering is a part of life. It has been a part of life since Adam and Eve brought sin into the world. 

Further, people have choices. And often they make bad choices—choices that hurt others. In addition, diseases, accidents, famine, sickness, and natural disasters happen on a daily basis.

We have to understand that God allows us to endure suffering in this world so that we become stronger and so that we grow closer to spending eternity with Him. When we suffer, we can—and should—unite our suffering to Christ’s on the cross. We can also offer up our suffering for someone else—a soul in purgatory or someone here on earth. When we do this, we grow spiritually. 

But God can—and will—help us make something good happen from the bad. We just have to be open to the good. We have to look at the bad and not allow it to beat us. Sure, we can stumble or even fall for a short period, but it’s that trust in Christ that will help us get back up and that will help us derive something good from the situation. Maybe we learn something. Maybe we can educate someone else. Maybe through the ordeal, we meet a new friend. Maybe we find a disease we didn’t know was there.

This very thing happened to a friend of mine who had been hospitalized with COVID. He struggled greatly with the illness and overcame it, but on a follow-up exam, the doctor found a cancerous mass in his kidney. Instead of feeling sorry for himself, he felt grateful—and grateful he had COVID. For had he not had it, the doctors would not have found the cancer. 

Today, he is cancer free, recovering, and very thankful. 

Our God is a wonderful God who leads us out of life’s difficulties and closer to Him. We just need to accept His offer.

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In the Gospel reading today, Jesus ate a meal with a Pharisee. When they sat down to eat, Jesus did not go through the washing ritual that was appropriate for Jews of the time, and the Pharisee commented on it. Jesus replied: “Although you cleanse the outside of the cup and the dish, inside you are filled with plunder and evil.”

Could Christ say that to us?

Could Christ look at us and see a washed, well-groomed body that looks beautiful and spotless but one that is filled with bitterness, anger, resentment, or even hatred?

We all feel those feelings at one time or another. People have hurt us. Their actions have left scars. Because of that, we hold onto anger and can’t seem to let it go. It begins to weigh us down. 

Not only does it weigh us down, but it starts to bubble out of our polished exterior. No matter what we do, it comes out—in both little and big ways. Maybe we’re rude to the cashier at the grocery store. Maybe we’re unkind to a coworker. Maybe we snap at our children or spouse. We don’t mean to, but the festering wounds take over.

It’s so difficult to keep this from happening, and some circumstances require us to seek professional help. 

But sometimes we just need to make a conscious decision to clean the inside, to purge those negative feelings, and to forgive. For that’s what it comes down to—forgiveness. Whether we must forgive ourselves or forgive the person who hurt us—or both—we will feel freer, lighter, and more at peace when we let go of those feelings that keep us from being our best selves.

It’s not easy. In fact, forgiveness is really hard! But it starts with small steps. And it starts with the realization that we are only responsible for our behaviors. We can only control what we do. We cannot control the actions of other people.

So today, think of that person (or people) who has hurt you. Take a deep breath and say aloud: “I forgive you.” And try to mean it. It may take days or weeks of saying these words, but you will soon feel the weight lifted.

You can also seek help in the confessional. Speaking with a priest, telling him that you’re holding onto these feelings, seeking his advice and encouragement and asking God for forgiveness can really go a long way toward actually forgiving someone. Tell him you’re having a difficult time. Ask for his prayers.

But most important of all, ask God for His help. Tell Him you want to forgive, that you want all those negative feelings on the inside to be washed away. Tell Him that you are trying to make the inside as clean as the outside. 

God is there with open arms. He will help you. You just need to ask. 

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The Responsorial Psalm for today talks about hope in the Lord. It implores: “Do me justice, O God, and fight my fight against a faithless people.”

It seems our world today is full of faithless people—people who place possessions over others, people who devalue human beings, people who spend days mired in anger, people anonymously spitting vitriol online, and so much more.

We see them and their behaviors, and it literally hurts.  

But the Lord wants us to remember to always have hope in Him and hope that our culture can return to a culture of life. 

He knows how tired we get. He knows the weariness of living in a world where human beings rejoice at the “right” to kill vulnerable people—whether they be in the womb or a hospital bed. He understands that sometimes we have no fight left in us to battle the evil of today. 

But the Psalm continues: “You, O God, are my strength.”

And in that, we must rejoice! Like a cold drink of water on an extraordinarily hot day, that realization renews us.

What an amazing feeling it is to know that God wants us to lean on Him. He wants us to seek Him out when we feel like we have nothing left to give others. 

So that is what we do. We go to Him in prayer. We sit quietly in Adoration. We say a decade of the Rosary. We read His words in the Bible. We talk to Him like a friend.

And we become energized. We realize that hope is more than just wishing for things to change. Hope is rooted in Christ.

According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit.”

Through the grace of the Holy Spirit, we can put away the hopelessness we feel and replace it with hope. We can stop looking at all the negative things in this world and create positive things. We can stop focusing on evil and instead be that source of good that the world so desperately needs.

In short, we must stop allowing the bad things of the world to consume us. Christ does not want that for us. That is why He gives us strength. That is why He wants us to have hope. 

So when you feel weary, when you feel exhausted, or when you look around at the world and feel utterly hopeless, remember that Christ fights for us, and He will never stop. His love is unending, and you matter to Him. We all do.

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In the Gospel reading today, we hear a very fitting line for 9/11: “A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good, but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil.”

Today, we remember with incredible sadness the events of 20 years ago, where evil took so many lives.

That day, and on every anniversary since, the people of this country have mourned as one. The tangible evidence of evil and hatred took root in our hearts that day, leaving us shaken and unable to forget what happens when evil rules.

But evil doesn’t have to have the last word. Nor does it have to rule us.

There were so many heroes that day—too many to count. But we thank God for them. And we know that we must focus on their actions as examples of what humanity is capable of rather than on the wicked actions of terrorists.

Through tears of grief, many of us found that we could lean on our families, lean on each other, and lean on God. We found that we didn’t want to allow evil to take hold. And we found that we can create good from something horrific.

So we take action to make today a brighter day because of the heroes. We make the world—or our small part of it—kinder so that we honor them and their sacrifice. 

And we hope that this day becomes so much more than a remembrance of evil. We hope that it becomes a celebration of the people we lost that day and a celebration of the heroic acts of so many. And we hope that it serves as a reminder that life is short, that life is precious, and that God wants us to shine forth His goodness no matter what happens in life.

This day has become bittersweet in my family, for it is also my dad’s birthday. But since that day in 2001, I get the feeling that he doesn’t like to celebrate. Maybe he thinks: How can I be happy on the day something horrible happened?

I’m sure that is the feeling of anyone who remembers that day and who also shares a birthday today. It’s only natural to think that. 

But we cannot allow the hatred of terrorists to outshine the life and love of people in our families. The celebration of someone’s birth is a tremendous blessing. And if we allow evil to take over a day so special, then the terrorists truly are winning.

So as we reflect on this tragic day, let us remember that a store of goodness produces good. Let us be that goodness—to our families, to our coworkers, to strangers, and even to people we don’t like—so that it can spring forth and bless the world around us.

And let us never forget to celebrate the lives of the people we love!

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The First Reading for today is from Colossians, and it’s just one sentence long. But it’s a powerful and thought-provoking sentence. In part, it reads: “You once were alienated and hostile in mind because of evil deeds; God has now reconciled you in the fleshly body of Christ through His death, to present you holy, without blemish, and irreproachable before Him, provided that you persevere in the faith, firmly grounded, stable, and not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard.”

Let us take just a few moments throughout the day today to reflect on that fact. Indeed, God sent His Son here to redeem us. He didn’t do this because we deserved it; He did it out of pure love. 

God’s love for us is so powerful, so unending, and so beautiful that He allowed His Son to die a horribly painful death on the cross for us. 

Despite this knowledge, and despite this immense gift God gave us, we sometimes reject His gift. We permit worldly things to come before Him, allowing them to hurt the relationship Christ sought to establish when He came.

Furthermore, we know that what we must do for Christ and what we actually do are often two very different things. We know that, as St. Paul says, we must “persevere in the faith,” but we find ourselves ensnared by sin, falling repeatedly into the same worldly traps of vice. Though we don’t have the same kinds of idols that the people of the Old Testament had, we do have the idols of society today. And often they do get in the way of our relationship with Christ and keep us from persevering in faith. 

These things include the trappings of modern life like the Internet, TV, video games or games on our phones, and so forth. Or maybe these “idols” are more serious addictions like drugs, alcohol, gambling, or something else. 

Anything that we put first or before Christ is an idol that keeps us from persevering and firmly grounding ourselves in our faith. They take us back to the time where mankind was alienated because of evil deeds.

The amazing thing is that we have the power to stop this alienation. We can decide to make changes anytime we want. It begins with identifying these “idols” and demoting them. Unless they are seriously hurting us or our relationships with others, we don’t have to totally give up things we enjoy, but we must not allow ourselves to be consumed by them. 

God must always come first in our lives. 

So, starting today, let us reflect on our lives and on what the “idols” are that we must reject so that we can start rebuilding and renewing our relationship with Christ. 

He’s waiting with open arms.

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In the Gospel reading today, the Pharisees asked Jesus what the greatest commandment was. He responded: “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” This pretty much sums up all the commandments, does it not? We must love our Lord with all of our being. And we must love our neighbor as we love ourselves. It seems easy. But, like many things in life, it’s easier said than done. First, let’s understand what love really means, as lots of people use the word to indicate a strong desire for something (like pizza or chocolate) or to indicate that they especially like something. While we can really like chocolate, adore koalas, or be fond of an excellent movie, that isn’t the meaning of love that Christ was referring to. The love Christ meant goes much deeper than a strong desire or proclivity for something.  He wants us to love Him above all else. And that love requires action. If we truly love God above all else, that means we pray throughout the day, we talk about our faith proudly, we go to confession regularly, we cherish the reception of His body in the Eucharist, and we glorify Him in all we do. In short, we develop a relationship with God, and we work on strengthening that relationship every single day. That is the love He commands from us. Loving others as we love ourselves means that we want what’s best for the other person. It means that we never wish any harm to come to them. We don’t speak ill of them. We treat them kindly and with compassion. And when Christ said to love our neighbor, He didn’t mean just our friends. Friends are easy to love. He meant everyone around us. That means we have to love the cashier at the grocery store, the bothersome person at work, the politician we dislike, or the person who has wronged us.  That is the hard part of God’s commandment. But we must also remember that loving others does not mean condoning bad behavior. It means treating them kindly, praying for them, serving as a good example, and teaching them about God. Indeed, we must be the light of Christ to them. When we faithfully follow these two commandments, we will not only find ourselves growing closer to God, but we will also make our world a better place. And this will lead to an eternity with God that begins with “Well done, my good and faithful servant.” Contact the author

Today’s Gospel reading is from Mark and details the Transfiguration of Jesus. As Mark states: “Jesus took Peter, James, and his brother John, and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves. . . .  Then a cloud came, casting a shadow over them; from the cloud came a voice, ‘This is my beloved Son. Listen to him.’”

The Apostles were rightly scared. This would have been quite a scene to witness.

But God’s command was clear: Listen to Christ. 

And nearly 2,000 years later, this command is still something we must follow. 

Yet we often struggle to abide by it. We know we should listen to Christ. We try. But sometimes it’s really difficult. Sometimes the world gets in the way and it’s hard to hear Him. Sometimes we allow the things of this world to push Christ’s voice aside or to obscure it. And sometimes we just outright refuse to listen. 

When do we refuse? When we don’t like what He tells us. When His words are too hard to follow. When we fear being ostracized by coworkers, friends, family, or our communities for adhering to our beliefs. All of the above?

Christ never said that following Him would be easy. And many of us know that it’s often very hard. It’s hard because listening takes effort. According to merriam-webster.com, listening means “to hear something with thoughtful attention: give consideration.” 

Listening is not simply hearing something and dismissing it. Listening requires our attention. It also requires us to think and to open our hearts to Christ. We must allow His words to wash over us, to guide us, and to change us. 

So if we truly listen to God’s words, we must also reflect on and adhere to them. We must let His words transform us. And then we must speak them out to the people in our lives and in our communities, for listening and living out the word of God means that we help transform other people as well. 

This is what Christ called His Apostles to do, and it is what He calls us to do as well.

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In the Gospel reading today, we read the story of the beheading of John the Baptist. According to Matthew, at Herod’s birthday celebration, Herodias’ daughter performed a dance that very much delighted Herod. He was so taken with her that he said he would give her whatever she wanted. After consulting her mother, she asked for the head of John the Baptist on a platter. Though the king hesitated because he did not want to put John to death, he also did not want to lose face in front of the guests. So he complied and had John beheaded.

Aside from the tragedy of John the Baptist’s death, this story should impel us to reflect on what we allow to influence us in our lives. We should ask ourselves: How can I apply the lesson in this story to my own life?

Herod knew what he was doing was wrong, but he did it anyway because he felt pressured by those around him.

How often do we do something we know that we shouldn’t? We allow others to persuade us, to change our point of view, or to make us think that something isn’t as bad as what we originally thought. 

It’s the essence of peer pressure, and it happens all the time—even to adults—and especially in matters related to morality. We get so swept away by what others want that we conform to society’s standards and set aside God’s. 

There are many within society, even in leadership positions, who like to teach that we should allow people to do what they want with their own bodies, in life-or-death situations, or within their own homes. “Live and let live,” they say. 

Why is this wrong? It’s wrong because it perpetuates a society based on people’s wants rather than on God’s laws. 

When we adopt this attitude, we allow ourselves to step further and further away from Christ. It’s like taking a brick house down one brick at a time. The loss of one brick may not matter. But when brick after brick is removed, only a shell of a house is left.

Every time we allow others to influence us so that we take an action we know is wrong, we are removing a “brick” from our path to heaven. If enough bricks are removed, the path becomes crumbled and obscured, and we lose sight of eternity with God. 

That is why we must pray and talk to God on a regular basis. Not only that, but we must be quiet and block out the world that’s trying to distract us with its mesmerizing dance. When we do this, we can hear God’s response.

If we keep our eyes focused on God rather than on the dancer, we will not lose those bricks that pave our way to heaven. And any that have been lost can be replaced, for God is merciful, and He wants us to spend eternity with Him.

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In today’s Gospel, we read that the Pharisees questioned why Jesus sat for a meal with tax collectors and sinners. Jesus responded: “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn the meaning of the words, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ I did not come to call the righteous but sinners.” 

Jesus’ words should be a huge relief to us, for we are all sinners. We all need the salvation that He came here to offer us. 

And through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, we can be absolved of our sins. We can tell God we’re sorry. And we can promise to try to sin no more.

Yet He knows we will sin again. And invariably we do. So we pick ourselves up and try again. That’s all He asks—that we keep working at following His laws and becoming closer to Him.

And sometimes we envy those who got to sit at the table with Him, who had the chance to talk with Him, who heard His voice, and who listened to His stories. Maybe we even think: If only I could sit down to dinner with Christ, how much different my life would be.

But we can! We can sit down to dinner with Christ every day in the celebration of the Mass. At Mass, we listen to His word. We sit in His presence. We sing hymns of praise. We pray and tell Him we love Him. And, if we are free of mortal sin, we can eat of His flesh and drink of His blood.

There is nothing more amazing than that!

As Catholics, we are so incredibly blessed to be able to partake in the Eucharist, for the Eucharist really is the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ. 

What a gift!

If we truly contemplate this miracle, we would be running to the confessional then skipping to church so we could receive Communion. 

But even once we’re there in Mass, we find ourselves getting distracted. Maybe the music is of poor quality. Maybe people are making noise. Maybe we can’t hear the homily. So our minds begin to wander away from the table and away from Christ. We are no longer eating with Him but drifting aimlessly and alone.  

It is at these times that we need Him the most. 

When this happens, ask Him to draw you back to the table. Tell Him how much you love being with Him. 

And as you think about that meal where He spoke to the Pharisees, understand that he was talking about you. 

He came here for you. He came here for me. We are the sinners He died for. Let us never forget that.

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The First Reading and the Responsorial Psalm tie in really well together today. In the First Reading, we hear the story of Hagar and her son Ishmael, the son of Abraham. In this story, Abraham sends the two away with just some water and bread. They wander in the wilderness and soon have eaten the bread and drunk the water. Despair sets in. 

Hopeless and fearing that her son will die, Hagar sits down and cries. But then an angel of God speaks to her, telling her that God has heard the boy’s cries and that He will protect him. She opens her eyes to find a well of water. 

Then, in the Responsorial Psalm, we hear that “the Lord hears the cry of the poor.” 

These words and this story should buoy us, for they are meant to give courage and hope.

Yet, life is often difficult or full of loss. That loss may be of a friend or family member, of a child, of a spouse, or of an ability. We cry and wonder why these things happen. We pray. We beg God to help us. Sometimes we may even think that He isn’t listening. Or if He’s listening, He doesn’t care. And just like Hagar, we can easily fall into despair.

But destructive thoughts like these are surely the work of the devil, for he wants us to wallow, to curse God, and to feel angry. That’s how he wins us over. He fills us with such resentment and such misery that we push God away. We begin to doubt His love. And the devil smiles.

However, these verses from the Bible—indeed, the whole Bible itself—prove God’s love and compassion for us. He wants us to know that He hears our prayers and our cries. He wants us to know that He’s always listening and paying attention. And He wants us to understand that we matter to Him. 

God knows our whole story—our beginning, our middle, and our end. We are not privy to the end. So we must learn to have faith and to follow Him even when we don’t understand, trusting that He surely walks with us during our times of despair. It is during these times that we need God the most. It is during these times that we cannot give up. And it is during these times that we must pray unceasingly.

God gave Hagar and Ishmael a literal well of water to quench their thirst and to save their lives. He gave us His Son. And it is from that well that we must learn to drink, for it is that well that will save us.

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