Archdiocese of Durban (20)

In today’s gospel we are presented with three wise men who sought to discern the happenings of great events in the stars. A common misconception presents the wise men as kings. The probable cause of this confusion comes from Ps 72 that we sung today for our psalm, where we …

Baptism of Our Lord – St. Ignatius 10am – Year C – Lk 3: 15-22 It may surprise you to learn that the early Christian community were very embarrassed by the Baptism of the Lord. This was because it upset the neat categories that they were trying to establish: namely that John …

Contrary to the other gospels, John does not pepper his gospel with many stories of Jesus’ miracles. We know Jesus worked many miracles, many of which are not even recorded in any of the gospels. But John decides to recount only seven miracles of Jesus in his gospel. …

In our hyper-individualistic society, we can sometimes fall into the trap of approaching our religious faith in individualistic terms. We each have our own faith and practice this faith in many different ways. Many of us have various devotional practices, which, for a large …

In our hyper-individualistic society, we can sometimes fall into the trap of approaching our religious faith in individualistic terms. We each have our own faith and practice this faith in many different ways. Many of us have various devotional practices, which, for a large …

Imagine that you were a car – now ask yourself what type of fuel you run on? What is the fuel that you put inside yourself, what keeps you going throughout the day. Now I’m not talking about whether you eat nshima, bread or spaghetti. I’m talking about what is the fuel that …

Today’s first reading begins by telling us that Abraham decided to put his faith in the Lord. What does this really mean to have faith in God? Surely it means more than simply believing that God exists and following his commandments. I would suggest to you today dear friends …

In today’s gospel, we are confronted by a certain version of Jewish theodicy. Theodicy is the branch of theology that wrestles with the question of how an all-powerful loving God might allow evil. At the time of Jesus, many Jews, following the lead of the Sadducees, did not …

This is a parable that we all know very well. I would suspect that when we hear this parable most of us are inclined to see ourselves in one of the sons. But I would like to invite you today to focus on the Father, for it was not really the son who was prodigal, but rather …

In today’s gospel, Jesus addresses some of his most demanding counsels to his disciples: “if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off!” While there have been Christians who have taken Jesus at his word, most notably the great Church father, Origen, who was rumoured to have …

It is noteworthy that the foundational and archetypal human relationship, as presented in our first reading today, is one of man-wife and not parent-child, or sibling-sibling. For the vast majority of us, the foundational relationship of our lives is mother-child. It is …

Richard Rohr, a Franciscan priest who has written a lot about male spirituality talks about how in the first half of his life, every man needs to build a tower, needs to achieve something, needs to prove himself to the world, make a name for himself. He needs to learn the …

Since the dawn of civilization, human beings have been struggling with the question of how to justify the authority of one person over another. What gives one person the right to tell another person what to do? In other words what gives authority its legitimacy, where does …

If we observe the stories of people who encounter Jesus in the Gospel, they are by and large people who are seeking help from Jesus, normally in the form of some physical healing. Invariably Jesus provides them with the help that they are seeking and they depart from Jesus …

Having just come out of a 30-day retreat, I had a rather jarring experience on Tuesday when I went into a mall for the first time in a month. But what added to the dissonance in my head was to see Christmas decorations all around the mall when we had not even begun Advent. …

Often when we attend ceremonies, those who are invited to make speeches preface their remarks with long formal acknowledgements of dignitaries both present and absent that go something like this: His Excellency, President of the Republic, in absentia, the Honourable Member …

Today is Gaudete Sunday, a Latin word meaning rejoice. In our second reading today, Paul even though he is in prison, is overflowing with joy and enjoins the same joy on the community at Philippi. Paul encourages the people of Philippi to rejoice always. We might think that …

With growing concern in recent years about the representation of minority groups in films, books and other works of fiction, a certain test was developed as a tool to measure the representation of women in a work of fiction. This test, known as the Bechdel test, has three …

Matthew’s gospel opens with a rather long and tedious genealogy of Jesus and we might wonder why we need to listen to such a boring list on a joyful night like tonight. Genealogies serve a number of purposes in the Scriptures. On the one hand, they serve to establish the …

There can be a certain temptation to idealize the Holy Family and think that as a family they never fought or misunderstood each other or failed to get along because of their own human frailty. To be completely clear, human frailties are not the same as sin. There can be …