Posts by Connor Szurgot
On the Means of Healing Our Souls
“[Jesus] then said to him, ‘Stretch out your hand.” He did so and his hand was restored.” Both the first reading and the Gospel from today speak of healing. When a physician is presented with a patient suffering from a grave wound, he must proceed to treat it in stages. First, he must thoroughly examine…
Read MoreDeny Yourself and Take Up Your Cross
“If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For he that will save his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for my sake, shall find it. For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world…
Read MoreOn the Call to Mission
We are called by Jesus to witness to the Gospel to others. It is by the power of Jesus that this proclamation is accomplished and fruitful. Without His power, we are powerless to bring about conversions. This is shown from the first reading where God complains, “How long will they be unable to attain innocence…
Read MoreCorpus Christi
Recently, I was doing some yard work with my four-year-old son. During our work, my shovel accidentally hit a worm and cut it in half. My son, who loves to find worms in our yard, examined the worm, and when he found that the worm wasn’t moving, he exclaimed, “The worm died and went to…
Read MoreOn Increasing Charity
Jesus said to his disciples: “As the Father loves me, so I also love you. The love of God for man should never cease to amaze us. We have done and can do nothing for Him. He is entirely and supremely happy in Himself and neither needs nor wants anything outside of Himself. Humanity has…
Read MoreOn the Effect of the Resurrection
We are all now living in the joy of the Easter season! Christ is risen! Alleluia, He is truly risen! Life has never been the same since the Resurrection. We live in the freedom of the children of God, freed from Satan’s yoke and the dominion of sin and death. The readings today remind us…
Read MoreOn Spending One’s Life Well
“So he hired himself out to one of the local citizens who sent him to his farm to tend the swine.” From the first chapters of the book of Genesis, we can see that man was created to spend his life in work for the glory of God. This is not a slavish condition, but…
Read MoreIN A DESERTED PLACE WITH JESUS
In both readings today, we see the pursuit of wisdom. In the first reading, Solomon asks wisdom from God and is granted it to reign over the kingdom of Israel. The Gospel shows the people receiving an overflowing wisdom from Our Lord in His teaching. The people are so eager for His presence that they…
Read MoreOn Dullness of Heart
“He got into the boat with them and the wind died down. They were completely astounded. They had not understood the incident of the loaves. On the contrary, their hearts were hardened.” (Mark 6:51-52) The Douy-Rheims translation renders the last part of those verses as “their heart was blinded”, and the Knox translation has “so…
Read MoreOn the Fruit of Repentance
The Gospel opens with St. John the Baptist’s famous call to action, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” This can seem like a strange reading choice as we near the Christmas season, a season we rightly associate with the coming of the Infant Jesus, meek and tender. This reading becomes logical when…
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