Father Kubicki???s Prayer Reflection

According to today’s gospel at Mass, people brought their children to Jesus. The image of Jesus smiling while surrounded by children shows a very good depiction of his love for humanity.

For the last couple of weeks, the readings at the weekday Masses have been from the letter of St. James who was a relative of our Lord. The Letter of James the Apostle is very concrete and practical in application to living out our Christian call to be holy.

Jesus speaks about Gehenna in today’s gospel. It was a real place just outside the city walls of Jerusalem where people burned garbage. Jesus used it as a symbol for hell, that state of complete alienation from God and the Communion of Saints.

Today, the Church celebrates the feast of an early Church Marty named Polycarp. He was a disciple of St. John the Apostle himself. He was the bishop of Smyrna which was in modern day Turkey

Today, the Church celebrates the feast of the Chair of St. Peter the Apostle. As Catholics, we are not celebrating a chair, but the authority Jesus gave to St. Peter, an authority that is symbolized by a bishop’s chair.

One-thousand years ago, a man named Peter was born and very early on in life, he was orphaned. His older brothers raised him, and one of them seeing his potential, and intellectual gifts, sent him off to study.

The words of Jesus in today’s gospel are very challenging. In fact, I suspect that if you and I were living at the time of Jesus, and we were in the crowd to which Jesus spoke, we would probably think that he was not serious.

Today’s gospel is the story of the Transfiguration of Jesus. “Jesus took Peter, James, and John and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no fuller on earth could bleach them."

There’s a saying in sports that half of the game is just showing up. The same can be said about prayer. We should start small and schedule time each day and be faithful to it. Like exercise, a little prayer every day is better then a lot every so often.

In the 13th century, 7 very prominent businessmen in Florence, Italy were appalled at the excessive materialism and immorality of the city. They decided to take a counter-cultural stand against the excesses of the times. After receiving a vision of the Blessed Virgin Mary who told them to leave the city, they left everything behind and dedicated their lives to poverty, prayer, and penance calling themselves Servants of Mary.

God answers every prayer but sometimes the answer he gives us is not the one we want. Sometimes the answer is no. God always hears our prayers just like God the Father heard his son Jesus when he prayed, and Jesus also received an answer which was hard to accept.

Today, the Church honors the memory of St. Claude La Colombière. He was the spiritual director of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque. He was extremely devoted to and an apostle of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Today is the feast of two Byzantine Greek saints who became missionaries to the Slavic people of Eastern Europe during the first millennium. These two saints we honor today are Saints Cyril and Methodius.

The Bible is one of the greatest tools that will help us reach our final destination of heaven. Much of what can help us in this journey are summed up by Jesus in the sermon on the mount. They are known as the beatitudes and in today’s gospel, we have St. Luke’s version of them.

Among the poor, there is great generosity. In fact, that is one of the main virtues in the tradition of the Lakota (Sioux) people. In the past, it was a sign of honor to give what you had away to those less fortunate. Thus, the most honored were those who gave the most away.

Today, the Church honors Our Lady of Lourdes. In 1942, a novel spent more then a year on the New York Times best seller list, including 13 weeks at number 1. That novel was made into a movie the following year in 1943 and it was nominated for 12 academy awards including best picture. It is the song of Bernadette and it won 4 academy awards including best actress by Jennifer Jones.

Today, the Church honors St. Scholastica. She is the twin sister of St. Benedict and was born around the year 500 in Italy. Like her brother, she started a monastery and what has come to be known as the Benedictine Sisters who have monasteries throughout the world.

In a couple of days, we will be celebrating the annual World Day of the Sick. When we saw Pope St. John Paul II at the end of his life, we knew he was teaching us all a very important message about sickness and suffering.

Today, the Church celebrates St. Josephine Bakhita. She is the patron saint of victims of human trafficking. She was born around the year 1868 in what is now Sudan. Josephine’s family was wealthy, but when she was 9, she was kidnapped by slave traders.

On this day in the year 1920, Frank Parater died. He was a Roman Catholic seminarian from the Diocese of Richmond who died of rheumatic fever at the age of 22 during his theological studies in Rome. He was very devoted to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.