Thank you to all our faithful benefactors for your generous gifts to our Parish Beautification projects! Since June of 2026, we received $58,085.00 from 303 families of Saint Joan of Arc parish. THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! This tells me that you trust God with what he has entrusted to you as a gift. We can all learn to be good stewards of God’s grace through Saint Peter: Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.” (1 Peter 4:10)

Do you know what it is like to be thrilled by the power of Christian faith one moment and then utterly fail in it the next? I do. That is Peter in today’s Gospel. After last week’s bold confession, he now hears Jesus speak of suffering and death, and something in him recoils. He takes Jesus aside and tries to correct him. Jesus responds with the shocking rebuke, “Get behind me, Satan.”

The first time I stood inside St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, its majesty overwhelmed me. The sheer beauty of Michelangelo’s dome seemed to lift my soul right out of my body. Later, I joined the Scavi tour that winds below the basilica, down into the ancient pagan cemetery where Peter was buried. There, in the dim light and narrow passageways, I found myself looking at the bones of a murdered Jewish fisherman, his feet cut off so his crucified body could be taken down more easily.

There’s a saying that good leaders have to play chess, not checkers.

It will surprise no one who knows me well that I am terrible at chess. It’s not so much a lack of skill (although that’s part of it) as a lack of effort. I find chess exhausting. To succeed at this complex game of strategy, you have to see not just the board in front of you, but the person in front of you — and more than that, you have to consider not just what is, but what could be.

What do we think when we see Jesus coming to save us?

The first thing the Apostles scream is “Ghost!” when they catch sight of Jesus walking towards them on water. That always makes me laugh. After all they have witnessed thus far as the companions of the Messiah, they see someone walking on water and they still react like extras in a bad episode of Scooby-Doo.

“Why aren’t there miracles anymore?”

I’ve heard people say this more than once. Usually, it is someone who is a believer in Christ but not a Catholic, because Catholics understand that miracles happen at every Mass, to say nothing of the other miracles the Church recognizes. But even some Catholics often find themselves wondering why it’s been so long since God gave us a good show. A good sun-dance in the sky. A good, flashy reason to believe.

Happy Sunday!

The dirt lot on the corner of 38th Street and Greenway in 1979 tells a story of a treasured land with a vision that will one day be built to worship God in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Our Blessed Lord teaches that the Kingdom is like treasure and like a pearl. Precious items so valuable that joy moves the seeker to a radical reorientation of life.

Happy Sunday in July!

This week in our Sacred Scriptures at the Holy Mass, we are invited to look at God’s way of ruling the world and then to imitate it in a way that allows for human flourishing in life and love. God’s ways are really not harsh, indifferent or quick to destroy, thankfully. He is sovereign, yet mild. He gives room for repentance.

I began writing this piece by googling “how do you make soil fertile?” which should tell you everything you need to know about my own abilities as a gardener.

I remember seeing a packet of seeds in the store one summer as a child and convincing my mother to buy them. They were delphiniums, which bloom into a beautiful cone shape if you know what you’re doing. Alas, I didn’t.

I receive a lot of junk mail. I’m on a bunch of people’s asking-for-money lists, and so were the people who owned this house before me, and when you put it all together, it results in quite the pile of paper accumulating on my counter.

I leave it there because, while I have received this mail, I don’t want to receive it. Do you see the difference? To really receive someone or something, you have to look at it, assess it, make space for it. Accept it. Decide it will have a place in your home or your life or whatever, and give it that place.