Catholic Preaching

Catholic Preaching

By Father Roger LandryReligion & Spirituality Christianity

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November 06, 2025The Wonder of Our and Others’ Being the Lord’s, 31st Thursday (I), November 6, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Leonine Forum Monthly Mass
IESE Business School Chapel, New York
Thursday of the 31st Week in Ordinary Time, Year I
Votive Mass for the Faithful Departed
November 6, 2025
Rom 14:7-12, Ps 27, Lk 15:1-10

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.6.25_Homily_1.mp3

The following points were attempted in the homily:
Today St. Paul summarizes one of the essential aspects of Christian identity and life: We are God’s, not as property he owns, but as beloved sons and daughters he loves. Jesus, through his life, death and resurrection did everything so that we might become children of God. Our behavior is meant to flow from this identity. Therefore, St. Paul says, “None of us lives for oneself, and no one dies for oneself. For if we live, we live for the Lord, and if we die, we die for the Lord; so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.” In this month of November, the Church helps us to ponder how to live according to our identity. We begin the month on All Saints Day, those who truly lived for the Lord and the martyrs who similarly died for him. On All Souls Day, we not only pray for the Faithful Departed — as we do tonight for the deceased members of the Leonine Forum, John Aroutiounian and Begho Ukueberuwa — but also consider death, so that we can learn how to die for the Lord. Throughout the month, we seek to grow in the capacity to live intentionally and to die intentionally, consecrating ourselves to God in life (which is how, from our perspective, we belong to God) and commending ourselves to him in death, echoing Jesus’ last words on the Cross.
This sense of belonging to God as beloved sons and daughters is very strong in today’s Gospel, which is perhaps the most moving chapter in all of Sacred Scripture, when Jesus gives us the Parables of the Lost Sheep, Lost Coin and Lost Sons, all of which stress how God’s love for us is greater than our sins, how he rejoices when he is able to restore us to our identity. When we wander away from him like the lost sheep, he never ceases to come after us to try to restore us. When are spousal significance of our life seemed ruptured — that’s what the lost coin is, because a Jewish woman would have ten silver drachmas on a head piece; losing one of them would be like a woman’s losing a wedding ring today, a symbol of one’s sense of loving belonging to a spouse — God rejoices abundantly when we rediscover it. And in the parable of the Lost Sons (which the Church doesn’t have us ponder this week, because it comes up powerfully every Lent and twice in the Sunday lectionary), we see how even when the Prodigal Son treats the father as dead and the older son treats him almost as as a slave owner, the father never stops loving them both as sons, waiting for the first son’s return and encouraging the older son’s coming into the familial celebration. The main point of this chapter is how dear we are to God, how much we belong to him from his perspective, and how he wants us to grow in our identity, in our subjectively belonging to him who has objectively and lovingly made us members of his family.
That brings us back to today’s first reading and how our understanding of this double-belonging is supposed to influence the way we look at others. After St. Paul stresses that whether we live or die we are the Lord’s because he is the Lord of the dead and the living, he asks, somewhat surprisingly, “Why then do you judge your brother or sister? Or you, why do you look down on your brother or sister?” The “then” is like a “therefore.” If we belong to the Lord of life and death, then, he implies, that we should not be looking negatively or judgmentally at our brothers and sisters, because they belong to the Lord too and we should approach them with the mercy that befits someone who belongs to God. Rather than judging we should be loving. Rather than looking down, we should be esteeming. Once we grasp that they belong to the Lord, we should grow to reverence them, and, when they do things objectively that are wrong, we should relate to them like the Father of the Prodigal Son rather than the older brother, namely with mercy, and, when they convert and come back, with extraordinary joy. This is at the root of Catholic Social Teaching, which begins with a deep appreciation, indeed a reverence, for the dignity of every person, which flows from the fact that each person belongs to the Lord who created them in love, redeemed them in love, and hopes to give them in love his mercy and restore them to their full dignity in his image and likewise.
We belong to the Lord. We don’t live for ourselves or die for ourselves. We live and die for the Lord. We live and die for his kingdom. We live and die for what he sent his Son to live and die for. The Pharisees and scribes criticized Jesus as one who “welcomes sinners and eats with them.” Today as we receive that welcome and not only eat with him but eat of him in Holy Communion, we ask him to increase our sense of belonging and help us to do everything not for ourselves but for him who lived and died for us.

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 ROM 14:7-12
Brothers and sisters:
None of us lives for oneself, and no one dies for oneself.
For if we live, we live for the Lord,
and if we die, we die for the Lord;
so then, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.
For this is why Christ died and came to life,
that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.
Why then do you judge your brother or sister?
Or you, why do you look down on your brother or sister?
For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of God;
for it is written:
As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bend before me,
and every tongue shall give praise to God.
So then each of us shall give an account of himself to God.
Responsorial Psalm PS 27:1BCDE, 4, 13-14
R. (13) I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
The LORD is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The LORD is my life’s refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
R. I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
One thing I ask of the LORD;
this I seek:
To dwell in the house of the LORD
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the LORD
and contemplate his temple.
R. I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the LORD
in the land of the living.
Wait for the LORD with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the LORD.
R. I believe that I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living.
Alleluia MT 11:28
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened,
and I will give you rest, says the Lord.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel LK 15:1-10
The tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to listen to Jesus,
but the Pharisees and scribes began to complain, saying,
“This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
So Jesus addressed this parable to them.
“What man among you having a hundred sheep and losing one of them
would not leave the ninety-nine in the desert
and go after the lost one until he finds it?
And when he does find it,
he sets it on his shoulders with great joy
and, upon his arrival home,
he calls together his friends and neighbors and says to them,
‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’
I tell you, in just the same way
there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents
than over ninety-nine righteous people
who have no need of repentance.
“Or what woman having ten coins and losing one
would not light a lamp and sweep the house,
searching carefully until she finds it?
And when she does find it,
she calls together her friends and neighbors
and says to them,
‘Rejoice with me because I have found the coin that I lost.’
In just the same way, I tell you,
there will be rejoicing among the angels of God
over one sinner who repents.”
The post The Wonder of Our and Others’ Being the Lord’s, 31st Thursday (I), November 6, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
21 min
November 06, 2025 Missionary Preaching, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 6, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 6, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.6.25_Missionary_Preaching_1.mp3
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1 hr 13 min
November 06, 2025 Eucharistic Meditation on Daring to Do All You Can, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 5, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 5, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.5.25_Eucharistic_Meditation_on_Daring_to_Do_All_You_Can_1.mp3
The post Eucharistic Meditation on Daring to Do All You Can, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 5, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
41 min
November 05, 2025What It Takes to Follow and Proclaim Christ, 31st Wednesday (I), November 5, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
Wednesday of the 31st Week in Ordinary Time, Year I
Votive Mass for the Evangelization of Peoples
November 5, 2025
Rom 13:8-10, Ps 112, Lk 14:25-33

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.5.25_Homily_1.mp3
The following text guided the homily:
In yesterday’s Gospel, Jesus gave us a parable about the Church’s mission — to invite everyone to a great dinner, a joyous banquet — and likewise taught us how not to respond to that invitation. We saw that people excused themselves to care for their fields, oxen, and newly married wife, none of whom recognized the importance of the calling they were receiving.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus doubled down on the point he was making in order that we grasp clearly the greatness of the call and the need to make decisive choices to put God in his proper place and order all other aspects of our life to him. This is stuff that every missionary to be effective must first grasp and live.
Jesus does so in a dramatic way. St. Luke tells us that “great crowds” were traveling with him. He had fixed his face on Jerusalem (Lk 9:51) and was on a long way of the Cross; the multitudes, like the apostles, thought and hoped that they were on a triumphal procession for Jesus to be recognized as Messiah, to unite the people and to drive out the Romans. Jesus turned around to the crowds and didn’t say, “How nice of you to come!” Rather, out of love he challenged them — really challenged them out of love — to know what they were signing up so that they would be prepared to follow him all the way. He wanted them to count the cost of discipleship and be willing to pay it, knowing that to obtain the pearl of great price, to enter the banquet of the kingdom, wouldn’t come on the cheap. He tells us that to follow him as his disciple to salvation, we have to do three things:
First, we need to “hate” father and mother, spouse and children, brothers and sisters. The Hebrew word for “hate” doesn’t mean “detest,” but rather “put in second place” or “knock down a peg.” Jesus, after all, calls us to honor our father and mother, not despise them. But we have to make sure that they don’t become gods in our life, that if there is ever a choice between what God is asking of us and what our family members are asking of us, that we say “God’s will be done” instead of “My loved one’s will be done.” And we need to remember that if we do “hate” them in this way, we actually will love them more because we will love them in God.
Second, Jesus says one needs to hate “even his own life,” “carry his own cross” and “follow” Him. We need to account Jesus’ life more valuable than our own, in imitation of him who deemed our life more valuable than His. This is the faith that led the martyrs to heaven. If we love our comforts, our life in this world more than we love God, then we won’t be completing the work of salvation because Jesus clearly taught us that to save our life we must lose it and that unless we fall to the ground and die like a grain of wheat we won’t bear the fruit of salvation.
Third, Jesus says one must “renounce all his possessions.” We must renounce the stuff that possesses us and then as good stewards use everything we have and are for God and his service, giving of ourselves together with our things for God and others, because if we cling to possessions we will not be able to fit through the eye of the needle to salvation.
In buttressing the conditions of the completion of the work of our salvation, Jesus employs two analogies that point to the cost of discipleship. He says that to build a tower, we need to calculate the cost and get the proper supplies lest we not finish what we began. Likewise, to win a battle, we have to know whether we have the resources to defeat the enemy. In building the tower toward heaven, among the supplies we have to have is detachment from ourselves, our loved ones, our possessions and our life. In fighting against the twenty thousand troops of the evil one, we have to divest ourselves of whatever will hinder us in battle, whatever earthly desires the devil can use against us. We won’t be able to finish what’s been started unless we count and pay the cost, knowing that in the biggest picture of all, this is the wisest and greatest deal in life, the treasure worth more than everything else. We also need to know that Jesus never calls us to something — especially something this hard — without providing the means necessary to do it. His help, however, doesn’t eliminate our sacrifice, but it does make the sacrifice lighter and sweeter.
Today in the first reading, St. Paul tells the first Roman Catholics and all of us about the cost that needs to be paid, about what we’re really signing up for if we follow Jesus. It’s a clear continuation of what we pondered yesterday in meditating on the 20 ways he described we needed to “let [our] love be sincere.” Today he says, “Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another.” Not only is this a statement against amassing financial debt — words that are very important today in a culture that doesn’t save but charges beyond their means on credit cards, and borrows way beyond our means as a national government — but it is a reminder for us that we do have a debt to love one another. Loving one another is not a good suggestion by Jesus. It’s not even just a command. It’s a debt to pay, it’s a real duty, it’s something we owe others. This might seem strange at first to think we owe everyone a debt of love, but when we take seriously Jesus’ words that whatever we do for the least of our brothers and sisters, we do to him (Mt 25:31-46), then it’s easier to understand, if still hard to do: because we owe a debt to Jesus for everything — for our life, our salvation, our gifts, etc. — we pay that debt in the way we love each other. St. Karol Wojtyla, the future Pope John Paul II, wrote in Love and Responsibility that the other is someone before whom the only worthy response is love. This debt is paid, first, in keeping the commandments. Today St. Paul lists the “second tablet” of the Decalogue, focused on love of neighbor, reminding us that the “one who loves one another has fulfilled the law” and “love is the fulfillment of the law.” Jesus said something similar in St. Matthew’s Gospel when he reminded us that all the law and the prophets, including obviously the Ten Commandments, hinges on the love of God with all our mind, heart, soul and strength, and the love of our neighbor as we love ourselves.
How are we doing in paying that debt to everyone we meet? We often think that we are loving others by the simple fact that we wish them good things or don’t hate them, but love is a sacrifice of ourselves for the good of the other as other, and we need to ask ourselves whether, when we look at each other and at others in general, we find ourselves in a real debt of love for them that we feel impelled from within to pay. Just like St. Therese Lisieux, each of us is called to be love in the heart of the Church, to love others with the love with which Christ has loved us first, and to do this concretely. There are lots of ways that we could apply this to our lives, but I’d like to focus on three.
First, if we’re really loving others, do we ever tell them we love them? Jesus himself said to us during the Last Supper, “Just as the Father loves me, so I love you,” and he wants us, having been loved by him, to say to others, “Just like Jesus loves me, I want to love you” and “I love you with the love of Jesus.”
Second, if we’re really loving others, we’ll be making willing sacrifices for them. Jesus’ love led him to lay down his life for us, and all love is a reflection of that basic nature of love, which is a willingness to say no to ourselves to say yes for another, to do all that we morally can for another. St. Paul is saying we have a debt that leads us to sacrifice for others.
Third, if we’re really loving others then, as St. Paul said yesterday, we’ll be doing so “with affection.” It’s not enough to sacrifice. God wants us to sacrifice from the heart, not just “paying a debt” that we owe to someone reluctantly, but with passion freely doing something for someone we either naturally or with effort want to treat with great warmth. God loves a cheerful giver, so he loves an affective lover, friend, Christian self-giver. I love the story of St. Therese’s treatment of the curmudgeonly old sister whom nobody really cared for, and how, through loving her with affection, she changed for the better in her relations with everyone. To me, it seems obviously that that old sister was just wanting for real human love, for friendship, for agape, for the love of Christ mediated through his Mystical Body. Everyone needs that. Our brother priests need it. Our faithful need it.
We can and should, moreover, interpret this debt of love in a missionary key. If love of neighbor as ourself is the summary of the second tablet, if essentially the golden rule is the measure of our behavior, to do unto others what we would want our neighbors to do to us, would any of us, knowing what we know, experiencing the meaning of friendship with Christ, even want our neighbor to fail to share the faith with us?
Pope Francis spoke about this in Evangelii Gaudium in what I think is one of its most powerful passages. He reminds us that the primary reason for evangelizing is the love and salvation of Jesus that we have received, urging us to greater love of him. “What kind of love would not feel the need to speak of the beloved, to point him out, to make him known?” Evangelization responds to that expectation. “We have a treasure of life and love that cannot deceive, and a message that cannot mislead or disappoint.” And therefore he says that our motivation flows from love and appreciation. He says, “We are convinced from personal experience that it is not the same thing to have known Jesus as not to have known him, not the same thing to walk with him as to walk blindly, not the same thing to hear his word as not to know it, and not the same thing to contemplate him, to worship him, to find our peace in him, as not to. …We know well that with Jesus life becomes richer and that with him it is easier to find meaning in everything. This is why we evangelize.” Just as we would never want someone to withhold the great gift of our faith from us — despite the loving challenges Jesus gives us in the Gospel — so we want to share that wealth, that love, that friendship with Jesus.
To strengthen us to love by his standard, Christ himself comes as Love incarnate to make his abode in us and help us from the inside. This is where we get the resources to build the tower and win the war. This is where we unite with him in praying for all our family members, where we bring our crosses and receive his strength to yoke ourselves to him by means of them, to die to ourselves so that he may live, and to detach ourselves from worldly goods to find in him our treasure. In the Psalm we prayed, “Blessed the man who is gracious,” who “lavishly he gives to the poor.” Jesus graciously and lavishly gives himself to us each morning in our poverty. He says by this gift “I love you” with all I am and have, and then he sends us forward as missionaries to love not just like that but together with him.

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 ROM 13:8-10
Brothers and sisters:
Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another;
for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.
The commandments, You shall not commit adultery;
you shall not kill;
you shall not steal;
you shall not covet,
and whatever other commandment there may be,
are summed up in this saying, namely,
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Love does no evil to the neighbor;
hence, love is the fulfillment of the law.
Responsorial Psalm PS 112:1B-2, 4-5, 9
R. ( 5a) Blessed the man who is gracious and lends to those in need.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Blessed the man who fears the LORD,
who greatly delights in his commands.
His posterity shall be mighty upon the earth;
the upright generation shall be blessed.
R. Blessed the man who is gracious and lends to those in need.
or:
R. Alleluia.
He dawns through the darkness, a light for the upright;
he is gracious and merciful and just.
Well for the man who is gracious and lends,
who conducts his affairs with justice.
R. Blessed the man who is gracious and lends to those in need.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Lavishly he gives to the poor;
his generosity shall endure forever;
his horn shall be exalted in glory.
R. Blessed the man who is gracious and lends to those in need.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Alleluia 1 PT 4:14
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
If you are insulted for the name of Christ, blessed are you,
for the Spirit of God rests upon you.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel LK 14:25-33
Great crowds were traveling with Jesus,
and he turned and addressed them,
“If anyone comes to me without hating his father and mother,
wife and children, brothers and sisters,
and even his own life,
he cannot be my disciple.
Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me
cannot be my disciple.
Which of you wishing to construct a tower
does not first sit down and calculate the cost
to see if there is enough for its completion?
Otherwise, after laying the foundation
and finding himself unable to finish the work
the onlookers should laugh at him and say,
‘This one began to build but did not have the resources to finish.’
Or what king marching into battle would not first sit down
and decide whether with ten thousand troops
he can successfully oppose another king
advancing upon him with twenty thousand troops?
But if not, while he is still far away,
he will send a delegation to ask for peace terms.
In the same way,
everyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions
cannot be my disciple.”
The post What It Takes to Follow and Proclaim Christ, 31st Wednesday (I), November 5, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
28 min
November 05, 2025 Forming Missionary Disciples in Communion, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 5, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 5, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.5.25_Forming_Missionary_Disciples_in_Communion_1.mp3
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1 hr 1 min
November 05, 2025 Priests’ Missionary Prayer to the Harvest Master, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 5, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 5, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.5.25_Missionary_Prayer_to_the_Harvest_Master_1.mp3

The post Priests’ Missionary Prayer to the Harvest Master, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 5, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
1 hr 14 min
November 05, 2025 Making Our Life a Living Memory of Jesus Christ, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 4, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 4, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.4.25_Missionaries_Helping_To_Remember_Jesus_1.mp3
The post Making Our Life a Living Memory of Jesus Christ, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 4, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
28 min
November 04, 2025Compelling With Sincere Love Everyone to Come to the Great Dinner, 31st Tuesday (I), November 4, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
Tuesday of the 31st Week in Ordinary Time, Year I
Memorial of St. Charles Borromeo
November 4, 2025
Rom 12:5-16, Ps 131, Lk 14:15-24

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.4.25_Homily_1.mp3

The following outline guided the homily:
Beautiful Gospel for Priests Seeking to Have the Mind and the Heart of Missionaries, the Mind and Heart of Christ.
Parable about the Kingdom of Heaven in which we see his zeal.
Invitation sent out to a banquet, to a “great dinner” to which he invited many.
“Come, everything is now ready.” Don’t hesitate.
“One by one, they all began to excuse themselves.”
Work — ‘I have purchased a field and must go to examine it” or ‘I have purchased five yoke of oxen and am on my way to evaluate them; I ask you, consider me excused.’
Other loves — ‘I have just married a woman, and therefore I cannot come.’
Zeal for everyone
‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in here the poor and the crippled, the blind and the lame.’
“There’s still room.”
“‘Go out to the highways and hedgerows and make people come in that my home may be filled.”
Our task is to invite people to that great dinner. This clearly has a Eucharistic significance on earth but it also has heavenly significance. Blessed are those who will dine in the kingdom.
First, to respond fully to the invitation. To show up properly dressed in our baptismal garment that the royal tailor has given us. Then to help others show up. First, those who should be there. Catholics. But then the neglected. Then everyone.
For this, we need a few qualities mentioned.
We need unity — We, though many, are one Body in Christ and individually parts of one another
We need to use our gifts and all of them — “Let us exercise them.” Prophecy, ministering, teaching, exhortation, generosity, diligent supervision, cheerful mercy.
We need love above all — Everything in this third section of the Letter to the Romans beginning today can be summed up, I think, by his expression in the middle of today’s passage, “Let love be sincere.” He’s calling us exactly to what Jesus Christ called us to do in the Gospel, to love: to grow in the image and likeness of God, who is love; to love God with all our mind, heart, soul and strength, and our love our neighbor as ourselves; to love as he loves us. St. Paul helpful adds the adjective “sincere.” Sincerity means that it has to be both truthful and from the heart, cut off from all duplicity. We can examine the entire passage from the perspective of sincere love and look at the way we live. St. Paul gives us a Litany of what made him the greatest missionary of all time. For us to have the mind and heart of missionaries, we must have these qualities.
Hate what is evil — If we love God and love others, we hate all evil and sin that alienates, divides, and ultimately kills those bonds of love.
Hold onto what is good — When we love God, we are grateful for what he has given and treasure it, and similarly when we love others, we focus fundamentally on how good they are.
Love one another with mutual affection — Our love can’t be cold. It must be full of affection, full of warmth, full of emotion. We should behave in such a way that others would think we’re the president of their fan club, that we don’t just love them but like them, and admire them and rejoice in them. We need to ask how we can love each other with greater affection.
Anticipate one another in showing honor — When we honor someone, we revere them, we praise them, we thank them for going way beyond what is due, we lift them up. A Christian community, filled with love, should be like a happy marriage, in which spouses anticipate one another in loving, praising, and honoring.
Do not grow slack in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord — If we sincerely love the Lord, we will seek to grow each day in zeal, fervor and service.
Rejoice in hope, endure in affliction, persevere in prayer — Our sincere love for the Lord will show itself in our joy, hope, endurance and persevering prayer, just as hardship can’t stop a husband’s love for a wife or a mom’s for her children.
Contribute to the needs of the holy ones — Sincere love attends to the needs of others.
Exercise hospitality — Sincere love rejoices to welcome.
Bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse them — Sincere love for our enemies leads to blessing them rather than wishing them ill.
Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep — Sincere love means sharing others’ joys and sorrows.
Regard one another equally, do not be haughty but associate with the lowly — Sincere love for another makes us regard them at least as equals, if not superiors. We don’t condescend but descend in love to lift others up.
St. Charles Borromeo is a living illustration of today’s Gospel.
He sought to reevangelize the Diocese of Milan to invite everyone to the feast.
He tried to bring the Church into unity at the Council of Trent and then in his Diocese.
He sought to exercise his gifts and invite others to do the same. Be who you promised to be.
He loved sincerely and challenged others to that standard.
He hated evil.
He treasured the good.
He loved with affection.
He honored those who responded to the Lord.
He never grew slack in zeal
He rejoiced in Christian hope, endured even during plagues, and persevered in prayer even amid assassination attempts. He shared peoples joys and sorrows.
He sold all his goods to contribute to the needs of others.
He opened up his residence to the poor.
He prayed for the conversion of those who were persecuting them and loved them enough to correct them.
He wasn’t haughty and associated with the lowly.
“Blessed is the one who will dine in the Kingdom of God.” We are indeed blessed to be called to the Supper of the King, the Lamb of God himself. This is where he strengthens us to use all of our graces for his kingdom. This is the means by which he unites himself to us so that we can love as sincerely as he does. This is the place where we exercise our logike latreia, and present our bodies as a living, holy and acceptable sacrifice to him who says to us today, “This is my body, given for you.”

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 ROM 12:5-16AB
Brothers and sisters:
We, though many, are one Body in Christ
and individually parts of one another.
Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us,
let us exercise them:
if prophecy, in proportion to the faith;
if ministry, in ministering;
if one is a teacher, in teaching;
if one exhorts, in exhortation;
if one contributes, in generosity;
if one is over others, with diligence;
if one does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.
Let love be sincere;
hate what is evil,
hold on to what is good;
love one another with mutual affection;
anticipate one another in showing honor.
Do not grow slack in zeal,
be fervent in spirit,
serve the Lord.
Rejoice in hope,
endure in affliction,
persevere in prayer.
Contribute to the needs of the holy ones,
exercise hospitality.
Bless those who persecute you,
bless and do not curse them.
Rejoice with those who rejoice,
weep with those who weep.
Have the same regard for one another;
do not be haughty but associate with the lowly.
Responsorial Psalm PS 131:1BCDE, 2, 3
R. In you, O Lord, I have found my peace.
O LORD, my heart is not proud,
nor are my eyes haughty;
I busy not myself with great things,
nor with things too sublime for me.
R. In you, O Lord, I have found my peace.
Nay rather, I have stilled and quieted
my soul like a weaned child.
Like a weaned child on its mother’s lap,
so is my soul within me.
R. In you, O Lord, I have found my peace.
O Israel, hope in the LORD,
both now and forever.
R. In you, O Lord, I have found my peace.
Alleluia MT 11:28
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened,
and I will give you rest, says the Lord.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel LK 14:15-24
One of those at table with Jesus said to him,
“Blessed is the one who will dine in the Kingdom of God.”
He replied to him,
“A man gave a great dinner to which he invited many.
When the time for the dinner came,
he dispatched his servant to say to those invited,
‘Come, everything is now ready.’
But one by one, they all began to excuse themselves.
The first said to him,
‘I have purchased a field and must go to examine it;
I ask you, consider me excused.’
And another said, ‘I have purchased five yoke of oxen
and am on my way to evaluate them;
I ask you, consider me excused.’
And another said, ‘I have just married a woman,
and therefore I cannot come.’
The servant went and reported this to his master.
Then the master of the house in a rage commanded his servant,
‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town
and bring in here the poor and the crippled,
the blind and the lame.’
The servant reported, ‘Sir, your orders have been carried out
and still there is room.’
The master then ordered the servant,
‘Go out to the highways and hedgerows
and make people come in that my home may be filled.
For, I tell you, none of those men who were invited will taste my dinner.’”
The post Compelling With Sincere Love Everyone to Come to the Great Dinner, 31st Tuesday (I), November 4, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
33 min
November 04, 2025 Priests’ Missionary Conversion, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 4, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 4, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.4.25_Missionary_Conversion_1.mp3
The post Priests’ Missionary Conversion, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 4, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
1 hr 8 min
November 04, 2025 The Missionary Mind and Heart of Priests, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 4, 2025
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Annual Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston
Sand Dunes Resort, Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
November 4, 2025
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/11.4.25_Having_the_Heart_and_the_Mind_of_Missionaries_Overview_1.mp3
The post The Missionary Mind and Heart of Priests, Retreat for the Priests of the Diocese of Charleston South Carolina, November 4, 2025 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
1 hr

About Catholic Preaching

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Father Roger J. Landry is a priest of the Diocese of Fall River, Massachusetts, who works for the Holy See’s Permanent Observer Mission to the United Nations in New York.

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