Catholic Preaching

By Father Roger LandryReligion & Spirituality Christianity

Catholic Preaching episodes

March 11 Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 11, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Journey to Nigeria Day 7
March 11, 2026
Here is the video for today’s stop in Nigeria.
The YouTube generated transcript for today’s video:
It’s day seven of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. We are here at the world’s largest seminary, Bigard Memorial Seminary in Enugu. And I have the honor to be here with the director of this seminary which has 714 seminarians, 82 faculty members. Father Albert, thank you for joining us on this little missionary pilgrimage we have. Tell us about this seminary visited by St. John Paul II 102 years old. What makes this such an inspiring place for Catholics across the globe? It makes it a very inspiring uh place for Cal in the world because here we train priests after the mind of Christ. And um uh since its inception in 1924, Bigard has continued to train priests in different areas of formation uh from the point of view of spirituality, from the point of view of intellectual formation, from the point of view of human formation and also from the point of view of pastoral formation that these have been our cardinal uh points. the world the way the the areas that we we train candidates and uh it’s it’s it’s wonderful when you see these products of big working in many parts of the world not only in Africa but also in uh United States of America and Europe. So uh here we form students after the mind of Christ and uh that has continued to be the motivating factor and uh with the spirit of evangelization inculcated in them they stand out actually the moto of big is it make testing you shall be my witnesses so that has been uh the way we form our for our candidate for the president earlier today when we arrived here we had mass at 7:30 in the morning. The chapel was filled. It was so vital. The music was some of the most beautiful music I’ve ever heard. Uh afterward, we had a tour of the seminary grounds. We were able to meet with the seminarian, see their incredible talents on full display. This is a sacred spot full of hope. And I am so edified that the Catholics in the United States have a big role in making Bigard Seminary what it is today. Through the generosity at the time of Archbishop Fulton J Sheen and his successors, American Catholics through the Society of St. Peter the Apostle have donated generously to help build up the many buildings on this property so that seminarians are able to eat, so that they’re able to sleep, so that they’re able to be warm, so that they’re able to pray. What would you like to say to American Catholics? Um, Father Albert, for the generosity which continues, we cannot thank you enough for your generosity. Without the help we have gotten from you, it would have been difficult uh to run a seminary of this nation. it would have been difficult to to give them feed them to accommodate them and also provide the enabling enabling environment. So we are very grateful for your generosity and then this generosity has been you know have been on for years and uh that is what also helped to keep us here uh as uh as we work for the uh the future priest. So we we thank the the American uh uh citizens, American Catholics and all those who help us in one way or the other uh from the bottom of our hearts. Our seminarians re very excited uh to receive Monsignor Landry and also uh um other delegates from America that here we can express our gratitude to you in person in person not just through letter writing but also in person so that we also go back and convey our gratitude to the people of America. We thank you so much. This has been a wonderful day. This visit to Bigard Seminary is really the highlight of our seven days up until now. Stay tuned for the next station.
I’m Monsignor Roger Landry, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies. We’re coming to the end of day seven of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. You’ve already seen what we did this morning. We spent about eight hours at Bigard Seminary with a beautiful mass with a tour of the property with uh two-hour series of presentations with the extraordinary talents of the seminarians and then an opportunity at mass and then at that auditorium to be able to address these seminarians who bear so much hope. After we left beard seminary, then we went to a parish that the Pontifical Mission Societies has helped to build, holy trinity parish in a place called Emene in Enugu state. It was a beautiful um experience of faith where the whole parish was there from the youngest to the oldest with so much enthusiasm and so much gratitude. Then we went to visit a hospital run by the daughters of divine love. One of the sisters on our staff in New York is a member of that Nigerian congregation. She helps us so much and it was a great joy to meet her fellow sisters and to see their beautiful work there among patients who basically need everything. The sisters made a special appeal to see if anybody would be able to help them get an MRI machine. If you happen to have those types of connections, I’d love to hear from you. And then we went to visit the place where the various religious sisters throughout the country have a joint commission in order to be able to coordinate their various activities as well as to receive the funds of the society of St. Peter the Apostle to help them train their novices, their young sisters who are preparing for their first vows. It’s been an extraordinary day in which we’ve seen both the beautiful present of the church and the hopeful future here in Nigeria. Can’t wait for day eight. See you tomorrow.

The post Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 11, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
7 min
March 10 Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 10, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Journey to Nigeria Day 6
March 10, 2026
Here is the video of today’s reflection.
The YouTube generated transcript for today’s reflection is:

I’m Monsignor Roger Landry National Director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the US. It’s day six of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. Today is mainly a travel day. We started in Ancore um very early this morning with mass and then we had a connecting flight to Abuja the federal capital and now we’re flying to Enugu which is one of the more Catholic regions in all of Nigeria to be able to see the building up of the church there. Travel in Nigeria is a different experience compared to those in the United States, the airport experience, etc. But the flights themselves are quite safe and you’re able to see a lot of this beautiful green country as we’re flying over it and praying for all those who are underneath us on the ground as we prepare to go to one of the most Catholic regions of the country. I’m excited to see the faith there. We’ve seen a lot of faith where we’ve already been. But down there from what I hear all the Nigerians are saying wait until you get to Enugu. So tomorrow we’re going to have mass of the largest seminary in the world which has over 600 named after the founders of the society of St. Peter the Apostle which is one of the four Pontifical Mission Societies we we support. We’ll visit some Catholic hospitals, Catholic women religious. We’ll visit some other shrines and churches and parishes to basically get a glimpse of what parish life is here in Nigeria.
I’m Monsignor Senior Roger Landry. It’s day six of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. We’ve arrived now in Enugu in the southeastern part of the country, one of the most Catholic uh regions of Nigeria. And we’re at Bigard Memorial Seminary, which is the largest seminary in the world. It has over 700 seminarians. Behind me we have the statue of Jean Bigard who in 1889 as a young woman together with her mother sold their house in order to help educate seminarians being trained by a French missionary bishop in Nagasaki. What a beautiful story this seminary is that that sacrifice eventually led to the only seminary in the world named Bigard Seminary which just happens to be the largest seminary in the world. An extraordinary place of hope. The word seminary comes from the Latin word for seed. And this is the seedbed of the future of the church. It’s because of what Jesus Christ, the divine gardener, plants within young men here that eventually germinates, that eventually grows, that eventually builds fruit. That so much of the Catholic present history of Nigeria is being written. And because there are so many, thanks be to God, vocations to the priesthood here in Nigeria, Nigerians are being missionary priests all over the world, including as many of us know in the United States. And so tomorrow morning we’re going to come here in order to be able to have mass Sunday, the Lord’s day at 7:30 in the morning. Here in Nigeria, we’re in a country where 93% of all Catholics come to mass each Sunday. We know that the mass attendance rate here at a seminary is 100% on Sunday. But we’re going to be able to experience a little bit of the vitality that helps this country every Christian Sabbath. So we’ll see you tomorrow.
The post Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 10, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
5 min
March 10Our Mission of Mercy, Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent, March 10, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Saint Mary’s Cathedral, St. Cloud, Minnesota
Midwest Regional Meeting of the Pontifical Mission Societies USA
Tuesday of the Third Week in Lent
March 10, 2026
Dan 3:25.34-43, Ps 25, Mt 18:21-35

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.10.26_Homily_1.mp3

The following points were attempted in the homily:
When we think about the mission of the Church, it is the continuation of Jesus’ saving mission. Jesus came to save. He came so that we wouldn’t perish but have eternal life. He came as the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world. He came to reconcile the human race to God. He came, in short, on a saving mission of mercy. The mission of the Church, therefore, is a mission of mercy. We having received the mercy of the Lord are summoned to pay that mercy forward.
Therefore, in order to be effective missionaries, we must first grasp how precious is the gift of mercy we have received, how much we needed it, and how much we need it still. We make our own the words of the Prophet Daniel today, “Do not take away your mercy from us” and “deal with us in your kindness and great mercy.” We likewise echo those of the Psalmist, “Remember your mercies, Lord,” and remark that the Lord is “good and upright,” who “shows sinners the way.” But it’s in the Gospel that we realize the enormity of the gift of mercy we’ve been given and how thoroughly we’re supposed to be transformed by that gift that we want to spend the rest of our life paying it forward.
St. Peter asks Jesus today, “If my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive him?” One of the most difficult aspects of living the Catholic faith is the teaching about loving even our enemies and forgiving those who repeatedly wrong us, hate us and persecute us. When people hurt us, we think it’s magnanimous and generous to give them a second chance. If we forgive them yet again, we think we’re ready for canonization. But Jesus’ standards for us are higher. He wants us to become as merciful as our heavenly Father is merciful — and each of our autobiographies shows clearly that God has given us way more than one or two spiritual chances. The Rabbis taught, based on a misinterpretation of passages of the Prophet Amos, that we needed to forgive three times, to give someone a fourth chance. Peter in his question to Jesus multiplied that by two and added one and said, “As many as 7 times?” This would be an astronomically high standard, giving someone an eighth chance, before writing someone off as incorrigible. Jesus replied, however, “No, Seventy Sevens.” Whether that means 70×7 (490) or 70+7 (77) times really doesn’t matter, because seven is a number already with a sense of infinity. It means to forgive without limit. He says Peter must forgive every time a brother or sister wrongs him. And what Jesus says to Peter, he also says to us. Just as God never tires, as Pope Francis used to say, of forgiving us, and we must never tire of asking for that forgiveness, so we, too, must never tire of extending that forgiveness when someone asks it of us, when someone has wronged us — even and especially those who have really wounded us deeply.
Jesus tells us why we must do this by means of the parable he gives us, which I’ve always found among his most powerful. He describes two debtors. The first is brought into the King for owing what our translation says is a “huge amount.” The actual term used by St. Matthew is “10,000 talents.” A talent was equivalent to 6,000 denarii and a denarius was a full day’s wage. That means that the man owed 60,000,000 days worth of work, something that would take him 164,271 years to pay off. His request, after he had fallen prostrate on the ground and begged for time to pay it back, was totally absurd. He would need to live to be 165,000 years old! To monetize his debt in today’s terms in order to better understand it, if he were making $100 a day (or $12.50 an hour), he would have owed $6 billion. But the text tells us that when the King saw the man on the ground begging absurdly for time, his “heart was moved with pity” (literally, he was sick to his stomach, his viscera exploded with compassion, splanchnizomai, the verb that the evangelists use to describe Jesus’ mercy) and he forgave the entire debt. He didn’t even make him pay what he could. He forgave it all. We’re supposed to see in this what God does for us. He forgives our entire debt — 10,000 talents worth — seven, seventy-seven, 490 times and more. His merciful generosity is the most distinctive reality about the world!
But then the Parable describes that the servant who had been forgiven billions, who was a billionaire in merciful love, went off and met a servant who owed him 100 denarii (100 days wages), something that could be paid off in a few months. This second debtor, using the very same words and actions as the first, fell down begging for time to pay it off. The first debtor must have recognized that the phrase and actions being employed had to remind him of his own recent condition. But instead of sharing mercy with the second debtor, instead of even just giving time to pay it off, he went up and started to choke him in anger and threw him into prison until his family was able to raise the 100 denarii (in today’s money $10,000 at $100 a day) to pay him back. It was obvious that he hadn’t been transformed by the incredible act of mercy of the King. He had received the King’s debt forgiveness superficially; even on a day on which he had been forgiven billions he couldn’t give another person a few months to pay back the debt he owed. At that point the other servants of the King, seeing the behavior of their colleague, were “saddened” and “disturbed” and they went to the Master, not so much to tattle-tale as to let him know of what was happening in his kingdom, that his standard of mercy was not being shown. He called in the first debtor, called him “wicked” and asked the poignant question: “I forgave you your entire debt because you begged me to. Should you not have had pity on your fellow servant, as I had pity on you?” Rather than paying the mercy forward, he stifled the flow. And he was sent to prison until she should pay back the last penny, something that, because of the size of his debt, was impossible. Because he was unwilling to forgive a small debt, he would be in prison forever; his lack of forgiveness, rather than what he owed, was what got him sent to an unending incarceration.
What’s the relevance for us in Lent and missionary disciples in communion in the whole of our life?
The first lesson is that we’re either “merciful like the Father” and forgive others their sins against us or we’re “wicked” because we do not extend to our fellow servants the pity that the Lord first showed us. Merciful or wicked. There is no third option. If we’re not merciful to others, we’re not faithful to our baptism and Christian identity.
The second is about the debt we’ve incurred to God because of our sins. It’s unpayable. We owe more to God than the rising U.S. national debt! There’s no way we can ever pay it back. We’re always debtors, not creditors, in the forgiveness department. God the Father did not write off our debt, but sent his Son to pay for the debt with his own body and blood on the Cross. Our sins — even every single venial sin — have incurred an infinite debt that Christ needed to pay. Since we have received his forgiveness in baptism and in the sacrament of reconciliation, we are called to go out likewise and forgive others their much smaller debts to us, because nothing anyone could do to us — nothing!— amounts to what we’ve done to the Son of God made man through our sins. Very often we can think our sins are light matter, not that big a deal. We can have very little compunction if we say a harsh word, or consent to an impure thought, or fail to help a needy neighbor. But every sin we’ve committed — even being impatient with others — makes us de facto crucifiers of the Son of God, because Jesus had to die to forgive even our least venial sin. This is a hard truth to bear, but I’m not exaggerating. That’s how horrible our sins are. Our sins are not peccadilloes; they led to the torture and execution of Jesus. If we stopped there, it would be hard for us not to feel infinitely miserable. But God loved us so much that he counted it a bargain to send his Son to die in payment of the debts we incurred by our sins. That’s the second lesson from today’s Gospel.
The third is that God’s mercy toward us — which is infinite and everlasting — can be forfeited. In the parable, the Master who had written off the $6 billion debt, revoked it when he saw the one he had forgiven refuse similar mercy to the person who owed him. God makes this point emphatically throughout Sacred Scripture. In the Book of Sirach, God tells us,“Forgive your neighbor the wrong he has done, and then your sins will be pardoned when you pray. Does anyone harbor anger against another, and expect healing from the Lord? If one has no mercy toward another like himself, can he then seek pardon for his own sins?” In today’s Gospel, Jesus vigorously made the same point: “So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you” — treat us like the first debtor in the parable — “unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.” And none of us should miss the eternal consequence if God revokes or we forfeit his forgiveness. We’ll go to Hell, where there will never be enough time to pay our debt — since unless God forgives us our sins, our sins will prevent us from getting to Heaven. We can add, however, that if we fail to forgive others, we will not have to wait until we die to go to Hell, because we’ll already be experiencing a type of hell on earth. The past pains due to others’ sins against us will always remain in the present, raw and heavy, dragging us down by their weight. Jesus gives us the command to forgive others not just so that we might imitate his merciful love, and not even so that we won’t revoke it by our failure to be merciful to others, but so that we might experience the liberation and joy mercy brings the giver. Framed positively, this third lesson that Jesus is teaching us in this parable is that we need to pay his mercy forward. We have been made rich in mercy by God’s generosity and we’re called to share it. It’s like God has made us billionaires and he wants us liberally to share that gift with those who owe us because of the debts of their sins toward us.
In calling us to forgive in this way, Jesus was himself calling us to follow his command to “love others as I have loved you,” and his love for us is always merciful. Therefore, our love for others must likewise always be clement. As he was dying to pay the debt for our sins, after his back had been shredded at the flagellation, after his head had been crowned with thorns, and the Roman soldiers were about to hammer his arms to the wood of the Cross, Jesus cried out not in pain but in mercy: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do!” (Lk 23:34). The “them” and the “they” he was referring to were not just the Roman soldiers who clearly knew how to crucify someone, but to all of us who when we sin really do not have a clue about how they crucify and kill our Savior. There is a similar consequential ignorance when we sin against others and others sin against us. Today Jesus is asking us to make his words our own, to make his love our own, to make his mercy our own — by our receiving it from him in the Sacrament of Mercy and by our sharing that forgiveness lavishly, with others. He who is mercy incarnate has made us rich in mercy like his Father. He’s restored to us billions that we’ve squandered. And he wants us to spend that merciful love down to the last penny! That’s what each of us and all of us in the Church have the privilege to do. We are sent out as spiritual billionaires commissioned to share that wealth of mercy, so that all might come to the same Lamb of God who wants to take away their sins just like he took away ours and give them life to the full just like his mercy seeks to do in us.
Ten years ago this year I was appointed by Pope Francis a Missionary of Mercy, one of about 1,000 priests of the 407,000 in the world given a special mandate to try to reconcile sinners in the Sacrament of Confession, with the Pope’s faculties for what are called sins reserved to the Holy See, and given a special mandate to preach mercy in the pulpit and through the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. But in a sense every Catholic is meant to be a missionary of mercy. God forgives us not only for our own sake but to transform us so that we might be the instruments of his mercy to the whole world.
Today at this Mass we pray this Mass open to receive and share the continuous living water of God’s merciful love that first welled up in us on the day of our baptism. Here Jesus gives us his body and his blood, given and poured out for the forgiveness of sins. We start Mass by calling to mind our sins and throwing ourselves on his mercy, so that as we leave this Church we can lavishly spend it. We cry out Kyrie, eleison. We invoke him as the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. We proclaim that we’re not worthy to receive him but we beg him only to say the word and forgive our debts so that he may enter under our roof. And with Jesus inside us, with Mercy Incarnate abiding in us, how can we not forgive others like he forgives us? There’s a beautiful silent prayer that the priest says at the altar that describes what our whole approach should be to the Mass. The priest says it after offering the chalice, right before his hands are washed. It’s derived from today’s first reading from the Book of Daniel. “In spiritu humilitatis, et in animo contrito suscipiamur a te, Domine: et sic fiat sacrificum nostrum in conspectu tuo hodie, ut placeat tibi, Domine Deus.” “But with contrite heart and humble spirit let us be received [by you, Lord]; so let our sacrifice be in your presence today,” that it may be pleasing to you, Lord God. We present ourselves with a humility and contrition so that God the Father can transform us by his mercy to become his mercy. Let’s present ourselves that way today because the Lord does remember his mercy and wants to help us never to forget it and as missionaries to help others come to know it!

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 DN 3:25, 34-43
Azariah stood up in the fire and prayed aloud:
“For your name’s sake, O Lord, do not deliver us up forever,
or make void your covenant.
Do not take away your mercy from us,
for the sake of Abraham, your beloved,
Isaac your servant, and Israel your holy one,
To whom you promised to multiply their offspring
like the stars of heaven,
or the sand on the shore of the sea.
For we are reduced, O Lord, beyond any other nation,
brought low everywhere in the world this day
because of our sins.
We have in our day no prince, prophet, or leader,
no burnt offering, sacrifice, oblation, or incense,
no place to offer first fruits, to find favor with you.
But with contrite heart and humble spirit
let us be received;
As though it were burnt offerings of rams and bullocks,
or thousands of fat lambs,
So let our sacrifice be in your presence today
as we follow you unreservedly;
for those who trust in you cannot be put to shame.
And now we follow you with our whole heart,
we fear you and we pray to you.
Do not let us be put to shame,
but deal with us in your kindness and great mercy.
Deliver us by your wonders,
and bring glory to your name, O Lord.”
Responsorial Psalm PS 25:4-5AB, 6 AND 7BC, 8-9
R. (6a) Remember your mercies, O Lord.
Your ways, O LORD, make known to me;
teach me your paths,
Guide me in your truth and teach me,
for you are God my savior.
R. Remember your mercies, O Lord.
Remember that your compassion, O LORD,
and your kindness are from of old.
In your kindness remember me,
because of your goodness, O LORD.
R. Remember your mercies, O Lord.
Good and upright is the LORD;
thus he shows sinners the way.
He guides the humble to justice,
he teaches the humble his way.
R. Remember your mercies, O Lord.
Verse Before The Gospel JL 2:12-13
Even now, says the LORD,
return to me with your whole heart;
for I am gracious and merciful.
Gospel MT 18:21-35
Peter approached Jesus and asked him,
“Lord, if my brother sins against me,
how often must I forgive him?
As many as seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I say to you, not seven times but seventy-seven times.
That is why the Kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king
who decided to settle accounts with his servants.
When he began the accounting,
a debtor was brought before him who owed him a huge amount.
Since he had no way of paying it back,
his master ordered him to be sold,
along with his wife, his children, and all his property,
in payment of the debt.
At that, the servant fell down, did him homage, and said,
‘Be patient with me, and I will pay you back in full.’
Moved with compassion the master of that servant
let him go and forgave him the loan.
When that servant had left, he found one of his fellow servants
who owed him a much smaller amount.
He seized him and started to choke him, demanding,
‘Pay back what you owe.’
Falling to his knees, his fellow servant begged him,
‘Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.’
But he refused.
Instead, he had him put in prison
until he paid back the debt.
Now when his fellow servants saw what had happened,
they were deeply disturbed, and went to their master
and reported the whole affair.
His master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant!
I forgave you your entire debt because you begged me to.
Should you not have had pity on your fellow servant,
as I had pity on you?’
Then in anger his master handed him over to the torturers
until he should pay back the whole debt.
So will my heavenly Father do to you,
unless each of you forgives your brother from your heart.”
The post Our Mission of Mercy, Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent, March 10, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
16 min
March 09 Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 09, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Journey to Nigeria Day 5
March 9, 2026
Here is the video of today’s reflection.
The YouTube generated transcript for today’s reflection is:
I’m Monsignor Roger Landry, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the US. I’m coming to you on day five of our mission pilgrimage to Nigeria from the minor seminary of the sacred heart in Enugu , Nigeria. This is a place where almost 300 seminarians are preparing to be priests. There’s so much future here. There’s so much hope. We just had mass here in the chapel that you see behind me. It was a beautiful mass in which we were able to ponder together the whole calling of the priesthood to be the love of the sacred heart of Jesus in the middle of the world that Jesus beats with love for us. And one of the ways that he responds is through the ministerial priesthood. And how can we not be thrilled that 300 boys are packing this place in order to receive what they would need one day to be future priests? It was an edifying experience for me. This is the second seminary on our five first five days here and I see so much of the future here. So many of these Nigerian seminarians are eventually going to be ordained and many of them are likewise going to become missionaries like those who are already in the United States of America. I know as I was looking out at these faces that were wrapped in attention at the word of God and at the word made flesh on the altar that some are going to bring that faith to be able to nourish us in the United States. This work is made possible through one of the four Pontifical Mission Societies that I have the honor to run. It’s the Pontifical Society of St. Peter the Apostle which funds the education of seminarians in missionary territories because most of these seminarians come from families that the families would never be able to pay for their upkeep in a place like this. Even though it is poor and simple in lifestyle they just wouldn’t have the money. Most dioceses that the Society of the Propagation of the Faith are upholding with ordinary subsidies we call it their ordinary budget which pays most cases 50% of all their expenses throughout the world. They don’t have what’s left over in order to be able to pay for the upkeep of seminarians. And so as we look at some of the future of the world in these young men and also our future in the United States, we remember that we are co-responsible for the growth of the missions. And it’s because of the support of Catholics in the United States that these places are able to survive. Last year, Catholics in the United States, you gave $2.6 million to the Society of St. Peter the Apostle. And a large chunk of that money came to pay for seminaries like this one. Sacred Heart in Ondo. So, thank you for all of that generosity. Please join me in praying for these seminarians here that God’s work in them might be brought to completion. And please hear their prayers for you in gratitude. There was so much thanks expressed today just for our visit because we represent hope to them that they’re going to be able to pay their bills here and continue on toward the altars as they represent so much hope to us. God bless you.
I’m Monsignor Roger Landry, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies. It’s day five of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. And we’ve come to a really special and sacred place, St. Patrick’s Church, St. Patrick, the great Irish saint. He is not just venerated in the United States, but also here in Nigeria. And I am with Father Augustine Dada, the vice president for the Society of St. Peter the Apostle in the Pontifical Mission Societies and this place is particularly special for him. Why?
Thank you very much Monsignor for coming here. This is St. Patrick’s Church. The church where I had my first communion, where I had my confirmation and where I had my first mass as a priest and uh just coming back in here uh into this church which is the first in the dioceses and so many other priests have um have grown out of this parish. I just have uh memories coming back to me of walking up this altar to have my first communion and uh coming back for confirmation when I was in the minor seminary and eventually being ordained being able to uh serve the community offer mass for them for the first time surrounded by my uncles and my family my brothers and sisters and my brother priests as well and we’ve had several uh family celebrations here when my father died I offered the mass for him right in this church. Both my sisters were married here and my brother as well. So, uh this is very very all ideas I have about the faith and the lovely community which the church offers are grew from here. If you go out of the church, you will see the the mango tree outside. Uh that is also the center of our of our community. So when we finish mass on Sunday, we go right under the mango tree and socialize and uh as children we pray the block rosary, the rosary, we we do that there. And uh all our holy childhood activities were also under that tree. So coming back here and seeing them is just uh it’s like I’m relieving this experiences all over again. So it was about 2 hours for us to get here today going up into the beautiful mountain regions of um of the diocese of Ondo. And so it’s great for us to be able to come back as this church is being renovated. They’re worshiping someplace else. They’ve got a new church built, but the church is always being renewed. It’s always being renovated. And this is the place in which living stones are made to be pillars on the base of which the whole church can build. We’ll continue our pilgrimage soon. I’m Monsignor Roger Landry, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the United States. We continue on day five of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. You’ve just seen the beautiful cross at the top of a mountain that can be seen for miles all in this mountainous region. It has some of the relics of the true cross of Jesus within the sign of our great triumph. the ladder that lifts us upward to heaven. We’re in the shrine dedicated to our lady of Lord, our mother, who continues to pray for us, including prayer for the types of miracles we need, not only of body, but of spirit. This is a place where Nigerians come especially in the month of February around the feast of our lady of lord to ask her for her help not just for their day-to-today struggles and the types of prayers that they would always be asking but also so that they could continue on the journey up a mountain much deeper than this the celestial Jerusalem following Jesus or son all the way to the father’s eternal right side as we come here on this pilgrimage to this u beautiful Marian shrine that all Nigerians come to. Please know of our prayers for you through our lady’s intercession, for all the good you do in trying to spread our faith, and for all you likewise do in supporting the Pontifical Mission Societies, so that we’re able to turn that generosity over to strengthen the building of the church throughout the 1,130 missionary das territory across the globe, especially the many dioceses here in Nigeria that need our help and are so grateful for it. We’ll be continuing the pilgrimage soon.

The post Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 09, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
9 min
March 08 Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, March 8, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Journey to Nigeria Day 4
March 8, 2026
Here is the video of today’s reflection.
The YouTube generated transcript for today’s reflection is:
I’m Monsignor Roger Landry. It’s day four of our missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. We have left Abuja, the federal capital, and come to Ondo state. We’re now at the Cathedral of the Sacred Heart in Ondo. We remember what Pope Francis wrote about the Sacred Heart of Jesus. that there’s a real missionary dimension in Jesus’s sacred heart and as St. and Paul once said, “The goal is to light fire everywhere to take the love of the sacred heart of Jesus, the love that brought him into the world, to take on our humanity, the love that led him to give his life for us, the love that led him to hide himself under the appearance of bread and wine in the Eucharist, to take that love everywhere.” And so as we come into Ondo state and start to see some of the institutions built by that fire here in this diocese, we’re going to be praying for the people of Ondo. More later. God bless. I’m Monsignor Roger Landry National Director of the Pontifical Mission Societies here in the church of of St. Francis Xavier in Ondo, Nigeria. It was in this very church among these very pews where assassins came on June 5th, 2022 to attack those who had come to do nothing other than to love the Lord Jesus. And we just had the extraordinary privilege of being able to celebrate mass among the incredibly faithful, courageous, and resilient people of this parish. You remember as well as I do what happened on June 5th, 2022 because Nigeria is ahead in a time zone. By the time we were going to mass in the morning in the US, we had already heard about what had happened here. Pope Francis had already heard and prayed for us in his angelus our Regina Caeli greeting. And so we were all the entire church united in praying for and with the people of this parish in the diocese of Ondo. I said and I was privileged to be able to preach at this beautiful mass with a packed church that there are few churches in the world that are known to every Catholic. One is St. Peter’s in the Vatican. Another is Notre Dame in Paris. But we all know St. Francis Xavier in Ondo, Nigeria. Because of the faith of the people here, because of the courage of the people here, because of the witness of the people here, then one day we will all have the privilege to celebrate the mass of the 41 martyrs of Owo from 2 years old all the way up until the ‘9s. We just saw there 41 graves. This is a witness. God takes people just like us, 46 chromosomes just like you and me, and makes us courageous, strong, and bearing witness to him. And we just were infused with some of the faith that was here. I want to talk to you more about this experience later. But this is day four of our missionary pilgrimage to Ondo and this is one of the summits of that pilgrimage coming here to St. Francis Xavier, the patron saint of the missions to meet these faithful people and priests who are missionaries still in a way that the whole world now knows. God bless you.

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4 min
March 08Satiating Jesus’ Thirst and Letting Him Satiate Ours, Third Sunday of Lent (A), March 8, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Convent of the Missionaries of Charity, Bronx, NY
Third Sunday of Lent, Year A
March 8, 2026
Ex 17:3-7, Ps 95, Rom 5:1-2.5-8; Jn 4:5-42

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/3.8.26_Homily_1.mp3

The following text guided the homily:
Over the last couple of weeks, I made a missionary pilgrimage to Nigeria. On our second day we had the joy to visit the minor seminary for the Archdiocese of Abuja, which is Saints Simon and Jude Minor Seminary in Kuje, which has about 300 seminarians. The seminarians were waiting for us in a huge unfinished auditorium, with a thick concrete roof, dirt floors, open sides and five steps leading to a concrete stage area. The seminarians welcomed us with songs and then the rector did with a beautiful speech thanking us for our support in the past and boldly presenting the needs the still have. The first need, he said in words I don’t think I’ll ever forget, is, “Our seminarians are thirsty.” I thought he might be speaking metaphorically about their holy desires. I couldn’t fathom, as I sipped from the bottled water they put next to my seat on a 97-degree day, that he was speaking literally. But he was. It turns out that the seminary only gets about 10 hours of electricity a week and they need electricity to run the pumps in the wells on the property. They have a couple of generators on the property supposedly to fill the gap — like most Nigerian Churches, businesses, and houses, some of which likewise can have solar power — but the seminary’s generators are so old, they constantly break down. That leads to lots of problems, like an inability to have light at night for the seminarians’ study, to run fans in the dormitory to help the seminarians get a decent night’s rest, not to mention affects everything from hygiene to laundry. But the first and greatest need, the rector told me forthrightly, is that the young athletic seminarians, in a very hot and dry climate, simply do not have enough water to drink. They’re thirsty. I hope to be able to help them.
Today’s readings speak about two thirsts, and how each is quenched. We first have the thirst of Jesus, and it was for far more than a drink of water under the brutal noon day Middle Eastern sun. His entire incarnation, his hidden life, public ministry, passion, death and resurrection can all be summed up by his fifth word from the Cross, “I thirst!” His thirst was not for wine mixed with gall but for us, for souls, that he might fill us with himself, with his love, with his divine life. His whole life can be summarized as an unquenchable quest to give himself to us as a spring of living water gushing up within us to eternal life.
His thirst was met by the Samaritan woman coming to the same well at midday to fill her jug. She was the Zsa Zsa Gabor or Elizabeth Taylor of her day, who had married five times already and was then living with a sixth man who was not her husband. She was coming to the well not at the cool times in the early morning or early evening but at the time of the most piercing sun because she was obviously trying to avoid being the butt of criticism from other women of the town for her past and present. According to St. Augustine, this woman represents the gentiles prior to the Gospel. And Jesus’ interaction with her is meant to symbolize the interaction he desires to have with every soul. The Eucharistic Preface we will pray later in this Mass reminds us that when Jesus “asked the Samaritan woman for water to drink, he had already created the gift of faith within her and so ardently did he thirst for her faith that he kindled in her the fire of divine love.” Just like our body cannot exist without water — the average adult human body is 50 to 60 percent water — neither can our soul survive without Jesus who identifies himself as the living water. Jesus, through whom both our body and soul were created, knows both realities, and came as the divine physician to give us the soul-sustaining remedy to the woman at the well and to each of us.
In his conversation with her, Jesus taught the woman and through her us about the two essential realities about our spiritual life: God’s grace, symbolized by the “living water” he describes, and our desire or “thirst” for that spiritual hydration. He began the dialogue at the most basic point of connection, a mutual love for cold drink on a hot day. “Give me a drink,” he asked, and the woman objected because Jews didn’t speak to Samaritans and men didn’t speak to women alone in public places. “How can you, a Jew, as me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?” Jesus replied, “If you knew the gift of God and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ and you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” Living water is a play on words, one clear to the people of Jesus’ time with a “Dead Sea” so close. Living water means running or fresh water, in comparison to stagnant and dead. Jesus was saying that the water she was drawing, the old water of her daily existence, was not leading her to freshness, newness, and life. He was offering her a better way. “Everyone who drinks this water,” Jesus said, referring to the water of Jacob’s well, “will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst; the water I shall give will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” The woman responded, perhaps with a little faith, perhaps with a lot of sarcasm, “Give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty or have to keep coming here to draw water.”
That’s when Jesus upped the ante and spoke about how to receive it, suggesting she needed to begin to live in a way consistent with living water. “Go call your husband and come back,” he said, and after she confessed that she didn’t have a husband, Jesus, engaging her gently where she was, told her that she was right in saying she didn’t have a husband because “you have had five husbands and the one you have now is not your husband.” At that the woman tried to change the subject twice, first to whether Jews or Samaritans were right about the right place to worship — Mount Zion or Mount Gerizim — and then to express her hopes about the coming Messiah. Jesus brought both conversations back to the essential: that he was coming as the Living Water to irrigate her whole life. He said that the time had arrived to worship God in Spirit and in truth, not on any mountain, but in communion with Him who is the union between God and man, and about the Messiah, “I am he, the one speaking with you.” It’s an incredibly direct admission from Jesus, because he knew already where the woman’s faith was. She replied with faith. Having imbibed the living water Jesus was serving her, she left her jug— a sign that she was leaving her old life — and ran into the town, saying to everyone — the five men who had left her, the sixth man who was using her without commitment, the women who used to deride her and everyone else, because she was a new woman and was no longer afraid! — “Come see a man who told me everything I have done! Could he possibly be the Christ?” They all came out with her and discovered for their own that Jesus was not only the Messiah, the Savior of the Jews, or the Samaritans, but the “Savior of the World.”
Jesus wants to have a similar dialogue with each of us, to take us from our early hopes, hungers, and loves to what they all ultimately hunger for: him. This woman had a deep thirst for God and when the Living Water came and made himself known, everything changed, and changed in an instant. That’s what he hopes to find in each of us. In one of the most beautiful psalms, which the Church prays in the Liturgy of the Hours on the first Sunday of the month and on every major feast day, this God-given thirst for God is highlighted: “O God, you are my God, for you I long, for you my soul is thirsting. My body pines for you like a dry, weary land without water” (Ps 63:1). The question each of us needs to ask today, and as we go more and more into the spiritual desert of Lent, is, “Do I really thirst for God?” “Does my soul pine for God?” “Can I really say in spirit and in truth, ‘Give me that water?’” We know from the first reading and the Psalm that often we don’t respond that way to God. The Israelites in the desert, even after the ten miracles to free them from Pharaoh, even after the wonder of crossing the Red Sea, still grumbled as if God had led them into the desert just to die of thirst and hunger. The responsorial Psalm had us pray, “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts,” because they had heard God’s voice and had responded with stiff-necks and sclerotic hearts. He who made water flow from the rock can pierce our hearts and make it flow with living water, but we have to want it, pine for it, thirst for it, like someone in the desert for 40 days would long for a glass of cold water.
What is this “living water” exactly? Jesus describes what it is later in two places in St. John’s Gospel. It is nothing short of God’s divine life — what we call in theology the Indwelling of the Blessed Trinity. In one place, he identifies the living water as the presence of the Holy Spirit; in the other, he identifies it as his own presence through the Holy Eucharist. But we know that whenever one of the divine persons is present in a soul, the other two persons in the one God are likewise present. Jesus’ two descriptions of that living water show us how that holy H20 quenches our deepest thirst:
In John 7, Jesus said: “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’” St. John tells us: “He said this about the Spirit, which believers in him were to receive” (Jn 7:37-38). This presence of the Holy Spirit within us is what St. Paul is describing in the beautiful passage from today’s second reading: “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.” The Holy Spirit is what allows us to worship God in Spirit and in truth.
And in John 6, when Jesus prophesied how the “bread” that he would give would far surpass the Manna in the desert given to the Jews, he stated: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.… for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them” (Jn 6:35; 55-56). The indwelling of the Blessed Trinity occurs through the Sacraments, when people who are thirsty come to Jesus who fills their hearts with this living water. This reality begins with the life-giving waters of baptism when we first receive within us Jesus, the water who saves. That’s why we have these readings today on the Third Sunday of Lent, to help the catechumens, the elect, who are now preparing for the waters of baptism to thirst for what Jesus desires to give them. But this saving water continues in every sacramental encounter, most particularly in the Eucharist, when we receive Jesus, the incarnation of that life-giving water, within our bodies and souls.
Whether we respond to Jesus’ invitation today is something of great stakes. If we really drink of the life-giving water of Jesus, it will lead us to heaven. But if we don’t, if we respond to his offer with hardened hearts, our lives will be desiccated in this world and we risk having them absent of Christ’s living water forever. Jesus tells us that the living water he wishes to give us will form a geyser welling up within us flowing up to eternal life. We are marking this year the 400th anniversary of the dedication of the new Basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican and the 1700thanniversary of the dedication of the Constantinian Basilica that preceded it. The Basilica of St. Peter’s is built over a pagan necropolis, today called the “Scavi” or “excavations” where I was a Vatican guide during my years in Rome. When the emperor Constantine in the 320s was planning to bury the entire necropolis underground so that the altar of the Basilica of St. Peter could be built right on top of St. Peter’s tomb, he allowed the pagan families to remove their deceased family members to necropolises elsewhere in the city. At the same time, Christians took advantage of the change in laws to move their dead into the necropolis. They didn’t care that it was going to be buried underground, presumably forever. They just wanted to bury their loved ones as close as possible to St. Peter, so that he would show them a special “love of neighbor” and pray for them to enter eternal life. And in that necropolis, you see a huge contrast between pagan and Christian burial practices. One of the pagan understandings of the afterlife was that it was a huge frat party led by the god of drinking Bacchus (also called Dionysius) who would be dragged around the afterlife by a centaur-driven carriage with a large carafe of wine in his hands keeping everybody’s glasses full and spirits high. The pagans also used to take out huge straws to pour wine down into the sarcophagi or the urns of their loved ones so that their deceased family members could join in their wine-filled celebration here on earth. When Christians came into the necropolis, what you started to see was that they would place a counter-image on their title plates. I remember one —of a woman named Amelia Gorgonia — whose husband scratched on the flip side of a former pagan marble title plate an inscription to his wife. On the side her epitaph, he depicted an image of the woman at the well, indicating that his wife was like the Samaritan woman today, who had asked Christ for the living water welling up inside of her to eternal life. Because of that living water, there was no need for Bacchus to keep everyone’s wine glasses full, because we had Christ, the living water, the one who had turned water into wine, on the inside, quenching all our thirsts, all our desires, forever. If we wish to have our desires fulfilled forever in heaven, the way we prepare ourselves for that is by imbibing Christ the living water as much as we can now.
This two-fold thirst — Jesus’ and ours — is central to the life of Missionaries of Charity. This morning I returned to Saint Mother Teresa’s March 25, 1993, Letter to you in which she wrote to you about Jesus’ thirst to satiate our and others’ deepest thirsts and the importance of our thirst to satiate Jesus’. “How beautiful is our vocation,” she wrote. “How great God’s love for us in choosing our Society to satiate that thirst of Jesus, for love, for souls — giving us our special place in the Church. At the same time, we are reminding the world of his thirst, something that was being forgotten. … For me Jesus’ thirst is something so intimate. … Everything in MC exists only to satiate Jesus. His words on the wall of every MC chapel, they are not from the past only but alive here and now, spoken to you. Do you believe it? … Let it become as intimate for each of you. … Jesus must be the one to say to you, ‘I thirst.’ Hear your own name. Not just once. Every day. ‘I thirst’ is something much deeper than Jesus’ just saying, ‘I love you.’ Until you know deep inside that Jesus thirsts for you, you can’t begin to know who He wants to be for you or who he wants you to be for him. The heart and soul of the Missionaries of Charity is only this — the thirst of Jesus’ heart, hidden in the poor. This is the source of every part of MC life. It gives us our aim, our fourth vow, the spirit of our Society. Satiating the living Jesus in our midst is the Society’s only purpose for existing. Can we each say the same for ourselves, that it is our only reason for living? … The thirst of Jesus is the focus of all that is the Missionaries of Charity. The Church has confirmed it again and again — ‘Our charism is to satiate the thirst of Jesus for love and souls, by working for the salvation and sanctification of the poorest of the poor.’ Nothing different. Nothing else. … Only the thirst of Jesus, hearing it, feeling it, answering it with all your heart will keep the Society alive after Mother leaves you. … Even when Mother leaves you, Jesus’ thirst will never leave you.”
In the last book of the Bible, in which Jesus speaks to us from within the celestial Jerusalem, he reiterates what he said to the Samaritan woman within the context of the gift of heaven and our need to desire it. He states: “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life” (Rev. 21:6). Then he gives us an incredible invitation; he is not forcing anything on us, but as with any invitation, we have to respond. “The Spirit and the bride (the Church) say, ‘Come.’ And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’ And let everyone who is thirsty come. Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift” (Rev. 22:17). Jesus is inviting us to the eternal wedding banquet, where he will quench our thirst forever. He gives us the means to anticipate that life, in prayer, in the sacraments and in the moral life that is life according to the Holy Spirit and truth.
In the beatitudes, Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for holiness.” To thirst for sanctity is to thirst for God. Jesus promised that those who so thirst “shall be satisfied,” and he’s faithful to his promises. If we are truly thirsting for him — and not for something or someone else — the Eucharist will be the greatest earthly satisfaction and joy we could possibly receive, because here we receive Him for whom we thirst “like a dry-weary land without water.” We consume Him “for whom our soul pines.” And we enter more fully into that life giving stream that brings us back to its Source, God himself, in that kingdom were we hope to drink of that life-giving stream to the dregs forever. We are grateful for our Mass today where God’s thirst meets ours. We pray that God will continue to provide means for all those who thirst for him to come to receive in the Holy Eucharist that living Water and to increase the desire, through spiritual communions, among all of the people of God. The Holy Spirit and the Church are saying, “Come! Take the water of life as a gift!” And we reply, “Jesus, give us that life giving water always!”
The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1
EX 17:3-7
In those days, in their thirst for water,
the people grumbled against Moses,
saying, “Why did you ever make us leave Egypt?
Was it just to have us die here of thirst
with our children and our livestock?”
So Moses cried out to the LORD,
“What shall I do with this people?
a little more and they will stone me!”
The LORD answered Moses,
“Go over there in front of the people,
along with some of the elders of Israel,
holding in your hand, as you go,
the staff with which you struck the river.
I will be standing there in front of you on the rock in Horeb.
Strike the rock, and the water will flow from it
for the people to drink.”
This Moses did, in the presence of the elders of Israel.
The place was called Massah and Meribah,
because the Israelites quarreled there
and tested the LORD, saying,
“Is the LORD in our midst or not?”
Responsorial Psalm
PS 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9
R/ (8) If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Come, let us sing joyfully to the LORD;
let us acclaim the Rock of our salvation.
Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;
let us joyfully sing psalms to him.
R/ If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Come, let us bow down in worship;
let us kneel before the LORD who made us.
For he is our God,
and we are the people he shepherds, the flock he guides.
R/ If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Oh, that today you would hear his voice:
“Harden not your hearts as at Meribah,
as in the day of Massah in the desert,
Where your fathers tempted me;
they tested me though they had seen my works.”
R/ If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.
Reading 2
ROM 5:1-2, 5-8
Brothers and sisters:
Since we have been justified by faith,
we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
through whom we have gained access by faith
to this grace in which we stand,
and we boast in hope of the glory of God.And hope does not disappoint,
because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts
through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
For Christ, while we were still helpless,
died at the appointed time for the ungodly.
Indeed, only with difficulty does one die for a just person,
though perhaps for a good person one might even find courage to die.
But God proves his love for us
in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.
Gospel
JN 4:5-42
Jesus came to a town of Samaria called Sychar,
near the plot of land that Jacob had given to his son Joseph.
Jacob’s well was there.
Jesus, tired from his journey, sat down there at the well.
It was about noon.
A woman of Samaria came to draw water.
Jesus said to her,
“Give me a drink.”
His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.
The Samaritan woman said to him,
“How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?”
—For Jews use nothing in common with Samaritans.—
Jesus answered and said to her,
“If you knew the gift of God
and who is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink, ‘
you would have asked him
and he would have given you living water.”
The woman said to him,
“Sir, you do not even have a bucket and the cistern is deep;
where then can you get this living water?
Are you greater than our father Jacob,
who gave us this cistern and drank from it himself
with his children and his flocks?”
Jesus answered and said to her,
“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again;
but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst;
the water I shall give will become in him
a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The woman said to him,
“Sir, give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty
or have to keep coming here to draw water.”
Jesus said to her,
“Go call your husband and come back.”
The woman answered and said to him,
“I do not have a husband.”
Jesus answered her,
“You are right in saying, ‘I do not have a husband.’
For you have had five husbands,
and the one you have now is not your husband.
What you have said is true.”
The woman said to him,
“Sir, I can see that you are a prophet.
Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain;
but you people say that the place to worship is in Jerusalem.”
Jesus said to her,
“Believe me, woman, the hour is coming
when you will worship the Father
neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.
You people worship what you do not understand;
we worship what we understand,
because salvation is from the Jews.
But the hour is coming, and is now here,
when true worshipers will worship the Father in Spirit and truth;
and indeed the Father seeks such people to worship him.
God is Spirit, and those who worship him
must worship in Spirit and truth.”
The woman said to him,
“I know that the Messiah is coming, the one called the Christ;
when he comes, he will tell us everything.”
Jesus said to her,
“I am he, the one speaking with you.”
At that moment his disciples returned,
and were amazed that he was talking with a woman,
but still no one said, “What are you looking for?”
or “Why are you talking with her?”
The woman left her water jar
and went into the town and said to the people,
“Come see a man who told me everything I have done.
Could he possibly be the Christ?”
They went out of the town and came to him.
Meanwhile, the disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat.”
But he said to them,
“I have food to eat of which you do not know.”
So the disciples said to one another,
“Could someone have brought him something to eat?”
Jesus said to them,
“My food is to do the will of the one who sent me
and to finish his work.
Do you not say, ‘In four months the harvest will be here’?
I tell you, look up and see the fields ripe for the harvest.
The reaper is already receiving payment
and gathering crops for eternal life,
so that the sower and reaper can rejoice together.
For here the saying is verified that ‘One sows and another reaps.’
I sent you to reap what you have not worked for;
others have done the work,
and you are sharing the fruits of their work.”
Many of the Samaritans of that town began to believe in him
because of the word of the woman who testified,
“He told me everything I have done.”
When the Samaritans came to him,
they invited him to stay with them;
and he stayed there two days.
Many more began to believe in him because of his word,
and they said to the woman,
“We no longer believe because of your word;
for we have heard for ourselves,
and we know that this is truly the savior of the world.”
The post Satiating Jesus’ Thirst and Letting Him Satiate Ours, Third Sunday of Lent (A), March 8, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
33 min
March 07 Lenten Lessons from Blessed to Be Fulton Sheen on the Seven Words From and To Jesus on the Cross, Leonine Forum NYC Chapter Lenten Day of Recollection, March 7, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
St. Agnes Parish, Manhattan
Leonine Forum NYC Chapter Lenten Recollection
March 7, 2026
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39 min
March 07 Lenten Lessons from Blessed to Be Fulton Sheen on Temptations in the Desert, Leonine Forum NYC Chapter Lenten Day of Recollection, March 7, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
St. Agnes Parish, Manhattan
Leonine Forum NYC Chapter Lenten Recollection
March 7, 2026
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The post Lenten Lessons from Blessed to Be Fulton Sheen on Temptations in the Desert, Leonine Forum NYC Chapter Lenten Day of Recollection, March 7, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
46 min
March 07Returning To And Remaining in the Father’s House and Inheritance, Second Saturday of Lent, March 7, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
St. Agnes Parish, Manhattan
Leonine Forum NYC Chapter Lenten Recollection
Saturday of the Second Week of Lent
March 7, 2026
Mic 7:14-15.18-20, Ps 103, Lk 15:1-3.11-32

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The following text guided today’s homily:
Today we reach the dramatic end of the first phase of the Lenten Season. From Ash Wednesday through Saturday of the Second Week of Lent, the readings from Sacred Scripture are all fundamentally geared to helping us understand and live the type of conversion to which God is calling us. Tomorrow, with the scene of Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well, we begin a heavy emphasis on the meaning of baptism, to assist catechumens in their journey toward the saving waters and to reinvigorate all those who have already been baptized in the ever-new life that is supposed to flow from baptism. At the end of the Fourth Week of Lent, we will make another transition to consider specifically all those prophecies and historical events that predicted and led to Jesus’ passion and death.
Today, however, as we make this Leonine Forum Lenten Day of Recollection, we come to the exclamation point of the phase in which God has been calling us, as Jesus told us on Ash Wednesday, to “repent and believe in the Gospel,” to pray, fast and give alms in such a way that we begin to think with the mind of God, hunger for what he hungers, and gratefully participate in his providential care of our brothers and sisters. It’s a time to become holy like God is holy, perfect as God is perfect, merciful like the Father is merciful. It is a time to focus on how his mercy endures forever and therefore on our recognizing our need for it, our coming to receive it, our rejoicing in it and our seeking to pass it on to others like we’ve first received it, are all meant to grow.
In today’s readings we focus on that mercy, which is the driver of the whole season of Lent, especially this first part concerning conversion. The Prophet Micah exclaims with wonder and gratitude about God’s hesed, his merciful faithfulness to us despite our sins: “Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt and pardons sin for the remnant of his inheritance; Who does not persist in anger forever, but delights rather in clemency, and will again have compassion on us, treading underfoot our guilt? You will cast into the depths of the sea all our sins; You will show faithfulness to Jacob, and grace to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers from days of old.” In the Responsorial Psalm we ponder how “kind and merciful” he is who “pardons all your iniquities, … heals all your ills, … redeems your life from destruction, … crowns you with kindness and compassion, … will not always chide, … does not keep his wrath forever, … who does not deal with us according to our sins, nor requite us according to our crimes,” who has “put our transgressions” further from us as the east is from the west and the heavens are high above the earth.” And then in the Gospel, Jesus illustrates for us the love of God who delights in clemency, who shows his faithfulness to his wayward children, who does not deal with us according to our sins but who treats his with paternal kindness and compassion. It’s perhaps the most famous short story of all time. It’s called the Parable of the Prodigal Son after the youngest of two boys, but it could easily have been called the Parable of the Merciful Father or the Parable of the Merciless Brother. We conclude this phase of Lent pondering what Jesus wants to teach us about mercy through all three characters in today’s Gospel.
We begin with the younger son. His essential sin was not all that he did to blow his inheritance on a dissolute life. It was to treat his Father as if he were dead. To ask for the inheritance while the Father was still living was tantamount to saying, “You’re dead to me, Old Man. I don’t want to wait until you croak. Give me now, as if it’s a right I have rather than an unmerited grace, what you’re planning to give me when finally you breathe your last.” And the Father, doubtless more concerned over the direction of his son’s life than nursing his own wounds at the son’s ingratitude and presumption, gave him the inheritance, probably figuring out it would be the only chance that the son might have of learning the lesson he had long missed. The son, as we know, went and squandered everything in an immoral life. Eventually when a famine hit the land where he was, he needed to do work that no Jew would ever have signed up for, to care for pigs (whom the Jews considered unclean animals). He was eventually so hungry that he longed for what the pigs were eating, something that indicated basically that he had become almost subhuman. But that’s when the grace of conversion first hit him. “Coming to his senses,” St. Luke writes, he realized that his Father’s hired hands were always well fed and he decided to return to his Father’s house, to apologize for his sins, and asked to be treated like a hired hand. He recognized that at least his Father was a good man who cared for those who worked for him. When we hear the word today, “hired hand,” most of us, I think, imagine he was being asked to be treated as an “employee,” but it was nothing really of the sort. He was asking to be treated as “less than a slave.” The slaves were considered members of the household to some degree and they were taken care of and fed. The “hired hands” were not members of the family. They were responsible for their own upkeep, if they could get a job day-by-day. But the younger son recognized that the Father was kind and gave “more than enough food to eat” even to those who had no right to food. The son was beginning to reawaken to the Father’s goodness. But he still didn’t understand the Father. He rehearsed his speech as he was returning home, that he had sinned against God and against his father — both of whom he had treated as if they were dead to him — and didn’t deserve to be treated as a son, thinking that the relationship of filiation would now have been “dead” since he had basically already pronounced his father’s obituary. But the Father, seeing him far off, was filled with merciful love and ran to his son. I’ve always imagined a 60-year-old-out-of-shape man in sandals looking foolish running to embrace his long-lost son. The son began with his well-practiced confession, but the Father interrupted him. He called for the finest garment to be put around him to cover up all of the swine excrement with which doubtless he had been covered. He put a signet ring on his finger, to show that he still had “power of attorney” over the Father’s goods. He had sandals placed on his feet to symbolize that he was free to go about as he pleased — slaves never had sandals. And for his return, he insisted that the fattened calf, fit for the most important feast, be slaughtered. Whereas he was prepared to ask to be treated like a hired hand lower than slaves, the Father restored him to his full dignity! He would eat far better even than the generosity with which his father fed the hired hands.
This is obviously an allusion to what God seeks to do to all of us through the Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation. When we come to our senses, when we realize the Father not only is not dead but is good and cares for us and we begin to make the journey home, he runs out to meet us to restore us to who we really are. In the parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin elsewhere in the same chapter of Luke 15, Jesus tells us that heaven rejoices most of all for the return of one sinner, because every forgiven sinner is a restored beloved son or daughter of the Father. The Father initiates a massive celebration, having the special fattened calf slaughtered for the son’s return, because, as he says, “My son was dead and has come back to life again. He was lost and has been found.” That’s what happens every good Confession. Every reconciliation is a resurrection, when we’re raised from the dead by the Father’s mercy (which is why, I believe, Jesus founded it on Easter Sunday evening). The Sacraments is God’s great lost-and-found department for his beloved children. The whole point of this first phase of Lent was to bring us back fully into the house of the Father so that he could restore us to who we really are. Lent is a time for us to recognize that we’re the prodigal son and make the journey to the Father’s restorative embrace. We need to recognize those areas in our life where we have treated him as if he were dead, through our self-sufficiency; the ways in which we have squandered his gifts by using them on ourselves; the times in which we have wallowed in the pigsties of grudges or self-pity; the ways in which we have lived like or below animals through obeying our appetites more than what he’s whispered though our conscience; and make our way back home to his embrace. As Pope Francis famously said at the beginning of his papacy, “God never tires of forgiving us, but it’s we who tire of asking for forgiveness.” The Father is always ready to embrace us with his merciful love, but we must be sensible enough to recognize who he is, come back to say sorry, and be grateful for the way that he does far more than feed and employ us.
During this Lenten season we have to do more than respond to God’s grace to restore our relationship with God the Father, however. We also have to seek to restore our relationship with our brothers and sisters. And that’s where the second, older brother comes into the scene. In some ways, Jesus told the whole parable in order to focus on his reaction to the loving mercy of the Father toward his younger brother. The setting for the parable was in response to the Pharisees and Scribes’ complaints that Jesus “welcomes sinners and eats with them.” They would rather have had the sinners never convert than for Jesus to have shown mercy to them. They were a society of older brothers in the parable. And we can see in the older brother’s behavior that he, too, never really grasped the Father’s goodness or love. When he got angry and refused to enter the party the Father was throwing for the younger son’s return, he passive-aggressively waited outside until the Father came for him. He couldn’t join in the celebration because, in his heart, his brother was still dead. When the Father pleaded with him to enter the party, he replied with anger that betrayed that he had never related to his Father out of love but only out of duty. He was essentially a slave who, even though he never left the Father’s house, really didn’t want to be there either and resented his Father out of the type of envy we heard about yesterday in the betrayal of Joseph by his brothers and the prophesied betrayal of Jesus by his own people. “Look, all these years I servedyou and not once did I ever disobey your orders.” That’s the language of a slave, not a son! We can almost hear him calling his Father “Master” or “Boss-man” rather than “Dad.” And it gets worse. “Yet when this son of yours returns…,” he complained. He couldn’t even refer to his own flesh-and-blood as his brother. The younger brother had wasted his inheritance “with prostitutes,” he declared, a detail that isn’t in evidence, a sign that that’s likely what he would have done had he been bold enough to do what the younger brother had done and gotten his own half of the inheritance. He was filled with envy and hatred against his brother as well as against the Father because, he claimed, had never even been allowed to kill a young goat for a party with his friends and yet the other brother got the fattened calf. By this point of the story, we can clearly see that while the younger brother was restored to health the older brother was still sick. The younger brother now at least understood the love of the Father and was rejoicing in it, whereas the older brother was still in a judgmental, bitter pigsty of his own. Jesus concluded the parable by telling us that the Father basically thought he had no choice but to celebrate because of his younger son’s being brought back morally from the dead, for his being restored fully into the inheritance, which was not a thing fundamentally of money but of fatherly love. We don’t know whether the older brother entered the party with him or not. The reason is because that was still an open question for the scribes and the Pharisees who were listening to the parable of Jesus, whether they would share his joy and come to welcome and eat with the same sinners, the same prodigal sons and daughters with whom Jesus was dining, or whether they would continue to remain defiantly and enviously outside.
There’s an obvious application for all of us, too, of this second part of the parable. Do we rejoice when other sinners return to the faith or do we resent that after they “had their fun” they are now restored to the same status as we have? When we’re tempted toward this type of hardness of heart of the Scribes and the Pharisees, the most common reason is because we look at the practice of the faith in general as a series of duties, of God as a powerful task master, rather than as a drama of love with God as the most loving Father ever. It’s also because we look at others not with the love of brothers and sisters but rather begrudgingly as fallen away sons and daughters of God but with whom we don’t want really to associate. The first phase of the Lenten season is meant to help us not only to make the journey of the Prodigal Son but also the journey to which Jesus was summoning the Scribes and the Pharisees. The Father comes out and wants us to join in the party. God’s greatest joy is forgiving and he wants us to enter into that joy. In fact, he wants us to join him in going out to others to invite them to return to the Father’s house so that the joy of heaven will be even greater.
Today, on this feast day of the heroic female martyrs Felicity and Perpetua, we’ve all come as repentant prodigals to the Father’s house, where he seeks to renew us in our baptismal garments, to restore us to our full inheritance and help us to walk with true freedom. And in his kindness and mercy, he hasn’t prepared a fattened calf but something far greater — a Lamb looking as if he has been slain — so that through communion with His own beloved Son on the inside, we may live always in the love of the Father and have his love become fully alive in our lives. This is the path by which our Lent will be translated into an Easter joy that will know no end.
The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1
MI 7:14-15, 18-20
Shepherd your people with your staff,
the flock of your inheritance,
That dwells apart in a woodland,
in the midst of Carmel.
Let them feed in Bashan and Gilead,
as in the days of old;
As in the days when you came from the land of Egypt,
show us wonderful signs.
Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt
and pardons sin for the remnant of his inheritance;
Who does not persist in anger forever,
but delights rather in clemency,
And will again have compassion on us,
treading underfoot our guilt?
You will cast into the depths of the sea all our sins;
You will show faithfulness to Jacob,
and grace to Abraham,
As you have sworn to our fathers
from days of old.
Responsorial Psalm
PS 103:1-2, 3-4, 9-10, 11-12
R. (8a) The Lord is kind and merciful.
Bless the LORD, O my soul;
and all my being, bless his holy name.
Bless the LORD, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
He pardons all your iniquities,
he heals all your ills.
He redeems your life from destruction,
he crowns you with kindness and compassion.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
He will not always chide,
nor does he keep his wrath forever.
Not according to our sins does he deal with us,
nor does he requite us according to our crimes.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
For as the heavens are high above the earth,
so surpassing is his kindness toward those who fear him.
As far as the east is from the west,
so far has he put our transgressions from us.
R. The Lord is kind and merciful.
Gospel
LK 15:1-3, 11-32
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 to them Jesus addressed this parable.
“A man had two sons, and the younger son said to his father,
‘Father, give me the share of your estate that should come to me.’
So the father divided the property between them.
After a few days, the younger son collected all his belongings
and set off to a distant country
where he squandered his inheritance on a life of dissipation.
When he had freely spent everything,
a severe famine struck that country,
and he found himself in dire need.
So he hired himself out to one of the local citizens
who sent him to his farm to tend the swine.
And he longed to eat his fill of the pods on which the swine fed,
but nobody gave him any.
Coming to his senses he thought,
‘How many of my father’s hired workers
have more than enough food to eat,
but here am I, dying from hunger.
I shall get up and go to my father and I shall say to him,
“Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you.
I no longer deserve to be called your son;
treat me as you would treat one of your hired workers.”’
So he got up and went back to his father.
While he was still a long way off,
his father caught sight of him, and was filled with compassion.
He ran to his son, embraced him and kissed him.
His son said to him,
‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you;
I no longer deserve to be called your son.’
But his father ordered his servants,
‘Quickly, bring the finest robe and put it on him;
put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet.
Take the fattened calf and slaughter it.
Then let us celebrate with a feast,
because this son of mine was dead, and has come to life again;
he was lost, and has been found.’
Then the celebration began.
Now the older son had been out in the field
and, on his way back, as he neared the house,
he heard the sound of music and dancing.
He called one of the servants and asked what this might mean.
The servant said to him,
‘Your brother has returned
and your father has slaughtered the fattened calf
because he has him back safe and sound.’
He became angry,
and when he refused to enter the house,
his father came out and pleaded with him.
He said to his father in reply,
‘Look, all these years I served you
and not once did I disobey your orders;
yet you never gave me even a young goat to feast on with my friends.
But when your son returns
who swallowed up your property with prostitutes,
for him you slaughter the fattened calf.’
He said to him,
‘My son, you are here with me always;
everything I have is yours.
But now we must celebrate and rejoice,
because your brother was dead and has come to life again;
he was lost and has been found.’“
The post Returning To And Remaining in the Father’s House and Inheritance, Second Saturday of Lent, March 7, 2026 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
27 min
March 02 Remarks at Holy Trinity Parish, Emene, Nigeria, March 1, 2026
Msgr. Roger J. Landry
Remarks at the Parish of the Holy Trinity, Emene, Nigeria
March 1, 2026
The delegation of the Pontifical Mission Societies USA visited Holy Trinity Parish in Emene, Nigeria, one of the various parishes in Nigeria that TPMS-USA has helped to build. The new Church is two-thirds of the way built. The whole parish turned out on a Sunday afternoon, waiting two-and-a-half hours for our arrival and giving many presentations to us. At the end of the program, they asked me to share some remarks.
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13 min

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.