theWord

For 27 November 2022, The First Sunday of Advent, based on Romans 13:11-14

For 26 November 2022, Saturday of week 34 in Ordinary Time, based on Luke 21:34-36

For 25 November 2022, Friday of week 34 in Ordinary Time, based on Luke 21:30-33

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

For 24 November 2022, Memorial of Saints Andrew D?ng-L?c and his Companions, Martyrs, based on Luke 21:20-28

(Photo of the Pillars of Creation by the James Webb telescope)

For 23 November 2022, Memorial of Blessed Miguel Agustín Pro, Martyr, based on Luke 21:12-19

(Image Copyright 1946 RKO Radio Pictures Inc. – Scan via Heritage Auctions., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=85715937)

For 22 November 2022, Tuesday of week 34 in Ordinary Time, based on Psalm 95(96):10-13

For 21 November 2022, Monday of week 34 in Ordinary Time, based on Luke 21:1-4

(Image by Scott Steinkerchner, OP)

For 20 November 2022, The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe , based on Colossians 1:15-20

I remember when my dad, a high school science teacher, would take me as a six-year-old to drive past bedtime to the nearby observatory at Carlton College in rural southern Minnesota. Together we would look through the telescope at the planets and the stars.

Much later, in the 1990s, I was astonished to see more deeply into space when I first examined the Hubble Space Telescope photograph of Terzan 1, a globular star cluster in the constellation Scorpius, 22,000 light-years from Earth. And now, perhaps you have been as awestruck as I at the first composite deep-field infrared photograph of a galaxy cluster, 4 billion, 600 million light-years away, as seen in July by the James Webb Space Telescope.

Sometime, examine the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe. See the eight-pointed stars on her blue mantle. God has clothed her with the stars and the galaxies. She is Queen of the Universe.

In 1969, Pope Paul VI changed the title of today’s last Sunday of the Church’s liturgical year to be the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe. Mary, the Queen, and Jesus, the King of the Universe.

Today’s scriptural reading from the Letter to the Colossians says: “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible. …

He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” In scripture, the infinite knowability of the universe speaks to us of the infinite knowability of God, who we cannot see.

The other day I watched an 80-minute YouTube documentary, The Letter, about Laudato Si’, Pope Francis’s encyclical letter to all people of Earth, an urgent plea to work together on behalf of the biodiversity of Earth, our Common Home. Under the mantle of the Queen of the Universe, and one body in Christ, King of the Universe, we are shown the grandeur of the stars and galaxies. Learning that our very bodies are created from the dust of God’s stars and galaxies, we turn our attention here and now to our corner of the vast universe, to our common home and to the care of Earth

(This image taken with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows Terzan 1, a globular cluster that lies about 22,000 light-years from Earth in the constellation Scorpius.)

For 19 November 2022, Saturday of week 33 in Ordinary Time, based on Luke 20:27-40

(Photo by Caleb Williams on Unsplash)

For 18 November 2022, Dedication of the Basilicas of Saints Peter and Paul, Apostles, based on Luke 19:45-48