Wo Knows the Most About Sin?

It is possible to be aware of the full dimensions of sin and imperfections only to the degree that one overcomes them or, rather, to the degree that one is delivered from them. It is not the sinner who knows the most about sin; it is the saint. It is the hero who has the greatest appreciation of what mediocrity really is, not the person who is himself mediocre. What we must become is only progressively revealed to us; as that occurs we will be ashamed of having believed that we already had the Christian spirit.

YVES DE MONTCHEUIL, SJ

Agents of Communion

Be agents of communion, capable of breaking down the logic of division and polarization, of individualism and egocentrism. Center yourselves on Christ, so as to overcome the logic of the world, of fake news, of frivolity, with the beauty and light of truth. 

POPE LEO XIV Address to Catholic digital missionaries and influencers, 7/29/25

Homily — Pentecost Sunday

“No one can say that ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.” These words of St. Paul, simple as they are, open up a whole perspective on God’s plan of loving kindness for us. The whole purpose of Pentecost is to fully reveal what God has planned for us from all eternity, namely, to become sharers in the divine nature; to realize the profound mystery hidden in the proclamation that Jesus is Lord; and to live in the same Spirit as the Father and the Son. 

Jesus is Lord! These are the words that the Father wants on the lips of all his children. They are a confession of faith in the great love that the Father has for us by sparing not even his own Son for our sake. At times we can forget just how alienated our human race is from God. It began with the disobedience of our first parents in paradise and has spread to the ends of the earth. But our Father is well aware of this alienation and our rejection of his plan. But precisely to overcome this alienation – and only God could overcome it – the Father sent his Son, Our Lord Jesus, the perfect model of obedience, to take on our human condition and free us from our misery. The Father did not spare his own Son out of love for us, but above all to make known the greatness of his Son so that “at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

“If you (only) knew the gift of God…” Today this gift is revealed to us as it was to the Jews who were marveling at hearing in their own tongues of the mighty acts of God. And this is the mighty act revealed by the Spirit: Jesus has endured death, utter failure, in witness to the Father’s love for us. He was in total agreement with the Father’s plan, matching love for love. This is a truth we can rely on, and if there is any doubt, we have a solid proof: the resurrection. Jesus was vindicated. He could not be held by the throes of death because of his acceptance of the Father’s plan and the gift of his life to fulfill it. The Father raised him up and exalted him at his right hand. He gave him the promise of his Spirit, and then Jesus poured this Spirit out on us. This is what we now see and hear.

I started by quoting St Paul: “No one can say “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.” But what good would this mighty act have been if no one knew about it? It is the Spirit’s mission to ensure that this truth would be known by all; therefore, he gathered and brought forth the Church, the Body of Christ. It is through the Church that the Spirit communicates the mighty acts of God and thereby gives us a share in the divine nature. This has been God’s will for us from the beginning, “so that the grace bestowed in abundance on more and more people may cause the thanksgiving to overflow for the glory of God.” In this thanksgiving we live and move and have our being.

My brothers and sisters, “See what love the Father has given us” that we have become sharers in the divine nature and can proclaim that Jesus is Lord. This is the meaning of Pentecost and reveals the plan of God’s loving kindness. In a few minutes we will experience a new Pentecost when the Spirit descends on bread and wine and makes them truly become the body and blood of the Father’s only Son, Jesus Christ Our Lord. This is the mighty act of God that we celebrate today.

The Eucharist is a Burning Coal

Let us approach it with burning desire and with our hands folded in the form of a cross let us receive the body of the Crucified, and applying our eyes and lips and forehead let us partake of the divine coal, so that the fire of the desire within us might receive the heat of the coal and burn up our sins and illuminate our hearts so that by partaking of the divine fire we might be set on fire and deified.

JOHN OF DAMASCUS On the Orthodox Faith: Vol. 3 of the Fount of Knowledge

Insatiable Trinity

You, eternal Trinity, are a deep sea: the more I enter you, the more I discover, and the more I discover, the more I seek you. You are insatiable, you in whose depth the soul is sated yet remains always hungry for you, thirsty for you, eternal Trinity, longing to see you with the light in your light.

ST. CATHERINE OF SIENA The Dialogue

A Higher Communion

The goal of Eucharistic communion is a total recasting of a person's life, breaking up a man's whole ‘I’ and creating a new ‘We”.

JOSEPH RATZINGER Behold the Pierced One: An Approach to Spiritual Christology

Divine Fullness

Spiritual awareness teaches us that the soul has only one natural sense… shattered in consequence of Adam’s disobedience. But it is restored to unity by the Holy Spirit… In those who are detached from the lusts of life, the spirit, because it is thus freed, acquires it's full vigor, and can experience in an ineffable manner the divine fullness. It then imparts its joy to the body itself… “In him,” says the psalmist, “my flesh has blossomed afresh’.

DIADOCHUS OF PHOTIKE Gnostic Chapters, 25