Category: Advent

Greetings on this the Monday of the Third Week of Advent
Readings: Numbers 24:2-7, 15-17a; Psalm 25:4-5ab, 6 and 7bc, 8-9; Matthew 21:23-27

Summary

People approached him as he was teaching and said, “By what authority are you doing these things? And who gave you this authority?” Jesus said to them in reply, “I shall ask you one question, and if you answer it for me, then I shall tell you by what authority I do these things. Where was John’s baptism from? Was it of heavenly or of human origin?” They discussed this among themselves and said, “If we say ‘Of heavenly origin,’ he will say to us, ‘Then why did you not believe him?’ But if we say, ‘Of human origin,’ we fear the crowd, for they all regard John as a prophet.” So they said to Jesus in reply, “We do not know.” He himself said to them, “Neither shall I tell you by what authority I do these things (Mt 21:23-27).

Since through embarrassment on the one hand and fear on the other the religious authorities claim ignorance of the origin of John’s baptism, they show themselves incapable of speaking with authority; hence Jesus refuses to discuss with them the grounds of his authority (NABRE Commentary).

Reflection

This is a common problem in every age.
People who claim leadership but possess neither the competence nor the personal ethics to speak with clarity and honest.

Jesus refuses to go down the rabbit hole as we say these days. Sometimes described as ‘losing the plot’ or ‘getting lost in the weeds’.

When entitlement replaces truth,
when fear replaces conviction,
and when reputation replaces integrity,
conversation becomes impossible.

So instead, Jesus points us back to the essentials.

• Truth
• Kindness
• Compassion
• Justice

Our psalmist names them clearly.
(from Psalm 25:4-5ab, 6 and 7bc, 8-9)

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. Teach me your ways, 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. Teach me your ways, 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.

Personal Reflection

Show us, LORD, your love, and grant us your salvation (PS 85:8).

Jesus asks us to think and decide.

Is John the Baptist from God?

Even if the question feels difficult, we must not avoid its truth—as the leaders did—because they could not bear to enter into any part of it.

So we pray:

Lord, remember us in your compassion.
Lord, teach us truth and a good path.
Lord, show us the way and make us be humble and seek justice.
Show us, LORD, your love, and grant us your salvation.

This is a good answer to Jesus.

Sacred Readings full text: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/121525.cfm

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Greetings on this the Third Sunday of Advent
Readings: Isaiah 35:1-6a, 10; Psalm 146:6-7, 8-9, 9-10.; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11

Summary

Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another? (Mt 11:3).

This week we have focused on the identity questions.

1) Are you still waiting for Elijah?
2) Do we recognize the stranger?
3) Now, the big question: Do we recognize the Messiah? Or, said another way, How do we recognize the Messiah?

Jesus answers John’s question with the overarching promise made by Isaiah: Here is your God, he comes with vindication; With divine recompense he comes to save you (Isa 35:4). Jesus replies to John’s messenger using the specific actions Isaiah describes as what the Messiah would take: See Is 26:19; 29:18–19; 35:5–6; and 61:1. He recombines them into a single statement with a kicker at the end: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them. And blessed is the one who takes no offense at me (Mt 11:5-6).

Rather than explaining Himself, Jesus describes what is happening for the primacy of our focus.

And blessed is the one who takes no offense at me? That blessing addresses our limited expectations—our human timelines, our partial vision, our desire for immediate resolution. John the Baptist wanted what everyone wants: Lord, fix it NOW! Plus, by the way, I’m in prison, about to die and, um, how about me?

Jesus is not disappointed in John.
He is inviting John to hold the horizon steady: Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done. The promise is real, the effects can be seen but the timeline belongs to God. We rely upon salvation history to help us see the constant works of holiness through the persons of : Abraham, Moses, and David, and through the Divine Person: Jesus Incarnate, Jesus Risen, Jesus Ascended, and now Jesus to Return.

This Joyful Sunday, “Gaudete” – Rejoice!

It is true: we see misery.
But it is also true: we see grace and salvation at work.

My joy is knowing that the Lord is always at work bringing joy, even when the work is not yet finished.

Our prayer today:
(From Third Sunday of Advent Morning Prayer LOTH)

Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
ever faithful to your promises
and ever close to your Church:
the earth rejoices in hope of the Savior's coming
and looks forward with longing
to his return at the end of time.
Prepare our hearts and remove the sadness
that hinders us from feeling the joy
which his presence will bestow,
for he is Lord for ever and ever.

Amen!

Reflection

How many fingers do I have? Ten.
When I smash a finger in the door jamb how many fingers do I have in that moment? One! One miserable, hurting, throbbing finger. For all intents and purposes I have only one finger in that moment. But, really I have 9 healthy fingers and one really painful finger.

So it is with life.

Pain can dominate our attention,
but it does not erase the larger reality.

Sacred Readings full text: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/121425.cfm

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Greetings on this the Memorial of Saint Lucy, Virgin and Martyr
Readings: Sirach 48:1-4, 9-11; Psalm 80:2ac and 3b, 15-16, 18-19; Matthew 17:9a, 10-13

Summary

Silence in the face of moral harm is not neutrality; it is abandonment.

Two days ago I asked the question: Are you still waiting for Elijah?

Today, I ask a harder one:

Do we recognize the stranger?

I tell you that Elijah has already come, and they did not recognize him but did to him whatever they pleased. So also will the Son of Man suffer at their hands (Mt 12:12-13).

John the Baptist stood in their midst—
calling for repentance, truth, conversion—
and they did not recognize him.

So they destroyed him.

And Jesus adds quietly, almost ominously:

“So also will the Son of Man suffer at their hands.”

Reflection

Sad days.

Not because laws exist.
Not because borders exist.
But because people can be rendered invisible.

Good people being swept up in this madness of immigration ethnic cleansing.

Because human beings—mothers, fathers, children—can be moved, displaced, separated, and spoken about as problems rather than persons.

Because once someone is no longer recognized,
anything can be done to them.

This is not new.

The people of Jesus’ time did not recognize Elijah when he came (in the person of John).
They did not recognize John.
And they did not recognize Jesus.

The tragedy was not ignorance.
It was misrecognition.

They saw a threat where God had sent a prophet.
They saw inconvenience where God had sent a human being.

Even today, as people seek legal counsel,
ICE moves them across state lines,
separating them from representation,
rendering them unseen.

• Cold hearted.
• Unrecognizable ethics.
• Unrepentant moral failure.

Personal Reflection

The same people that rail Life Begins at Conception do not recognize persons after birth.

And still, it is possible to defend life in theory while failing to recognize persons in reality.

Jesus’ words do not allow us that separation:

Literally, in the season of Mary & Joseph fleeing to Egypt they do not recognize the moral failure. What you do for the least of these, you do to me: So also will the Son of Man suffer at their hands.

A very sad day.

Saint Lucy is perfect for today!

• she saw,
• she refused blindness,
• and she paid a price.

Sacred Readings full text: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/121325.cfm

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Joseph’s Dream

Greetings on this the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe
Readings: Rev 11:19a; 12:1-6a, 10ab; Judith 13:18bcde, 19; Luke 1:39-47

Summary

Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the infant leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth, filled with the holy Spirit, cried out in a loud voice and said, “Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And how does this happen to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For at the moment the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed are you who believed that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled (Lk 1:39-45).

She gave birth to a son, a male child, destined to rule all the nations with an iron rod. Her child was caught up to God and his throne. The woman herself fled into the desert where she had a place prepared by God, that there she might be taken care of for twelve hundred and sixty days. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have salvation and power come, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed.(Rev 12:5-6, 10ab).

Reflection

Mary set out. She did not forget the Indigenous, the oppressed, the disappeared. Nor has she forgotten you.

Personal Reflection

Reflection of this feast last year: https://deacongerrypalermo.blog/2024/12/12/celebrating-juan-diego-and-divine-promises/
Photo reflection on the diaspora: https://deacongerrypalermo.blog/2022/01/12/diaspora/
House of the Migrant: https://deacongerrypalermo.blog/2022/06/04/these-things-were-written/

Sacred Readings full text:

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Greetings on this the Thursday of the Second Week of Advent
Readings: Isaiah 41:13-20; Psalm 145:1 and 9, 10-11, 12-13ab; Matthew 11:11-15

Summary

Are you still waiting for Elijah? Why?

The prophecy of Malachi states: Now I am sending to you Elijah the prophet, Before the day of the LORD comes, the great and terrible day; He will turn the heart of fathers to their sons, and the heart of sons to their fathers (Mal 3:23-24). Elijah was to bring healing from the people’s idolatry and the stop the evil acts of the kingdom (x-ref 1 Kngs 17:1ff).

Isaiah describes the situation slightly differently:

1. The bare heights
2. Desert
3. Dry ground
4. Wasteland.

And brings a vision of relief from these things using imagry of drought-ending renewal.

Jesus’ Testimony to John. Amen, I say to you, among those born of women there has been none greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. All the prophets and the law prophesied up to the time of John. And if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah, the one who is to come. (MT 11:11, 13-14).

Isaiah’s description of the dire circumstances. Do not fear, you worm Jacob, you maggot Israel; I will help you—oracle of the LORD; the Holy One of Israel is your redeemer (Isa 41:14).

Reflection

How we feel about things is often not a good indicator of how things really are. Isaiah describes Jacob and Israel as “worm” and “maggots”. He is describing the difficult situation the people live in. He also is describing the spiritual state of their souls. So a double edge of personal and social problems. I imagine the people did not see it that way. Even as Elijah has come, they still search for Elijah – thus delaying the reckoning of the actual state of affairs.

The Elite at the time of Jesus actually saw Jesus as the threat not the overlords of the Romans and the injustice of the monied class.

Despite all this, Elijah did come – in the person of John the Baptist – and herald the coming of the Messiah. The Holy One will redeem us from our squalid condition.

Personal Reflection

There is a joke that goes like this (it is just a joke).

One day a modern-day prophet approached the Holy Father and said, “The Lord is coming soon!” To which the Pope replied, “I hope not before Saturday’s football playoff.”

Humor often reveals truth (even silly examples).

Our humility in Week Two of Advent is for the reckoning of our true condition. The courage to say Yes to Jesus and the promises proclaimed by Malachi, Isaia, Elijah, and finally John are fulfilled.

Are you still waiting for Elijah?

Sacred Readings full text: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/121125.cfm

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Greetings on this the Wednesday of the Second Week of Advent

Readings: Isaiah 40:25–31; Psalm 103; Matthew 11:28–30

Summary

The Second Week of Advent invites us into the themes of humility and pride, and today’s readings make that contrast vivid.

In our first reading, Isaiah presents the tension between the negative self-talk of humanity and the “omni” qualities of God:

1. Omnipresence — all-present
2. Omniscience — all-knowing
3. Omnipotence — all-powerful
4. Omnibenevolence — all-good

Isaiah challenges Israel’s complaint:

“Why, O Jacob, do you say…
‘My way is hidden from the LORD,
and my right is disregarded by my God’?” (Isa 40:27)

At first hearing, this may sound like humility — but on closer inspection, it is actually a form of pride.
Despondency can be a self-centered despair:

• “I can’t do it, therefore I am helpless.”
• “I am beneath God’s concern.”

But Isaiah answers with hope:

“They that hope in the LORD will renew their strength;
they will soar on eagles’ wings…
run and not grow weary…
walk and not grow faint.” (Isa 40:31)

The psalm adds:

“Bless the LORD, O my soul…
and forget not all His benefits.” (Ps 103:1–2)

A humble person knows their worth comes not from themselves, but from God.
Genesis reminds us:

“Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness.” (Gen 1:26–27)

Our dignity is inseparable from the Divine Image — and we are called to grow into that likeness.

In the Gospel, Jesus does two beautiful things:

1. He acknowledges the burdens of life.
2. He offers rest that is only a hug away.

“Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest…
for I am meek and humble of heart.” (Mt 11:28–30)

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Reflection

The Lord our God is meek and humble.
He possesses all the “Omni” attributes we associate with divinity — yet none of the pride that humans attach to power.

His powerful love is the essential relationship.
The image in which we were created is His gift, meant to be shared with Him and with one another.

Be at rest in the Lord.

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Personal Reflection

I realize I need to be humble to accept the humble love of God.
I need to be meek to accept the meek love of God.

Pretty cool, if you ask me.

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Full readings: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/121025.cfm

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Greetings on this the Tuesday of the Second Week of Advent
Readings: Isaiah 40:1-11; Psalm 96:1-2, 3 and 10ac, 11-12, 13; Matthew 18:12-14

Summary

In the two previous uses of the blog post title “What is your opinion?“, I wrote in the context of observing the lives of the particular Saints. The Memorial of Saint John of the Cross and the Memorial of Saint Ambrose. Jesus’ question is an invitation to dialog and healing.

How are we answering Jesus’ question, What is your opinion?

The answer is summarized. The day of the Lord is near; Behold, he comes to save us (Alleluia verse before the Gospel)

Jesus said to his disciples: “What is your opinion?”

If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them goes astray, will he not leave the ninety-nine in the hills and go in search of the stray? And if he finds it, amen, I say to you, he rejoices more over it than over the ninety-nine that did not stray. In just the same way, it is not the will of your heavenly Father that one of these little ones be lost.” (MT 18:12-14).

Reflection

Is it our belief that if you lost one of 100 sheep that you would go in search of it and rejoice when you found it and returned the sheep to the flock?

Jesus says, In just the same way, he states by extrapolation, it is the will of your heavenly Father to find the lost sheep of humanity. Do you believe that?

Our gospel portion today is not presented as a personal challenge of moral behavior (although it clearly is) but in the framework of love.

Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God.
Speak to the heart of Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her service has ended, that her guilt is expiated (Isa 40:1-2a).

Israel, in particular, is the direct object of God’s love in the old testament reading and is expanded in the gospel of Matthew by Jesus to all persons by the symbolism of sheep immediately placed after the protection of children and before the return of wayward believers.

Everyone and anyone who is lost.

• Do you feel lost or abandoned? the Lord is actively looking for you!
• Have you lost or abandoned anyone? the Lord will help you find them.
• Have you lost your faith? the Lord is ready to restore.

Personal Reflection

I am alway reassured that no matter the mistake, the Lord is always finding us and rejoicing when he is hugging us.

Sacred Readings full text: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/120925.cfm

Peace be with you,
Deacon Gerry

Advent seems the perfect time to reflect on Mary and Eve, these two “mothers of all the living.”

By Sr. Grace Remington and Joy Marie Clarkson

December 20, 2022

https://www.plough.com/en/topics/culture/holidays/christmas-readings/mary-consoles-eve

Peace be with you,

Deacon Gerry

The Aspirational Nativity is lost when holiness becomes optional and ceremony becomes illusion – Deacon Gerry Palermo

Here is the advice of CHATGPT on how to avoid partisan writing in a culturally insensitive world. Insensitive includes reactionary, emotive and irrational. Sensitive is sincere responsiveness that brings the truth of the impact. There is a difference. You see, being truthful is not insensitive if the sensitivity you are defending is the outrage, oversized, heavily rationalized responses. It is the response to John the Baptist.

More pointed…

https://nypost.com/2025/12/06/us-news/boston-archdiocese-calls-for-removal-of-ice-was-here-sign-from-nativity-scene

Move violent…