Msgr. Anselm Nwaorgu

READINGS: Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time In the first reading of this 17th Sunday in ordinary times, Year C (Genesis 18:16 -33), the very first paragraph reads, “In those days, the Lord said: ‘The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great, and their sin so grave, that I must go down and see whether or not their actions fully correspond to the cry against them that comes to me. I mean to find out.’” This statement from God is so instructive about the way we should cond

READINGS: Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time I once had a family in therapy. The father was working 16 to 18 hours each day and therefore was rarely at home. After sometime, the children began to exhibit behavioral problems at school and their grades were dropping drastically. His wife found emotional support outside of the home and found consolation in her three kids. In one of our therapy sessions, the father was raving about how he was working so hard to put food on the tab

READINGS: Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time The gospel reading of this 14th Sunday in ordinary times, Year C, (Luke 10:1-12, 17- 20), tells about Christ sending out his disciples to proclaim the good news of salvation while warning them, “I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves” (Vs 3). What a caution! It is not a very comforting statement, is it? We know what usually happens when lambs find themselves in the midst of wolves; they become lunch. No wonder, Peter

READING: Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time In our Gospel passage for this 13th Sunday in ordinary times, year C (Luke 9:51-62), we read about the rejection of Jesus by the Samaritans who refused him passage through their town because of his destination— Jerusalem. Imagine being refused entry into a place because of your gender, orientation, race, color, ethnicity, etc. That was what happened here. For over 700 years Jews and Samaritans have been hostile to one another. Durin

In one of His visits to His disciples, before He ascended into heaven, Christ told them not to leave Jerusalem until they had received the Holy Spirit. In other words, they were not to begin their mission of proclaiming the good news of salvation unto the ends of the world until they have the assistance of the Holy Spirit. Many a time, we like to be lone rangers, when it comes to Christian life; to go it all alone and to do it by our own power. But the truth is that we cannot

As you may have heard, the American Bishops have moved the Solemnity of the Ascension, permanently, to the Sunday following Ascension Thursday. So, on this seventh Sunday of Easter, Year C, we celebrate the solemnity of Ascension, an important solemnity because it marks the return of Jesus to the Father; the permanent victory over death; the sole opportunity for us to have a defense counselor at the right hand of the Father interceding for us; and our certain hope that one da

READINGS: SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER The first reading of this Sixth Sunday of Easter, year C, (Acts 15:1-2, 22-29) brings to light the difficulty involved in bringing diverse peoples to worship together without letting ethnic uniqueness breed division and chaos. As could be seen in our passage, the Gentile converts to Christianity were being told, by some Jewish converts, that they had to become Jewish in tradition and rituals in order to be accepted into the household of the re

READINGS: 5TH SUNDAY OF EASTER In verse five of the second reading of this 5th Sunday of Easter, (Revelation 21:1-5), God says, "Behold, I make all things new" (vs. 5) and He backed these words with authority by uttering them while seated on His throne, and then directed that they be written down because “They are trustworthy and true”. Life, as we know it, is an interesting mixture of beginnings, endings, and new beginnings. Every moment of our lives, every transition we en

READINGS : 3RD SUNDAY OF EASTER The Gospel for this 3rd Sunday of Easter, Year C, describes the turning point in the lives of the Apostles. The apostles were apparently lost as to what the future held for them. In the midst of this confusion, Peter declared that he was returning to his former trade—“I am going fishing” and six other apostles eloped with him. They fished all night and caught nothing. Then, at dawn, something happened. Christ appeared to them for the 3rd time a

READINGS: EASTER SUNDAY The response to the Responsorial Psalm for the first reading on this Easter Sunday is: “This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad”. It is truly a day when the biggest thing that means the most in our lives happened—the resurrection of Jesus Christ—the very act that destroys the powers that block our blessings, pollute our anointing and short-circuit our destinies in life. Today, we have gained a counselor, a defense lawyer, and an a

READINGS: PALM SUNDAY A professor was traveling by boat and as the boat set sail, he asked the sailor, “Do you know anything about Biology, Ecology, or Oceanology”?, to which the sailor answered, “No Sir” and then the professor yelled out, “What on earth do you know, then, as a sailor? You will die of illiteracy. ”After a while, a heavy wind developed, tossing the boat around, and the sailor made the situation look worse, using his expertise, and then turning to the professor

READINGS: FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT In the Gospel reading of this 5th Sunday of Lent, Year C (John 8:1-11), we are confronted with the story of the woman caught in adultery and how she was treated, with humiliation and condemnation by the crowd—made to be on the ground while everybody else was standing, her sin laid bare for all to see, surrounded by angry accusers willing to stone her to death, and stamped with shame and disgust. Where was the man caught with her in this act? The

READINGS: FOURTH SUNDAY OF LENT In the first reading of this fourth Sunday of Lent, Circle C (Joshua 5:9-12), we read that the day after the Israelites ate of the produce of the land of Canaan, while encamped at Gilgal, the manna, that God had supplied to feed them during their 40-year journey, on their way to the promise land ceased. This act, on the part of God has two very important lessons for us. For over 40 years, God had miraculously provided food, in the form of mann

The next three Sundays in our Church will be Scrutiny Sundays as we will be celebrating part of the process of initiating those who are being prepared to come into full communion with the Catholic faith. During the Masses for these Scrutinies, the readings will be taken from Circle A instead of Circle C. The gospel, for this Sunday, therefore, is the story of the Samaritan Woman’s encounter with Jesus (John 4:1-42) What is fascinating about this story is that it reveals the

READINGS: SECOND SUNDAY OF LENT My dear friends, as we continue our Lenten journey, let us remember some of the greatest lessons of these past two years of coronavirus pandemic—the uncertainty of life; that life is too short; and the need to get our priorities ordered right. At the heart of Lent is fasting and the purpose of this fasting is to reset the heart.. There are two types to fasting that resets the heart—what we need to fast from and what we need to fast into. When i

READINGS: FIRST SUNDAY OF LENT Rudyard Kipling is a writer whose books sold so much that words in his books were said to be worth a hundred dollars each. So a journalist once gave Kipling a hundred dollars with the request, “Mr. Kipling, could you please give me one of your one hundred dollar words.” Kipling took the money, put it into his pocket, and looking at the reporter said, “Thanks”. Yes, thanks—to be grateful and to appreciate blessings in life—is a genuine and gracio

Being an African, otherwise called black in America, is not easy. One is constrained to endure the destructive tendencies resulting from the societal presumptions of white supremacy. The challenges are not only enormous; they are also anxiety-provoking with eminent health issues. As human beings, we are called to become the best version of ourselves but this is so difficult to do when one is working from a deficit, guilty-pronounced, and negatively perceived assumptions; when

READINGS: EIGHTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME In the 1st reading of this 8th Sunday in Ordinary Times (Sirach 27:4-7) we read: The fruit of a tree shows the care it has had; so too does one’s speech disclose the bent of one’s mind”. Again, it says, “When a sieve is shaken, the husks appear; so do one’s faults when one speaks”. So if we ever want to get a glimpse of what our heart is full of, all we have to do is to listen to the words that proceed from our mouth. Our speech always

READINGS In the gospel of this 7th Sunday in Ordinary Times (Luke 6:27-34), Jesus says, “Love your enemies and do good to those who hate you”. What a radical injunction to give! How do you love someone who has hurt you, lied against them, negatively gossiped about you, hates you with passion and ignominy? That goes against every natural instinct in our body. At the time of Jesus, payback was the norm: “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” and that is no different from h

The first reading on this 6th Sunday in Ordinary Times, year C, (Jeremiah 7:5-8) presents us with a scenario that could easily prompt an essay requiring us to compare and contrast between a person whose trust is in human beings and their abilities and a person whose trust is in the Lord; between a brown lifeless shrub in the desert and a green fruitful tree planted by the bay; between a person who is cursed by God and a person who is blessed by God. Life always requires an an