If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone Matthew 18:15
“Reckon him no more amongst the number of thy brethren. But yet neither is his salvation on that account to be neglected. For the very heathen, that is, the Gentiles and Pagans, we do not reckon among the number of brethren; but yet are we ever seeking their salvation” – St. Augustine
Author Archives: Fr. Will Rooney
Prophetic Anguish
The folly of the Cross becomes the salvation of all. Brothers and sisters, to share in his anguished heart which beats for every human soul. What greater joy could be found?
Making friends by being friends
Christ himself is the Good Samaritan who finds you and me wounded and naked on the side of the road and heals us and raises us up. He makes us his neighbors and friends. We are called to invite others to become our neighbors by being their neighbors as Christ did for us. Then we must invite them to meet our best Friend, the Good Samaritan, Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns forever and ever
Harsh Healing Words from the Word
For her benefit and for our benefit, the Lord draws faith out of the Canaanite woman. She becomes a remarkable example of what trusting prayer in faith looks like. For when we desire in prayer, nothing other than the will of God, then it will be done in our lives.
Reaching out to the one who reaches for us
If we admit our need before God, our weaknesses are not the end of the story but only its beginning.
Fighting Temptation Relationally
Simply bask in the fact that God loves you. Your sin, your past temptations, your present struggles, none of them can change the fact that God loves you. He’s loved you from the beginning, and he will always love you. You are his son or daughter. Christ compassionately weeps when he sees us in sin because he loves us. He is always present and desires to enter the temple of our hearts and cleanse it of the robbers who wish to cause us harm.
“Give them something yourself…”
Perhaps in encountering an impoverished person, we fear recognizing our own poverty and need: the truth that human beings exist fundamentally in relation. This fact is made perfectly clear in the incarnation, the enfleshment of Our Lord Jesus, who is God, needed his Mother. As we pass through our daily lives in the City of Austin, we encounter a vast multitude of people who do not know Jesus and who have never received the bread which will satisfy. The Lord’s words should resound in our ears: “there is no need for them to go away, give them some food yourselves.”
Where is your heart?: Vain Treasures
Brothers and Sisters, knowing what right is essential, but it is not enough. We must choose to do it. We must decide each day to live according to what we know is right. We must desire God above every other good thing or person. God is supremely generous with you and me.
Sons nor Servants: Living without fear
As the bread and wine are made Christ, who always cries out to the Father, so also our lives must be made into Christ through the work of the Spirit so that in union with him, we too cry out Father through that same Spirit.
What fruit should we expect?
We are the trees, in the garden of the Lord. We are perhaps a variety of different trees, but we are all meant to bear good fruit, which means receiving a new nature from him, living in charity, and letting ourselves be pruned. “The tree is the soul, that is, the man himself; the fruit is the man’s works.” AUGUSTINE
