Celebrating water may sound like something more suited to the Easter Season or a child's Baptism. Yet August is Water Quality Month for a reason. As our Indigenous sisters and brothers frequently remind us, water is life.

We’re learning that it takes wisdom to understand God’s simple desire that we love one another. Jesus is telling the people that God is their food, their life, their only hope for everlasting joy, but they keep wanting more signs, explanations, and clarifications.

A lot of voices compete for our attention these days. Voices of doom tell us that all is lost—inflation has made it difficult for many to make ends meet. And there are voices of blame saying we must point a finger at one sort of politics or another for the present state of society.

After Sunday Mass, the pastor of the sleepy farming village where my dad and uncles were born and who decades later sent donations from America for a new, small church, invited me spend Monday with him

My husband went to get the car while the nurse went over a few last-minute details about how to care for our newborn daughter, who had a serious heart defect and a diagnosis of Down syndrome.

As we enter into the mysteries of our faith, let us acknowledge our sins and ask for mercy.

Jesus has made himself the Bread of Life. Night and day, he is there.

Browse our library for additional Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B material.

Click here to view the Take Five weekly for August 18, 2024.