The reading from the Book of Revelation speaks of “the endurance we have in Jesus”: perseverance in the face of adversity.

You’re a breath away from being the believer you could be. That is good news! It also requires a sincere act of faith on your part to take in the gift of God-life eternally held out to you. That is proven most powerfully in the "upper room," when Jesus comes to impart his Spirit by breathing on his disciples cowering there.

Their work offers a lesson: “I believe the church is living a moment of crisis,” Sister Rosalba Avalos Ramos told Kevin Douglas Grant in the GlobalPost. “The church needs to be transformed and live out a more radical commitment to the most needy. If we’re really trying to follow the way of Jesus, there’s a lot of his path that we need to pick up again and start living.”

The mercy of the Lord endures forever. With hope in that mercy, we offer our prayers.

This fairly sunny picture, however, contrasted with what came immediately before: the fearful story of the striking down of Ananias and Sapphira; Saint Peter and the others, it seemed, had power over life and death. Even Peter’s shadow could heal—a detail reminiscent of Saint Paul in Acts 19:11-12 and Jesus in Matthew 14:35-36. All these “signs and wonders,” though, were not for show but manifested God’s healing power and the faith of people in it.

If you ever are in a “Thomas state of mind”—doubting your faith, doubting God’s love, doubting our hope for redemption—consider all the great Christians who have gone before you who have experienced similar doubts

Above all, attention shall be paid to the care of the sick, so that they shall be served as if they were Christ himself. —Saint Benedict (c. 480-c. 547)