Today—the Fourth Sunday of Easter—is called “Good Shepherd Sunday.” It’s a good day to recount a modern parable of the Lost Sheep: the story of Fiona, the sheep who was spotted by a kayaker last October, stranded for two years at the bottom of a treacherous cliff in the Scottish Highlands.

I remember how badly it stung. The kids in the neighborhood were choosing up sides for a pickup game of touch football, and I was odd man out. Rejected.

George was an avowed atheist and loved challenging believers. 

When my kids were little, if they fell down and hurt themselves, they would usually run to my wife or me to show us their “boo-boo.” And we would swoop them up in hugs and kisses and tend to their bruised egos as well as their skinned knees.

“When you fall in love—it doesn’t matter what with—you walk the plank.” That’s what Franciscan priest Father Richard Rohr, O.F.M. said to me during a gathering of my online prayer group.

If you want your children and grandchildren to grow up generous, let them watch you be generous. In the first reading this weekend we hear how the first Christians shared all they had, with the ultimate result that “there was no needy person among them.”

On the occasion of his 50th birthday, a man’s spouse decided to host a surprise celebration. The spouse booked a private dining room and sent invitations to select friends. No one knew who else was invited and all were told to keep it secret.

I‘ve always had a hard time with Easter. Maybe it’s that I don’t do well when I eat too much candy, which I inevitably do on Easter Sunday. But I find Easter a difficult day to celebrate.

At the start of each Holy Week, my mind drifts to the Holy Land and the visit I made as a pilgrim.

How do you pass on a living faith to the next generation? Robert Wuthnow, sociologist of religion, conducted research among people who considered themselves religious and asked what influences from childhood had helped their faith take root.