Posts by Sr. Mary Valerie Schneider

The Easter candle continues to burn throughout the Great Fifty Days. Are you still aglow with its flame? Let’s return to the Easter Vigil. The New Fire is lit, and a spark is taken to light the Paschal Candle. The gesture symbolizes Christ’s rising from the dead in glory. As the deacon processes with it,…

Today’s First Reading begins with “a severe persecution of the Church in Jerusalem,” which forces the believers to move out of the area. They land in Samaria and bring “great joy in that city.” In the Gospel Jesus says to the crowd that no one will be rejected; all who believe will have eternal life.…

The crowd wanted proof to believe in Jesus. He responded, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger.” As followers of Jesus Christ, as extensions of him, and persons made in the image of God, we too can say that we are the bread of life. How can this be?…

His persecutors in fury, the deacon and first martyr Stephen intently looked to heaven and saw the glory of God. The Holy Spirit filled Stephen with courageous conviction. The incredible outpouring of the Holy Spirit floods the stories of the Easter Season beginning with the resurrection of Jesus on that Sunday morning. Thomas Keating writes:…

Today’s gospel relates how Jesus was made known to the disciples on the road to Emmaus “in the breaking of the bread.” Even as they are telling the story, Jesus has “a piece of baked fish” to eat with them. So many ways to discover Jesus Christ during the Easter Season! We go from empty…

The poem “My Silence Is the Lord” by Brother Paul Quenon begins “My silence is the Lord, / I listen, his silence speaks at all times. / When I listen not, my hearing is filled with words/ and my tongue takes to rambling.” We have all experienced the truth of this poem, I’m sure. Take…

Abigail Carroll’s poem “Creed” begins “I believe in the life of the word, / the diplomacy of food.” The power and life in Jesus’ words as he gratefully blessed the five loaves multiplied the bread until thousands had their fill. Did Jesus use the diplomacy of food in the multiplication of the loaves? Jesus was…

Julian of Norwich wrote, “The fulness of joy is to behold God in everything.” The smell of plowed earth, the absoluteness of grace, deer tracks in snowmelt, futures free of the past, twirls of incense, children’s babble, wonder of breathing, contented hugs, contrite sobs. Behold God in everything. As today’s First Reading states, “He does…

The poem “Rosing from the Dead” by Paul J. Willis tells of Hanna commenting, “Sunday Jesus will be rosing from the dead.” The narrator of the poem agrees that resurrection may have been like a red blossom “pulsing from the floor of the tomb.” The soldiers are “overcome with the fragrance, and Mary at sunrise…

The origin of communities of religious men and women lies in today’s First Reading. We read that the community of believers was of “one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common.” Not claiming anything as one’s own provides the factual basis…