Author: Fr. Peter Kavanaugh

“Do you say this of your own accord, or did others say it to you?” (Jn. 18:24).

Christ looks into Pilate’s eyes, and challenges him. Pilate asks a simple question, “Are you the king?” Christ responds with a question: “Why are you asking?” It is a question of sincerity. Is Pilate searching genuinely for the King of Life? Or is he simply parroting the crowds? This is our challenge too, in our faith and our life. Do we say, “Christ is King,” with our lips only? Do we believe on an intellectual level solely, for sentimentality sake, or because we were raised to do so? Or do we live out, “Christ is King,” with our hearts and breath? Today, the Feast of Christ the King, confronts us to look into our lives and determine who sits on the throne.

Continue reading “A Challenge for Our Secular Lives”

“The safest road to Hell is the gradual one—the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts” ~ C. S. Lewis.

That is what Uncle Screwtape advises. In an imaginative tale, C. S. Lewis describes the story of an uncle and nephew. Two devils, a senior and novice, write letters to one another about temptation. The inexperienced devil wants to tempt with all the exciting and licentious sins. Uncle Screwtape advises him otherwise. Just waist the man’s time, he says. Distract him with meaninglessness. Fill his mind with fluff. Make him sleepy, forgetful, and indifferent. Indeed, the gentle slope, the soft underfoot, the rut, is so easy to slip into. We get stuck. We fall into spiritual paralysis. That is the paralysis in us that Jesus Christ most longs to heal.

Continue reading “Paralysis of the Soul”

I. “Stir up one another to love and good works” (Hb. 10:24). 

A minister set out on a pastoral visit. He was concerned about a parishioner who had stopped attending services. When the pastor arrived, he found the man sitting alone by the fireplace. The pastor quietly took a seat by the man. They sat in that way for a few minutes, staring into the flames of the fire. Then the pastor reached for the tongs. He picked up one solitary, burning ember, placed it on the hearth, and sat back down. Silently, they watched as the ember flickered and went out. The minister rose, picked up the now cold ember and threw it back into the fire. Once again, it began to glow. The pastor turned to leave and the parishioner looked up, saying, “Thank you for the sermon, pastor. I will see you on Sunday.” 

Continue reading “No Community, No Christ”

In rain and snow, with shackles on his hands, St. Patrick learned to pray. He was captured by Irish pirates. He was torn from family, home, and luxuries, and subjected to the cruelest slavery. Yet, in the thick of poverty, he encountered God. Jesus Christ calls the “poor in spirit” blessed, because it is only in inner poverty that we can learn to pray. It is only when we learn to pray, with depth, with heart, and unceasingly, that we can truly be alive. “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God” (Matthew 5:3). Nothing else really matters but to discover this secret.

Continue reading “Detachment and Happiness”

Limbs stiff, heart broken, she stood and looked at the cross. Who knows pain as tender and poignant as a mother? Who knows suffering as a mother who has lost her son? Today is a great feast, the Feast of the Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Yet, there is irony here. We are celebrating sadness, pain, and loss of the heaviest kind, and we are celebrating it with joy, with bright flowers and white vestments. Here, standing at the cross, in the midst of so much sorrow, we discover a joy beyond understanding.

Continue reading “Why Mary’s Tears Matter”

“Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.” ~ Ps. 51:7

He carried the bruised and beaten man on his donkey. It was an arduous and tiring trip. The sun beat down. The dry dust blew across the path. Step by step, donkey, Samaritan, and invalid sweat together through the desert. This is our story. We are the invalids. Christ is our physician, and the inn the Church. Our purpose in this story is simple: to be purged and made new. 

Continue reading “Road to Healing”

C. S. Lewis was an atheist when he climbed aboard the train. The whistles blew, the train pulled forward, and the young scholar lit into his new book. It was a Scottish fairytale of the wandering discoveries and transformations of a man lost in Fairy Land. By the time he turned the last page and the train came to a stop, he was a changed man. Years later he explained, “that night [on the train], my imagination was, in a certain sense, baptized…” The book sparked something, so that the rest of his life was an insatiable pursuit of God.  What does it take to waken up a sleeping soul to the reality of God? Secularism, consumerism, television, and all those comforts of our modern life have the effect of a narcotic. They make us drowsy and blasé, halfhearted and only superficially concerned with spiritual matters. How can we shake it off and walk with God?

Continue reading “Dry and Secular”

The devil was exasperated. As the story goes, St. Macarius was fasting in the desert, when the devil met him. The spirit complained, “Macarius, I suffer a lot of pain because of you. Anything you can do, I do. You fast. Well, I eat nothing day and night. You keep vigil. I never fall asleep. There is only one thing you have that I don’t: your humility. For that, I cannot beat you.” What is humility? What is so remarkable about humility? Why is it necessary to enter the Kingdom of Heaven?

Continue reading “Why Humility”

Life was good and prosperous and then everything fell apart. The Roman army swarmed into Jerusalem with spears and torches. The temple, towers, and homes were demolished. The people were murdered or forced into slavery. Only weeks before, the Jewish citizens celebrated in luxury. How could the tides turn so suddenly? When we are most comfortable, it is easiest to forget God. When we are most confident, we are most sure to fall. 

“In the days of good things be not unmindful of evils” (Ecclusiasticus 11.27).

Continue reading “Detachment and Prayer”

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves” (Matthew 7:17).

In June 2008, the “Atheism Bus Campaign” was launched in London. A bus set out to tour the country with words in large print saying, “There is probably no God. Stop worrying. Enjoy your life.” Immediately, money poured in to support the campaign. Over ₤140,000 were raised to spread the word. Probably? Is that not a little disconcerting? What if there is a God and that makes all the difference in the way we need to life? Yet, the bus seemed to say just the thing that people were feeling. Is that not our culture? We look at truth with a comic shrug. 

Continue reading “Crippled By Wrong Beliefs”