Life will be heavy, but God will do the lifting if we will let Him.

When Paul offers us the hope of being free of anxieties, he is not suggesting the world will be without worries. He is suggesting that the more our hearts are fixed on Jesus, the more we will grow into allowing the Lord to carry our burdens. While Paul applies this to marriage having more worldly worries than single people might, his teaching is far more significant when we apply it (married or single) to God’s longing to free us. We are, as the
Psalm notes, the people who have seen light in the darkness. If the demons can recognize God’s power, should we not also see it and call on it? God wants to set us free from worry and weariness. If we are struggling to
receive that freedom, we can and should reach out for help. See a spiritual director, call a therapist, do the things necessary for mental, emotional, spiritual and physical wellness. Seek God’s healing in all the places it can be found. His abundant life includes our freedom, and He will carry us through it, if we let Him.

Healing Jesus, help us see where we have been enslaved and weighed down by burdens you want to lift from us. Give us the courage to set them before you and allow you to lift them with us and from us. May we seek the healing and freedom you desire for us. Amen.

Taken from CCCB – Reflection

God’s life plan is frequently uncomfortable.

How often do we resist what God asks of us because it makes us uncomfortable or scares us? The readings today remind us that God often asks His people to go to places they would rather not. Jonah is asked to go to people he finds repulsive. Simon, Andrew, James, and John leave everything to follow Jesus.

What comforts, habits, attitudes or behaviors are you attached to that might be preventing you from following Jesus?

Through what discomforts, disruptions or invitations might God be speaking right now?

Spend some time this week with the uncomfortable, and ask God to show you how you could follow Him out of your comfort zone.

Migrant Mover, you pitched a tent in the desert, walked out to fishing boats, weathered storms, fed crowds without money — and you ask us to follow you. Show us where our attachment to, and comfort with, our lives keeps us from serving you the way you desire. Draw us into your divine movement, going out to seek all who are searching for you. Amen.

Taken from the CCCB – Reflection

Life requires us to listen for God.

The first reading is a wonderful lesson for us in the effort and messiness of listening to God. Three times, God calls to Samuel, but Samuel thinks it is Eli calling. With Eli’s help, Samuel identifies that God is sending him a message, and opens his ears and heart to what God has to say. How often do we need to hear God multiple times before we recognize the messenger (let alone the message)? Lots of us have experienced change during the pandemic, whether it is change to employment status, daily routines and activities, connections with others, or workplace and school adaptations. Change can affect our ability to listen. What is God saying to you right now? What is He asking? Open your ears and your heart to hear what He is saying to you this week.

God of whispers and windstorms, open our hearts and our ears to hear you speaking. May we keep seeking you when you nudge us until we can hear you clearly. May your words take root in us so that your life grows in us with each whispered word. Amen.

Taken from the CCCB – Reflection

We have been chosen and anointed for life, as it is.

At the end of the Christmas season, we enter the coldest part of the year in much of Canada. This year, we enter it after a very different Christmas in quarantine. It is easy to become discouraged, or even angry with God
in seasons of suffering, loss, or isolation. But these beautiful readings on this wonderful feast of Jesus’ Baptism remind us He was called into the world to love and bless it as it was, and so are we. God does not call us to, or
commission us for, a perfect world that doesn’t exist, but for the perfectly imperfect world into which He has placed us. We are His beloved children, chosen for this time in history, called to build the Kingdom with Him
here and now. We have been baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit to be conduits of God’s love for the world. So call a lonely friend. Make one more meal for the people who don’t always appreciate it. Go
back for another shift as an essential worker. Pray hard for someone suffering more than you. Every little act of love of the baptized is a participation in grace – even and especially in a world plagued by COVID.

Baptized Jesus, you were anointed to walk among us, beloved and chosen by the Father, and you have anointed and chosen us too. Remind us of the grace of our Baptism, and inspire us to love the world as it is, especially when the world is hurting. Amen.

Taken from the CCCB – Reflection
Roman Catholic Diocese of Calgary

“We are the gift God longs to receive.”

In the first reading, Isaiah reminds the Israelites exiled in Babylon that they, not the fallen kingdom, are God’s glory. When the Magi bring gifts for Jesus, they celebrate the One who will redeem God’s people. The second reading reminds us that the promises made to the Israelites have been offered through Jesus to all people, Jews and Gentiles. The Magi – or Wise Men and traditionally also kings – point us to the King who longs to love and save each and every one of us, to draw us into the divinity of God. What a gift it is to discover we are nothing more or less than the beloved children of God.

“Infant King, you came as one of us to gather us to yourself. Draw us into your tenderness with all the wonder of a newborn. May we find ourselves as precious as you have made us, and may we make of our lives a gift to you. Amen.“

Taken from CCCB – Reflection