When we hear Jesus’ disciples being criticized for picking grains of wheat on the Sabbath to eat, which the Pharisees would consider work, with work on the Sabbath being prohibited under Jewish law, we might consider how we consecrate the Sabbath in our own lives through our words and our actions. When some parishioners tell me that they are unable to attend mass on a particular weekend because they are traveling, I tell them that they could honor the Sabbath in some other way, such as reflecting on the readings for that day and doing an act of mercy or watching the mass online on the internet. Sometimes the Pharisees saw the letter of the law as more important as the spirit of the law. How indeed are we honoring the Sabbath in our lives? Unfortunately, many in our society do not worry about keeping the Sabbath holy in any sense. But that is what God is commanding us to do. And not just on the Sabbath. How do we cultivate a life of holiness every day.
The saint we celebrate today is one of the most honored saints in the Catholic Church, Mother Teresa of Calcutta. We have been celebrating the feast day of Mother Teresa on September 5 since she was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 2003 and canonized by Pope Francis in the extraordinary Jubilee year of Mercy in 2016. In February 2025, before Pope Francis entered eternal life, it was announced that according to his wishes, her feast day would be official inserted in the Roman calendar on this date as an optional memorial. During this announcement, Cardinal Roche of the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments offered praise for Mother Teresa, stating that she was “a beacon of hope (in the world), … a witness to the dignity and privilege of humble service in the defense of all human life and of all those who have been abandoned, discarded and despised even in the hiddenness of the womb.” Born in August 26, 1910 in North Montenegro in the city of Skopje to a family of Albanian ancestry, she entered the sisters of Loreto in Calcutta, India in 1937. She left that order in 1950 to found the Missionaries of Charity, an order that now has over 6,000 sisters in more than 130 countries throughout the world, serving the poor and those most in need. During her lifetime, she was recognized many times in the Church and in the secular world for her extraordinary life of service, being awarded the Nobel prize for peace in 1979. She died on September 5, 1997. Mother Teresa’s very simple but profound quotes often center on God’s love, service to others, and the importance of small acts of kindness. She once said, “Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.”
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