February 12, 2025 // Wednesday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time
Read the Word // Open your Bible to today’s Gospel: Mark 7:14-23
Reflect on the Word //
From the Saturday morning kids’ shows of my youth that taught me I could be anything I wanted to be if only I would believe in myself, to the girl-power pop songs of my young adulthood, which insisted that I’m perfect just the way I am and not to let anyone tell me differently, I was fed a steady diet of self-empowerment messaging throughout my formative years.
It wasn’t until marriage and motherhood inspired me to learn about my Catholic faith and take it seriously that I realized, hey, I might not be quite so perfect as I had been led to believe. I began to see the consequences of my inclinations towards sin and selfishness as a “me problem," rather than just a failure of others to celebrate and appreciate me enough, warts and all. What if focusing on loving and serving Jesus and my family and my neighbor more, and myself less, would help, like, actually rid me of some warts?
Jesus, speaking to His disciples in today’s Gospel, makes it clear that it’s not outside factors, but our own sins that create our suffering: “From within the man, from his heart, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils come from within and they defile” (Mark 7:21-23).
This tendency towards sin in us—a result of Original Sin—is called “concupiscence” (see CCC § 2514-2519). And, really, it explains so much. It also leads us to the solution: it’s not believing in ourselves more (sorry, cartoons); it’s not blaming others (sorry, pop songs); rather, it’s strengthening and purifying our hearts and taming our inclination to sin by practicing love and prayer and sacrifice.
For me, it was a whole new way of looking at myself and the world, but it was one that lined up with my life experience, and one that, slowly and steadily, has borne fruit in my life. Maybe I can’t be anything I want to be, but—through God’s grace—I might be able to be what God wants me to be.
Relate to the Lord // What “warts” has Jesus healed or set you free from? Which ones still need purifying?
Kendra Tierney Norton is grateful to be a wife, mother, and stepmother. She lives in the wilds of unincorporated Los Angeles County in a big old fixer-upper house with her husband and a varying number of their combined fourteen children, plus one fish, two cats, and twenty chickens. She likes to say that her goal is keeping Catholicism weird. To that end, she is the author of books including the Catholic All Year Compendium: Liturgical Living for Real Life with Ignatius Press and O Come, Emmanuel: Advent Reflections on the Jesse Tree for Families with Emmaus Road Publishing, the creator of the TV series Catholic All Year At Home on FORMED, and the CEO of Catholic All Year, an apostolate dedicated to helping parents live out their Catholic faith and pass it along to their children.
Be a Woman of the Word
