Scripture this week assures us that God hears the cries of God’s people, knows our suffering, and rescues us.

Preachers may need to be reminded from time to time not to fall into the Luke trap. Many of us have been lulled into thinking that Luke is the warm fuzzy gospel wherein Jesus gives a big group hug to Romans and Samaritans, lepers and tax collectors and prostitutes, not to mention women in general. Luke reveals Jesus in his most liberal and inclusive mood, when everybody and everything is OK by God, right?

A few years back, a professor at a Christian college created controversy when she expressed her solidarity with Muslim students by wearing a hijab and stating that Christians and Muslims “worship the same God.”

Not long ago I attended the funeral of my beloved Uncle Don. At the end of the Mass, one of his three sons, Tom, stood to give the eulogy. Tom talked about his father’s growing up in New Jersey, his migration to the Midwest to attend college, and his marriage to Mary Jane, their mother.

As we begin the remembrance of our Lord’s Passion, we call to mind the failures and sins from which he saves us.

Faith consists in being vitally concerned with that ultimate reality to which I give the symbolical name of God. Whoever reflects earnestly on the meaning of life is on the verge of an act of faith.