The God of Being:
The Twenty-First Sunday of Ordinary Time 2026
August 23, 2026
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Isaiah 22:19-23; Psalm 138; Romans 11:33-36; Matthew 16:13-20
Who do you say that I am? Peter gets it right, while the other disciples give some good, plausible answers. Notice that each person has a different answer and distinct experience of Jesus. Peter answers “The Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Those are almost two answers. Let us start with the first one – The Christ.
Who is the Christ? We know the title means Messiah, so what do we expect the Messiah to do for us? Most would answer, “To save us.” From what? Sin and guilt. That has not happened. It kind of presupposes that we are problems to be fixed. That is a difficult starting point for theology. Is it possible that Jesus did not come to fix us, but to be in communion with us?
We sometimes project Jesus Christ to be the new powerful Goliath instead of the resilient underdog, David. The Church is a manifestation of Christ. In our perceptions, the Church is supposed to be huge, important players on the national stage, the acknowledged voice of the people, all the things Goliath was, and all the things that David was not. The irony is that David became the inflated, bullying Goliath he sought to defeat. Many want the Church today wants to be Goliath, while it is turning back into the smaller David, the one who was full of hope, confidence, and not needing any power or bombastic big talk.
Jesus was the disarmed young David who faced the Goliath of empire and death and remains that young armor-less David, armed only with trust in God. Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” because he wants to make certain they do not turn him into the King David of power, politics, and conquest. We may turn Jesus into Goliath in our imaginations, our politics, our rhetoric, and even in our worship, but Jesus never became Goliath. He remains the little guy.
The second part of the answer, the Son of the Living God, provides a fuller portrait. The role of Jesus was to be the utter embodiment in time of God’s purpose to be with us forever. We do not need to be fixed. Christ comes into communion with us as a conversation partner. The purpose of Christ’s incarnation was so that we would perpetually be in a relationship with the Triune God. God, through Jesus, showed us that “being with” us is what is important. It is what God wants most of all. The heart of our faith is that the mystery of the living God, revealed in Jesus Christ, is love itself expressed by sharing communion. If Jesus Christ were to ask me today, “Who do you say that I am?” I would have to answer, “You are God’s love and essence shared with each of us. You call us into communion and relationship with one another. You are the one who wants to be “with us.” You help us to become completely free, open to others, people who can build healthy and beautiful relationships, and you call us to embrace others as God does.” Who are you? You are God “being with” us.
Scripture for Daily Mass
Monday: (Revelation 21) The angel spoke to me, saying, "Come here. I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb." He took me in spirit to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God.
Tuesday: (2 Thessalonians 2) To this end he has also called you through our Gospel to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, brothers and sisters, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours.
Wednesday: (2 Thessalonians 3) For you know how one must imitate us. For we did not act in a disorderly way among you, nor did we eat food received free from anyone. On the contrary, in toil and drudgery, night and day we worked, so as not to burden any of you.
Thursday (1 Corinthians 1) I give thanks to my God always on your account for the grace of God bestowed on you in Christ Jesus, that in him you were enriched in every way, with all discourse and all knowledge, as the testimony to Christ was confirmed among you, so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Friday (1 Corinthians 1) Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the Gospel, and not with the wisdom of human eloquence, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its meaning. The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
Saturday (1 Corinthians 1) Consider your own calling, brothers and sisters. Not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. Rather, God chose the foolish of the world to shame the wise, and God chose the weak of the world to shame the strong.
Gospel:
Monday: (John 1) Philip found Nathanael and told him, "We have found the one about whom Moses wrote in the law, and also the prophets, Jesus son of Joseph, from
Nazareth." But Nathanael said to him, "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" Philip said to him, "Come and see."
Tuesday: (Matthew 23) Jesus said: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You pay tithes of mint and dill and cummin and have neglected the weightier things of the law: judgment and mercy and fidelity. But these you should have done, without neglecting the others.
Wednesday (Matthew 23) Jesus said, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites.
You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of filth.
Thursday (Matthew 24) Stay awake! For you do not know on which day your Lord will come. Be sure of this: if the master of the house had known the hour of night when the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and not let his house be broken into.
Friday (Matthew 25) The Kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were wise. The foolish ones, when taking their lamps, brought no oil with them, but the wise brought flasks of oil with their lamps.
Saturday (Mark 6) Herod was the one who had John the Baptist arrested and bound in prison on account of Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip, whom he had married.
John had said to Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.”
Saints of the Week
August 23: Rose of Lima (1586-1617) was the first canonized saint of the New World. She had Spanish immigrant parents in Lima. Rose joined the Dominicans and lived in her parents' garden to support them while she took care of the sick and the poor. As a girl, she had many mystical experiences as she practiced an austere life. She also had many periods of darkness and desolation.
August 24: Bartholomew (First Century), according to the Acts of the Apostles, is listed as one of the Twelve Disciples though no one for sure knows who he is. Some associate him with Philip, though other Gospel accounts contradict this point. John's Gospel refers to him as Nathaniel - a Israelite without guile.
August 25: Louis of France (1214-1270) became king at age 12, but did not take over leadership until ten years later. He had eleven children with his wife, Marguerite, and his kingship reigned for 44 years. His rule ushered in a longstanding peace and prosperity for the nation. He is held up as a paragon of medieval Christian kings.
August 25: Joseph Calasanz, priest (1556-1648), was a Spaniard who studied canon law and theology. He resigned his post as diocesan vicar-general to go to Rome to live as a pilgrim and serve the sick and the dying. He used his inheritance to set up free schools for poor families with children. He founded an order to administer the schools, but dissension and power struggles led to its dissolution.
August 27: Monica (332-387) was born a Christian in North Africa and was married to a non-Christian, Patricius, with whom she had three children, the most famous being Augustine. Her husband became a Christian at her urging and she prayed for Augustine's conversion as well from his newly adopted Manichaeism. Monica met Augustine in Milan where he was baptized by Bishop Ambrose. She died on the return trip as her work was complete.
August 28: Augustine, bishop and doctor (354-430), was the author of his Confessions, his spiritual autobiography, and The City of God, which described the life of faith in relation to the life of the temporal world. Many other writings, sermons, and treatises earned him the title Doctor of the church. In his formative years, he followed Mani, a Persian prophet who tried to explain the problem of evil in the world. His mother’s prayers and Ambrose’s preaching helped him convert to Christianity. Baptized in 387, Monica died a year later. He was ordained and five years later named bishop of Hippo and defended the church against three major heresies:Manichaeism, Donatism, and Pelagianism.
August 29: The Martyrdom of John the Baptist recalls the sad events of John's beheading by Herod the tetrarch when John called him out for his incestuous and adulterous marriage to Herodias, who was his niece and brother's wife. At a birthday party, Herodias' daughter Salome danced well earning the favor of Herod who told her he would give her almost anything she wanted.
This Week in Jesuit History
- August 23, 1558: In the First General Congregation, the question was discussed about the General's office being triennial, and the introduction of Choir, as proposed by Pope Paul IV, and it was decreed that the Constitutions ought to remain unaltered.
- August 24, 1544: Peter Faber arrived in Lisbon.
- August 25, 1666: At Beijing, the death of Fr. John Adam Schall. By his profound knowledge of mathematics and astronomy, he attained such fame that the Emperor entrusted to him the reform of the Chinese calendar.
- August 26, 1562: The return of Fr. Diego Laynez from France to Trent, the Fathers of the Council desiring to hear him speak on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.
- August 27, 1679: The martyrdom at Usk, England, of St. David Lewis, apostle to the poor in his native Wales for three decades before he was caught and hanged.
- August 28, 1628: The martyrdom in Lancashire, England, of St. Edmund Arrowsmith.
- August 29, 1541: At Rome the death of Fr. John Codure, a Savoyard, one of the first 10 companions of St. Ignatius.
