Daily Gospel Reflection
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June 27, 2026
When Jesus entered Capernaum,
a centurion approached him and appealed to him, saying,
“Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully.”
He said to him, “I will come and cure him.”
The centurion said in reply,
“Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof;
only say the word and my servant will be healed.
For I too am a man subject to authority,
with soldiers subject to me.
And I say to one, ‘Go,’ and he goes;
and to another, ‘Come here,’ and he comes;
and to my slave, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.”
When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him,
“Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith.
I say to you, many will come from the east and the west,
and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven,
but the children of the Kingdom
will be driven out into the outer darkness,
where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.”
And Jesus said to the centurion,
“You may go; as you have believed, let it be done for you.”
And at that very hour his servant was healed. Jesus entered the house of Peter,
and saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever.
He touched her hand, the fever left her,
and she rose and waited on him. When it was evening, they brought him many
who were possessed by demons,
and he drove out the spirits by a word and cured all the sick,
to fulfill what had been said by Isaiah the prophet: He took away our infirmities and bore our diseases.
Excerpts from the Lectionary for Mass for Use in the Dioceses of the United States of America, second typical edition © 2001, 1998, 1997, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc., Washington, DC. Used with permission. All rights reserved. No portion of this text may be reproduced by any means without permission in writing from the copyright owner. The full readings of the day from the Lectionary are available here.
Matthew’s story of Jesus and the centurion reminds me of a favorite folk song I first heard and sang at Notre Dame, “Seek and Ye Shall Find.” Unsurprisingly, the lyrics tell listeners to seek, and he shall find, knock and it shall be opened, ask and it shall be answered, and love comes trickling down.
As Matthew tells it, an unnamed centurion seeks Jesus and asks him to heal his paralyzed, suffering servant. Jesus says he will come to the centurion’s home and cure the servant. Immediately, the centurion declares his unworthiness to receive Jesus into his home in the words we all pray before receiving Jesus in Holy Communion, changing only the word servant to soul.
As a Roman centurion in charge of 100 soldiers, he knows authority, sees the authority of God in Jesus, and declares it to all. Jesus recognizes the centurion’s faith and heals his servant instantly, then exorcises demons and heals the sick of other believers.
Matthew does not tell us how the centurion found faith. His seeking Jesus and asking for healing tells us what we need to know about the power of faith in Jesus. But Matthew gives us more. His centurion seeks physical healing for his servant, spiritual healing of his own soul. Matthew describes a man loving his neighbor as himself, regardless of class, and Jesus loving both.
Oh, and it seems my Notre Dame favorite folk song has been gospel music since Matthew wrote this piece of good news: believe, ask Jesus, and love comes trickling down.
Prayer
What an extraordinary man that centurion must have been. He loved his slave, which was totally against the grain of his culture. He approached Jesus knowing his fellow soldiers would probably ridicule and mock him. He was humble and respectful, unusual for a soldier of an occupying force. May we approach you, Jesus, with the centurion’s expectant yet confident faith, knowing that you will show us your mercy and give us your help. Amen.
Saint of the Day
St. Cyril of Alexandria was at the center of one of the great dramas in Christian theology, and it is thanks to his courage and clear vision that our beliefs about Jesus have been faithfully passed on to us.
He was born in Alexandria, Egypt, in the late 300s. His uncle led the Church in Alexandria, and when he died, Cyril was named bishop there. Cyril was known as a vigilant defender of the faith, and kept careful watch over the Christian communities that were under his supervision.
In 428 a monk and priest named Nestorius was named archbishop of Constantinople, a city that was the seat of the empire. Nestorius began proclaiming beliefs about Jesus that claimed he was really two persons—divine and human—and that the divine person of Jesus simply inhabited the human part of him. In short, he was teaching that Jesus was God who walked on earth wearing a human body like a suit. As a consequence, he said, Mary should not be called Mother of God, but only mother of the man, Jesus.
Cyril objected and raised the matter with the pope. The pope called a meeting in Rome to examine the claims and sided with Cyril, and had Cyril deliver the verdict to Nestorius, who was to be excommunicated unless he retracted his claims. Nestorius refused.
In 431 a large council was gathered at Ephesus to decide the matter once and for all—Cyril led the council and acted as the pope’s representative. Nestorius was in town, but refused to attend. In his absence, the council condemned his works and excommunicated him.
The story does not end there. A group of some 40 bishops from Antioch arrived to the council late, and supported Nestorius. They were not accepted to the council, so they formed their own council in town and claimed to depose Cyril.
Both sides appealed to the emperor. Confused, the emperor had both Cyril and Nestorius jailed until it could all be sorted out.
Finally, representatives from the pope arrived and explained the matter to the emperor, and Cyril was released and restored to honor. Nestorius was sent back to Antioch to retire to his monastery, and he was later further exiled to the desert. The group of bishops from Antioch reconciled with Cyril and gave a statement of their orthodoxy.
Until he died in 444, Cyril maintained the faith that was handed to him from the apostles. Even his contemporaries knew him to be a great defender of the faith. Because of his strong and clear leadership, the declarations of the Council of Ephesus continue to guide our faith today. Thanks to Cyril’s leadership, we understand Jesus’ Incarnation to mean that Jesus was fully God and fully man—one person with two natures.
This may seem like a semantic abstraction, but the implications are tremendous for Christian spirituality. In the Incarnation, God fully joined our humanity in the person of Jesus. This was not God paying us a visit or pretending to be human for a while—God became human in every way except for sin. This means that every part of our humanity has the potential to connect us with the divine—we can find God in beauty and goodness, in relationships and learning truth, for example. Even our daily experience—the mundane progression of our days—can be a source of connection to the divine for us.
St. Cyril of Alexandria has been named a doctor of the Church, a title given to 38 saints who are known for elucidating the faith by their words or example—he is known as the Doctor of the Incarnation. His relics rest in the reliquary chapel in the Basilica.
St. Cyril of Alexandria, you guided the Church through heresy and handed us the faith we live today—pray for us!
Image Credit: Our featured image of St. Cyril of Alexandria available for use under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. Last accessed March 19, 2025 on Wikimedia Commons.
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