Daily Gospel Reflection
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March 11, 2024
At that time Jesus left [Samaria] for Galilee.
For Jesus himself testified
that a prophet has no honor in his native place.
When he came into Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him,
since they had seen all he had done in Jerusalem at the feast;
for they themselves had gone to the feast.
Then he returned to Cana in Galilee,
where he had made the water wine.
Now there was a royal official whose son was ill in Capernaum.
When he heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea,
he went to him and asked him to come down
and heal his son, who was near death.
Jesus said to him,
“Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe.”
The royal official said to him,
“Sir, come down before my child dies.”
Jesus said to him, “You may go; your son will live.”
The man believed what Jesus said to him and left.
While the man was on his way back,
his slaves met him and told him that his boy would live.
He asked them when he began to recover.
They told him,
“The fever left him yesterday, about one in the afternoon.”
The father realized that just at that time Jesus had said to him,
“Your son will live,”
and he and his whole household came to believe.
Now this was the second sign Jesus did
when he came to Galilee from Judea.
If I’m being honest, I probably need to include myself in that category of people about whom Jesus says, “Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe.”
Since the National Eucharistic Revival began a couple of years ago, I have been reflecting on my belief in the Real Presence of Jesus, body, blood, soul, and divinity in the Eucharist. That belief doesn’t come easily to me. I researched some of the Eucharistic miracles in which extraordinary things happened during the consecration, and I find myself thinking, “If I had been there to see it, I would believe.”
As I prayed for a greater belief in the Real Presence, I thought: “Believing is not the same as knowing something for sure. It’s a choice. Believing is living as if something is true.” And if Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist, how would I receive such a wonderful gift?
Since that insight, I have received the Eucharist on my knees. That’s certainly not the norm in the church my family and I attend, and I’m more than a little mortified each time I kneel before the Eucharistic Minister because I don’t like to stand out. I’m not doing it because I have a new-found certainty of Jesus’s Real Presence in the Eucharist. But I’m making a choice— choosing to live as if it is true.
Yes, Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief.
Prayer
Lord, hear those who call out for healing of body, mind, and spirit. May we unite with the sufferings of our brothers and sisters as they call out for your healing. Amen.
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Saint of the Day

St. Teresa Margaret Redi, also known as Teresa Margaret of the Sacred Heart, is one of seven discalced Carmelite religious women who has been declared a saint. She was an intensely spiritual and private religious, who devoted her life to quiet prayer in service of the love of God.
Teresa was born in the Italian city of Arezzo in 1747, to a wealthy, noble family. Her baptismal name was Anna Maria Redi. At the age of nine, she was sent to a Benedictine boarding school in Florence. Her course was decided by the example of one of her older schoolmates. One of the girls who had graduated from the boarding school several years before approached one of Anna Maria's teachers to thank her for the education and the Christian formation, as she was entering the Carmelites. Anna Maria saw the deep joy on this young woman's face and instantly knew that she, too, desired to enter the Carmelites. Anna Maria, like many saints on fire with God, decided to pursue joy.
In the spring of 1764, Anna Maria returned home and began to live as a Carmelite in her own home, to practice the disciplines of the order. That September, she applied to the Monastery of St. Teresa in Florence. She was admitted that November. She took the name Teresa Margaret of the Sacred Heart and professed her vows in March of 1766.
Teresa was assigned the role of community nurse, and she tenderly cared for the suffering sisters in her care, particularly those experiencing mental illness. Teresa devoted herself to caring for her fellow sisters and cultivating her robust interior life. As a Carmelite sister, Teresa maintained the disposition of joy that drew her to the order, despite rebukes and harsh treatment. She continually repeated the phrase from 1 John 4:8: "God is love," and received deep insight into it in prayer.
Teresa died at the age of twenty-three, on March 11, 1770, in the midst of an outbreak of a disease in the monastery. She continued caring for other ill nuns until she reached her deathbed. Teresa's body, swollen from disease, at the time of her funeral, had miraculously been restored to its healthy form.
St. Teresa Margaret Redi, mystic and Carmelite, who fully embodied the truth that "God is love"—pray for us!
Image Credit: Our featured image of St. Teresa Margaret Redi is in the public domain. Last accessed February 6, 2025 on Wikimedia Commons.