Daily Gospel Reflection
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March 28, 2026
Many of the Jews who had come to Mary
and seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him.
But some of them went to the Pharisees
and told them what Jesus had done.
So the chief priests and the Pharisees
convened the Sanhedrin and said,
“What are we going to do?
This man is performing many signs.
If we leave him alone, all will believe in him,
and the Romans will come
and take away both our land and our nation.”
But one of them, Caiaphas,
who was high priest that year, said to them,
“You know nothing,
nor do you consider that it is better for you
that one man should die instead of the people,
so that the whole nation may not perish.”
He did not say this on his own,
but since he was high priest for that year,
he prophesied that Jesus was going to die for the nation,
and not only for the nation,
but also to gather into one the dispersed children of God.
So from that day on they planned to kill him.
So Jesus no longer walked about in public among the Jews,
but he left for the region near the desert,
to a town called Ephraim,
and there he remained with his disciples.
Now the Passover of the Jews was near,
and many went up from the country to Jerusalem
before Passover to purify themselves.
They looked for Jesus and said to one another
as they were in the temple area, “What do you think?
That he will not come to the feast?”
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.
Many years ago, my dad told me a story: There was once a man who desperately wanted to win the lottery. Every day, he’d say the same prayer. “God help me win the lottery.” Yet day after day, he’d do the same thing, say the same prayer, and never win. At the end of his life, the man asked God why his prayer was never answered. God responded, “I could have, but you never bought a ticket”.
In today’s gospel, we hear the chief priests and Pharisees ask, “What are we going to do?” Perhaps in this Lent the question sounds more like “What should we do?” Here, the story of the man and the lottery immediately comes to mind.
As a college student at Notre Dame, there is a constant cycle of discerning what your next step will be. Just when you’ve settled into your summer job, it’s time to find another. It is a blessing to have options, but it can also be difficult to know which one God is calling you to. I find myself at times envying the man who had the certainty of knowing the path he wanted in winning the lottery, but what sort of ticket should we buy? How will we know this is the lottery God wants us to play in? Should we even want to win the lottery in the first place?
Another key part of the question in today’s gospel is “we.” As much as our vocation can feel like an individual journey of who God is calling us to become, we aren’t on this journey alone. In this second half of Lent, as we all discern what God is calling us to do, let’s ask these questions together and rejoice in the community that we have been given.
Prayer
Father, your beloved Son Jesus was anointed in the Spirit and brought your healing love to our world. We pray that Christ, the light of the world, will sustain us always in faith, hope, and love. Amen.
Saint of the Day
St. Tutilo was a medieval monk who fully embodied the culture and learning of his day and presented it beautifully in his works of art.
He was born in Ireland and educated in a Benedictine monastery. He grew into a large, powerful body, and it is said that he was a formidable boxer. He joined the monastery as a monk and took on a role teaching the classics; he could preach in either Latin or Greek.
Tutilo was handsome, quick-witted, and eloquent, and it is apparent he was also a genius because he is described as a poet, orator, architect, painter, sculptor, metal worker, and mechanic. Music, apparently, was his real passion, and he learned to play all of the instruments that the abbey held. He was also an accomplished illustrator of texts, and he carved the ivory cover of the book of the Gospels shown here.
Despite his command of the arts, he was exceedingly humble. His works were of great interest, even to kings, and tried to avoid notice when he had to travel to large cities where he shared his music or applied his talent to the building of churches. He died in the year 915.
St. Tutilo, you were the boxing man of letters who reflected God’s beauty in your works of art, pray for us!
Image Credit: Our featured image of the carving by St. Tutilo is available for use under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. Last accessed April 2, 2025 on Wikimedia Commons.
