Daily Gospel Reflection
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May 19, 2026
Jesus raised his eyes to heaven and said,
“Father, the hour has come.
Give glory to your son, so that your son may glorify you,
just as you gave him authority over all people,
so that your son may give eternal life to all you gave him.
Now this is eternal life,
that they should know you, the only true God,
and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ.
I glorified you on earth
by accomplishing the work that you gave me to do.
Now glorify me, Father, with you,
with the glory that I had with you before the world began.
“I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world.
They belonged to you, and you gave them to me,
and they have kept your word.
Now they know that everything you gave me is from you,
because the words you gave to me I have given to them,
and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you,
and they have believed that you sent me.
I pray for them.
I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me,
because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours
and everything of yours is mine,
and I have been glorified in them.
And now I will no longer be in the world,
but they are in the world, while I am coming to you.”
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.
During his recent trip to Algeria, Pope Leo, our first Augustinian pope, visited Annaba, the modern site of the ancient city of Hippo, where St. Augustine ministered as bishop. Writing the opening prayer of his Confessions, Augustine asks the Lord what comes first: “To know you or to call upon you? Must we know you before we can call upon you?…But how can people call upon someone in whom they do not yet believe? And how can they believe without a preacher?”
Today’s gospel invites these questions as it tells us that eternal life consists of knowing God and Jesus Christ, whom God has sent. How do people come to know the Lord? How can they without a witness to show the way?
Fortunately for us, Jesus reveals God the Father so that we can know, love, and serve the Lord, and he in turn sends us so that we can help others to do the same. I feel convicted by this call to bear witness to Christ, both because it is a clear expectation Jesus communicates to his followers and because I often fall short of meeting that expectation. Of course, this is not limited to words, although I often feel like that can be the most difficult form of bearing witness. Rather, we are called to conform our whole lives to imitate Christ, to accomplish the works of God as he did, to love our neighbor.
As the gospels note in Jesus’ own ministry, this begins in prayer, which draws us closer to God and strengthens us to share God with others. This union with God leads us to that eternal life where, as Augustine writes in that same opening prayer, our hearts, so restless in this world, will finally be able to find rest in God.
Prayer
Take Lord, and receive, all our liberty, our memory, our understanding, and our entire will. Everything we have is yours. All is gift. Jesus, remember us, when we come into your kingdom. This day, teach us how to truly pray. Amen.
Saint of the Day
St. Ivo is the patron saint of lawyers because of the great lengths he went to serve his clients and the poor.
He was born to an aristocratic family in Brittany in 1253, in the northwest part of France. As a teenager, he was sent to schools in Paris, where he excelled as a student, and went on to study law under a famous jurist in Orleans. As a student, he began practicing self-mortification to discipline his will—he abstained from meat and wine, ate only bread and water during Lent and Advent, and slept on a simple straw mat.
When he completed his training in the law, he took on a role judging cases that came before the Church’s court in a nearby diocese. He used his position to protect orphans and defend the poor, and he did so with such charity and kindness that he reconciled many of those who lost their cases to his decision.
He was recalled to serve the bishop in his home diocese in Brittany, where he continued to defend the marginalized; he became known as “the poor man’s advocate.” When his clients faced charges in civil courts, he would defend them there, too, and would visit them in prison and even pay their expenses. He went to great lengths to reconcile opposing parties so that they would not argue the case in court and begin unnecessary and costly lawsuits. It was customary in his culture to offer bribes and presents to lawyers, even before engaging their representation, but Ivo never accepted these gifts.
In 1284, Ivo was ordained a priest, and three years later, he left his practice of the law to dedicate all of his energy to his parishioners. He built a hospital and worked there himself to help care for the sick. He often gave the clothes off his back to people he found on the street. Ivo once found a homeless man sleeping on his doorstep, and insisted that the man sleep in his bed inside; Ivo himself took the man’s place sleeping on the doorstep.
Ivo was a great preacher and would visit other churches to speak to congregations there. After 15 years of leading people as a priest, he died of an illness on this date in 1303. He was 50 years old.
St. Ivo is depicted in stained glass windows from the Basilica. He is also depicted with the symbol of the bread he shared with the poor in this imagery from the exterior of the Eck Hall of Law on campus.
St. Ivo, you were known as “the poor man’s advocate” and are the patron saint of lawyers—pray for us!
View a FaithND prayer card for lawyers that asks for St. Ivo's intercession here.