Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Daily Reflection for July 20, 2025
Here is the video of today’s reflection:
The Youtube generated transcript for today’s reflection is:
I’m Monsignor Roger Landry, National Director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in front of the house of the Archbishop of Krakow, which is where St. John Paul II lived when he was the Archbishop here between 1967 and 1978 and where he would stay when he would come back on his many trips to Poland as the 264th Peter. Looking at the house where we receive so many guests, it’s an opportunity for us to ponder today’s gospel in which Jesus welcomed in Bethany at the house of Martha and Mary. But Martha and Mary, these two sisters who love Jesus very much, received him in two totally different ways. Mary received Jesus by sitting at his feet just letting him speak and be received with her great feminine genius. Martha served Jesus. She worked very hard, no doubt, to clean the house, but she was working in the kitchen to prepare a meal that Jesus definitely, we could know, would have appreciated. But when Martha began to complain that Mary was a lazy louch, seated at Jesus’s feet, Jesus corrected Martha with tenderness. He said, “Martha, Martha, you’re worried and anxious about many things.” And then he taught her and us only one thing is necessary. And what’s that one thing? Mary had recognized it. He said, “Mary has chosen the better part. You’ve chosen a good part, but Mary’s chosen the better part, and it won’t be taken away from her.” Jesus had come to their house fundamentally to feed, not to be fed, to love, not to be loved. Though Martha was loving Jesus and trying to do something for him, he primarily wants to be received by doing something for us. That’s why he came into the world. So, as we think of the work of missionaries all across the globe led by Pope Leo, we remember that it’s first and foremost work to try to get people to receive Jesus as he wishes to be received, to welcome them, to welcome him into their life, into their home, into their day-to-day existence. That’s what made St. John Paul II so great. And having welcomed Jesus within, he was able to go help the whole world welcome him and learn how to serve him because he worked as hard as St. Martha did. God bless you.
The Gospel reading on which the reflection was based was:
Jesus entered a village
where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him.
She had a sister named Mary
who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak.
Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said,
“Lord, do you not care
that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving?
Tell her to help me.”
The Lord said to her in reply,
“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.
There is need of only one thing.
Mary has chosen the better part
and it will not be taken from her.”