Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, July 29, 2026

Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Daily Reflection for July 29, 2026

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 the United States. It’s Wednesday, July 29th, the feast of Saints Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, and I’m coming to you from the outdoor shrine of Divine Mercy on the campus of Mundelein Seminary, St. Mary of the Lakes, in Chicago. Today’s gospel is the same gospel we had on Sunday, in which Jesus gives us the two parables of how to seize the kingdom. That the kingdom of God, that our relationship with God, God himself, is like a treasure buried in a field that’s discovered, or a pearl of great price, for which one sells everything one owns in order to be able to obtain. This shows us the importance of the kingdom that it that God is worth more than all the other good things in our life combined. We should always prioritize him in that way. That doesn’t mean he necessarily has us give up every other good thing, but we need to be willing to do it if he asks. We need to be able to grasp that he’s worth more, even as he says elsewhere, than our life, than our families of origin, than our families of choice, than our friends. God is the most important of all, and when we prioritize him in this way, then we’re able to treat the material goods with which he’s blessed us in a new way, using them for his kingdom. We’re able to love our family members and our friends differently because we’re loving them in him as his image. People who show us how to do this is are the three great saints, the friends of Jesus that we celebrate today. St. Martha, St. Mary of Bethany, and St. Lazarus, their brother. They were the ones who always gave Jesus hospitality as he was coming into the holy city of Jerusalem. He would always have to pass if he was coming up from Galilee and Jericho through Bethany in order to get um to the Mount of Olives and then from the Mount of Olives to see Jerusalem and pass through the Kidron Valley to enter into Jerusalem. They gave Jesus a true welcome. That’s why we’re supposed to be like Bethanys to welcome Jesus within us. Our homes are supposed to be Bethanys including for all those he sends out, the apostles, the missionaries, his priests and religious and fellow parishioners and you name it. Martha, Mary, and Lazarus were great witnesses of Jesus’ divine mercy. We see that for example when he raised Lazarus from the dead on the fourth day out of love for Lazarus, out of love for Martha and Mary. He had come, but he didn’t come precisely when they first asked because he wanted to be able to give them all an extraordinary miracle bringing somebody back from the dead when every Jew on the fourth day would have thought that there was no chance. Lots of us will ponder today in the gospel that scene in which Jesus was in Martha and Mary’s house, Luke 10, which Martha was in the kitchen and Mary was seated at Jesus’ feet. Jesus teaches a lesson about the priority that Mary herself had adopted that he had come to their home not primarily to be fed but to feed and it was Mary who sat at his feet receiving that nourishment. Martha loved Jesus just like Mary did and she was preparing a meal for him. But there was something more important. Jesus wanted to serve rather than be served. It was only Mary that grasped that lesson. What is the Lord asking of us? He’s asking us first to receive from him and then work in his kingdom. He wants us to be able to do work like Martha but with the contemplative heart of Mary, always choosing the better part because Jesus is in fact that pearl and that buried treasure. God bless you.

The Gospel reading on which the reflection was based on: