Daily Reflection for the Pontifical Mission Societies, July 31, 2026

Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Daily Reflection for July 31, 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 Friday, July 31st, the feast of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuits. I’m here at Mundelein Seminary, in front of a statue of Saint George, on the top of which you see Athleta Christi Nobilis, noble athlete of Christ. Saint George was the patron saint of Cardinal George Mundelein, who founded Mundelein Seminary. And this was a homage to his patron. It’s a statue that can help us on the feast of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, who indeed was a noble athlete of Christ. We get to him in a second. In today’s gospel, Jesus returns to Nazareth, to his native place. He goes into the synagogue, and people doubted him. People said, “Where’d this man get all of these incredible deeds? Is he not the son of the carpenter Joseph? Do we not know his mother, Mary, and all his brothers and sisters, all his cousins, James, Joseph, Judas, and Simon? We know who their mother was, Mary, the wife of Clopas. Are not his sisters here with us? Again, his female cousins. Mary herself didn’t have other children. She was a perpetual virgin before, during, and after Jesus’ conception and birth. But all relatives, according to Hebrews, are listed in male and female kin would be our greatest translation. The bigger point, though, is when Jesus returned home, they didn’t accept him. And so, Jesus said, “No prophet is without honor, except in his native place and in his own home.” And he couldn’t work many righteous deeds there, because people were objecting to him. We are made literally familiar with Jesus. We become a member of his family on the day of our baptism. But do we take him for granted? Does he become just a piece of art in our house? Or do we treat him with the awe he deserves? Do we have the faith such that he can work miracles for us? Or does he not work miracles because of the little faith that he finds? Saint Ignatius eventually became a became a man of great faith. He was a soldier, a noble athlete who was wounded in the Battle of Pamplona in 1521. He had his leg shattered by a cannonball that hit it straight on. So, he was convalescing for 9 months and trying to stay entertained, trying to take his mind off the pain. They didn’t have of course television and devices at the time. All they had were books. And after he was devouring the library, there were only two books left, a life of Christ and a life of the saints. And so, he began to read. And reading that life of the saints, he started to ask, “Why can’t I do what Dominic of Guzmán did, the founder of the Dominicans? Why can’t I do what Francis of Assisi did, the founder of the Franciscans?” Cooperating with God’s grace, he knew that there was no limit to what God could do, that he himself could be the one through whom the Lord would do great works in the middle of the world. So, he had a massive conversion. He basically went back to school. He had to learn Latin. He made a 9-month retreat in Manresa, a cave. And then, he founded the Jesuits at the University of Sorbonne where he studied in order to be a priest. His roommates were Francis Xavier and Peter Faber, two great saints. And off they went, the Jesuits, to transform the church, to bring the church back after the Protestant Reformation. They did it with beauty. They did it with great teaching. They did it with heroic missionary work. Today, on Saint Ignatius’ feast day, let’s ask for his help to accept Jesus as our familiar, but at the same time as God. Let’s open ourselves up in faith to what he might want to do through us because why can’t we do what Ignatius of Loyola has done?

The Gospel reading on which the reflection was based on: