Msgr. Roger J. Landry
National Director, The Pontifical Mission Societies
Daily Reflection for October 30, 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 coming to you from a Manhattan rooftop. It’s October 30th. Today in the Gospel, people come up to warn Jesus that Herod is trying to kill him. And he says, “Go and tell that fox that today, tomorrow, and the third day, I am casting out demons and healing the sick, but on that third day, I will accomplish my purpose.” And then he says, “I must continue on my journey today, tomorrow, and the third day because a prophet can’t die outside of Jerusalem.” Jesus by mentioning that first, second, and the third day is prophesying what’s going to happen in his passion, death, and resurrection. And through that work, he’s healing us, and he’s exercising us of the devil’s victory, of the devil’s clutches. He’s defeating the devil once and for all. But he laments that not everybody’s open to receiving that extraordinary gift. And so he weeps and he says, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often I have tried to gather you under my wings just like a hen does her brood, but you are unwilling.” That of course is so much of salvation history of how God wanted to do that for his beloved sons and daughters in Jerusalem. But how much he wants to do it for the entire human race. He wants to embrace us, to gather us, to protect us, but we’ve got to be willing. We’ve got to want it. We’ve got to choose it. And he says, “But you were unwilling.” And he says, “Unfortunately, your house is going to be abandoned.” And that would occur in 70 AD. But it would likewise occur when they were abandoning Jesus, the true temple. And that can happen to anybody. The extraordinary work of the mission of the church is to spread Jesus’s accomplishments on that first, the second, and the third day. Not just to inform people about them, but to form people by them, to help them enter into Jesus’ love, his suffering, death, and his resurrection. That is the way we are ultimately brought underneath Jesus’s protection not just in this world but forever. That’s what he desires to do. To gather us as a hen gathers or brood not in the earthly Jerusalem alone but in the heavenly Jerusalem. This is the great mission of the church. So today let’s continue that mission of the Lord Jesus. He still wants to heal. He still wants to exercise. He still ultimately wants to love. But he’s asked for you and me to gather the people of the world underneath his wings. A lot of work to do today. God bless you.
The Gospel reading on which the reflection was based on:
Gospel
Some Pharisees came to Jesus and said,
“Go away, leave this area because Herod wants to kill you.”
He replied, “Go and tell that fox,
‘Behold, I cast out demons and I perform healings today and tomorrow,
and on the third day I accomplish my purpose.
Yet I must continue on my way today, tomorrow, and the following day,
for it is impossible that a prophet should die
outside of Jerusalem.’
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you,
how many times I yearned to gather your children together
as a hen gathers her brood under her wings,
but you were unwilling!
Behold, your house will be abandoned.
But I tell you, you will not see me until the time comes when you say,
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.”