These reflections are a result of more than 40 years of ministry as a Roman Catholic priest. Most of these years I spent in the Diocese of Charlotte which covers Western North Carolina. Now I am retired, and live in Medellín, Colombia where I continue to serve as a priest in the Archdiocese of Medellín.

WEDNESDAY, WEEK XV, ORDINARY TIME

Responsorial Psalm (Psalm 94)

R. The Lord will not abandon his people. Your people, O LORD, they trample down,
your inheritance they afflict.
 Widow and stranger they slay, 
the fatherless they murder.
 R. The Lord will not abandon his people. 
And they say, “The LORD sees not;
 the God of Jacob perceives not.”
 Understand, you senseless ones among the people; 
and, you fools, when will you be wise? 
R. The Lord will not abandon his people.
 Shall he who shaped the ear not hear?
 or he who formed the eye not see?
 Shall he who instructs nations not chastise, 
he who teaches men knowledge? 
R. The Lord will not abandon his people.
 For the LORD will not cast off his people, nor abandon his inheritance; 
But judgment shall again be with justice, and all the upright of heart shall follow it.
 R. The Lord will not abandon his people.

For people of faith, this pandemic gives rise to many doubts . . . Where is God? Why has God abandoned us? We’re suffering and God doesn’t care? The Book of Psalms, the original hymnbook of the church, can be very helpful. The psalms remind us that “the Lord will not abandon his people.”