Pier Giorgio and Carlo show us that holiness is not a thing of the past but a living reality. They gave a reason for their hope through their joy, their service to the poor, and their love for the Eucharist. And so, we too, are called to be people of good hope. Hope is a daily practice, not a mood. Hope isn’t optimism on autopilot. Hope needs to be worked at. Our Lady is our greatest model for this kind of hope. Her life is a profound testament to the power of hope.

To be a disciple is to fully embrace the identity and mission of Jesus. The cost of discipleship. Jesus must be our first priority and our all.

"What a person is before God, that they are, nothing more, nothing less." True humility recognizes that what we have and who we are, is by grace. We are not self-made people. A humble person knows this and is quick to give thanks and praise to God.

Every time we make a choice we are turning the central part of ourselves into something a little different from what it was before. All our lives we are slowly turning this central thing into a heaven creature or into a hellish creature.

In Mary’s great song of praise, which we hear in the Gospel today, she prophesies that all generations will call her blessed. We fulfill that prophecy every time we repeat Elizabeth’s words in the Hail Mary prayer, that Mary is the most blessed of all women.

Faith is something precious and important. We can ask for faith in prayer, and we can ask for an increase in faith.

St Paul teaches that our new identity calls for a radically new way of living and acting. He is quite clear that this new identity is incompatible with certain kinds of wrong behaviour. He even uses the strong language of saying that we must put to death everything in us that belongs only to earthly life. We must get rid of all those actions and ways of living that do not match up to the standards required by our nature as Christians

Why do we pray? After all, God knows us and our needs much better than we can explain them. Well, we pray because prayer is relational; it is the cement that keeps us connected to God.

When we celebrate the Mass, Jesus is present to us in four ways. He is present to us in the proclaiming of the Scriptures, the Word of God. During the Mass, it is Jesus who speaks to us when the Scripture texts are proclaimed. For everyone present, Jesus speaks to touch our hearts, to convert us, comfort us, challenge us and form us.

Trinity is a way of saying God is love. Not only is God loving, but God is love in himself. The phrase "is love" means that God's very being is structured according to love. In the Trinity, the Father is the one who loves, he is the Lover; the Son is the one who is loved, he is the Beloved; and the Holy Spirit is the love they have for each other.

On Pentecost Sunday, we remember the gift of the Holy Spirit. God’s personal, powerful presence poured into our lives to guide, comfort, and transform us. As at the first Pentecost, we are invited to be “pentecosted,” living daily in the Spirit’s love, strength, and mission.

The Ascension of Jesus is not his going away from us, but rather his coming infinitely closer to us. In St Matthew’s version of the Ascension, Jesus promises, “Behold I am with you always, even to the close of the age.”