Hearing The Word

A weekly newsletter delivering context and insight into the Sunday Gospels.

November 9, 2025

Feast of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica in Rome

John 2:13-22

Since the Passover of the Jews was near,

Jesus went up to Jerusalem.

He found in the temple area those who sold oxen, sheep, and doves,

as well as the money-changers seated there.

He made a whip out of cords

and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen,

and spilled the coins of the money-changers

and overturned their tables,

and to those who sold doves he said,

"Take these out of here,

and stop making my Father's house a marketplace."

His disciples recalled the words of Scripture,

Zeal for your house will consume me.

At this the Jews answered and said to him,

"What sign can you show us for doing this?"

Jesus answered and said to them,

"Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up."

The Jews said,

"This temple has been under construction for forty-six years,

and you will raise it up in three days?"

But he was speaking about the temple of his Body.

Therefore, when he was raised from the dead,

his disciples remembered that he had said this,

and they came to believe the Scripture

and the word Jesus had spoken.

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To Be Consumed for the Father's Mission

~Rev. Jordan Kelly, O.P.

Director of Music and Liturgy at Saint Patrick

John’s Gospel offers four accounts of Jesus visiting the Holy City Jerusalem. Today, at the beginning of Christ’s public ministry John presents a dramatic and prophetic Christ who is consumed by His desire to complete the Father’s Mission. John places this encounter at the very beginning of Jesus ministry, while the Synoptics place it just before the Passion Narrative. The synoptics placement of the parable may be more conceivable, but John’s placement reveals a much deeper, a much greater reality.

Jesus comes to Jerusalem as the Passover draws near. Like our high holy days, the Temple was filled with pilgrims. Upon entering, Jesus does not find prayer and adoration, but rather consumers and merchants exchanging coinage that bears the mark of another emperor, not the mark of His Father’s Kingdom.

Enraged by such an offense, Jesus upsets the usual manner of sacrifice for His day. This upset signifies the change that Christ will affect through the Paschal Mystery. Only John places the word “marketplace” of the lips of our Savior. Christ’s proclamation is a way for Him to alert His hearers, that the Lord is in their midst.

As the Gospel continues, we encounter one of the great Johannine themes: Jesus’ relationship with His Father. It is this relationship and Christ’s revelation that all He does, He does with, in, and through the Father. It is this unbreakable unity that consumes Christ and His every word and action.

Because of this unity, Christ can easily proclaim that if the Temple were destroyed, He could restore it in three days. This restoration is no physical building, but hearts consumed to one with the Father, through Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit!

Purity of Our Hearts in Worship

~Jeannette Williams

Our Lady of Sacred Heart + Hilltown, Pa.



My husband and I just returned from a trip of a lifetime, visiting our daughter who is in Rome for the semester. My goal was to make our trip a pilgrimage, rather than a site-seeing adventure. While we did visit the Forum, we focused on visiting churches and saints, and we were able to pray at 25 different churches, walk through all four Holy Doors, and attend the canonization of one of my favorites, St. Bartolo Longo!

Every church we entered, even those small churches we happened to pass while we were strolling, left us in awe; no effort had been withheld in creating a church worthy of God. The Masses we attended, including Mass at St. Peter’s Basilica and St. John Lateran, were reverent, beautiful, and transcendent.

This was certainly true of the temple of Jerusalem, as well. We can only imagine its beauty and the profoundness of its rituals! And yet, we see from Jesus’ actions that at least some people had lost their sense of awe and wonder in that sacred place; the sellers and money-changers were providing items necessary for worship, but it had become for them a business, a “marketplace,” not an act of service to the worshipers.

For me, this Gospel is a reminder to refocus. Jesus’ zeal for the right worship of His Father challenges me to examine where my priorities lie. Am I getting distracted by the exteriors, or am I seeking the Lord? Even in my church ministry work, is my heart focused on the work itself or on service to God and His people?



"Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up." With these words Jesus informs us that the Old Testament worship will be replaced with His infinite sacrifice on the cross and His resurrection – HE is now the true Temple, the House of God, the One through Whom true worship is offered. Beauty and reverence in the Mass are important because we are sentient beings – what our senses experience affects how we think and feel. For this reason, those involved in liturgy should always strive for the Mass to be as beautiful and reverent as possible. But our hearts must always be focused on Christ, even as we try to build His Church. Jesus is the one for whom we should have zeal; “zeal for your house consumes me.” Jesus is that House. May the Lord give us grace to keep our focus on Him, both in our worship and in our service to His people.