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Reflection on the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Posted on January 25, 2026, by Eleanor Craig SL

Isaiah 8:23-9:3            1 Corinthians 1:10-17             Matthew 4:12-23

This is the third time, the third Sunday, that the Gospel invites us to walk with Jesus at the very beginning of his public life. First we witnessed him on the banks of the Jordan River, baptized by John, chosen by God. Then we listened to the Baptist introduce Jesus as the light of the nations. We heard John assert that this Jesus will bring light into the darkness for people of all times and places.

Now, this morning, we walk with Jesus from Nazareth to Capernaum as he begins to preach the coming of the kingdom and gathers followers along the way. In the background, from today’s first reading, we hear the chorus of the last two Sundays: This Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s promise to send light for people who sit in darkness in all times and places.

Today, we urgently need to hear the good news of God’s light, to live into it, to learn to trust it. In this present moment what seems an onslaught of darkness is deeply troubling — worldwide conflicts, national political and social turmoil, our own Community’s diminishment and loss, and the emotional burdens of anxiety, grief and fear that such darkness evokes. In the middle of darkness, it helps to hear good news again and again. 

Enduring Light is present over all the world. Healing Light shines in every dark corner. Unfailing Light accompanies each of us, and every one of our sisters and brothers, through this day and into tomorrow. Light for all the world is with all of us.

Please sit for a few moments in the quiet of your own reflections, trusting that God’s Light embraces all.

Eleanor Craig SL

Sister Eleanor Craig SL, Loretto Community Historian, served as director of the Loretto Heritage Center Archives and Museum from 2012-2020. While beginning her Loretto ministry as a math teacher, she soon developed a way of teaching life lessons through storytelling and adventure traveling, including, as Eleanor once put it, leading more wagon trains along the old western trails than any mountain man. She is guided by an inner passion for the natural world, for history in its natural context, and for teaching beyond the walls of a school. Now into her 80th decade, Eleanor is still avidly listening, reading and writing, and telling true stories.