Today's Feast: St. Andrew

Today's gospel for the feast of St. Andrew recounts how Christ called him and his brothers, who were busy with their fisherman's nets. They left their nets to follow the Lord. Grace builds on nature, and so these fishermen took up new a new net, the one Mother Teresa named joy. "Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls," she said, adding that "A joyful heart is the inevitable result of a heart burning with love." Another woman by the name of Teresa comes to my mind, St. Teresa of the Andes. She wasn't even 20 years old when she died -- just 19 years, 9 months! -- but her life of radiant, vibrant joy has caught many souls for the Lord, whom she called her only joy, the joy of her life. "You are loved by the God who is infinite joy," she once told her brother -- and so we are, thanks be to God!

Dear Lord, please catch me and keep me forever in your net of joy, so that through me others may know the joy of your love. Amen.