Monday, December 14, 2026 — Memorial of Saint John of the Cross, Priest and Doctor of the Church
By what authority?
Matthew 21:23-27
Readings of the day: Numbers 24:2-7, 15-17a; Psalm 25:4-5ab, 6-7bc, 8-9; Matthew 21:23-27.
The Gospel
The chief priests and the elders come to Jesus as he teaches in the temple and ask him by what authority he does these things. Jesus answers their question with a question of his own: was the baptism of John from heaven or from men? They weigh what each answer would cost them, and at last they say, “We do not know.” So Jesus says to them, “Neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things.”
Reflection
They knew, but they would not say so. “In saying that they knew not, they lied,” says St. Jerome: they had seen John’s baptism and the works of Jesus, yet they hid behind a careful “We do not know,” because either answer would cost them something. Truth is not kept from those who seek it; as Rabanus teaches, it is kept back from those who ask while unfit to receive it, or who hate and despise it. The priests came to test Jesus, not to learn from him, and a question asked to trap rather than to learn finds no answer. Advent asks us the same question in reverse: when God puts a question to us that we already know the answer to, will we speak it honestly? The door to truth opens for the heart that stops calculating and says what it knows.
From the Fathers
“In saying that they knew not, they lied.”
— St. Jerome, Commentary on Matthew, in the Catena Aurea on Matthew 21:23–27
“There are two reasons why the knowledge of truth should be kept back from those who ask; either when he who asks is unfit to receive, or from his hatred or contempt of the truth is unworthy to have that which he asks opened to him.”
— St. Rabanus Maurus, in the Catena Aurea on Matthew 21:23–27
Saint of the day
Saint John of the Cross (1542–1591), Spanish Carmelite priest and mystic, Doctor of the Church. With St. Teresa of Avila he founded the Discalced Carmelites, and his writings, The Dark Night and The Spiritual Canticle, guide souls through purification to union with God. He died on 14 December 1591 and was canonized in 1726.
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Sources: the day’s readings follow the daily lectionary (USCCB, Lectionary 187). The Gospel text is not reproduced here; read it at the link above. Patristic quotes: Catena Aurea on Matthew 21:23–27, compiled by St. Thomas Aquinas, translated by John Henry Newman (1841, public domain).