April 4, 2020

Ezekiel 37:21–28; Jeremiah 31:10, 11–12abcd, 13; John 11:45–57

The prophet Ezekiel proclaims that the Lord will bring the Israelites back from exile and return them to their own land. Catherine of Siena may have meditated on that prophetic word, from our First Reading, as she struggled to reform the church in the fourteenth century.

One week ago, Pope Francis celebrated a special service blessing the city of Rome and the entire world in this time of pandemic. Italy has been especially hard hit by the coronavirus, and St.