There is a thread running through today’s Scriptures that feels both ancient and startlingly contemporary: the ache for home, the courage to rebuild, and the costly clarity of following Christ. Exiles along Babylon’s riverbanks weep for Zion; a cupbearer steels himself to ask a foreign king for leave to restore a ruined city; and three would-be disciples hear from Jesus that the Kingdom demands undivided hearts (Ps 137; Neh 2:1-8; Lk 9:57-62). Into that tapestry we celebrate Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus, whose “little way” shows how love, small and surrendered, can carry the full weight of the Gospel. The Alleluia whispers the secret of it all: to gain Christ is to count everything else as loss (Phil 3:8-9).
Homesickness and holy desire
The exiles “sat and wept” by the streams of Babylon, memory aching like a pulled muscle: “If I forget you, Jerusalem, let my tongue be silenced” (Ps 137:1, 5-6). Their vow isn’t bitterness; it’s fidelity. When songs are demanded by captors, they resist commodifying their worship (Ps 137:3-4). They keep God at the center of their joy.
Many know this homesickness: migrants between countries, students between seasons, workers between jobs, the lonely between friendships, the grieving between tears and quiet. Exile can be geographical, emotional, or spiritual. Saint Athanasius once said that in the Psalms we find our own voices—our griefs, hopes, and desires—taught back to us until they become prayer. Psalm 137 gives us permission to name our dislocation and to turn it into a pledge: whatever else clamors for attention, God’s presence will remain our first love.
Saint Jerome, the great translator of Scripture, spent his life as a pilgrim-scholar. He memorably insisted, “Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ.” Let the memory of Zion become a habit of Scripture—five unhurried minutes with a psalm, the Gospel of the day, or the simple repetition of a verse carried like a pocket-stone through the day. Holy desire is formed by holy words.
Praying and planning under pressure
Nehemiah models the way desire becomes action. He is visibly sad before the king, risks honesty, breathes a prayer, and makes a precise request: permission, safe-conduct, timber, a house (Neh 2:1-8). He does not confuse faith with passivity. He prays; he plans. He trusts; he asks. “The favoring hand of my God was upon me,” he testifies (Neh 2:8).
Rebuilding—of marriages, neighborhoods, parishes, or personal integrity—will require both the quiet of prayer and the courage of concrete steps. That might look like initiating a hard but necessary conversation, drafting a budget that aligns with values, asking for help, or writing the first email toward reconciliation. Nehemiah shows that grace often rides on the rails of good planning. Providence is not allergic to particulars.
The cost and clarity of discipleship
Three dialogues in Luke expose the sharp edge of discipleship. To boundless enthusiasm Jesus replies with poverty: “The Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head” (Lk 9:58). To genuine duty—a son’s desire to bury his father—Jesus insists on urgency: “Let the dead bury their dead. But you, go and proclaim the Kingdom of God” (Lk 9:60). To affectionate delay—“let me say farewell”—Jesus answers with a plowman’s image: once the hand is on the handle, don’t look back (Lk 9:61-62).
These are not counsels of cruelty but of clarity. Discipleship is not a hobby. It will reorder comforts, timelines, and secondary loyalties. Saint Ambrose, commenting on Luke, observed that a plowman must keep his eyes forward if the furrow is to run straight; so too the disciple’s charity faces what lies ahead and does not meander back to what was renounced. Saint Paul’s confession sharpens the focus: “I consider everything as loss because of the supreme good of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Phil 3:8). To be “found in him” (Phil 3:9) is worth any cost.
This is bracing in a world of obligations—aging parents, children’s needs, demanding jobs. The Gospel does not sanctify negligence; it sanctifies priority. There are moments when the living work of the Kingdom can’t be deferred: a person who needs mercy now, a truth that must be told today, a call that must be answered without a backward glance. The question is not “What do I abandon?” but “Whom do I follow?” When the “whom” is clear, the “what” arranges itself.
Saint Thérèse: the littleness that rebuilds the world
Therese of Lisieux, a cloistered Carmelite who died at twenty-four, is proclaimed Doctor of the Church because she grasped the Gospel’s center with luminous simplicity. Her “little way” is the path of trust and love: choosing small, hidden acts with great love; accepting one’s poverty without despair; and surrendering every ambition into the hands of the Father. She desired mission with a burning heart, yet never left her convent; she discovered that love makes every place a mission field.
Therese lived what Jesus describes. She did not hoard a “place to rest her head” in reputation or spiritual consolations; she welcomed dryness and misunderstanding as chances to love. She did not “look back” to a more comfortable self-image; she looked steadily at Jesus, confident that his mercy could carry her littleness farther than her efforts ever could. In a world that measures worth by scale and speed, she teaches that the Kingdom often advances by teaspoons: a patient reply, an unseen kindness, a silent sacrifice, a prayer offered when feelings are absent.
Her witness also harmonizes Nehemiah’s practicality with the Psalmist’s longing. She remembered Zion—Christ’s presence—with jealous fidelity, and she rebuilt the broken walls around her by investing love into ordinary tasks: laundry, chores, the sister who irritated her, the letter to a missionary, the smile for a novice who felt lost. In this way, she embodied Paul’s cry: to gain Christ is to let go of the illusion that greatness must always look large (Phil 3:8-9).
Walking this Gospel today
Keep Jerusalem before your joy: Choose one verse to carry today—perhaps “Let my tongue be silenced if I ever forget you” (Ps 137:6) or “That I may gain Christ and be found in him” (Phil 3:8-9). Return to it at lunch, during a commute, before sleep. Let desire be trained by repetition.
Pray, then plan a Nehemiah step: Name one area that needs rebuilding—your prayer routine, a strained relationship, an ethical stand at work. Pray briefly, then write a concrete, specific request or action you can take within the next 48 hours. Ask God for favor; then knock on the necessary doors (Neh 2:4-8).
Choose one “little way” act: Embrace a small inconvenience for love—a seat given up, a chore done without notice, a text sent to someone overlooked. Offer it for a person or intention. The Kingdom moves on such hidden hinges.
Practice forward-facing fidelity: Identify a recurring “look back”—a regret, old resentment, or comfortable compromise. For one week, whenever it surfaces, say: “Jesus, I choose you in this.” Keep your eyes on the furrow that charity asks you to plow today (Lk 9:62).
Rest where the Son of Man rests: If Jesus had “nowhere to rest his head” (Lk 9:58), he chose to rest in the Father’s will. End the day with a simple surrender: “Father, into your hands.” Therese would add, “I trust your love.”
Between Babylon’s rivers and Zion’s hills, between kings’ courts and city ruins, between the road and the furrow, today’s Word calls for a love that is both tender and unreserved. May Saint Thérèse teach our hearts to become small enough to be strong, and brave enough to be gentle, so that, counting all else as loss, we may gain Christ and be found in him (Phil 3:8-9).