Teach us to count our days aright, that we may gain wisdom of heart.

Last updated on January 2nd, 2026 at 09:14 pm

Happy New Year! The title is a quote from Psalm 90:12. As we have counted down for the New Year may we also gain wisdom of heart.  New Year Day has traditionally been a day to resolve to start the year with resolutions for improvement. For a good source for resolution material let us look at the intentions of Pope Leo XIV for the month of January.

January – For prayer with the Word of God

Let us pray that praying with the Word of God be nourishment for our lives and a source of hope in our communities, helping us to build a more fraternal and missionary Church.

Tools for the Journey

The website of US Council of Catholic Bishops provides the Lectionary for Mass for Use in the Dioceses of the United States. This is the daily Mass reading. You can sign up at that site to receive a daily email of the readings. It has been reported in a 2009 analysis of the Lectionarty, that the Sunday and weekday Lectionaries over a 2 year weekday and Sunday  cycle contain:

13.5 percent of the Old Testament (not counting the Psalms)
54.9 percent of the non-Gospel New Testament
89.8 percent of the Gospels
71.5 percent of the entire New Testament

Another valuable resource is Father Mike Schmitz’s Bible in a Year podcast available at Ascension Press Bible In a Year .

Of course there is the old fashioned yet ever blessed way of simply cracking open the Bible and reading.

A final resource is the Scriptural Rosary in which a phrase from Scripture is read before each Hail Mary. An example of this can be found at Scriptural Rosary from Knights of Columbus .

The Word of God

I find it beneficial to remind myself how blessed and sacred is the Bible. No better place to realize this than the Bible itself.

For just as from the heavens
the rain and snow come down
And do not return there
till they have watered the earth,
making it fertile and fruitful,
Giving seed to him who sows
and bread to him who eats,
So shall my word be
that goes forth from my mouth;
It shall not return to me void,
but shall do my will,
achieving the end for which I sent it. (Isaiah 55:10-11)

Reading Scripture is not like reading any other book, because Scripture is a living word through which God speaks to each of us personally, right here and now. “For in the sacred books, the Father who is in heaven meets His children with great love and speaks with them; “¹

St. Augustine wrote,

A woman cried out: Happy is the womb that bore you, blessed is that womb! But the Lord, not wishing people to seek happiness in a purely physical relationship, replied: More blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it. Mary heard God’s word and kept it, and so she is blessed. She kept God’s truth in her mind, a nobler thing than carrying his body in her womb.²

Sunday of the Word of God: January 25, 2026, dedicated to scripture. It will be celebrated on Sunday 25 January 2026, with the motto: “The word of Christ dwells among you” (Col 3:16).

Mary, Mother of God: Exploring the Solemnity and her relationship to the Word

On this First Day of 2026 we celebrate The Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God. The Blessed Virgin Mary is honored as the Mother of God because she conceived and gave birth to Christ, who is the incarnation of God the Son, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity. It is fitting to honor Mary as Mother of Jesus, following the birth of Christ. When Catholics celebrate the Solemnity of Mary Mother of God, we are not only honoring Mary, who was chosen among all women throughout history to bear God incarnate, but we are also honoring our Lord, who is fully God and fully human.

Luke tells us that Mary “kept all these things and pondered them in her heart.” As we look upon the intention of Pope Leo for January 2026, may we like Mary take on the reading of the Word of God and keep these and ponder them in our heart. In the Angelus we pray “ The angel of the Lord declared unto Mary, and she conceived of the Holy Spirit”. May we ask the Holy Spirit to help us to be open to the Word of God before read the scripture so that we too as it is declared unto us may have the Word bear fruit within our thoughts, words and deeds. As St. John Paul II taught us, “Mary’s spiritual motherhood transcends the boundaries of time and space. It is part of the Church’s history for all times, because she never ceases to exercise her maternal office or to help us.” (Signum Magnum 33) May we also implore our mother, Mary, to help us to know and love Jesus and His people more each day.

Peace and New Beginnings: World Peace Day and the Holy Spirit

The day is also World Peace Day. It is likewise a fitting occasion for renewing adoration of the newborn Prince of Peace, for listening once more to the glad tidings of the angels (cf. Lk. 2:14), and for imploring from God, through the Queen of Peace, the supreme gift of peace.”

Let us end by a reference to the hymn Veni Creator Spiritus on the first day of the year. This hymn is traditionally sung for beginnings of things, calling on the Holy Spirit before embarking on a new endeavor:

Come, Holy Spirit, Creator blest, and in our souls take up Thy rest; come with Thy grace and heavenly aid to fill the hearts which Thou hast made.

O comforter, to Thee we cry, O heavenly gift of God Most High, O fount of life and fire of love, and sweet anointing from above.

Thou in Thy sevenfold gifts are known; Thou, finger of God’s hand we own; Thou, promise of the Father, Thou Who dost the tongue with power imbue.

Kindle our sense from above, and make our hearts o’erflow with love; with patience firm and virtue high the weakness of our flesh supply.

Far from us drive the foe we dread, and grant us Thy peace instead; so shall we not, with Thee for guide, turn from the path of life aside.

Oh, may Thy grace on us bestow the Father and the Son to know; and Thee, through endless times confessed, of both the eternal Spirit blest.

Now to the Father and the Son, Who rose from death, be glory given, with Thou, O Holy Comforter, henceforth by all in earth and heaven. Amen.