Cycle C

5th Sunday of Easter, Cycle C

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In today’s First Reading recalls the end of Paul’s first missionary voyage. In his lifetime he made three missionary voyages, and just like when he was knocked to the ground and blinded, he had no idea where his missionary voyages would lead him. Today he arrives back in Antioch, the Christian community who had sent him out at the Holy Spirit’s instruction, and he tells them something none of them expected: the Gentiles, the non-Jews, were welcoming the Gospel too. He encourages them to keep the faith, since, as he says “It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God.” Paul is saying that from experience. On the mission he just finished he had almost been stoned in one town, mistaken for the god Zeus in another, and in a third was dragged outside the city, stoned, and left for dead.

In today’s Second Reading John tries to describe what the Kingdom of God will look like one day: the Church, as splendid as a bride on her wedding day, with Christ as her spouse. In every celebration of the Eucharist we try to imitate what the Church will be like to Christ on that day: we wear nice clothes and vestments, we sing beautiful music, we use things of gold and silver and candles and nice things to celebrate Jesus coming down to be with us and come down into our hearts. Some day we will all be united, just like those people listening to St. Paul in Antioch, just as when we gather to celebrate the Eucharist, rejoicing forever with God among us and all the pain and sorrow wiped away.

St. Paul describes the path to Heaven as hardships, but Our Lord in today’s Gospel calls it the moment of his glorification. When John in his gospel talks about glorification, he is referring to Jesus being crucified. So as Judas goes out to betray Our Lord, the Lord says, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him.” He knows that the suffering and hardship that he is about to undergo will make what John sees in the Second Reading come true: all of us, united with him in joy. “The One on the throne” in the Second Reading today is Jesus Himself, and he says, “Behold, I make all things new.” Death and sickness and tiredness and effort are a part of life, but Jesus will re-new everything again: not just spruced up, new again. He is always coming into our hearts to renew us with his love, and one day, things will be as if they were brand new, forever, like a flower in the fullness of bloom, but never drying out or wilting.

Let’s love one another as he had loved us, so that in us he can continue to make all things new.

Readings: Acts 14:21–27; Psalm 145:8–13; Revelation 21:1–5a; John 13:31–33a, 34–35.

World Day of Prayer for Vocations (4th Sunday of Easter, Cycle C)

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I’m happy to celebrate a special anniversary with you all today – the anniversary of a prayer answered. This Sunday we are celebrating the 53rd World Day of Prayer for Vocations. Twenty years ago, on April 28th, 1996 – the 33rd World Day of Vocations, I was the reader for Sunday morning Mass, sitting in the front pew of my home parish, and right before the Eucharistic Prayer the priest celebrating the Mass reminded everyone “let us pray today on this World Sunday of Prayer for Vocations that young men and women come forward to answer the Lord’s call to work in His harvest.”

I knew those prayers were pointed right at me.

It was a bucket of water in the face: so many ambitions and expectations were doused as illusions, and also a chord struck deep within my soul: that what I’d sought all my life, my deepest aspirations, would be found in God by following the path he traced out for me from all eternity. So I followed him. A year later I entered the Legionaries of Christ, and ten years later, on December 8th, 2006, I was ordained a priest.

Each of us has a dream for our life. We aspire and yearn for something greater, and in our hearts it becomes a dream we hope for and strive for whenever and however we can. God has a dream for us too, a dream he shows to John in the Second Reading today: that all be united to him and around his Son – the Lamb – for all eternity, washed clean, bearing the palm of victory, and rejoicing. The white garments in the reading show us kept clean by Baptism and kept clean by living a Christian life and receiving the sacraments, but it is all thanks to the blood that the sacrificed Lamb – Jesus – shed for us, taking away the sins of the world.

God’s dream is our dream, and answering his call is how we follow it and achieve it. In the First Reading Paul and Barnabas extend God’s invitation to follow the dream the People of Israel had long awaited – but many declined the invitation. We can fall into the same trap, thinking that making God’s dream a reality through living our life in this world is just the job of priests and monks and nuns and, forgive the expression, “Holy Rollers.” If that were true, Paul and Barnabas would have stopped right there when the Jews rejected their message. But God’s dream was bigger than the Jews’s or the Gentiles’ earthly expectations: Jew and Gentiles – everyone – are called to help God make his dream for us a reality in this world and through how we live our life in this world.

The Gentiles were eager and overjoyed to receive the dream and spread it. Following our dream broadens our horizons and opens us up to unimagined possibilities. How much more so is this true when we have faith that God’s dream and our dream are one and the same thing: God doesn’t just have any big picture in mind – he has the biggest picture in mind. Jesus, the Lamb in the Second Reading, shows us in eternity what Jesus, the Good Shepherd in today’s Gospel, shows us in history – both our history and his history. God became flesh and won our redemption because how we live this life does matter. If we heed the Good Shepherd’s voice, God’s call in each moment of our life, he will lead us to the Father and to our dream: eternal life, not just for ourselves – something good in itself, but incomplete – but for everyone we love.

God’s dream and ours – deep down – is that everyone get their dream, the dream that is really possible and really will make them happy: eternal life, the answer to all the aspirations and yearnings they have in this life.

Let us pray today on this World Sunday of Prayer for Vocations that young men and women come forward to answer the Lord’s call to work in his harvest. Let us pray for all those who’ve answered God’s call, that they may continue to follow it. Let us pray for all those discerning God’s will for their life, that they may receive clarity and courage to follow their true dream. Let us pray for each other, that we may all seek our dream by following God’s dream for our lives.

Readings: Acts 13:14, 43–52; Psalm 100:1–3, 5; Revelation 7:9, 14b–17; John 10:27–30.

3rd Sunday of Easter, Cycle C

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The Lamb in today’s Second Reading, surrounded by everyone and everything falling down in worship before him, is the same person who makes breakfast for the disciples in today’s Gospel after a long night fishing. Do we let that sink in? Peter and the disciples did, which is why in today’s First Reading they were happy to have suffered dishonor for the sake of Jesus. You cannot pigeonhole Our Lord in once place and role or he other: if you try to either just place Our Lord in Heaven or on the shore cooking breakfast, you cannot understand what motivates him. He doesn’t just want our adoration; actually, he deserves that and woe to us if we don’t give it to them. He wants our love. He doesn’t need our love, but he wants it.

We can all stand in Peter’s place in today’s Gospel. A burst of enthusiasm has us running toward the Lord, but also, after the initial emotion, in our hearts, he asks us, over and over, “Do you love me?” We have the same hesitation in responding as Peter; we know there are moments when we haven’t loved him and moments where we haven’t loved him as much as we should. They are moments where we wouldn’t have adored him in Heaven or stood up for him on earth, but he never stopped being there for us, and he never will.

Put yourself in Peter’s shoes today and respond to Our Lord’s questions from wherever you’re at regarding your relationship with him. Just like Peter, he will coax a greater love out of you if you let him.

Readings: Acts 5:27–32, 40b–41; Psalm 30:2, 4–6, 11–13; Revelation 5:11–14; John 21:1–19. See also 2nd Week of Easter, Thursday (2), 7th Week of Easter, Friday and Easter Friday.

2nd Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday), Cycle C

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This Sunday, as we conclude the eight-day solemnity of Easter and continue into the liturgical season of Easter, we celebrate the gift of divine mercy. It’s easy to forget sometimes that mercy is not something to which we have a right. Our Lord didn’t have to forgive Thomas for his lack of faith in today’s Gospel, just as Adam and Eve didn’t have to receive mercy after the Fall, a Fall that condemned all their posterity (all of us) to separation from God forever. We didn’t commit the original sin, nor did the Lord have to forgive it or redeem all of us from its effects. In appearing to the Apostles today Our Lord’s message is one of peace and reconciliation, not condemnation.

Our Lord in today’s Gospel also empowers his Apostles to be instruments of his mercy. In the First Reading we see the power of healing flowing from Peter and the faith of the people who sought him out; Peter over this last week’s readings has been the first to tell us that the power comes from Jesus, not from him, and when a priest or bishop absolves his penitent from his sins, that mercy and power comes from Jesus too. Instead of remaining in doubt and regret about whether we’ve truly been forgiven Our Lord has given sacraments that in faith we know bring us his forgiveness. Baptism, which we remember in a special way over these last eight days as we celebrated those who were baptized in the Easter Vigil a little over a week ago, also wipes away sins.

Let’s thank Our Lord today for the gift of his mercy, and also strive to remain in the same peace that he wishes to share with us, not only between us and him, but among ourselves in a world wounded by sin.

Readings: Acts 5:12–16; Psalm 118:2–4, 13–15, 22–24; Revelation 1:9–11a, 12–13, 17–19; John 20:19–31. See also 2nd Sunday of Easter, St. Thomas the Apostle, and Pentecost Sunday.

Easter Vigil, Cycle C

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Tonight’s Gospel shows an understandable confusion on the part of the apostles, but also the noble calling of being a witness to the Risen Lord, something to which every believer is called. The Apostles would be privileged witnesses to what Jesus said and did, but the holy women got the scoop: early on that first Easter Sunday morning went to the tomb and angels helped them process the incredible even that had taken place. The angels helped them to see that the empty tomb was all part of Our Lord’s plan. For their dedication to Our Lord they were blessed with being the first witnesses to the Resurrection, witnesses who announced it the Apostles themselves. Peter, to his credit, went to check the tomb, but Luke doesn’t say what he was thinking and he was uncharacteristically silent.

The readings of the Easter Vigil are many and long because they represent all of salvation history. The Old Testament hardly spoke of the resurrection of the dead, and even then the Jews believed it would only come at the end of time. Yet here were signs that it had happened in their lifetimes. The candles we light from the Paschal candle blessed on this solemn night represent the light of Christ spreading like the light of dawn. Today’s Gospel doesn’t show Our Risen Lord appearing to the disciples who had believed in him, yet the empty tomb poignantly symbolizes the dawn of a new life in Christ that we celebrate this evening, not just due to the amazing event of the resurrection, but also due to so many catechumens who receive the light of Christ tonight through baptism.

As we contemplate the candles in our hands that remind us of that day when we received the light of Christ through baptism, it’s a good moment to ask ourselves whether the amazing implications of the Resurrection have dawned on us. Let’s pray in this newly born Easter season that the light of Christ shines in everything we do.

Readings: Romans 6:3–11; Luke 24:1–12.