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17th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 6:35-40) for Wednesday, Third Week of Easter.: ‘I am the bread of life’.

Wednesday, Third Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 6:35-40 It is my Father's will that whoever sees the Son should have eternal life.

Jesus said to the crowd:

‘I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst. But, as I have told you, you can see me and still you do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I shall not turn him away; because I have come from heaven, not to do my own will, but to do the will of the one who sent me. Now the will of him who sent me is that I should lose nothing of all that he has given to me, and that I should raise it up on the last day. Yes, it is my Father’s will that whoever sees the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and that I shall raise him up on the last day.’

Gospel (USA) John 6:35-40 This is the will of my Father, that all who see the Son may have eternal life.

Jesus said to the crowds, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst. But I told you that although you have seen me, you do not believe. Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and I will not reject anyone who comes to me, because I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me. And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should not lose anything of what he gave me, but that I should raise it on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him may have eternal life, and I shall raise him on the last day.”

Reflections (5)

(i) Wednesday, Third Week of Easter

In Luke’s gospel, Jesus tried to preach the gospel to a Samaritan village, but the Samaritans rejected him. Now, in Luke’s second volume, the Acts of the Apostles, the risen Lord preaches the gospel again to the Samaritans through Philip, as described in our first reading. On this occasion the Samaritans ‘united in welcoming the message Philip preached’. The Samaritans’ rejection of Jesus did not mean the Lord’s rejection of them. The Lord never takes our ‘no’ to him as final. He continues to offer himself and the gift of his gospel to us, in the hope that our ‘no’ will become a ‘yes’. In today’s gospel reading Jesus declares, ‘Whoever comes to me, I shall not turn away’. Even though we may have turned away from him in the past, he does not turn away from us. If we come to him, even having initially turned away from him, he will not turn us away because, as he declares in the gospel reading, it is his Father’s will that ‘whoever sees the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life’. There is a time for every matter under heaven, according to the Book of Ecclesiastes. According to Luke, the public ministry of Jesus wasn’t the time for the Samaritans to respond to the gospel (contrary to the gospel of John!) but the preaching of Philip in the period after Pentecost was the time for them to welcome the gospel message. Like the father in the parable of the prodigal son, the Lord knows how to wait on us. He is prepared to wait on our timing, just as he waited on the timing of Paul of Tarsus. According to our first reading, Paul initially ‘worked for the total destruction of the church’. However, after the Lord appeared to him on the road to Damascus, Paul went on to become the great apostle to the pagans in response to the Lord’s call. The great persecutor of the church has left us wonderful letters to his churches which have nurtured the faith of the Lord’s disciples for the past two thousand years. The story of the Samaritans and the story of Paul reminds us that the Lord’s time is always ‘today’.

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(ii) Wednesday, Third Week of Easter

In today’s first reading, Philip preaches the gospel in Samaria and the people there unite in welcoming the message Philip preached. In Luke’s first volume, Jesus had attempted to preach the gospel to a Samaritan village but they rejected Jesus because he was heading for Jerusalem. Now the risen Lord, through Philip, preaches the gospel to the Samaritans and this time they welcome the gospel. The Lord continues to offer the gospel even to those who have rejected it. Even though we may turn from the Lord at times, he never turns from us. This is in keeping with what Jesus says in today’s gospel reading, ‘Whoever comes to me I shall never turn away’. Easter celebrates the faithfulness of God to his Son Jesus, and the faithfulness of Jesus to all of us. The Lord’s faithfulness encourages us to keep turning back to him, to keep coming to him, even after we have turned away from him. Even when we fail to respond to his coming, he remains for us the bread of life and he continues to promise that if we come to him we will never hunger and if we believe in him we will never thirst.

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(iii) Wednesday, Third Week of Easter

There is a striking statement in today’s first reading, ‘Saul then worked for the total destruction of the church’. In the immediate aftermath of the martyrdom of Stephen, Saul, the zealous Pharisee, set himself the task of destroying this heretical Jewish movement. It was this same Saul who went on to become the greatest missionary in the early church, bringing the gospel to major cities in modern day Turkey and Greece. In the gospel reading, Jesus declares that he came to do his Father’s will, which is that all who see the Son and believe in him shall have eternal life. Saul or Paul, while in the very act of persecuting the church, came to see the Son and believe in him and received the gift of eternal life. Paul saw the Son because the risen Lord appeared to him just outside Damascus. We have not seen the Son in the way Paul did; the risen Lord has not appeared to us as he appeared to Paul. Yet, we see him with the eyes of faith. We recognize him in the Eucharist as ‘the bread of life’, in the language of today’s gospel reading. It is Paul who in his letters teaches us that through baptism we have become members of the Lord’s body, temples of his Spirit, sons and daughters of God, sharing in Jesus’ own relationship with God. Although Paul had seen the risen Lord in a unique sense, he didn’t consider the members of the church to whom he wrote, including ourselves, to be any less privileged than himself. It is Paul, the former persecutor of the church, who reminds us in his letters that the bread that we break and the cup that we bless in the Eucharist is a communion with the body and blood of Christ. Our union with Christ through baptism is thereby strengthened in the Eucharist. It is Paul who teaches us in his letters that this communion with the Lord that we enjoy in this life will not be broken by death, because our ultimate destiny is ‘to be with the Lord forever’, as he says. We can be grateful to this former persecutor of the church for opening us for up the riches of our Christian identity and destiny.

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(iv) Wednesday, Third Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus says, ‘whoever comes to me I shall not turn away’. It is a statement that reveals the welcoming nature of the Lord’s presence. Those who come to him will find a welcome from him. The opening invitation of Jesus in this gospel is ‘Come and see’. He invites people to come to him and he promises those who do so that he will never turn them away. In this he is being true to God’s will which is, according to the gospel reading, that all who see the Son and believe in him shall have eternal life’. It is as the source of life, as the one who can satisfy our deepest hungers and thirsts, that Jesus invites people to come to him, while assuring them that they will never be turned away if they do come. It is said of Saul in the first reading that he worked for the total destruction of the church. Saul sought to destroy all who responded to the welcoming invitation of Jesus. There will always be forces in our world that are hostile to our coming to Jesus. Yet, the later experience of Saul suggests that not only does the Lord welcome those who come to him but he seeks out those who are hostile to him. Saul eventually came to Jesus because Jesus went after him. The Lord who welcomes us when we come to him also seeks us out when we walk away from him. When we don’t come to him, he comes after us, not in anger but in love. He is always driven by God the Father’s will that all should see the Son and believe in him and so have eternal life.

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(v) Wednesday, Third Week of Easter

We sometimes find ourselves asking, ‘What is God’s will for my life?’ We often struggle to answer that question. Today’s gospel reading is clear about God’s will for humanity in a general sense, ‘It is my Father’s will that whoever sees the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life’. God, who so loved the world that he gave his only Son, wills that all humanity would come to believe in his Son and, so, find life. Indeed, the verses following on from our reading state that the Father draws people to the Son. Jesus declares, ‘no one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me’. God not only wills that people come to the Son but draws them there. Because Jesus has come to do the will of the one who sent him, he states in our reading that ‘whoever comes to me I shall never drive away’. Jesus is not in the business of driving people away from him, because this is not God’s business. Elsewhere in John’s gospel Jesus declares, ‘When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself’. Not only does the Father draw people to his Son, but Jesus, the risen Lord, draws people to himself. There is a kind of divine gravitational pull towards Jesus, the Bread of Life, who alone can satisfy the basic hungers and thirsts of the human heart. The gospel reading invites us to ask the question, ‘Can we allow ourselves to be drawn?’ In the first reading, the Samaritans are drawn to the Lord through Philip’s preaching of the gospel. In Luke’s first volume, his gospel, the Samaritans refused to be drawn to Jesus, rejecting Jesus’ request for hospitality in their villages, because he was a Jew, heading for Jerusalem. However, the Lord continued to draw them to himself and the time came when they were ready to be drawn. Even though we may resist the drawing power of the Lord, he does not give up on us. He continues to draw us to himself, waiting for the time when we are ready to come to him so that we may have life to the full.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 2 days

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16th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 6:30-35) for Tuesday, Third Week of Easter: ‘I am the bread of life'.

Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 6:30-35 It is my Father who gives you the bread from heaven.

The people said to Jesus, ‘What sign will you give to show us that we should believe in you? What work will you do? Our fathers had manna to eat in the desert; as scripture says: He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ Jesus answered:

‘I tell you most solemnly, it was not Moses who gave you bread from heaven, it is my Father who gives you the bread from heaven, the true bread; for the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’

‘Sir,’ they said ‘give us that bread always.’ Jesus answered:

‘I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst.’

Gospel (USA) John 6:30-35 It was not Moses, but my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven.

The crowd said to Jesus: “What sign can you do, that we may see and believe in you? What can you do? Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, as it is written:

He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”

So Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

So they said to Jesus, “Sir, give us this bread always.” Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

Reflections (12)

(i) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

More than once in the gospels, people come to Jesus asking him to perform a sign before they will take him seriously. In today’s gospel reading people ask Jesus, ‘What sign will you give to show us that we should believe in you? What work will you do?’ This is immediately after Jesus had done the work of feeding a large crowd with five barley loaves and two fish. Here was a work that was a sign for those with eyes to see. This work pointed beyond itself to Jesus’ true identity. His feeding of the crowd with bread and fish was a sign that Jesus was ‘the bread of life’ in the language of today’s gospel reading. The real significance of Jesus’ miraculous work of the crowd lay in what it has to say about who Jesus is for all those who believe in him. The crowd who were fed would become hungry again, however, Jesus remains the bread of life for all who come to him, not just during his public ministry, but for all future generations who will come to him as risen Lord. Jesus is our Bread of Life today. The promise he makes in today’s gospel reading is made to each one of us, ‘those who come to me will never be hungry; those who believe in me will never thirst’. The risen Lord promises to satisfy the deepest hungers and thirsts in our heart, the hunger and thirst for love, for forgiveness, for justice, for peace, for communion, for life to the full. There is a sense in which those deeper hungers and thirsts will only be fully satisfied at the heavenly banquet in the kingdom of God. However, Jesus’ promises pertains not just to the ultimate future but also to the present. Here and now, in our own place and time, he is bread of life for all who believe in him and for all who come to him. We encounter the Lord as Bread of Life in a special way at the Eucharist, yet the Lord’s invitation to come to him as Bread of Life is not limited to the Eucharist. He is our daily bread of life, in every place and time.

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(ii) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

In this morning’s first reading, Stephen is stoned to death by those who found his preaching offensive. Luke who wrote the Acts of the Apostles portrays Stephen’s way of dying in a manner that would call to mind how Jesus died. As Jesus on the cross prayed, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’, Stephen prays to the risen Jesus, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit’. As Jesus on the cross prayed, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’, Stephen prays to the risen Jesus, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’. In other words, Luke presents Stephen as having the same relationship with Jesus that Jesus has with his heavenly Father. We are all called to have the same relationship with Jesus that Jesus has with his Father. Jesus’ intimate relationship with God his Father is to be the model of our relationship with Jesus. In the gospel reading this morning from the gospel of John, Jesus invites us into this intimate relationship with himself. He offers himself to us as the bread of life and calls on us to come to him, to believe in him, so that our deepest hunger will be satisfied and our deepest thirst quenched. We spend our lives responding to this invitation. The coming to him that believing in him involves is a constant coming; it is the journey of a lifetime, a journey into an ever deeper and more intimate relationship with the Lord. A little on in John’s gospel Jesus expresses the nature of this journey in another form when he calls on us to abide in his love, just as he abides in his Father’s love.

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(iii) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

We have become very aware in recent times of the persecution of Christians in parts of the Middle East and in other parts of the world. It appears that Christians have no future in territories that are currently controlled by ISIS in particular. Huge numbers of believers have been put to death, simply because they profess the name of Jesus. It has been said that there are more Christian martyrs in these years than at any time in the church’s history. Today’s first reading from the Acts of the Apostles is Luke’s account of the death of the first Christian martyr, Stephen. According to Luke, Stephen’s way of dying reflected how Jesus died. As Jesus entrusted his spirit to God, Stephen entrusted his spirit to the risen Lord. As Jesus died with a prayer asking God to forgive those responsible for his death, Stephen died asking the risen Lord not to hold the sin of his executioners against them. Jesus and Stephen died as they lived. They show us not simply how to die but how to live. We too are to live, entrusting ourselves to the Lord and revealing his love and mercy to those we meet, including those who sin against us. If we are to live in this way, we need the Lord’s help. We need to keep on receiving the Lord into our lives as Bread of life, in the words of Jesus in this morning’s gospel reading.

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(iv) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

The children who make their first Holy Communion are familiar with the term ‘bread of life’ that Jesus uses with reference to himself in this morning’s gospel reading. They understand that what they receive is bread, but it is not ordinary bread; it is the bread of life. When Jesus says, ‘I am the bread of life’, it is the first of seven ‘I am’ expressions that Jesus uses with reference to himself in the fourth gospel. He will go on to say, ‘I am the light of the world’, ’I am the gate’, ‘I am the good shepherd’, ‘I am the resurrection and the life’, ‘I am the vine’, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life’. The fact that the fourth evangelist has Jesus speak of himself in this way seven times is not by accident. The number seven in the biblical world is always a symbol of completion or fullness. Each time Jesus uses any of these seven expressions with reference to himself in this gospel, he is identifying himself as God’s life-giving presence in human form. More specifically, in declaring himself to be the Bread of Life, he is saying that he alone can satisfy the deepest hungers of the human heart. That is why Jesus’ invitation to us in this gospel of John is the simple invitation, ‘Come’, ‘Come and see, ‘Come and eat’. We spend our earthly lives trying to respond to that life-giving invitation.

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(v) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

Chapter 6 of John’s gospel from which we are reading all this week is very much a Eucharistic chapter. Unlike the other three gospels, John’s gospel has no account of the actual institution of the Eucharist, but it does have this wonderful chapter, which is unique to this gospel and which is full of Eucharistic themes. In this morning’s gospel Jesus contrasts the bread with which the people of Israel were fed by Moses on their way through the wilderness en route to the promised land with the true bread, the bread of God, which is given not just to the people of Israel but to the world. What is this true bread, this bread of God? Jesus goes on to identify himself as this bread, ‘I am the bread of life’, he says. Jesus gives himself to us as the bread of life on our own journey towards the promised land of heaven. Jesus is our fundamental resource on our pilgrimage through life. He nourishes us spiritually in the Eucharist, but in other ways as well, such as in and through his word. His word is in its own way bread of life. He nourishes us with his Spirit, the Holy Spirit. Our calling is, in the words of the gospel reading, to come to him and to receive.

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(vi) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

This morning’s first reading gives us the account of the death of Stephen the first martyr. This reading contains the first reference to Saul in the Acts of the Apostles. He is present at the death of Stephen and entirely approves of the killing. Saul would go on to become the great apostle to the Gentiles. Perhaps the courageous witness of Stephen left some kind of impression on Saul and sowed a seed which would later bear much fruit. God may have touched Saul in some way through the witness of Stephen. We need each other’s witness. Our faith is strengthened by the witness of others, just as it is weakened by the lack of witness of others. One aspect of Stephen’s witness was his willingness to forgive his enemies. His final words were, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’. Stephen’s willingness to forgive his executioners echoed Jesus’ own willingness to forgive those who crucified him. In this way, both Jesus and Stephen revealed something of God’s willingness to forgive each of us. Stephen’s death revealed something of God. If we witness to our faith in such a way that we reveal something of God, then God will certainly touch the lives of others through us.

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(vii) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

In this morning’s gospel reading, the people ask Jesus what sign he will give to show them that they should believe in him, in spite of the fact that he had just fed them with bread and fish in the wilderness. Jesus does not answer their question. He does not meet their demand. We cannot make demands on Jesus which have to be met before we believe in him. Our relationship with him does not work in that way. The crowd were trying to bargain with Jesus; do one more sign and we will believe in you. We cannot bargain with the Lord in that way. Instead of granting the crowd’s request, Jesus declares himself to be the bread of life and promises that those who come to him will never be hungry. They are being challenged to take Jesus at his word. This is the essence of believing in Jesus according to the gospel of John. We are to take Jesus at his word and to respond to him accordingly. This morning we are being asked to recognize Jesus as the bread of life, the one who can satisfy our deepest hungers, and, on the basis of that recognition, to come to him and to keep on coming to him.

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(viii) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

The first reading this morning from the Acts of the Apostles describes the martyrdom of Stephen, the first recorded Christian martyr. Luke, who wrote the Acts of the Apostles, describes the death of Stephen in a very similar way to how he had described the death of Jesus in his first volume, the gospel. Just as Jesus prayed to God, ‘Father, forgive them for they know not what they do’, so Stephen prays to the risen Lord, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’. Just as Jesus prayed to God, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’, so Stephen prays to the risen Lord, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit’. It is as if Luke is saying that the fundamental attitudes of Jesus are to be reproduced in that of his followers. The risen Lord seeks to continue living out his life in and through his followers, and that includes us all. Because the Lord wants to live out his life in us, he invites us to come to him as our bread of life, in the words of this morning’s gospel reading – ‘I am the bread of life, whoever comes to me will never be hungry’. Our coming to the Lord in faith, and our receiving nourishment from him, creates an opening for him to live out his life in us, so that, in some way, we can continue to give flesh to his fundamental outlook and attitudes.

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(ix) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

The first reading this morning from the Acts of the Apostles describes the martyrdom of Stephen, the first recorded Christian martyr. Luke, who wrote the Acts of the Apostles, describes the death of Stephen in a very similar way to how he had described the death of Jesus in his first volume, the gospel. Just as Jesus prayed to God, ‘Father, forgive them for they know not what they do’, so Stephen prays to the risen Lord, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’. Just as Jesus prayed to God, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’, so Stephen prays to the risen Lord, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit’. It is as if Luke is saying that the fundamental attitudes of Jesus are to be reproduced in that of his followers. The risen Lord continues to live out his life in and through his followers, and that includes us all. If the Lord is to live out his life in us, we need to come to him as our bread of life, in the words of this morning’s gospel reading. ‘I am the bread of life, whoever comes to me will never be hungry’. It is only in coming to the Lord in faith, and receiving nourishment from him, that we will be able to reproduce, in some way, his life, his presence, his fundamental attitudes.

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(x) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

In the gospel reading this morning the people of Jesus come to him looking for a sign so that they can believe in him. Jesus refuses to give them a sign. Instead he points to himself. He is the sign; he is the sacrament of God’s presence. He points to himself as the bread of life, as the one who can satisfy the deepest hunger and thirst in our lives. ‘Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, whoever believes in me will never thirst’. We all hunger and thirst for love, for forgiveness, for light in our darkness, for new life in our various dyings, for strength in our weakness. Jesus points to himself as the one who can satisfy such hunger and thirst. We do not have to go looking for the spectacular sign, the unusual phenomenon. The Lord is all we need because he alone is the bread of life. He is present to us as bread of life in his word and in the Eucharist. He calls on us, as he called on people in the gospel reading, to come to him, to believe in him. If we do that and begin to taste and see that the Lord is good, we won’t find ourselves looking for signs of one kind or another; we won’t need them.

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(xi) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading we find one of the great ‘I am’ statements attributed to Jesus in the fourth gospel. ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry; whoever believes in me will never thirst’. The image of bread corresponds to that of hunger, but the reference to thirst is perhaps surprising in this context. The language of ‘bread’, ‘hunger’ and ‘thirst’ is clearly symbolic. Jesus is declaring that he alone can satisfy the deepest hunger and thirst of the human heart. In the next chapter of John’s gospel Jesus will say, ‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink’. The language of eating and drinking in this gospel are often symbolic of believing. Jesus is declaring that all who come to him and believe in him will find that their deepest spiritual hunger and thirst will be satisfied. He is stating that he is as essential to our spiritual lives as food and drink is to our physical lives. We are always aware of our physical hunger and thirst; we cannot ignore it. We try to eat and drink on a regular basis. The deeper, spiritual, hunger and thirst in our lives, while just as real, does not always reach the same level of awareness in us. We can much more easily neglect it. If we do so, there will be something seriously out of joint within us. Today’s gospel reading invites us to attend to that deeper hunger and thirst and to recognize Jesus as the one who alone can satisfy it fully.

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(xii) Tuesday, Third Week of Easter

In Luke’s gospel, Jesus dies with two prayers on his lips, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing’ and ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’. In Luke’s second volume, Stephen dies with similar prayers on his lips, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit’ and ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them’. Whereas Jesus prays to God the Father, Stephen prays to the risen Lord. Luke makes clear that these prayers of Stephen were inspired by the Spirit, ‘Stephen, filled with the Holy Spirit…’ Jesus’ prayers to God were also inspired by the Spirit who had shaped his whole life. These are Spirit-filled prayers which we are all invited to make our own. The response to today’s responsorial psalm encourages us to do just that, as it places a version of the prayer of Jesus and Stephen on our lips, ‘Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit’. It is a wonderful prayer to pray at the end of our lives, as Jesus and Stephen did. However, it is also a prayer we can pray throughout our lives. I often find myself praying, ‘Into your hands, Lord, I commend my spirit’. It is a prayer of trust which is worth praying at any time. We trust those we consider reliable. The Lord is totally reliable. In the words of today’s responsorial psalm, he is a rock of refuge for us, a mighty stronghold to save us. In the gospel reading, Jesus gives us another reason to entrust ourselves to him throughout our lives and not just as the end of our lives. Jesus speaks of himself as the bread of life who can satisfy our deepest hunger and quench our deepest thirst. Here is someone who is, indeed, worthy of our complete trust. Every day we are invited to entrust ourselves into his reliable hands so that we can draw strength from him we need to run the race and keep the faith, in the language of Paul.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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15th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies for Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 6:22-29) for Monday, Third Week of Easter: ‘Do not work for food that perishes but for food that endures to eternal life’.

Monday, Third Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 6:22-29 Do not work for food that cannot last, but for food that endures to eternal life.

After Jesus had fed the five thousand, his disciples saw him walking on the water. Next day, the crowd that had stayed on the other side saw that only one boat had been there, and that Jesus had not got into the boat with his disciples, but that the disciples had set off by themselves. Other boats, however, had put in from Tiberias, near the place where the bread had been eaten. When the people saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into those boats and crossed to Capernaum to look for Jesus. When they found him on the other side, they said to him, ‘Rabbi, when did you come here?’ Jesus answered:

‘I tell you most solemnly, you are not looking for me because you have seen the signs but because you had all the bread you wanted to eat. Do not work for food that cannot last, but work for food that endures to eternal life, the kind of food the Son of Man is offering you, for on him the Father, God himself, has set his seal.’

Then they said to him, ‘What must we do if we are to do the works that God wants?’ Jesus gave them this answer, ‘This is working for God: you must believe in the one he has sent.’

Gospel (USA) John 6:22-29 Do not work for food that perishes but for food that endures for eternal life.

[After Jesus had fed the five thousand men, his disciples saw him walking on the sea.] The next day, the crowd that remained across the sea saw that there had been only one boat there, and that Jesus had not gone along with his disciples in the boat, but only his disciples had left. Other boats came from Tiberias near the place where they had eaten the bread when the Lord gave thanks. When the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they themselves got into boats and came to Capernaum looking for Jesus. And when they found him across the sea they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” Jesus answered them and said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him the Father, God, has set his seal.” So they said to him, “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?” Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.”

Reflections (10)

(i) Monday, Third Week of Easter

There are several stories in the gospels of people who go looking for Jesus. In the gospel of John, Nicodemus went looking for Jesus at night. In the gospel of Luke, Zacchaeus goes looking for Jesus in broad daylight, even climbing a sycamore tree to see him. In today’s gospel reading, the people who had been fed by Jesus in the wilderness go looking for him, getting into boats and crossing the Sea of Galilee to find him. When those who look for Jesus eventually find him, they often discover that they get more than they had bargained for. Nicodemus heard Jesus say to him that he needed to be born of water and the Spirit. Zacchaeus heard Jesus invite himself to his home and go on to declare that salvation had come to this house. The people in today’s gospel reading heard Jesus say to them that they were looking for him for the wrong reasons. Having been feed with bread in the wilderness, they wanted more of the same. However, Jesus offers himself to them as someone who can satisfy not just their material hunger, but the deep, spiritual, hunger within them. He can give them not just physical food that cannot last, but food that endures to eternal life. He can offer himself to them as the Bread of Life, as one who responds to the deepest yearnings of their heart, for truth, for a love that endures, for a life over which death has no power. Believing in him as the one sent by God will open them up to receive all that he wants to give them. We are all invited to turn towards the Lord as the Bread of Life in trusting faith. We come before him because we know he has a fullness from which he wants us to receive, so that our deepest hungers and thirsts can be satisfied. The Eucharist is a privileged moment when we come before the Lord as the Bread of Life and open our hearts to all he can offer us.

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(ii) Monday, Third Week of Easter

In the gospel reading this morning, the people come to Jesus looking for more of the bread they ate when Jesus multiplied the loaves and fish. In response, Jesus challenges them to work, not for food that cannot last, but for food that endures to eternal life. In a sense, Jesus is calling on them to get their priorities right, to put most energy into what is ultimately important. Yes, Jesus fed their physical hunger in the wilderness, but more importantly he wants to feed their spiritual hunger, their longing for true life, the life that endures forever, eternal life. Jesus is concerned when people are physically hungry, when their basic physical needs are not being met, but he always leads us beyond the level of the physical, the material, to more ultimate realities. Jesus takes seriously the horizon of this world in which we live and work, but he also shows us another horizon, a horizon that is not of this world. He wants to lead us towards that other horizon; he wants us to be where he now is, so that we can see his glory. If that is to happen, we must believe in him, as he said to the crowds in today’s gospel reading, ‘this is…’ To believe in him is to relate to him as he relates to us, to remain in him as he remains in us.

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(iii) Monday, Third Week of Easter

There tends to be a restlessness in all of us. That restlessness drives us to make contact with other people; it often leads us to set out on a journey of one kind or another, whether it is a physical journey, or an inner journey. There is something of the searcher, the seeker, in us all. At the deepest level of our being, we are searching for God. It was Saint Augustine who said that our hearts are restless until they rest in God. In the gospel reading this morning, the people of Galilee set out to look for Jesus. He had fed the multitude in the wilderness; this had made a great impression on them. Jesus was pleased that they came looking for him, but he wanted to refine their search. They looked for him as the giver of bread; Jesus wanted them to look for him as the giver of food that endures to eternal life. As Christians, we are all searching for Jesus in some sense. The gospel reading invites us to pay attention to why we are searching for him. What are we looking to him for? What do we expect from him? Perhaps, like the people of Galilee, our expectations are too small. What Jesus can offer us, more than anything else, is eternal life, a sharing in God’s own life. This sharing in God’s life begins here and now for those who turn to Jesus in faith, and comes to fullness in the life beyond death.

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(iv) Monday, Third Week of Easter

In this morning’s gospel reading the crowd, who had been fed by Jesus in the wilderness, go looking for him. To look for Jesus, to search for him, is a good thing. Yet, Jesus suggests to the crowd that they are searching for him for the wrong reasons. They want more of the bread that Jesus provided in the wilderness. They are searching for the material bread that Jesus had given them earlier, rather than for Jesus himself. Yes, Jesus gave them bread in the wilderness to eat, but, more importantly, he himself is the Bread of Life who can satisfy their deepest hunger, their spiritual hunger. In this morning’s gospel, Jesus calls on us to search for him for who he is rather than for what he can give us. The temptation is always to relate to people for what they might be able to give to us rather than relating to them for who they are. We are called to love others for themselves rather than for what we can get from them. What is true of our relationship with others is true to a greater extent of our relationship with Jesus. Rather than seeking the consolations of the Lord we are to seek the Lord of consolation. In the words of this morning’s gospel reading, we are to believe in the one that God has sent.

And/Or

(v) Monday, Third Week of Easter

In the gospel reading this morning, the people come to Jesus looking for more of the bread they ate when Jesus multiplied the loaves and fish. In response, Jesus challenges them to work, not for food that cannot last, but for food that endures to eternal life. Yes, Jesus fed them in the wilderness, but he has something more to give them, not just physical bread but a deeper and more enduring form of nourishment. As well as physical hungers, we also have deeper hungers within us, spiritual hungers and thirsts. In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus identifies himself as the one who can satisfy these deeper hungers in our hearts, the hunger for God, for a love that is faithful, for a life that endures beyond this life. The Lord will go on in that same chapter of John’s gospel to speak of himself as the bread of life. If we are to experience him as the bread of life, as the one who can satisfy our deepest hungers, we must believe in him, give ourselves to him in trust and faith. When the crowds ask Jesus, ‘What must we do to do the works God wants?’ Jesus replies that this is only one work God wants, to believe in the one God has sent. That is our fundamental calling, to come to the Lord in faith; all else follows from that. Our presence at the Eucharist is one of the primary ways we come to the Lord in faith and open ourselves to his presence as the bread of life.

And/Or

(vi) Monday, Third Week of Easter

At some level we are all seekers or searchers. We never stand still; we are always looking for more. At the heart of that search for more is a search for God, a search for the Lord who is God with us. At the beginning of today’s gospel reading we find the people of Galilee searching for Jesus. They got into boats by the shore of the Sea of Galilee after Jesus and his disciples and crossed to Capernaum looking for him. When they found Jesus, he addresses them and declares that they are looking for him for the wrong reasons. They want more of the bread that he multiplied in the wilderness. Jesus challenges them to look for him not as the provider of food that cannot last but as the provider of food that endures to eternal life. We can all look for Jesus for the wrong reasons. What we want from him does not always correspond to what he wants for us. What we want from him can be far too limited. He wants to give us what endures and we look for what perishes. We struggle to bring our prayers of petition into line with what the Lord wants to give us. Saint Paul says in his letter to the Romans that we do not know how to pray as we ought. He immediately goes on to say, ‘the Spirit helps us in our weakness’. This Easter season, we ask the Holy Spirit to shape our longing, our desires, so that they correspond more to the Lord’s desire for us.

And/Or

(vii) Monday, Third Week of Easter

In the gospel reading this morning Jesus makes a distinction between food that cannot last and food that endures to eternal life. He had just fed the people in the wilderness with bread and fish; he was very aware that people’s physical hunger needed to be satisfied. As the people continued to look for more of this physical food, Jesus called on them to look for food that endures to eternal life, food that satisfies the deepest hunger in our lives. Jesus has come not just to give people physical food but to give them the spiritual food of God’s presence, God’s life and God’s Spirit. The gospel reminds us that, while the physical and material is vital because we are physical and material beings, our searching must not stop at the physical and the material. There is a great deal more to life than the satisfaction of our physical needs. We have deeper, spiritual hungers and thirsts as well that we need to attend to if we are to live a truly balanced life and be at peace within ourselves. In the gospel reading Jesus offers himself to us as the one who offers us the food that endures to eternal life. He can satisfy the deepest hungers and thirsts in our hearts. Our seeking must ultimately be directed towards him; it cannot stop at or be satisfied with anything less.

And/Or

(viii) Monday, Third Week of Easter

It is probably true to say that we are all searching for something. We are all seekers. In today’s gospel reading, the crowd who had been fed by Jesus in the wilderness go to great lengths to seek him out. When they find him, Jesus reveals to them what it is that motivates their seeking. They are looking for more of the bread that Jesus had given them the day before. He tells them, ‘you are looking for me because you had all the bread you wanted to eat’. Jesus challenges them to look for something more enduring. He calls on them to work not just for food that cannot last, the food which satisfies their physical hunger, but to work for food that endures to eternal life, the food that can satisfy their deeper, spiritual, hunger. Jesus was concerned about people’s physical needs, their physical hungers. That is why he took action to feed the crowd in the wilderness when he saw that they were hungry. However, he was just as concerned, if not more concerned, with people’s spiritual hungers. He presents himself to the crowd as someone who can satisfy not just their physical hunger but their spiritual hunger. He wants the crowd and all of us to pay attention to that deeper, spiritual hunger, by believing in him as the one sent by the Father so that we may have life and have ii to the full. This deeper hunger is more easily neglected than our physical hunger. It is also true that just as we can eat poor quality food in an effort to satisfy our physical hunger, we can try to satisfy our spiritual hunger on poor quality fare. In today’s gospel reading, Jesus presents himself as the only one who can truly satisfy the deeper, spiritual, hunger in our lives.

And/Or

(ix) Monday, Third Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus speaks of two kinds of food, food that cannot last and food that endures to eternal life. He challenges the crowd to reflect on their priorities. Are they working for food that cannot last or for food that endures to eternal life? Jesus takes seriously food that cannot last. Jesus fed the hungry multitude in the wilderness with five loaves and two fish. The basis physical needs of people were very important for him. He fed the hungry, healed the sick; he called on the rich to share with the poor. These basic human physical needs had to be met first. However, having fed the physical hunger of the crowd, some of that crowd now want Jesus to give them more of the same. In response to this preoccupation with Jesus as the provider of physical bread, Jesus speaks of the food that endures to eternal life which he is offering. He is calling on those who have gone looking for him to attend to the deeper hunger in their lives, their spiritual hunger. Jesus presents himself as the one who can satisfy this spiritual hunger. That is why he equates working for the food that endures to eternal life with believing in him. Believing in him is the one work that is required if that deeper hunger in our lives is to be satisfied, the hunger for a love that is unconditional, for forgiveness, for truth, for justice, for peace, ultimately, our hunger for God. We cannot ignore our physical hunger; when we are hungry, we eat. We can ignore those deeper hungers which Jesus alone can satisfy. This is why he draws attention so strongly in today’s gospel to the importance of working for the food that endures to eternal life.

And/Or

(x) Monday, Third Week of Easter

In times of conflict and war, truth is often the first casualty. The aggressor in particular will often bend the truth to try and justify what they are attempting to do. The Jewish religious leaders who were hostile to Jesus were equally hostile to his followers who were proclaiming that God had raised Jesus from the dead. In today’s first reading, we hear of their antagonism to Stephen, a gifted preacher. They procured people to falsify what Stephen had said, ‘We heard him using blasphemous language against Moses and against God… This man is always making speeches against this Holy Place and the Law. We heard him say that Jesus the Nazarene is going to destroy this Place’. Although such accusations were essentially false, they would be a significant factor in the eventual death of Stephen by stoning. Jesus once said of himself, ‘I am the truth’. He revealed to us the truth about God, about what it is to be human, about creation. His followers are to be people of truth, who live by the truth that Jesus proclaimed and lived. Because he is the truth, he can satisfy the deep hunger in our hearts for truth. In the gospel reading, Jesus challenges the crowd to come to him not just as someone who can satisfy their physical hunger, which he had recently done, but as someone who can satisfy their deeper hungers, their hunger for truth, for a love that is faithful, for a life that is eternal. ‘Do not work for food that cannot last, but for food that endures to eternal life’. Jesus offers himself to them, and to us all, as one who can satisfy the deepest hungers of our heart. Such hungers will only be fully satisfied at the banquet of eternal life, but in so far as we keep coming to the Lord and opening our hearts to him, our deepest hungers will begin to be satisfied in the course of our earthly lives.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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14th April >> Fr. Martin's Homilies / Reflections on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. Luke 24:35-48)for the Third Sunday of Easter, Year B: ‘He then opened their minds to understand the Scriptures’.

Third Sunday of Easter (B)

Gospel (Except USA) Luke 24:35-48 It is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead.

The disciples told their story of what had happened on the road and how they had recognised Jesus at the breaking of bread. They were still talking about all this when Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you!’ In a state of alarm and fright, they thought they were seeing a ghost. But he said, ‘Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts rising in your hearts? Look at my hands and feet; yes, it is I indeed. Touch me and see for yourselves; a ghost has no flesh and bones as you can see I have.’ And as he said this he showed them his hands and feet. Their joy was so great that they still could not believe it, and they stood there dumbfounded; so he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ And they offered him a piece of grilled fish, which he took and ate before their eyes.

Then he told them, ‘This is what I meant when I said, while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses, in the Prophets and in the Psalms has to be fulfilled.’ He then opened their minds to understand the scriptures, and he said to them, ‘So you see how it is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that, in his name, repentance for the forgiveness of sins would be preached to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses to this.’

Gospel (USA) Luke 24:35–48 Thus it was written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day.

The two disciples recounted what had taken place on the way, and how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread. While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have.” And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them.

He said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. And he said to them, “Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.”

Homilies (6)

(i) Third Sunday of Easter

Catholics of a certain generation associate fish with fasting from meat. Fish was often eaten on a Friday. It had a certain penitential association. It was considered a poorer relative of meat. That attitude has changed. Lots of people do not eat meat, and the benefits of eating fish have been highlighted.

There are lots of references to fish and fishing in the gospels, because some of Jesus’ first disciples were fishermen. Jesus himself fed the multitude in the wilderness with bread and fish. In today’s gospel reading, when the risen Lord asked his disciples, ‘Have you anything to eat?’ they offered him a piece of grilled fish, which he ate before their eyes. When Jesus eats in the gospels, he can either be the host or the guest. In our gospel reading, the risen Lord makes himself a guest of his disciples by asking them if they had anything to eat. He placed himself as a needy person in their debt. Perhaps this was the Lord’s way of trying to reassure his disciples that all was well between him and them. When he stood among them and offered them the gift of his peace, they were ‘in a state of alarm and fright’, thinking he was a ghost. Jesus had to ask them why they were so agitated, and why were so many doubts rising in their hearts. When he went on to show them his hands and his feet, the gospel readings says that ‘they stood dumbfounded’, and that ‘their joy was so great, they could not believe it’. There is a powerful depiction here of the impact of the risen Lord’s appearance to his disciples – alarm, fright, agitation, doubt, disbelief, dumfounded. The poor disciples didn’t know where they were. The ordinariness of eating a little bit of grilled fish might just calm them down.

There was something both extraordinary and ordinary about the appearance of the risen Lord to his disciples. It was extraordinary because how could someone who had been so brutally put to death by the Romans come back to life? It was also extraordinary because how could the Lord offer the gift of his peace, the gift of reconciliation, to the disciples who had failed him so badly during the hour of his passion and death, with one of them betraying him, another denying him, and all of them deserting him. How could anything good come out of the crucifixion of Jesus and the abject failure of his followers? The good news of Easter is that God brought wonderful new life out of the tragedy of Jesus’ death and the tragedy of the disciples’ failure. Jesus was not dead; he was alive with the life of heaven, over which death has no power. The disciples were not dead either; the Lord still had a mission for them. They were to proclaim the good news of Easter to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem, the good news that God’s merciful love is stronger than death and human failure, and all that is needed is for people to repent, to turn trustingly towards this merciful love present in the risen Lord. In the verses after our gospel reading, Jesus promises to empower his disciples for this mission by sending them the Holy Spirit. This extraordinary good news of Easter remains good news for us today. Just as death no longer has power over the risen Lord, death no longer has power over those who believe in him. Our ultimate destiny is to share in the Lord’s own risen life. Also, just as the disciples’ failure did not mean a definitive break in their relationship with the Lord, so our own failings and sins need not separate us from the Lord’s love. He continues to stand among us saying, ‘Peace be with you’. He remains faithful to us, even after we have turned away from him. All he asks is that we keep on turning back to him in trusting faith, acknowledging our failings and opening ourselves up to the Spirit of his merciful love. The Lord’s gift of his peace continues to transform us into his missionaries.

If there was something extraordinary about the appearances of the risen Lord to his disciples, there was also something very ordinary about it. What could be more ordinary than sharing a simple meal of fish? What could be more ordinary than conversing with someone on the road home, as happened when the Lord met the two disciples on the road to Emmaus? The risen Lord often stands among us in and through the ordinary circumstances of our day to day lives. According to today’s gospel reading, it was while the two disciples from Emmaus were telling their story to the other disciples of what had happened on the road and around their table that the risen Lord stood among them. We all have a story to tell about our relationship with the Lord. Whenever we find a space to share something of that story, we are creating an opening for the risen Lord to stand among us. Also, whenever we respond generously to those who asks the question the risen Lord asked, ‘Have you anything to eat?’ the risen Lord stands among us. Easter invites us to leave our minds and hearts open to the many ways the risen Lord is present to us in the common happenings of daily life.

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(ii) Third Sunday of Easter

Most of us if we look back over our lives will find something or other that we very much regret. We will almost certainly be able to identify times when we failed to live up to the values that we try to live by. We might remember speaking or acting in ways that hurt or damaged others. We might be aware of not doing something that we could have done and, that in our heart of hearts, wanted to do. Sometimes these experiences of personal failure can leave us very burdened. We can find it hard to move on from them; they trouble us and we struggle to be free of them. They can weight heavily on us and drain us of energy. We can find ourselves going back in memory to them over and over again.

The first disciples of Jesus must have felt like this in the aftermath of Jesus’ crucifixion. They had not exactly covered themselves in glory during the time of Jesus’ final journey. They had all deserted the one who had given them so much of himself. Their mood in the aftermath of Good Friday can only have been one of deep regret. They must have felt that their relationship with Jesus was over, and, deservedly so. In all of the gospels, however, the first words that the risen Jesus speaks to his disciples when he appears to them is ‘Peace be with you’. This morning’s gospel reading states: ‘He stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you”’. These are words of reconciliation that sought to assure the disciples of the Lord’s forgiveness. For those first disciples, the initial experience of the risen Lord took the form of a profound experience of forgiveness. This was the risen Lord’s gift to them. The gift of forgiveness can be difficult to receive at times. We wonder if we are really forgiven. According to the gospel reading, when Jesus said ‘Peace be with you’, they responded with alarm and fright and thought that they might be seeing a ghost. The risen Jesus then questioned them, ‘Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts rising in your hearts?’ It took the disciples a while to realize that they were forgiven.

It is only after the disciples had come to receive this gift of forgiveness that they could be sent out as messengers of the Lord’s forgiveness to others. According to our gospel reading, the risen Lord, having assured them that they were forgiven, went on to commission them to preach repentance for the forgiveness of sins to all the nations. It is forgiven sinners who are entrusted with the task of proclaiming the good news of God’s forgiving love to all. This is what we find Peter doing in today’s first reading. He declares to the people of Jerusalem that, although they had handed Jesus over to Pilate, God’s forgiveness was available to those who turn to God by believing in Jesus. The church has been faithful to the mission entrusted to the disciples, proclaiming down the centuries the good news that God’s forgiveness is stronger than human sin. In raising his Son from the dead, God was declaring that even when we reject God’s Son, God does not reject us. The risen Jesus reveals a faithful, forgiving God. Today’s second reading states this clearly: ‘If anyone does sin, we have our advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, who is just’.

Before we can receive the Easter gift of God’s forgiveness that comes to us through the risen Lord, we must first acknowledge our need of that gift. In the words of today’s second reading, we need ‘to admit the truth’. The truth is that we are always in need of the gift of God’s forgiveness. Recognizing our need and, in the light of that, asking God for that gift is what we call repentance. Peter in the first reading calls on the people of Jerusalem to repent and turn to God so that their sins may be wiped out. The risen Lord in the gospel reading sends out his disciples to preach repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Within the Catholic tradition, the Sacrament of Reconciliation is a privileged opportunity to admit the truth, to acknowledge our need of God’s forgiveness and to ask directly for it. In that sacrament that the risen Lord says to us, ‘Peace be with you’. The words of absolution include the prayer, ‘through the ministry of the church may God grant you pardon and peace’.

The first disciples, having received the gift of the Lord’s forgiveness, were sent out as heralds of that forgiveness to others. In a similar way, we who receive the same gift are sent out on the same mission. As forgiven sinners we proclaim with our lives the presence of a forgiving and faithful God. We extent to others the gift we have received from the Lord. This will not always come easy to us. Who was it who said, ‘to err is human, to forgive is divine’? If that is true, we need divine help to do what is divine. In the verses that immediately follow where today’s gospel ends, the risen Jesus promises his disciples that he would send the Holy Spirit upon them. It is only in the power of the Holy Spirit that they would be able to engage in the task that Jesus was entrusting to them. We need the same Spirit if we are to forgive as we have been forgiven. In the weeks ahead that precede the feast of Pentecost, we might pray the prayer, ‘Come Holy Spirit, fill my heart and enkindle in me the fire of your love’. We could pray this prayer especially during those times when we find ourselves struggling to pass on to others the gift of forgiveness that we continue to receive from the Lord.

And/Or

(iii) Third Sunday of Easter

We began a prayer meeting via Zoom for the season of Lent and we are continuing it into the season of Easter. It is based on the gospel reading for the following Sunday. There are times of silence to reflect on the reading, and then an opportunity for people to share how the word of God is speaking to them. Most of us have found that sharing to be very powerful. The Lord is not only speaking to us through the gospel reading, but also through the breaking of the word by those present. As people tell their story of how the Lord is speaking to them through the reading, they are sharing the Lord himself with the others in the group. It is good to have opportunities to share our faith story with others and to hear others share their faith story with us. We can be helped to experience the Lord’s presence by hearing others share the story of how the Lord has spoken to them through his word. We all have a personal story to tell, and included in that story is our faith story, the story of how the Lord relates to us.

That is what we find happening in today’s gospel reading. Two disciples had a wonderful experience of the risen Lord while they were making their sad journey home from Jerusalem to Emmaus in the aftermath of Jesus’ crucifixion. They were joined by a stranger. However, when this stranger broke the word of God with them, their hearts began to burn. They didn’t want to let go of their travel companion. When they reached their home village, they asked him to stay with them. It was at table in their home as the stranger took bread, broke it and gave it to them that they finally recognized him as Jesus, whose death they had just been mourning. They ran back to the city which they had been glad to leave earlier in the day. They had a story to tell, the story of the Lord’s coming to them in Word and Eucharist. They needed to tell this story to the other disciples and that is how our gospel reading begins, ‘The disciples told their story of what had happened on the road and how they had recognized him in the breaking of bread’.

It is striking that, according to the gospel reading, it was while the two disciples were telling their faith story and the others were engaging with it that the risen Lord appeared to the whole group in person. The two disciples’ sharing of their faith story with others created a space for the risen Lord to come and stand among them all. Whenever we have the freedom and the courage to share something of our faith story with others, we too will be creating an opening for the risen Lord to stand among us and touch our lives. Yet, the gospel reading also acknowledges the struggle we sometimes have to really believe that the Lord is risen and that he is standing among us. According to the gospel reading, when the risen Lord stood among the disciples, offering them the gift of his peace, they were in a ‘state of alarm and fright, they thought they were seeing a ghost’. Jesus had to ask them, ‘Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts rising in your hearts’. Alarm, fright, agitation, doubt – these were the initial responses of the disciples to the presence of the risen Lord in their midst. The gospel reading goes on to say that even after the risen Lord showed them his hands and his feet, his wounds that spoke of his love for them and for all, ‘their joy was so great that they could not believe it’. Even when fear and doubt gave way to joy, they still could not believe that the Jesus was powerfully alive in their midst. We have no difficulty believing that Jesus was crucified. Many of us have crucifixes or crosses in our homes or on our persons. However, we can struggle to believe that Jesus is risen, that he stands among us as risen Lord. It is sometimes not as easy to believe in the risen Jesus as in the crucified Jesus. In that regard, we are no different to the first disciples. Today’s gospel reading suggests that Easter faith often grows in the midst of doubt and questions. Believing in the risen Lord is a journey that different people travel at different paces. Yet, what matters is our attitude, our openness to the various ways that the risen Lord may choose to come to us and touch our lives.

The first disciples had good reason to believe that if Jesus did come back to them after his crucifixion it would have been to reprimand them for deserting him in the hour of his passion and death. Yet, in all of the Easter stories of the gospels, there is no reprimand. The coming of the risen Lord to the disciples was for them a profound experience of forgiveness, ‘Peace be with you’. It was also a moment of mission, as the risen Lord sent them out to proclaim to others the forgiveness they had received. The risen Lord comes to us too to assure us that we are loved and forgiven and to send us out as ambassadors of his forgiving, reconciling, love to others.

And/Or

(iv) Third Sunday of Easter

After we have been through a difficult experience, we can often find ourselves emotionally raw. We can be somewhat vulnerable and brittle, anxious and uneasy. Things that we might normally take in our stride can get us down.

That must have been the kind of space the disciples found themselves in after the crucifixion of Jesus. The person for whom they had left everything to follow had been cruelly put to death. The journey that started out near the Sea of Galilee with such hope and expectation had come to a devastating end on the hill called Golgotha, just outside the city of Jerusalem. In those last dark days and hours, the disciples had not exactly covered themselves in glory. They discovered to their shame and regret that they were only prepared to follow Jesus up to a point, and, certainly not along the way of the cross. In the wake of Good Friday, the disciples were dealing with a great sense of loss and a real sense of shame and guilt; they were also fearful. They worried lest what had happened to Jesus might also happen to them.

It was into that space of loss, shame, guilt and fear that the risen Jesus came. The first words Jesus spoke, according to our gospel reading this morning, were ‘Peace be with you’. We hear that greeting every time we celebrate Mass, just before we are invited to come and receive the Lord in Holy Communion. If the disciples had known in advance that the risen Lord was coming to them and that he would speak to them, they probably would not have anticipated that his first words to them would be ‘Peace be with you’. They might well have imagined that his first words to them would be words of rebuke, or words expressing sadness and disappointment at their failure to stand by him when he needed them. Yet, the words of Jesus did not reflect their failure in any way; rather, they reflected the Lord’s faithful love for them in spite of their failure. In saying, ‘Peace be with you’, the Lord is saying, ‘I am at peace with you and I invite you to be at peace with me and at peace with one another’. The Lord is constantly saying ‘Peace be with you’ to all of us. He says those words to us in a very powerful way in and through the Sacrament of Reconciliation and the Sacrament of the Eucharist. He can speak those words to us at any time, from within the silence of our hearts. We can find it difficult to say ‘Peace be with you’ to those who have disappointed us or hurt us or let us down badly. However, the Lord is not like us in that respect. In John’s gospel Jesus is portrayed as saying, ‘My own peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives’. Jesus does not relate to us as the world does, as other people relate to us or as we relate to others.

According to this morning’s gospel reading, when the risen Jesus stood among his disciples and said, ‘Peace be with you’, they were in a ‘state of alarm and fright’, so much so that Jesus asked them, ‘Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts rising in your hearts?’ Something wonderful was happening for them; their shattered hopes were being rebuilt in a way they could never have conceived of, and, yet, there they were alarmed, frightened, agitated and full of doubt. We might find ourselves identifying rather easily with those disciples. Sometimes we too can find it difficult to accept the Lord’s gift of his peace, the gift of his reconciling love. We back away from that gift, for one reason or another. Maybe we find it hard to believe that we could be so graced; we consider that we are not deserving of such a gift. We can allow our own fears and doubts to drown out the Lord’s word of ‘peace’ to us. At the very moment when the Lord is drawing attention to what is best in us, we can be absorbed by what is worst in us.

In order to cut through his disciples’ fears and doubts the risen Lord showed them his hands and his feet – his wounds. These were the wounds of love; he had suffered for them, and for all; he had died that they, and all of us, might have life to the full. In showing them his wounds, the Lord finally broke through to them. Luke says, ‘their joy was so great that they could not believe it’. The Lord’s wounds can break through to all of us when his other approaches to us fail. Perhaps that is why Good Friday continues to speak to so many people. Our own sharing of our wounds, the sharing of our pain, can also build bridges to others. When we are at their most vulnerable, we often draw others to ourselves. When members of our family become ill, we are drawn to gather around them in a supportive, loving way. In attending to them, we are attending to the Lord. The Lord continues to reach out to us through the wounds of others, because such wounds are, in a very real sense, his own wounds.

And/Or

(v) Third Sunday of Easter

Paul Verlaine was a nineteenth century French poet. His early life was somewhat on the wild side. He was imprisoned for a time for having shot at his companion, a fellow poet. While he was in prison he had something of a conversion. His poems written while in prison are very moving. In one of his poems he addresses the risen Lord, ‘Lord... Beneath this troubled canopy where my heart has been digging out its tomb and where I feel the heavens flow towards me I ask you, by what road you’d have me come’. He is asking the Lord to show him the road on which he could come to him. Later in the same poem, the Lord says to him, ‘It is not you who must come to me; it is I who have chosen to come to you. Look at my hands stretched out to you. Here, eat; be nourished. Let your mind be opened to understand’. Verlaine came to understand that, rather than having to find the right road along which to come to the Lord, it was the Lord who was coming to him. He realized that the gap between himself and the Lord would be bridged by the Lord rather than by himself.

Verlaine’s uncertain mood in prison must have been similar to how the disciples felt after Good Friday. They had broken their relationship with Jesus by abandoning him when he needed them most. They had created a gap between themselves and the Lord; they must have felt that this gap was unbridgeable. There was no road they could take to undo what had been done. Yet, on that first Easter Sunday they discovered that the gap they had created between themselves and the Lord was bridged by the Lord. They could not come to him, but he came to them. This morning’s gospel reading suggests that when the Lord came to them, they found it almost impossible to believe. When he appeared among them, and said to them, ‘Peace be with you’, their reaction was one of alarm and fright. They were agitated and full of doubt. They thought he could not be real; theypresumed they were seeing a ghost. How could someone whom they had betrayed, denied, abandoned be standing among them now, offering them the gift of his peace, the gift of his reconciling love.

We are in the season of Easter, which is seven weeks long. The church gives us this lengthy period of Easter to help us reflect on the various dimensions of the meaning of Easter. Easter has many messages which are vitally important to us, the Lord’s followers, today. One of the messages the feast of Easter proclaims is the Lord’s faithfulness to us, in spite of our unfaithfulness to him. Because of our various failures and weaknesses, we can sometimes find ourselves wondering, like Verlaine in his prison, by what road we can come to the Lord from whom we have turned away. In response to that anxiety, the Lord says to us, ‘it is not you who must come to me; it is I who have chosen to come to you’. We can find that good news hard to believe at times. As was the case with the disciples in today’s gospel reading, doubts can rise in our hearts. Having failed to love the Lord in various ways, we doubt that he could love us in this all forgiving way. Yet, this is at the heart of the message of Easter. Easter invites us to open ourselves to the coming of the risen Lord who loves us in our weakness and frailty and empowers us to go forth renewed.

According to this morning’s gospel reading, the risen Lord broke through the self-doubt of his disciples in three ways. He firstly showed them his wounds. These weren’t just any old wounds. They were the wounds of that greater love which led Jesus to lay down his life for all. He continues to show us his wounds today, to bring home to us the depth of his love for us and the extent of his faithfulness to us. The Lord then opened the Scriptures for his disciples to help them to see that what happened to him, including his passion and death, was already contained within the Jewish Scriptures. The risen Lord continues to speak to us today through the Scriptures. He is present to us in his word, the word of the Lord. Finally, the risen Lord then shared a simple meal with his disciples to convince them that he wanted to be in communion with them in spite of their failures. The Lord continues to call us to his table today. It is above all at the table of the Eucharist that he enters into communion with us and invites us to enter into communion with him. It is in the Eucharist that we can really appreciate that the Lord has chosen to come to us in our brokenness and weakness. It is from the Eucharist that he sends us out in the power of his presence to be his witnesses in the world.

And/Or

(vi) Third Sunday of Easter

There was something both extraordinary and ordinary about the appearance of the risen Lord to his disciples. It was extraordinary because how could someone who had been so brutally put to death by the Romans come back to life? It was also extraordinary because how could the Lord offer the gift of his peace, the gift of reconciliation, to the disciples who had failed him so badly during the hour of his passion and death, with one of them betraying him, another denying him, and all of them deserting him. How could anything good come out of the crucifixion of Jesus and the abject failure of his followers? The good news of Easter is that God brought wonderful new life out of the tragedy of Jesus’ death and the tragedy of the disciples’ failure. Jesus was not dead; he was alive with the life of heaven, over which death has no power. The disciples were not dead either; the Lord still had a mission for them. They were to proclaim the good news of Easter to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem, the good news that God’s merciful love is stronger than death and human failure, and all that is needed is for people to repent, to turn trustingly towards this merciful love present in the risen Lord. In the following verses Jesus promises to empower his disciples for this mission by sending them the Holy Spirit. This extraordinary good news of Easter remains good news for us today. Just as death no longer has dominion over the risen Lord, death no longer has dominion over those who believe in him. Our ultimate destiny is to share in the Lord’s own risen life. Also, just as the disciples’ failure did not mean a definitive break in their relationship with the Lord, so our own failings and sins need not separate us from the Lord’s love. He continues to stand among us saying, ‘Peace be with you’. He remains faithful to us, even after we have turned away from him. All he asks is that we keep on turning back to him in trusting faith, acknowledging our failings and opening ourselves up to the Spirit of his merciful love. The Lord’s gift of his peace continues to release us from our failings and transform us into his missionaries.

If there was something extraordinary about the appearances of the risen Lord to his disciples, there was also something very ordinary about it. What could be more ordinary than sharing a simple meal of fish? What could be more ordinary than conversing with someone on the road home, as happened on the road to Emmaus? The risen Lord often stands among us in and through the ordinary circumstances of our day to day lives. According to today’s gospel reading, it was while the two disciples from Emmaus were telling their story to the other disciples of what had happened on the road and around their table that the risen Lord stood among them. We all have a story to tell about our relationship with the Lord. Whenever we find a space to share something of that story, we are creating an opening for the risen Lord to stand among us. Also, whenever we respond generously to those who asks the question the risen Lord asked, ‘Have you anything to eat?’ the risen Lord stands among us. Easter invites us to leave our minds and hearts open to the many ways the risen Lord is present to us in the common happenings of daily life.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 5 days

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13th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies for Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 6:16-21) on Saturday, Second Week of Easter: ‘It is I! Do not be afraid’.

Saturday, Second Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 6:16-21 They saw Jesus walking on the lake.

In the evening the disciples went down to the shore of the lake and got into a boat to make for Capernaum on the other side of the lake. It was getting dark by now and Jesus had still not rejoined them. The wind was strong, and the sea was getting rough. They had rowed three or four miles when they saw Jesus walking on the lake and coming towards the boat. This frightened them, but he said, ‘It is I. Do not be afraid.’ They were for taking him into the boat, but in no time it reached the shore at the place they were making for.

Gospel (USA) John 6:16-21 They saw Jesus, walking on the sea.

When it was evening, the disciples of Jesus went down to the sea, embarked in a boat, and went across the sea to Capernaum. It had already grown dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them. The sea was stirred up because a strong wind was blowing. When they had rowed about three or four miles, they saw Jesus walking on the sea and coming near the boat, and they began to be afraid. But he said to them, “It is I. Do not be afraid.” They wanted to take him into the boat, but the boat immediately arrived at the shore to which they were heading.

Reflections (5)

(i) Saturday, Second Week of Easter

According to the verse before our gospel reading (John 6:15), Jesus had withdrawn to the mountain by himself, in response to the crowd wanting to make him king. The suggestion is that Jesus needed to be in communion with God in prayer. Jesus’ prayer did not remove him from the struggles of his disciples. It was while he was at prayer that he became aware of the disciples in the boat on the Sea of Galilee struggling with a strong wind and a rough sea. He immediately came to them, speaking a reassuring word, ‘It is I. Do not be afraid’. The literal translation would be ‘I am. Do not be afraid’. In this fourth gospel, the words ‘I am’ on the lips of Jesus suggest the name of God revealed to Moses at the burning bush. Jesus comes to his disciples as God in human form. Once the disciples show a willingness to take Jesus into the boat with them, they reach the shore. The prayer of Jesus created a space for him to be present to his disciples in a very troubling moment. The first reading puts before us a troubling moment in the life of the church, conflict between Greek speaking and Aramaic speaking Jewish Christian widows regarding the distribution of food. This conflict in the church required the Twelve to clarify for themselves and for the other members of the church what their priorities were to be, ‘We will continue to devote ourselves to prayer and to the service of the word’. The clarity with which the apostles could identify their priorities amid competing claims on their time is admirable. They understood, as Jesus did, that prayerful attentiveness to God’s word would allow their lives to be shaped by God’s purpose and would best serve the life of the believing community. Today’s readings remind us that prayerful attentiveness to God’s word needs to be at the heart of the church’s life, and of our own lives as individual disciples.

And/Or

(ii) Saturday, Second Week of Easter

At the end of yesterday’s gospel reading, we heard that Jesus, having fed the multitude in the wilderness, withdrew to the mountain by himself. The evangelist, John, suggests that Jesus needed to be alone with God the Father who had sent him into the world. While Jesus was alone, the disciples set out to cross the sea of Galilee without Jesus. In his absence they found themselves struggling with a strong wind and a rough sea. Even after evening had given way to night they had rowed only three to four miles. They seemed lost without Jesus. It was then that they discovered that Jesus’ withdrawal to pray did not remove him from them. They saw him coming towards them, speaking words of reassurance, ‘It is I. Do not be afraid’. Almost immediately, they arrived at the destination that they had just been struggling to reach. The gospel reading is suggesting that the Lord who lives forever to intercede for us is always coming towards us. If we are to reach our destination, we cannot do it on our own. We need the Lord’s help. A little later in this same gospel, Jesus will say to his disciples, ‘those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing’. On our own journey, our journey of faith, we depend on the Lord to reach the goal of our life’s journey. We depend on him especially when the wind is against us and the waters of life get stormy. Today’s gospel reading assures us that the Lord comes to us in those difficult and threatening moments. If we are open to his coming and receptive to his presence we will move on through the storms that come our way and reach the shore.

And/Or

(iii) Saturday, Second Week of Easter

The first reading from the Acts of the Apostles shows some tension in the church of Jerusalem. Something of a storm was brewing in this young church, which became the mother church, because it was from the church in Jerusalem that the other churches were founded. The Hellenists, Greek speaking believers, were complaining about the Hebrews, Aramaic speaking believers, because the Hellenists felt that their widows were not being as well provided for as the widows of the Hebrews. The leaders of the Jerusalem church, the Twelve, realized that this problem would not be resolved unless they drew other members of the church into this ministry of providing for all the widows and the other vulnerable people in the church. The Twelve could not do everything; they had to prioritize. They declared to the other members of the church that as the leaders they should be devoting themselves to prayer and to the service of God’s word. As a result, they invited the members of the church to choose people of wisdom and of the Spirit who could attend to this important work of providing for the most vulnerable. Seven suitable people were chosen, allowing the Twelve to focus on what was important in their calling. Here at the very early days of the church we have a good example of how the church must function in every age. No one group within the church can do everything. There is a need for different groups of people to take responsibility for different ministries. This is how the Spirit continues to shape the life of the church. There will always be the kind of tensions or storms within the church that we find in today’s first reading. However, such stormy moments can be times of grace, opportunities for the Spirit in work in new ways in the church. In today’s gospel reading, the Lord came to his disciples as they were struggling with a strong wind and a rough sea and brought them to a safe haven. The Lord is always with his church in the various storms that will assail it. His presence at the heart of the storm can help to ensure that moments of crisis in the church can also be times of new life.

And/Or

(iv) Saturday, Second Week of Easter

There is a sense in which we are always trying to get to the other side, like the disciples in the boat who were trying to reach the other side of the Sea of Galilee. We often feel the call to move beyond where we are, to reach for a different shore. However, once we set out for that other side, we often find ourselves struggling, like the disciples. In the gospel reading, darkness came over the disciples in the boat, and they found themselves facing into a strong wind and having to sail through a sea that was getting rougher. Whenever we take on some new enterprise, or go in a new direction of some kind, we will sometimes find ourselves battling with the equivalent of a strong wind and a rough sea, perhaps with a kind of darkness coming over us. It was at that moment when they were battling with the elements in the darkness that the disciples saw Jesus coming towards the boat, saying to them, ‘It is I. Do not be afraid’. The Lord comes to us all in our moments of struggle, when we sense our vulnerability, our frailty, when a darkness of spirit threatens to engulf us. That may have been the experience of many during these Covid times. The Lord is there with us at those moments in all his risen power, calling on us not to be afraid but to trust in his presence. Once the risen Lord spoke to the disciples, they seem to have reached the shore they were making for immediately. The Lord’s presence to us and our awareness of his presence always makes the journey to the other side, the far shore, seem that bit shorter. Like Saint Paul, we can find ourselves saying, ‘I can do all things through him who strengthens me’.

And/Or

(v) Saturday, Second Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading, the disciples in the boat keenly feel the absence of the Lord as they struggle with a strong wind and a rough sea. In the words of the gospel, ‘It was getting dark by now and Jesus had still not rejoined them. As a community of faith and as individual believers we can keenly feel the Lord’s absence, especially when we sense that our human resources are not sufficient to get us through some storm or other, some moment of disturbing crisis. We find such a disturbing moment in the life of the early church in the first reading, as conflict arose between two language groups, Aramaic speaking and Greek speaking Jewish Christians. Yet, the Lord was not really absent from the disciples in the boat. He was aware of their struggle and he came towards the boat, proclaiming a reassuring word, ‘It is I! Do not be afraid’. When the disciples were open to taking the Lord into the boat, it quickly reached the shore they were making for. In times of personal or communal crisis we can be assured that the Lord is present to us, even though he may seem to be absent. He comes to us in all his risen power to raise us up above our fears. The first letter of John declares that ‘perfect love drives out fear’. The presence of the risen Lord is the presence of perfect love, of the God who so loved the world that he gave his only Son. If we take the Lord into the boat, into our personal and communal life, we will reach the shore towards which he is leading us. The presence of the risen Lord to the early church in the first reading ensured that its moment of crisis was a moment of new growth. The risen Lord will always bring us through the storm if we turn to him. In the words of today’s psalm, his love will be upon us if we place our hope in him.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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12th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings for Friday, Second Week of Easter (Inc. John 6:1-15): ‘As many as five thousand sat down’.

Friday, Second Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 6:1-15 The feeding of the five thousand,

Jesus went off to the other side of the Sea of Galilee – or of Tiberias – and a large crowd followed him, impressed by the signs he gave by curing the sick. Jesus climbed the hillside, and sat down there with his disciples. It was shortly before the Jewish feast of Passover. Looking up, Jesus saw the crowds approaching and said to Philip, ‘Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat?’ He only said this to test Philip; he himself knew exactly what he was going to do. Philip answered, ‘Two hundred denarii would only buy enough to give them a small piece each.’ One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said, ‘There is a small boy here with five barley loaves and two fish; but what is that between so many?’ Jesus said to them, ‘Make the people sit down.’ There was plenty of grass there, and as many as five thousand men sat down. Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and gave them out to all who were sitting ready; he then did the same with the fish, giving out as much as was wanted. When they had eaten enough he said to the disciples, ‘Pick up the pieces left over, so that nothing gets wasted.’ So they picked them up, and filled twelve hampers with scraps left over from the meal of five barley loaves. The people, seeing this sign that he had given, said, ‘This really is the prophet who is to come into the world.’ Jesus, who could see they were about to come and take him by force and make him king, escaped back to the hills by himself.

Gospel (USA) John 6:1-15 Jesus distributed to those who were reclining as much as they wanted.

Jesus went across the Sea of Galilee. A large crowd followed him, because they saw the signs he was performing on the sick. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. The Jewish feast of Passover was near. When Jesus raised his eyes and saw that a large crowd was coming to him, he said to Philip, “Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?” He said this to test him, because he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough for each of them to have a little.” One of his disciples, Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what good are these for so many?” Jesus said, “Have the people recline.” Now there was a great deal of grass in that place. So the men reclined, about five thousand in number. Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were reclining, and also as much of the fish as they wanted. When they had had their fill, he said to his disciples, “Gather the fragments left over, so that nothing will be wasted.” So they collected them, and filled twelve wicker baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves that had been more than they could eat. When the people saw the sign he had done, they said, “This is truly the Prophet, the one who is to come into the world.” Since Jesus knew that they were going to come and carry him off to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountain alone.

Reflections (8)

(i) Friday, Second Week of Easter

The question Jesus asks towards the beginning of this gospel reading suggests that he fully intends to satisfy the physical hunger of the crowd whom he had been teaching, ‘Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat?’ The disciples, Philip and Andrew, didn’t think it was humanly possible to feed such a crowd, as is clear from the somewhat despairing questions they asked, ‘Where can we buy some bread for these people to eat?’ and ‘There is a small boy here with five barley loaves and two fish, but what is that between so many?’ Andrew didn’t see the presence of the small boy with his few loaves and fish as having any significance when it comes to feeding this very large crowd. However, Jesus saw the small boy and his few resources in a very different way. He knew he could work powerfully through the boy’s meagre resources if he was prepared to part with them. The small boy clearly was prepared to part with them, because Jesus went on to feed the crowd with his five barley loaves and two fish. Indeed, he fed the crowd abundantly because there were twelve baskets of scraps collected by the disciples afterwards. The gospel reading reminds us that if we are willing to place our own human resources at the Lord’s disposal, meagre as they may seem to us, he will be able to work through them in ways that gwill o beyond all our expectations. When we give him our resources of time, energy, he will nourish the lives of others through us. Like Andrew, we might be tempted to think that we have nothing of value that the Lord could work with. Yet, as Saint Paul says in one of his letters, the Lord’s power is often made perfect in weakness.

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(ii) Friday, Second Week of Easter

I remember some people saying recently when they heard this very familiar gospel story again that prior to this they hadn’t really paid much attention to the presence of the small boy. We tend to focus on Jesus and his disciples, and on the crowd. Yet, the small boy with his five barley loaves and two fish is the key to what happens. In John’s version of this episode, which we have just heard, he is first referred to by Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, but he is referred to in a way which suggests his relative insignificance, ‘There is a small boy here with five loaves and two fish; but what is that between so many?’ However, Jesus does not consider the presence of this small boy with his meagre resources to be insignificant. Jesus knows that if the boy is prepared to part with his precious little store, great things can happen. Indeed, according to the gospel reading, Jesus goes on to satisfy the hunger of the crowd with the five loaves and two fish of this small boy. Perhaps we can never know what exactly happened on that day, but the gospel reading is suggesting that the Lord can work powerfully through what are apparently very insignificant resources, a small boy and his few loaves and fish. Our human resources, inadequate though they may be, matter a great deal to the Lord. If we offer our own meagre resources to him, he can enhance them beyond all our expectations. All the Lord asks is that we are generous with what we have, little as that may be, and he will work through us in ways that will surprise us. The Lord’s way of working is different to how the world works. As Saint Paul came to realize, the Lord’s power is often made perfect in weakness.

And/Or

(iii) Friday, Second Week of Easter

When we are faced with a challenge or a problem the way we speak about it can be very important. We can speak about it in a way that deflates us and drains us of energy or we can speak about it in a way that makes us hopeful and inspires us. In this morning’s gospel reading, Jesus sees crowds coming towards him. Seeing that they were in need of food, he asked Philip where food could be bought to give them something to eat. Philip’s response to Jesus showed that he felt overwhelmed by the problem. The words he used were very defeatist, ‘Two hundred denarii would only buy enough to give them a small piece each’. When Andrew chimed in, he too spoke in a way that conveyed a kind of hopelessness. Noticing that there was one small boy with five barley loaves and two fish, he asked, ‘What is that between so many?’ However, the way Jesus spoke in response to the problem was much more inspirational. He gave instructions to the disciples, he prayed aloud to God, and somehow the crowd got fed with the young boy’s small fare. We can all be a little bit like the disciples before the challenges that life throw up. We can become limp before it all. The gospel reading this morning encourages us to remain hopeful even in the face of situations that seem very unpromising. The reading suggests that the Lord can work in surprising ways in situations that seem daunting. Saint Paul seems to have a very strong sense of how the Lord can work powerfully in weakness. That is why he could say in his letter to the Philippians, a little written from prison, from a very unpromising situation, ‘I can do all things through him who strengthens me’.

And/Or

(iv) Friday, Second Week of Easter

Jesus and his disciples found themselves before a situation that seemed beyond their ability to deal with. Philip and Andrew were both at a loss. Their inclination was to do nothing because the situation seemed hopeless. Where could food be found to feed such a crowd? Jesus knew that something could be done and he involved his disciples in doing what could be done, calling on them to make the people sit down and then asking them to collect the pieces that were left over when everyone had eaten. With the Lord’s help what seemed impossible became possible. The gospel reading suggests that the Lord can work powerfully through meagre resources. Like the disciples, we can feel hopeless before certain situations. We find it very hard to get started. It all seems too much for us. Yet, there is always something we can do, no matter how small. It may seem as small as the two barley loaves and five fish, but the Lord can work powerfully through our efforts, small as they may seem to us. We can always ask the Lord to do what he can with the little that we have and if we do that we may discover, like the disciples, that something wonderful happens.

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(v) Friday, Second Week of Easter

In this morning’s gospel reading we find Jesus and his disciples faced with a hungry crowd and little or no means of feeding them. In this situation different people reacted in different ways. Philip made a calculation: on the basis of the number of people and the amount of money available to buy food, and decided that nothing could be done. Andrew recognized that one of the crowd had a small amount of food but he dismissed this small resource as of no value. There were two other reactions in the story. There is the reaction of the small boy who willing gave to Jesus the few pieces of food that he had. This is the reaction of the generous person, of the one who is prepared to give all he or she has, even though it appears to be far less than what is needed. He gave all he had to give. Then there is the reaction of Jesus himself. He took the few resources that the young boy was generous enough to part with and, having prayed the prayer of thanksgiving to God over these small pieces of food, he somehow fed the enormous crowd. The gospel teaches us that if we give generously from our resources to others, the Lord will work powerfully through those resources, small as they may seem to us.

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(vi) Friday, Second Week of Easter

It is difficult to know exactly what happened that day in the wilderness when Jesus and his disciples found themselves before a large hungry crowd. However, the message that the evangelist seeks to communicate through his telling of that event is reasonably clear. Jesus is presented as working powerfully through very meagre resources. He feeds a multitude with five loaves and two fish. The Lord can work powerfully through our own rather limited resources, if we are generous with those resources and place them at the Lord’s disposal. A little can go a long way when it is placed in the hands of the Lord. Saint Paul expresses that truth in these terms: ‘God’s power is made perfect in weakness’. The tendency of Philip and Andrew in the gospel story was to complain about the hopelessness of the situation, ‘Two hundred denarii would not buy enough… What is that between so many?’ We are all prone to throwing our hands up to the heavens in exasperation and even despair. The gospel reading calls on us rather to have an expectant faith, a faith in the Lord’s power to work wonders with even the little that we give him.

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(vii) Friday, Second Week of Easter

In this morning’s gospel reading, Andrew, noticing that a small boy has give barley loaves and two fish, asks the question, ‘What is that between so many?’ His assessment was that the resources available were much too small to meet the need. We can all find ourselves asking a similar kind of question to Andrew, ‘What is that between so many?’ We see some need or other and we recognize that our own personal resources or those of the group are not sufficient to meet the need. Andrew, Philip and the other disciples went on to discover that the Lord worked powerfully in and through the few resources that the small boy made available. The hunger of the crowd was satisfied and there was food left over. The gospel reading reminds us that the Lord can work powerfully through humble and meagre resources if they are made available to him. We are all aware of our limitations, our weaknesses, and, yet, we are not always so aware of the many ways that the Lord can work through us, in spite of that, if we trust him to do so. The small amount of food that the boy had was not enough to feed the crowd in itself, and, yet, Jesus could not have fed the crowd without it. The Lord needs what we have, even if it seems slight to us, and he can accomplish far more than we could imagine with the little we have.

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(viii) Friday, Second Week of Easter

We are very familiar with the story from the life of Jesus that we have just read. The feeding of the multitude is one of the few stories from the public ministry of Jesus that is to be found in all four gospels. This morning we read the account from the gospel of John. Only this gospel gives us the dialogue between Jesus and the two disciples, Philip and Andrew. That dialogue shows us how the perspective of Jesus differs greatly from that of his two disciples. When Philip saw the large hungry crowd, he also despaired, ‘Six months wages wouldn’t buy enough to give each of them a little’ Andrew was just a little more hopeful. He recognized that there was a boy present who had five loaves and two fish, but he realistically asked, ‘What is that among so many people?’ Jesus, however, saw the rich potential of those meagre resources and immediately began to take control of the situation, ‘Make the people sit down’. In some mysterious way, Jesus worked with those few resources to feed the multitude. When I hear that story, I am often reminded of the comment of Saint Paul that God’s power is made perfect in weakness. The gospel reading this morning suggests that when we ourselves feel at our weakest, our most vulnerable, our lowest, when our own resources seem meagre, the Lord can work powerfully in us and through us.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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11th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 3:31-36) for Thursday, Second Week of Eastertide: ‘He whom God has sent speaks God’s own words’.

Thursday, Second Week of Eastertide

Gospel (Except USA) John 3:31-36 The Father loves the Son and has entrusted everything to him.

John the Baptist said to his disciples:

‘He who comes from above is above all others; he who is born of the earth is earthly himself and speaks in an earthly way. He who comes from heaven bears witness to the things he has seen and heard, even if his testimony is not accepted; though all who do accept his testimony are attesting the truthfulness of God, since he whom God has sent speaks God’s own words: God gives him the Spirit without reserve. The Father loves the Son and has entrusted everything to him. Anyone who believes in the Son has eternal life, but anyone who refuses to believe in the Son will never see life: the anger of God stays on him.’

Gospel (USA) John 3:31-36 The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him.

The one who comes from above is above all. The one who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of earthly things. But the one who comes from heaven is above all. He testifies to what he has seen and heard, but no one accepts his testimony. Whoever does accept his testimony certifies that God is trustworthy. For the one whom God sent speaks the words of God. He does not ration his gift of the Spirit. The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him.

Reflections (8)

(i) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading, it is said of Jesus, ‘he whom God has sent speaks God’s own words. God gives him the Spirit without reserve’. It is because we believe Jesus is full of God’s Spirit, the Holy Spirit, and speaks God’s own words that he is at the centre of our faith, and the centre of our lives as Christians. We believe that God came among us in a unique way through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Jesus has come full of the love and the life of God and as risen Lord that is how he remains among us. According to the gospel reading, if we entrust ourselves to the risen Lord in faith, we will come to share in that life of God which fills Jesus, which is the life of heaven, eternal life. As believers in the Lord, we already begin to live with the life of heaven, and will come to enjoy it fully beyond this earthly life. Because of who Jesus is, our relationship with him is the most important relationship in our lives. It is the foundation of all our other relationships. In today’s first reading, the apostles demonstrate just how central the risen Lord is in their lives. When the religious leaders repeat their formal warning to them not to preach in the name of Jesus, the apostles replied, ‘Obedience to God comes before obedience to men’. It is God present in Jesus as risen Lord who shapes what the apostles say and do, not the religious leaders in Jerusalem. The apostles show us that our primary allegiance is to the Lord and not to any human authority or power. They also inspire us to be faithful to our allegiance to the Lord, even when it is costly, and puts us at odds with the powers that be.

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(ii) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

In this morning’s gospel we are given words spoken by John the Baptist. In the verse just before this gospel reading begins, John the Baptist had said of Jesus, ‘He must increase, but I must decrease’. He then goes on to speak of Jesus, in the opening line of our gospel reading, as ‘the one who comes from above’ and who, therefore, ‘is above all others’. John was very aware that Jesus was above him. He goes on to say of Jesus, in the words of our gospel reading, that he ‘comes from heaven’, that ‘the Father gives Jesus the Spirit without reserve’, that the Father ‘has entrusted everything to the Son’. John was very aware that none of those things could be said about himself. He had a profound appreciation of the uniqueness of Jesus, which is why he could say, ‘he must increase, but I must decrease’. There is a sense in which we never fully appreciate the uniqueness, the specialness, of Jesus in this life. The more we see of Jesus, the more we recognize what is yet to be seen. The closer we come to him, the more we realize how deeper our relationship with him could be. There is always a sense in which we can say with John the Baptist ‘he must increase’ and ‘I must decrease’. As he increases in us and we decrease, we don’t cease to be ourselves. Rather, the more Jesus increases in us, the more we become our true selves, our Christ selves, the person God is calling us to be.

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(iii) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

One of the questions that Jesus is often asked in John’s gospel is ‘Where do you come from?’ When people ask that question they generally mean ‘Where about in Judea or in Galilee do you come from?’ However, the attentive readers of John’s gospel will recognize that there is more to that question than those who ask it realize. The real answer to the question addressed to Jesus, ‘Where do you come from?’ is that Jesus comes from heaven or from God. This is what we find stated very clearly in this morning’s gospel reading, which declares that Jesus comes from above or from heaven. The gospel reading goes on to declare that because Jesus comes from heaven, he is able to bear witness to what he has seen and heard in heaven, what he has seen and heard from God his Father. He is uniquely placed to bear witness to who God is because, according to John’s gospel, he has been with God from all eternity and has come from God. Indeed this gospel would go further and state that Jesus is God in human form. That is why we take Jesus so seriously, why we pay such close attention to what he does and says, to his life, death and resurrection. That is why we treasure the books of the gospels so much, because if Jesus bears witness to God, the gospels bear witness to Jesus. Jesus brings God to us and brings us to God. The risen Jesus, therefore, has to be at the centre of our faith lives and at the centre of the life of the church.

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(iv) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

The gospel reading puts before us some very striking statements about Jesus. He comes from above, from heaven, and bears witness to what he has seen and heard there. He speaks God’s own words. God gives him the Spirit without reserve. God the Father has entrusted everything to his Son. All of these statements claim that Jesus has a unique relationship with God. He is the full revelation of God. That is why the reading ends with the declaration that all who believe in Jesus have eternal life, the life of God. Here and now they already share in the life of God which Jesus brings us. Eternal life is not just a life that begins after death. It is the life of God and his Son and it is received here and now by those who believe in God’s Son. Eternal life, this sharing in the life of God, begins now and will extend beyond the barrier of physical death into the undying life of God. The claims of the gospel reading about Jesus and about what he offers us take time to absorb, so striking and powerful are these claims. If what the gospel reading says is true then how we respond to Jesus, the one whom God has sent into the world, is of enormous significance. The most important decision we can make in life is to believe in the one whom God has sent into the world and allow that belief to shape the whole pattern of our life.

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(v) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

The Acts of the Apostles suggests that as soon as the gospel began to be preached after Pentecost efforts were made by people in authority to suppress it. The gospel was not experienced as good news by some and they made every effort to silence those who were preaching it. However, today’s first reading shows that the efforts of those in authority to silence the gospel were not successful. Although Peter and the other apostles had been given a formal warning by the religious authorities not to preach the gospel, they carried on regardless because they understood that this was their calling in life, the mission they had received from the risen Lord. As they say to the religious authorities in that first reading, ‘Obedience to God comes before obedience to men’. It is a statement worth reflecting upon. It invites us to ask, ‘Who shapes our lives? Is it the Lord or someone or something else?’ Or to put the question in another way, ‘Who or what is Lord of our lives?’ The apostles were clear that Jesus was Lord of their lives and not the religious authorities. It was to him that they must submit, not to them. The attitude of the apostles shows us what is at the heart of our own lives as Christians. We are those who seek to take Jesus as the Lord of our lives. We recognize in the words of today’s gospel reading that ‘he is above all others’, including all human authority, be it religious or political. We spend our lives trying to submit ourselves to the Lordship of Jesus. In submitting to his Lordship, we are assured that we will experience true freedom, what Saint Paul calls ‘the glorious freedom of the children of God’, the freedom to live in the fully human way that God desires for us.

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(vi) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading, John the Baptist says of Jesus, ‘He whom God has sent speaks God’s own words’. Jesus speaks God’s own words because he is the Word of God in human flesh. In the opening verses of his gospel, John the evangelist declared, ‘the Word became flesh and lived among us’. We reflect deeply on all that Jesus said and did, on the whole of his life, on his death, resurrection and ascension, because we know that God has spoken the most powerful and clearest word he could ever speak through Jesus. We are not in the dark about God, wondering who God is and what God is like. In the language of this fourth gospel, it is Jesus, ‘who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known’. Jesus came among us, full of God’s grace and truth, full of God’s gracious love and faithfulness, and we are invited to keep receiving from this fullness of God in Jesus. He has given us so much from his fullness that a life time is not long enough to receive it all. According to today’s gospel reading, God gives the Spirit to Jesus without reserve. God gave all to Jesus without reserve, and what Jesus received from God he has given to us, without reserve. However, there will always be a reserve in our receiving. We struggle to empty ourselves sufficiently to receive all the Lord wants to give us. We spend our lives learning to receive like little children. The greater our capacity to receive from the Lord’s fullness, the greater will be our ability to give as we have received. As Jesus received all from God and gave what he received to us, so Jesus looks to us to receive all from him and to give what we receive to one another. We are to keep receiving from Jesus all he wishes to give us, his word, his Spirit, his love, so that, like Peter in today’s first reading, we can witness to him before others.

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(vii) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

We live in a sea of words. Words come at us in various forms, be they written or spoken or digital. In the past, people had to seek out the written word in a book. Now, the digital word arrives on our smart phones without us having to look for it. Surrounded by so many words, the task of discerning which words are more important than others become all the more pressing. Today’s gospel reading declares that ‘he whom God has sent speaks God’s own words’ because ‘God gives the Spirit to him without reserve’. Jesus has a unique relationship with God and so he is uniquely placed to speak God’s own words. Indeed, the opening chapter of John’s gospel declares that not only does Jesus speak God’s own words but that he is the Word of God become flesh, God’s Word in human form. As the Lord’s disciples, we pay closer attention to his words than to anyone else’s words because we recognize that his words are God’s words and that his life, death and resurrection is God’s Word to us. Our attentiveness to God’s word present in Jesus allows us to assess the value of all the other words that come towards us. The more we immerse ourselves in the words of God spoken and lived by Jesus, the more we can make wise judgements about the words of others. In the first reading, the apostles did not take seriously the words of the high priest when he warned them not to preach in the name of Jesus. Their fundamental loyalty was to the word of God revealed in Jesus, ‘Obedience to God comes before obedience to men’. Faithfulness to the words of God, especially spoken by Jesus, will often put us at odds with the words of others, but the gospel reading declares that in doing so, in believing in the Son, we are assured of eternal life.

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(viii) Thursday, Second Week of Easter

The words of Peter and the apostles to the high priest, ‘Obedience to God comes before obedience to men’, was a conviction which shaped the life of the first believers. It often brought them into conflict with the religious leaders who thought of themselves as the mediators of God’s word. For us as Christians, obedience to God is obedience to his Son, Jesus, our risen Lord, because as today’s gospel declares, ‘he whom God has sent speaks God’s own words’. The Greek word translated ‘obedience’ suggests attentive listening. We are called to listen attentively to the word of God, especially as proclaimed and lived by Jesus who is God’s Word in human form. As the Word of God, Jesus is the Bread of Life because his words can satisfy the deepest hunger in our hearts, our hunger for truth and for an assurance of God’s love. In the words of today’s responsorial psalm, we are invited to ‘taste and see that the Lord is good’. The gospel reading declares that ‘God gives him (Jesus) the Spirit without reserve’, and in this fourth gospel Jesus declares that his words are ‘spirit and life’. When we listen attentively to the Lord’s word, we are opening ourselves to Holy Spirit, and in the power of that Spirit we will be able to witness to our faith in the Lord with something of the courage shown by Peter and the apostles in today’s first reading.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 8 days

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10th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 3:16-21) for Wednesday, Second Week of Easter: ‘God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son’.

Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 3:16-21 God sent his Son into the world so that through him the world might be saved.

Jesus said to Nicodemus:

‘God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life. For God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through him the world might be saved. No one who believes in him will be condemned; but whoever refuses to believe is condemned already, because he has refused to believe in the name of God’s only Son. On these grounds is sentence pronounced: that though the light has come into the world men have shown they prefer darkness to the light because their deeds were evil. And indeed, everybody who does wrong hates the light and avoids it, for fear his actions should be exposed; but the man who lives by the truth comes out into the light, so that it may be plainly seen that what he does is done in God.’

Gospel (USA) John 3:16-21 God sent his Son that the world might be saved through him.

God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light, so that his works might not be exposed. But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.

Reflections (8)

(i) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

A common security measure in many homes and businesses are strong lights that come on at night when somebody comes within a certain radius and breaks the beam. It is based on the presumption that during hours of darkness light is the enemy of anyone who might want to break into the premises. Those who might be up to no good prefer the cover of darkness. In the words of today’s gospel reading, ‘everybody who does wrong hates the light and avoids it, for fear his actions should be exposed’. Light exposes wrong doing. In a sense, it condemns the wrong doer. According to the gospel reading, God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world. When today’s gospel reading says that ‘the light has come into the world’, the reference is clearly to Jesus. Yet, the light of Jesus is not a condemning light whose sole purpose is to expose evil. The light of Jesus is essentially a light of love, the light of God who so loved the world that he gave his only Son. The first letter of John makes two simple statements about God, ‘God is love’ and ‘God is light’. When we step into the light of God’s love shining through Jesus, there is a sense in which our sins are exposed. To see ourselves in the light of Jesus is to recognize how far we fall short of the loving person God has created us to be. Yet, the primary purpose of Jesus’ loving light is to take away our sin. Jesus, the light of God, seeks to draw us to himself so that we may have life and have it to the full. Jesus says of himself in John’s gospel, ‘I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life’. The Lord’s light is the light of life because it is the light of love. There is a fullness of life in the Lord’s light from which we can all receive if we keep coming out into this light.

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(ii) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

We can certainly notice a stretch in the evenings these days. All of a sudden it is bright beyond 7.00 pm. Most of us like the light. We are pleased to know that the daylight is lengthening every day at this time of the year. Our heart sinks a bit when we realize that the days have begun to get shorter. Even though most of us like the light, the gospel reading declares that people have shown they prefer darkness to light. The evangelist is referring there not to daylight, but to the one who declares himself to be the light of the world. Our calling is to ‘come out into the light’, in the words of the gospel reading. This morning’s gospel reading makes the very generous statement that all who live by the truth come out into the light. All who seek the truth are already standing in the light of Christ, even though they may not be aware of it. The gospel reading suggests that people of faith, those who seek to be guided by the light of Christ, will always have something very fundamental in common with all who seek the truth with sincerity of heart.

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(iii) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

One of the great verses of John’s gospel is to be found at the beginning of our gospel reading this morning, ‘God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him... may have eternal life’. That statement has been a source of inspiration for many believers over the centuries. The evangelist declares that Jesus, God’s Son, reveals God’s love for the world and for each of us individually. All authentic love is life-giving, and God’s love, revealed in the coming of Jesus, is life-giving to an exceptional degree. God gave us his Son so that we might have life and have it to the full, what this morning’s gospel reading calls ‘eternal life’. Therein lies the gospel, the good news of God’s loving and life-giving initiative towards us. The fourth evangelist is also clear that God’s initiative needs our response if it is to be effective. We need to come to God’s Son, to come out into the light, in the words of gospel reading. Having come to God’s Son, we need to remain in him, to remain in his love, and we do that by keeping his word, by living out his new commandment to love one another as he has loved us. God has given his Son to us; it falls to us to give ourselves to God’s Son. Then we will indeed have life and have it to the full.

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(iv) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

The words of Jesus to Nicodemus in this morning’s gospel reading are one of the strongest and most positive statements in the New Testament about God. It speaks of God’s love for the world, of God’s generous way of expressing his love by giving the world his Son and of God’s desire that all people would experience eternal life through receiving God’s Son in faith. It is a hugely positive image of God and of how God relates to the world. It is a verse worth pondering and reflecting upon at length. Yet, the gospel reading we have just heard acknowledges another reality. It recognizes that people can refuse God’s love, God’s gift of his Son, God’s offer of life. In the words of the gospel reading, ‘though the light has come into the world, people have shown that they prefer darkness to the light, because their deeds were evil’. God can only do so much. We have to open ourselves to God’s love, receive God’s Son, enter into the light and allow it to shine upon us. God wants our response, but God cannot force it. Yet, God is prepared to wait, as Jesus was prepared to wait for Nicodemus. He only gradually came to believe in Jesus as God’s Son given to the world out of love. His first tentative step was to come to Jesus by night. His last appearance in the gospel is alongside Joseph of Arimathea, as they both arrange for Jesus to have a dignified burial.

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(v) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

According to today’s first reading, Peter and the message he preaches cannot be confined behind bars, in spite of the best efforts of those who want to silence that message. The Easter proclamation cannot be imprisoned, just as the guards at the tomb of Easter could not prevent Jesus bursting forth into new life. The light which shone from the risen Lord and from the preaching of the Easter gospel could not be extinguished by the powers of darkness. The gospel reading acknowledges that even though the light has come into the world, some have shown that they prefer darkness to the light. They hate and avoid the light because they feel threatened by it, as if it will expose what is wrong in them. Yet, the light of Easter is not like the light of the interrogation room. It is not a light to be feared or avoided. It is the light of God who so loved the world that he gave his only Son, in the language of the gospel reading. It is not a condemnatory light; God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world but so that, through him, the world may have life and have it to the full. This is a light to be warmly welcomed, not to be extinguished or imprisoned. God has embraced the world through the death and resurrection of his Son. It falls to us now to embrace God’s Son, the light of the world, the one who declared that whoever follows him will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.

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(vi) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

The gospel of John frequently refers to Jesus as light. On one occasion, Jesus says of himself: ‘I am the light of the world’. In today’s gospel reading, Jesus says with reference to himself: ‘Light has come into the world’. In one of the most memorable statements of the New Testament the gospel reading declares that the light that has come into the world in the person of Jesus is the light of God’s love, ‘God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him… may have eternal life’. The light of Jesus is not the probing light of the grand inquisitor that seeks out failure and transgression with a view to condemnation. Indeed, the gospel reading states that God ‘sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world’. The light of Jesus, rather, is the inviting light of God’s love, calling out to us to come and to allow ourselves to be bathed in this light, and promising those who do so that they will share in God’s own life, both here and now and also beyond death. At the beginning of our gospel reading, Jesus speaks of himself as the Son of Man who must be lifted up. It was on the cross and in his resurrection that Jesus was lifted up, and it was above all at that moment that the light of God’s love shone most brightly. Those who attempted to extinguish God’s light shining in Jesus only succeeded in making that light of love shine all the more brightly. God’s gift of his Son to us was not in any way thwarted by the rejection of his Son. God’s giving continued as Jesus was lifted up to die, and God’s giving found further expression when God lifted up his Son in glory and gave him to us as risen Lord. Here indeed is a light that darkness cannot overcome, a love that human sin cannot extinguish. This is the core of the gospel.

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(vii) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

Most of us prefer light to darkness. When we realize shortly after Christmas that the days are starting to get longer, it gives our heart a lift. When we see in late September how much shorter the days are getting we can get a bit discouraged. Light draws us out. On the longer days, we might go for a walk late in the evening, whereas we wouldn’t think of walking so late in the winter darkness. However, we know that much crime is committed under cover of darkness. Darkness gives more protection to those who are intent on doing harm. In their case, it is darkness rather than light that attracts. Today’s gospel reading declares that ‘though light has come into the world, people have shown they prefer darkness to the light because their deeds were evil’. Some people found the light of God’s love and goodness shining through Jesus too threatening. It was challenging to their way of thinking and behaving, and so they sought to extinguish the light. It seemed as if they had done so on Calvary, but the God of light raised Jesus from the dead and the light of God’s loving goodness now shone even more brightly through the risen Lord. The light of the Easter gospel could not be extinguished, just as the messengers of that light could not be imprisoned in today’s first reading. The light that shines through the risen Lord is not a light to be feared, even by those ‘whose deeds were evil’. It is not the harsh light of the interrogator. Rather, it is the light of love, the light of God who so loved the world that he gave his only Son so that all may have life and have it to the full. It is by opening ourselves to this light and allowing it to penetrate our lives that we will come to share in the risen Lord’s own peace and joy, and be the bearers of his peace and joy to others.

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(viii) Wednesday, Second Week of Easter

The first reading suggests that no human power can block the preaching of the gospel, not even the imprisonment of the apostles, Jesus’ closest associates. The risen Lord will always find a way for the gospel to be proclaimed, in spite of people’s best efforts to silence it. That is because, in the words of today’s gospel reading, ‘God so loved the world’. God sent his Son into the world so that everyone may have eternal life. For God, it is a matter of the greatest urgency that the gospel that was proclaimed and lived by his Son, now risen Lord, be announced to as many people as possible. God will stop at nothing to ensure that the world of humanity hears the gospel of God’s saving love for all. The light of God’s love shines through the gospel and God passionately desires that this light would shine upon all, in every time and place, just as the earthly sun shines on all. Yet, the gospel reading also states that people need to be open to this light, to come out into the light, to love the light of God’s enduring love. In the words of today’s psalm, we need to look towards the light so that we can be radiant. Nothing we do or fail to do will prevent the light of the gospel of God’s love from shining upon us, but we can chose to turn away from the light, to block it out, just as Judas left the presence of Jesus at the last supper and went out into the night. The good news is that even when we turn from the light and chose darkness, the light shines in the darkness and, if there is even the smallest opening in us to the light, the darkness will not overcome the light of God’s loving presence.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 9 days

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9th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 3:7-15) for Tuesday, Second Week of Easter: ‘You must be born from above’.

Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

Gospel (Except USA) John 3:7-15 No-one has gone up to heaven except the Son of Man who has come down from heaven.

Jesus said to Nicodemus:

‘Do not be surprised when I say: You must be born from above. The wind blows wherever it pleases; you hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. That is how it is with all who are born of the Spirit.’

‘How can that be possible?’ asked Nicodemus. ‘You, a teacher in Israel, and you do not know these things!’ replied Jesus.

‘I tell you most solemnly, we speak only about what we know and witness only to what we have seen and yet you people reject our evidence. If you do not believe me when I speak about things in this world, how are you going to believe me when I speak to you about heavenly things? No one has gone up to heaven except the one who came down from heaven, the Son of Man who is in heaven; and the Son of Man must be lifted up as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.’

Gospel (USA) John 3:7b-15 No one has gone up to heaven except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man.

Jesus said to Nicodemus: “‘You must be born from above.’ The wind blows where it wills, and you can hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes; so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” Nicodemus answered and said to him, ‘How can this happen?” Jesus answered and said to him, “You are the teacher of Israel and you do not understand this? Amen, amen, I say to you, we speak of what we know and we testify to what we have seen, but you people do not accept our testimony. If I tell you about earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has gone up to heaven except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”

Reflections (9)

(i) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

In the gospel reading Jesus speaks of ‘things of this world’ and ‘heavenly things’. Yet, it is clear from what Jesus has been saying that there isn’t a sharp distinction between the earthly and the heavenly realm. Heavenly things can be viewed through earthly things. The human experience of birth can speak to us of another kind of birth, a being born of the Spirit. The natural phenomenon of the wind can speak to us of the spiritual phenomenon of the Holy Spirit. Jesus is the en-fleshed Word, God in human form. To look upon the flesh of Jesus, his human life, is to look upon God. In Jesus, the earthly has become the revelation of the heavenly, and Jesus shows us how to see the deeper, heavenly, reality in and through the earthly reality. In all four gospels, Jesus shows us how so much of human life can speak to us of God’s life, the kingdom of heaven. Just as God became flesh in Jesus, so the Spirit of God can become flesh in our lives. When we allow the Spirit of the Lord to shape our lives, others can see something of the life of God in and through our lives. The first reading shows us one way in which the Spirit of God took flesh in the life of the early church. Within that community of faith, no member was ever in want, because all who had more than they needed shared with those in need, through the agency of the Apostles. Such a life was the fruit of the Spirit’s activity among them. Here in the early church was the life of God in human form. The life of God is a life of love given and received. Our calling as individual believers and as a community of faith is to allow the Holy Spirit to take flesh in our lives so that others can see heavenly things through our way of living and our manner of relating to one another.

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(ii) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

The birth of a child is one of the greatest causes of joy in human experience, especially for the parents of the child. Life is never the same for a couple after the birth of their child. This new life has an extraordinary impact on their lives from the moment the child is born. There is something wonderfully mysterious about the birth of every child. We encounter something of the mystery of God in and through every human birth. The spontaneous response to such mysterious new life is thanksgiving. In this morning’s gospel reading Jesus speaks to Nicodemus of a different kind of birth. He speaks to him of the need to be ‘born from above’ or ‘born of the Spirit’. If human birth makes the child a son or daughter of his or her parents, birth from above or birth of the Spirit, makes us sons and daughters of God, thereby giving us a share in Jesus’ own relationship with God as Son. If there is something mysterious about every human birth, the kind of birth that Jesus speaks about is even more mysterious. Although a teacher in Israel, Nicodemus responds to Jesus’ words about this kind of birth with the question, ‘How can that be possible?’ Yet, the good news is that Jesus came to draw us into his own relationship with God and he makes this possible in and through the gift of his Spirit to us, the Holy Spirit. There is indeed much to ponder here and much to give thanks for.

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(iii) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

Jesus speaks about the wind in this morning’s gospel reading. He says, ‘the wind blows where it pleases’. The wind is beyond our control; it doesn’t blow where and when we want it to blow. We can harness the wind to some good purpose, but we are never in control of it. Jesus often spoke about day to day realities, like the wind, as a way of talking about more spiritual realities. In this morning’s gospel, in speaking about the wind he is, in reality, speaking about the Holy Spirit, ‘This is how it is with all who are born of the Spirit’, he says. In the language Jesus spoke, and in the language the gospels were written in, the same word could mean either ‘wind’ or ‘Spirit’. Jesus seems to be saying to Nicodemus and to us that the Spirit of God is not something we can control. We do not take the Spirit where we want it to go; the Spirit takes us where God wants us to go. All we can do is to surrender to the breath of the Spirit within us and around us, to allow the Spirit to direct us and to lead us. Like a flag blowing in the wind, we are to move in response to the movement of the Spirit. The spiritual person is the person whose life is shaped and directed by the Spirit. We are all called to be spiritual people in that sense. Discerning where the Holy Spirit is leading us is central to our lives as followers of Jesus.

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(iv) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

In this morning’s gospel reading we find Nicodemus struggling to understand when Jesus tells him that he must be born from above, born of the Spirit. In response, Nicodemus asks ‘How can that be possible?’ Nicodemus is an example of someone who struggled to come to faith; he struggle to become a disciple of Jesus. He was drawn to Jesus but he could not quite grasp what Jesus was asking of him, not initially at least. Yet, Nicodemus did not give up on Jesus and the last we see of him in John’s gospel is at Golgotha where, after the death of Jesus, he and Joseph of Arimathea ensure that Jesus has a dignified burial. It seems that in the course of Jesus’ public ministry he gradually grew in his relationship with Jesus; he allowed himself to be drawn to Jesus more fully. The journey of faith is not always straightforward. Like Nicodemus we can find ourselves at an impasse. His question, ‘How can that be possible?’ becomes our question. Yet, all we can do is stay with our questions and be faithful to our search. The Lord will do the rest. If we are open and honest, the Lord will draw us to himself in time, in his time and in ours.

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(v) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus speaks of the wind as having a mysterious quality. Although we can hear the sound of the wind, it is not always easy to judge the direction the wind is blowing from and the direction towards which it is blowing. In the language in which the gospels were written, and the language Jesus spoke, the same word could refer to both the physical wind and the Spirit of God. Jesus argues that if there is a mysterious quality about the wind, there is an even more mysterious quality about the Spirit of God. The origin and destination of the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is wrapped in the mystery of God. We cannot fully grasp the Holy Spirit and we certainly cannot control the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God’s love, a love whose breadth and length and height and depth cannot be fully comprehended. Yet, God pours this Spirit of his love into our lives. Our calling is to surrender to this Spirit in our lives, to allow ourselves to be born of this Spirit, to be born from above, in the words of Jesus to Nicodemus. This being born of the Spirit will take more than nine months, the period of human birth. The opening of our lives more fully to the Spirit of God is the journey of a lifetime, a journey we are asked to be faithful to until the end of our earthly lives.

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(vi) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

Jesus often speaks about spiritual realities with reference to various aspects of human experience. When he seeks to give an understanding of the kingdom of God, he tells parables, stories that are deeply rooted in everyday life. We find something similar happening in today’s gospel reading. He speaks about the mysterious reality of the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, with reference to the everyday reality of the wind. There is a mysterious quality to the wind. As Jesus says, ‘it blows where it pleases’. Nowadays we can harness the wind to generate electricity, but there is so much about the wind which is beyond our control and understanding. In the words of the gospel reading, we certainly cannot control where it comes from or where it goes to. We also cannot control the strength of the wind. If the wind is beyond our control and understanding, this is true to an even greater extent of the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. We cannot manage the Holy Spirit. If we are not masters of the wind, we are even less masters of the Spirit. Yet, whereas the wind is an impersonal force, the Spirit is a personal force. We speak of the Spirit as the third person of the Trinity. The Spirit is the Spirit of God’s personal love for the world. Whereas the wind can be destructive, the Spirit is always life-giving. Our calling is to surrender to the movement of the Spirit in our lives, to allow the Spirit to shape and mould us. When that happens, our lives will give expression to God’s personal love for the world.

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(vii) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

In today’s gospel Jesus says, ‘the wind blows wherever it pleases’. In other words, the wind does not blow in accordance with our wishes. When it comes to our relationship with the wind, it is the wind, not us, that has the upper hand. Some days we have a cold wind from the north or the east. Other days we have a warm wind from the south. Most days in this part of the world we have a damp wind from the west. We have to accept the wind that comes our way. We can harness the wind to some extent, to generate electricity, but that is dependent on the strength of the wind, over which we have no control. The wind is a mysterious force which we cannot simply manage to suit ourselves. In the gospel reading Jesus makes a comparison between the wind and the Holy Spirit. Indeed, in the language Jesus spoke and in the language in which the gospels were written the one word could be translated either wind or Spirit. If the wind is mysterious and beyond our control, the Spirit of God is even more mysterious and beyond our control. The Spirit comes from God and goes to God and God is always beyond us, beyond our understanding and our control. However, the Spirit can enter a human life and we know what a Spirit-filled life looks life. Jesus is the one on whom the Spirit came down and remained and his life is pre-eminently Spirit filled. The risen Lord continues to pour out his Spirit into our hearts so that our lives may be Spirit-filled. Paul portrays such a Spirit-filled life when he says in his letter to the Galatians that the fruit of the Spirit is ‘love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control’. Elsewhere Paul suggests that a Spirit-filled life is also a prayerful life. In his letter to the Romans he says, ‘we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words’. It is the Spirit in us who does the praying. The Spirit may be mysterious but when the Spirit takes shape in a human life we recognize the Spirit’s attractiveness. It is the attractiveness of God whose love is beyond human comprehension.

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(viii) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

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(ix) Tuesday, Second Week of Easter

The first reading gives us an insight into how the members of the early church looked out for one another. If a member of the community had more that was needed, it was presented to the Apostles who distributed it to those who were in greater need. As a result, none of the members of the community were ever in want. This tradition of sharing from our surplus to give to those in greater need has been an essential feature of the life of the church since its earliest beginnings. One expression of it today is the work of the Vincent de Paul Society. The monthly collection that is taken up outside the church allows them to help people who find themselves in a once-off need or perhaps in a situation that requires a more sustained response. This is one manifestation of the presence of the Holy Spirit in the life of the church, what Saint Paul calls a fruit of the Spirit. In the gospel reading, Jesus compares the Spirit to the wind. Just as you cannot see the wind as such but can experience its impact on ourselves, on others, on nature, so we cannot see the Holy Spirit directly, but we can see the impact of the Holy Spirit in our lives and the lives of others. Just as the wind blows wherever it pleases, so the Spirit works where it pleases. We will often see the impact of the Spirit in people and in places where we didn’t expect to find it. We can delight in wherever we happen to find the fruit of the Spirit. As people born of the Spirit through baptism, we have a special calling to allow the Spirit to blow through us and to shape what we say and do.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 10 days

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8th April - Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. Luke 1:26-38)for the Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord: ‘Let what you have said be done to me’.

Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord

Gospel (Except USA) Luke 1:26-38 'I am the handmaid of the Lord'.

The angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the House of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. He went in and said to her, ‘Rejoice, so highly favoured! The Lord is with you.’ She was deeply disturbed by these words and asked herself what this greeting could mean, but the angel said to her, ‘Mary, do not be afraid; you have won God’s favour. Listen! You are to conceive and bear a son, and you must name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David; he will rule over the House of Jacob for ever and his reign will have no end.’ Mary said to the angel, ‘But how can this come about, since I am a virgin?’ ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you’ the angel answered ‘and the power of the Most High will cover you with its shadow. And so the child will be holy and will be called Son of God. Know this too: your kinswoman Elizabeth has, in her old age, herself conceived a son, and she whom people called barren is now in her sixth month, for nothing is impossible to God.’ ‘I am the handmaid of the Lord,’ said Mary ‘let what you have said be done to me.’ And the angel left her.

Gospel (USA) Luke 1:26–38 Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son.

The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin’s name was Mary. And coming to her, he said, “Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you.” But she was greatly troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his Kingdom there will be no end.” But Mary said to the angel, “How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?” And the angel said to her in reply, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God. And behold, Elizabeth, your relative, has also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who was called barren; for nothing will be impossible for God.” Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.” Then the angel departed from her.

Reflections (5)

(i) Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord

The gospel reading we have just heard has often been depicted by artists down the centuries, whether on canvas or in glass. It is as if artists recognize the great significance of this scene. God had a purpose for the world but if that purpose was to come to pass it needed the consent of a young woman, named Mary, from a small village in the region of Galilee in Northern Israel. A great deal depended on the consent of this young woman to what God was asking of her. God wanted her to be the mother of the one through whom God would work for the wellbeing and final salvation of all humanity. The son whom Mary would bear would have such an intimate relationship with God that he could be called ‘Son of the Most High’. Because of the unique identity of Mary’s son, he would be conceived in a unique way, through the power of the Holy Spirit. This was a great deal for a young woman to comprehend and consent to. It is not surprising that the gospel reading says she was ‘deeply disturbed’ and was left with many questions, including the question, ‘How can this come about, since I am a virgin?’ God was drawing very close to Mary and it left her with many questions. When God draws near to us and we draw near to God, we too will find ourselves asking many questions. We come to realize that the answers we have given to our questions about God are not adequate. God is so much more mysterious that we imagined, so much more wonderful. The gospel goes on to declare that, in the end, Mary consented to what God was asking of her, ‘I am the handmaid of the Lord, let what you have said be done to me’. She gave herself over to God’s purpose for her life, even though she didn’t fully understand it. She surrendered in faith and trust to God. Because of her act of trusting faith, God’s purpose for all humanity came to pass. Mary is a wonderful model of trusting faith in God, when all is not clear, when we have more questions than answers. She also shows us that our faith, our trusting relationship with the Lord, will always have life-giving consequences for others. Because of our faith, God’s purpose, not just for our own lives but for the lives of others, will come to pass.

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(ii) Feast of the Annunciation of the Lord

The feast of the annunciation celebrates the moment when Mary said ‘yes’ to God’s call to be the mother of God’s Son. The gospel reading suggests that her ‘yes’ did not come without a struggle. When God first approached her through the angel Gabriel, Mary was ‘deeply disturbed’. When Gabriel went on to announce God’s purpose for Mary’s life, Mary was full of questions, ‘How can this be?’ It was only when Gabriel spoke for the third time that Mary surrendered to what God was asking her through Gabriel, ‘Let what you have said be done to me’. The gospel suggests Mary’s ‘yes’ to God’s call did not come effortlessly; it was not a foregone conclusion. Yet, because of her ‘yes’ we have all been greatly blessed, and, so, today, on the feast of her annunciation, we give thanks for her generous response to God’s call, which has been a source of grace for us all. The portrayal of Mary in this morning’s gospel reading suggests that our own response to the Lord’s call will never be easy; it will always involve something of a struggle. The reading also suggests that, as in the case of Mary, our saying ‘yes’ to the Lord will be a source of blessing for others. My relationship with the Lord may be personal, but it is never private. It always has consequences for others. When I am generous in my response to the Lord’s call, as Mary was, others are helped to come to the Lord. Mary has been described as the first and the model disciple of the Lord; we look to her to inspire us as we seek to take to Lord’s call to heart; we ask her to pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.

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(iii) Feast of the Annunciation of the Lord

In the gospel reading this morning Mary is portrayed by Luke the evangelist as someone whose initial response to the call of God was to raise questions. After she was greeted by the angel Gabriel as ‘highly favoured’, Luke tells us that she was deeply disturbed by these words and asked herself what this greeting could mean. Then when Gabriel announced that she would give birth to a child who would be called Son of the Most High, she asked, ‘How can this come about, since I am a virgin?’ Mary’s questioning did not cease when her child was born. When the shepherds came and told her all they had seen and heard, Luke tells us that Mary treasured their words and pondered them in her heart. When her twelve year old son went missing and was eventually found in the Temple, Mary questioned him, ‘Child, why have you treated us like this?’ When Jesus answered her question by saying that he must be about his Father’s business, Luke tells us that Mary and Joseph did not understand what he said to them and that Mary, in particular, treasured all these things in her heart. The picture Luke gives us of Mary is of a woman who is full of questions, who ponders deeply on all that was happening in her life so as to understand it more fully. She models for us a reflective faith, a faith that seeks to understand. Theology has been described as faith seeking understanding. Mary was a theologian in that sense. Indeed we are all called to be theologians in the sense in which Mary was one. Like her, we too ask questions about God and Jesus and about what it means to respond to God’s call to us in Jesus; like her we are invited to ponder the great mysteries of our faith so as to grow in our understanding of them. As people of faith, we are to be searchers after truth, like Mary. In our searching we have the encouragement of the Lord’s promise to us, ‘Seek and you will find’.

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(iv) Feast of the Annunciation of the Lord

There is a lot of very concrete information at the beginning of this evening’s gospel reading: Galilee, Nazareth, Joseph of the house of David, Mary. There is reference to a very particular place, Nazareth in Galilee, and to a very particular couple in that place, Joseph who was betrothed to Mary. It was that particular couple in that particular place at a particular moment in time whom God chose in a special way for the sake of all of humanity. It was to that couple in that place at that time that God’s Son was entrusted for all of us. The gospel reading concludes with the confident declaration, ‘Nothing is impossible to God’. Yet, the one thing that God cannot do is to force our consent. God’s purpose for our lives was dependant on the consent of this particular woman in this particular place at a particular time, and, also, on the consent of her spouse, Joseph. Mary’s consent to God’s messenger allowed God’s purpose to come to pass for all of us. In a certain sense, at the moment of the annunciation, Mary represented us all; we all waited for her to say ‘yes’ to God on all our behalves. All of humanity’s deepest aspirations were focused on this particular woman, place and time. At the annunciation, God’s call met with the complete human response, ‘Let what you have said be done to me’. Luke is presenting Mary here as the exemplary disciple, the one who hears the word of God and keeps it. Because of her exemplary response to God, she became a source of blessing for all of humanity. If we can enter in some way into her response to God’s call, we too will be a source of blessing for others.

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(v) Feast of the Annunciation of the Lord

The gospel reading this morning portrays Mary as saying ‘yes’ to God’s call on her to become the mother of God’s Son. The gospel suggests that her response to God’s call did not come easily to her. Initially she was ‘deeply disturbed’ by the greeting of the angel. She was full of questions in response to the further words of the angel. ‘How can this come about?’ she asked. She eventually arrived at the point where she could say, ‘Let what you have said be done to me’. However, she only came to that point after a lot of struggle. We amreminded of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. His prayer eventually brought him to the point where he could say, ‘Not my will but yours be done’. However, that was only after a great struggle, in the course of which he had prayed, ‘Remove this cup from me’. The experience of Mary and of Jesus remind us that responding to God’s call, remaining faithful to God’s will for our lives, will always involve a struggle of some kind. The nature of that struggle will be different for each of us. We engage in that struggle knowing that we are not alone in it. The power of the Most High will overshadow us; the Holy Spirit will come upon us, as it came upon Mary. In our struggle to be faithful, we are also encouraged by the words of Gabriel to Mary, ‘nothing is impossible to God’. In the words of Paul’s first letter to the church in Thessalonica, ‘The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 11 days

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7th April >> Fr. Martin's Homilies / Reflections on Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 20:19-31) for the Second Sunday of Easter, Cycle B (Divine Mercy Sunday): ‘Happy are those who have not seen and yet believe’.

Second Sunday of Easter, Year B

Gospel (Except USA) John 20:19-31 Eight days later, Jesus came again and stood among them.

In the evening of that same day, the first day of the week, the doors were closed in the room where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and stood among them. He said to them, ‘Peace be with you’, and showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were filled with joy when they saw the Lord, and he said to them again, ‘Peace be with you.

‘As the Father sent me, so am I sending you.’

After saying this he breathed on them and said:

‘Receive the Holy Spirit. For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; for those whose sins you retain, they are retained.’

Thomas, called the Twin, who was one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. When the disciples said, ‘We have seen the Lord’, he answered, ‘Unless I see the holes that the nails made in his hands and can put my finger into the holes they made, and unless I can put my hand into his side, I refuse to believe.’ Eight days later the disciples were in the house again and Thomas was with them. The doors were closed, but Jesus came in and stood among them. ‘Peace be with you’ he said. Then he spoke to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here; look, here are my hands. Give me your hand; put it into my side. Doubt no longer but believe.’ Thomas replied, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him:

‘You believe because you can see me. Happy are those who have not seen and yet believe.’

There were many other signs that Jesus worked and the disciples saw, but they are not recorded in this book. These are recorded so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing this you may have life through his name.

Gospel (USA) John 20:19–31 Eight days later Jesus came and stood in their midst.

On the evening of that first day of the week, when the doors were locked, where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.”

Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nailmarks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”

Now a week later his disciples were again inside and Thomas was with them. Jesus came, although the doors were locked, and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe.” Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”

Now, Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book. But these are written that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that through this belief you may have life in his name.

Homilies (6)

(i) Second Sunday of Easter

I don’t like seeing a church whose doors are always closed, except when there is Mass or some religious service on. There are, of course, good reasons why the doors of some churches have to remain closed outside the times of public worship. Yet, the open doors of a church say something about what a church is meant to be, a place where the Lord calls people in, perhaps just to sit in prayerful silence. On one occasion, Jesus said, ‘I am the door’. By that he meant that he was an open door, not a closed door. He was the door through whom we could come to God and through whom God always comes to us. Jesus wanted people to come in and to go out through him.

The church is not primarily the building where the community of faith gathers, but it is the community of faith itself. As a community of believers, we don’t want to close the door on ourselves, locking people out, and locking ourselves in. Yet, this is what we find happening in today’s gospel reading. The community of the first disciples had locked themselves into a room, with the intention of locking others out, especially those who might be hostile to them. They were fearful lest those responsible for having Jesus crucified might now turn their attention to his followers. In the immediate aftermath of Good Friday, this was an understandable attitude. The first disciples can hardly be blamed for going into hiding. However, according to the gospel reading, this was now the first day of the week, the first Easter Sunday. Locking themselves away and others out was totally out of place in the time of Easter which began on that Sunday and extends until the end of time.

The risen Lord needed to unlock not just the disciples’ room, but their hearts, minds and wills. There was good news to be proclaimed, the good news that God’s love was stronger than hatred and sin, and that God’s life-giving power was stronger than death. The disciples needed to get out and proclaim this Easter good news. This morning’s gospel reading says, ‘Jesus came and stood among them’. He didn’t knock on the door, hoping one of the disciples would let him in. He simply came and stood among them, the very ones who had abandoned him during the hour of his passion and death, whose leader had denied Jesus three times. He stood there, not to reprimand them, but to show them his wounds, the signs of his own self-giving love, signs of God’s unconditional love for all. As he showed them his wounds through which the light of God’s love shone, he offered them the gift of his peace, declaring that he was at peace with them. The risen Lord was healing their wounded hearts and spirits, freeing them from past failures. Having restored their communion with him, Jesus then entrusted them with the very same mission that God his Father had entrusted to him, ‘As the Father sent me, so am I sending you’. To empower them for this mission, he breathed the Holy Spirit upon them, the Spirit of God’s love. Jesus was recreating them, renewing them, so that they could continue his own mission of proclaiming the good news that God so loved the world that he gave and continues to give his only Son, so that all may have life and have it to the full. Locked doors made no sense now. They had to be out and about.

The same risen Lord stands among us today. We may be tempted to lock ourselves in and lock the Lord out, but he comes and stands among us anyway. He doesn’t wait for us to unlock the door. The situation is too urgent for that. He simply stands among us to pour the gift of the Holy Spirit upon us. He says to us what he said to those first disciples, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’. The risen Lord stands among us full of the Holy Spirit, ready to give the Spirit to us, and our task is to receive from his fullness, so that we can proclaim the gospel of God’s love with our lives, so that, through us, the Lord can continue to touch the lives of others with his healing and life-giving presence. The Lord wants to breathe the gift of the Holy Spirit upon us so that our lives can be the open door through which he continues to come into our world. After the risen Lord left his disciples, they went out and proclaimed the good news of Easter. However, they met with resistance from one of their own, Thomas. He wasn’t ready to receive what the risen Lord was offering him through his fellow disciples. There can be resistances in our own lives to the Lord’s coming and standing among us. Yet, Thomas’s resistance did not shut out the Lord. The Lord came and stood before Thomas offering him the same gift of his peace, until Thomas finally came to make one of the greatest acts of faith in all four gospels, ‘My Lord and my God’. The Lord respects our honest unbelief. He goes at our pace. He keeps stanidng among us, leading us to Easter faith, so that he can lead others to the same Easter faith through us.

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(ii) Second Sunday of Easter

We know that fear can be very disabling. We often hold back from saying something because we are fearful of how it will be received. If we suspect that someone is going to oppose us for doing something, our tendency is not to proceed with it, even though we might know in our heart of hearts that it is worthwhile. It can happen that some people only discover quite late in life that they have a gift for something. That gift was there all along but they got very little encouragement to recognize it or to use it. The significant people in their lives may have been prone to criticizing, and so, out of fear of criticism, the gift lay dormant and was never really used. Fear of others can hold us back and inhibit our growth as human beings.

This morning’s gospel introduces us to a group of fearful disciples. It is the evening of the first day of the week, Easter Sunday, but the disciples are locked away in fear. The fear which caused them to abandon Jesus in his hour of need continues to take hold of them. They fear those who put Jesus to death, suspecting that what they did to Jesus they could do to them. It may be Easter Sunday, but the shadow of Golgotha hangs over them. The risen Lord comes to his fearful disciples. The evangelist simply states: ‘He stood among them’. Standing is often a sign of strength and confidence. When we stand we assert that we are here. We speak of people standing on their own feet, or standing their ground. The Lord stood in all the strength and self-assurance of his risen life. This was a life that no one could take from him. Rather than standing, the disciples were cowering, trying to make themselves small, invisible even. In standing among them, the Lord led them from fearfulness to boldness, from weakness to strength; he enabled them to leave their self-imposed prison and to go forth as his messengers of Easter good news. The gospel reading states that from being full of fear they were now filled with joy.

We may be able to identify rather easily with the group of fearful disciples in this morning’s gospel reading. Fear of others can prevent us from witnessing to our faith. The culture in which we live encourages us to think of our faith as something very private, to be given expression to only behind the closed doors of our churches. There can be an intolerance of any public expression of faith. In that climate, we can be fearful about giving public witness to our faith in the Lord. We may be committed to the values of the Lord’s gospel, but we can be tempted to hide that commitment from others, fearing ridicule or rejection if we declare where we really stand. In many ways, we can be very like the disciples in this morning’s gospel reading. We need the risen Lord to stand among us as much as the first disciples did, and we can be assured that he does stand among us. He breathes the Holy Spirit on us as he did on those disciples. The seven week Easter season which we are beginning is the time to draw strength from the risen Lord who stands among us. It is a time when we might pray the prayer: ‘Breathe on me, Breath of God, fill me with life anew’. The risen Lord stands among us to give us renewed courage to witness to our faith in the places where we live and work.

As well as being able to identify with the fearful disciples, we may also recognize something of ourselves in doubting Thomas. He had not been with the other disciples when the risen Lord appeared to them. He had moved away from the community of disciples. There may be times in our own lives, when like Thomas, we do not particularly want the company of other disciples. We go apart from the church, the family of believers. There can be all kinds of reasons for this. When the disciples to whom the risen Lord appeared went looking for Thomas in their excitement and declared to him, ‘We have seen the Lord’, Thomas gave them short shrift – ‘Unless I see… unless I put’. Thomas was not ready to return to the fold; he continued to keep his distance. We would have to say of Thomas that, at least, he was an honest man. He was true to himself, even though that meant putting a distance between himself and the other disciples.

It seems that the Lord respected Thomas’ honesty. When he appeared again to the disciples, this time with Thomas present, he accommodated himself to Thomas’ request. There was no rebuke, only an invitation to believe. In response to the Lord’s invitation, Thomas made one of the greatest confessions of faith in the gospels, ‘My Lord and my God’. It is often the case that those who have drifted from the community of believers go on to become people of deep faith who show others the way. The story of Thomas shows us that scepticism and doubt are not necessarily the enemies of faith. It is in being true to ourselves - including our doubts - that we find the Lord or, rather, that the Lord finds us. Thomas did not travel to Easter faith at the same pace as the other disciples. The Lord respected that. No two journeys of faith are the same. The Lord is always ready to meet us where we are.

Thomas belatedly joined the group who saw and believed. We who gather here this morning belong to a different group. We are among those who have not seen and yet believe. In this morning’s gospel reading the risen Lord declares us blessed. Here is a beatitude that embraces us all.

And/Or

(iii) Second Sunday of Easter

We have all become very security conscious in recent years. Most houses are now alarmed. The alarm has become as basic an item as table and chairs. We also feel the need to have good strong locks. Long gone are the days when you could leave the key in the door, at least in the city. Fear of what others can do to us tends to close us in on ourselves, in the very physical sense of getting stronger security, but also in other senses. We tend to be somewhat withdrawn around people we perceive to be very critical. We are slow to open up to someone we think will judge us. We hesitate to share ideas and plans we might have with those who are known not to suffer fools gladly. Fear of others can hold us back and stunt our growth.

In the gospel reading today we find the disciples locking themselves into a room because they were afraid of the Jewish authorities. Even though Mary Magdalene had come to them from the empty tomb announcing, ‘I have seen the Lord’, this was not enough to overcome their fear. What had been done to Jesus could be done to them. Self-imposed confinement was preferable to that prospect. The turning point for the disciples came when the risen Lord himself appeared to them behind their closed doors and lifted them beyond their fear. He did this by breathing the Holy Spirit upon them, thereby filling them with the energy and the power of God, freeing them from the fear that held them back and releasing them to share in his mission in the world. In the power of the Spirit they came to life and went forth from their self-imposed prison to witness publicly to the risen Lord. This is exactly the picture of the disciples that Luke gives us in the first reading today. He describes a community of believers, the church, witnessing to the Lord with great power by the quality of their living.

We can all find ourselves, as disciples, in the situation of those first disciples as described in the first reading. What Shakespeare calls, ‘the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune’, can wear down our commitment to following the Lord and to serving him with our gifts. Like the disciples in the gospel reading, we can come to a kind of a full stop on our faith journey. The temptation to pull down the shutters and to lock ourselves away can be very strong. The tendency to self-preservation, which, in itself, is a wholesome tendency, can come to dominate our lives, and prevent us from doing what we are capable of doing with the Lord’s help. The wounds we carry from earlier efforts and initiatives can make us hesitate to put ourselves forward again. Even when someone like a Mary Magdalene comes to us full of enthusiasm and hope we are unaffected. We let them get on with it, while we hold back and stay safe. The gospel reading today suggests that the risen Lord will not leave us alone in our self-imposed confinement. If a Mary Magdalene makes no impact on us, the Lord will find another way to enter our lives and to fill us with new life and new energy for his service. Locked doors, or even locked hearts, are no obstacle to the Lord’s coming. He will find a way to enter the space where we have chosen to retreat and he will empower us to rise above what is holding us back. He does require some openness on our part; at the very least some desire on our part to become what the Lord is calling us to be. The risen Lord stands ready to breathe new life into us. He never ceases to recreate us and to renew us in his love. Easter is the season when we celebrate the good news that the power of the risen Lord is stronger than whatever weakness or discouragement might afflict us.

In a few moments we will celebrate the baptism of N. What the Lord did for the first disciples on that first Easter Sunday he now does for N., breathing his Holy Spirit upon him. As the Lord re-created the disciples by breathing his Holy Spirit on them, he now creates N. as his disciple through the sacrament of Baptism. Today N. is brought into the community of disciples, the church, and we are gathered here to welcome him into that community. N. does not yet have faith in the strict sense, but we carry the faith for him. We are among those whom the risen Lord calls blessed in the gospel reading, those who have not seen and yet believe. We have not seen in the way that Thomas and the other disciples saw, and yet we believe. It is into this believing community that N. is now about to be baptized. Without such a believing community, baptism would make no sense and could not be celebrated. Once baptized into this believing community, hopefully N. will catch the faith for himself, and, in time, be counted among those whom the Lord declares blessed, those who believe without having seen. The light of the Easter candle, the light of Christ, the light of faith, will be carried for him today and for the coming years, but only until he is ready to take that light for himself and to carry it for himself. In the meantime, N. will look to us to shown him what it means to be a disciple of the Lord, what it means to walk in the light of Christ. We pray that we will each be faithful to our own baptismal calling, so that N. may be helped to grow into his baptismal identity and calling.

And/Or

(iv) Second Sunday of Easter

Cardinal Joseph Bernardin was archbishop of Chicago. He was told in August 1996 that a cancer which had been in remission had returned and that he had only a short time to live. He died the following November. During those two months he wrote a book covering the previous three years of his life, entitled, ‘The Gift of Peace’. One of the most difficult experiences of those last three years of his life was a much publicized accusation of misconduct which was made against him by a young man called Stephen. He subsequently withdrew the accusation and acknowledged that it was false. In his book Cardinal Bernardin describes the reconciliation which he initiated with his accuser. Stephen was dying of AIDS at the time, and at their meeting he offered the cardinal an apology which was gently accepted. Cardinal Bernardin offered Stephen a gift, a Bible in which he had inscribed words of loving forgiveness. Then he showed him a one hundred year old chalice, a gift to the cardinal from a man who asked him to celebrate Mass sometime for Stephen. That Cardinal Bernardin celebrated Mass there and then. He described his meeting with Stephen as the most profound and unforgettable experience of reconciliation in his whole priestly life.

In this morning’s gospel reading we find the first disciples dispirited and terrified after the death of Jesus. They have to confront their failure to be faithful to Jesus in the hour of his passion and death. They are in a huddle, having locked themselves away in a room. Suddenly Jesus stands among them and says to them, ‘Peace be with you’ and breaths the Holy Spirit upon them. The risen Lord was reconciling his failed disciples to himself; they came to recognize themselves as forgiven, and, so their hearts were filled with joy. Having experienced the gift of the Lord’s forgiveness, they are sent out in the power of the Spirit to offer to others the gift of forgiveness they have received. ‘Those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven’. That gift and mission is given to all of us who have been baptized into the risen Jesus. Having been reconciled to the Lord we are all sent out as ministers of reconciliation. The sacrament of reconciliation is, of course, a privileged moment of reconciliation, when we receive anew the Lord’s forgiveness and extend that forgiveness to those who have hurt us. However, there are other, more frequent, moments of reconciliation: the daily forgiveness of our brothers and sisters; the speaking of the hard words, ‘I am sorry’ and the gracious acceptance of another’s offer of apology. In these moments, Jesus is standing in our midst, helping us to break out of situations that can be draining of life for everyone involved.

Thomas had not been in the room when the risen Lord appeared to the other disciples. He had missed out on the Lord’s bestowal of the gifts of peace and forgiveness. Thomas seems to have cut himself off from the community of the disciples. He had gone off on his own to nurse his wounds, and so he missed out on the Lord’s presence in the midst of the fearful and failed disciples. He is not unlike so many today who, for a variety of reasons, have cut themselves off from the church. When we cut ourselves off from the community of believers, we lose out greatly. For all its flaws and failings, the church is the place where we encounter the risen Lord. The Lord continues to stand among the community of disciples, especially when we gather in worship and pray, when we gather to serve others in the Lord’s name. It is there that we hear the Lord say, ‘Peace be with you’, that we experience his forgiveness for our past failures, that we hear the call to go out in his name as his witnesses, that we receive the Holy Spirit to empower us to be faithful to that mission. The community of disciples reached out to Thomas; they shared their newfound faith with him, their Easter faith, ‘We have seen the Lord’. Those first disciples remind us of our calling to keep reaching out in faith to all those who, for whatever reason, have drifted away from the community of believers and no longer gather with us. If we do so, we may encounter the same negative response that the first disciples experienced from Thomas, ‘I refuse to believe’.

Yet, even though our efforts may fail, as the efforts of the disciples failed, we know that the Lord will keeps reaching out to us when we cut themselves off from the community of faith, just as the Lord reached out to Thomas. ‘Doubt no longer’, he said to him, ‘but believe’. Then, out of the mouth of the sceptic came one of the greatest acts of faith in all of the gospels, ‘My Lord and my God’. Thomas Merton wrote in his book Asian Journal, ‘Faith is not the suppression of doubt. It is the overcoming of doubt, and you overcome doubt by going through it. The man of faith who has never experienced doubt is not a person of faith’. There was a great honesty about Thomas; he didn’t pretend to believe when he didn’t. The gospel reading suggests that such honesty is never very far from authentic faith.

And/Or

(v) Second Sunday of Easter

Sometimes people of faith can worry when they sense that doubts have crept into their faith. They sense that their faith is not as strong as it used to be because they have all these doubts that they never had in the past. Because of their doubts, prayer does not come as easy to them. They feel that they are no longer on the same wavelength as other people of faith. They start to compare their own faith unfavourably with the faith of others. Yet, faith and doubt are inseparable companions. Some of the church’s saints were plagued with doubt and suffered a great darkness of spirit. Saint Therese of Lisieux comes to mind in that regard. In more recent times, some of the writings of Mother Theresa of Calcutta have revealed that she went through a time of great spiritual darkness and doubt.

Thomas Merton was a Cistercian monk who wrote many books that have been an inspiration to many people. He died about twenty years ago. In one of his books called Asian Journal he wrote, ‘Faith is not the suppression of doubt. It is the overcoming of doubt and you overcome doubt by going through it. The person of faith who has never experienced doubt is not a person of faith’. We often have to pass through a period of great religious doubt and scepticism to pass over into a deeper certitude, a certitude which is not just a human certitude but the certitude of God within us.

The gospels suggest that those closest to Jesus were no strangers to doubt. In this morning’s gospel reading from John, we meet the figure of Thomas. When the disciples sought him out after the risen Lord appeared to them, they went to Thomas with their wonderful news, the Easter gospel, ‘We have seen the Lord’. Thomas could not bring himself to share their Easter faith; he doubted that what they said could be true. He was like a wall, a block that stopped the good news cold. He laid down very clear conditions before he would believe. He insisted not only on seeing the risen Lord but on putting his finger into holes that the nails had made in Jesus’ hands and feet and putting his hand into the wound in Jesus’ side. Here was someone who wanted physical evidence before he would believe. He needed proof of a kind that would banish all doubt. It can be somewhat disconcerting for people of faith to come up against that kind of attitude. They feel helpless before it. When parents who are people of faith encounter such an attitude in their own children it can be especially distressing.

Yet, we cannot force our faith on those who are in a place of doubt, no more than others can force their faith on us when we are in that place. We need to accommodate ourselves to those who cannot share our faith, for whatever reason. This is what we find Jesus doing in the gospel reading. When he appears again to the disciples, this time with Thomas present, he doesn’t reprimand Thomas for his refusal to believe. He meets Thomas in the place where Thomas is, in that place of honest doubt, and he accommodates himself to the conditions that Thomas laid down, inviting him to touch the wounds of his crucifixion. He then gently invites Thomas to move on from doubt to faith, ‘Doubt no longer but believe’. The risen Lord is constantly calling on all of us to go through our doubt and out beyond it into a rich and full Easter faith. He continues to call in that way, even when there is no response forthcoming.

The response of Thomas to that call of the risen Lord is very striking. Out of the mouth of the great doubter comes one of the greatest confessions of faith in all of the gospels, ‘My Lord and my God’. It is a confession of faith that has resonated with believers ever since. We often recite it together as one of the responses after the moment of consecration in the Mass. It is often the case that those who have plumbed the depths of great religious doubt and scepticism emerge from that experience as people of unshakable faith. It is as if their faith has been honed and purified in the cauldron of doubt.

Thomas joined the ranks of those who saw and believed. However, after Thomas’ great profession of faith, Jesus goes on to pronounce a beatitude upon all those who believe without having seen the risen Lord in the way Thomas and the other disciples saw him. Jesus’ beatitude embraces all future generations of believers, including all of us gathered here this morning. We might be inclined to think that those to whom the risen Lord appeared are more privileged than we are. Yet, Jesus’ beatitude hints that a greater blessedness rests upon us who believe with having seen in the way they did. The risen Lord is as present to us in as real a way as he was to those eyewitnesses, through the community of faith, through the Eucharist and through his word. Through all these sacraments of his presence, the risen Lord calls out to us, ‘Doubt no longer but believe’.

And/Or

(vi) Second Sunday of Easter

For the past year or more, most of us have experienced some measure of isolation. We have not been able to gather in the usual way, whether it is in church or in other settings. For some, the experience of isolation has been especially painful and difficult, such as those in nursing homes or in hospitals. Many have felt cut off from others. Yet, even in those moments when we are cut off from others, we are never cut off from the Lord.

The gospel reading begins with an image of the disciples cutting themselves off from others, locked in a room out of fear. Fear can be very isolating. Over the past year, many of our older and more vulnerable people isolated themselves out of fear of contracting the virus. Fear can have an isolating impact on all our lives. The fear of failure, for example, can prevent us from taking initiatives that would result in our being more connected with others. Although the disciples’ fear isolated them from others, it did not isolate them from the Lord. The locked doors may have kept others out, but it could not keep the Lord out. The gospel reading says that ‘he came and stood among them’. The Lord’s love for his disciples overcame their efforts to self-isolate. The disciples may have run away from the Lord at the moment of his arrest, but the risen Lord did not run away from them; he stood among them. He stood there in all his risen power. The same risen Lord stands among us today, especially in those moments when we feel isolated or vulnerable, when fear or anxiety seems to overwhelm us. When we are brittle, we need people to stand by us. ‘Standing’ suggests a readiness to remain, to endure, to be there always. The risen Lord stands among us, especially when our human resources seem to be at their lowest.

According to the gospel reading, when the risen Lord stood among his disciples, he showed them his wounds. The Lord carried his wounds to the other side of death. The risen one is also the crucified one. In showing his disciples his wounds, he was showing them the extent of his love. He had earlier said to them, ‘a man can have no greater love than to lay down his life for his friends’. Jesus stands before his disciples as the embodiment of God’s love. That is how the risen Lord stands among us today. He continues to show us the wounds that speak of the extent of his love for us. As Jesus hung from the cross, his wounds spoke of the depths of human cruelty. As risen Lord, his wounds speak of the depths of God’s love for us. His wounds are the openings through which the light of God’s love shines upon us. The risen Lord stands among us as one who gave his all so that we may have life to the full. Because the risen Lord is also the wounded one, he knows our own woundedness from within. The light of God’s love shining through his wounds can heal our wounds. It is to his wounded disciples that the risen Lord comes in today’s gospel reading. That is why the first words that he speaks to them are, ‘Peace be with you’. ‘Peace’ in the gospels, in the Scriptures, is not just the absence of conflict; it is a fullness of life, a wholeness of body, soul and spirit. The risen Lord stands among us as the giver of peace in that complete sense. The Lord’s action of breathing upon the disciples suggests his desire to recreate and renew them. Just as God created Adam by breathing into his nostrils the breath of life, so the risen Lord recreates his broken, wounded disciples by breathing into them the Holy Spirit. The Lord continues to stand among us to recreate us, to heal us of our wounds by breathing into us the Holy Spirit. Only then, can he send us out as messengers of his love to others, as he sent out the first disciples, ‘As the Father has sent me, so am I sending you’.

If fear kept the disciples isolated, it was doubt and disillusionment that kept Thomas isolated. He was not with the other disciples when the risen Lord stood among them. He had broken with the community of disciples. We can be tempted to do the same when our faith in the Lord and in the community of his followers takes a battering. Yet, just as the disciples’ fear could not isolate them from the Lord, Thomas’s doubt could not isolate him from the Lord. Once again, the risen Lord came and stood among them, with Thomas present this time. He shows Thomas the wounds of his love, inviting him to touch them, and he gently issues an invitation to Thomas that is addressed to us all in those moments when our faith is weakening, ‘Doubt no longer but believe’. It is Thomas who makes the greatest confession of faith in the whole of John’s gospel, ‘My Lord and my God’. Thomas’ journey to the Lord was different to the other disciples. We all have our own journey to the Lord and the Lord has his own ways to meet each one of us wherever we are and to offer us his peace.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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6th April >> Fr. Martin’s Reflections / Homilies on Today’s Mass Readings for Easter Saturday (Inc. Mark 16:9-15): ‘Proclaim the good news to all creation’.

Easter Saturday

Gospel (Except USA)

Mark 16:9-15

Go out to the whole world and proclaim the Good News.

Having risen in the morning on the first day of the week, Jesus appeared first to Mary of Magdala from whom he had cast out seven devils. She then went to those who had been his companions, and who were mourning and in tears, and told them. But they did not believe her when they heard her say that he was alive and that she had seen him.

After this, he showed himself under another form to two of them as they were on their way into the country. These went back and told the others, who did not believe them either.

Lastly, he showed himself to the Eleven themselves while they were at table. He reproached them for their incredulity and obstinacy, because they had refused to believe those who had seen him after he had risen. And he said to them, ‘Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News to all creation.’

Gospel (USA)

Mark 16:9–15

Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature.

When Jesus had risen, early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom he had driven seven demons. She went and told his companions who were mourning and weeping. When they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe.

After this he appeared in another form to two of them walking along on their way to the country. They returned and told the others; but they did not believe them either.

But later, as the Eleven were at table, he appeared to them and rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart because they had not believed those who saw him after he had been raised. He said to them, “Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature.”

Reflections (12)

(i) Easter Saturday

There is a focus in today’s gospel reading on the refusal of the disciples to believe the report of some of their group that Jesus had appeared to them. They did not believe Mary Magdalene or the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. It was only when the risen Lord appeared to them himself that they believed he had been raised from the dead. Once Jesus had been crucified, the disciples never expected to see him again. The news from others that he was alive was too good to be true. Perhaps we are all a little like the first disciples. We find it easier to believe that Jesus was crucified than that he was raised from the dead. It often seems that the dominant symbol of Christianity is the crucified Jesus rather than the risen Jesus. We tend to have far more images of the crucified Jesus in our churches than of the risen Jesus. Yet, the good news that Jesus is risen is at the core of our faith. As Saint Paul, to whom the risen Lord appeared, says in one of his letters, ‘if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain’. We can also say that if Christ had not been raised, then the disciples who had gone into hiding after the crucifixion of Jesus would never have been seen again. Instead, they became enthusiastic and courageous proclaimers of the gospel of Christ crucified and risen. In today’s first reading, when the Jewish leaders gave Peter and John a stern warning never to teach in the name of Jesus again, they replied, ‘We cannot promise to stop proclaiming what we have seen and heard’. Christ is risen and is alive among us and within us. This is the good news of Easter we are asked to believe in and make our own. It is such good news that the church gives us seven weeks to reflect upon it and absorb it. Just as Lent lasted seven weeks, the Easter season lasts seven weeks, from Easter Sunday to Pentecost Sunday. As we absorb the good news of Easter during this time, we can come to say with Saint Paul, ‘It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me’, and we can enter more fully into our Easter calling to bring Christ to others by our lives.

And/Or

(ii) Easter Saturday

The gospel reading this morning suggests that those who had spent time with Jesus, his companions, his closest disciples, were slow to believe the good news of Easter when it was proclaimed to them. Mary Magdalene went to Jesus’ companions to share her wonderful experience of meeting the risen Lord and they refused to believe her. The two disciples on the road to Emmaus went to the other disciples to share the wonderful news of their meeting with the risen Lord and their story was not believed. It was as if those closest to Jesus were in such a dark place that they were incapable of hearing news that Jesus was not dead but alive. Finally, according to our gospel reading, the risen Lord showed himself to his closest companions, reproaching them for their refusal to believe what others had said to them. It took the Lord himself to move his disciples from unbelief to belief. Yet, the Lord kept faith with them; having appeared to them he sent them out as messengers of the good news of Easter. Their initial refusal to believe did not disqualify them from the mission Jesus intended for them. We can find ourselves in a place where we seem incapable of hearing the good news that the Lord is risen, that life is stronger than death and love stronger than sin. Yet, the Lord never gives up on us. He continues to come towards us until our eyes are opened. He continues to believe in us, even when we do not believe in him. Even though the Lord may initially have met with resistance, he continues to hold out to us the privilege of proclaiming by our words and our lives the good news of Easter.

And/Or

(iii) Easter Saturday

In this morning’s gospel reading the disciples refuse to believe when Mary Magdalene comes to them and tells them that she had seen the Lord. They refuse to believe again when two disciples who had been on their way into the country tell them that they had seen the Lord. Eventually the Lord himself appears to the disciples and reproaches them for their failure to believe those who had seen him. It seems that nobody, not even Jesus’ closest associates, was prepared to believe that he had risen from the dead unless they could see him for themselves. They struggled to bring themselves to believe such good news. We can be more prone to believing bad news than good news. We too can doubt the reports of others contained within the New Testament that the Lord has risen. We can be as incredulous and obstinate as the first disciples. Yet every Easter the Lord calls out to us to believe that he is risen, with all that this good news implies for us. Easter is the season when we allow ourselves to be touched by the almost unbelievable good news that the Lord is alive and that we are destined to share in his risen life, not only beyond this earthly life but in the course of it.

And/Or

(iv) Easter Saturday

There is a striking contrast between the way that the disciples are portrayed in this morning’s gospel reading and how they are portrayed in the first reading. In the gospel reading the disciples refuse to believe Mary Magdalene and the two disciples who had left Jerusalem for Emmaus when these three people told them that Jesus was alive and had appeared to them. When Jesus himself appeared to his disbelieving disciples, he rebuked them for their refusal to believe those who had who witnessed to his resurrection. In spite of their initial failure to believe, Jesus commissions them to go out and proclaim the good news of Easter to all creation. That is precisely what we find the disciples doing in the first reading. From being people who refused to believe the Easter gospel, we now find them proclaiming that gospel with conviction and with great courage. The religious leaders in Jerusalem forbade them to preach the gospel of Jesus but the disciples, uneducated as they were, stood up to them and declared to them that they cannot stop proclaiming what they have seen and heard. The disciples are a living sign of how people can change through the power of the risen Lord. Jesus was transformed through his resurrection from the dead and he had a transforming effect on others. The same risen Lord can have a transforming effect on all of us. If we are open to his presence, he can do for us what he did for the disciples, transforming our doubt and disbelief into a faith that is public and courageous.

And/Or

(v) Easter Saturday

In this morning’s gospel reading the disciples refuse to believe when Mary Magdalene comes to them and told them that she had seen the Lord. They refuse to believe again when two disciples who had been on their way into the country tell them that they had seen the Lord. Eventually the Lord himself appears to the disciples and reproaches them for their failure to believe those who had seen him. It seems that nobody, not even Jesus’ closest associates, was prepared to believe that he had risen from the dead unless they could see him for themselves. Only then was their incredulity and obstinacy overcome. Unlike those first disciples, we have no option but to believe that the Lord has risen on the basis of the reports of others. The Lord will not appear to us as he appeared to his original disciples. In John’s gospel Jesus declares blessed those who believe without having seen him, in the way the original disciples saw him. That beatitude embraces all of us here this morning, all who believe without having seen. We believe on the basis of those who have seen the Lord, something the original disciples were very slow to do. The beatitude suggests that we who believe without having seen are no less privileged than those who believed on the basis of seeing the Lord for themselves. The beatitude seems to suggest that we are more blessed in some ways because of our willingness to believe without having seen. Yet, although we may not have seen the Lord, we experience his presence in a variety of ways, in and through his word, the sacraments, especially the Eucharist, and in and through each other, the members of his body.

And/Or

(vi) Easter Saturday

Today’s gospel has a focus on the unwillingness of the disciples to initially believe the Easter story. Mary of Magdala went to them to announce that the risen Lord had appeared to her, and they did not believe her. Two of the disciples went to the other disciples to announce that the risen Lord had appeared to them and their story was not believed either. Jesus himself finally appeared to those who had refused to believe the story of Mary of Magdala or the story of the two disciples and rebuked them for their reluctance to believe those who had seen the risen Lord. The gospel reading suggests that the disciples were very slow to believe the news that Jesus had risen from the dead, until the risen Lord himself appeared to them. Nothing less than a personal appearance of the risen Lord to them would bring them to Easter faith. It is evident that Jesus’ closest associates did not expect him to rise from the dead and had great difficulty in really believing it. However, the first reading shows that once the risen Lord appeared to them and they knew in their hearts that the Lord had risen from the dead, nothing would stop them from proclaiming this wonderful news. When the Jewish authorities warned them to make no further statements about Jesus, the disciples stood their ground, ‘We cannot promise to stop proclaiming what we have seen and heard’. Once doubt and incredulity gave way to Easter faith, after the Lord appeared to them, their faith was unshakable. It is because of their eventual, unshakable, faith and their courage in proclaiming it that we are here today to celebrate our Easter faith. The risen Lord has touched all our lives through the preaching of those eye witnesses of the risen Lord, and for this we give thanks.

And/Or

(vii) Easter Saturday

Today’s gospel reading is often referred to as the longer ending of Mark’s gospel. It was probably added to the end of Mark’s gospel by someone other than Mark, to bring Mark’s gospel more into line with the ending of the other gospels. This passage consists of a summary of the appearances of the risen Lord that are to be found in the other three gospels. There is mention there of Jesus’ appearance to Mary Magdalene, which is found in the gospel of John, of Jesus’ appearances to two disciples, which is found in Luke, and of Jesus’ appearance to the disciples as a group, which is to be found in Luke and John. The mission the risen Lord gives to the disciples at the end of the reading, ‘Go out to the whole world…’ reminds us of the commission the risen Lord gives to the disciples at the end of Matthew’s gospel, ‘Go make disciples of all the nations’. Why did some early scribe think it necessary to make this addition to the ending of Mark? Probably because the way Mark had ended his gospel seemed very unsatisfactory to him and to many others in the early church, ‘So they (the women) went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid’. Why, people must have wondered, end a gospel on this note of fear-filled silence? Mark was sensitive to human failure and, in particular, to the failure of Jesus’ disciples, including the women disciples who had been more faithful to Jesus than their male companions. Yet, he was all the more sensitive to the Lord’s faithfulness to his failing disciples. Mark and his readers knew that the risen Lord met his failing disciples in Galilee, where he renewed their call. Even in today’s gospel reading, the failure of the disciples is in evidence. They refused to believe either Mary Magdalene or the two disciples when they said that they had seen the risen Lord. Yet, it was to these somewhat obstinate disciples that Jesus entrusted his world-wide mission. The Lord continues to call us, weak as we are, to share in his work of proclaiming the Easter gospel.

And/Or

(viii) Easter Saturday

There are many examples both in the past and in the present of people in power and authority seeking to silence those whose public utterances are considered a threat. The spoken or written word can often be experienced as dangerous by those who have a vested interest in preserving the status quo. In today’s first reading from the Acts of the Apostles, the religious leaders attempt to silence the preaching of Peter and John, ‘they gave them a warning on no account to make statements or to teach in the name of Jesus’. The pressure by those in authority to silence those considered dissidents does not always meet with success. Courageous people who know they have truth and right on their side can continue to speak out, in spite of the pressure to do otherwise. In our first reading, Peter and John show such courage. They refuse to be silenced, declaring to those who try to silence them, ‘We cannot promise to stop proclaiming what we have seen and heard’. Peter and John recognized that they were subject to a higher authority than the authority of the religious leaders and that was the authority of God, saying to the religious leaders, ‘you must judge whether in God’s eyes it is right to listen to you and not to God’. They were clear that they must listen to God, and God was calling them to proclaim the gospel of Jesus. Peter and John can be an inspiration to us all to be courageous in our own witness to our faith, in spite of pressure to be silent. At the end of the gospel reading, the risen Lord says to his disciples, ‘Go out to the whole world; proclaim the good news to all creation’. We have all received that same commission, to proclaim the good news by what we say and above all by the way we live. If we turn towards the Lord, he will give us the courage to be faithful to that commission, just as he gave courage to Peter and John.

And/Or

(ix) Easter Saturday

In today’s gospel reading, the evangelist Mark gives us a list of some of the appearances of the risen Lord to his disciples. He mentions the Lord’s appearance to Mary Magdalene, his appearance to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and his appearance to the Eleven disciples in the setting of a meal. A fuller account of these appearances are to be found in the other gospels. There were many other appearances of the risen Lord, according to the gospels, and according to the earliest witness to the appearances, the apostle Paul. He lists in his first letter to the Corinthians the Lord’s appearances to Peter, and to the Twelve, to more than 500 of the brothers and sisters at the same time, to James, to all the apostles, and, finally, to himself, on the road to Damascus. The tradition of the appearances of the risen Jesus to his followers was an inspiration to the early church, including those who did not have such a privileged experience. The Lord’s appearances to so many remains an inspiration to us all. It was those appearances which allowed the first disciples to understand why the tomb of Jesus was empty on the third day after his crucifixion. It was empty because he had been raised to a new and glorious life, in which his body was transformed. According to today’s gospel reading, when Mary Magdalene told the other disciples that the Lord had appeared to her, they did not believe her, and when the two disciples told the other disciples that the Lord had met them on the road to Emmaus, they did not believe them either. When the Lord himself appeared to this wider group of disciples, he reproached them for refusing to believe these reports. Sometimes good news can be harder to believe than bad news. This Easter we are invited to renew our faith in the good news of Easter. The Lord is risen from the dead. He thereby reveals to us our own ultimate destiny, which is to share in his risen life beyond this earthly life. As risen Lord, he is also present with us throughout our earthly life, empowering us to live in the same self-giving way as he did, the way that leads through death to new life.

And/Or

(x) Easter Saturday

In today’s first reading, the religious leaders are concerned to stop ‘the whole thing spreading any further among the people’. ‘The whole thing’ refers to the preaching of the gospel by Peter, John and others and the favourable response of people to their preaching. However, the religious leaders were fighting a losing battle. The Lord had been raised from the dead; he was on the loose and they could do nothing about it. He had poured out his Spirit upon his followers and in the power of the Spirit they were proclaimed the good news of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection, and they couldn’t be stopped. As Peter says in the reading, ‘We cannot promise to stop proclaiming what we have seen and heard’. The gospel reading suggests that initially Jesus’ closest disciples struggled to believe the gospel that God’s love had overcome human hatred by raising his Son from the dead. They did not believe Mary Magdalene when she told them what she had seen and heard, nor did they believe the two disciples who had set out for Emmaus when they told them what they had seen and heard. It was only when the risen Lord appeared to them and they saw and heard for themselves that they believed in the Easter gospel. Then they responded enthusiastically to the Lord’s call to ‘go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News to all creation’, which is what we find Peter and John doing in today’s first reading. Having met the risen Lord themselves, no human authority could stop them proclaiming what they had seen and heard. The life-giving power of the risen Lord at work in and through his followers could not be contained or controlled by either religious or political authorities. Easter cannot be cancelled in any time or place. The risen Lord will continue to work in us and through us if we give him the opportunity. The efforts of some to ‘stop the whole thing spreading’ will always be in vain. When it comes to the risen Lord, there is no stopping him.

And/Or

(xi) Easter Saturday

The impression today’s gospel reading gives is that the first disciples found it very difficult to believe reports that Jesus who had been crucified was now alive. When Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene and she went and told the disciples what had happened, they were in such deep mourning that they did not believe her. When Jesus appeared to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus and they went and told the disciples their news, they did not believe them either. It was only when the risen Lord appeared to the group of disciples themselves that they finally believed that Jesus who was crucified was now living with a new quality of life. On that occasion, the risen Lord rebuked them for refusing to believe the witness of those to whom he had appeared. We are asked to do what the original disciples failed to do, to believe that Jesus is risen on the basis of the witness of those to whom the risen Lord appeared. We find this witness in the gospels and in the letters of Paul. Our belief in the risen Lord is also based on his coming to us personally. He may not appear to us in the way he appeared to the first disciples, but he touches our own lives in a very personal way. We are to belief on the basis of the written testimony of the first eye witnesses, and on the basis of our own personal experience of the risen Lord’s presence in our lives. The risen Lord who comes to us sends us out in the same way he sent out the disciples in today’s gospel reading, to ‘proclaim the good news (of Easter) to all creation’.

And/Or

(xii) Easter Saturday

There is a focus in today’s gospel reading on the refusal of the disciples to believe the report of some of their group that Jesus had appeared to them. They did not believe Mary Magdalene or the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. It was only when the risen Lord appeared to them himself that they believed he had been raised from the dead. Once Jesus had been crucified, the disciples never expected to see him again. The news that he was alive was too good to be true. Perhaps we are all a little like the first disciples. We find it easier to believe that Jesus was crucified than that he was raised from the dead. It often seems that the dominant symbol of Christianity is the crucified Jesus rather than the risen Jesus. We tend to have far more images of the crucified Jesus in our churches than of the risen Jesus. Yet, the good news that Jesus is risen is at the core of our faith. As Saint Paul, to whom the risen Lord appeared, says in one of his letters, ‘if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in vain’. We can also say that if Christ had not been raised, then the apostles who had gone into hiding after the crucifixion of Jesus would never have been seen again. Instead, they became enthusiastic and courageous proclaimers of the gospel of Christ crucified and risen. In today’s first reading, when the Jewish leaders gave Peter and John a stern warning never to teach in the name of Jesus again, they replied, ‘We cannot promise to stop proclaiming what we have seen and heard’. Christ is risen and is alive among us and within us. This is the good news of Easter we are asked to believe in and make our own. It is such good news that the church gives us seven weeks to reflect upon it and absorb it. Just as Lent lasted seven weeks, the Easter season lasts seven weeks, from Easter Sunday to Pentecost Sunday. As we absorb the good news of Easter during this time, we can come to say with Saint Paul, ‘It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 13 days

Text

5th April >> Fr. Martin's Reflections / Homilies for Today's Mass Readings (Inc. John 21:1-14) for Easter Friday: ‘Come and have breakfast’,

Easter Friday

Gospel (Except USA)

John 21:1-14

Jesus stepped forward, took the bread and gave it to them, and the same with the fish

Jesus showed himself again to the disciples. It was by the Sea of Tiberias, and it happened like this: Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee and two more of his disciples were together. Simon Peter said, ‘I’m going fishing.’ They replied, ‘We’ll come with you.’ They went out and got into the boat but caught nothing that night.

It was light by now and there stood Jesus on the shore, though the disciples did not realise that it was Jesus. Jesus called out, ‘Have you caught anything, friends?’ And when they answered, ‘No’, he said, ‘Throw the net out to starboard and you’ll find something.’ So they dropped the net, and there were so many fish that they could not haul it in. The disciple Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord.’ At these words ‘It is the Lord’, Simon Peter, who had practically nothing on, wrapped his cloak round him and jumped into the water. The other disciples came on in the boat, towing the net and the fish; they were only about a hundred yards from land.

As soon as they came ashore they saw that there was some bread there, and a charcoal fire with fish cooking on it. Jesus said, ‘Bring some of the fish you have just caught.’ Simon Peter went aboard and dragged the net to the shore, full of big fish, one hundred and fifty-three of them; and in spite of there being so many the net was not broken. Jesus said to them, ‘Come and have breakfast.’ None of the disciples was bold enough to ask, ‘Who are you?’; they knew quite well it was the Lord. Jesus then stepped forward, took the bread and gave it to them, and the same with the fish. This was the third time that Jesus showed himself to the disciples after rising from the dead.

Gospel (USA)

John 21:1-14

Jesus stepped forward, took the bread and gave it to them, and the same with the fish.

Reflections (7)

(i) Easter Friday

Several of Jesus’ first disciples were fishermen on the Sea of Galilee. Jesus called them from their fishing to become his followers, promising to make them fishers of people. When Jesus was crucified and all their hopes in him were dashed, they returned to Galilee and went back to their fishing. Today’s gospel reading suggests that they had lost their touch as fishermen. Perhaps their hearts weren’t really in it. It is hard to go back to what we once did when, in the meantime, we have found something much more fulfilling. Yet, there is a short statement in the gospel reading which would change everything for the better, ‘There stood Jesus on the shore’. The risen Lord would not allow his disciples to go back. He had vitally important work for them to do. He began, however, by helping them with their fishing. His suggestion to throw their nets to starboard resulted in such a huge catch of fish that one of the disciples, the beloved disciple, immediately recognized the stranger on the shore as the Lord. ‘It is the Lord’, he said. Having helped them with their fishing, he then invited them to breakfast, ‘Come and have breakfast’. By very simple gestures, he was drawing them back into communion with himself. They may have abandoned him, but he had not abandoned them nor had he changed his plans for them. The Lord is always standing on the shore of our lives, regardless of what we have done or failed to do. He is always at work from within our own experience drawing us into communion with himself. He remains faithful to us, even when we are unfaithful. Having drawn us to himself, he then sends us out to share in his work of shepherding, the work of serving others in love, and he gives us his Spirit, the Holy Spirit, to empower us to do his work.

And/Or

(ii) Easter Friday

In this morning’s gospel reading we find the disciples returning to their occupation as fishermen. Jesus had called them away from their profession some years earlier. He had called them to follow him and to share in his work of drawing people into God’s kingdom. However, now that Jesus had been crucified, there was nothing to do but go back to what they knew best. They were returning to their past. However, a little bit like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus who were heading in the wrong direction, these disciples were facing in the wrong direction; they were heading back to where they had been. The risen Lord now stood on the shore of the Sea of Galilee to redirect them, to renew the call he had made to them by the Sea of Galilee some years earlier. He first established communion with them, the communion they had broken by abandoning him in the hour of his passion and death. He did so by the simple invitation, ‘Come and have breakfast’. We are often tempted to go back to where we have been, even if it is only in our memories. Yet, the Lord is always calling us forward. Even when we have failed him in various ways, he continues to call us to begin afresh, and to cast our net in a different direction. Our relationship with the Lord always has a future that is full of hope. Easter is a season when we are invited to recognize the Lord on the shore of our lives calling out to us to follow where he is leading us.

And/Or

(iii) Easter Friday

John’s gospel draws heavily on the imagery of light and darkness. Only four verses into the gospel we have that ringing declaration, ‘the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it’. That image of light and darkness is there in today’s gospel reading. The disciples are out on the Sea of Tiberias fishing at night, in the darkness. After the disaster of Golgotha, they have gone back to their former occupation. Yet, they seem to have lost their touch; in the darkness of night, they catch nothing, they labour to no avail. Their professional failure on this occasion harks back to their personal failure during the passion of Jesus when they showed themselves unfaithful to him in various ways. The dark night of failure is something we have all experienced in different ways at different times. Yet, with the coming of the dawn, Jesus stands on the shore, although the disciples did not recognize him at first; the light was shining in the darkness. In response to the word of this stranger, the disciples cast their nets again and this time they catch a huge number of fish. The word of the Lord brings light into their darkness, and their labour bears rich fruit. We are reminded of an earlier saying of Jesus in John’s gospel, ‘those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing’. Today’s gospel reading reminds us that the Lord’s light always shines in our darkness, whatever form that darkness takes. We are being assured that our failures need not have the last word. The Lord remains in communion with us, and if we seek to be in communion with him and are open to his word, he will work powerfully to bring new life out of our failures.

And/Or

(iv) Easter Friday

In the gospel reading this morning the risen Lord comes to a group of his disciples. All of the disciples in that group had failed him during the time of his passion, except one, the disciple Jesus loved. In spite of their failure the risen Lord comes to them. At the time of his coming they were failing again, failing to catch fish, even though they were experienced fishermen. Jesus came to them in the night of their failure. His presence had a transforming effect on them. In response to his word of invitation, they caught a huge haul of fish and they would soon become fishers of people, sharers in his missionary work. Jesus went on to speak a second word of invitation to them, ‘Come and have breakfast’. He, thereby, entered into communion with those who had broken communion with him. Jesus did not reproach his disciples for their failure. He called out to them, spoke inviting words to them, built communion with them. The Lord relates to us as he related to those disciples. In the dark night of our own failures, the Lord stands on the shore of our lives; he comes to us, not to reproach us, but to speak a life-giving word to us, an inviting word, a transforming word. We pray that we would hear that word of the Lord as spoken to each of us this Easter season.

And/Or

(v) Easter Friday

This morning’s gospel reading makes reference to the shore of the Sea of Galilee. The disciples had an unproductive night of fishing on the Sea of Galilee. The gospel reading tells us that as the darkness of night gave way to the light of dawn, ‘there stood Jesus on the shore’. We could savour that verse, those of us who are fortunate to live on the shore. Wherever we live, by the sea or inland, in beautiful or dismal surroundings, Jesus is always standing on the shore of our lives. Like the disciples in the gospel reading, we don’t always recognize him. Even those who had been with Jesus for the previous couple of years did not recognize him on the shore; they presumed he was dead and that they would never see him again. One of the disciples went on to recognize the stranger on the shore, the disciple Jesus loved, the beloved disciple. After the wonderful catch of fish he exclaimed, ‘it is the Lord’. We often need others to point out the Lord to us. In our sorrow, our brokenness, our sense of failure, we can become blind to the Lord who sees us with eyes of love. It is then that we need someone to show us what we cannot see. This is part of the season we are called to render each other; we can open up each other to the Lord, to reveal the Lord to each other.

And/Or

(vi) Easter Friday

In this morning’s gospel reading we find the disciples going back to their work as fishermen in the aftermath of Jesus’ crucifixion. The journey they set out on when Jesus called them from their fishing by the Sea of Galilee had come to an end. Now they could only go back to where they had been before Jesus called them. There can be times in our own lives when we feel that we have gone backwards rather than forwards in our relationship with the Lord. Perhaps something happens in our lives that undermines our faith and our hope. Yet, in the gospel reading, the journey of faith that the disciples thought had come to an end was, in reality, only beginning. Their Lord who had been crucified was alive with a new and risen life. He came to his disheartened disciples and renewed his call to them. That call took the form of a simple invitation, ‘Come and have breakfast’. It was an invitation to a renewed communion with him. It was that renewed communion which would be the basis of the renewed call to go forth and become fishers of people, shepherds of the Lord’s flock. In those moments when we feel that we have gone backwards and that our faith has grown weak, the Lord comes to us too. As he did for those disciples by the Sea of Galilee, he invites us into a renewed communion with him. One of the ways we respond to that invitation is through our presence at the Eucharist, where the Lord says, ‘Come and eat’. We may drift from the Lord in various ways but he is always calling us back into communion with himself and from that communion he sends us out as his messengers of Easter hope.

And/Or

(vii) Easter Friday

The gospel reading this morning gives us a picture of the disciples beside the Sea of Galilee. It was Easter; the Lord had risen. Yet, it didn’t feel like Easter to the disciples. As far as they were concerned, Jesus was dead, and, so they went back to their fishing, but they seemed to have lost their knack for fishing. They caught nothing that night. Their efforts bore no fruit. There are times in our own lives when, even though it is Easter and the Lord is risen, it does not feel like Easter. Perhaps some important hope we had has been dashed; something we have invested a lot of time and effort in does not come to pass; life is not as we had hoped it would be or expected it to be. Yet, even when it does not feel like Easter in our lives, the Lord is there, just as he was standing on the shore of the Sea of Galilee in the early morning when the disciples seemed very lost. It took one the disciples to recognize the presence of Jesus and to help the others see what he saw, ‘It is the Lord’, he said. Sometimes we need someone else to help us to recognize the Lord in situations where he seems to be absent, someone whose sensitivity to the Lord’s presence is a little stronger than ours is at the time. These are the people who help us to see that all is not as dark as it seems. We thank God for such people in our lives and we ask the Lord to help us to be such a person for others.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 14 days

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4th April >> Fr. Martin’s Reflections Homilies on Today’s Mass Readings (Inc. Luke 24:35-48) for Easter Thursday: ‘Their joy was so great that they still could not believe it’s’.

Easter Thursday

Gospel (Except USA)

Luke 24:35-48

It is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead.

The disciples told their story of what had happened on the road and how they had recognised Jesus at the breaking of bread.

They were still talking about all this when Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you!’ In a state of alarm and fright, they thought they were seeing a ghost. But he said, ‘Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts rising in your hearts? Look at my hands and feet; yes, it is I indeed. Touch me and see for yourselves; a ghost has no flesh and bones as you can see I have.’ And as he said this he showed them his hands and feet. Their joy was so great that they still could not believe it, and they stood there dumbfounded; so he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ And they offered him a piece of grilled fish, which he took and ate before their eyes.

Gospel (USA)

Luke 24:35–48

Thus it was written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day.

The disciples of Jesus recounted what had taken place along the way, and how they had come to recognize him in the breaking of bread.

While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, “Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have.” And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, “Have you anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them.

Reflections (4)

(i) Easter Thursday

In today’s gospel reading, when the disciples were talking about all that had happened to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, ‘Jesus himself stood among them’. They didn’t invite him to join their company. He simply took the initiative himself to join them. The risen Lord always stands among us, without waiting for our invitation. He stands among us, as he stood among those first disciples, with the wounds of his passion on his hands and feet. They are no longer simply the cruel wounds inflicted by brutal soldiers. They are the expressions of the extent of his love for us; they are the openings through which the love of God shines upon us. In the gospel reading, the risen Lord asked the disciples if they had anything to eat. He wanted to share table with them as he had done many times during his public ministry. Even though they had failed him in the hour of his passion and death, he wanted to enter into communion with them, to reveal the extent of his faithful love for them. The risen Lord stands among us today so as to enter into communion with us. He does that in a special way at every Eucharist. The Eucharist is the celebration of the Lord’s faithful love for us. The Lord can enter into communion with us in other ways as well, such as through his word and through those who journey with us in life. He also enters into communion with us through his sending of the Holy Spirit into our hearts. He lives within us through his Spirit. He then sends us out in the power of the Spirit to bring his presence to those we meet on the journey of life. The risen Lord wants to stand among people today in and through each one of us.

And/Or

(ii) Easter Thursday

The Stations of the Cross have been an important part of our Catholic tradition for many years. Recently, I came across the expression ‘The Stations of Light’. These stations are the various appearances of the risen Lord to his disciples as recorded in the gospels. The whole of the Easter Season between now and Pentecost Sunday is an invitation to reflect on those Stations of Light. Today’s gospel reading puts before us one of those Stations of Light, Luke’s account of the appearance of the risen Lord to the disciples as a group. According to the beginning of that gospel reading, the two disciples who had met the Lord on the road to Emmaus and at table in Emmaus were sharing their story with the other disciples. It was while they were sharing their story that the risen Lord stood among them and declared, ‘Peace be with you’. Luke is reminding us that whenever we share our faith stories the risen Lord is there in our midst. Sharing our faith with others creates an opening for the Lord to stand among us. In that gospel reading the disciples struggle to believe that the Lord was present to them. According to Luke, even after Jesus spoke to them, ‘their joy was so great that they still could not believe it and they stood there dumbfounded’. They presumed that the crucifixion of Jesus had brought to an end the story of their relationship with him. Yet, the presence of the risen Lord among them revealed that the Lord of love and life was stronger than the powers of hatred and death. The first Easter shattered all their expectations. Easter continues to shatter our expectations. The risen Lord continues to take us by surprise. He stands among us even when all hope seems lost; he touches us with his presence when we are least expecting it. When we are most aware of our failure to follow him, he speaks his word of peace to us, because even when we are faithless, he remains faithful. Easter announces that the story of our relationship with the Lord never ends, because his relationship with us never ends. He continues to stand among us, assuring us of his presence, offering us his gift of peace, and sending us out as his messengers of hope.

And/Or

(iii) Easter Thursday

There are a lot of emotions attributed to the disciples in this morning’s gospel reading. When Jesus initially stood among them with his gift of peace, their response was one of alarm and fright, thinking they were seeing a ghost. Jesus then addresses them as people who are very agitated and full of doubt. When he showed them his hands and feet, joy became their dominant emotion. Indeed, the gospel reading says something unusual at this point, ‘their joy was so great that they still could not believe it’. Fear had given way to joy and yet they still struggled to believe that Jesus was actually alive and standing among them. The gospel reading conveys a sense of how unexpected the event of Easter Sunday was for the disciples. The risen Jesus had to go to great lengths to convince them that he was alive, and alive in a new and more powerful way. There are times when we too can be tempted to think that the message of Easter is too good to be true. Yet, Easter is at the core of our faith. Without Easter, the Friday on which Jesus was crucified would never have come to be known as Good Friday. It was only in the light of Easter that Jesus’ death came to be understood not just as yet one more tragic execution of an innocent person but as a revelation of the God of love and life. This Easter Season we are invited to allow ourselves to savour something of the joy of those first disciples.

And/Or

(iv) Easter Thursday

Luke’s account of the appearance of the risen Lord to his disciples in today’s gospel reading suggests that the disciples had great difficulty believing that it was the same Jesus they had come to know and love and had been crucified who was now standing before them. The gospel reading says that ‘in a state of alarm and fright, they thought they were seeing a ghost’ and that ‘their joy was so great that they still could not believe it, and they stood there dumbfounded’. It seems that it took the disciples a while to take in and believe the good news of Easter. They had been so traumatized by what had happened a few days earlier that they struggled to believe that Jesus was alive with a powerful new life. There is indeed something extraordinary about the good news of Easter. Even today we struggle to take it in, to really believe it. We often find it easier to identify with the death of Jesus than with his resurrection. In our religious tradition images of the crucifixion are more common than images of the resurrection. We can easily connect with the suffering Jesus because of the suffering in our own lives. Like the disciples in the gospel reading we stand before the good news of Easter dumbfounded, struggling to believe. Perhaps that is why the church gives us seven weeks of the Easter season to take it all in. We need time to recognize that the risen Lord is indeed standing among us, saying to us what he said to his disciples in the gospel reading, ‘Peace be with you’. He offers us that peace of mind and heart which is the fruit of his love poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. As we allow ourselves to receive this gift of his reconciling love he sends us out as agents of reconciliation, as his peacemakers, just as he sent out the disciples in the gospel reading.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

3 notes · View notes

frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 15 days

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3rd April >> Fr. Martin’s Reflections / Homilies on Today’s Mass Readings (Inc. Luke 24:13-35) for Easter Wednesday: ‘Their eyes were opened and they recognised him’.

Easter Wednesday

Gospel (Except USA)

Luke 24:13-35

They recognised him at the breaking of bread.

Two of the disciples of Jesus were on their way to a village called Emmaus, seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking together about all that had happened. Now as they talked this over, Jesus himself came up and walked by their side; but something prevented them from recognising him. He said to them, ‘What matters are you discussing as you walk along?’ They stopped short, their faces downcast.

Then one of them, called Cleopas, answered him, ‘You must be the only person staying in Jerusalem who does not know the things that have been happening there these last few days.’ ‘What things?’ he asked. ‘All about Jesus of Nazareth’ they answered ‘who proved he was a great prophet by the things he said and did in the sight of God and of the whole people; and how our chief priests and our leaders handed him over to be sentenced to death, and had him crucified. Our own hope had been that he would be the one to set Israel free. And this is not all: two whole days have gone by since it all happened; and some women from our group have astounded us: they went to the tomb in the early morning, and when they did not find the body, they came back to tell us they had seen a vision of angels who declared he was alive. Some of our friends went to the tomb and found everything exactly as the women had reported, but of him they saw nothing.’

Then he said to them, ‘You foolish men! So slow to believe the full message of the prophets! Was it not ordained that the Christ should suffer and so enter into his glory?’ Then, starting with Moses and going through all the prophets, he explained to them the passages throughout the scriptures that were about himself.

When they drew near to the village to which they were going, he made as if to go on; but they pressed him to stay with them. ‘It is nearly evening’ they said ‘and the day is almost over.’ So he went in to stay with them. Now while he was with them at table, he took the bread and said the blessing; then he broke it and handed it to them. And their eyes were opened and they recognised him; but he had vanished from their sight. Then they said to each other, ‘Did not our hearts burn within us as he talked to us on the road and explained the scriptures to us?’

They set out that instant and returned to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven assembled together with their companions, who said to them, ‘Yes, it is true. The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.’ Then they told their story of what had happened on the road and how they had recognised him at the breaking of bread.

Gospel (USA)

Luke 24:13–35

They recognized Jesus in the breaking of the bread.

That very day, the first day of the week, two of Jesus’ disciples were going to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus, and they were conversing about all the things that had occurred. And it happened that while they were conversing and debating, Jesus himself drew near and walked with them, but their eyes were prevented from recognizing him. He asked them, “What are you discussing as you walk along?” They stopped, looking downcast. One of them, named Cleopas, said to him in reply, “Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know of the things that have taken place there in these days?” And he replied to them, “What sort of things?” They said to him, “The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, how our chief priests and rulers both handed him over to a sentence of death and crucified him. But we were hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel; and besides all this, it is now the third day since this took place. Some women from our group, however, have astounded us: they were at the tomb early in the morning and did not find his Body; they came back and reported that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who announced that he was alive. Then some of those with us went to the tomb and found things just as the women had described, but him they did not see.” And he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are! How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?” Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them what referred to him in all the Scriptures. As they approached the village to which they were going, he gave the impression that he was going on farther. But they urged him, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them. And it happened that, while he was with them at table, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight. Then they said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?” So they set out at once and returned to Jerusalem where they found gathered together the Eleven and those with them who were saying, “The Lord has truly been raised and has appeared to Simon!” Then the two recounted what had taken place on the way and how he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

Reflections (3)

(i) Easter Wednesday

In today’s first reading we find a man crippled from birth who is put down every day by others at the entrance to the Temple so that he could beg. He relies on others to put him in the best place to collect alms. By the end of the reading, as a result of his meeting with Peter, he is walking and jumping and praising God. Peter didn’t give him alms, but gave him a more precious gift through the power of the risen Lord, the gift of mobility. The transformation in that man’s life has a parallel in the gospel reading in the transformation of the two disciples who were walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus. These two disciples are not crippled, they are walking. However, they are certainly not jumping and praising God. Theirs is a slow, sad, walk, with downcast faces. In their own way, they are crippled, crippled in spirit. They walk in the shadow of Jesus’ death; their hopes for him have been dashed. They are soon joined by a stranger, who, unknown to them, is the risen Lord. His impact on them is similar to Peter’s impact on the crippled man. This stranger invites them to share with him what they have been talking about. Having told their sad story to the stranger, he in turn tells them a different story, one taken from the Scriptures. It is not a story that ends in death but in glory. As the disciples listen, their hearts begin to burn within them; they start to come alive again. They don’t want this stranger to leave them, and so they invite him to their home. There, as the stranger breaks the bread at their table, they finally recognize him as the Lord. Having left Jerusalem, sad and despondent, they return in joy, with a spring in their step. They re-join the community of disciples to share their Easter story and they listen to Easter stories the other disciples have to share. There is a wonderful image of the church here. The risen Lord comes to us all, as he came to the crippled man through Peter, as he came to the two disciples through the stranger, through God’s word and through the breaking of bread in the Eucharist. He always comes to renew our life in some way, to recreate us in his love, to fan our faith into a living flame, to replenish our hopeful spirit. The Easter season, which continues until Pentecost, is a special time to open our lives to the many ways that the risen Lord comes to us with his Easter graces. We are all crippled in some way, and we all need the Lord’s coming, which is why, like the two disciples, we call on the Lord to stay with us.

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(ii) Easter Wednesday

Through his resurrection Jesus had undergone a transformation, from earthly to risen life, and his presence to his disciples as risen Lord had a transforming effect on them. We can see that from this morning’s gospel reading. The two disciples were burdened by sadness and a loss of hope. It is said of them that their faces were downcast and in talking to the stranger they said, ‘We had hoped’. Now they hoped no longer. They were walking away from Jerusalem, the city of death, as they had come to experience it, away from the other disciples. In reality, Jerusalem was the city where life had triumphed over death and they should have remained there with the other disciples until the Holy Spirit came upon them. The risen Lord journeyed with them, even though they were heading in the wrong direction. His presence to them transformed their sorrow into joy and their despair into hope and as a result, they turned around and journeyed back to Jerusalem, back to the gathering of the disciples. There they shared their Easter story and heard the Easter story of the others. We too can sometimes find ourselves going in the wrong direction, away from the community of believers, burdened by a sense of sadness and hopelessness. In such times, the risen Lord is journeying with us as he journeyed with the two disciples. He is present to us as our companion on the way, inviting us to share our story with him, speaking his word to us, just as he opened the Scriptures for his two disciples, revealing himself to us as bread of life. If we open ourselves to the Lord’s presence to us in these ways, we will be transformed as the two disciples were. Our sadness will turn to joy, our despair to hope, and we will begin to face again in the right direction. We will return to the gathering of the disciples, the community of believers, the church.

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(iii) Easter Wednesday

We often walk away from situations and places that have painful associations for us. Sometimes that can be the right thing to do, but, perhaps, not always. In this morning’s gospel reading we find two disciples walking away from Jerusalem. The city of Jerusalem had very negative associations for them now. It was the city where the one they had been following, to whom they had given their lives, was crucified. It was the city that killed not only Jesus but also all the hopes they had invested in him. They wanted to get out of it as quickly as possible. Yet, they should really have stayed put; the Lord wanted them to stay in that city. Although they didn’t realize it at the time Jerusalem was not only the city where Jesus was put to death; it was also the city where Jesus was raised from the dead and it would be the city where the risen Lord would pour out his Holy Spirit upon the disciples, the city from which the gospel would begin to be preached. The Lord journeyed with these two disciples to help them to see that there was a lot more to the city of Jerusalem than they realized. It is often the case in our own lives that the places we try to get away from because we see them as places of darkness are the very places where the seeds of new life are to be found, and where God is mysteriously but powerfully at work in the darkness.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 15 days

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2nd April >> Fr. Martin’s Reflections / Homilies for Today’s Mass Readings (Inc. John 20:11-18) for Easter Tuesday: ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God’.

Easter Tuesday

Gospel (Except USA)

John 20:11-18

'I have seen the Lord and he has spoken to me'.

Mary stayed outside near the tomb, weeping. Then, still weeping, she stooped to look inside, and saw two angels in white sitting where the body of Jesus had been, one at the head, the other at the feet. They said, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ ‘They have taken my Lord away’ she replied ‘and I don’t know where they have put him.’ As she said this she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, though she did not recognise him. Jesus said, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Who are you looking for?’ Supposing him to be the gardener, she said, ‘Sir, if you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will go and remove him.’ Jesus said, ‘Mary!’ She knew him then and said to him in Hebrew, ‘Rabbuni!’ – which means Master. Jesus said to her, ‘Do not cling to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go and find the brothers, and tell them: I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ So Mary of Magdala went and told the disciples that she had seen the Lord and that he had said these things to her.

Gospel (USA)

John 20:11–18

I have seen the Lord, and he said these things to me.

Mary Magdalene stayed outside the tomb weeping. And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting there, one at the head and one at the feet where the Body of Jesus had been. And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus there, but did not know it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” She thought it was the gardener and said to him, “Sir, if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni,” which means Teacher. Jesus said to her, “Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord,” and then reported what he had told her.

Reflections (5)

(i) Easter Tuesday

I have often been struck by those words of the risen Jesus to Mary Magdalene in today’s gospel reading, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God’. The God of Jesus is also our God, the Father of Jesus is also our Father. Because of Easter, we have come to share in Jesus’ own relationship with God. The risen Jesus gives us the gift of the Holy Spirit and that Spirit draws us into a sharing in Jesus’ relationship with God. Writing to churches of Galatia, Paul expresses this conviction in his own way, ‘God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts crying, “Abba! Father!”’ The Spirit of the risen Lord within us moves us, inspires us, to address God in the same intimate way that Jesus did. In a sense, because of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives, the risen Lord prays his own prayer to God in us. Perhaps we don’t often think of the Lord as praying to God within us. Yet, that is the depth of the Lord’s communion with us that Easter makes possible. When Jesus says to Mary Magdalene in the gospel reading, ‘Do not cling to me’, he was saying that it was not necessary for her to cling to him as if she was in danger of losing him. Through the Holy Spirit, he would come to her and be in a deeper relationship with her that he has ever been, his God becoming her God, his Father becoming her Father. This was the message that she was to go and proclaim to the other disciples, to all of us. She becomes the first and primary preacher of the gospel. This is the Easter gospel that continues to be proclaimed to us through her. The risen Lord is always in a deeply personal relationship with us, even in those times when we feel we have drifted from him. He doesn’t drift from us. Because of Easter, we can all make our own what Paul says elsewhere in his letter to the Galatians, ‘It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me’.

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(ii) Easter Tuesday

All of us will have wept at the death of a loved one at some point in our lives. When people who are close to us die it affects us deeply. The sadness of loss is one of the deepest of human agonies. In this morning’s gospel reading Mary Magdalene is to be found weeping outside the tomb of Jesus. Her deep sadness at the death of Jesus has been compounded by the absence of his body. When there is no body to focus our grief the sadness of loss can be even more traumatic. To the question, ‘Why are you weeping?’ she can only answer, ‘they have taken my Lord away and I don’t know where they have put him’. Into that deep grief of Mary steps the risen Lord. Initially, Mary’s grief blinds her to his presence; she mistakes him for the gardener. When we are grieving the loss of a loved one, we don’t always recognize the Lord’s presence to us initially. Our grief can overwhelm us and isolate us. It was when the risen Lord spoke Mary’s name that she recognized him. The Lord speaks our name too when we find ourselves in a dark valley of grief or in some other form of darkness. We need to be attentive to the Lord speaking our name. He relates to each of us in a very personal way, especially in our darkest moments. He comes to us as he came to Mary to bring light to our darkness and to proclaim the triumph of life over death. From being paralyzed by grief, Mary became the messenger of Easter joy to the other disciples, the apostle to the disciples. The Lord who was transformed by his resurrection had a transforming effect on Mary. The risen Lord can have the same transforming impact on all of our lives, empowering us to become his messengers of the good news of Easter.

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(iii) Easter Tuesday

In the gospel reading, the risen Lord asks Mary two questions, ‘Woman, why are you weeping? Who are you looking for?’ Mary was weeping because she could not find Jesus for whom she was looking. Some of the sadness in our lives comes from a sense of loss, an awareness of unfulfilled longing. We have probably all known that particular form of sadness. We long for something or someone, and because that longing goes unfulfilled, we experience a sense of deep sadness. In the gospel reading, Mary’s longing for Jesus was satisfied. The risen Lord spoke her name, and her sadness was banished as she clung to him. Yet, even in that moment of great joy, she had to learn to let go of Jesus as she had known him. Because Jesus was returning to the Father, from now on he would relate to her and to all of his disciples in a new way. He would be as close to her and his disciples as he ever was, indeed even closer, but in a different way. The gospel reading assures us that, even if many of our longings go unsatisfied, our longing for the Lord, which is our deepest longing, will always be satisfied. The Lord speaks our name as he spoke Mary’s name. Because of his death and resurrection, his Father is now our Father and his God is now our God. In journeying from this world to the Father, the Lord draws us into his relationship with God, thereby making us his brothers and sisters and brothers and sisters of each other. If we open our lives to him and search for him as Mary did, we will come to experience this quality of communion with him and with each other.

And/Or

(iv) Easter Tuesday

There is a very strong emphasis in this morning’s gospel reading on the weeping of Mary Magdalene. She stood outside the tomb weeping. The angels asked her, ‘Woman, why are you weeping?’ Jesus asked her, ‘Why are you weeping?’ She weeps because she cannot find the Lord. We weep when we lose someone who is significant for us, or when we cannot seem to connect with someone important to us, no matter how hard we try. We search and we cannot find, and, so, we grieve. In the case of Mary, she searched and she found – or, rather, the Lord for whom she was searching found her, as he called out to her by her name, ‘Mary’. We may not always succeed in finding our loved ones for whom we search, but we will always find the Lord if we search for him, because he is always searching for us. He is the good shepherd who calls his own by name. The Lord is calling our name, even before we begin to search for him. Our finding the Lord is always in response to the Lord’s search for us. He came to seek and to save the lost, and we are all lost to some degree. The Lord seeks us out in his love. All we need to do is to put ourselves in the way of his searching love, as Mary Magdalene did. She has something to teach us about seeking the Lord in our pain and loss.

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(v) Easter Tuesday

The Easter garden in our church is looking lovely. Several parishioners have contributed potted plants to transform what was a Lenten garden with a desert look into a flowering Easter garden. The gospel reading this morning makes a link between Easter and a garden. John’s gospel from which we read this morning places the tomb of Jesus in a garden. When the risen Lord appears to Mary Magdalene, she initially mistakes him for the gardener. Because Jesus had been raised into a new and glorious life, into a transformed life, he wasn’t initially recognizable by his disciples. He was the same Jesus who had been crucified and, yet, he had been changed. He could no longer be seen in the way other people are seen. It was only when the risen Jesus called Mary by name that she recognized that the man speaking with her was not the gardener but Jesus himself. We too do not see the Lord as we see other people and, yet, the Lord is as present to us as other people are. Indeed he is more present to us than other people are, because he is more alive than anyone else, as he shares in God’s glorious life. The risen Lord calls us by name as he called Mary Magdalene by name. He declares to us as he declared to her that his Father is our Father and his God is our God. He draws us into a sharing in his own intimate relationship with God, because of which we become his brothers and sisters. These are the graces of Easter. This Easter week is a time when we allow ourselves some space to savour these graces and, also, to hear the call that goes with those graces, the call to witness to the risen Lord before others, as Mary Magdalene did.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 17 days

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1st April >> Fr. Martin’s Reflections / Homilies on Today’s Mass Readings (Inc. Matthew 28:8-15 ) for Easter Monday (B): ‘The soldiers took the money’.

Easter Monday

Gospel (Except USA) Matthew 28:8-15 Tell my brothers that they must leave for Galilee: they will see me there.

Filled with awe and great joy the women came quickly away from the tomb and ran to tell the disciples.

And there, coming to meet them, was Jesus. ‘Greetings’ he said. And the women came up to him and, falling down before him, clasped his feet. Then Jesus said to them, ‘Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers that they must leave for Galilee; they will see me there.’

While they were on their way, some of the guard went off into the city to tell the chief priests all that had happened. These held a meeting with the elders and, after some discussion, handed a considerable sum of money to the soldiers with these instructions, ‘This is what you must say, “His disciples came during the night and stole him away while we were asleep.” And should the governor come to hear of this, we undertake to put things right with him ourselves and to see that you do not get into trouble.’ The soldiers took the money and carried out their instructions, and to this day that is the story among the Jews.

Gospel (USA) Matthew 28:8–15 Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.

Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went away quickly from the tomb, fearful yet overjoyed, and ran to announce the news to his disciples. And behold, Jesus met them on their way and greeted them. They approached, embraced his feet, and did him homage. Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid. Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.”

While they were going, some of the guard went into the city and told the chief priests all that had happened. The chief priests assembled with the elders and took counsel; then they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers, telling them, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep.’ And if this gets to the ears of the governor, we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.” The soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed. And this story has circulated among the Jews to the present day.

Reflections (9)

(i) Easter Monday

Today’s gospel reading suggests that just as Jesus’ enemies did away with his earthly life, they also tried to do away with his risen life. A meeting of the religious leaders was held at which it was decided that a story would be put out to explain why the tomb was empty early on the first day of the week. Jesus’ disciples came during the night and stole his body from the tomb. Not only was Jesus crucified as a criminal but his disciples were to be labelled as body snatchers. However, all of these efforts to suppress the good news of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead were in vain. Jesus appeared to the women who had come to the tomb early with their spices. He went on to appear to his disciples in Galilee and, according to Saint Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians, there were many more people to whom the risen Lord appeared, some of whom were still alive at the time Paul was writing to the church in Corinth twenty five years or so after Jesus’ death and resurrection. Those to whom the risen Lord appeared, including Paul himself, went on to preach the good news of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection to Jews and pagans alike. In today’s first reading we find Peter and the other apostles preaching the gospel to the Jews in Jerusalem. Jesus’ risen life cannot be snuffed out the way his earthly life was. Jesus’ enemies had some control over his earthly life; they had and have no control over his risen life. The Lord’s risen life is a glorious flame that no human power can extinguish. The risen Lord is present among us, present within us, through the Holy Spirit, in season and out of season, in good times and in bad. He is present to us every day as light in our darkness, as strength in our weakness and as loving communion in our isolation. For this irrepressible good news, we can all give thanks this Easter Monday.

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(ii) Easter Monday

The mood of Easter is very well captured at the beginning of this morning’s gospel reading, ‘Filled with awe and great joy the women came quickly away from the tomb and ran to tell the disciples’. Easter is a feast that fills us with great wonder and joy because it tells us that God’s love is stronger than human sin, and the life God gives is more powerful than the death humans often inflict on each other. Easter also tells us that we do not walk through life alone. As the risen Lord says to the women in today’s gospel reading, ‘Go and tell my brothers that they must leave for Galilee; they will see me there’. As the risen Lord went ahead of his disciples to Galilee, so he goes ahead of us to all the places that we journey to and find ourselves in. Yet, there will always be people who will try to deny Easter and all that it means. That was so from the very first Easter Sunday, as is clear from this morning’s gospel reading. The chief priests and the elders put out a story, to the effect that the disciples of Jesus stole his body while the guards were asleep. You will find modern versions of that anti-Easter story in our newspapers today at times. There will always be those who want to deny what God has done and put something trite in its place. This Easter week, however, we rejoice what God has done, the story of Easter, of life’s triumph over death, of love’s triumph over evil.

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(iii) Easter Monday In this morning’s gospel reading we find two very contrasting responses to the news that Jesus had triumphed over death and was no longer confined by the tomb. The woman came up to risen Lord and, falling down before him in worship, they clasped his feet. They then set out immediately, in response to his call to proclaim the good news that he was no longer in the tomb but was on his way to Galilee to meet his disciples. In contrast to the women, the chief priests and the elders of the people gave money to the soldiers to proclaim the lie that Jesus’ body had been stolen. The women proclaimed the truth of the Easter message, a message of hope, of the triumph of life over death, of love over hatred, of grace over sin. The religious leaders of the people proclaimed a lie which simply compounded the tragedy of what happened on Calvary; not only had an innocent man been put to death but his body had been stolen. This Easter Monday we are being asked to identify with the women’s response to the risen Lord. We are all called to be heralds of the truth of Easter, messengers of hope, disciples who announce by our lives that the light of the risen Lord shines in the darkness and the darkness does not overcome it.

And/Or

(Iv) Easter Monday

Two journeys are described in this morning’s gospel reading, the journey of the women to the disciples to tell them the good news that Jesus was alive and had appeared to them, and the journey of the soldiers who guarded Jesus’ tomb to the chief priests to tell them the bad news that the body of Jesus was no longer in the tomb because he had been raised from the dead. The momentous events of that first Easter Sunday were not experienced as good news by all. For those who wanted Jesus dead, news that he had risen from the dead was very bad news. This morning we identify with the women and the other disciples, rather than with guards and the chief priests. Like the women, we are filled with awe and joy at the news that Jesus has risen from the dead; like them our instinct is to worship the risen Lord; like them we hear the Lord say to us, ‘Do not be afraid’; like them we are sent from our worship as messengers of hope. Some people can hear good news as bad news, even the good news of Easter. We, however, are invited to savour the good news of Easter, and the church gives us seven weeks of the Easter season to do so. During these weeks we have an opportunity to keep on absorbing the momentous good news of Easter. This news gives meaning to our living and to our dying because it assures us that we are brothers and sisters of the Risen One who is also the Life Giver for all who seek him.

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(v) Easter Monday

There is a strong contrast in this morning’s gospel reading between the actions of a group of women and the actions of a group of men. The women fall down before the risen Lord and clasp his feet; they then respond immediately to the Lord’s command to go to the disciples and announce to them that he is going to meet them all in Galilee. Matthew portrays them a worshipping the Lord and then going out as his messengers in response to his call. They model for us our own Easter calling. We gather to worship the Lord, to fall down before him like the women. We go forth from our worship to proclaim the good news that the Lord is risen and wants to meet us not just in Galilee but in all the places where we live and work. In contrast to the women, the group of men, both soldiers and elders, conspire between them to spread a false story about Jesus’ disciples stealing his body. They are not open to the good news that Jesus is risen; they cannot take seriously anyone who says, as Mary Magdalene said, ‘I have seen the Lord’. There are versions of that false story around to this day, pouring scorn on the central core of our faith, ‘the crucified one has been raised from the dead’. It is a counter story to the story of the gospels, the women’s story in this morning’s gospel reading, the story of Peter, the story of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, the story of Paul. It is in and through those stories that we continue to meet the risen Lord. It is to those stories we give our minds and hearts and souls, so that we may have life and have it to the full.

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(vi) Easter Monday

This morning’s gospel reading falls into two very distinct parts, each part standing in contrast to the other. The first part is full of the joy of Easter. Having heard the message from the empty tomb that Jesus is risen, the women are filled with awe and great joy. Their joy is deepened when the risen Lord himself meets them and commissions them to share the good news, the gospel, with Jesus’ brothers and sisters, his disciples. We have a sense of a joy that is ever expanding, beyond the circle of the women, to the wider circle of the disciples, and beyond them to that much wider circle of all those who will become the Lord’s disciples. We all belong in that wider circle and we are invited to taste the joy of the good news of Easter this Easter Monday. The second part of the gospel reading has a much more sombre tone. There is a conspiracy to suppress the good news of Easter by spreading a false story, that Jesus’ body was, in reality, stolen. Just as money had been used to procure Jesus’ betrayal; it is used again to promote this lie. The second half of this morning’s gospel reading reminds us that there are always forces at work to suppress the Easter story, because this story is so significant and so much depends on it. Easter placed God’s seal of approval on all that Jesus said and did. In raising Jesus from the dead, God raised up all that Jesus stood for. To suppress the Easter story is to suppress the whole story of Jesus from his conception to his death. We are all asked to keep bearing witness to the Easter story even in the face of those who try to suppress it. We are to keep bearing witness to all that Jesus stood for, to his attitudes and values and we are to keep announcing God’s power to transform all our tombs into places of new life.

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(vii) Easter Monday

This morning’s gospel reading suggests that right from the very first Easter Sunday efforts were made to explain away the empty tomb of Jesus and his rising from the dead. According to Matthew the chief priests and elders put out the story that the disciples of Jesus came and stole his body during the night, and they were prepared to spend a lot of money to ensure that this story took hold. A story of Jesus’ empty tomb and of his resurrection from the dead did not suit their purposes and, so, it had to be suppressed. Efforts to suppress the truth, when the truth turns out to be uncomfortable, have always been a feature of the human story. Yet, the truth has its way of breaking free from all attempts to suppress it. The truth of Easter could certainly not be suppressed. God had done something powerful and wonderful in raising his Son from the dead. Such an extraordinary happening could never be covered over. The transforming impact of the risen Lord could not be hidden. Because of the resurrection a group of fearful disciples became courageous witnesses of the gospel before the world. Because of the resurrection the church was born in earnest. Our presence here this morning witnesses to the truth of the resurrection. The proper response to the resurrection is not to find ways of explaining it away. Rather, like the women at the beginning of our gospel reading we respond to this good news ‘with awe and great joy’. We stand amazed, in awe, before what God has done on that first Easter morning and what he has continued to do ever since, working to bring new life out of every death. We allow something of the joy of that triumph of life to touch our lives, so that even in the midst of the sorrows and struggles of life we remain a joyful, hopeful people.

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(viii) Easter Monday

The gospels indicate that Judas was willing to betray Jesus for money, thirty pieces of silver. In this morning’s gospel reading the soldiers are willing to propagate a lie about the resurrection of Jesus for money. They are paid to say that Jesus’ disciples stole the body while the soldiers slept. The story of Judas and the story of the soldiers demonstrate the power of money and how that power can be abused. Money, while not harmful in itself, can be made to serve purposes that are contrary to God’s purpose. In this morning’s gospel reading money is being used to silence the good news that God had raised Jesus from the dead, that God had triumphed over the religious and political forces that conspired to put Jesus to death. Money is being used to cancel out the gospel. Yet this was a doomed effort to muzzle the gospel. The lie that the soldiers spread about why Jesus’ tomb was empty is no match for the truth of the gospel. The good news that Jesus has been raised and that Jesus is Lord was proclaimed, despite the lie that was put about, and that good news continues to be proclaimed today. We are being reminded that the Easter gospel has a dynamism that no human power or conspiracy can overcome. God is always at work in and through the risen Lord, accomplishing far more than anything we can imagine, in spite of the best efforts of some to silence the gospel.

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(ix) Easter Monday

In the gospel reading from Matthew that we have just heard, the women, who were first to the tomb on Easter Sunday and found it empty, are also the first to whom the risen Lord appeared. This group of women are the primary witnesses to the resurrection, the first to proclaim the good news that Jesus is risen and that he will meet his disciples in Galilee. In contrast to this group of women, the gospel reading presents the chief priests and the elders of the people paying off the soldiers who guarded the tomb so that they would propagate the lie that Jesus’ body was stolen by his disciples. The women proclaim the truth of the gospel; the group of men in the gospel reading proclaim a lie. We are all being asked to identify with the group of women. They were faithful to Jesus; they were present during his public ministry, at the cross and at the tomb. Because of their faithfulness, they are sent out as messengers of Easter joy. Our faithfulness will prompt the Lord to send us out too as messengers of Easter joy and hope, proclaiming Easter good news, the triumph of life over death, of God’s love over human sin.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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