Month: April 2019

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Divine Mercy Sunday

Image of the Divine Mercy and prayer: Jesus I trust in You

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Mass Readings
First Reading: Acts 5:12-16
Psalm: Psalm 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24
Second Reading: Revelation 1:9-11A, 12-13, 17-19
Gospel: John 20:19-31

The Lord is risen alleluia. Peace be with you on this Divine Mercy Sunday. Inspired by a revelation to St. Faustina, Divine Mercy Sunday focuses on the gift of mercy and love that we are given through Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection. All our readings today in some way describe God’s mercy and love.

The first reading from the Acts of the Apostles Chapter 5 explains how the Risen Lord continued to show his Divine Mercy to the sick through the healing and preaching ministry of the apostles. The Responsorial take from Psalm 118 shows the Divine Mercy that “endures forever.” The second reading, taken from the first chapter of the Book of Revelation encourages Christians to fight fear with faith, and trepidation about the future with trust and hope. And in today’s Gospel from John 20, we hear that familiar story about doubting Thomas. You know, I think Thomas gets a bit of a bum rap, but Thomas says he will not believe unless he sees Jesus – unless he can see and touch Jesus’ wounds.

You know, I encounter a lot of people like Thomas – or perhaps worse. At least Thomas was willing to believe if he saw Jesus. I’ve encountered people who don’t want to see Jesus. There are those who are so angry about something that happened in their life or over someone they lost, that they are afraid of what they’d say to Jesus if they met him. They’re more willing to scream to heaven, “Where are you God!” Maybe they’re too comfortable with their anger.

I’ve also encountered people who are so embarrassed or ashamed of something they did, or something done to them that they can’t bring themselves to look in Jesus’ eyes. They think they are in some way unworthy. Maybe they’re afraid of being forgiven or they’re too comfortable with their pain or their embarrassment.

And then there are the people I’ve encountered who can’t believe that there is a Jesus at all. They have no desire to look for Jesus, let alone come face to face with him. They’re skeptical.

How do we bring God’s Divine Mercy to all these people? I’d like to share a recent experience with you. Last week, most of my family and I had the chance to go on a pilgrimage to Lourdes with HCPT. I think I will dedicate an entire podcast episode to our experience, but for now, I’d like to share this brief story with you. HCPT is a UK-based organization founded by Dr. Michael Strode who is now a Cistercian monk. HCPT helps children and young adults with disabilities travel on pilgrimage to Lourdes. We were blessed to travel with HCPT Switzerland on the Easter pilgrimage.

On our last day, our group leader arranged for us to celebrate our last mass at the Catholic Ukrainian church in Lourdes. It’s a beautiful, small church. We invited the HCPT group from Bristol, the “Green Machine” to join us for our last mass since the Swiss group is an offshoot of the Green Machine. There was a young man in the Green Machine whose name I don’t know. As it happens, he’s confined to a wheelchair. As the mass progressed, he began to cry. Soon, he was outright bawling as were many of the Green Machine helpers. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a chance to speak with him after mass, but what I’ve learned from others is that the end of pilgrimage week can be a highly emotional experience for everyone. You see, when all these youth from around the world gather together at Lourdes for Easter, they don’t experience judgment or prejudice there.

When we gather, we don’t see disabilities. We see people. Period. For some of the youth who come here, this may be a very different experience then their lives back home. I think those who travel here with some sort of disability experience the Divine Mercy of God through all the people around them. Whether the helpers realize it or not or want to believe it or not, they – we – are conduits for God’s Divine Mercy. But Jesus also said, whatever you do to the least of these, you do to me, Matthew 25:40. So when we treat people with disabilities with respect and as equals, we are in fact ministering to Jesus Christ. We are touched by the Jesus through those to whom we minister. So you see, we allow Jesus to touch others through us and we are touched by Jesus through others.

But this experience of sharing with each other God’s mercy isn’t something limited to Lourdes that can be bottled up and brought home. God’s mercy is available to all of us all the time – no matter what we’ve done. We just need to ask. You see, in today’s Gospel, when Jesus appeared to Thomas, he could have run, because Jesus will not force himself on anyone. Like Thomas, we need to be willing to face Jesus and allow God’s healing to wash over us. That’s the beautiful thing about the waters of Lourdes. It helps us experience in a concrete way God’s mercy washing us clean – healing us. But it doesn’t end there.

Jesus gave us his Church to bring us God’s mercy and grace every day! In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells his Apostles, “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained,” John 20:23. We see this as the foundation for the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Some people ask, “Why do I need to go confess my sins to a man?” But it’s not about the priest. We confess our sins out loud to take responsibility for what we’ve done. We say it! We own it! We ask God for forgiveness. We can also experience God’s mercy through the mass itself – most especially in the Blessed Sacrament. In fact, we can experience God’s mercy through all the Sacraments in one way or another. The question is, are you ready, like Thomas, to face Jesus and proclaim, “My Lord! My God!”? And that leads us to our homework today.
Homework! I encourage you to reflect on the following two questions this week.

  1. Ask yourself, “What’s stopping me from receiving God’s Divine Mercy?”
  2. If you were to come face-to-face with Jesus, what would you say to him?

Do you got? Do you get it? Good! May Almighty God bless you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. +Amen!

Resources:
• How to pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy

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Easter: Overcome Slavery to Sin

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Easter Readings
First Reading: Acts 10:34A, 37-43
Psalm: Psalm 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23
Second Reading: Colossians 3:1-4
Gospel: John 20:1-9

Happy Easter! He is risen! Alleluia, alleluia! So, what does Easter mean to me? What is the importance of the resurrection?

Today I’m going to reflect on Paul’s reading that we used on Saturday night during the Easter Vigil, Romans 6:3-11. In the notes for the podcast today, you’ll find the readings for Sunday’s Easter mass. But I want to reflect on Paul’s reading from the Easter Vigil. Since Paul’s reading is not in the notes, I’d like to read a little bit of it to you.

“Brothers and sisters, are you aware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death, we were indeed buried with Him through baptism into death, so that just as Christ was raised from the dead, by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life.” He goes on to write, “We know that our old self was crucified with him, so that our sinful body might be done away with that we might no longer be in slavery to sin.”

Think about that phrase just for a second, “…in slavery to sin.”

What does this mean in relation to Easter? Here’s the bottom line: Christ was killed for us. His death washed away our sins. By dying, he defeated death itself. That’s it. As Christians, we may have different ideas about how all of this works, but this our common belief. As CS Lewis put it, “That is the formula. That is Christianity,” (Mere Christianity, 55). But there’s the catch. We have to say yes. You see, we have a choice. Jesus will never force himself on anyone. So, we have a choice.

Why would anyone refuse the offer?

That’s a good question and Paul gives us some insight through the phrase he uses, “…in slavery to sin.” You see, temptation and sin are so powerful a force that people find themselves trapped in a cycle of sin. Yes, that sin could be things like drugs and alcohol, but people can also become slaves to money, power, influence, new technology, pornography, sex, among other things. A slave cannot do whatever they want. They can only do what their master commands.

Maybe another way of looking at sin is through the language of addiction. An addict may lack the power to resist – to fight – to decide. To break the cycle of addiction, an addict needs help from the outside, but even then, it won’t work unless the addict is wants help.

Consider the life of Venerable Matt Talbot. Born in 1856 in Dublin, Ireland, the second of twelve children, his father and most of his brothers were heavy drinkers. In 1868 Talbot left school at the age of twelve and went to work in a wine store where he soon began “sampling their wares.” By the age of thirteen, he was considered a hopeless alcoholic. He was an alcoholic by the age of thirteen! But that didn’t stop him from getting work at various whiskey stores. He frequented pubs spending most or all of his pay and running up debts. When he ran out of money, he borrowed and scrounged for money. He pawned his clothes and boots to get money for alcohol and once he stole a fiddle from a street entertainer just so he could buy drink.

At age 28, he was broke and out of credit. He waited in the street outside a pub in the hope that somebody would buy him a drink. After several friends had passed him without acknowledging him, he went home humiliated. With the help of his pastor, he turned to God for help.

He was an alcoholic for 16 years, but Talbot stayed sober for the next forty years of his life. He once said, “Never be too hard on the man who can’t give up drink. It’s as hard to give up the drink as it is to raise the dead to life again. But both are possible and even easy for Our Lord. We have only to depend on him,” (Matt Talbot).

My brothers and sisters, I have good news! Like Matt Talbot, we are not alone! By our baptism, we have access to God’s grace. You see, when we pour water over a baby during a baptism or submerge an older child or adult in the water, it symbolizes what Paul is saying – we die with Christ. When the child or adult emerges from the water, it symbolizes the Resurrection – we rise with Christ.

St. Paul reminds us that by our baptism we have God’s grace – we have the power to nail our sins to the cross and with Jesus to experience the resurrection. For Christians the Resurrection at Easter is like the Passover. Easter means deliverance from the oppression of sin and failure to new life through baptism.

Our lives can demonstrate freedom from sin’s power and show the fruits of the resurrection in our lives. Paul uses strong images to get his message across. Those baptized into Christ have been “buried with him.” We are united with him in his death, but also in his resurrection. Christ “raised from the dead, dies no more.” The same is true for us: we died with him and now we are “living for God in Christ Jesus.”

This Easter, Jesus invites you and he invites me to look at the results of our Lenten sacrifices and, by the grace of God, to nail our sins to the cross so that we can experience the liberating freedom of the resurrection. The great challenge of Easter is of course how the resurrection will bear fruit in our lives, and that leads us to our homework.

Homework!

  1. Reflecting on my Lenten experience, what sins am I prepared to nail to the cross? In other words, what is new about my faith this Easter?
  2. Like Jesus who emptied himself out for all of us, ask yourself, “as a disciple, where and how am I being called to sacrifice in my life for the good of others?”

Do you got it? Do you get it? Are you going to do it? Well good! May each of us come to experience the joy of Easter! He is indeed risen! May Almighty God bless you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. +Amen!

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Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion

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Readings
Gospel at the Procession with Palms: Luke 19:28-40
Reading 1: Isaiah 50:4-7
Psalm: Psalm 22:8-9, 17-20, 23-24
Reading 2: Philippians 2:6-11
Gospel: Luke 22:14-23:56

Today we celebrate Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion. Can you imagine being one of Jesus’ disciples during the scene described by Luke today? People were cheering and clapping and celebrating. They treated him like a rock star! And then a few days later, just a few days later, they crucified him. They stripped him and they nailed him to a cross. They drove nails through his hands and his feet and hung him in the air until he died.

Can you imagine what his disciples were feeling as they watched Jesus dying on the cross? Do you think they were sad? I think they were profoundly sad. Were they scared? Oh yes. Scripture tells us that his closest disciples, those who would become his apostles, were in the upper room hiding – hiding! They were hiding! Yes, I think they were scared. Do you think they were angry? You bet! How could this happen? They thought he was their savior. They thought he was supposed to be their king. This wasn’t supposed to happen! Now what?

Now what?

Death has a funny way of making us feel a hurricane of emotions like sad, scared, angry. Like our Psalmist today, we want to scream and shake our fists to heaven, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”, (Ps 22:2).

When death comes, some of us move on and try as best we can to pick up the pieces of our lives. But some in our families never do move on, do they? In both cases, those who move on without processing what happened, and those who can’t seem to move on don’t understand the message of Easter.

Before we get there, though, let’s make sure we’re all on the same page and to do that, we need to go back to the beginning. In the Garden while Adam and Eve were walking, they encountered a sly and cunning serpent. Can you imagine how that conversation went? He probably told them, “Good? You’re not good! You’re human! You’re so filthy! If you want to be good, then you need to be like God and if you want to be God, then you need to eat the fruit of this tree.”

Jewish scholars tell us that evil entered the world through the first temptation. What was the first temptation? Doubting the goodness of God’s creation. You see, Adam and Even didn’t need to eat the fruit to be good. God made them so they were good just the way they were.

The Original Sin totally disrupted our ability to find God on our own. Humans caused the rift, and only a human could fix it, but no human had the power to bridge the gap between God and us. So, God chose to send His son to us, as a human. St. Paul tells us in the second reading today from Philippians, that, “…though he was in the form of God, Jesus did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness…” (Phil 2:6-7).

As a human, Jesus sanctifies humanity. That’s what the incarnation is all about. But to save us – to bridge the gap between God and humanity, requires the ultimate sacrifice. St. Paul goes not to tell us that, “…found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross,” (Phil 2:8). Through his death and by his blood, we are washed clean of our sins and we become whiter than snow (Ps 51:9). And by his resurrection, he conquers death itself! Death no longer has any hold over us.

So, in both cases we discussed earlier, those who move on after death without processing what happened, and those who can’t seem to move on, both don’t understand the promise of the resurrection. All of us disciples, those of us who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, will see our friends and loved ones again! Death is not the end.

Today, the Church celebrates both Palm Sunday and Passion Sunday. We enter Holy Week and welcome Jesus into our lives, asking him to allow us to share in his suffering, death and Resurrection. Palm Sunday and Passion Sunday are two sides of the same coin. We rejoice as we receive Jesus into our lives as our Lord and Savior. We weep and mourn as his death confronts us with our sin. But that is not the end, because we look forward with great hope to Easter when we will celebrate the Resurrection.

Homework! As we enter Holy Week, I suggest we reflect on the following questions:

  1. Am I ready to welcome Jesus into my heart? Am I ready to surrender my life to Him during this Holy Week and welcome Him into all areas of my life as my Lord and Savior?
  2. Are we willing to follow Jesus, not just to Church but in our daily lives? Are we willing to entrust ourselves to Him even when the future is frightening or confusing, believing God has a plan? Are we willing to serve Him until that day when His plan for us on earth is fulfilled?

I think that reflecting and contemplating these questions this week will further our Lenten exercise of taking the focus off our own lives and opening us up to God’s people. Do you got it? Are you going to do it? Good! May each of us have a blessed Holy Week! The Lord be with you. And may Almighty God bless you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. +Amen!