Catholic Preaching

By Father Roger LandryReligion & Spirituality Christianity

Catholic Preaching episodes

April 13, 2024Third Sunday of Easter (B), Conversations with Consequences Podcast, April 13, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Conversations with Consequences Podcast
Homily for the Third Sunday of Easter, Vigil
April 13, 2024

To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/4.13.24_Landry_ConCon_1.mp3

The following text guided the homily:
This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a joy for me to be with you as we enter into the consequential conversation the Risen Lord Jesus wants to have with each of us as we look forward to the Third Sunday of Easter.
If ever there were a day for a party, it was the day Jesus rose from the dead! It was the happiest day in all of human history, made more jubilant by ending the terrible despair and dejection of the disciples over the previous two days. And once the immense shock of seeing Jesus risen from the dead walk through the closed doors of the Upper Room to greet them had worn off, St. Luke tells us that the disciples were “incredulous for joy and amazed.” But they didn’t run out for gallons of wine or ask Jesus to convert water into champagne. Jesus didn’t call for cakes and fruit and other Middle Eastern celebratory fare. Instead, in the midst of the joy of his resurrection, Jesus turned the Upper Room into a vocational training school and began to finish the training of the disciples and apostles to fulfill his saving mission. There was a certain urgency involved in this that Jesus didn’t want to put off until later: the fields were white and ready for the harvest (Jn 4:35) and Jesus wanted the apostles, and the disciples with them, to get ready to go out to take in that harvest. He wants his conversation with us in this Sunday’s Gospel to be as formative and consequential.
There were three steps to his finalizing their and our preparation so that they and we might become his witnesses to all nations.
First, he allowed himself to be seen, encountered, and embraced. The apostles were troubled and Jesus came to give them his peace. Jesus wants to have a similar encounter with us in prayer so that he may give us his peace. Jesus showed them his body and invited them to touch him. This was to communicate that he wasn’t a ghost. He wasn’t imaginary. He was real. This points to the need for us to recognize that Jesus’ presence with us isn’t phantasmic either, but real. He’s not a ghost but he’s got real flesh and blood. We can see him. We can touch him and not just on the “outside” but on the inside. This obviously points to the importance of the Eucharist, which is meant to amaze us and make us, like the first apostles, “incredulous for sheer joy.” This truth that seems too good to be true actually is true: God is with us in his risen body and blood, and he comes to give himself to us. Any apostle needs to live a Eucharistic life, to be amazed at God’s gift of himself to such a degree that that joy overflows to others. The Eucharist, I repeat, isn’t a ghost, isn’t an imaginary presence, isn’t a thing at all, but the same Jesus who appeared to his first followers in the Upper Room; he just looks different under sacramental form. This is something that the ongoing Eucharistic Revival in the United States is meant to help us grasp, and to respond with faith, gratitude, amazement and love.
The second stage in the finalizing of their vocational training is that Jesus “opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” Just like he had done a couple of hours with the disciples on the road to Emmaus, whose hearts he had made burn as he interpreted to them the things about himself in the scriptures, so Jesus filled his apostles with a similar fire, showing them, too, how everything foretold had been accomplished. He was the fulfillment of the innocent Abel, killed by his brother Cain; of Isaac, who carried the wood of the sacrifice on his shoulders to be sacrificed on Mount Moriah (which later became Jerusalem); of Joseph’s being betrayed by his brothers; of the Passover Lamb, who needed to be slain and eaten for the Jews to be set free; of the Suffering Servant, whom Isaiah prophesied would be “wounded for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities”; of the “just man beset” by the envy of others in the Book of Wisdom; of all of the prophecies of the traits and sufferings of the Messiah in the Psalms and more. As St. Luke’s Gospel summarizes, Jesus helped them to see how “everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets and the psalms, must be fulfilled,” especially that the “Messiah was to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day.” Likewise for us, we need to allow Jesus to open our minds to understand the Scriptures, to see how every part of Scripture relates to him. We have to show up for the Master’s master class in the liturgy of the word at Mass, in prayerful meditation and lectio divina on Sacred Scripture, in Bible Studies at our parishes or, for example, with Father Mike Schmitz’s Bible in a Year podcast, which has helped so many. St. Jerome said that ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ, and the corollary of that means that the better we know Sacred Scripture, the better we will be able to know Jesus Christ and the better we will know not only how to understand his sufferings but our own in him.
The final step in their post-resurrection vocational finishing school was to be commissioned by Jesus as his witnesses. Jesus told them, “You are witnesses of these things,” witnesses of all that happened to Jesus, his life, death and resurrection; witnesses to repentance and forgiveness of sins, because they themselves had been reconciled through the mercy they were commissioned to proclaim. Likewise, Jesus calls each of us to be witnesses of his life, of the metamorphosis his life has had in ours, of the reality that he is alive and, as Pope Francis loves to say, “living at [our] side every day to enlighten, to strengthen and free [us]” (EG 164).
So the three-step path begins with encountering Jesus, something that can’t be taken for granted. There are many Catholics who keep the Ten Commandments, who are engaged in good, charitable works, but who really only know about Jesus rather than really know him personally. They “say their prayers” rather than enter into a true prayerful dialogue with the risen Lord. They go to confession and forensically audit their soul, but they do so as if they were engaging in a good spiritual exercise rather than meeting the Lord Jesus who out of mercy died to take those sins away. They come to Mass as if they were attending a commemoration or sacred ceremony, rather than truly meeting Jesus Christ — the same Jesus who was wrapped in swaddling clothes, who walked the dusty streets of Palestine and hurdled the waves of the Galilean Sea, who was hammered to the Tree on Calvary, rose from the dead, and entered the Upper Room. As a university chaplain, I interact with many young people who perhaps live by the good Catholic values and habits they’ve inherited from their parents, grandparents and godparents, but who haven’t yet made those values personal. Many of them, despite years of the practice of the faith, drift away because, despite all the prayer, Masses, confessions, service opportunities and more, the lightbulb never went off that in all these activities they were really meeting the real Jesus. We need a real encounter.
But to become a witness, we need to do more than simply encounter Jesus. There were many people in Jesus’ time who met him, who heard his words, who even could repeat them, but who chose not to follow him or to help bring others to encounter and follow him as well. We are called to be Jesus’ witnesses, not — as Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston likes to say — members of a witness protection program. Jesus meets us not only to change our lives forever but to make us his instruments to change others’ lives in the same radical way. Once Andrew had met Jesus, he went and brought his brother Simon to meet him, and Jesus changed Simon’s name to Peter and promised to build his Church on him. Once the Samaritan woman met Jesus, she ran to her townspeople and encouraged all of them to come to meet Jesus, too, and discover that he was the Savior of the world. Once various people had been cured by Jesus, they couldn’t help but spread word of Jesus to others, even when he asked them to tell no one. They couldn’t help from sharing what Jesus had done for them. If we’ve really encountered Jesus, we can’t help but share him. Everyone we meet should be able to spot in us someone who has seen Jesus, who remembers him and his words, who has had his life totally changed by Jesus, and who recognizes that the greatest gift he could ever give someone else is the gift of the Lord. As Christians we give witness to what we believe, whether we want to or not. The disciple is meant to be a compelling witness to the Risen Christ and to his unbelievable gift of salvation, his teaching, his love, his presence, and his Church. This Easter Season Jesus wants to raise us all from the dead with him, to help us to experience the power of his resurrection, so that we will no longer by “troubled” with “questions aris[ing] in our hearts,” but so that we will be “incredulous for joy” and “amazed.”
So on Easter Sunday evening, Jesus didn’t throw a big party, but instead formed us for the urgent task of going out and inviting everyone to a banquet. God is indeed planning such a celebration, a feast that will know no end, in heaven, where he hopes we and others will fully share in the triumph of his resurrection. He is sending us out into the world with the invitation. And to strengthen us for that Mission, and prepare all of us for that banquet, he comes to meet us this Sunday in the Upper Room, where Jesus weekly — even daily — encounters us, gives us his peace, opens our minds to understand the Scriptures, feeds us with his own Body and Blood, and sends us out changed, to help him change the world. We are indeed witnesses of all of these things. God bless you!

The Gospel passage on which the homily was based was:
Gospel
Lk 24:35-48
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.”
The post Third Sunday of Easter (B), Conversations with Consequences Podcast, April 13, 2024 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
10 min
April 12, 2024Rejoicing to Be Found Worthy to Work With and For the Lord, Second Friday of Easter, April 12, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Notre Dame Church, Manhattan
Friday of the Second Week of Easter
April 12, 2024
Acts 5:34-42, Ps 27, Jn 6:1-15

To listen to an audio recording of this homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/4.12.24_Homily.mp3

The following points were attempted:
The readings of the Easter Season are an annual mystagogical catechesis of the way in which we live together with the Risen Jesus. In this second week, we begin with Nicodemus, which allows us to ponder Jesus’ words about the meaning of Baptism, the rebirth from above God gives us by the Holy Spirit so that we may go wherever the Spirit blows us, so that we might think as God thinks, so that we might live the truth not as reluctant disciples but fervent, courageous ones.
In today’s Gospel, we shift from a focus on Baptism to the Eucharist and begin what I like to call the “Second Octave of Easter,” dedicated to eight different sections of the sixth chapter of the Gospel of St. John, which feature how Jesus’ gift of himself in the Eucharist is not only prophesied by the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fish but also prophesies the eternal wedding banquet. Jesus worked this miracle and gave us the words we’ll be hearing between now and Saturday of the third week of Easter knowing that we would be focusing on them in the Church after his Resurrection. He gave them to the Church so that we would know how to grow in the power of his resurrection, that, as we’ll hear in upcoming days, if we enter into communion with him through eating his flesh and drinking his blood, we will have eternal life and he will raise us on the last day.
Today we ponder the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fish, which has various Eucharistic resonances. The first is Jesus’ compassion on the crowds. They were hungry and he was going to feed them. In the Eucharist, he feeds our souls with the only nourishment he considers worthy of them, himself. Then we see the collaboration of the apostles and the young boy. Jesus through whom all the plants, fish and animals in the world were made, could have easily created food out of nothing to feed the multitudes, but he wanted to involve his followers. All the apostles could find in a crowd of 5,000 was what a boy had carried, doubtless only for himself: five small buns and two sardines. But Jesus took them, gave thanks to God (the Greek work is eucaristein) and distributed them to the crowds. Likewise in the Eucharist Jesus begins with what we give him — the bread and wine that are not only God’s gifts but the “work of human hands” — and multiplies those efforts in an even greater miracle. Finally we see the “leftovers.” Clearly Jesus could have worked the miracle without leftovers, but there were exactly twelve wicker baskets left, one for each apostle, to remind each of them in a sense of what we’re supposed to do with the Eucharistic food we’ve received, to go and give our own bodies and blood, our own love to the extreme, our own compassion for others’ deepest hungers to those in need. There’s no need for us to “horde” the Eucharist, to keep our relationship to ourselves; rather Jesus fills our baskets to overflowing so that we may lavishly share his gifts with others.
This gift of risen life through communion with the Risen Jesus is what makes us strong. And it’s what in turn makes us a sign. Today we see those consequences in the witness of the apostles brought before the Sanhedrin. The Rabbi Gamaliel, the teacher of Saul of Tarsus, talked the members of the Sanhedrin out of their desire to do to the apostles what they had conspired to do to Jesus. This was a totally different theology than that which Caiphas had enunciated weeks earlier; Caiphas had said that it was better for one to die than the whole people; Gamaliel said that if we oppose the apostles we might be opposing God, thoughts that should have been expressed in the illegal trial of Jesus early on Good Friday! But there’s something very powerful in his change and in the Sanhedrin’s decision. While the words of Jesus had not sufficed to soften their hardened hearts to the possibility that he might be doing all he did by the finger and power of God, what the apostles were accomplishing did at least get him and them to wonder. These were simple men who had, it seemed, healed the cripple at the Beautiful Gate, were fearlessly and seemingly sanely proclaiming the crucified Jesus as risen, and were willing to suffer and die in testimony of that claim. The presence of the Risen Lord Jesus in them was making them, in some sense, an even more powerful sign than Jesus had been, at least to the critical members of the Sanhedrin. St. Thomas Aquinas once said that if the apostles had succeeded in convincing the ancient world, which was very down to earth, that a crucified carpenter had risen from the dead when he hadn’t risen, if they were willing to live and die for this lie and hallucination, then that would have been a greater miracle than the resurrection itself. The “miracle” of what was happening in them by the power of Jesus abiding in them was an even greater sign that what had been given prior to his resurrection. And that sign value grew as they suffered for Christ. St. Luke tells us that the Sanhedrin had the disciples “flogged, ordered them to stop speaking in the name of Jesus, and dismissed them.” They had the disciples scourged, just as Jesus had been scourged. It shows just how messed up the Sanhedrin was that they responded to Gamaliel’s assertion by scourging men whom they thought might possibly have been sent by God! Peter’s and John’s reaction, however, was “rejoicing that they had been found worthy to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name.” That was the power of their communion with the Risen Jesus. They rejoiced over being scourged, because they knew that it was allowing them to enter into an even greater participation in Jesus’ resurrection through sharing in his sufferings. They rejoiced because it allowed them to give even greater witness. They grasped that if Jesus was raised from the dead 40 hours after having been crucified, that there was nothing for them to be afraid of — not flaggelations, not crownings with thorns, not sham trials, not even crucifixions. God would have the final word. Their Easter joy could not be suppressed and so St. Luke tells us, “all day long, both at the temple and in their homes, they did not stop teaching and proclaiming the Christ, Jesus.”
Reflecting on the courage of Saints Peter, John, and the Apostles, we can examine ourselves as to the holy boldness with which we live our faith and to whether we are effective signs of the Risen Christ. Jesus comes to strengthen us by his Risen Life in this great miracle of the multiplication of his body and blood from the Last Supper, so that we may bear our own hardships on account of the faith, our own physical ailments, even our own death with joy and trust on account of the power of the Resurrection and come through that communion a wonder for the world. The Lord whom we’re about to receive is our “light and salvation,” and so we respond with the words of Psalm 27: “Whom should I fear? The Lord is my life’s refuge; of whom should I be afraid? One thing I ask of the Lord this I seek: To dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.” Jesus gives us an anticipation of that eternal entrance into his temple by coming to dwell within our own house in Holy Communion. The more we receive our Light and Salvation within us, the more we recognize that we are indeed seeing “the bounty of the Lord in the land of the living” and the more we will recognize the grace we need from on high, like the Apostles to “be stouthearted” and “wait for the Lord with courage” in this world, give witness to him before the Gamaliels and Sanhedrins and those of good will, and rejoice forever with him in the next!

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1
ACTS 5:34-42
A Pharisee in the Sanhedrin named Gamaliel,
a teacher of the law, respected by all the people,
stood up, ordered the Apostles to be put outside for a short time,
and said to the Sanhedrin, “Fellow children of Israel,
be careful what you are about to do to these men.
Some time ago, Theudas appeared, claiming to be someone important,
and about four hundred men joined him, but he was killed,
and all those who were loyal to him
were disbanded and came to nothing.
After him came Judas the Galilean at the time of the census.
He also drew people after him,
but he too perished and all who were loyal to him were scattered.
So now I tell you,
have nothing to do with these men, and let them go.
For if this endeavor or this activity is of human origin,
it will destroy itself.
But if it comes from God, you will not be able to destroy them;
you may even find yourselves fighting against God.”
They were persuaded by him.
After recalling the Apostles, they had them flogged,
ordered them to stop speaking in the name of Jesus,
and dismissed them.
So they left the presence of the Sanhedrin,
rejoicing that they had been found worthy
to suffer dishonor for the sake of the name.
And all day long, both at the temple and in their homes,
they did not stop teaching and proclaiming the Christ, Jesus.
Responsorial Psalm
PS 27:1, 4, 13-14
R. (see 4abc) One thing I seek: to dwell in the house of the Lord.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The LORD is my light and my salvation;
whom should I fear?
The LORD is my life’s refuge;
of whom should I be afraid?
R. One thing I seek: to dwell in the house of the Lord.
or:
R. Alleluia.
One thing I ask of the LORD
this I seek:
To dwell in the house of the LORD
all the days of my life,
That I may gaze on the loveliness of the LORD
and contemplate his temple.
R. One thing I seek: to dwell in the house of the Lord.
or:
R. Alleluia.
I believe that I shall see the bounty of the LORD
in the land of the living.
Wait for the LORD with courage;
be stouthearted, and wait for the LORD.
R. One thing I seek: to dwell in the house of the Lord.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Gospel
JN 6:1-15
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.
The post Rejoicing to Be Found Worthy to Work With and For the Lord, Second Friday of Easter, April 12, 2024 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
19 min
April 11, 2024Baptism, Faith and Eternal Life, Second Thursday of Easter, April 11, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Notre Dame Church, Manhattan
Thursday of the Second Week of Easter
Memorial of St. Stanislaus
April 11, 2024
Acts 5:27-33, Ps 34, Jn 3:31-36

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/4.11.24_Homily_1.mp3

The following points were attempted in the homily:
The Easter Season is meant to be a post-baptismal mystagogy, the period in which the Church helps the newly baptized — and those baptized many years before — enter into the reality of the mystery of Christ’s risen life received in the Sacraments, pondering his words, and living the truth so that all our works may be seen as done in God, as we heard earlier this week. Throughout this Second Week of Easter, we have been pondering the mystery of our baptismal sharing in Christ’s risen life through Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus about spiritual rebirth and St. John’s subsequent reflections on it. Tomorrow we will begin eight days of focus on the Eucharistic reality of the Christian life, our ability to receive Jesus’ risen Body and Blood each day. And all of these truths were able to see enfleshed by the members of the early Church in the readings from the Acts of the Apostles.
Today we have the concluding words of the chapter of Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus in which St. John — or Jesus, the text is a little ambiguous and scholars go back and forth about whether St. John is quoting Jesus or whether he is giving his own theological reflections on why Jesus said what he said — describes his own mission and the life of anyone born anew from above, as we have been in Baptism. St. Paul told us on Easter Sunday morning, as he told the Colossians, “If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” Today St. John describes this difference between living with Jesus risen from the dead or living according to the old Adam: “The one who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of earthly things,” St. John writes, “but the one who comes from heaven is above all. He testifies to what he has seen and heard.” Jesus witnessed to what he had seen and heard and a Christian must be a witness to what he has seen and heard in his encounters with Christ in person, in prayer, in the Sacraments. The disciple and apostle of Jesus must be someone who seeks, thinks and testifies to what is above. St. John describes that not everybody wants to live with hearts aloft. He says that Jesus came as light into the world but many preferred the darkness. “No one accepts his testimony,” he writes, referring in general to the fact that most don’t seek the things that are above, most don’t leave the darkness to enter the light, most don’t allow Jesus to change their fundamental orientation at its root, most don’t really convert and continue to lift up their hearts to God. But, he adds, “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.” We believe what Jesus says on the basis of our faith in God. Because we trust in God, we trust in what he says and gives witness to. The one born from above allows the Holy Spirit to give witness within him, not putting up any resistance to what God is doing. The Holy Spirit is a witness — just as much as the apostles — to Jesus’ risen life and when we are reborn from him, we give witness together with him. We don’t ration the Holy Spirit’s work, and he helps us, as St. Paul described to the Galatians and the Romans, to “live by the Spirit,” which allows us to be “concerned with the things of the Spirit.” And for that reason, Jesus says, such a person living by the Spirit is already living eternally because he is through the Spirit in union with Christ’s risen life: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life.” That’s the life that begins when we’re baptized with water, the Spirit and fire. When babies are baptized today, the priest or deacon asks, first, what name the parents give the child and then, “What do you ask of God’s Church for [your child]?” There are three correct answers, but I encourage couples to say all three: baptism; what baptism leads to, faith; and what faith leads to, eternal life. Baptism, Faith and Eternal Life are all connected, for whoever truly believes in the Son has eternal life. And that eternal life always experienced makes us courageous in the face of all challenges and vicissitudes, something that, as we saw earlier this week, Nicodemus, the reluctant disciple, desperately needed in order to leave the darkness and come to live with Jesus in the light.
We see life according to these principles in the apostles in the first reading. The apostles accepted Jesus’ testimony, they didn’t ration the gift of the Spirit, but with all boldness were giving witness with the Holy Spirit to what they had seen and heard. After the same members of the Sanhedrin who had had Jesus publicly tortured and executed were threatening them with the same fate had given them strict orders to stop teaching in Jesus’ name only to be met by their “fill[ing] Jerusalem with your teaching,” St. Peter and the Apostles said, “We must obey God rather than men.” They kept giving witness, undaunted because they knew that they were already experiencing eternal life and even should they be martyred, that wouldn’t be the end of their life but the passage to life with Jesus. That was the source of their boldness. They sought the things above, they spoke of heavenly things, they grasped that, just like Jesus’ testimony, not everyone would receive theirs, but to everyone who did, they testified that God is trustworthy and would give eternal life. They appeal to us to accept that testimony coming from God the Holy Spirit, to order our life to the things that are above and to fill Columbia University, New York City and beyond with this teaching. That’s what Jesus, whose Risen Life we’re about to receive within in Holy Communion, wants to strengthen us, like he strengthened his first followers, to do. That’s what he was able to do in the life of St. Stanislaw, bishop and martyr, whom the Church celebrates today, who courageously gave a fraternal correction to King Boleslaus II, who out of anger killed the Bishop of Krakow with his own hands.
The same Jesus who spoke to Nicodemus comes to speak to us today and to feed us, helping us from the inside to live as those born anew from above, helping us not ration the Spirit but put up the sails to the Spirit who blows where he wills, strengthening us boldly to spread his teachings so that everyone for which he poured out his blood might come to have life to the full, in this world and forever.

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 ACTS 5:27-33
When the court officers had brought the Apostles in
and made them stand before the Sanhedrin,
the high priest questioned them,
“We gave you strict orders did we not,
to stop teaching in that name.
Yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching
and want to bring this man’s blood upon us.”
But Peter and the Apostles said in reply,
“We must obey God rather than men.
The God of our ancestors raised Jesus,
though you had him killed by hanging him on a tree.
God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior
to grant Israel repentance and forgiveness of sins.
We are witnesses of these things,
as is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.”
When they heard this,
they became infuriated and wanted to put them to death.
Responsorial Psalm PS 34:2 AND 9, 17-18, 19-20
R. (7a) The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
I will bless the LORD at all times;
his praise shall be ever in my mouth.
Taste and see how good the LORD is;
blessed the man who takes refuge in him.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The LORD confronts the evildoers,
to destroy remembrance of them from the earth.
When the just cry out, the LORD hears them,
and from all their distress he rescues them.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The LORD is close to the brokenhearted;
and those who are crushed in spirit he saves.
Many are the troubles of the just man,
but out of them all the LORD delivers him.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Alleluia JN 20:29
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
You believe in me, Thomas, because you have seen me, says the Lord;
blessed are those who have not seen, but still believe!
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel JN 3:31-36
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.
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14 min
April 10, 2024Living the Truth and Coming to the Light, Second Wednesday of Easter, April 10, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Notre Dame Church, Manhattan
Wednesday of the Second Week of Easter
April 10, 2024
Acts 5:17-26, Ps 34, Jn 3:16-21

To listen to today’s homily, please click below:
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The following points were attempted in today’s homily:
Today in the readings we see illustrated for us in words and deeds the great Christian paradoxes between love and rejection, salvation and judgment, light and darkness. We see the full meaning of Jesus’ resurrection but at the same time we witness how some people prefer to continue to live as spiritual cadavers rather than experience the risen life Jesus has come to give us. This is the essential drama of human life.
St. John begins today by giving us the most beautiful — and probably famous — synthesis of the Gospel: “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.” God loves us so much that he himself died so that we would live forever. He didn’t want to lose any one of us. The incarnation, life, preaching, passion, death and resurrection of Jesus were all one big rescue mission. “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,” St. John continues, “but that the world might be saved through him.” That salvation comes ultimately through our participation in his life through the Sacrament of Baptism, about which Jesus has been speaking to Nicodemus this week.
Despite Jesus’ not coming into the world to condemn it, there is still a condemnation, however, there’s still a judgment. It’s the condemnation and judgment that happens when we refuse to accept Jesus’ rescue. St. John describes it in these terms: “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.” We see so much here. Everything begins with faith but faith must become operative, it must be faith working through love (Gal 5:6). The work of the evil one is often the reverse: he starts with getting us to do deeds contrary to our faith — with “works” that are “evil” — and then to have the shame over such Christian misbehavior start to lead our whole life into darkness. We do one deed of darkness and prefer to keep it hidden. That leads us more and more into a life of darkness such that we begin to hate the light.
Later Jesus would add, in an excised passage, “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.” Judgment, condemnation and the wrath of God sadly remain on the one who does not respond with faith to Jesus and enter into his light and life, not because that’s what God wants — he wants all to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth — but because in freedom someone chooses to reject God’s work of salvation. The “wrath” of God basically means a state of alienation from God, brought about not by the act of divine punishment but by the choice of people to live and walk in darkness out of a self-love so strong that it turns on God and “hates” his light. Those who live in the peace of God, on the other hand, believe in Jesus, believe in what he says, choose to align their life to the truth he reveals and come to see and experience all things in his holy light. St. John says, “Whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.” The aim of the Christian life, the aim of faith, is to live in communion with Christ who is the truth, to believe in him is to believe in what he says and try with all our might to put what he says into practice. And when we live the truth, we want to live in the light not so that we can show off — Jesus warns us against that every Ash Wednesday when he tells us to pray, fast and give alms in secret — but so that the Father may be glorified, so that our deeds may be seen as done in God, so that God may get the credit, so that our life may give him witness and glory. God so loved us as to make that possible.
We see this paradox between darkness and light, the lie and the truth, condemnation and salvation illustrated in the reading from the Acts of the Apostles. The Sanhedrin, the chief priests, Sadducees, many of the Scribes and Pharisees and Sanhedrin in large part preferred the darkness and rejected Christ’s rescue work. They did it before they conspired to have him executed and during the events of his public execution. Even after word of his resurrection started to spread and his simple followers started to work incredible miracles in his name as they testified that he was alive, they continued to prefer the darkness, bribing the guards to lie about what happened at the tomb. They warned Peter and John not to say anything ever again about Jesus, but the two apostles courageously kept speaking out, saying that it was impossible to keep their mouths shut about what they had seen and heard and that their primary obedience was to God, who sent them as his witnesses. At the beginning of today’s reading, they were arrested a second time for preaching openly, in the light of Solomon’s Portico in the temple, about Jesus and his call to conversion and salvation. After they were imprisoned, however, an angel rescued them, opening the doors of the prison just like he opened Jesus’ sealed tomb, telling them, “Go and take your place in the temple area, and tell the people everything about this life.” They were arrested again but surreptitiously, in darkness we could say, because the leaders feared the people. St. Luke tells us that they were “filled with jealousy.” They resorted once again to threats. “We gave you strict orders did we not, to stop teaching in that name. Yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and want to bring this man’s blood upon us.” These were the same people who had clamored in Pontius Pilate’s praetorium, when Pilate washed his hands of the blood of Jesus whom he called an “innocent man,” “his blood be upon us and on our children.” Yet St. Peter wasn’t trying to condemn them for shedding Jesus’ blood but to have them saved by that blood. He was trying to convert them through repentance and forgiveness. Peter said, “The God of our ancestors raised Jesus, though you had him killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to grant Israel repentance and forgiveness of sins.” But they didn’t want to repent and have their sins forgiven. They didn’t want to acknowledge that they had sinned at all. And so after Peter had said, “We are witnesses of these things, as is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him,” St. Luke tells us, “They became infuriated and wanted to put them to death.” It wasn’t enough for one man to die for the people, as Caiaphas had said about Jesus. Now they wanted to kill his disciples, too. They hated the light of Christ’s resurrection radiating through his disciples and they wanted to extinguish that light. Those who had condemned Jesus to death were condemning themselves for not believing in him. Those who pronounced verdicts supposedly on behalf of God were in fact pronouncing a verdict against themselves. This is a dynamic that all of us have to grasp, because many times Christians act like the apostles and live in the light and bring Jesus’ salvation to others, and at other times, we prefer to live by our “own light,” which is fact a darkness, and behave like members of the Sanhedrin, pronouncing judgment on others and their actions without recognizing that we’re just condemning ourselves to living apart from Jesus and his light partially or fully.
As we prepare to encounter in the Holy Eucharist Jesus the Light of the World, who wants to make us children of the Light, we rejoice that God the Father so loved the world — so loves us — that he gives us his own Son here that we might not perish but enter into communion with Jesus’ eternal life. Jesus promised that whoever eats his flesh and drinks his blood has eternal life and he will raise him on the last day. It’s here that we ask for Jesus’ blood to be on us and on our children, not the unrepented guilt for his martyrdom but the healing blood of his risen life. It’s here that the truth incarnate helps us to live the truth and do this act of worship in the light so that our whole faith may be seen as done in God.

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 Acts 5:17-26
The high priest rose up and all his companions,
that is, the party of the Sadducees,
and, filled with jealousy,
laid hands upon the Apostles and put them in the public jail.
But during the night, the angel of the Lord opened the doors of the prison,
led them out, and said,
“Go and take your place in the temple area,
and tell the people everything about this life.”
When they heard this,
they went to the temple early in the morning and taught.
When the high priest and his companions arrived,
they convened the Sanhedrin,
the full senate of the children of Israel,
and sent to the jail to have them brought in.
But the court officers who went did not find them in the prison,
so they came back and reported,
“We found the jail securely locked
and the guards stationed outside the doors,
but when we opened them, we found no one inside.”
When the captain of the temple guard and the chief priests heard this report,
they were at a loss about them,
as to what this would come to.
Then someone came in and reported to them,
“The men whom you put in prison are in the temple area
and are teaching the people.”
Then the captain and the court officers went and brought them,
but without force,
because they were afraid of being stoned by the people.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 34:2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8-9
R. (7a) The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
I will bless the LORD at all times;
his praise shall be ever in my mouth.
Let my soul glory in the LORD;
the lowly will hear me and be glad.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Glorify the LORD with me,
let us together extol his name.
I sought the LORD, and he answered me
and delivered me from all my fears.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Look to him that you may be radiant with joy,
and your faces may not blush with shame.
When the poor one called out, the LORD heard,
and from all his distress he saved him.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The angel of the LORD encamps
around those who fear him, and delivers them.
Taste and see how good the LORD is;
blessed the man who takes refuge in him.
R. The Lord hears the cry of the poor.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Alleluia Jn 3:16
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might have eternal life.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel Jn 3:16-21
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.
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14 min
April 10, 2024Practical Consequences of the Resurrection, Choral Vespers of the School of Sacred Music, April 9, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Chapel of the Good Shepherd, Manhattan
Worship and Wisdom: Choral Vespers with the School of Sacred Music
April 9, 2024

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The following text guided the reflection:
Introduction on April 9
Grateful to Thomas Wilson and the School of Sacred Music for this invitation tonight to preside at Vespers and to share some thoughts.
Before I get into the practical consequences of the resurrection that I’m supposed to address tonight, I would like to say something about the importance of April 9 in our calendar.
If Matthew, Mark and Luke are right about the Last Supper taking place during the Passover meal on the 14th of the month of Nisan, then the resurrection of Jesus took place 1994 years ago today, on April 9, 30 AD.
If St. John is right on the other hand, that the Last Supper were not a Passover meal and that Jesus’ crucifixion took place at the hour of the killing of the Passover Lamb in the temple on the day of preparation, then Jesus would have risen from the dead April 3, 33 AD.
For multiple scholarly reasons we don’t have the time or the setting to get into tonight, I am partial to the synoptic sequence. And so one practical consequence of the resurrection would be to celebrate April 9 every year with particular joy. Another is that six years from tonight, even though because of a late Easter, it will be Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent, the traditional Friday of Sorrows in pious remembrance of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we should asking heaven for an exception and be making plans to thank the Lord in a particular way for the 2000th anniversary of his triumph!
Practical Consequences
The practical consequences I intend to speak on tonight, however, have to do with the Paschal metamorphosis all four evangelists, the Acts of the Apostles, St. Paul and St. Peter underline in their passages on Easter.
Paul tells us — which we hear during the Easter Vigil — “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. … Consequently, you too must think of yourselves as [being] dead to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus.”
We see that there was a dramatic change in the life of the first apostles, Mary Magdalene, the disciples of Emmaus on the day Jesus rose from the dead, turning their lives right-side-up. The living memorial of Christ’s resurrection should similarly change us. It should lead to newness of life.
I would like to consider briefly ten different ways we can think about this change.
First, Faith
John, “He saw and believed.”
Jesus to St. Thomas: “Blessed are those who have not seen but believe.”
Faith is a belief in something (fides quae) on the basis of a trust in someone (fides qua).
It’s not just faith in an event — Jesus’ resurrection — but, more importantly, trust in Jesus who predicted and fulfilled his promise to rise on the third day.
Faith in the event: empty tomb, appearances, credible proclamation.
Faith in the person: this was the fulfillment of the sign of Jonah!
Second, Conversion
Peter on Pentecost called the people to conversion when they asked, “What are we to do?” in response to the Resurrection. He said, “Repent and be baptized … for the forgiveness of your sins” (Acts 2:37-38)
Conversion is not about a minor course correction in our life or the eradication of a sinful habit. It’s about a death and resurrection. It’s about a new life.
Divine Mercy Sunday is for a reason the culmination of the Easter octave!
Jesus founded the Sacrament of Penance on Easter Sunday evening (Jn 20).
Parable of the Prodigal Son teaches us that every reconciliation is supposed to be a resurrection: “My son was dead and has been brought to life again.”
Third, the Sursum Corda Effect
Our first antiphon tonight was, “Seek the things of heaven, not those that are of earth, alleluia!”
We hear from St. Paul on Easter morning: “If you were raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Think of what is above, not of what is on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:1-3).
The resurrection lifts us from obsessing about worldly things and helps us to view everything increasingly from God’s perspective. We place our treasure in God and our heart goes to where our treasure is (Mt 6:21).
In the heart of the Mass, the priest invites and commands us, “Lift up your hearts”: Sursum Corda. This means we strive prioritize prayer, worship, Sacred Scripture, adult educational resources, and charity. Jesus wants to make our hearts burn just like he made the two disciples’ hearts on the road to Emmaus, about which we focused in the Magnificat antiphon.
Fourth, Living in the Presence of God
Risen from the dead, Jesus is no longer bound by the limits of the humanity he assumed. He can be with us always.
The same risen Jesus who walked through the closed doors of the Upper Room can traverse the doors of our apartment, our bedroom, our closets, our offices, our automobiles and subway cars and beyond.
He wants to enter our life and accompany us like he accompanied the disciples on the Road to Emmaus, to join our conversation and make our hearts burn by relating present events to what he has revealed.
He is very much alive and with us, as Pope Francis likes to say, “living at your side every day to enlighten, strengthen and free you” (EG 164).
Fifth, Joy
Joy is meant to be our fundamental response to the reality of Easter.
Luke tells us, “While [the disciples] were still incredulous for joy and were amazed…” (Lk 24:41). Incredulous for joy.
Eucharistic preface: “Overcome with paschal joy…”
Psalm, Lauds and Vespers responsory and the Gospel versicle throughout the Easter Octave: “This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!” (Ps 118:24).
Exultet: “Let this holy building shake with joy!”
As we prayed in the hymn tonight, “O Jesus, be for mind and heart our everlasting paschal joy”
The joy of Mary in the Regina Caeli, that the son whom she merited to bear has risen just as he said.
The Strife is O’er: “Let us swell the joyful strain.”
Easter season is an ode to joy!
Bloy: “Joy is the most infallible sign of God’s presence.”
Sixth, Charity
Jesus’ dialogue with Simon Peter after the Resurrection: “Simon, son of John, do you love me?”
After Peter’s affirmative response, Jesus says, “Feed my sheep. … Feed my lambs. … Tend my sheep.” Peter’s love for Jesus would be shown in his care for the Good Shepherd’s sheep and lambs.
Jesus didn’t say, “Love me as I have loved you.” Rather: “Love one another as I have loved you.”
Love is sacrifice. It’s a willingness to die for the sake of others.
That’s why St. Peter will tell us in the reading tonight at Vespers, “Come to Jesus, a living stone, rejected by men but approved nonetheless, and precious in God’s eyes. You, too, are living stones, built as an edifice of spirit, into a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
The resurrection helps us to see that when we give our life for others, we don’t lose it, but gain it!
Seven, Courage
First disciples were totally changed by the Resurrection.
They would not leave the Upper Room to betray and abandon Jesus anew, but to proclaim him.
Even when those who had crucified Jesus had Peter and John scourged and commanded them never to speak again of Jesus, they continued, knowing that if Jesus were raised, not even death, not even crucifixion, could hold them down. This is what gives courage to the martyrs.
We prayed in Ps 49 earlier, “Why should I fear in evil days, the malice of the foes who surround me?”
Courage is not the lack of fear but of doing what we ought despite our fears. The risen Jesus says, “Be not afraid!”
Eighth, Vibrant Hope in Eternal Life
We prayed in the Psalm 49, “But God will ransom me from death and take myself to himself!”
Each of us can say with Job, “I know that my Redeemer lives!” (Job 19:25).
Each of us can echo St. Paul, “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting? … God gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!” (1 Cor 15:55-57).
We know that an imperishable crown awaits for those who believe, live and die in Christ (1 Cor 9:25).
That’s why Christians “do not grieve like the rest who have no hope” (1 Thes 4:13). We know that God not only so loved the world that he gave his only Son that we might not perish but raised his Son as the first fruits of those who have died (Jn 3:16; 1 Cor 15:20).
We prayed in the intercessions: Jesus, the new Adam and life-giving spirit, transform the dead into your own likeness, that the fullness of your joy may be theirs.”
The resurrection gives us that indomitable hope.
Ninth, Desire to Share the Faith
In the Collect at Vespers tonight, we prayed, “ENABLE us, we pray, almighty God, to proclaim the power of the risen Lord, that we, who have received the pledge of his gift, may come to possess all he gives when it is fully revealed.”
Jesus risen from the dead gives us the commission to share that great news and what it means.
To Mary Magdalene: “Go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
We sang about this in the Motet earlier, “DIC nobis, Maria, quid vidisti in via? Sepulchrum Christi viventis, et gloria. Vidi resurgentis, angelicos testes, sudarium et vestes. Surrexit Christus spes mea, præcedet vos in Galileam.” “Tell us, Mary: say what you saw on the way. The tomb the Living did enclose; I saw Christ’s glory as he rose! The angels there attesting, shroud with grave clothes resting. Christ, my hope, has risen: he goes before you into Galilee, alleluia.”
To the Apostles:
“…You are witnesses of these things.”
At the Ascension, “All power in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the world.”
Pope Francis: “What kind of love would not feel the need to speak of the beloved, to point him out, to make him known?” (EG 264).
Tenth, Life according to the Holy Spirit
Jesus during the Last Supper:
“And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth.”
“The Advocate, the holy Spirit that the Father will send in my name — he will teach you everything and remind you of all that [I] told you.”
“When the Advocate comes, whom I will send you from the Father, the Spirit of truth that proceeds from the Father, he will testify to me. And you also testify, because you have been with me from the beginning.”
“I tell you the truth, it is better for you that I go. For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.”
Jesus before the Ascension:
“I am sending the promise of my Father upon you; but stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”
“He enjoined them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for ‘the promise of the Father about which you have heard me speak; for John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the holy Spirit.”
“You will receive power when the holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Pentecost
Holy Spirit came as a “strong driving wind” and descended upon each of them as “tongues as of fire.”
The Holy Spirit helps us:
Grow in faith (piety, gift of the Holy Spirit)
Convert and live newness of life (Sequence: “Cleanse that which is unclean, water that which is dry, heal that which is wounded. Bend that which is inflexible, fire that which is chilled, correct what goes astray”)
Seek the things that are above (Rom 8:5)
Recognize God’s indwelling (1 Cor 16:9)
Burst with joy (second fruit of the Holy Spirit, Gal 5:22)
Love (first fruit, Gal 5:22)
Grow in Courage (gift of the Holy Spirit, Is 11:2)
Have vibrant hope in eternal life (Rom 8:11: “If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also”)
Share the Faith (Acts 5:32: “We are witnesses of these things, as is the holy Spirit that God has given”)
Conclusion
To celebrate the resurrection on the 10th day of Easter this year, and, I believe, on the 1994th of the day of the resurrection itself, it cannot remain superficial. If a crucified carpenter rose from the dead by his own power on the third day and is still alive, that is one of the most astonishing and life-changing realities of all time. It would validate everything he said, not just about his being betrayed, crucified, and rising, but everything else, too, including about his summons to follow him all the way to the place he has gone to prepare for us. If Christ has not been raised, St. Paul says, our faith would be in vain. But if Christ has been raised, then this is meant to change everything in our life, just like it changed the lives of the first apostles. And Christ has been raised, resurrexit sicut dixit. Alleluia.
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20 min
April 09, 2024Bearing Witness to the Resurrection, Second Tuesday of Easter, April 9, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Notre Dame Church, Manhattan
Tuesday of the Second Week of Easter
April 9, 2024
Acts 4:32-37, Ps 93, Jn 3:7-15

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
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The following points were attempted in the homily:
The Easter cycle of readings at daily Mass are meant to be a mystagogical catechesis of the newly baptized and all the baptized about the meaning and practical consequences of the Resurrection. During the Octave, we focus on Christ’s appearances and the conversion that took place among the apostles, disciples, and the first members of the early Church. Yesterday, if we did not have the translated celebration of the Solemnity of the Annunciation, we would have begun a cycle on how we enter into Jesus’ resurrection through baptism. After that, we will then have an octave of focus on receiving Jesus’ risen Body and Blood in the Holy Eucharist. Then we will focus on relating to the risen Jesus as our Good Shepherd who seeks to lead us through life to eternally verdant pastures. Then we will enter deeply into what he told us during the Last Supper, looked at from within the prism of his resurrection and the fulfillment of all his words, especially with regard to what he says about the Holy Spirit’s work within us and within the Church as we prepare for the culmination of the Easter season on Pentecost. That’s our itinerary between now and May 19.
We begin with the mini-cycle on baptism, which takes place through Jesus’ conversation with Nicodemus. Yesterday, if we had had the Gospel for Monday of the Second Week of Easter, we would have seen Nicodemus come to Jesus timidly at night and meet Jesus as a “teacher who has come from God.” Jesus immediately tried to help prepare Nicodemus for a new life, for a totally new wineskin in order to receive what Jesus was outpouring, by means of speaking about what he wanted to do in us through our sharing in his death and resurrection by baptism. “Amen, amen, I say to you,” Jesus told him, “unless one is born from above, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” He described that to enter the kingdom, one must be “born of water and Spirit” “born from above.” Rather than trying to assimilate what Jesus was indicating through those images and to understand how the analogy of physical birth related to the mystery of spiritual regeneration, Nicodemus responded by trying to treat the mystery of rebirth as an absurdity: “How can a man once grown old be born again?,” he asked. “Surely he cannot reenter his mother’s womb and be born again, can he?” Nicodemus was too smart not to grasp that that was not what Jesus was implying.
So Jesus, as we see today, tried to help him to accept the fact of the need for rebirth from above without the necessity of understanding how. He did so by means of another analogy: “Do not be amazed that I told you, ‘You must be born from above,’” Jesus said. “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.” When we feel a cool breeze outside, we don’t spend time wondering whether it originated in Chicago or Philadelphia or whether it’s on its way to Connecticut or to New Jersey. We just acknowledge the breeze and are grateful for it. Jesus says we should approach the way the Holy Spirit blows with the same acceptance and not get distracted by how the Holy Spirit is bringing about our spiritual rebirth or where he wants to blow us later. We’re called to acknowledge what he’s doing with trust.
But Nicodemus doesn’t buy that either. “How can this happen?,” he retorts. That’s where Jesus seeks to humble him, because it was his pride that was preventing him from being a true disciple in the light. “You are the teacher of Israel,” a Pharisee and a member of the Sanhedrin, “and you do not understand this?” … If I tell you about earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?” Nicodemus wasn’t really even buying what Jesus was saying about the wind; how could he accept what Jesus was saying about the divine Ruah (Holy Spirit)? Jesus indicated the reason why Nicodemus wasn’t understanding: because he wasn’t accepting Jesus as a witness who spoke the truth. “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.” Because he was resisting Jesus as a divinely sent witness to these things, he wasn’t accepting what Jesus said. Jesus would point to a similar truth elsewhere in the Gospel with regard to his teaching by parables. He taught spiritual truths by using images of mustard seeds, yeast, soil, and wedding banquets so some may understand but others may “hear but not understand [and] look but never see” because their heart was “fat” and didn’t want to convert (Mt 13:10-17). Jesus used images as spiritual litmus tests to expose people’s hearts and see whether people would put in the time to search for the truth the images contained, whether they really wanted to convert or just to have a “dialogue” or “learn a thing or two.” That was Nicodemus’ essential problem. He didn’t want to convert. He was fascinated and was drawn, but he didn’t really want a new life to the extent of willing the means. His lack of comprehension began in his heart, not his head.
Jesus finishes the dialogue by describing to Nicodemus and us how we will be born again from above. One wouldn’t have to re-enter his mother’s womb, but rather the Lord’s tomb. “No one has gone up to heaven,” Jesus said, “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.” In order to be born from above, we need through faith to be lifted up with Jesus; that happens, as Jesus alluded, when he is lifted up on the Cross. It’s from Jesus on the Cross that we see our need to convert like the Jews in the desert who had been bitten by saraph serpents since they had been following and worshiping the “serpent” instead of God. It’s from Jesus on the Cross that we learn how to unite all our sufferings, hardships, contradictions and difficulties to God. It’s from Jesus on the Cross, ultimately, that we learn to believe in God’s love and how to live with similar love, because the Cross is not principally a sign of pain and suffering but of the self-giving love that made even that much pain bearable. We’re born anew from his pierced side from which flowed the water and blood that is the source of the Sacramental life of the Church, the water of baptism and the blood of the Eucharist. That points to the reality that the Christian life not just about being “born” again from above through the Cross but “living” from above, living by the Holy Spirit who helps us to be buried with Christ so that we may have a newness of life, as St. Paul tells us at the Easter Vigil (Rom 6). After we’re reborn, the Holy Spirit helps us to grow from above. Since we have been raised with Christ seek the things that are above and set their mind on the things of the Spirit (Col 3, Rom 8).
Once the Holy Spirit leads us to birth and life from above, once he helps us to learn how to love like Christ, everything changes. We see a glimpse of that change in today’s first reading from the Acts of the Apostles. St. Luke tells us that “With great power the Apostles bore witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.” He was doubtless describing miracles they were doing, but perhaps the greatest miracle of all was what the Spirit was doing among all the Christians, which became the means by which everyone was bearing powerful witness to the new life Christ’s resurrection brings. St. Luke says, “The community of believers was of one heart and mind, and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they had everything in common. … There was no needy person among them, for those who owned property or houses would sell them, bring the proceeds of the sale, and put them at the feet of the Apostles, and they were distributed to each according to need.” Once they were willing, like Christ, to die out of love for God and others, selling and distributing their property was easy, as we see in the example of St. Barnabas mentioned. Moreover, because of their rebirth by the Holy Spirit they related to each other differently. They looked at each other as spiritual brothers and sisters, as beloved family members, for whom sacrificing for them in their need was as natural as a parent or sibling’s sacrificing for a beloved family member by blood. We see three characteristics of life from above. First, we see that they were of “one heart and mind,” because the Holy Spirit brings about unity. Second, we see generosity. And third we see the trust that encourages that generosity: they were laying the proceeds at the feet of the apostles, trusting that they would distribute as good stewards for the sake of the whole family like any good father of a big poor family would. The Church is meant to be in every age the type of loving, sacrificial family we see among the early Christians and to the extent that’s not what we find in a particular parish, diocese, religious community or the Church universal, it’s a sign that not everyone has allowed the Holy Spirit to help them grow and live in accordance with the rebirth they’ve received.
Today at Mass, we ask the Holy Spirit for the grace to correspond as fully to the work of the Holy Spirit as the first Christians did. We ask him for the divine gifts we need to give witness, with great power, to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, just like they did. We ask him to lift us up by faith to be with Christ on the Cross, so that we may live more and more from the blood and water flowing from his side, unite our whole lives to him, receive and imitate his self-giving love, sacrifice our things generously and with trust in him working through the Church, and become one mind and one heart with Him and with each other in this world so that we may be united with the communion of saints forever. This is what Christ’s resurrection, and our entrance into it through the death and resurrection of baptism, makes possible!

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1
ACTS 4:32-37
The community of believers was of one heart and mind,
and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own,
but they had everything in common.
With great power the Apostles bore witness
to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,
and great favor was accorded them all.
There was no needy person among them,
for those who owned property or houses would sell them,
bring the proceeds of the sale,
and put them at the feet of the Apostles,
and they were distributed to each according to need.
Thus Joseph, also named by the Apostles Barnabas
(which is translated “son of encouragement”),
a Levite, a Cypriot by birth,
sold a piece of property that he owned,
then brought the money and put it at the feet of the Apostles.
Responsorial Psalm
PS 93:1AB, 1CD-2, 5
R. (1a) The Lord is king; he is robed in majesty.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The LORD is king, in splendor robed;
robed is the LORD and girt about with strength.
R. The Lord is king; he is robed in majesty.
or:
R. Alleluia.
And he has made the world firm,
not to be moved.
Your throne stands firm from of old;
from everlasting you are, O LORD.
R. The Lord is king; he is robed in majesty.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Your decrees are worthy of trust indeed:
holiness befits your house,
O LORD, for length of days.
R. The Lord is king; he is robed in majesty.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Gospel
JN 3:7B-15
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.”
The post Bearing Witness to the Resurrection, Second Tuesday of Easter, April 9, 2024 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
18 min
April 08, 2024The Sun and the Moon, Solemnity of the Annunciation, April 8, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Notre Dame Church, Manhattan
Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord
April 8, 2024
Is 7:10-14.8:10, Ps 40, Heb 10:4-10, Lk 1:26-38

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
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The following text guided the homily:
Today we mark the most important event in human history, the time when, out of love for us and to save us, the Son of God himself became one of us in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Everything Jesus would later do flows from this event, which should never cease to fill us with wonder. And this incarnation is not just a one-time event in the distant past, but a continual reality. God-with-us is still with us, most especially in the enduring incarnation of the Holy Eucharist.
The attention of most people today, however, is not on the coming in time of the One through whom all things were made, but on the total solar eclipse that will happen later this afternoon in upstate New York. But today’s special focus on the Sun and the Moon can be a helpful way to look at the mystery of the incarnation. Christ is the Sun, the Light of the World, the dawn from on high (Lk 1:78) foretold to come upon us. Mary, whom the Book of Revelation depicts clothed with the sun with the moon under her feet (Rev 12:1), has often been compared to the moon, reflecting the sun’s light. My friend, Canadian priest Fr. Raymond de Souza, summarizing centuries of reflection, wrote in a recent column, “The moon is an apt Christian symbol for the Blessed Mother, as the moon has no light of its own, but only reflects the light of the sun; Mary reflects the light of her Son upon the face of the earth. But the moon is not purely ancillary much less merely decorative; its gravitational pull keeps the earth in balance, as it were. An intermediary between the sun and earth, the moon watches over the earth with its face turned always to the sun. The moon is not a star, like the sun, a fearsome source of light and warmth. It remains the more approachable light. It is not possible to look directly into the sun – face to face, as it were (Exodus 33:20) – much less to stand upon it. The moon can be contemplated easily, a friendly companion, a gentle reminder that the sun, though not seen, is working still and will return.”
And so we look at this mystery between sun and moon, between Son and Mother, between the “The Word was made flesh and dwelled among us” and Mary’s “the handmaid of the Lord,” whose whole life can be summarized by her “Let it be done to me according to your word,” since, like the light of the moon to the sun, her whole life was developed in accordance with that Word who took on her flesh.
It’s great that we have a chance this year, because of the translation of the Solemnity from March 25 to after the Easter Octave, to celebrate this mystery during the Easter Season, when the prayer of the Regina Caeli helps us each day to focus on the source of Mary’s joy, that the One whom she merited to bear from the Annunciation to the Nativity has risen just as he said. There is a connection between the joy of Mary at the Annunciation and the joy at the Resurrection, , as the Word of God kept his word and rose on the third day, as God-with-us is now with us even more powerfully risen from the dead.
It’s likewise great that we have a chance to celebrate this Solemnity in the afterburn of the Feast of Divine Mercy, because it’s easier to grasp that when the eternal Son of God took on our humanity, he came as Mercy. As St. Faustina Kowalska wrote in her Diary, “The inconceivable miracle of Your mercy takes place, O Lord: The Word becomes flesh; God dwells among us, the Word of God, Mercy Incarnate.” The Sign that God would give Ahaz and the world was not just “God with us!,” literally Emmanuel, but Mercy-with-us, Em-man-u-hesed. When in the words of today’s Psalm, Jesus would eventually pray, “Sacrifice and oblation you wished not, but ears open to obedience you gave him. Holocausts or sin-offerings you sought not; then I said, ‘Behold I come,’” the obedience to which he was pointing, which was worth far more than the sacrifice of animals, was one of mercy. Jesus himself would say in the Gospel, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice!” (Mt 9:13). That’s the purpose for which he took on a body in the fulfillment of Ps 40 attested to by the Letter to the Hebrews: “When Christ came into the world, he said: ‘Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me.’” He took on our nature to offer it as a sacrifice of merciful love.
Beyond that, he took on our nature so that he could literally incorporate us into his sacrifice of mercy so that, as his Mystical Body, we might continue his work of mercy, his work of salvation, until the end of time. He wants us to offer ourselves, together with his Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity, to the Father in expiation for our and others’ sins. The Blessed Virgin Mary shows us the type of cooperation, the type of participation, he desires in the Gospel, when she gives a wholehearted fiat to God’s will of mercy. To call her “full of grace” is to call her “full of God,” and since God is hesed, loving mercy, she was full of mercy preveniently and preventively from the first moment of her conception. She sang of God’s mercy in her Magnificat, reminding us that God has mercy on those who fear him in every generation and he remembers his promise of mercy to Abraham and our fathers in faith forever. Even though the modality by which we will be filled with God’s mercy is different than what happened in her, God’s will is for us to become full of his forgiving love and to cooperate with his plan, singing and sharing his mercy, as Mary did.
We do so each day most stupendously at the altar, where the mystery of the Incarnation endures as Mercy Incarnate in the stupendous gift of the Holy Eucharist. The same Holy Spirit who overshadowed Mary in Nazareth and throughout her life comes now to overshadow this altar and all of us in a double epiclesis. He comes to work just as great a miracle as Jesus’ virginal conception, totally changing bread and wine into the Blessed Fruit of Mary’s womb, into Jesus’ own Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Then the Holy Spirit wants to overshadow all of us and through our communion with the Word-made-flesh transform us into one body, one spirit in Christ. Let us ask through Mary’s intercession that our Amen to this mystery may be as full as her Fiat and that we, like the moon, may reflect and never occlude her Son’s life-giving light.

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1 IS 7:10-14; 8:10
The LORD spoke to Ahaz, saying:
Ask for a sign from the LORD, your God;
let it be deep as the nether world, or high as the sky!
But Ahaz answered,
“I will not ask! I will not tempt the LORD!”
Then Isaiah said:
Listen, O house of David!
Is it not enough for you to weary people,
must you also weary my God?
Therefore the Lord himself will give you this sign:
the virgin shall be with child, and bear a son,
and shall name him Emmanuel,
which means “God is with us!”
Responsorial Psalm PS 40:7-8A, 8B-9, 10, 11
R. (8a and 9a) Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.
Sacrifice or oblation you wished not,
but ears open to obedience you gave me.
Holocausts or sin-offerings you sought not;
then said I, “Behold I come.”
R. Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.
“In the written scroll it is prescribed for me,
To do your will, O my God, is my delight,
and your law is within my heart!”
R. Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.
I announced your justice in the vast assembly;
I did not restrain my lips, as you, O LORD, know.
R. Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.
Your justice I kept not hid within my heart;
your faithfulness and your salvation I have spoken of;
I have made no secret of your kindness and your truth
in the vast assembly.
R. Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.
Reading 2 HEB 10:4-10
Brothers and sisters:
It is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats
take away sins.
For this reason, when Christ came into the world, he said:
“Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but a body you prepared for me;
in holocausts and sin offerings you took no delight.
Then I said, ‘As is written of me in the scroll,
behold, I come to do your will, O God.’”
First he says, “Sacrifices and offerings,
holocausts and sin offerings,
you neither desired nor delighted in.”
These are offered according to the law.
Then he says, “Behold, I come to do your will.”
He takes away the first to establish the second.
By this “will,” we have been consecrated
through the offering of the Body of Jesus Christ once for all.
Verse Before The Gospel JN 1:14AB
The Word of God became flesh and made his dwelling among us;
and we saw his glory.
Gospel LK 1:26-38
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.
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14 min
April 07, 2024Have Mercy Victor King, Ever Reigning!, Divine Mercy Sunday (B), April 7, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Convent of the Missionaries of Charity, Bronx, NY
Divine Mercy Sunday, Year B
April 7, 2024
Acts 4:32-35, Ps 118, 1 John 5:1-6, Jn 20:19-31

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
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The following text guided the homily:
Pondering and preaching on Jesus’ last words from the Cross on Good Friday, I’ve always been moved by the first two things Jesus, through literally excruciating pain, said while dying at the Place of the Skull. These two things not only came first in time; but they seem to be first in priority, summarizing and synthesizing all Jesus was doing on Calvary and throughout his earthly life. The first was to turn to God the Father and make a cry not of pain but of mercy: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” He wanted sinners always and everywhere to know he was thinking about them and begging the father to exculpate them, including those who that day were crucifying and mocking him, because they didn’t know the eternal consequences of what they were choosing. His second word was to a sinner dying alongside of him, who heard Jesus’ prayer, defended him against the derision of the thief on Jesus’ left and then decided to entrust himself to that mercy. When the Good Thief asked Jesus, who would die even before he would, to remember him when he came into his kingdom, it was a plea for mercy after death, somehow believing that Jesus would be able to remember him after he would breathe his last. And Jesus, out of merciful love, would do far more than remember him. He replied to this criminal, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.” Out of mercy, he would raise the Good Thief with him to life and to eternal joy. So first Jesus said a word for sinners in general and then another for one sinner in particular, so that each of us might learn from the Good Thief how to trust as he trusted and ask for what he asked.
Jesus’ evident priorities on Calvary were recapitulated when the Risen Jesus walked through the locked doors of the Upper Room where the apostles were barricaded out of fear of the Jesus. As we see in the Gospels, on Easter Sunday night, Jesus spoke and acted first in favor of sinners in general; a week later, he spoke and acted in favor of one sinner in particular, so that we might all learn from that sinner how to eventually to trust in Jesus and proclaim what he proclaim. Today it is fitting for us, therefore, to turn to Jesus to whom we prayed in the Sequence and say, “Have mercy, Victor King, ever reigning!,” as we joyfully “offer thankful praises” because “a Lamb the sheep redeems, Christ, who only is sinless, reconciles sinners to the Father.” We beg to share in his victory of merciful love, conscious, as St. John says in today’s second reading, that “the victory that conquers the world is our faith” and “Who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?” Indeed, eternal triumph comes from trusting in God and in his mercy. It flows from echoing the house of Israel, the house of Aaron and all God-fearers in joyfully exclaiming, “His mercy endures forever.”
We see that mercy first expressed for all sinners in general on the night Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus passed through the closed doors of the Upper Room where three days before he had given them his Body and Blood in anticipation of Calvary and said to them, twice, “Shalom!,” “Peace be with you!” Jesus had come down from heaven to earth and had sacrificed his life to give us peace, but it was a special kind of peace, one the world can’t give or take away. “Not as the world gives peace do I give it,” Jesus had said during the Last Supper. The peace Jesus leaves and gives us is not the mere absence of war or conflict, but harmony with God through the forgiveness of sins. Without this type of peace, no other form can endure, because it is sin that destroys interior peace, the peace of the home, the peace of friendship, the peace of communities, the peace of nations. And so Jesus, wasting absolutely no time to set the next stage of his peace plan in motion, on the night of his resurrection, divinely empowered the apostles as his peacemakers to bring that gift, and the joy to which it leads, to the ends of the earth.
Jesus began by saying to the apostles, “Just as the Father sent me, so I send you!” We know that the Father had sent Jesus as the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world and Jesus was sending his apostles to continue that saving mission of mercy. Since we know that only God can forgive sins committed against Him (see Mk 2:7), however, Jesus needed to impart to the apostles that divine power. So he breathed on them as he said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” He gave them God the Holy Spirit so that they might forgive sins in God’s name, just as we hear every time the priest pronounces those beautiful words in the Sacrament of Penance, “God, the Father of Mercies, through the death and resurrection of his Son, has … poured out the Holy Spirit for the forgiveness of sins.” And then Jesus did something that refers to the essential structure of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. He said, “Those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; those whose sins you retain, they are retained.” Since Jesus didn’t give the apostles the capacity to read hearts and souls, the only way they — and their successors and their priestly collaborators — would be able to know which sins to forgive or to retain would be if people told them. And that’s what happens in the Sacrament of Confession.
It’s fitting that Jesus established this Sacrament of his Mercy on Easter Sunday Evening because he wanted to link the joy of his resurrection to the joy of forgiveness. He had pointed to the connection between the two when he gave us the unforgettable Parable of the Prodigal Son. When the lost son returns to the Father to give his rehearsed speech of repentance, the Father interrupts him and erupts with happiness. He covers his son with the finest robe, adorns him with a ring and sandals, and kills the fattened calf. When the jealous older son asked why his dad was pulling out all the stops at the return of his brother, the Father replied, “We must celebrate with joy, because your brother was dead and has come to life again!” This Parable, which is about what happens in the Sacrament of Penance when we come back and say to our Father that we have sinned and he restores us to the full dignity as his beloved sons and daughters, points to the truth that every reconciliation is a resurrection! Pope Francis called confession simply “the sacrament of resurrection.” In every good confession, a son or daughter who was dead comes to life again, healed of sins both mortal and venial, and made fully alive once more in the risen Christ Jesus!
That’s why it’s so fitting today, too, as we conclude the Easter Octave, that we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday. Back in 2000, St. John Paul II established this feast for the Sunday after Easter so that all of us could thank God for the gift of his merciful lov that led him to stop at nothing to save us from our sins and from the eternal death to which our sins lead. John Paul announced the establishment of this Feast during the canonization of St. Faustina Kowalska, the humble Polish sister to whom in a series of profound mystical experiences during the 1930s, Jesus had revealed the depths of his merciful love for the human race and his desire for all people to recognize our need for his mercy, trust in it, come to receive it, and share it with others. One of the requests St. Faustina described in her Diary that Jesus made of her was about this Feast. She wrote, “The Lord said, ‘I want… the first Sunday after Easter … to be the Feast of Mercy. I desire that the Feast of Mercy be a refuge and a shelter for all souls, and especially for poor sinners. On that day, the very depths of my tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon those souls who approach the fount of my mercy. The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion shall obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment. On that day are open all the divine floodgates through which graces flow.”
The entire message of Divine Mercy, as well as the practices Jesus asked her to convey to the world, are all meant to help us to trust in Jesus’ mercy and celebrate and share in the Victor King’s triumph. In addition to celebrating Divine Mercy Sunday, the practices are: to prepare for today by a novena in which we lift up to God different groups of souls in need of mercy; to pray at the hour of mercy, 3 pm each afternoon, the time in which Jesus died on Calvary to forgive us our sins, for mercy upon us and the whole world; to pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, in which we offer the Eternal Father the Eucharistic Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of his Son, in atonement for sins; and to venerate him in the image of Divine Mercy, in which we see him, risen from the dead, blessing us with his mercy and pointing to his wounded side, from which, as St. John told us in his Gospel and reminded us in today’s second reading, blood and water flowed out to heal us by the waters of baptism and the precious blood poured out for the forgiveness of sins. Each of these five practices is meant to help us grow in love of the Lord’s mercy, to seek it, receive it, live in it and share it. The joy that we have at Easter — and in life — is directly proportional to our entering into this mystery, because it’s through this devotion we receive the fruits of his victory and become more like the Victor through sharing his love and mercy.
We know, however, that when Christ came for the first time to the Upper Room after the Resurrection to make the apostles capable of bringing his mercy and peace to the whole world, one of them was famously absent. When the other apostles joyfully told Thomas, “We have seen the Lord!,” he replied that unless he saw and probed the nail marks in Jesus’ hands and side, he wouldn’t believe. Jesus then extended his mercy to Thomas in particular. Evincing Jesus’ desire anew to link mercy to the day of his resurrection, Jesus appeared to him and the other apostles the following Sunday, wished them “Shalom” once more — a sign that he was giving him forgiveness and reestablishing the tranquility of order with God — and then invited Thomas to do what he insisted he had to do to believe: to put his finger and hands into his wounds and so that he would not continue unbelieving but believe. It was a great act of special mercy to someone so intimate to the Lord’s plans for the world’s salvation. We all have to admit that it’s a pity, it’s unjust, that Thomas, who left everything to follow the Lord Jesus, who gave his entire life for the Lord and would die in witness to Christ, is called “Doubting Thomas” almost as much as he is called “Saint Thomas.” He is the most famous doubter in history! But his doubts were not unique among the first disciples and apostles. With the exception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, none of the early disciples believed after the resurrection. The women on Easter morning went to anoint a corpse. The disciples on the road to Emmaus were talking to what they thought was an anonymous Wayfarer about a Jesus whom they believed was still dead. When Mary Magdalene and these Emmaus disciples went to inform the other apostles that they had seen Jesus, the apostles didn’t believe them. That’s why Jesus, when he appeared to them, as St. Mark reminded us in yesterday’s Gospel, “rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart because they had not believed those who saw him after he had been raised” (Mk 16:14). Faith, as we know, is the belief in something on the basis of a belief in someone giving witness. They had a double-distrust that led to their lack of faith in Jesus’ resurrection: first, they distrusted the witness of Mary and the disciples on the Road to Emmaus, thinking that they were just too gullible; more importantly they distrusted in Jesus’ words that he would rise on the third day. Thomas’ distrust was not qualitatively different at all, just quantitatively. Thomas was unwilling to accept the testimony of the other apostles, too, as if they, the women and the disciples from Emmaus were all together in a collective hallucination. But it wasn’t a general incredulity. Thomas had obviously been struggling about the criteria he’d need to accept that Jesus had risen from the dead, almost certainly because he had been pondering Jesus’ words about his resurrection on the third day as well as the witness of the others who had claimed to have seen him risen. Thomas had concluded that the criteria would be Jesus’ wounds, which were the sign not just of his death but of his love, of the connection between Jesus’ risen body and his earthly body. He had somehow intuited that after the resurrection, Jesus would be recognized not by his face but by his wounds! Jesus’ physical appearance might be different, his voice might different, almost everything else might be different — as we would see in some of his appearances that the disciples wouldn’t recognize either his face or his voice — but Thomas believed that the wounds would have to be there. That’s why he said what he did: “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” And when Jesus appeared to him and, rather than castigating him, lovingly invited him not just to see his wounds but put his finger into his hands and his hand into his side, St. Thomas dropped to his knees and burst out with the greatest theological confession of Jesus’ divinity recorded in Sacred Scripture: “My Lord and my God.” Normally when we focus on this expression, which many of us have been piously trained to say during the elevation of Jesus’ Body and Blood at Mass, we focus naturally on the titles of divinity. Six years ago on Divine Mercy Sunday, however, when I had the privilege, together with other Missionaries of Mercy throughout the world, to concelebrate Mass with Pope Francis, the Holy Father looked at this phrase from another angle and focused on the possessive adjective “my.” Jesus was not just the Lord and God, the Holy Father said, but Thomas’ Lord and God. The exclamation pointed to the personal relationship between the two. The Holy Father commented, “Jesus wants us, too, to relate to him as ‘my Lord and my God,’ to belong to us as we belong to him, … That’s what St. Thomas can teach us.” Jesus wants us to entrust ourselves to him like Thomas did, to entrust ourselves personally to his divine mercy.
Jesus finishes Doubting-Turned-Confessing Thomas’ restoration and resurrection by stating, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” Earlier in the Gospel, Jesus had said to his disciples, “Blessed are your eyes that see what you see.” St. John the Evangelist in his first letter would announce what he had “seen with his eyes.” There is indeed beatitude in seeing God, because in order truly to see Jesus we need to have faith, since Jesus Christ, having taken on our humanity, looks similar to other human beings. We need faith to be able to see behind the human face, to peer beyond the human body, and in the Eucharist to see beyond the appearances of seeming bread and wine. But Jesus indicates a greater beatitude to one who does not see but still believes. The ultimate test of faith is when we don’t see with our physical eyes or probe with our hands or index fingers, but make the same act of faith in Jesus. This is what led another Thomas, Saint Thomas Aquinas, the 750th anniversary of whose death the Church marked exactly a month ago, to write in his famous hymn Adoro Te Devote, “Plagas, sicut Thomas, non intueor, Deum tamen meum te confiteor. Fac me tibi semper magis credere, in te spem habere, te diligere,” literally, “Wounds, like Thomas, I do not see, nevertheless I confess you my God to be. Make be always more and more believe in you, have hope in you and love you.” That’s what Saint Thomas the Apostle is interceding for us to do, to confess Jesus as God, to grow in faith, hope and love in him, and to trust in his divine mercy forever.
As we, in this Mass, offer the Eternal Father in heaven Jesus’ body, blood, soul and divinity, we ask God Father, who is Rich in Mercy, to help us to entrust ourselves fully to our Victor King, to the Lamb who redeems the sheep, to the sinless Messiah who reconciles sinners to the Father. We ask for the grace to give thanks to the Lord and to sing, “His Mercy endures forever.” We implore through the Divine Mercy devotion to become, like Christ, “merciful as our Father in heaven is merciful” (Lk 6:36). And as we prepare in just a few minutes to look upon the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world,” we ask the Holy Spirit to help us cry out with all our mind, heart, soul and strength, “My Lord and my God” and “Jesus, I trust in you!”

The readings for today’s Mass were:
Reading 1
Acts 4:32-35
The community of believers was of one heart and mind,
and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own,
but they had everything in common.
With great power the apostles bore witness
to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,
and great favor was accorded them all.
There was no needy person among them,
for those who owned property or houses would sell them,
bring the proceeds of the sale,
and put them at the feet of the apostles,
and they were distributed to each according to need.
Responsorial Psalm
Ps 118:2-4, 13-15, 22-24
R. (1) Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, his love is everlasting.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Let the house of Israel say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
Let the house of Aaron say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
Let those who fear the LORD say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
R. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, his love is everlasting.
or:
R. Alleluia.
I was hard pressed and was falling,
but the LORD helped me.
My strength and my courage is the LORD,
and he has been my savior.
The joyful shout of victory
in the tents of the just:
R. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, his love is everlasting.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The stone which the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
By the LORD has this been done;
it is wonderful in our eyes.
This is the day the LORD has made;
let us be glad and rejoice in it.
R. Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, his love is everlasting.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Reading 2
1 Jn 5:1-6
Beloved:
Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is begotten by God,
and everyone who loves the Father
loves also the one begotten by him.
In this way we know that we love the children of God
when we love God and obey his commandments.
For the love of God is this,
that we keep his commandments.
And his commandments are not burdensome,
for whoever is begotten by God conquers the world.
And the victory that conquers the world is our faith.
Who indeed is the victor over the world
but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
This is the one who came through water and blood, Jesus Christ,
not by water alone, but by water and blood.
The Spirit is the one that testifies,
and the Spirit is truth.
Sequence — optional
Victimae paschali laudes
Christians, to the Paschal Victim
Offer your thankful praises!
A Lamb the sheep redeems;
Christ, who only is sinless,
Reconciles sinners to the Father.
Death and life have contended in that combat stupendous:
The Prince of life, who died, reigns immortal.
Speak, Mary, declaring
What you saw, wayfaring.
“The tomb of Christ, who is living,
The glory of Jesus’ resurrection;
bright angels attesting,
The shroud and napkin resting.
Yes, Christ my hope is arisen;
to Galilee he goes before you.”
Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining.
Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning!
Amen. Alleluia.
Alleluia
Jn 20:29
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
You believe in me, Thomas, because you have seen me, says the Lord;
Blessed are those who have not seen me, but still believe!
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
Jn 20:19-31
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.
The post Have Mercy Victor King, Ever Reigning!, Divine Mercy Sunday (B), April 7, 2024 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
23 min
April 06, 2024Divine Mercy Sunday, Conversations with Consequences Podcast, April 6, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Conversations with Consequences Podcast
Homily for the Divine Mercy Sunday, Vigil
April 6, 2024

To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below:
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The following text guided the homily:
This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a joy for me to be with you at the end of the Easter Octave as we enter into the consequential conversation the Risen Lord Jesus wants to have with each of us in the Gospel, as we enter into the scene of two dramatic dialogues, one that took place on the night Jesus triumphantly rose from the dead and the second a week later. Both have so much to teach us about growing in faith this Easter.
On Easter night, Jesus walked through the closed doors of the Upper Room where the apostles were huddling together out of fear and he first said to them, “Shalom!,” “Peace be with you!” Jesus had come down from heaven to earth and given his life to give us peace, but it was a special kind of peace, one the world can’t give or take away. “Not as the world gives peace do I give it,” Jesus had said during the Last Supper. The peace Jesus leaves and gives us is not the mere absence of war or conflict, but harmony with God through the forgiveness of sins. Without this type of peace, no other form can endure, because it is sin that destroys interior peace, the peace of the home, the peace of friendship, the peace of communities, the peace of nations, as we see in the mounting sins wreaking havoc in the Middle East, the Holy Land, Ukraine and various other conflicts. And so Jesus, wasting absolutely no time to set the next stage of his peace plan in motion, on the night of his resurrection, divinely empowered the apostles as his peacemakers to bring the gift of his mercy, and the joy to which it leads, to the ends of the earth.
It’s important for us to pay close attention to the various steps Jesus took so that we can understand better the divine foundation of the Sacrament of his Mercy and better explain it to those who claim that they can confess their sins to God alone without the Sacrament. Jesus began by saying to the apostles, “Just as the Father sent me, so I send you!” We know that the Father had sent Jesus as the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world and Jesus was sending his apostles to continue that saving mission of mercy. Since we know that only God can forgive sins against Himself (see Mk 2:7), however, Jesus needed to impart to the apostles that divine power. So he breathed on them as he said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” He gave them God the Holy Spirit so that they might forgive sins in God’s name, just as we hear every time the priest pronounces those beautiful words in the Sacrament of Penance, “God, the Father of Mercies, through the death and resurrection of his Son, has … poured out the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of sins.” And then Jesus did something that refers to the essential structure of the Sacrament of Reconciliation. He said, “Those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; those whose sins you retain, they are retained.” Since Jesus didn’t give the apostles the capacity to read hearts and souls, the only way they — and their successors and their priestly collaborators — would be able to know which sins to forgive or to retain would be if people told them. And that’s what happens in the Sacrament of Confession.
It’s so fitting that Jesus established this Sacrament of his Mercy on Easter Sunday Evening because he wanted to link the joy of his resurrection to the joy of forgiveness. He had pointed to the connection between the two when he gave us the unforgettable Parable of the Prodigal Son. When the lost son returns to the Father to give his rehearsed speech of repentance, the Father erupts with happiness, because, he says, his son was dead and had been brought to life again. This Parable, which is about what happens in the Sacrament of Penance, points to the truth that every reconciliation is a resurrection! In every good confession, a son or daughter who was dead comes to life again, healed of sins both mortal and venial, and made fully alive once more in Christ Jesus!
That’s why it’s so fitting, as we conclude the Easter Octave, that we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday. Back in 2000, St. John Paul II established this feast for the Sunday after Easter so that all of us could thank God for the gift of his merciful that led him to stop at nothing in order to save us from our sins and from the eternal death to which our sins lead. John Paul announced the establishment of this Feast during the canonization of St. Faustina Kowalska, the humble Polish sister to whom in a series of profound mystical experiences during the 1930s, Jesus had revealed the depths of his merciful love for the human race and his desire for all people to recognize our need for his mercy, trust in it, come to receive it, and share it with others. This Sunday is an opportunity for us to thank the Lord for the gift of his mercy, to come to receive it in the way he himself established and to be transformed by it such that we seek to share it. It’s also a time to get to know better, and do, the practices Jesus told us through St. Faustina, would help us grow to trust in his mercy more: to stop each day at 3 pm, when Christ breathed his last on Calvary, to implore his mercy and bring him our prayers; to venerate him in the image of Divine Mercy, in which we see him, risen from the dead, blessing us and asking us to trust in him; to pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, offering God the Father Jesus in the Eucharist and begging him, on account of his Son’s passion, for mercy on the whole world; to make a novena, from Good Friday through this Sunday, in which we bring to Jesus various groups of people in need of his mercy; and finally to celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday itself, when we mark the end of the Easter Octave and ponder in the Gospel Jesus’ establishment of the Sacrament of his Mercy.
When Christ had that dialogue with the apostles, however, one was famously absent. When the others told Thomas, “We have seen the Lord!,” he replied that unless he saw and probed the nail marks in Jesus’ hands and side, he wouldn’t believe. Jesus appeared to Thomas and the other apostles the following Sunday, wished them “Shalom” once more and then invited Thomas to put his finger and hands into his wounds and not to continue unbelieving but to believe. It’s a pity that Thomas, who left everything to follow the Lord Jesus, who gave his entire life for the Lord and died in witness to faith, is called “Doubting Thomas” almost as much as he is called “Saint Thomas.” He is the most famous doubter in history! But his doubts were not unique among the first disciples and apostles. With the exception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, none of the early disciples believed after the resurrection. The women on Easter morning went to anoint a corpse. The disciples on the road to Emmaus were talking to what they thought was an anonymous Wayfarer about a Jesus whom they believed was dead. When Mary Magdalene and these Emmaus disciples went to inform the other apostles that they had seen Jesus, the apostles didn’t believe them. That’s why Jesus, when he appeared to them as St. Mark reminds us through St. Peter, “rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart because they had not believed those who saw him after he had been raised” (Mk 16:14). Faith, as we know, is the belief in something on the basis of a belief in someone giving witness. They had a double-distrust that led to their lack of faith in Jesus’ resurrection: first, they distrusted the witness of Mary and the disciples on the Road to Emmaus, thinking that they were just too gullible; more importantly they distrusted in Jesus’ words that he would rise on the third day. Thomas’ distrust was not qualitatively different at all, just quantitatively. Thomas was unwilling to accept the testimony of the other apostles, too, as if they, the women and the disciples from Emmaus were all together in a collective hallucination. But it wasn’t a general incredulity. He had obviously been struggling about the criteria to accept that Jesus had risen from the dead, almost certainly because he had been pondering Jesus’ words about his resurrection on the third day. Thomas had concluded that the criteria would be Jesus’ wounds, which were the sign not just of his death but of his love, of the connection between Jesus’ risen body and his earthly body. He had somehow intuited that after the resurrection, Jesus would be recognized not by his face but by his wounds! Jesus’ physical appearance might be different, his voice might different, almost everything else might be different — as we would see in some of his appearances that the disciples wouldn’t recognize either his face or his voice — but Thomas grasped that the wounds would have to be there. That’s why he said what he did: “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” And when Jesus appeared to him and, rather than castigating him, lovingly invited him not just to see his wounds but put his finger into his hands and his hand into his side, St. Thomas dropped to his knees and burst out with the greatest theological confession of Jesus’ divinity recorded in Sacred Scripture: “My Lord and my God.” As he was pondering the criteria of the wounds, he recognized that if Jesus had risen with the wounds that he would absolutely have demonstrated his divinity. Normally when we focus on the expression, “My Lord and my God” that many of us have been piously trained to say during the elevation of Jesus’ Body and Blood at Mass, we focus on the titles of divinity. Six years ago, however, when I had the privilege to concelebrate Mass with Pope Francis on Divine Mercy Sunday in the Vatican, the Holy Father looked at this phrase from another angle and focused on the adjective “my,” which he noted was a possessive adjective. Jesus was not just the Lord and God, but Thomas’ Lord and God. It pointed to the personal relationship between the two. The Holy Father said, “Jesus wants us, too, to relate to him as ‘my Lord and my God,’ to belong to us as we belong to him, … That’s what St. Thomas can teach us.”
Jesus finishes the consequential conversation with Doubting-Turned-Confessing Thomas by stating, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” Earlier in the Gospel, Jesus had said to his disciples, “Blessed are your eyes that see what you see.” St. John the Evangelist in his first letter would announce what he had “seen with his eyes.” There is indeed beatitude in seeing God, because in order truly to see him we need to have faith, since Jesus Christ, having taken on our humanity, looks similar to other human beings. We need faith to be able to see behind the human face, to peer beyond the human body. But Jesus indicates a greater beatitude to one who does not see but still believer. The ultimate test of faith is when we don’t see with our physical eyes or probe with our hands or index fingers, but make the same act of faith in Jesus. This is what led another Thomas, Saint Thomas Aquinas, the 750th anniversary of whose death the Church marked a month ago, to write in his famous hymn Adoro Te Devote, “Plagas, sicut Thomas, non intueor, Deum tamen meum te confiteor. Fac me tibi semper magis credere, in te spem habere, te diligere,” literally, “Wounds, like Thomas, I do not see, nevertheless I confess you my God to be. Make be always more and more believe in you, have hope in you and love you.” That’s what Saint Thomas is interceding for us to do, to confess Jesus as God, to grow in faith, hope and love in him, and to trust in his divine mercy forever.

The Gospel passage on which the homily was based was:
Gospel
Jn 20:19-31
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.
The post Divine Mercy Sunday, Conversations with Consequences Podcast, April 6, 2024 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
10 min
April 05, 2024The Way Jesus Feeds Us for the Mission, Easter Friday, April 5, 2024
Fr. Roger J. Landry
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Notre Dame Church, Manhattan
Friday of Easter Week
April 5, 2024
Acts 4:1-12, Ps 118, Jn 21:1-14

To listen to an audio recording of today’s homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/4.5.24_Homily_1.mp3

The following points were attempted in the homily:
Jesus’ post-resurrection appearances all had a purpose: to strengthen the disciples and apostles in the reality of the Resurrection so as to help them to become living signs of the Resurrection — of the mercy, joy and life associated with it — to all the nations. But that transformation was a radical one and took time. As we’ve been seeing all week, with Mary Magdalene, the disciples in Emmaus, and the apostles in the Upper Room, the Risen Jesus meets with initial incredulity, then shows him that his resurrection is real, teaches them how it was the fulfillment of all he and the prophets had foretold, sees them respond with faith, and gives them a mission to bring news of his resurrection and all that he had told them to others. Today, Jesus doesn’t meet with initial incredulity but rather a lack of recognition. Then he leads Peter and the other six disciples on a journey of growth in faith in order to strengthen them for the mission of witnessing to him before others. Part of this journey was to reconstitute them in the meaning of their calling after the lack of confidence coming from their initial response to his Passion, death and Resurrection.
Jesus had told Mary Magdalene to ask his apostles to meet him in Galilee, as we just sang in the Easter Sequence. Finally Peter and the others were in Galilee and Peter decided to spend the night catching upcoming meals, a reminder of the practical necessities to which they always had to attend. The other apostles decided to join him. But just like happened the first time he had met Jesus three years earlier, Peter toiled all night but caught nothing. In the morning, amid what was probably normal haze and fog, a supposedly unfamiliar voice came from the shore telling them to cast their net on the other side of the boat. Jesus’ voice, just like his other sensible appearances, had mysteriously changed after the resurrection. The fishermen obliged and they caught so many fish that their nets were at the breaking point. That’s when St. John recognized by faith that it had to be the Lord who had called out to them. St. Peter, so excited it was the Lord, put his clothes back on and hopped into the water and swam 100 yards to be with the Lord as soon as possible — just like he exuberantly had hopped overboard during a storm to meet Jesus who had been walking toward them on the water.
When the apostles reached the shore, Jesus had breakfast going with fish and bread on a fire and asked for them to bring some of the fish they had caught. Jesus was teaching them that after his resurrection, he was with them in their work, with them as he provided for their meals, and with them in basically all good aspects of their life. But he was particularly showing them that he would be with them in their continuance of his work as fishers of men. St. John tells us that they caught 153 fish. In addition to being the actual number of fish they caught — a sign that they took every one as precious, because 153 is not an estimate but a sign they actually counted each one — 153 had symbolic significance: it was both the number of known nations in the world at that time and what the ancients believed was the number of species of fish. For that reason, the early saints of the Church interpreted it as Jesus’ showing that he was sending them out as “catholic” as “universal” fishers of men to all 153 nations, to catch all “153” temperaments of men, women, boys and girl (fish).
But he also had a deeper mission in mind for Peter. Unfortunately the Church separates this reading from the second half of the scene by six weeks. We’ll hear it on the third to last day of Easter, on Friday of the Seventh Week, May 17th this year, after the academic year will have been completed. Jesus, right after feeding everyone, asks Peter three times whether he loves him, to help Peter repent of the three denials on Holy Thursday. Jesus first asks Peter if he loves him with a total self-sacrificial love (agape), more than “all the rest,” more than everything else. Peter replies, “Lord you know that I love you,” but the word he uses for love is philia, signifying love as a friend. Peter, who had said that he would die for the Lord but denied him three times before the cock crowed, evidently didn’t feel comfortable saying that he loved him in that self-sacrificial way lest he betray him again. Jesus asked him a second time whether Peter loved him with agape. And Peter replied that he loved him with philia. So Jesus asked him a third time, but this time changed the verb: “Simon, son of John, do you love me as a friend?” That’s when Peter was upset and said, “Lord, you know that I love you as a friend.” But Jesus wouldn’t leave him there. He then told Peter, “Amen, amen, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to dress yourself and go where you wanted; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go,” signifying, St. John tells us, what type of death he would undergo when his arms would be stretched in crucifixion. Even though Peter was too ashamed after his falls to say it, Jesus prophesied that he actually had the agape that would lead him courageously to give his life for Jesus.
We see that type of love and that type of fishing for others in the first reading. After curing a crippled man and calling the crowds to conversion as a result, Peter and John were arrested by the same people who had conspired to have Jesus murdered just a few weeks before, the chief priests, scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees and Sanhedrin members. They were among the most learned people in Israel, and Peter a simple fisherman with a strong Galilean accent. But regardless, he spoke out forcefully by the gift of courage of the Holy Spirit and called everyone to conversion: “Leaders of the people and elders,” he said, “If we are being examined today about a good deed done to a cripple, namely, by what means he was saved, then all of you and all the people of Israel should know that it was in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazorean whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead; in his name this man stands before you healed. … There is no salvation through anyone else, nor is there any other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved.” The name of Moses won’t save. The name of the prophets won’t save. Even the invocation of the Temple won’t save. Peter was saying that only by the name of Jesus, whom the Sanhedrin and others had had crucified but God raised from the dead and was therefore living, can people be saved. Those were revolutionary words, even “blasphemous” in the understanding of his audience. But he said them any way, regardless of whether it would lead to his own crucifixion. The reason is because after Jesus’ resurrection, they recognized there was nothing to fear. If people can brutally execute someone like they did Jesus and God could still raise him from the dead on the third day, then there was no reason for any of them to be intimidated! That just as Jesus was the stone rejected by the builders who became the cornerstone, so when we suffer rejection for the Gospel, the witness we make will nevertheless form us to become a living stone built on Christ the cornerstone. That’s the power of the resurrection, that refuse becomes a foundation, that sins even become happy!
Today Jesus meets us for a late breakfast, as we break our Eucharistic fast. He comes to feed us not with baked fish and bread but with his own Body and Blood. The early Christians used to symbolize him as a fish, because the word in Greek for fish, ichthus, they used as an acrostic, Iesous Christos Theou Uios, Soter, “Jesus Christ God’s Son Savior.” Jesus is the food that strengthens us to live in him and the “bait” with which we go out to fish for others. He asks us to bring to Mass with us the “fish” we have caught and are praying to catch, the brothers and sisters we have sought to introduce to the Lord. Even if we’ve toiled “all night” and caught nothing or very little, even if we feel somewhat rejected, even if we feel that we have let him down by our betrayals in the past, Jesus wants to firm us up to send us out anew to cast out net to the other side, to the right side, to the side he indicates. And he wants to send us out to proclaim his Gospel with the same courage as we see in St. Peter. May we, nourished by the most incredible Breakfast of all, be strengthened to do just that today!

The readings for this Mass were:
Reading 1
ACTS 4:1-12
After the crippled man had been cured,
while Peter and John were still speaking to the people,
the priests, the captain of the temple guard,
and the Sadducees confronted them,
disturbed that they were teaching the people
and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection of the dead.
They laid hands on Peter and John
and put them in custody until the next day,
since it was already evening.
But many of those who heard the word came to believe
and the number of men grew to about five thousand.
On the next day, their leaders, elders, and scribes
were assembled in Jerusalem, with Annas the high priest,
Caiaphas, John, Alexander,
and all who were of the high-priestly class.
They brought them into their presence and questioned them,
“By what power or by what name have you done this?”
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, answered them,
“Leaders of the people and elders:
If we are being examined today
about a good deed done to a cripple,
namely, by what means he was saved,
then all of you and all the people of Israel should know
that it was in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazorean
whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead;
in his name this man stands before you healed.
He is the stone rejected by you, the builders,
which has become the cornerstone.
There is no salvation through anyone else,
nor is there any other name under heaven
given to the human race by which we are to be saved.”
Responsorial Psalm
PS 118:1-2 AND 4, 22-24, 25-27A
R. (22) The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,
for his mercy endures forever.
Let the house of Israel say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
Let those who fear the LORD say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
R. The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The stone which the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
By the LORD has this been done;
it is wonderful in our eyes.
This is the day the LORD has made;
let us be glad and rejoice in it.
R. The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone.
or:
R. Alleluia.
O LORD, grant salvation!
O LORD, grant prosperity!
Blessed is he who comes in the name of the LORD;
we bless you from the house of the LORD.
The LORD is God, and he has given us light.
R. The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Gospel
JN 21:1-14
Jesus revealed himself again to his disciples at the Sea of Tiberias.
He revealed himself in this way.
Together were Simon Peter, Thomas called Didymus,
Nathanael from Cana in Galilee,
Zebedee’s sons, and two others of his disciples.
Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.”
They said to him, “We also will come with you.”
So they went out and got into the boat,
but that night they caught nothing.
When it was already dawn, Jesus was standing on the shore;
but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.
Jesus said to them, “Children, have you caught anything to eat?”
They answered him, “No.”
So he said to them, “Cast the net over the right side of the boat
and you will find something.”
So they cast it, and were not able to pull it in
because of the number of fish.
So the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord.”
When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord,
he tucked in his garment, for he was lightly clad,
and jumped into the sea.
The other disciples came in the boat,
for they were not far from shore, only about a hundred yards,
dragging the net with the fish.
When they climbed out on shore,
they saw a charcoal fire with fish on it and bread.
Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish you just caught.”
So Simon Peter went over and dragged the net ashore
full of one hundred fifty-three large fish.
Even though there were so many, the net was not torn.
Jesus said to them, “Come, have breakfast.”
And none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?”
because they realized it was the Lord.
Jesus came over and took the bread and gave it to them,
and in like manner the fish.
This was now the third time Jesus was revealed to his disciples
after being raised from the dead.
The post The Way Jesus Feeds Us for the Mission, Easter Friday, April 5, 2024 appeared first on Catholic Preaching.
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Father Roger J. Landry is a priest of the Diocese of Fall River, Massachusetts, who works for the Holy See’s Permanent Observer Mission to the United Nations in New York.