Fr. Roger J. Landry

Conversations with Consequences Podcast

Homily for the Sixth Sunday of Easter (A), Vigil

May 16, 2020

 

To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below: 

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/5.16.20_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 this Sunday.

* He will talk to us specifically about four promises, four blessings, four different ways he wants to relate to us. He said these words during the Last Supper, not only to prepare the apostles for his betrayal, crucifixion and death that would happen within hours, but even more for the post-Resurrection reality of the Church, which is why the Church always ponders these passages during the Easter Season.

* The first promise is “I will not leave you orphans.” Jesus will never abandon us. Sometimes we may feel abandoned, just like he felt on the Cross, but just as God the Father was with him so He will be with us. What a great consolation this is, something we pray that all of those in ICUs with Covid-19, or who otherwise feel alone, may experience. Notice the expression Jesus uses, however. He doesn’t say, “I will not leave you alone,” but rather, “I will not leave you orphans.” He will not allow us to be abandoned by Father and mother. He will speak to us later about how God the Father will remain with us and the following afternoon he will give us his Mother to be our own. In this month of May, dedicated to our Lady, how important it is for us to recognize that we’re not orphans, but to live ever more in communion with God the Father and with Mary our spiritual Mother, both of which are made possible by the work of Jesus, the Son of the Father and the son of Mary.

* The second promise is, “I will ask the Father and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth,” whom he says “you know because he remains in you and will be with you.” We’re now beginning our remote preparation for Pentecost and Jesus will be speaking to us three weeks in a row about the work of the Holy Spirit in us. Today I will just mention one of the chief works of the Holy Spirit is to convince us we are beloved sons and daughters of God the Father. The Holy Spirit is poured into our hearts so that we might cry out, “Abba, Father!,” so that we might recognize the intimacy of a relationship with God as “dad.” The Holy Spirit will remain in us helping us to relate to God the Father, so that we may never feel we’re orphans.

* The third promise is, “In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you.” Jesus tells us that his resurrection will be our life — “I live and you will live,” he says — and that when he goes to be with the Father, to dwell in communion with the Father, he is bringing us with him, as members of his Mystical Body. This is a mind-blowing reality. Jesus will develop it more deeply on Holy Thursday in a passage we’ll hear next Sunday. But his mission is to bring us into the communion of persons who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, to help us come alive through his resurrection and ascension, and to assist us to live in communion with God who entered our world to redeem us and make that communion possible.

* And the fourth promise is, “Whoever loves me will be loved by my Father and I will love him and reveal myself to him.” We have been made by God, who is love, in his image and likeness,