Easter

Jan 30 2025

Scripture Study for

The ascension of Jesus brought closure to his earthly activity, while at the same time launching the ministry of the apostles. Thus the Ascension is a turning point in the history of the church. The actual account of the Ascension is brief. Jesus is lifted up and concealed by a cloud. Attention shifts to the men (angels?) who now appear. They rebuke the disciples and assure them that Jesus will return on the clouds just as he left. The church is now in a liminal state. Jesus has left, but the Spirit has not yet come.

The reading from Ephesians is a prayer for spiritual enlightenment. God’s power raised Christ from the dead and seated Christ in the place of honor in heaven; God’s power made all things subject to Christ and exalted Christ as head of the church. It is this same power that is now called upon. The church is characterized as a body. As members of this exalted body, believers share in the wisdom and insight to grasp these mysteries and to live lives informed by them.

Marks’ account of Jesus’ ascension ties together many themes found elsewhere in the gospel. It begins with a Resurrection experience in which Jesus commissions the apostles to preach the gospel to all. Jesus is then taken from their sight. The reading clearly states that just as he was raised from the dead by the power of God, so he is taken up today. This reflects the early church’s concern to show that it is the power of God that is active in Jesus, not some kind of miraculous force. As exalted Lord, Jesus takes his rightful place of privilege next to God. The concluding verse succinctly summarizes the entire apostolic age: the apostles went into the entire world and preached the gospel; the Lord was with them, confirming their ministry through wondrous signs.

Jan 30 2025

The Falling Spirit

If we were going to give a name to this Sunday in the Easter season, we might call it “Love Sunday.” No matter which year of readings we hear—A, B, or C—the theme today is love: God’s love for Jesus, Jesus’ love for God, and God and Jesus’ love for us and their desire that we love them in return.

This dynamic picture of divine love is captured powerfully in the first reading when the Holy Spirit “falls upon” Cornelius and his family while Peter is still preaching. The most frequent images for the Holy Spirit in stained glass and paintings are those of a white dove gently hovering, or a flickering flame of fire suspended in mid-air. But here there is a sense of something weightier “falling upon” the listeners, the weight of divine love, intensified by divine impatience. St. Alphonsus spoke of a God “crazy in love” with us. Might we find evidence of such a divine passion at play here?

It is one of the clearest expressions of God’s desire for us, of God’s great love that yearns for intimate communion. Jesus puts it into words for us: “As the Father loves me, so I love you.” Take time and repeat these words of Jesus throughout the week. Then, hear his next words: “Remain in my love.” How? “If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love.” And what are those commandments? Just one really: “This I command you: love one another.”

Consider/Discuss

How does this command to love relate to the feast of Easter?
Jesus says that he told us this command to love “so that my joy may be in you and your joy might be complete.” Have you known this joy?

Responding to the Word

God of love, you call us to know you as love and to live in your love so that your joy may fill us. Draw us into the mystery of the love that binds you, Father, Son, and Spirit, in such intimate communion. Send your Spirit upon us and break down any resistance to knowing and doing your will.

Jan 30 2025

Scripture Study for

Cornelius, the newly converted Roman centurion, recognizes Peter as a messenger of God. The real power of the narrative is seen not in the disposition of Peter but in the action of the Holy Spirit. The event is a kind of Gentile Pentecost. While Peter’s companions are surprised that the Spirit is given to the uncircumcised he intervenes on their behalf, insisting that God shows no partiality. Those who received the Spirit at the first Pentecost and those who have received it at this second Pentecost are now joined by a special bond, the shared outpouring of the Spirit. The ritual of baptism is a sign of the church’s acceptance of God’s action.

The teaching about love is the heart of the message of the second reading. Several dimensions of this reality are examined: Love is of God; love begets others of God; it is revealed in the salvation realized through the sacrifice of the Son of God. The most startling statement about love is: God is love! This divine love is the fundamental reality of our faith. The love described here is neither exemplary piety nor altruistic concern for others. Actually, there is nothing merely human about it. It is divine in its origin and only those who have been begotten of God can have a share in it.

The passage from John’s Gospel is one of the best-known discourses on love. The source of this love is divine love itself: “As the Father loves me, so I love you;” “love one another as I love you” (15:9, 12). Jesus promises the disciples that if they abide in his love and obey his commandments, they will abide in his joy as well. Although the passage does not describe the character of this joy, we can presume that it flows from union with God. The love that is described here is active love, reaching out to others—God to Jesus, Jesus to his disciples, the disciples to one another.

Jan 30 2025

The Vitality of the Vine

Jesus the vine gives flower to some very different branches. Last week we considered Peter, so this week let us turn to Paul. No one would have suspected that Saul of Tarsus, that “breather of murderous threats against the disciples of the Lord,” would ever become known as “the Apostle to the Gentiles” and one who would refer to himself as both a loving father and mother to the communities he himself tended. As Peter proved to be a good shepherd of the flock, so Paul was a dedicated worker in the vineyard, tending with such loving care the branches growing from the one vine that is Jesus.

What we see in Paul and hear in his letters is the intimate love of Christ for his church. Take up any of his letters and you will become engaged with the spirit of Paul as an instrument that communicates the spirit of Christ. Paul’s letters reveal the many voices he used to preach Christ crucified: the evangelizer and herald, the teacher and witness, the admonishing father and loving midwife, all calling God’s children to be fully alive in Christ.

Jesus speaks of himself as a vine with many branches, befitting not only the infinite variety of individuals he called in his own day, but also the many peoples and nations that have come to believe in him. We pray for all who give themselves over to the work of the vineyard, to all who help others to remain in Christ and bear fruit.

Consider/Discuss

What does the image of Christ as the vine with many branches say to you about today’s Church?
How do you understand Jesus’ words about the branches needing to be pruned so that they might bear more fruit?

Responding to the Word

Risen Jesus, you are the vine and we are the branches. Strengthen our resolve as a community to remain in you, so that we might bear more fruit. May your words remain in me, your child; may I, like Paul, recognize the life these words carry within them, and hold them in my heart.

Jan 30 2025

Scripture Study for

Saul, the formidable persecutor, has now become a disciple of the risen Lord. Initially he meets resistance, not to his message but to his claim of conversion. It takes another member of the community to witness to the saving grace of God that transformed Saul into a believer. If God can raise Jesus from the dead, surely God can recreate Saul. Saul’s rebirth as a disciple is a sign of the grace that has been unleashed by the Resurrection. It was the risen Jesus that Saul encountered and it is that same risen Jesus that he now proclaims. The power of God is unfathomable.

The author of the Letter of John insists that it is not enough to proclaim love for God; it must be demonstrated through concrete action. There seems to have been a sense of guilt somewhere in the community. The writer assures them that God’s love far exceeds any guilt that they may experience. They are called to believe this, thus rooting their faith in confidence. This confidence is also manifested in the way they turn to God in prayer. Although only one commandment is placed before them here, its focus is twofold. They are to believe in the name of God’s Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another.

The metaphor of vine and branches characterizes the intimate nature of the relationship between Jesus and his followers. Jesus lives in his branches, and his branches live in his life. The vine is not totally dependent on any one branch or group of branches. Therefore, it can endure pruning without withering and dying. However, there is no vine if there are no branches at all. The basis of this union is acceptance of and fidelity to the words of Jesus, not ethnic or national identity. The vitality expressed by this image is unmistakable. The vine and the branches are alive with the life of God.