Rev. James A. Wallace, C.Ss.R.

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

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

Wanted . . . Good Shepherds

Peter is a wonderful example of someone growing into the role of a good shepherd. His calling was evident from the beginning, when Jesus summoned him and his brother Andrew while they were casting their nets into the sea: “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of [people]” (Mark 1:17).

We know Peter as the first to confess Jesus as Messiah, but also as someone who did not understand what this would mean both for Jesus and his followers: the cross. We know Peter was not afraid to ask questions along the lines of “What are we going to get out of being disciples?” or even say the wrong thing (“You shall never wash my feet!”). And, perhaps most importantly, we know Peter folded when the chips were down, denying he ever knew Jesus.

This same Peter boldly preaches Jesus as raised by God for the salvation of all who believe. He preaches not only outside the upper room on Pentecost, but in the synagogue soon after, then twice before the Sanhedrin (the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem), and finally in the house of the Roman centurion Cornelius.

What explains this transformation from denying follower to charismatic leader? Paul tells us in one of his letters (1 Corinthians 15:5) that the risen Lord appeared to Kephas (the Aramaic name for Peter). And Luke records the descent of the Spirit upon those in the upper room (Acts 2:4). All of this reminds us that God’s power at work in us is the key to having and being a good shepherd.

Consider/Discuss

From the beginning, Jesus the Good Shepherd has called others to shepherd in his name. Have you known any good shepherds in your life?
Do you pray for those called to shepherd God’s people?

Responding to the Word

Loving Jesus, you have called many people to shepherd your faithful. We pray for them today, most especially our Holy Father, and all of our bishops, the bishop of this diocese, and all men and women in positions of leadership. Grant them wisdom and give them the gifts needed to guide your people.

Jan 30 2025

Recognizing the Lord

Recognizing Jesus as the risen Lord seems to have been something of a problem. Mary Magdalene didn’t; she thought he was the gardener. The disciples on the road to Emmaus didn’t; they took him for a stranger who had heard nothing about the recent events in Jerusalem. And even in today’s Gospel, the apostles thought he was a ghost.

It is instructive to note how Jesus reveals himself in each case. To Mary Magdalene, he simply says her name, “Mary.” The two disciples on the road get an instruction on how all these recent events in Jerusalem fulfill the scriptures. And today the apostles are shown his hands and feet, watch him eat, and again, have their minds opened to the meaning of the scriptures. In all cases, Jesus’ words play an important role.

How we come to know the risen Lord runs along the same lines. We come to know him through the word of God. He calls us to be disciples, to be friends, to be children of the Father through the scriptures. We come to the table of the Lord each week, where our minds and hearts can be opened.

We recognize him in the breaking of the bread, both the bread of the Eucharist and the bread of God’s word. Some preparation on our part can be helpful. By spending some time with the coming Sunday’s readings during the week, we are more likely to have God’s word penetrate our hearts when we gather to listen together to the scriptures and the preaching.

Consider/Discuss

Have you had any experience of knowing the presence of Christ and hearing his voice in the readings and preaching at Sunday Eucharist?
Do you appreciate the Sunday Eucharist as a time when the community continues to experience the presence of the risen Lord?

Responding to the Word

Risen Lord Jesus, by our baptism we began to live with your life and received the gifts of faith, hope, and love. We know you have come to draw us into the life and love of the Trinity. Increase our ability to hear your voice and know you through the scriptures.

Jan 30 2025

A Time to Fathom

Can one “fathom” a mystery? “Fathom” derives from an Old English word meaning “outstretched arms;” eventually it referred to the length from fingertip to fingertip of arms opened wide. As a verb, it means to probe or penetrate in order to understand. Granting the impossibility of ever coming to fathom the Resurrection fully, I like the image of trying to reach out and put my arms around this great mystery—or, better yet, to have the risen Christ put his outstretched arms around me, drawing me into it more fully.

Which brings us to Thomas. He is the original person who tried to fathom the risen Christ, insisting that if his friends in the upper room wanted him to believe what he could only think of as nonsense, he needed to touch the wounds of the risen Lord. Jesus didn’t seem to have much of a problem letting him.

We never learn whether Thomas did touch Jesus or not, but every second Sunday of Easter we are told this story about Thomas and the risen Lord. It encourages us to fathom the mystery that is our faith, to learn to penetrate it by confessing Jesus as Lord and God, then allow this belief to flow out into our daily activities, reaching out to embrace others.

Don’t you think when Thomas left the upper room that day he knew that the Resurrection was not something to keep to himself? That his whole being was filled with the warmth and light absorbed from being in the presence of the risen Lord? Is it possible that this can happen to us?

Consider/Discuss

Have you begun to fathom the mystery of the Resurrection?
What does it mean to say, “My Lord and my God” and make that your daily prayer over the coming weeks?

Responding to the Word

Father of the only-begotten Son, send your Spirit upon us that we might know more deeply the truth of your Son’s resurrection and allow it to penetrate our lives. Deepen our faith, hope, and love so the world will know us even now as children of the Resurrection.