The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today invite us to contemplate the deep intimacy of our relationship to Christ.
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| Relationship surprises |
The Reading from the Book of Acts is the continuation of Peter’s Speech at Pentecost.
* [2:38] Repent and be baptized: repentance is a positive concept, a change of mind and heart toward God reflected in the actual goodness of one’s life. It is in accord with the apostolic teaching derived from Jesus (Acts 2:42) and ultimately recorded in the four gospels. Luke presents baptism in Acts as the expected response to the apostolic preaching about Jesus and associates it with the conferring of the Spirit (Acts 1:5; 10:44–48; 11:16).1
Psalm 33 declares the greatness of human beings consists in God’s choosing them as a special people and their faithful response.
* [Psalm 33] A hymn in which the just are invited (Ps 33:1–3) to praise God, who by a mere word (Ps 33:4–5) created the three-tiered universe of the heavens, the cosmic waters, and the earth (Ps 33:6–9). Human words, in contrast, effect nothing (Ps 33:10–11). The greatness of human beings consists in God’s choosing them as a special people and their faithful response (Ps 33:12–22).2
The Gospel from John describes the Appearance to Mary of Magdala.
* [20:11–18] This appearance to Mary is found only in John, but cf. Mt 28:8–10 and Mk 16:9–11.
* [20:16] Rabbouni: Hebrew or Aramaic for “my master.”3
Don Schwager quotes “The Easter Alleluia,” by Saint Augustine of Hippo, 354-430 A.D.
"Because there are these two periods of time - the one that now is, beset with the trials and troubles of this life, and the other yet to come, a life of everlasting serenity and joy - we are given two liturgical seasons, one before Easter and the other after. The season before Easter signifies the troubles in which we live here and now, while the time after Easter which we are celebrating at present signifies the happiness that will be ours in the future. What we commemorate before Easter is what we experience in this life; what we celebrate after Easter points to something we do not yet possess. This is why we keep the first season with fasting and prayer; but now the fast is over and we devote the present season to praise. Such is the meaning of the Alleluia we sing." (excerpt from commentary on Psalm 148, 1-2) 4
The Word Among Us Meditation on John 20:11-18 comments the Easter liturgy is so beautiful that memories from last weekend may still be lingering in our minds. During such a celebration, it’s easy to say, with Mary Magdalene, “I have seen the Lord” (John 20:18).
Yet our faith tells us that the risen Christ is always with us, not just on Easter and not just when we’re in church before the tabernacle. He died and rose so that he could live within us and be close to us at all times. But just as Mary had difficulty recognizing Jesus in the garden, we often fail to notice that the Lord is with us in concrete, real-life ways.5
Friar Jude Winkler explains the use of the name Lord or Adonai by Peter in the kerygma in Acts. The symbolism in the Gospel connects to the Song of Songs and Jesus as the Good Shepherd. Friar Jude comments that Jesus, not restricted in timespace, is a sign of our state of and inability to pin down Christ who always surprises.
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, nudges us to become intimate with our own experiences, learn from them, and allow ourselves to descend to the depth of things, even our mistakes, before we try too quickly to transcend it all in the name of some idealized purity or superiority. God hides in the depths—even our sins—and is not seen as long as we stay on the surface of anything.
The archetypal encounter between doubting Thomas and the Risen Jesus (John 20:19-28) is not really a story about believing in the fact of the resurrection but a story about believing that someone could be wounded and also resurrected at the same time! That is quite a different message and still desperately needed. “Put your finger here,” Jesus says to Thomas (John 20:27). Like Christ, we are all indeed wounded and resurrected at the same time. In fact, this might be the primary pastoral message of the Gospel.
I’ve often said that great love and great suffering (both healing and woundedness) are the universal, always available paths of transformation because they are the only things strong enough to take away the ego’s protections and pretensions. Great love and great suffering bring us back to God, and I believe this is how Jesus himself walked humanity back to God. It is not just a path of resurrection rewards but a path that now includes death and woundedness. Or as I teach our Living School students, the sequence goes order —> disorder —> reorder!6
Our intimate interaction with Christ is an experience that moves our whole being as it cuts to the heart.
References
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(n.d.). Psalms, chapter 33 - usccb. Retrieved April 23, 2019, from http://www.usccb.org/bible/psalms/33
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(n.d.). Daily Scripture Readings and Meditations. Retrieved April 23, 2019, from https://dailyscripture.servantsoftheword.org/
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(2019, April 23). Tuesday within the Octave of Easter - Mass Readings and Catholic .... Retrieved April 23, 2019, from https://wau.org/meditations/2019/04/23/
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(n.d.). Daily Meditations Archive: April 2019 - Daily Meditations Archives .... Retrieved April 23, 2019, from https://cac.org/category/daily-meditations/2019/04/
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