AD SENSE

Easter 5th Week: Apr 29-May 4th

 Easter 5th Week: April 29-May 4:

April 29 Monday (Saint Catherine of Siena, Virgin and Doctor of the Church):

The context: Today’s Gospel passage is taken from Jesus’ Last Supper discourse. It was commonly held by the Jews that when the Messiah came, he would be revealed to the whole world as King and Savior. Hence, Judas Thaddeus asks why Jesus is revealing himself only to his disciples. Jesus does not answer that question directly. Instead, He continues preparing his disciples for his imminent departure from them by assuring them that he is not leaving them alone. Instead, Jesus will live in them along with God his Father and the Holy Spirit. The presence of the Father can be experienced through the experience of love. It means that the criterion of the Father is always the same: love. “If anyone loves Me, he will observe My word, and My Father will love him and We shall come to him and make a home in him.”

Jesus promises the abiding presence of the Holy Trinity in his disciples who express their responsive love for him by keeping his commandments, especially his commandment of love, because only this type of loving will open them and make them receptive to the Divine Indwelling of the Trinitarian God. Jesus is referring to the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the soul renewed by grace. God repeatedly revealed Himself in the Old Testament and promised to dwell amid His people (cf. Ex 29:45; Ez 37:26-27; etc.). But here Jesus speaks of the presence of God in each person. We are each a part of the Divine chain of love. God loves man. He sent His Son to prove it. After Jesus’ Resurrection and Ascension, God the Father continues to live in us with His Son and the Holy Spirit. This abiding God gives us the Father’s protection and providence, the Son’s redemption and forgiveness of sins, and the Holy Spirit’s sanctification and guidance.

Life messages: 1) Let us live in constant awareness of the abiding presence of the Trinitarian God within us and behave well in His presence. 2) During moments of doubts and temptations, let us seek the active guidance and strengthening of our indwelling God. Fr. Tony(https://frtonyshomilies.com/) 

April 30 Tuesday: [Saint Pius V, Pope]:

The context: In his Last Supper discourse, Jesus gives two gifts to his disciples, namely, the gift of peace and the gift of the cross leading to glory. Today’s passage refers to the gift of peace. Wishing a person peace (Shalom), was, and still is, the usual form of greeting among the Jews and the Arabs. Shalom is a right relationship with God and with others. Arabs wish each other saying “Islam Alikum” in Arabic, meaning peace be with you. And the response is “alikum Islam” (and also with you). Moses instructed the Aaron and his descendants, the priests, to bless the Israelites with God’s peace: “The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace” (Nm 6:22-26). “Peace be with you!” is the greeting that Jesus used, and which the Apostles continued to use. Hence, the Church uses it several times in the liturgy. Peace is one of the great Messianic gifts. St. Paul tells us that it is one of the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Jesus repeats his promise saying, “My peace I give to you, my peace I leave with you.” Pope St. Paul VI (canonized October 14, 2018), said: “True peace must be founded upon justice, upon a sense of the untouchable dignity of man, upon the recognition of an indelible and happy equality between men, upon the basic principle of human brotherhood.”

Life message: 1) We are invited to live in the peace wished by Jesus. This requires that we be reconciled every day with ourselves, with our neighbors, and with our God. Reconciliation with God demands that we obey His commandments, repent every day of our sins, and ask God’s forgivenessReconciliation with others demands that we forgive others for their offenses against us, and that we ask for their forgiveness for our offenses against them in words, attitudes, and deeds. Reconciliation with ourselves comes from our grace-given humble recognition of our weaknesses and failures and our grateful acceptance and use of the Holy Spirit’s loving gifts to us of deepened love and trust that God loves us in spite of these weaknesses, forgives us our sins when we repent, helps us to do better, and uses our weaknesses to bring us closer to Him, in order to demonstrate His own Love and Power working through us for His glory.

(Fr. Tony) (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)

May 1 Wednesday: [Saint Joseph the Worker]:

Introduction: Today we celebrate the liturgical feast of St. Joseph the Worker to honor St. Joseph, to highlight the dignity and importance of labor and to honor the workers who are dignified by their labor and who bring Christ to their workplace. This is the second feast of St. Joseph; the first was the feast of St. Joseph, husband of Mary and the patron of the universal Church which we celebrated on the 19th of March.

History: In response to the May Day Celebrations of workers in the Communist countries where workers were considered mere “cogs in the machine,” Pope Pius XII instituted the feast of St. Joseph the Worker to Christianize the concept of labor, to acknowledge the dignity of labor and to give all workers a role model and heavenly patron.

Theology of work: The Bible presents God as a worker (Gen 1:1: “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.”) Who is engaged in the work of creation and providing for His creatures. God the Father assigns His Son Jesus the work of human redemption and gives the Holy Spirit the work of our sanctification. That is why Jesus said: “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work (John 5: 17). Further, it was God’s command that man should work: “You have to earn your bread by the sweat of your brow” (Genesis 3: 19). Jesus showed us the necessity and nobility of work by working in Joseph’s carpentry shop until he started his public life of a preaching and healing ministry. The workers are important and their work noble, not only because they obey God’s command to work, but also because they sustain and promote social welfare and the progress of societies.

Joseph as an exemplary worker: Joseph worked to support his family by helping his neighbors, using his skill in carpentry. He was a just worker, honest in his trade of buying wood, selling his finished products and charging for his services. He was a working parent laboring hard to support his family. He was a praying worker who prayed in all his needs and got answers from God in dreams on important occasions and who kept God’s presence in his workshop. He was an obedient worker who obeyed the Mosaic Law of Sabbath rest and spent the day of rest to take Jesus to the local synagogue and to teach Jesus God’s Law given through Moses.

Life messages: 1) Let us appreciate the dignity of all forms of work and all types of laborers as they glorify God and promote the welfare of society. 2) Let us be sincere and committed to our work as St. Joseph was, working in the constant awareness of the presence of God. 3) Let us love our work and convert it into prayer by offering it for God’s glory. (Fr. Tony)

Context: During his Last Supper discourse, Jesus uses one of God’s Old Testament images, the vine, and the branches, to help his disciples understand the closeness of their relationship with him and the necessity of their maintaining it. Jesus assures them, using the parable of the vine and branches, that the Life-giving Spirit, Whom Jesus will send them, will be present and active among his disciples and their successors. This Gospel passage also emphasizes the need for Christians to abide in Christ as an essential condition for producing fruits of kindness, mercy, justice, charity, and holiness. Paul further clarifies this idea in Colossians 1:18 using another metaphor, that Christ is the Head and Christians are the different members of His Mystical Body. Pruning is an essential part of growing fruit-producing branches. In the vineyards in Palestine, dead branches were pruned to save the vine. Fruitless, leafy branches draining life sap from the main trunk were also pruned away leaving only fruit-bearing branches. Jesus tells his apostles that they have already been pruned by the words he has spoken to them. Eventually, they will be pruned of all attachment to the things of this world so that they may be ready to attach themselves to the things of Heaven.

Life messages 1) We need pruning in our Christian life. Pruning, which cuts out of our lives everything that is contrary to the spirit of Jesus and renews our commitment to Christian ideals in our lives every day, is the first type of self-imposed pruning expected of us. A second kind of pruning is accomplished by practicing self-control over our evil inclinations, sinful addictions, and aberrations. A third type of pruning is done by our permitting Jesus to prune, purify, and strengthen us as God allows us to face pain, suffering, contradictions, and difficulties with His grace and the courage of our Christian convictions. 2) Let us abide in Christ and let Christ abide in us: Personal and liturgical prayers, frequenting of the Sacraments of the Holy Eucharist and Reconciliation, daily, meditative reading of the Bible, and selfless, loving acts of kindness, mercy, and forgiveness, all made possible by God’s grace, enable us to abide in Jesus, the true vine, as fruit-bearing branches. 

May 2 Thursday: (Saint Athanasius, Bishop and Doctor of the Church):

The context: During the Last Supper discourse, Jesus teaches his disciples that love is the hallmark and the criterion of Christians. Jesus reminds his disciples that he has chosen them as his friends with a triple mission. First, they are to love others as he has loved them. Second, they are to bear the fruits of the Holy Spirit in their lives. Third, they are to ask God the Father for whatever they need in Jesus’ name.

The criteria of Christian love: First, Jesus modifies the Old Testament command from “love your neighbor as you love yourself” (Lv 19:18) to “love others as I have loved you.” This means that our love for others must be unconditional, forgiving, and sacrificial. Jesus invites each Christian to be in the inner circle of his friends by obeying his commandments including the new commandment of love. Such friends abide in Jesus as Jesus abides in them, and their prayers in Jesus’ name will be answered promptly by God the Father. We express our love for Christ by obeying his new commandment of love. Jesus further explains that the real source of Christian joy is the certainty that God loves us. We, too, must be ready to express our love for others by our readiness to die for them as Jesus died for us.

Life message: 1) Let us remember that true Christian love is costly and painful because it involves sacrifice on our part when we start loving unlovable, ungrateful, and hostile people with Christ’s unconditional, forgiving, sacrificial love. But our Christian call is to love others as Jesus has loved us, and as Jesus loves them. (Fr. Tony) (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)

May 3 Friday: (Saints Philip and James, Apostles): 

John describes Philip as a fisherman from Bethsaida in Galilee, the same town as Andrew and Peter. It is possible that Philip was originally a follower or disciple of John the Baptist because John depicts Jesus calling Philip out of a crowd attending John’s baptisms. Immediately after his call as an apostle by Jesus, Philip introduced Jesus to his friend Nathaniel/Bartholomew as the “one about whom Moses wrote” (Jn 1:45). On one occasion, when Jesus saw the great multitude following him and wanted to give them food, he asked Philip where they should buy bread for the people to eat. Philip expressed his surprise declaring “two hundred days’ wages worth of food would not be enough for each of them to have a little bit” (Jn 6:7). It was in answer to Philip’s question, “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us” (Jn 14:8) that Jesus answered, “Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9). Since Philip had a Greek name, some Greek Gentile proselytes once approached him with a request to introduce them to Jesus. Eusebius records that Polycrates, 2nd century Bishop of Ephesus, wrote that Philip was crucified in Phrygia and later buried in Hierapolis, in Turkey. Tradition has it that Philip’s death was around AD 54. We celebrate his feast day on May 3rd.

James, son of Alphaeus, called James the Lesser, wrote the epistle that bears his name and became the bishop of Jerusalem. He is the brother of Jude, and they are cousins of Jesus because their mother Mary (who was married to Alphaeus or Clophas/Cleopas), is the sister or cousin of Jesus’ mother. (This James is different from James the Greater, the son of Zebedee
who was married to another sister or cousin of Mary; hence, James and his brother John were  also cousins of
Jesus.)

James the Lesser is also known by the title of James the Just on account of his eminent sanctity. James and his brother Jude were called to the apostleship in the second year of Christ’s preaching, soon after the Pasch, probably in the year 31. James, son of Alphaeus, only appears four times in the New Testament, each time in a list of the twelve apostles as number 9. In Christian art he is depicted holding a fuller’s club because he was believed to have been martyred, beaten to death with a fuller’s club, at Ostrakine in Lower Egypt, where he was preaching the Gospel.

Life message: Let us ask the intercession of Sts. Philip and James so that we, too, may bear witness of Jesus by our lives to those around us. (Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)

May 4 Saturday: Jn 15:18-21: 

The context: In today’s Gospel passage, taken from the Last Supper discourse, Jesus warns his apostles of what they can expect from a world which ignores God and His teaching. They will be hated and persecuted as Jesus was. But there can be no compromise between Christ’s disciples and the followers of the powers of darkness. The term “world” in today’s Gospel passage means people who are hostile towards God and opposed to His will. They represent an evil society which “calls evil good and good evil” (Is 5:20). Such a society will hate Christ and his teachings because Christian teaching exposes the evil of society and its false and dangerous doctrines. Since the Church Jesus established stands for truth, morality, and justice, it does not support the modern “dictatorship of relativism.” The modern world hates and ridicules everything Christian through its liberal, agnostic and atheistic media.

Life message: Let us ask the Holy Spirit for the courage of our Christian convictions to believe and practice what Jesus taught and what Jesus continues to teach through the Church.

(Fr. Tony) (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)