May 22 Monday: Context: Jesus is speaking to his apostles after the Last Supper.
Scripture lessons: In this Last Supper
discourse, Jesus explains his Divine origin and his relationship to God his
Father in clear terms without using any metaphors. The apostles acknowledge
that they understand the Divinity of Jesus. But Jesus prophesies that they will
soon desert him and seek their own safety, while he will be arrested, brought
to trial and crucified. Our Faith is tested every day when we live in a world
filled with agnostics, atheists, and pleasure-seekers who see true believers as
superstitious people and hate them. That is why Jesus gave his apostles and all
his future disciples the assurance of the anointing of the Holy Spirit Who
would strengthen them and guide them. The Second Vatican Council teaches
in connection with this passage: “The Lord Jesus who said `Be of good
cheer, I have overcome the world’ (John 16:33), did not by these words
promise complete victory to his Church in this world.
This sacred Council rejoices that the earth which has been sown with the seed
of the Gospel is now bringing forth fruit in many places under the guidance of
the Spirit of the Lord, who is filling the world” (Presbyterorum Ordinis,
22).
Life messages: 1) Our Faith is firmly
rooted in the Divinity of Jesus demonstrated by his Messianic miracles, most of
which were foretold by the prophets. The Resurrection of Jesus is the Miracle
of miracles proving Jesus’ Divinity beyond doubt. 2) We need to get our
daily infusion of spiritual strength by recognizing the presence of God – the
Father, the Son, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit — living within us wherever we are,
and by communicating with our indwelling God in prayer.
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
May 23 Tuesday: (St. Rita of Cascia, Religious): St.
Bede the venerable, Priest, Doctor of the Church; St.
Gregory VII, Pope; St. Mary Magdalene de
Pazzi, Virgin:
The context: Today’s Gospel passage is
taken from the “High Priestly Prayer” Jesus offered to the Father
for himself, the apostles and all future believers at the end of his long Last
Supper discourse. It is called the High Priestly Prayer because
it is as the High Priest of the New Covenant that Jesus offers to God, his
Father, the imminent sacrifice of his passion and death, his apostles and their
mission, and all future believers.
Glory in crucifixion: In the first part of the
prayer, Jesus asks for the glorification of his human nature and the acceptance
of his sacrifice on the cross by his Father. Jesus
considered his crucifixion as his glorification — just
as the martyrs would later do. The cross was the glory of Jesus
because it was the completion of his double work of saving mankind and of
demonstrating to us how much God loves us. Further, it was his death on the
cross that led to his Resurrection in glory. Jesus glorified God 1)
by accepting death on the cross in perfect obedience to God, to complete His
eternal plan of salvation; 2) by revealing God to men as a loving, forgiving
and saving Father; and 3) by giving believers Eternal Life in making them
his disciples and teaching them to obey his new commandment of love.
The essence of Eternal Life: According to the
New Testament, Eternal Life is: “to know You, the only true God, and
Jesus Christ Whom You have sent” (John 17:3). To “know”
God in the Gospel sense is to have a deep, personal experience of God Who
is working in one’s life. It involves a close, intimate relationship
which matures eventually into mutual love and trust. Christian Faith is
essentially a “believing in”- a total surrender. It is the
way we come to “know” Christ closely, to experience Him intimately,
and to love Him personally.
Life message: 1) Let us center
our Christian life on prayer and the glorification of God.
Prayer means getting into contact with God — listening to Him and talking
to Him. If we are convinced of the presence of God within us, we can talk
to Him even while we are driving, waiting in a queue, or doing routine
work in the kitchen or yard. Our talk with God can include adoration,
praise, thanksgiving, pleas for forgiveness for ourselves and
for those who injure us and/or others, and prayer for the needs of
others and of ourselves. A few minutes spent in reading the Bible is
the best way of listening to God. 4) We glorify God by obeying His
commandments, especially the commandment of love given by Jesus. Fr. Tony (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
May 24 Wednesday: In today’s Gospel passage,
taken from Jesus’ high-priestly prayer, Jesus prays in particular, for those
disciples who are sharing the meal with him. Jesus prayed for the victory,
unity, protection, and consecration of his disciples. (i) Jesus
prayed that they might find victory by living out
their Christianity in the rough-and-tumble of life. The
disciples must win the world for Christ by living out their
Christianity within the world. They must bear witness to Christ
through their transparent Christian lives, reflecting Christ’s love, mercy,
forgiveness, and spirit of humble service. (ii) Jesus
prayed for the unity of his disciples. The
world cannot be evangelized by competing Churches, and that is why Jesus prayed
that his disciples might be as fully one as He and the
Father are One. Christian unity is determined by whether and how
well we love one another, and whether we reflect the love of God in Christ
for the world. (Eph 4:4–6: “ … one body and one Spirit, just as you
were called to the one hope that belongs to your call; d 5 one
Lord, one faith, one baptism; e 6 one
God and Father of us all, Who is above all and through all and in all).” (iii) Jesus
prayed for His Father’s protection for his disciples
from the attacks of the Evil One. If the disciples of Christ fall, it is
because they try to meet life with their own strength alone, and do not remember
the presence of their protecting God and seek His help. (iv) Jesus
prayed that his disciples might be consecrated in the truth. (a) ‘Consecrate’
means to set apart for a special task (Jer 1:5; Ex 28:41). (b) ‘Consecrate’
also means to equip a man with the qualities of mind, heart,
and character which are necessary for that task. God has chosen us and
dedicated us for His special service of loving and obeying Him
ourselves and of bringing others to do the same. He has
not left us to carry out that great task with only our own strength, but by His
grace He fits us for our task — if we place our lives in His hands.
Life message: 1): We need to
understand, appreciate, cooperate with, and pray with and for each other:
The denominations are a reality. There is no use in
our blaming each other for the historical events which caused these
divisions in Christ’s Body. What we can do is to learn
sympathetically about the doctrinal similarities and differences among
the members of our Christian community and learn to love each one and cooperate
with the members of all denominations in all ways possible. 2) Let us
pray fervently that God may show us how to proceed in building true and
lasting Christian unity without sacrificing the basic Christian principles
and teachings.
Fr. Tony (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
May 25 Thursday (St. Bede the Venerable, Priest,
Doctor of the Church,, St. Grgory VII, Pope, St. Magdalene de Pazzi,
Virgin): The context: Today’s Gospel passage is the
concluding part of Jesus’ “High Priestly Prayer” in his Last Supper
discourse. Here, Jesus prays for true unity among his followers who accept him
as their Lord and Savior.
Divisions in Christianity: The first major division
in Christianity, which took place in the fifth century, was
the schism caused when the Eastern Orthodox Churches under the
patriarchs separated themselves from the Western Church under the Pope.
Next, the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century separated
its followers from unity with the Church centered in Rome and freed them from
her Authority. During the following five centuries, this separation resulted in
the formation of more than 30,000 Protestant denominations. According
to Pope St. Paul VI [canonized October 14, 2018 by Pope Francis] “the
Church founded by Jesus Christ and for which he prayed is indefectibly one in
Faith, in worship and in the bond of hierarchical communion” (Creed of the
People of God, 21).
Jesus’ prayer for unity: In his prayer for
unity among his disciples, Jesus mentions that the basis and criterion of
unity must be the Unity of God in His Three Divine Persons among Whom
there is eternal, mutual love and Self-giving. The unity of Jesus and his
Father is a unity of love and obedience and a unity of personal relationship.
Another reason for Christian unity is the union of the faithful with
Jesus Christ in His Mystical Body by Baptism, and through Him with the
Father (verse 23). This means that the fullness of Unity is attained through
the supernatural grace, which comes to us from the Father through Christ (cf.
Jn 15:5). Jesus declares that unity among the believers is essential if
the world is to acknowledge Him as Lord and Savior, because the
disunity among Christians acts as the biggest block for evangelization, as it
offers living, constant counter-witness to the Good News of Redemption.
Life messages: 1) Since Jesus Christ
himself left us his final wish for unity through his prayer to the
Father: “that they may all be one; even as You, Father are in Me, and I
in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You
have sent Me” (Jn 17:21), it is our duty to pray
and work for meaningful unity among Christians. 2) Let us learn
to appreciate each other’s common beliefs and enter into genuine
dialogue and cooperation with members of other Christian denominations, instead
of accusing each other of heresy. We need to remember that the present
non-Catholic Christians are not responsible for the historical events and
actions from which the various denominations originated in the past. .
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
May 26 Friday: (St. (t. May 26 Friday: (St. Philip
Neri, Priest) The context: This is a
post-Resurrection apparition scene. After miraculously providing breakfast for
his apostles who had been fishing all night, Jesus conferred on Peter the
Primacy in his Church, which Jesus had promised as a reward for Peter’s
profession of Faith (Mt 16:16-19).
The triple question: As if to give him a triple
chance to atone for his triple denial, Jesus asks Peter, three
times, “Simon, son of John, do you love me (agápe love) more than
these?” Jesus asks Peter if he loves Jesus more than he loves his boat
and fishing equipment, occupation, family, and friends. Jesus is also asking
whether Peter loves him more than the other Apostles do. Instead of boasting of
his own fidelity, strength, and greater love, as he had done before his triple
denial of the Master, Peter humbly puts everything in Christ’s hands. “Lord,
You know well that I love (philia love=love of a friend) You.” The
dual reward: 1) Primacy of jurisdiction over the
Church was formally defined by the First Vatican Council (Vatican I) in the
First Dogmatic Constitution “On the Church of Christ,” (Pastor Aeternus,
Chapter 1) declaring, “We therefore teach and declare
that, according to the testimony of the Gospel, the primacy of jurisdiction
over the universal Church of God was immediately and directly promised and
given to Blessed Peter the Apostle by Christ our Lord. […] And it
was upon Simon Peter alone, that Jesus, after his Resurrection, bestowed the
jurisdiction of chief pastor and ruler over all his fold in the words: ‘Feed
My lambs; feed My sheep (Jn 21:15-17).’” 2) Peter was also given the
promise of a martyr’s death because real love involves
responsibility as well as sacrifice. According to Tradition, St. Peter followed
his Master to the point of dying by crucifixion — head downwards, because he
felt unworthy to die as Jesus had done. This happened during Nero’s persecution
of the Christians, which took place between the years 64 and 68 in Rome.
Life messages: 1) We need to pray for the
Pope, the successor of Peter, and for the bishops, the successors of the
Apostles, and to support them in their ministry. 2) Jesus is a God of second
chances Who gives chance after chance to sinners to return to his love, as is
made clear by Jesus’ conferring primacy in his Church on he repentant
Peter.
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
May 27 Saturday (St. Augustine of Canterbury,
Bishop): Context: Today’s Gospel passage describes the role
of Peter as the chief shepherd of Christ’s people and of John as a long-lived
witness to Christ in the early Church. The last part of the passage was
intended to correct the false notion in the early Church that John would not
die until the much-expected, imminent “second coming” of Jesus.
Jesus’ reply: Jesus’ response implies that
what is important is not to be curious about what the future will bring but to
serve the Lord faithfully each day, keeping to the way He has marked out for
one.
John’s testimony about his Gospel: The passage
concludes with John’s testimony about the truth of the content of his Gospel.
It also explains the purpose of John’s Gospel: to strengthen our Faith in what
Jesus did and taught. In addition, it tells us that the written Gospels contain
only a fraction of what Jesus taught and did, implying that we have to depend
upon the Sacred Tradition of the early Church handed down to us by the early
Fathers of the Church to complete the truth of the written testimony.
Life message: 1) Just as Peter and John
each had his unique role in Christ’s Church, so each believer, as a member of
this Mystical Body of Christ, each of us with our different talents,
strengths, weaknesses, and limits, has one’s own particular work to
do in bringing the task of the Body – to bring the world to Christ and
Christ to the world – to its completion. Hence it is our duty to bear witness
to Christ by surrendering our lives to Christ on the altar of service for the
people of God and by offering ourselves as humble instruments in the hands of
Christ. (Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)
Context: Jesus is speaking to his apostles after the
Last Supper.
Scripture lessons: In this Last Supper
discourse, Jesus explains his Divine origin and his relationship to God his
Father in clear terms without using any metaphors. The apostles acknowledge
that they understand the Divinity of Jesus. But Jesus prophesies that they will
soon desert him and seek their own safety, while he will be arrested, brought
to trial and crucified. Our Faith is tested every day when we live in a world
filled with agnostics, atheists, and pleasure-seekers who see true believers as
superstitious people and hate them. That is why Jesus gave his apostles and all
his future disciples the assurance of the anointing of the Holy Spirit Who
would strengthen them and guide them. The Second Vatican Council teaches in
connection with this passage: “The Lord Jesus who said `Be of good
cheer, I have overcome the world’ (John 16:33), did not by these words
promise complete victory to his Church in this world. This sacred Council
rejoices that the earth which has been sown with the seed of the Gospel is now
bringing forth fruit in many places under the guidance of the Spirit of the
Lord, who is filling the world” (Presbyterorum Ordinis, 22).
Life messages: 1) Our Faith is firmly rooted in
the Divinity of Jesus demonstrated by his Messianic miracles, most of which
were foretold by the prophets. The Resurrection of Jesus is the Miracle of
miracles proving Jesus’ Divinity beyond doubt. 2) We need to get our daily
infusion of spiritual strength by recognizing the presence of God – the Father,
the Son, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit — living within us wherever we are, and by
communicating with our indwelling God in prayer.
(Fr. Tony) (https://frtonyshomilies.com/)