Good News Bad News

Do you want the good news, or the bad news?

I wonder if Jesus spoke much Greek.

His primary language would have been Aramaic.

But he was a fairly literate guy.

We know he impressed the scholars in the temple when he was just a boy.

We know he knew the scriptures and that he read the scroll in the synagogue.

And Greek and Hebrew, and I guess even some Latin, were spoken in the area.

So he may well have known that the Greek word Gospel, means Good News.

Maybe he just didn’t know that the accounts of his life and would be called Gospels.

Because he often slips in some bad news.

Today’s Gospel is a good example of that.

Matthew and Luke seem to have overlooked this bit of bad news.

But Mark picked up on it and recorded it in his Gospel.

Yesterday we heard of the disciples’ utter amazement

When Jesus told them how hard it is for a person to enter the Kingdom of God.

Especially for a rich person.

Today we hear Peter ask for some reassurance.

He says We’ve given up everything and followed you.

So Jesus gives that reassurance.

You’ll receive a hundredfold more—now, in this present age.

And you’ll have eternal life in the age to come.

That is Good News.

A hundredfold in houses and brothers and sisters and children and lands.

As they traveled in their ministry, they would indeed be welcomed into many houses.

And they came to recognize many hundreds of their brothers and sisters.

All were brothers and sisters under God.

But in that list of rewards, the one misfit jumps out –

And persecutions.

Jesus isn’t about to mislead us into unrealistic expectations.

Even if the news is ultimately overwhelmingly good—eternal life!

He cautions us about the bad that we’ll have to endure.

In this life everyone encounters some amount of suffering.

The disciples couldn’t avoid it.

Jesus himself couldn’t avoid it.

Surely we can’t avoid it.

Whenever suffering does find us, we can endure it more easily

If we remember all the good things we’ve already enjoyed in this present age.

And that ultimate Good News – 
Eternal life with God, in union with our loved ones.

Tuesday 8th Week Ordinary Time

Mk 10:28-31      Read this Scripture @usccb.org

Bound for Glory

Today we find ourselves in the midst of two glorious events.

A few days ago we celebrated the Ascension—Jesus' glorious return to Heaven.

Sunday we'll celebrate Pentecost—the Spirit's glorious arrival from Heaven.

In today's Gospel passage we jump back a month in time.

We hear Jesus praying to the Father.

He says he has glorified God by completing the mission God gave him.

The scene for this prayer is the Last Supper.

So, Jesus hasn't quite fully completed his mission.

He has completed his mission of making God's name known.

Making God's character known.

Letting us know that He's not a vengeful God who is out to punish us.

But a merciful God who loves us.

A God we should call Our Father.

In terms of time, Jesus' mission is just about over.

And this supper is his last opportunity to pray in the presence of the Apostles.

Where his prayer can be one final lesson for them before his Passion.

The remaining difficult work of the mission will take less than a day.

But it will take long hours of immense suffering.

Jesus knows that, but he also knows that he'll carry it through to completion.

And that God will then glorify him.

In our passage from Acts, Paul is nearing completion of his mission.

The Spirit is leading him on to Jerusalem.

Repeatedly warning him that suffering lies ahead.

Paul doesn't care about his suffering or even his life.

He cares only about completing the ministry that he received from Jesus.

To bear witness to the Gospel of God's grace.

Jesus and Paul give us two models for fearless, faithful dedication to mission.

And just as Paul was given a mission by Jesus, so were we.

And essentially it's the same mission.

To bear witness to the Good News that we have a God who loves us.

And who we should love in return.

A mission to make God known.

To glorify God by our lives, so that he might also glorify us.

A mission not unlike the first part of Jesus' own mission.

And that same Spirit who came to help and lead Paul, has also come to help and lead us.

The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ.

The Spirit who came at Pentecost to dwell within us.

Christ's continuing presence on Earth.

If we're not quite matching the commitment and fervor that Jesus and Paul modeled for us,

What's holding us back?
 

Tuesday 7th Week of Easter

Jn 17:1-11      Read this Scripture @usccb.org

Famous Last Words

On the Internet you can find a number of collections of famous last words.

Some of the quotes I found were well documented and supported, others were unverified.

They ran the full range from defiant and bitter to accepting and joyous.

From spontaneous to carefully planned.

Public and political to private and personal.

Many were inspirational, and reverent.

Many were farewells to spouses and families and friends.

Many expressed trust or hope that they were going home to their merciful God.

Some were intentionally witty, perhaps to ease the tension of the moment.

Oscar Wilde had evidently been confined to his room too long.

At the end he said, Either this wallpaper has to go or I do.

Groucho Marx supposedly exited with, Die, my dear? Why that's the last thing I'll do.

Some were unexpecting—and mistaken.

Seconds after being shot, Archduke Franz Ferdinand told his aide, It is nothing.

Union General John Sedgwick, approaching the fringe of a battlefield, assured his men.

They couldn't hit an elephant from this dist—.

On the Fourth of July in 1826 Thomas Jefferson said, simply, Is this the Fourth?

He and his old rival, John Adams, were in a contest to outlive each other.

On that very same day John Adams, unaware that Jefferson had just died,

Uttered his last words, Thomas Jefferson (still survives).

Due to the gravity surrounding them, last words are often given special attention.

Especially if they were intended to impart wisdom or guidance.

Such as Andrew Jackson's: Be good, children, and we shall all meet again in Heaven.

Or those last words of Jesus as he hung on the cross.

Repeated by a number of people now recognized as saints.

And many more people not recognized as saints.

Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.

Those were Jesus' last words before his death.

But, unlike anyone before or since, he came back and gave us more last words.

Those words we hear in today's Gospel.

These were his words at his ascension into Heaven.

A supernatural, miraculous departure that was clearly not into death but into glory.

The last words he spoke during his physical human presence on earth.

And in those words he gave us, his disciples, his final parting instructions.

Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature.

That instruction, that command, that assignment, is referred to as the Great Commission.

We see other common examples of secular commissions in our world today.

Military officers are commissioned, heads of government offices might be commissioned.

Their commissions generally come from the head of state.

Our Great Commission, is set out in our Gospel today.

Coming directly from Jesus, the head of our Church

Assigning to us the duty of carrying his message to the whole world.

Granting us the authority to represent Him.

It's interesting that in Mark's account of this commissioning,

Jesus instructs us to proclaim the Gospel to every creature.

That's sometimes translated as all creation.

So should we proclaim the Gospel to our dogs and cats, the squirrels and birds?

The trees and flowers and crops and rivers?

In a sense, yes.

St Francis of Assisi (no stranger to creatures and nature) is often quoted saying,

Preach always and sometimes use words.

Our lives, our actions, proclaim the Good News of God's love more loudly than our words.

Our actions toward all of God's creation are a proclamation.

In a sense, a proclamation to and through that creation.

When we faithfully exercise the stewardship God has given us,

We proclaim our love and respect for God and for all He has created.

Especially for our neighbors who are part of that creation.

And who share all of creation with us.

In giving us this Great Commission Jesus also promised to support us.

He would send his Spirit to work with us, to dwell within us.

Dwell within each of us individually, and among us as a group.

We members would have mutual support to and from each other—as his Church.

Jesus has ascended back to Heaven, but remains in Spirit as head of this Church.

Every week we gather together as Church for that mutual support.

We join together in sharing the sustaining food of his presence in the Eucharist.

We're nourished, strengthened, recharged.

And then, as Jesus instructed in his final words, we're sent out into the whole world.

We refer to our Eucharistic celebration as the Mass.

That name comes from the Latin word missa—to send.

And as with all memorable last words,

The last words of the Mass merit special attention and offer important instruction.

They echo Jesus' own last words, his last instruction to us, our Great Commission.

Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life.

Feast of the Ascension

Mk 16:15-20      Read this Scripture @usccb.org

The Spirit Within

It is better for you that I go.

If I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you.

But if I go, I will send him to you.

These words are part of Jesus' farewell to his disciples.

The Feast of the Ascension is coming up this Thursday <we'll celebrate Sunday>.

And these words sound like something he might say there on the mountain.

As he begins his ascent to Heaven.

But these words were spoken earlier.

As he's about to enter into his Passion.

Yes, this is the start of his trip back to the Father.

And it won't be an easy trip.

He's going by Way of the Cross.

His statement of If I do not go still carried some possibility and attraction for him.

He knew how painful the going would be.

But he also knew the Father.

He also knew Heaven.

He knew what ultimately awaited him.

And he knew it was worth the suffering.

His suffering would not only return him to the Father.

It would also complete his mission.

His mission of opening the way for all of his friends to follow him.

He wasn't thinking primarily of himself.

It was for us that he came.

And now, it was better for us that he went.

Our most immediate benefit would be his sending the Advocate.

He would send his Holy Spirit—the Spirit of God—to take his place.

This coming Sunday we commemorate and celebrate the Ascension.

Jesus' final departure as a distinct human person here on earth.

The following Sunday we celebrate Pentecost.

The return of his Holy Spirit to dwell with us, to dwell within each of us.

Until the end of time.

Today's Gospel passage deserves some reflection, or meditation or contemplation.

How often do we acknowledge and appreciate the Spirit's presence within ourselves?

How often do we acknowledge and appreciate the Spirit's presence in everyone else?

Tuesday 6th Week of Easter

Jn 16:5-11      Read this Scripture @usccb.org

Gone to the Father

The saint listed on the Church calendar today is St Hilary or Arles.

He was a bishop in Gaul, now France, in the 5^th Century.

The best available information is that he was born in the year 401 and died May 5, 449.

That's why his feast day is celebrated today.

Unlike our celebrations of worldly heroes—like Washington's Birthday and Lincoln's Birthday—

We usually celebrate our saintly heroes on their death-days.

The date of their birth into the next life, their entry into Heaven.

That's not surprising when you think about it.

We're commemorating these people because they made it to sainthood.

They made it to Heaven.

So the anniversary of their entry is a most appropriate time to honor them.

If we can keep our priorities in proper order, our entry into Heaven is our chief goal,

And the key date of our existence.

But with all the busy-ness of daily life, it's easy to have that slip out of focus.

The World is Too Much With Us.

Even more so today than when William Wordsworth coined that phrase 200 years ago.

We can be pulled back to conscious awareness of our top priority by a thought, by a message.

Something we read or hear, or remember.

Remembering a saint or a famous person, or a loved one who has died.

Perhaps on an anniversary.

We're jolted back to priorities most strongly and painfully when a loved one dies.

We have to deal with our grief, our personal loss.

Our sympathy for other loved ones who may be suffering even more through that same loss.

We can take heart from the assurances and encouragements that Jesus has given us.

Like his words in today's Gospel passage.

If you loved me you would rejoice that I am going to the Father.

Rejoicing at the loss of a loved one is not often easy or immediate.

It's easier if we see that person was suffering greatly and is now at peace.

That peace that Jesus offers in today's Gospel.

It helps if they were very old—and suffering.

It helps if we believe that person was saintly and must surely have gone on to Heaven.

It helps if we have strong faith and hope in God's extravagant mercy.

And so we get through it.

We overcome the grief and sorrow and uncertainty.

We think about the purpose of this life, we think about the next life.

We adjust our own focus a bit.

Away from this world and to the Heaven that awaits us.

Perhaps we even rejoice.

Tuesday 5th Week of Easter

Jn 14:27-31      Read this Scripture @usccb.org