His Word Today: Saint Pius V

Good morning everyone,

Today, the Church celebrates the liturgical Memorial of Saint Pius V (17 January 1504 to 1 May 1572).  Antonio Ghislieri served as Pope from the day of his election to the See of Peter on 8 January 1566 until his death.  This was not an easy time to lead the Church.  There were many questions about unity that needed to be delicately attended to, and it was Saint Pius V who faced this task.  He gained a reputation for putting orthodoxy before personalities.

Being objective in judgement was also a crucial requisite for Nicodemus, the Pharisee mentioned in Saint John's gospel: the one who met with Jesus in the dark of night.  Nicodemus had to be objective in his questioning.  He had to set aside any prejudice that may have existed in order to make room in his heart to welcome the Word that Jesus proclaimed: a word that is eternally young, ever fresh.

Jesus invites us all to hear these same words and to be as objective as we can in exploring the truth that his words bear.  It is - as a wise and holy man once said - when we dare to pray through the questions of our faith - that we come to believe the truth that the Son of Man must be lifted up so that those who believe in him may have eternal life (Jn 3:15).

Have a great day.

His Word Today: Saint Catherine of Siena

Good morning everyone,

Today, the Church celebrates the Memorial of Saint Catherine of Siena (25 March 1347 to 29 April 1380).  One of only four female Doctors of the Church, Catherine distinguished herself first as a lay woman associated with the Dominican Order and later as a philosopher and a theologian who had great influence on the Church of her day.

Shortly after she joined the Sisters of Penance of Saint Dominic and professed her vows, she received the gifts of the stigmata (wounds in her hands and feet resembling the wounds of Christ) and mystical marriage (the New Testament portrays communion with Jesus as a marriage).  Despite her constant pain, she accompanied the Dominican chaplain to Avignon in the role of Ambassador of Florence where she played a role in convincing Pope Gregory XI to leave Avignon and to return to Rome.  She subsequently worked tirelessly, writing letters to princes and cardinals in order to promote obedience to Pope Urban VI.

Saint Catherine's diplomacy and her dedication to promoting unity in the Church were no doubt born out of her own zealousness to know and love Jesus.  This is the same thirst that brought Nicodemus, a Pharisee who lived in the time of Jesus to come to Jesus under the cover of darkness (cf Jn 3:1) and to begin his own search for truth.

Like these two figures, we too must look to Jesus if we want to discover the path that we must follow today.  He is always ready to show us the way, and he is always willing to walk alongside us so that we never have to walk alone.

Have a great day.

Jesus: God's Divine Mercy

The gospel for this second Sunday of the Easter season places us with the disciples in the house where they had met (Jn 20:19).  The gospel writer tells us that it was evening on the day Jesus rose from the dead ... and the doors of the house ... were locked for fear of the Jews. At this point in the story, they had already heard the testimony of Mary of Magdala and the other women who had gone to the tomb early that morning. Peter and John had run to the tomb and confirmed the fact that the stone had been rolled away. Yet, despite these hope-filled experiences, the disciples still feared for their lives.  If the Jewish authorities had put their Teacher, their Master, to death, perhaps they too would be killed if they dared to show their faces.

What about us? Have we ever experienced such fear? Have we ever known a time when we had good news to share, but we were afraid to speak for fear that we would be ridiculed or judged for speaking. Have we ever chosen to remain silent, with the doors of our hearts locked for fear of being ridiculed?

Even though the doors of the house were locked, and even though the disciples were fearful, Jesus came and stood among them and said, 'Peace be with you' (Jn 20:19). Even in the moments when they were most filled with doubt and fear, Jesus stood among them and offered them the gift of his peace, his reassurance and his mercy ... and these gifts were also offered to Thomas, even though he was not with the other disciples when Jesus came (Jn 20:24).

Jesus knows our hearts even better than we do. He knows that no matter how fervently we may believe all that we have heard about him, there is always a part of us that remains imprisoned by fear and doubt, but even in situations where we are paralyzed by doubt, Jesus still stands in our midst and says to us: Peace be with you!  It is this powerful gift of his peace, the beautiful gift of his mercy at work within us that allows us to discern, to witness and to appreciate how patient he is with each one of us.

On the second Sunday of Easter in the year 2000, Pope John Paul II canonized Saint Faustyna Kowalska and established the annual celebration of Divine Mercy Sunday. Since that day, the Church has continued to observe this feast day.  Maria Faustyna Kowalska of the Blessed Sacrament (1905-1938) was a Polish nun and a mystic who received visions of Jesus.

Like the disciples gathered in the house on the evening hours of the day when Jesus rose from the dead, Saint Faustyna shared the details of her visions and as a result, even today, the experiences that are described are as fresh and life-giving for us as they were for those who first read them.

Through the intercession of Saint Faustyna Kowalska, may we be attentive to the many signs and wonders (Acts 5:12) that continue to be accomplished among God's people. Renewed by the light of the risen Lord, may we proclaim in Word and deed: Jesus, my risen Lord, I trust in you.

He is risen!

Waking from a coma that had lasted for twenty-three years, the Blegian man Rom Houben suprised many people.  Some of them even spoke of resurrection.  This term was also used in reference to people who Jesus raised to life: the daughter of Jairus (Mk 5:41), the young man from Nain (Lk 7:14-15) and Lazarus (Jn 11:43-44).  In each of these cases, people were restored to physical life and their existence was prolonged.  Later, they would die again.

Jesus' resurrection is another matter.  Raised from the dead, Christ will never die again; death has no power over him (Rom 6:9).  This is not merely a matter of returning from a coma or having a second chance at life after a clinical death, but rather it is an entrance into an existence that unfolds beyond the limits of space and time, an existence in God.  From now on, the Risen One ensures his luminous presence everywhere and at the same time. And everyone who welcomes him is in touch with his life. Is this not what is evoked by the tomb that was found empty on Easter morning?

At the end of our earthly existence, we will experience the same resurrection: to die in the world, once and for all, to rise and remain forever with God. Today, we are already taking part in this new life when we love like Jesus loves us.

Happy Easter!

The tomb is empty

Two years ago, I made my most recent pilgrimage to the Holy Land. On the last morning of our trip, we found ourselves in Jerusalem. Early in the morning, our group of 42 pilgrims arrived in the city. Together, we made our way along the Via Crucis - the Stations of the Cross.  It ends at the Holy Sepulchre: the tomb in which the body of Jesus was placed following the crucifixion. Our guide had warned us that there are normally many visitors lining up every day to visit this holy place. While we stood outside and meditated on the last three stations of the cross, our guide went to check the length of the lineup to enter the tomb. We had only just finished our meditation on the thirteenth station when Anton arrived to call out to us: Come, come now, the tomb is empty!

This is the scene I have always envisioned at the moment when the women who had visited the tomb on Easter morning arrived in the Upper Room, when they told the Eleven what they had experienced at the sepulchre: about the two men who stood in front of them in dazzling clothes (Lk 24: 4) In fact, this is the way that we must all understand life, because the Passion of the Lord does not really end with death on the cross, but rather with him coming out of the tomb.

Following the ignoble death of their Lord, the Apostles lost heart: their dream of a new kingdom had just collapsed. They wanted to return to their old lives, the lifestyles they had known before they had met the Master of Nazareth. It was at this time that the Lord took the initiative to call his Son from death and lift him up: his teaching, his plana and his gestures turn out to be authentic and life-giving. For us, and for the whole Church, this resurrection is the fulcrum of faith.

In fact, it is for us that the Lord raised his Son, because along with him, he wants to lead us into the new life in which we have been participating since the day of our baptism. From that point on, as disciples of Christ, we are constantly being invited to radiate the light of the resurrection. We do it when we turn away from selfishness and direct our lives towards love without measure.

Love without measure

Today, it is particularly difficult for us to realize how difficult it was for those who knew Jesus' to admit that a crucified man might be their saviour. Infamous torment among the Romans, crucifixion was the worst possible punishment according to Jewish tradition (cf Deut 21:23).

The gospels tell us about the almost inhuman suffering of a destitute and vulnerable man, unjustly accused and sentenced. Why did he suffer? Was his cross the price to pay in order to calm the wrath of God and obtain our salvation in exchange? Certainly not. For it is not the sum of the sufferings suffered by Jesus who saves us, but the gift of his life, given out of love for us: a love without measure and a life given without measure. The Passion of Christ is certainly a story of terrible suffering, but it is also an incredible love story offered once and for all.

Such a love without measure, lived to the end and relayed by the testimony of so many people through the centuries continues even today to inspire us to imitate it by serving our brothers and sisters out of love and inspired by the example of Jesus Christ. In fact, if the events we are recalling today do not tell us anything, then we should be the ones to shout: Woe to us!

There is infinite love and life in the Passion and in the death of Christ.  This love, this life is only waiting for the morning of Easter to break forth.

An example worth following

Tonight we are gathered to relive the first moment of the Pascal Triduum. In order to better understand and appreciate the significance of this moment in the life of Jesus and his disciples, we must re-read the narrative provided to us in the first reading we heard tonight. This is a meal that is shared with family and neighbours (cf Ex 12:4) but it is not a meal like any other normal meal. This meal must be eaten quickly: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand (Ex 12:11). It may seem strange that this meal is eaten so quickly, but there was a deep meaning to this evening and in the shared meal.

It was this Passover meal that Jesus shared with his disciples the night before his death, but that night Jesus did two things that astonished his disciples: the breaking of the bread and the washing of the feet. The details are recounted in the Gospel story (John 13:1-15) and in the letter of Saint Paul to the Corinthians (1 Cor 11:23-26).

Two thousand years later, the breaking of bread is part of the ordinary life of the Church; it lives in her memory like a most precious treasure. Not so with the washing of feet. This gesture, strange and often annoying, is only done on Holy Thursday, and even so ... this is not always the case. However, these two acts - the breaking of the bread and the washing of the feet - are inseparable because of their origin and their meaning: both are born out of the same love that beats in the heart of Jesus, love that is offered to the world. As for the Eucharist, Christ commands his disciples to do as he did: You too must wash one another's feet (John 13:15), he says.

We can imagine the disciples' heads when Jesus knelt before them. This gesture, which manifests the folly of God, was the exact opposite of their dreams of greatness. Christ becomes a servant because he knows only how to love. The people of God - that is, we - can not hope to do better in our heads and in our hearts than to renounce the temptations of power and instead to serve the Gospel and one another.

The Holy Thursday liturgy we are experiencing reminds us of this truth. It's up to us to put it into practice.