Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Homily – April 13, 2010 – Second Week of Easter - Tuesday

+ We reflect on this weekday of the Easter Season how central Jesus must be in our lives if anything is to make sense. When our focus is Jesus raised up on the cross and risen from the dead, then everything can make sense if we piece things together with the tools that the faith gives us. This implies our cooperation in our own salvation.

In the gospel passage today Jesus tells Nicodemus that his act of cooperation would be to "born (again) of the spirit" so that he may participate in the benefits of the spiritual life which are now (thanks to his death and resurrection) eternal. Nicodemus questions how this can be happen: how is one born again – and Jesus tells him that for those who have faith, those who look up at Jesus crucified, those who believe in his resurrection from the dead – all things would be possible – and eternal life would be given to them because of their willingness to cooperate in God's plan for their salvation.

May we be among those today who look up, believe and cooperate with Jesus for our salvation!

In the first reading we see that when cooperators band together, when believers become of one mind and heart then a whole new kind of society emerges – a very caring, kind, compassionate society, group, community! Such is the community that we call the church. The church is God's gift! The church is Jesus' Body! The church is our spiritual home! Very realistically though, it is not perfect – because it is made up of imperfect human beings who make errors, some very grave – whether they own up to the fact or not– but it is also quite simply divine and the only source of the fullness of grace that God wants to make available to his faithful people in their lifetimes.

We pray for the church today, we pray for ourselves who are the church that we may be of the mind and heart of Jesus – as much as we possibly can; own up to our mistakes when we make them, and ask God's merciful forgiveness which he shall most certainly give if we are sincere.

The Son of Man must be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.

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