The awe-inspiring kindness and encouragement of the Holy Spirit, our ever-present Lord,
strengthens us daily and prepares us to receive our divine reward for every hardship we’ve lived through, and these rewards will surely surpass anything we’ve ever dreamt or imagined.
- Julian of Norwich, Revelations
(Come, Holy Spirit,
come.)
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Acts 13:13-25; Ps. 89:2-3, 21-22, 25 and 27; Jn 13:16-20
R. For ever I will sing the goodness of the Lord.
The favors of the LORD I will sing forever;
through all generations my mouth shall
proclaim your
faithfulness.
For you have said, "My kindness is established forever";
in heaven you have confirmed your faithfulness.
"I have found David, my servant;
with my holy oil I have anointed him,
That my hand may be always with him,
and that my arm may make him strong."
"My faithfulness and my mercy shall be
with him,
and through my name shall his horn be exalted.
He shall say of me, 'You are my father,
my God, the Rock, my savior.'"
Reflection on the Scriptures |
Today’s first reading reminds us that the narrative arc of our own Christian story goes way back. Our first reading gives us Paul’s opening speech in Acts. It is revealing that Paul’s first words do not concern Jesus himself, but rather the classic story of Israel’s salvation history – God’s liberation of Israel from Egyptian slavery; God’s gifts of the Promised Land, Judges, Samuel, Saul and David; and the final preparatory ministry of John the Baptist. Even Jesus the
Savior enters the world as a part of a much larger story; Jesus’s story only makes sense in light of the larger narrative arc of God’s saving work with Israel. John’s gospel today echoes this theme of fulfillment. Jesus’s betrayal is foretold in the Psalms, and his exalted identity as I AM unmistakably echoes YHWH’s famous revelation to Moses in Exodus 3:14.
In the modern world it is easy to see ourselves as “inventors” of our identities. The future is ours for the making; the past and tradition are dispensable. But as Christians we are “not our own creators.” As Paul himself famously said to a small group of Jews and Gentiles in Rome, we are “grafted” onto the story of Israel and God’s saving work in
Jesus (Romans 11). This Easter season, let us recall with gratitude our insertion into the rich family history of this ancient Judeo-Christian tribe.
- by Jay Carney
Revelations of Divine Love - by Julian of Norwich
Eighth Revelation, Chapter 16 “A Part of His Passion”
AFTER this Christ shewed a part of His Passion near His dying.
Bloodlessness and pain dried within; and blowing of wind and cold coming from without met together in the sweet body of Christ. And these
four,—twain without, and twain within—dried the flesh of Christ by process of time. And though this pain was bitter and sharp, it was full long lasting, as to my sight, and painfully dried up all the lively spirits of Christ’s flesh. Thus I saw the sweet flesh dry in seeming by part after part, with marvellous pains. And as long as any spirit had life in Christ’s flesh, so long suffered He pain. This long pining seemed to me as if He had been seven nights dead, dying, at the point of outpassing
away, suffering the last pain. And when I said it seemed to me as if He had been seven night dead, it meaneth that the sweet body was so discoloured, so dry, so shrunken, so deathly, and so piteous, as if He had been seven night dead, continually dying. And methought the drying of Christ’s flesh was the most pain, and the last, of His Passion.
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