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"Now let the heavens be joyful,
Let earth her song begin:
Let the round world keep triumph,
And all that is therein;
Invisible and visible,
Their notes let all things blend,
For Christ the Lord is risen
Our joy that hath no end."
- St. John of Damascus
(Ask the Spirit to bless you with the joy of Easter this day.)
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I invite you to join with me to study and reflect more deeply on the meaning of the resurrection of Jesus during this sacred season. We will use my book, Jesus Alive in Our Lives (2nd Edition), and meet by Zoom on April 15, 22, 29; May 6 and 13 from noon to 1 p.m. CDT. For more information and registration, please visit the link below:
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Acts 3:1-10; Ps 105:1-2, 3-4, 6-7, 8-9
Lk 24:13-35
That very day, the first day of the week,
two of Jesus’ disciples were going
to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus,
and they were conversing about all the things that had occurred.
And it happened that while they were conversing and debating,
Jesus himself drew near and walked with them,
but their eyes were prevented from recognizing him.
He asked them,
“What are you discussing as you walk along?”
They stopped, looking downcast.
One of them, named Cleopas, said to him in reply,
“Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem
who does not know of the things
that have taken place there in these days?”
And he replied to them, “What sort of things?”
They said to him,
“The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene,
who was a prophet mighty in deed and word
before God and all the people,
how our chief priests and rulers both handed him over
to a sentence of death and crucified him.
But we were hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel;
and besides all this,
it is now the third day since this took place.
Some women from our group, however, have astounded us:
they were at the tomb early in the morning
and did not find his Body;
they came back and reported
that they had indeed seen a vision of angels
who announced that he was alive.
Then some of those with us went to the tomb
and found things just as the women had described,
but him they did not see.”
And he said to them, “Oh, how foolish you are!
How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke!
Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things
and enter into his glory?”
Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets,
he interpreted to them what referred to him
in all the Scriptures.
As they approached the village to which they were going,
he gave the impression that he was going on farther.
But they urged him, “Stay with us,
for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.”
So he went in to stay with them.
And it happened that, while he was with them at table,
he took bread, said the blessing,
broke it, and gave it to them.
With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him,
but he vanished from their sight.
Then they said to each other,
“Were not our hearts burning within us
while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?”
So they set out at once and returned to Jerusalem
where they found gathered together
the Eleven and those with them who were saying,
“The Lord has truly been raised and has appeared to Simon!”
Then the two recounted what had taken place on the way
and how he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread.
USCCB Lectionary
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Praying the Daily Gospels: A Guide to Meditation, by Philip St. Romain,
2018 (3rd ed.)
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Luke 24: 13-35 (The road to Emmaus)
Those who loved Jesus were crushed by his scandalous death. Whatever he had promised them concerning his Resurrection must have been poorly understood, because his followers were deeply shaken when they learned that his tomb was empty. The disciplesÕ experience on the road to Emmaus gives us an idea of how their sorrow was turned to joy.
* Imagine yourself walking down a lonely road with Jesus by your side. Pour out your heart to him; tell him everything that has been weighing heavily upon you. Write in your journal the response you believe he is giving you.
* What is the significance of the verses concerning the breaking of the bread? How important to you is breaking bread with other Christians?
Paperback, Kindle and eBook
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Treatise on the Love of God, by St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622)
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BOOK II: THE HISTORY OF THE GENERATION AND HEAVENLY BIRTH OF DIVINE LOVE
Chapter 7: How admirable the divine providence is in the diversity of graces given to us.
But we must be very careful never to make inquiry why the supreme wisdom bestows a grace rather upon one than another, nor why it makes its favours abound rather in one behalf than another. No, Theotimus, never enter into this curiosity, for having all of us sufficiently, yea abundantly, that which is requisite to salvation, what reason can any creature living have to
complain if it please God to bestow his graces more amply upon one than another? If one should ask why God made melons larger than strawberries, or lilies larger than violets, why the rosemary is not a rose, or why the pink is not a marigold, why the peacock is more beautiful than a bat, or why the fig is sweet and the lemon acid,--one would laugh at his question, and say: poor man, since the beauty of the world requires variety it is necessary there should be difference and inequality in
things, and that the one should not be the other. That is why some things are little, others big, some bitter, others sweet, the one more, the other less beautiful. Now it is the same in supernatural things. Every one hath his proper gift from God; one after this manner, and another after that, [77] says the Holy Ghost. It is then an impertinence to search out why S. Paul had not the grace of S. Peter, or S. Peter that of S. Paul; why S. Antony was not S. Athanasius, or S. Athanasius S. Jerome;
for one would answer to these inquiries that the church is a garden diapered with innumerable flowers; it is necessary then they should be of various sizes, various colours, various odours, in fine of different perfections. All have their price, their charm and their colour, and all of them in the collection of their differences make up a most grateful perfection of beauty.
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