Claretian Communications Foundation, Inc.
4TH WEEK OF EASTER
Psalter: Week 4 / (Red)
Responsorial Psalm: Ps 2: 6-7, 8-9, 10-11ab: You are my Son; this day I have begotten you!
1st Reading: Acts 13: 26-33
Brothers, children and descendants of Abraham, and you, also, who fear God, it is to you that this message of salvation has been sent.
It is a fact, that the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and their leaders, did not recognize Jesus.
Yet, in condemning him, they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath, but not understood. Even though they found no charge against him that deserved death, they asked Pilate to have him executed.
And after they had carried out all that had been written concerning him, they took him down from the cross and laid him in a tomb.
But God raised him from the dead, and for many days thereafter, he showed himself, to those who had come up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem. They have now become his witnesses before the people.
We, ourselves, announce to you this Good News: All that God promised our ancestors, he has fulfilled, for us, their descendants, by raising Jesus, according to what is written in the second psalm: You are my Son, today I have begotten you.
Gospel: John 14: 1-6
“Do not be troubled! Trust in God and trust in me! In my Father’s house there are many rooms; otherwise, I would not have told you that I go to prepare a place for you.
After I have gone and prepared a place for you, I shall come again and take you to me, so that where I am, you also may be. Yet you know the way where I am going.”
Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going; how can we know the way?” Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father but through me.
REFLECTION:
“Jesus is love.”
Laudato Si’ recognizes how troublesome our world today is. Pope Francis cautions us that this feeling of uncertainty may result to selfishness. He says, “The current global situation engenders a feeling of instability and uncertainty, which in turn becomes ‘a seedbed of collective selfishness’.” (LS 204). Where else shall we find our security but in Jesus?
In today’s Gospel, the very first invitation of Jesus is for us not to be troubled. We are called to have faith in him. He said that there are many dwelling places in his Father’s house.
One of the reasons why Jesus had to leave his disciples was for him to prepare them dwelling places. Why? Because Jesus did not want his followers to be separated from him. Where Jesus is, there his disciples must also be. Jesus is the only security of those who follow him. And wherever Jesus is, there is love. Jesus wills that love will never depart from those who follow him. Otherwise, there will be selfishness.
Moreover, collective selfishness leads to collective destruction. Let us care for our common home. Let us not be selfish. Let us abide in Jesus’ love.
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