Saint Peter Chanel -- The Eminent Martyr Of Oceania

St Peter Chanel was born on 12 July 1803, the fifth of eight children, in a farming family with a small-holding in south-eastern France. The area was still troubled by the political instability that followed the Revolution. That, plus the need to help on the farm, meant his primary schooling was rather fragmented.

In his early teens the parish priest helped him with special lessons in the presbytery, so that in 1819, aged 16, he was ready to begin his four years of secondary education at the minor seminary at Meximieux. He progressed to the major seminary at Brou in 1824, to be ordained on 15 July 1827, at the age of 24, as a priest for the Belley diocese. For his first year of priesthood he was assistant in a medium sized town, already thinking seriously about applying for an apostolate in the foreign missions. Then followed three years as parish priest in a small country town where the Church was still in disarray a generation after the Revolution. With quiet zeal, tact and compassion he transformed it.

Underlying his approach was his personal motto, ‘To love Mary and bring others to love her.’

In 1831, at 28, with his bishop’s agreement, he joined the small group of diocesan priests in the dioceses of Belley and Lyons, who had hopes of starting a Society of Mary. Its most prominent members were Jean-Claude Colin and Marcellin Champagnat, who was responsible for establishing a branch of teaching brothers. There were also sisters, founded by Jeanne-Marie Chavoin, and groups of laypeople. Among the Marists’ declared aims was to undertake foreign missions. At this stage, however, the priests were occupied in giving parish missions and in running the minor seminary in Belley, which also doubled as a college for boys who had no thought of a priestly vocation. Peter joined the staff of this college, where, in 1832, he became its spiritual director.

ln 1833 Peter accompanied Fr Colin and another priest to Rome to ask the Pope’s approval for their planned Society of Mary. They left Rome empty-handed. After Peter’s return, he became vice-superior and effective head of the college at Belley. In this position he was not exactly a success, a fact of which he was himself painfully aware.

Papal approval of the priests’ branch of the Society of Mary was finally given in April 1836 when the Marists accepted responsibility for new missions in the little-known south-west Pacific. Peter was one of the first group of Marist priests who met for the retreat that culminated in the election of Jean-Claude Colin as General and the first professions on September 24th.

Given his long interest in foreign missions, it is not surprising that Peter offered his name for Oceania. He was chosen to be one of the first band of missionaries, four priests and three catechist brothers, who had been trained by Champagnat, under the leadership of Bishop Pompallier, vicar apostolic of Western Oceania and later first bishop of Auckland. Having visited his family and slipped away in the early morning, Peter made for Lyons and on 15 October, with his companions, took part in a service of consecration to Mary before her statue in the shrine of Fourvière.

Finally, after a long wait at the port of Le Havre, the band set forth on Christmas Eve in the sailing ship Delphine. The journey took almost a year, round Cape Horn and up to Valparaiso on the Pacific coast of South America. In March 1837, one of the priests, Claude Bret, contracted a fever. He and Peter had been friends for a number of years, and Peter looked after him in his illness. Despite all efforts to save him, Bret died off the Canary lsles and was buried at sea.

The missionaries sailed into the Pacific, fact-finding and considering possibilities. On All Saints Day 1837, Pompallier placed Fr Peter Bataillon and Br Joseph Luzy on Wallis Island, in an island group north of Fiji. A week later he founded a second mission, leaving Fr Peter Chanel and Br Marie-Nizier Delorme 170km away on Futuna, the smaller island of the two. By then the Bishop had decided to make his base in New Zealand and, via Sydney, landed in the Hokianga on 10 January l838.

Peter and Marie-Nizier were well received by the king of one of the two factions into which the islanders were split and they were allowed to stay. Pompallier left, promising to return with another missionary in six months, a promise he proved unable to keep, and which seriously undermined the missionaries’ position in the eyes of the islanders. On the island were also some English traders, including Thomas Boag, an English Protestant and widower of a Futunan woman, who helped the missionaries, especially with the local language. The missionaries tried to help the islanders with primitive medicine, to discourage tribal warfare and practices such as abortion, and to seize whatever opportunities arose for giving instruction and administering baptism.

Progress was painfully slow and uncertain. For three and a half years on Futuna, Peter and Marie-Nizier battled with language difficulties, strange customs and food, sickness, malnutrition, loneliness.
Hardest to bear was the seeming lack of success in adult conversions. But they persevered, living and preaching the Gospel, in spite of the king’s tolerance wearing thin.

The eventual conversion of the king’s son proved to be Peter’s death warrant. With the king’s approval, a small group of his tribal leaders clubbed Peter to death while Marie-Nizier was absent visiting elsewhere. It was on 28th April 1841.

When he heard the news of Peter’s brutal death, Pompallier sailed to Wallis, accompanied by Fr Philippe Viard, later to be the first Bishop of Wellington, New Zealand.

Viard went ashore on Futuna, refusing any armed escort, and gathered Peter’s remains, which were then brought to New Zealand. These were kept reverently at Kororareka (Russell) till 1849 when they were returned to France. They are now once again on Futuna, venerated in a shrine that has become a pilgrimage centre for the whole Pacific.

Because of the difficulty of getting reliable eye-witness evidence, it took the Church a long time to be satisfied that Peter died because of hatred of the Catholic faith, and not for some other reason. He was officially declared a martyr and beatified in 1889.

He was declared a saint by Pope Pius XII in 1954 and, because of his connection with New Zealand, St Peter Chanel is honored with a Feast Day.

Credits : The Marist Fathers Of New Zealand 

Catholic Evangelization In The Rugged Himalayas

Bishop Stephen Lepcha gasps for a breath in the thin air. He trudges a few more steps along the narrow path etched into the side of the mountain, here in the craggy foothills of the Himalayas, then stops, his chest heaving. We are enveloped in an inky blackness except for the weak beam of a flashlight four of us share. The road we left behind an hour ago is far below, yet the lights of Behga, the tiny village atop this mountain five miles from the border with Nepal, still look distant.

Bishop Stephen, a stout man of 57 with graying hair and a generous smile you rarely see him without, is the ordinary of one of most remote regions of the Catholic and geographical world. He is on his way to say Mass and administer the sacraments. This long and tortuous journey on foot from the barely navigable dirt road below has been made for a single -- albeit somewhat large -- family.
At Behga, a village of a few hundred souls scattered among small plots of terraced farmland, a plastic canopy flaps in the breeze, supported by large bamboo poles.

This is the parish church. Under it sit over a hundred people, wrapped in thick jackets and blankets against the night’s chill, who rise as the bishop approaches. The bishop was scheduled to be here at 4 p.m. It is now 8. This is his yearly visit and at least the day is correct. The actual time of day has little meaning for this special occasion.

William Sherpa, 31, takes a cup from a tray, and as the bishop bends his head back, William pours the warm milk into the bishop’s mouth. This is the traditional greeting of the Sherpas, the storied mountain-dwelling tribe, best known in the West as guides and porters for Mount Everest ascents; many individuals, like William, also have this as a last name. They are traditionally Buddhist, and were all Buddhist for centuries. It was just 20 years ago that Catholicism began making slow inroads in the Sherpa communities of Western Sikkim.

Far removed from the church’s current dilemmas with sex abuse and debates over stem cells, women’s roles, and procreation, Bishop Stephen serves on one of Catholicism’s final frontiers.

Overcoming immense natural and man-made hurdles to bring the church to the people of Sikkim, this is Catholic evangelization and pastoral care in its purest and most direct form. I was able to witness it firsthand traveling with the bishop and the parish priest of West Sikkim, Salesian Fr. George Thirumalachalil, over three days in the spring.

Darjeeling, Bishop Stephen’s diocese, comprises the state of Sikkim, the district of Darjeeling (of the train and tea fame) in West Bengal, and the kingdom of Bhutan. Within it are just over 30,000 Catholics spread out over some of the earth’s most forbidding terrain, an area of some 17,000 square miles. A kingdom until it joined the Indian Union in 1975, Sikkim is wedged between Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan and is India’s second-smallest state and least populated, the latest census numbering under 600,000. It is one of the most isolated places in the world, sorely lacking in infrastructure (it has no airport or railroad, and few roads) and economic opportunity.

Average yearly income stands at just $600. Most of Sikkim’s population of 540,000 relies on primitive agriculture and government subsidies to survive.

In 1990 Father George moved to Sikkim and started the Don Bosco School at Malbasey, which is now one of the best in Sikkim. At first, he could claim only one family of converts, but today there are over 300 Catholic families and six churches and chapels sprinkled throughout the rugged mountains and pristine valleys of his parish. “There are almost no first- or second-generation Catholics in Sikkim,” says Father George. “You’re more likely to find first- or second-year Catholics.”

The story of a young church emerging in Sikkim is reflected in the evening at Behga. William Sherpa’s parents, Bhaje and Bhoju, at 78 and 79, are being baptized as Helen and Paul. A decade after their son and his wife, Albina, converted to Catholicism, his parents have followed.

Only a 10th of the audience is Catholic, but they not only attend the bishop’s two-and-a-half-hour Mass, but witness Helen and Paul’s baptism, first Communion and confirmation. It is a prime opportunity to expose potential converts to the Catholic faith, a fact not lost on the bishop and Father George, who set up the bishop’s itinerary. Father George knew the Sherpa family was popular, but even he was surprised by the large turnout.

“The most important thing,” Bishop Stephen says during the homily, looking out over the largely Buddhist and Hindu group, “is to know about God. Forget about religion, religion will not save you. Don’t be afraid to accept Jesus Christ.” Then he strikes a reoccurring theme. “Holiness is not the monopoly of the few, but is open to all who are willing to accept it.”

He is both an inspiring teacher and natural performer, spreading his arms wide, as if to embrace the entire world when he tells his congregants-cum-pupils that God is not just for a few of them, but for all. During a sung Our Father, with a beaming smile he waves his arms in the air to the rhythm, like a conductor before his orchestra. It is a bouncy, joyful Our Father, injecting life into what can be one of more routinized moments in the liturgy.

During Communion, he turns to a statue of Jesus on the cross behind him, the figure bleeding profusely. He points to the host, then back to Jesus, and uses the physical symbolism to explain how Jesus died to wipe away their sins.

In these remote villages that only see a priest once a month, and their bishop yearly, Bishop Stephen is keenly aware that to be effective he needs to instruct and enlighten, not just go through the motions of the Mass. “I must explain the meaning of what I am doing; I want them to better understand what they are partaking in,” Bishop Stephen says after the Mass. “Only then can they fully enjoy it. I’m not great, but God is; I want them to feel that. I take as the gift of God the people that will listen to me.

If I don’t get to speak to someone about God each day, I’m not happy.”

First Chrism Mass strengthens Vietnamese Catholics’ faith --- Holy Week 2019 in Vietnam

At least 3,000 flock to remote northern parish to attend first special Holy Week Mass held there

April 18, 2019

Thousands of Catholics in a mountainous Vietnamese province who attended the first-ever Chrism Mass to be held in their remote locality say it was a sign of God’s love and has strengthened their faith.

More than 3,000 Catholics including many ethnic people attended the special Mass on April 16 outside Vinh Quang Church in Yen Bai province’s Nghia Lo district. The Mass was celebrated outside the church because of the number of people in attendance. Some 130 priests also attended the Chrism Mass, which was celebrated by Bishop John Mary Vu Tat of Hung Hoa. It was the first such Mass to be held in Nghia Lo deanery since local parishes were established 100 years ago.

“It was a completely new experience for me,” Joseph Lam Van Hung, 70, told ucanews.com after the event, adding he had never seen as many priests concelebrate a Mass like that before. Hung, who is from Vinh Quang parish, said the Mass brought “great comfort to local people who have suffered constant persecution.”

He said his family were among 11 Catholic families who moved to the area from famine-hit Thai Binh province in 1900. French missionaries led them in building the church in 1936. Many Catholics were publicly denounced by the communists and were killed or imprisoned from 1953-64.

Local Catholics had no resident priest for 40 years after the last one was jailed in 1964. He said they have suffered various religious restrictions imposed by the government. The parish with 3,600 Catholics still has no resident priests.    “We have to follow our ancestors’ example of bravery by being united in love to develop the parish,” Hung said. His brother Joseph Lam Van Minh, 74, said local people “were proud to host the Chrism Mass, which showed that God loves and blesses us

Father Joseph Nguyen Trong Duong, head of the deanery, called the special Mass a great event that will help cement the faith of 14,000 Catholics, half of whom are from the Hmong, Muong, Thai and Tay ethnic groups. Eight priests in six parishes, 37 subparishes and five mission stations serve them.

“We priests were also inspired by the event, which actively brought Catholicism to local people,” said Father Duong, who provides pastoral care to three parishes. He said Vinh Quang parish was named after two late French missionaries whose Vietnamese names were Vinh and Quang.

 During the Chrism Mass, Bishop Tat, 75, consecrated three oils that are used in the administration of the sacraments — the oil of catechumens for baptism, the oil of the infirm for the anointing of the sick, and the oil for the sacraments of baptism, confirmation and holy orders.

The renewal of priestly vows was incorporated into the Mass. Hung Hoa, the largest of Vietnam’s 27 dioceses in terms of size, covers nine provinces and part of Hanoi. Chrism Masses are traditionally held there before Holy Thursday so that priests have enough time to return to their parishes and celebrate Holy Thursday liturgical services.

Credits : UCA News 

Pentecost Sunday -- The Birthday Of The Universal Catholic Church

The Church celebrates Pentecost, one of the most important feast days of the year that concludes the Easter season and celebrates the beginning of the Church.  
Here’s what you need to know about the feast day:

The timing and origins of Pentecost:

Pentecost always occurs 50 days after the death and resurrection of Jesus, and ten days after his ascension into heaven. Because Easter is a moveable feast without a fixed date, and Pentecost depends on the timing of Easter, Pentecost can fall anywhere between May 10 and June 13.

The timing of these feasts is also where Catholics get the concept of the Novena - nine days of prayer - because in Acts 1, Mary and the Apostles prayed together “continuously” for nine days after the Ascension leading up to Pentecost.

Traditionally, the Church prays the Novena to the Holy Spirit in the days before Pentecost.

The name of the day itself is derived from the Greek word "pentecoste," meaning 50th.

There is a parallel Jewish holiday, Shavu`ot, which falls 50 days after Passover. Shavu’ot is sometimes called the festival of weeks, referring to the seven weeks since Passover.

Originally a harvest feast, Shavu`ot now commemorates the sealing of the Old Covenant on Mount Sinai, when the Lord revealed the Torah to Moses on Mount Sinai. Every year, the Jewish people renew their acceptance of the gift of the Torah on this feast.

What happens at Pentecost?

In the Christian tradition, Pentecost is the celebration of the person of the Holy Spirit coming upon the Apostles, Mary, and the first followers of Jesus, who were gathered together in the Upper Room.
A “strong, driving” wind filled the room where they were gathered, and tongues of fire came to rest on their heads, allowing them to speak in different languages so that they could understand each other.

It was such a strange phenomenon that some people thought the Christians were just drunk - but Peter pointed out that it was only the morning, and that the phenomenon was caused by the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit also gave the apostles the other gifts and fruits necessary to fulfill the great commission - to go out and preach the Gospel to all nations. It fulfills the New Testament promise from Christ (Luke 24:46-49) that the Apostles would be “clothed with power” before they would be sent out to spread the Gospel.

Where’s that in the bible?

The main event of Pentecost (the strong driving wind and tongues of fire) takes place in Acts 2:13, though the events immediately following (Peter’s homily, the baptism of thousands) continue through verse 41.

Happy Birthday, Church:

It was right after Pentecost that Peter, inspired by the Holy Spirit, preached his first homily to Jews and other non-believers, in which he opened the scriptures of the Old Testament, showing how the prophet Joel prophesied events and the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

He also told the people that the Jesus they crucified is the Lord and was raised from the dead, which “cut them to the heart.” When they asked what they should do, Peter exhorted them to repent of their sins and to be baptised. According to the account in Acts, about 3,000 people were baptised following Peter’s sermon.

For this reason, Pentecost is considered the birthday of the Church - Peter, the first Pope, preaches for the first time and converts thousands of new believers. The apostles and believers, for the first time, were united by a common language, and a common zeal and purpose to go and preach the Gospel.

Pentecost vestments and customs around the world:

Typically, priests will wear red vestments on Pentecost, symbolic of the burning fire of God’s love and the tongues of fire that descended on the apostles.

However, in some parts of the world, Pentecost is also referred to as “WhitSunday”, or White Sunday, referring to the white vestments that are typically worn in Britain and Ireland. The white is symbolic of the dove of the Holy Spirit, and typical of the vestments that catechumens desiring baptism wear on that day.

An Italian Pentecost tradition is to scatter rose leaves from the ceiling of the churches to recall the miracle of the fiery tongues, and so in some places in Italy, Pentecost is sometimes called Pascha Rosatum (Easter roses).

In France, it is tradition to blow trumpets during Mass to recall the sound of the driving wind of the Holy Spirit.

In Asia, it is typical to have an extra service, called genuflexion, during which long poems and prayers are recited. In Russia, Mass goers often carry flowers or green branches during Pentecost services.

Credits : Catholic News Agency 

Ascension Sunday and The Holy Eucharist

Our Lord remained on earth for forty days after His Resurrection before ascending to His Father. During this time, He appeared twelve times to His Apostles instructing them, and preparing them for the coming of the Paraclete in His fullness. In the Cenacle, after rising, He appeared to the Apostles and gave them the power of the Holy Ghost so that they could forgive sin.

The Gospels can be a little hard to follow sequentially in their accounts of the Resurrection.

What I found intriguing in the accounts of the Resurrection is that no one believed it until they saw Jesus with their own eyes. And this, even though He had spoken to the Apostles of His passion and resurrection four times. They would not even believe those to whom He had appeared. Our Lord was not pleased; in fact, when He did appear to them all together in the Upper Room “he upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen him after he had risen again” (Mark 16:14).

Take Mary Magdalene for example. She, and a few other holy women, saw the empty tomb and two angels, albeit in the form of young men, sitting in the sepulchre. The angels told the women that Jesus is not there, He has risen, as He said He would. Yet, they did not believe the angels, or if they did, it was weakly so. They were in a state of stupor, “for a trembling and fear had seized them.” Mary Magdelene, even after receiving the news from the angel, still asked “the Gardener” who had asked her why she wept (as had the angel also): “Sir, if thou hast taken him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him, and I will take him away” (John 20:15).

It was then that Jesus revealed Himself to her.

Mark’s Gospel ends with a word about the Ascension, but just in one sentence. More detail is given in Acts. Now Mark is called “the interpreter of Peter,” so we will see the personality of Peter in this disciple’s Gospel more than the others. Notice the emphasis on Baptism at the end of the Gospel. “He that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be condemned (Mark 16:16). Do we need an “interpreter”? Are the words not clear enough? This is the Savior’s last will and testament, so to speak. This is His commission to the Twelve. “Go ye into the whole world, and preach the gospel to every creature” (vs 15).

The words certainly struck Saint Peter. Jesus meant what He said. And, though the Apostle wavered even as he saw the empty tomb, still, in his heart Peter believed: “To whom shall we go Lord?” he had confessed after Our Lord’s challenging sermon on the Eucharist, “thou hast the words of eternal life” (John 6:69).

And these are the signs Jesus promised, as recorded in Mark’s Gospel, that will be given to those who believe: “In my name they shall cast out devils: they shall speak with new tongues. They shall take up serpents; and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them: they shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall recover (Mark 16:17-18).

Peter spoke in tongues, cast out demons, and healed the sick. Why his very shadow healed, as we read in Acts 5:15. In his travels, perhaps he was given poison or, like Saint Paul, was bitten by a serpent. He certainly tread on serpents in the moral sense.

Finally, let us turn to the account of the Ascension in Acts.

“Ye men of Galilee, why stand you looking up to heaven?” As if to say, “You have work to do, you are sent. Ite Missa Est! Get ye down and pray and prepare to receive the Holy Ghost.” Then, “go and set the world on fire!”

“This Jesus who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come, as you have seen him going into heaven.“

What is this coming the angels speak of? It is as Judge. “This word going,” says Saint John Chrysostom, “sufficiently intimates, that he ascended by his own power: for so will he come by his own power to judge the world — Jesus Christ shall come on the last day, in the same body, in the same majesty, to judge the living and the dead. This he had likewise promised, in more than one place of the gospel, speaking of the vengeance, which he will exercise on the city of Jerusalem.”

But the Lord had also promised to be with the Church until the end of time: “Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world” (Matthew 28:19). He said this to the Apostles on a mountain in Galilee sometime before His Ascension from Mount Olivet near Jerusalem.

He ascends yet He remains. He ascends in glory and sits at the right hand of the Father. He remains in love and humility to feed us with His Flesh and Blood and abide with us in our tabernacles. Saint Hilary says “And that same body, which thus ascended to heaven, and which will thus descend, is given us in the blessed Sacrament.” (Super Matt. XXIV: 32)

“O miracle!” exclaims Saint John Chrysostom, “He that sitteth with his Father above, is at the same time handled by men below. Jesus Christ ascending to heaven, both hath his flesh with him above, and hath left it with us below. Elias being taken up, left his disciple, Eliseus, his mantle and double spirit, but the Son of Man ascending, left his own flesh for us.” (Lib. iii. de Sacerd. him. 2. ad pop. Ant. hom. de divit. et paup.)

See here the relation between the Ascension (the going) and the abiding kenosis (the coming). Jesus became our Emmanuel (God with us) for all time on a Thursday, abiding in the Holy Eucharist and making us one with Himself in Holy Communion. And Jesus ascended to His Father in glory on a Thursday where He sits at the Father’s right hand.

The day will come, if we persevere in grace, when our bodies will rise and go to heaven from the grave in glory and we shall sit with the King at His table in one unending Communion.

Good Shepherd Sunday --- A Time To Reflect On The Pure Goodness Of Jesus Christ To Us Mortal Humans

Like most people today, chances are you do not know any shepherds. For the first Christians, who were familiar with shepherds, the Good Shepherd was a favorite image to associate with Christ. In fact, the earliest Christian art depicts Christ as the Good Shepherd, not the crucified Savior. Often he was portrayed as a beardless youth. Surprisingly, the image of Jesus as the Good Shepherd is still popular. In fact, early childhood education experts tell us that young children find the concept of a shepherd and his love for his sheep enchanting.

In the Old Testament God was called a shepherd, and God's people the flock. For instance, in Psalm 23 the psalmist sings that the shepherd leads him to green pastures near refreshing waters. The shepherd guards him in right paths and protects him from evil. God says, “I myself will pasture my sheep; I myself will give them rest. . . . The lost I will seek out, the strayed I will bring back, the injured I will bind up, the sick I will heal” (Ezekiel 34:15-16).

According to the Gospels, Jesus referred to himself as a shepherd. He said, “My sheep hear my voice; I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27). A shepherd knows his sheep well. There is a personal relationship between Jesus and his followers. Jesus knows each of us by name. On the other hand, we respond to his voice and do not follow the voice of strangers who may lead us to harm.

Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:11). Unlike a hired hand who flees to save his life, Jesus saved his flock from the wolf even though it meant sacrificing his own life.

The parable Jesus told about the lost sheep is a story about Jesus' concern and care for us sinners. He is the loving shepherd who goes to great lengths to search for his lost sheep and when he finds it, carries it back on his shoulders rejoicing.

When Jesus gave Peter the responsibility of leading his Church, he again used shepherd imagery. He told Peter, “Feed my lambs. . . . Tend my sheep. . . . Feed my sheep” (John 21:15-17).
Knowing about shepherds sheds light on the image of Jesus as shepherd.

The shepherd uses a staff with a hook on the end to guide the sheep and pull back the stray. Today Jesus guides his flock through bishops, who are known as pastors, the Latin for shepherds. Bishops carry staffs called crosiers. The shepherd has a rod to fend off wild animals that might harm the flock. Jesus saved us from evil.

Jesus restores our souls. Shepherds feed their flocks. Jesus feeds us with the excellent bread of the Eucharist and brings us to living waters: baptism and the Holy Spirit.

The image of shepherds is that they are kind, loving, patient, strong, and self-sacrificing. They are a good image for Jesus. And sheep, who can be rather stupid and foolish creatures, are a good symbol for us!

Homily For Divine Mercy Sunday 2020

Today we celebrate this love that reveals itself, is implemented as mercy in our daily existence and urges each of us to have “mercy” towards the Crucifix. In fact, the life of the good Christian consists in the holy desire of God, loving him and his neighbor and even the “enemies”.

Christ reveals not only that God is Love, but that God is mercy because He not only loves man but the Risen One shows that He loved the guilty man. God has not only good children but also rebellious ones, beings who are not worthy neither useful nor pleasant in themselves nor good to Him.

He has loved and loves those who are farthest from him and the most miserable, the most adverse and the worst. This love was prodigious not only in itself and for the intimate happiness of God, but also for the undeserving beings who are its inexplicable object of love. God, paternally loving the sinner, gives an example of supreme goodness saving him with recreating forgiveness.

Mercy bows over evil not for it to remain and or justice to be won, but rather for justice to be recomposed in its rights and have its claim. God loves the bad person not because he is such, but to make him a good one. While pushing mercy to the point of canceling the fatal consequences of sin, God restores the absoluteness of the moral law bringing the sinner back to it.

This singular relationship between mercy and justice is one of the most profound and most clearly resolved problems of Christianity. No one thinks that God’s mercy, announced as it should be and revealed in its source and in its term, which is Love, is complicit with evil and weakens the strength of the moral imperative. Mercy manifests to everyone that it alone can recover the lost good to repay the evil done and to generate new forces of justice and holiness.

Today as then, the liturgical celebration is not simply a commemoration of past events, nor even a mystical and interior experience, but essentially an encounter with the risen Lord, who lives in the dimension of God, beyond time and space. Nevertheless, he makes himself truly present amid the community, speaks to us in the Holy Scriptures and breaks for us the Bread of eternal life. Through these signs we live what the disciples experienced, that is the fact of seeing Jesus and at the same time not recognizing him. It can also happen to us to touch his body, a real Eucharistic body that gives peace.

In this regard, it is useful to recall what the Gospel says, namely that Jesus, in the two apparitions to the Apostles gathered in the Upper Room, greets them several times saying “Peace be with you” (Jn 20: 19.21.26). The traditional greeting, with which we wish each other hope and peace, becomes here a new thing: it becomes the gift of the peace that only Jesus can give because it is the fruit of his radical victory over evil. The “peace” that Jesus offers to his friends is the fruit of God’s love that led him to die on the cross and to shed all his blood as a gentle and humble Lamb “full of grace and truth” (Jn 1:14).

This is the reason why Saint John Paul II wanted to name the Sunday after Easter Sunday of the Divine Mercy with a very precise icon: that of the pierced side of Christ from which blood and water come out, according to the eyewitness testimony of the apostle John (see Jn 19: 34-37). Now Jesus is risen and from Him the Easter sacraments of Baptism and the Eucharist spring forth: those who approach them with faith receive the gift of eternal life.

This Sunday’s Gospel shows how the Risen Lord helps to confirm this faith in the Apostle Thomas and in each of us, who like this apostle want to meet Christ by touching him. This Gospel passage, in fact, shows the merciful goodness of Christ, who – to help the faith of St. Thomas the Apostle, appears a second time and asks him to put his finger into His pierced chest from which blood and water had come out. (Jn19, 34)

Today we are asked to remember the encounter of an incredulous man who could put his hand into Christ’s chest. From Christ’s heart pierced by sin surges the wave of mercy. Even if our sins were dark as the night, divine mercy is stronger than our misery. Only one thing is needed, that the sinner leaves ajar the door of his heart…God will do the job.

Saint Faustina Kowalska wrote that everything begins in His mercy and everything ends in His mercy.  For this reason, Saint John Paul II had dedicated the Second Sunday of Easter to the Divine Mercy.

In fact, today’s liturgy, starting with the first prayer, is a liturgy of mercy. Undoubtedly Saint John Paul II decision was inspired by the private revelations of Saint Faustina who saw two rays of light, a red one which represents blood and a white one which represents water, coming out from the chest of Christ. If blood recalls the sacrifice of the cross and the gift of the Eucharist, water recalls baptism and the gift of the Holy Spirit. (Jn 3:5; 4:14; 7:37-39).

Through the pierced chest of the crucified Christ, divine mercy reaches humanity. Jesus is “Love and Mercy personified” (Saint Faustina Kowlaska, Diaries 374). Mercy is the “second name” of Love (Dives in Misericordia, 7) caught in his most deep and tender meaning and in his ability to take charge of every need and, above all, of the need of forgiveness. “The great wound of the soul is the great mercy of God” (Saint Eusebius).

Jesus “uses” the ointment of his chest’s sore to cure Thomas’s heart, which has been wounded by incredulity. The medicine of his mercy is greater than human sins. He goes to Thomas, to his disciples and to every one of us and doesn’t ask “What did you do?” but “Do you love me?” as He did to Peter on the lake’s shore after the resurrection. The answer that Peter and we have is our pain, but that’s enough for Him. In the same way, He did with Peter, He confirms us in his merciful love, a love that liberates, heals and saves.

We are poor and fragile things, but we can rejoice if we say,” My God I trust you” (as suggested to Saint Faustina by Jesus; Diaries, 327) because the announcement of this mercy is the source of gladness: Jesus is mercy. He is the envoy by the Father to let us know that the supreme characteristic of the essence of God is mercy.

We should ask ourselves if we are always conscious of the fact that we live because of God’s mercy and of his charity that gives us life, freedom, love, hope, forgiveness and all graces. We should also ask ourselves if we practice charity. Charity is a fact that touches the roots of man’s life because it is acceptance of the way of living of Christ, who “for your sake became poor although he was rich, so that by his poverty you might become rich” (2 Cor 8:9). It is the acceptance that Christ is the richness of our life and that we must follow him without regretting what we leave behind. (Mt 19, 21)

Charity/ mercy is not pure and simple philanthropy, but it is the love for Christ that we reach through our poorest brothers: “whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.” (Mt 25).  Therefore, Christ accepts that the most expensive perfume is “wasted” on him instead of being sold to get money for the poor. Christ is the valid foundation of every love for the poor.

Merciful Jesus Christ, I Trust In You.

Merciful Jesus Christ, I Believe In Your Love For Me.

Merciful Jesus Christ, Your Kingdom Come.