The Paraclete from Heaven

From the Catholic Liturgy for the 6th Sunday of Easter, May 21, 2017 - John 14:15-21. The Promise of the Holy Spirit. This Sunday's Gospel comes from the middle of Jesus’ Farewell Discourse at the Last Supper and informs us about the mission of the Holy Spirit in the life of a disciple and in the Church at large. The word John used in his original Greek version, parakletos, is translated as paraclete in traditional Catholic vocabulary, but is most meaningfully rendered into modern American English as defense attorney or public defender. Other acceptable translations of this original Greek word can be: advocate, counselor, encourager, intercessor, helper but they all carry that same nuance of "someone with authority who attends up for us before others, particularly before those who accuse or persecute us." In other words, we are not in this alone. In our daily living of the Gospel, in our efforts to serve others, in our daily work carried out with a Christian example, in our conversations with peers and friends...the Spirit is ever-present ready to help us with the words and fortitude we need to witness Christ.

But here’s the thing: no matter how good or wise our Public Defender may be, it will be beneficial to us in court only to the extent that we listen to what he or she says and put their counsel into practice, right? Our defense attorney will tell us when to speak up and give our testimony; when to be quiet and just sit still and listen.  The very same hold true with the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit. He will tell us what to do, when to speak out and when to remain silent. Our witness to Christ will only be as fruitful and effective as is our listening to the Spirit and putting following His inspirations. And how to we do this? By prayer. Not just reciting prayers, but prayer of the heart, being still before the Lord, asking for advice and then listening in the silence of our hearts. And we need to do this every day for at least a short bit of time.

Today’s Liturgy also links to the Sacrament of Confirmation, which is indeed, along with Baptism and Eucharist, an Easter Sacrament. As a matter of fact, the great solemnity of Pentecost which closes up the Easter Season is considered the first "confirmation" of the Catholic Church! And today’s first reading, where Peter & John lay hands of newly baptized Christians and confer the Holy Spirit, is the classic New Testament text used to illustrate Confirmation in the early Church. And Confirmation is above all the sacrament of mission, of witness, of giving testimony to Christ by our words and behavior. So we can easily see its connection to the Spirit as Paraclete. So, on this 6^th Sunday of Easter, let’s renew our Confirmation and recommit ourselves to follow the wisdom and advice of our Personal Defender, the Holy Spirit, who dwells within us. Let’s open hearts to his guidance and follow his inspirations so that others may come to know and believe that Jesus is risen and desires to reign as Lord in every human heart.

The Hero of Our Rescue Mission

From the Catholic Liturgy for the 5^TH Sunday of Easter – John 14:1-2 – Jesus the Way, Truth & Life.  John’s Gospel has 7 sayings of self-revelation by Jesus that tell us about his mission as well his identity. They all begin with "I Am" and they inform us as to what kind of relationship Jesus desires to have with each one of us.  The I Am Saying in this Sunday's Gospel is one of the most encompassing of them all. Jesus says, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life; no one comes to the Father except through Me." (Jn 14:6)   To truly understand this relationship that Jesus desires to have with us, we have to keep that He came to earth, became one of us, for the sake of a rescue mission.

He came to undo the mess caused by Adam and Eve's decision (which we call original sin) to live life on their own terms apart from God and take the consequences.   What did this mean for all of us humans, their descendants? Fundamentally, it meant that the way to Heaven was closed to humanity by our own choosing.  It meant that sin entered into our daily realities and caused confusion and cloudiness in our moral thinking and choosing. It meant that sickness and suffering would plague our lives, which God originally created as harmonious and joyful. Death became the only escape, the only way out of this compromised existence.  And so Jesus came to us as the Way, the Truth and the Life:

Jesus shows us the Way to live as humans and He sanctified our human experiences. So, we are rescued by Jesus the Way from living our everyday lives in alienation from God as Adam and Eve chose to do. Jesus shares our experience and relives it with each one of us if we open our hearts and ask Him to do so.  Jesus proclaims the Truth and we find that Truth in the Gospels and teachings of his Church, which apply the Gospel to our contemporary lives.  And so, we follow Jesus the Truth and are rescued from the misleading darkness of error by reading his gospel frequently and by studying our Catholic Faith. While  to follow Jesus as Way and Truth is excellent,  it doesn’t complete the rescue mission.  There is still that matter of suffering and of death to overturn.

The way Jesus chose to rescue us from these realties was by facing them head-on himself, not exempting himself from these consequences of original sin.  By his death & resurrection he destroyed the power of sickness and suffering to be victimizing and meaningless in our lives.  He actually turns the tide on them and transforms the bad news of suffering into the good news of salvation.  He faced the ultimate evil, the most final consequence of original sin, that of death, and turned that black hole of nothingness into a gateway to eternal life, to a real life, an existence beyond our imagining.

Let’s thank Jesus for the gift of this threefold relationship with us. And let’s ask for the grace to never forget that more than any other voice or celebrity that clamors for our attention, no one goes back to the Father except through Him, the hero and champion of our rescue mission.

Flock of Sheeple?

From the Catholic Liturgy for the 4^th Sunday of Easter, May 7, 2017. John 10:1-10. Christ is the Good Shepherd and we are His sheep. Sheep & shepherds were very familiar sight to the people of Jesus’ time. We might think it’s kind of cute to be compared to wooly soft & cuddly animals but, you see, it is not really a compliment to call us sheep. It's a reality check in humility and truth.  It tells us why we need a Good Shepherd. You see, the people listening to Jesus 2,000 years ago knew that sheep were dumb, directionless, and defenseless and so are we when it comes to knowing what is really good for us in order to be reasonable happy here on planet earth and then infinitely happy with God forever in Heaven.

First, sheep are dumb - they will follow their leader into oblivion.  We are, by nature, sheep-people. Or, as a brand new word in the dictionary puts it: sheeple. Sheeple describes those who follow the crowd, who give in to popular opinion or influence without critical thinking, no matter what the outcome might be in the long-run.  And every single one of us, because of the effects of original sin upon our human nature, can easily become sheeple.

Second, since sheep are dumb they are also directionless. That's why shepherds use sheep dogs. These dogs keep the flock together and make sure that the sheep who are in the lead are going in the right direction. Christ gives us “sheep-dogs” in the ministry of the pope, the bishops, parish priests and deacons, parents, and of the parish as a good Christian community. These give us direction and keep us going on the right path so that we do not stray and find ourselves separated from the flock.

Lastly, the dumb directionless sheep are among the most defenseless of animals. Sheep don't fight, they do not have fangs or claws.  Sheep cannot run fast at all, they kind of ramble along. Sheep have no threatening look or growl to scare away predators.  But today’s Gospel doesn’t focus on animal predators, it warns us about thieves and robbers who often tried to break into the corral or pen at night. Back in the day, a good shepherd would protect his sheep by rolling out his sleeping mat across the sheep-gate, the entrance, so that if anyone tried to take them, they would first have to go through him. And isn’t that exactly what Jesus did for us?  He laid himself down, laid down his life, on the wood of the cross and gave himself up for our eternal safety and well-being.

Let’s pray for the humility to acknowledge that if we are not careful, if we do not cling to the Good Shepherd and follow his voice, we can easily become sheeple, living like dumb, directionless and defenseless sheep. Let’s turn to our Blessed Mother, in this month of May especially dedicated to her, and place ourselves under her protection, because she is the Mother of the Good Shepherd and loves us, his sheep, with all her heart.