Monday, April 17, 2023

 Monday of the Second Week of Easter

 (Acts 4:23-31; John 3:1-8)

 In Leonard Bernstein’s epic musical Mass, the epistle is sung as a tribute to the “Word of the Lord.”  Addressed to “men of power,” the song exalts what the Acts of the Apostles teaches about the efficacy of God’s message.  Over the long run, the song says, God’s message of love will conquer the pride, ambition, and contempt of the powerful.

In today’s passage from Acts, Peter and John have just returned from being told by the Jewish Sanhedrin never to speak the name of Jesus again.  The apostles, having openly defied the order, now pray with the Christian community for strength.  Their stance is confirmed as the room shakes with the approval of the people moved by the Holy Spirit.

 Although its contents are only words, the Word of God can threaten the interests of the powerful.  It speaks of God’s desire that humans worship Him, not the heads of armies.  We must study it, understand it, preach it, and live it as God’s servants. 

Tuesday, April 19, 2016

Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Easter

(Acts 11:19-26; John 10:22-30)

In his Mass Leonard Bernstein composes a marvelous tribute to Scripture.  The song “The Word of the Lord” declares that autocratic powers may incarcerate God’s preachers, but they cannot imprison the message they preach.  In today’s reading from Acts, Luke also shows how the word spreads in the primitive church with similar dynamism. 

Followers of Jesus, after being persecuted in Jerusalem, evangelize in other places.  They preach exclusively to Jews, but their converts do not discriminate.  When they come to Antioch, they preach to everyone.  The Greek followers of Jesus cannot be called Jews because they do not follow the Jewish Law.  The entire community – Jews as well as Greeks – must re-identify.  They call themselves Christians.  It is the beginning of a new era for the Church which is still in existence.

If the word of God seems stymied today because of secularism in many Western countries, it has hardly lost its dynamism in Africa and Asia.  It is convincing large numbers of people in these places that Jesus is the way to happiness.  In today’s gospel it tells of Jesus delivering the message: “I give (my sheep) eternal life, and they shall never perish.”