Thursday, April 1, 2021

 Holy Thursday – Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper

(Exodus 12:1-8.11-14; I Corinthians 15:23-26; John 13:1-15)

An American rabbi writes of a Passover his father, a Polish emigrant, had many years ago.  He says that his father had gone to Lithuania to study in a Hebrew school.  However, he was captured by the Soviets and sent to a workcamp in Siberia.  There he and his friends prepared for Passover while harvesting summer wheat.  They saved a few kernels each day and hid them until the following spring to make matzoh.  They fashioned a rolling pin from the gears of an old clock and a piece of wood.  The pin was used to perforate the matzoh dough so that it would bake quickly and thoroughly.  Then in the middle of a Spring night, the boys baked the matzoh in a hut with an oven.  On Passover night they came together to fulfill the biblical mandate that was reiterated in today’s first reading.  They thanked God, the Creator, for His great kindness.

The apostle Paul tells us in the second reading how Jesus transformed the Passover supper.  He took the unleavened bread, blessed it, and said that it was his body.  When he blessed the wine and called it his blood, he spoke of a new covenant between him and his disciples.  The new covenant would supplant the old, not entirely replacing it but adding substantially to it.

Tonight’s gospel reveals the difference.  At the anticipated Passover feast in John’s gospel Jesus washes the feet of his disciples.  The gesture is meant to be symbolic.  Jesus tells his disciples that they are to serve one another as he just served them. In the long discourse that the foot washing initiates, Jesus further explains himself.  His disciples are not only to thank God for His kindness but are to love one another as radically as he loves them.  That is, they must be ready to die for one another. 

Most of us have difficulty acknowledging much good in others.  Some, however, like that police officer killed in Boulder, Co., last week, have the courage to love radically like Jesus.  Tonight we want to pray for him and for the many loving people we have known in our lives.  Perhaps some of these died in the pandemic this past year.  We also should pray for one another and ourselves that we will emerge from this Easter weekend triumphant with the Lord.  We hope to have Jesus’ Spirit of love more deeply embedded with us.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Holy Thursday

(Exodus 12:1-8.11-14; I Corinthians 11:23-26; John 13:1-15)

Tomorrow evening Jewish families will gather in their homes to celebrate Passover. Many will eat the traditional foods and have their children ask the four famous questions leading to a retelling of Israel’s liberation from slavery in Egypt. Such a supper comprises the context of today’s gospel.

Although it is taken in the customary way, Jesus gives the meal a new significance for his followers. It is to commemorate not just Israel’s release from forced servitude but humanity’s deliverance from spiritual bondage. By identifying the bread that is blessed, broken, and shared with his body and the wine which is likewise blessed and drunk with his blood, Jesus points to his imminent death and resurrection as humanity’s emancipation from sin.

What proof do we have that this liberation has taken place? This is a legitimate question in the face of widespread maliciousness, even among Christians. It should not be answered by invoking the cover of a “mystery of faith.” We see ample evidence of liberation in the saints who through two millennia have happily followed Jesus’ example of washing the feet of others. That is, they did not literally pour water over the feet of the needy, but they patiently cared for their well-being. Such a person died in Dallas just a week ago. Fr. Matt Robinson would graciously assist all callers at the door and, until his religious community installed voice mail, the telephone. He was always available for confession and for the last half of his life worked tirelessly for the unborn.

Friday, April 16, 2010

Friday of the Second Week of Easter

(Acts 5:34-42; John 6:1-15)

Once I met a Jewish friend on the day before Passover. He remarked that the feast provides an excuse for a party. He was being a bit irreverent, of course, but what he said hit the mark. Passover gives reason to rejoice as it celebrates Israel’s release from Egyptian slave gangs.

John the Evangelist notes that Jesus feeds the crowds at Passover time. This is not a detail to add realism to his story; rather, it frames the account in gold. It tells us that Jesus’ feeding the five thousand men and an untold number of women and children has a liberation theme. The people’s attention to Jesus frees them from helpless attachment to sin. Their participation in his supper gives energizes them for life’s journey. The fact that the people carry home leftovers underscores Jesus’ accomplishment.

We should find ourselves involved in this same process of liberation during the Eucharist. The Word of God prunes us of vices while the bread and wine, changed into Jesus’ body and blood, charge us with his life. Carefully attended to with prayer, the Eucharist allows us to feel in our lives the effects of Christ’s redemption.

Homilette for Thursday, April 9, 2009

Holy Thursday – Evening Mass of the Lord’s Supper

(Exodus 12:1-8.11-14; I Corinthians 15:23-26; John 13:1-15)

At a Jewish Passover meal the youngest at table asks, “Why is tonight different from all other nights?” We might make a similar question for our meeting here this evening. How is this mass different from other masses? The answer is, of course, that in this mass we give ourselves in a special way to remembering.

The word remember literally means to put the component parts or members back together. When we remember we recreate what existed in the past to make it present to us now. This evening we remember three events of faith found in the Scripture readings. First, we recall God’s liberating the Israelites from their exile in Egypt. Second, we reestablish Jesus’ initiation of the Eucharist on the night before he died. And finally, we bring to mind Jesus’ astonishing show of humility when he washes his disciples’ feet.

Dogs can remember in a sense, and we regularly pay a false compliment to computers by speaking of their memory. We must distinguish our act of remembering as different from the trivial memories in animals and machines. When we humans remember, we assign meaning to past events and allow the new meanings to shape our lives. In our first memory this evening we understand the liberation of the Israelites as our own deliverance from the captivity of sin accomplished through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Our remembrance of the first Eucharist allows us to imagine the celestial banquet in which we hope to participate with Jesus, the Father, the saints, and all our beloved. Our final instance of remembering shows us to reach our heavenly goal. We are to become like Jesus imitating his service to others in the spirit of love.

Homilette for Friday, April 20, 2007

Friday, II Easter

(John 6)

A Jewish friend whom I saw on the day before Passover remarked how the feast is an excuse for a party. He was being a bit irreverent, but what he said was on the mark. Passover gives reason to rejoice as it celebrates Israel’s release from Egyptian slave gangs to Sinai’s song of freedom.

John the Evangelist notes that Jesus feeds the crowds at Passover time. This is not just a minor detail to add realism to the story. Rather, it frames the story in gold. It tells us that Jesus’ feeding the five thousand men and an untold number of women and children has a liberation theme. The people’s attention to Jesus frees them from helpless attachment to sin and inspires a responsive life of virtue. The fact that the people sate themselves and still find abundant leftovers illustrates Jesus’ accomplishment.

We can find ourselves involved in this same development at Mass. The Word of God prunes our vices while the Eucharistic bread and wine charge our lives with grace. We find ourselves increasingly free of egotistic concerns. Indeed, we can more readily give ourselves to the Lord in love.