Bulletins by St. Clare Parish (Page 10)

“Without cost you have received; without cost you are to give.” It was with this instruction that Jesus sent the Apostles to continue the work that he had begun. The “gift” that is so freely given is a reminder that God’s own life in us, which we call “grace,” is given to us so that we can just as freely share with others. We remember that every gift and blessing that comes our way is destined for another, that we are stewards of all that is ours. Jesus continues to summon us, to gather us as His very own: “The harvest is rich, but the laborers are few.” By virtue of our Baptism, each is commis-sioned by the Lord to share His work, whatever we do and wherever we go.

The Eucharist is God’s greatest gift to humanity, “the Lord’s presence in His absence.” In this year of Eucharistic Renewal, Catholics are invited to focus and pray over the words, “My flesh is true food, my blood is true drink.” The “living bread that came down from heaven” pledges eternal life. . . “unlike your ancestors who ate [manna] in the desert, whoever eats this bread and drinks this cup will live forever.” In the Sacrament of His Body and Blood, Jesus is really present. The Church has long described this in terms of the ancient term, “transubstantiation,” which is not easily grasped by most of us. When we ask our young people who have been well-prepared to receive Holy Communion whether or not the Eucharist is the real Body and Blood of the Lord, the responses are generally split right down the middle. A number of years, a survey of American Catholics came upon some ambivalence regarding the “Real Presence” of Christ in the Eucharist. Some decried this as a lack of faith on our part; it is probably fairer to state that there is a misunderstanding about how the consecrated Bread and Wine are signs and symbols of what they truly are and what the truly signify. To put it in the words of a class on liturgy that I took long ago at SCU, a symbol embodies that for which it is a symbol. It is not merely a sign that points to another reality. The symbol is the other reality. As such, the bread and wine of the Eucharist are not only signs of the Body and Blood of Christ; through the power of the Holy Spirit and the prayer of the Church, they truly become what they signify. They become the Body and Blood of the Lord. That is how and why the consecrated Bread and Wine are in actuality the very realities of which they are signs: the Body and Blood of the Lord. When we say our “Amen” to the minister who distributes the Host, our Amen is our assent to two dual realities: that which we receive into our hands and, at the very same time, the Body and Blood of Christ, which we are called to be-come! Finally, it has been said often that “the Eucharist makes the Church.” A corollary of this is that if there is no Eucharist, so goes the Church. That is why we are invited and challenged to celebrate the Eucharist every Sunday, or at least as often as our health allows.

Saint John’s most precise description of God is: “God is love.” This does not mean simply that God is loving, but that it is God’s nature, before all else, the essence of God is love poured out. Love is the bond among the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. It is the source of all that is, all that has been and will ever be throughout the entirety of the universe or even the sum of all possible universes. To be anything other than love cannot be. God’s love is not a selfish love, as though God were looking into the mirror and is pleased. Saint Augustine describes it this way: God is the Lover, the Beloved and the Love that is between Lover and Beloved. The Father loves the Son, and the Son the Father and the bond of their love is the Spirit, which is poured into our hearts. That love is so great that Creation was the result – It is another great mystery, how something came into being from nothingness. This is what we celebrate this weekend as the foundation of all and, at the very same time, as the goal of our lives: to be love as God is love.

This weekend’s reading focus on the gift of the Holy Spirit, promised by Jesus. Although we are still two weeks away from Pentecost, the Church prepares us, just as Jesus did the Apostles. He called the Spirit “another Advocate, the Spirit of truth,” and He assured them that they would not be orphaned. Through the Spirit, Jesus would always be with His followers, even as He never abandons us. On Mother’s Day, we reflect on this same abiding love, which most of us have shared with our mothers. Although it is often branded as a “Hallmark occasion,” this second Sunday in May provides us an opportunity to offer our thanks to our mothers and all of the “mothers” in our lives for their nurturing love. Indeed, when we wish “Happy Mothers Day” to someone we love, we are saying far more. So, from all of us who serve you, we are pleased to say Happy Mothers Day to all of you. May God continue to bless you now and always.

On the night before He died, Jesus’ message to the disciples was clear: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” Even as the Lord was facing the Passion, His concern was for the others: “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places.” We continue to hear these words of consolation, hope and promise, the assurance to us of the loving embrace of God, no matter what: “I am the way and the truth and the life.” Just as Thomas, Philip and the other Apostles were troubled and confused, so are we at various times in our lives. The Lord will not give up on us, even as He did not give up on them. And together we encourage one another in our faith. That is one of the beauties of the Christian community, which each of us is privileged to share, wherever we might be at this moment on the continuum of faith.

In the tenth chapter of the Gospel of John, Jesus describes Himself as the Good (or “ideal”) Shepherd and the “Gate” for the sheep, the One who will lay down His life for the sake of the flock. This biblical image of shepherds and sheep reminds us of King David, who himself was shepherding his father’s flock when he was anointed to be King over all of Israel. Jesus, proclaimed as “Son of David,” is Shepherd- King, the Servant of all. We who follow Him are asked to be the same: authority is for loving service, whether in our homes and families, in our parish and beyond. In the Diocese of San José, “Good Shepherd Sunday.” (the Fourth Sunday of Easter) is the weekend on which an annual collection is taken to benefit the Retirement Fund for our Diocesan Priests. This Sunday was chosen in the hope that parishioners throughout the Diocese might relate the priests who served them for decades in the past to Jesus, the Good Shepherd. There is a lengthy announcement about this collection here in the bulletin. I would ask you to review it when considering if you can make a gift to support the retired and soon-retired priests of our Diocese.

A hymn comes to mind, in the original Spanish: Por la calzada de Emaús un peregrino iba conmigo. No le conocí al caminar; ahora sí, en la fracción del pan. [Along the road to Emmaus a pilgrim was with me. I did not know him when walking; now yes, in the breaking of the bread.] The proverbial “Road to Emmaus” is the age-old story of disciples encountering the Lord who walks with them along the paths of their lives. It also presents the pattern of our worship: breaking open the Scriptures and the Breaking of the Bread. It is through the latter that the former makes sense, as recounted in the gospel account: “Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?” and “And it happened that, while he was with them at table, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them. With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight.” Jesus does not wait for us to call upon Him or for us to go where we expect Him to be (as in the church). He finds us and walks with us, present to us especially in our time of need. The Risen Lord continues to be present to us. We need to attune ourselves to recognize Him in the Scriptures, the Eucharist and at every moment of our lives.

Easter is so great a feast that it cannot be contained in one day alone. For us, the “day” of Easter extends for a whole week, until today. The Easter Season extends until Pentecost, which we celebrate on May 28. During this past week, we have been hearing gospel accounts of Easter morning and Easter night. In today’s gospel reading, we join the apostles – all of them except Thomas – on the night of Easter and again the following week. They were slow to understand and accept what had happened, even as we might have been. After all, they knew that Jesus had died and was buried; they could not imagine that he was alive again. For us who have celebrate Easter and the Lord’s Resurrection for most or all of our lives, perhaps the opposite is true: we are so used to the idea of Resurrection that we do not appreciate how truly earthshaking it is and what a rupture in the human condition it represents. Psalm 118 captures this reality: “This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad.” Only God turns death into life. Let us rejoice and let us be glad!