Daily Gospel Reflection – Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Easter
May 9, 2023
Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Easter
Gospel: 14:27-31a
Jesus said to his disciples:
"Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.
Not as the world gives do I give it to you.
Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.
You heard me tell you,
'I am going away and I will come back to you.'
If you loved me,
you would rejoice that I am going to the Father;
for the Father is greater than I.
And now I have told you this before it happens,
so that when it happens you may believe.
I will no longer speak much with you,
for the ruler of the world is coming.
He has no power over me,
but the world must know that I love the Father
and that I do just as the Father has commanded me."
*United States Conference of Catholic
Bishop Robert Barron
Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus promises his Second Coming.
In one sense, Christianity is a religion of fulfillment (the Lord has come), but in another sense, it is a religion of waiting, for we expect the Second Coming of Jesus in the fullness of his power. We wait and watch and keep vigil.
What we all know is that great things take time. When a kid comes to an artist’s studio to apprentice, he has to submit to a long and difficult discipline; when a young man enters a monastery or a seminary, he has to do a lot of waiting; when a woman becomes pregnant, she has to wait nine long months before the baby is ready; when a gardener works, he waits and watches and cultivates; when an author writes a book, he has to let it come on its own terms and in its own time.
"How long does this analysis take?" a woman asked Carl Jung. He replied, "Just as long as it takes." Gestation, growth. So we endure the harsh and the sweet processes that make growth possible.
COMMENTS