3rd Sunday of Easter - Year A - 30th April, 2017
The most difficult question that could be put to you is: ‘Who is Jesus Christ for you, personally?’ I’m sure it is the ‘personally’ bit that gives you the challenge.
The Search began
One day I heard a lady say from her death-bed: “Isn’t it wonderful that Jesus Christ, with whom I hope to spend eternity has been with me under my roof?” That speaks to our hearts: Jesus is going to be our forever friend in heaven – maybe it is about time we got to know each other!
At other times Jesus is the one who walks in our footsteps and indeed invites us to walk in his; Jesus is the one praying in our midst: I eavesdrop on him as he prays for all known to me, my family, my friends and even my enemies, with the same sincerity and fervour.
The children teach us
Over the next two weekends the children will make their First Holy Communion, that is, they will receive Jesus into their hearts for the first time. We would love to be that child again, full of innocence and wonder and full of faith. Jesus comes to the children as a friend. With the guidance of their parents, families, teachers and parish catechists, the children know that Jesus is their forever friend and that he loves them. He speaks to us adults and says, that unless we become like children again, we cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.
A child-like faith
In the gospel today we read: ‘Jesus himself came up and walked by their side; but something prevented them from recognizing him.’ Later we will hear that they will recognize him in the Breaking of Bread. (That was their Mass.)
The Children can make us holy Let us look at the children receive and learn from their child-like faith and say: 'I live now, not I but Jesus Christ lives in me’ as our thanksgiving prayer.
Just a thought!
What would I give up, what would I sacrifice, just to have that childlike faith again?
Fr. Michael McCullagh C.M.