Sixth Sunday of Easter
Fr Dominic’s homily
The scene of today’s Gospel is set during the Last Supper. Why are we hearing this now that we are in the Easter season?
It’s because Jesus is giving his last will and testament which doesn’t come into effect until he dies – so we are reading his will if you like to know what his plans were for what was to happen after his resurrection. And especially at the feast of Pentecost which we celebrate in two weeks’ time.
So the scene is that his crucifixion was just about to occur and He was giving them His last words of love and consolation and support.
He speaks about the trinity. The triune nature of God. This is the central mystery of our faith because it explains who God is in himself. It’s closely followed by the incarnation where Jesus becomes a human being for us and then the Eucharist where he provides us with his spiritual nourishment.
Up to this point Jesus had protected the disciples, taught them and guided them. So the disciples were worried. Who would look after them now? Who would have all the answers now? But God would not leave them, as he will never leave us.
So he tells them that they would have His support and guidance through the power of His Holy Spirit, the Advocate – the one who would act on his behalf. God would send the Holy Spirit as their teacher, advocate, inspirer and guide.
Jesus consoles his disciples with his promise of the Holy Spirit who will teach them everything they need to know. And with the help of the Holy Spirit, they can announce the good news of salvation to the whole world.
The gift of peace that Jesus promises to give the disciples – and to us - is a peace that we can never achieve through this world. This is good because it also means that the world can never take it away either because it comes from God himself. It’s a supernatural peace.
St. Augustine reminds us that this sort of peace gives us Serenity of the mind, Simplicity of heart and Tranquillity of soul.
Serenity is the opposite of anxiety. It’s easy for us as human beings to exaggerate our fears often we worry too much about situations. Remember true love knows no fear. There is that famous saying that:
70 percent of the things we worry about never happen
20 percent aren’t really that serious
And so the remaining 10 percent we can manage with Gods help.
Without simplicity of heart our emotions can run wild. We can get angry, upset and envious. So it’s good to simplify our wants, desires and needs.
Lack of tranquillity means that we are not at peace because our lives feel messy. This is often more psychological than actual. This usually happens when we are chained to the past or worried by the future and are not living fully in the present moment.
We know that we never really reach peace through our jobs, our families, our friends, our possessions. Because these are all worldly attributes. They may be wonderful in themselves – but we shouldn’t expect them to fulfil us.
And why is that? Because we have a spiritual dimension to us and this can only be fulfilled in a spiritual way. That’s why we need a personal relationship with Jesus that needs to be regularly fed.
Often there are parts of our lives that we keep at arms length without ever fully accepting it them. We shut them out. Once we accept everything deeply into our hearts then we can start to live life to the full.
Jesus tells his disciples that he will go away but it will not be over. In fact His death and resurrection will be the crowning glory of His work. He will have a different kind of presence among us in the Holy Spirit.
This means trusting that God can bring fruitfulness from all those situations in life that we deem as utterly hopeless. Which is probably the story of the Old Testament in a nutshell.
Jesus knows the road for all of us can be long and tough so with the Holy Spirit as our teacher and our guide we will be able to reach our true home, destination and resting place that is in the loving embrace of God himself.