THE MOST HOLY TRINITY

31 MAY 2026

 

          Today’s Gospel contains the best-known verse of the Bible.  We see John 3:16 at sports events – behind home plate in baseball, in the end zones at football games, behind the baskets at basketball games, and others.  It summarizes the whole Gospel of Jesus Christ.  In his secret meeting at night, Jesus tells Nicodemus how much God loves the “world” (kosmos).  John uses the word kosmos nearly 80 times, painting a picture of a system that is fundamentally opposed to God. He describes this negative kosmos in three distinct ways.

            First, he points out that the world is spiritually blind, and that the world simply cannot perceive or comprehend spiritual truth.  In the first chapter of his Gospel, John says that the One who shared in the creation of the world entered it at his birth.  The world had become so spiritually blind that humanity did not know who he was.  Later in the Gospel, Jesus says that the world cannot accept the Spirit of Truth, “because it neither sees him nor knows him.”

            Second, the world is actively hostile to the truth, because the light of truth will expose the brokenness of the world.  Jesus tells his disciples that the world hates him, because he testifies to what is evil in the world.  After Pentecost, the disciples found that the world hates them and persecutes them, because it hated their Lord.

            Finally, the world is under dark leadership.  Jesus presents kosmos as a rebel kingdom working directly in opposition to God’s kingdom.  As he approaches the cross, Jesus insists that it is the time of judgment of this world, and the prince of this world will be driven out.  Standing before Pilate, Jesus draws a final, stark contrast: “My kingdom is not of this world.
            John paints a picture of the world that looks incredibly dark.  It can be blind, hateful, and ruled by a dark power.  For Nicodemus and the Jewish people, the kosmos includes the Roman Empire and the corrupt Sanhedrin.  Today, we do not have to look far to see the darkness in our own world.  Despite much progress, we know that racism is still very much part of our world. We see the systemic exploitation of the vulnerable.  Too often, the powerful ignore their needs so that they can maintain and expand their power.  People tend to us euphemisms to ignore the reality of abortion.  They insist that it is “health care.”  Too many people in authority prefer to use their power to control, instead of entering into dialogue.  Leaders wage wars, because the world sees them as legitimate ways of furthering their own objectives. 

            Despite so much darkness in our world, John insists that God so loved the world that he sent his own Son, so that all who believes in him might have new life in the world redeemed by Jesus Christ.  That love is evident in today’s readings.  Instead of destroying his people when they worshipped a golden calf in the absence of Moses, God does not give up on them.  His love, kindness, and fidelity know no end.  In the Canticle which replaces the Psalm, the three young men who emerge unharmed from the fiery furnace praise God for his faithfulness and love.  Saint Paul urges the Corinthian community torn apart by division to embrace the peace of Christ and live it, abandoning the Roman cultural values of dominance and competition.  In living the peace of Christ, they embrace the values of humility, submission, and self-sacrificial love.  He concludes by invoking the Trinity: the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.

            On this Solemnity of the Holy Trinity, the Lord does not tell us to withdraw from this world and go into hiding.  Instead, he calls us to be honest about the darkness of our world and open ourselves to the many ways in which the Holy Spirit is drawing us into the trinitarian love of God.  That is our hope, not only for eternity, but also for our continued journey in the world.

 

PENTECOST SUNDAY

24 MAY 2026

 

          The Jewish Feast of Pentecost occurs 50 days after the Feast of Passover.  Jewish people would gather in Jerusalem to celebrate the giving of the Law, because Pentecost was one of the three Jewish feasts that involved a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.  That is why there are Jewish people from all over the Mediterranean Sea gathered in the Holy City.  While the language of the Liturgy is Hebrew, they speak the language of the individual areas where they live.  In our own day, Catholics who speak their own language from around the world gather in Rome when the Pope celebrates Mass.  He speaks the commons of the Mass in Latin, the official liturgical language of the Catholic Church.  But the readings and Universal Prayer are proclaimed in some of the individual languages of people assembled.   

            On this pilgrimage feast, the disciples are gathered in the upper room, following the instructions of Jesus at the Ascension.  Suddenly, there comes from the sky a noise like a strong driving wind. And it fills the entire house in which they are.  There appears to them tongues as of fire, which parts and comes to rest on each of them.  Those outward manifestations reveal that they are filled with the Holy Spirit.  Instead of locking themselves in the room out of fear, as they had done on the day of the Lord’s resurrection, the Spirit drives them into the public space, where they speak to the gathered throng.  They are doing what the risen Lord told them to do after he had broken through the locked door on the day of the resurrection.  Each person hears them speaking in his or her own language of the mighty acts of God.  Some people in the crowd sneer that these are simple Galileans, and that they have had too much new wine!

            Today, we conclude the Easter Season by reaffirming that the Lord continues to give us the Holy Spirit.  It is the Holy Spirit who has kept the Catholic Church alive for over 2,000 years, despite the sinfulness and weaknesses of her leaders.   The Holy Spirit continues to be given to our parish community, enabling us to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ in this area of South Bend for almost one hundred years.  Saint Paul reminds us that the Holy Spirit is given to each of us individually.  Each of us has our own unique gifts, and the Holy Spirit gives us the courage to put our gifts in service to this community.  We can see how our different gifts are given in service when a family is confronted by death.  Annie uses her gifts to schedule a time for the funeral and alert the rest of the team.  The team works together to plan the liturgy and welcome the grieving people.  Deacon Mel conducts the funeral liturgy, and musicians help people to pray and sing.  Some use their gifts to prepare food, while others set up the hall and clean it afterwards.  Parishioners use their different gifts to proclaim the good news that death is not the end, and that the Lord keeps his promise that those who mourn will be consoled.

            The miracle of Pentecost continues today, so that we speak a common language to communicate the love of God.  That language is desperately needed in a noisy world without a high regard for the truth.  Sometimes Christians need to learn new languages.  That is why Bishop Rhoades is sending Father Augustine to Spain to be immersed in Spanish.  Hispanic parishioners are the future of Saint John.  All of us must learn new languages.  We need to speak the language of grief when someone’s life is marked by loss.  We need to speak the language of resilience to someone who has been unjustly treated.  We need to speak the language of curiosity to a young person full of questions.  We need to speak the language of patience to someone who has been hurt very badly.  The Holy Spirit does not make it any easier to speak these languages.  Instead, the Holy Spirit gives us courage to speak them so that others can understand.

 

 

THE ASCENSION OF THE LORD

17 MAY 2026

 

          In his second book, addressed to Theophilus (a friend of God), Saint Luke says that the risen Lord Jesus presented himself alive to the Apostles by many proofs after he had suffered, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God.  The number forty is a symbolic way of saying that the Apostles had sufficient time to encounter the risen Lord and be convinced that his bodily Resurrection is true.  Jesus returns to the Father, promising that the Holy Spirit will be given to them so that they will be witnesses in Jerusalem, through Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.  The Apostles stand there looking up to the cloud that had enveloped Jesus.  Two men in white garments are like the two men in white garments who announced the resurrection at the empty tomb in Luke’s first book.  They ask why they stand there looking at the sky.  They tell them to put their noses to the grindstone and start doing what Jesus commanded.

            That is what the risen Lord tells the eleven in today’s Gospel of Saint Matthew.  They go to the mountain in Galilee where they had received the Beatitudes.  They see him and worship him, acknowledging the truth of the resurrection.  Even though they have their doubts, Jesus gives them the great commission before returning to the right hand of the Father.  He tells them to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that he has commanded them.  Just as Matthew had  assured us that Jesus is Immanuel (God with us) at the beginning of his Gospel, so he assures us that he will be with us always, until the end of the age.

            When we celebrate the birth Jesus at Christmas, we are given dramatic details about angels and shepherds and magi.  When we celebrate his resurrection at Easter, we hear about earthquakes and encounters with the risen Christ on the road.  When we celebrate the Ascension, no dramatic details are given.  But this Mystery is critical for our faith in the Paschal Mystery.  The body of the risen Lord is no longer present to us.  He is seated at the right hand of the Father, interceding for us, sending the Holy Spirit to be our Advocate.  We become the Body of Christ, sent to accomplish the same great commission given to the original Apostles.

            In a sense, we experience the Mystery of the Ascension at every Mass.  We gather here as the Body of Christ, trusting that the Apostles told the truth about encountering the risen body of Christ.  We acknowledge our sins and our doubts and listen to the Lord speaking to us in the Word proclaimed.  We bring our prayers and petitions to the Father.  Then we recognize the real presence of the risen Lord in the Eucharist, just as the two disciples recognized him in the breaking of bread at Emmaus.  Having been fed by his Body and Blood, we are told to go in peace as the Body of Christ to continue obeying the Lord’s great commission today.

            Sometimes, obeying the great commission can be dramatic, when we are given a chance to witness to the Lord’s presence in unusual ways.  But most of the time, we are sent to obey the great commission in the ordinary events of our lives.  We are sent to be more understanding of the behavior of a fellow worker who is truly annoying; or to be more patient with a stubborn child who continues to disobey.  We might be sent to visit an elderly relative in a nursing home, or to give some of our time to the soup kitchen or to the Saint Vincent de Paul Society.  Young people can accomplish the great commission by resisting the temptation to bully or take advantage of someone weaker.  At the end of Mass, each of us will be sent out to obey the great commission today.  Don’t hesitate.  We are the Body of Christ.  The Lord is with us, and he will not ignore our seemingly insignificant efforts to make a difference in our world.

 

FIFTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

3 MAY 2026

 

            Throughout his public ministry, Jesus explained to his disciples his mission as the Messiah.  His mission was not to free his people from Roman occupation.  Instead, his mission would be to suffer on the cross to defeat the power of sin and death.  In this final discourse at the Last Supper, he tells them that their hearts need not be troubled.  He insists that they know the way.  Either because they had not been listening, or because they could never conceive of a crucified Messiah, they do not know the way to the Father.  Thomas is the only disciple with the courage to say that they do not know the way.  Very soon, they will be horrified to know that his painful and horrible death is the way to the Father.  Only after he had been raised from the dead would they understand what he is talking about.  Sustained by his forgiveness for abandoning him in his darkest hour, they cooperated with the gift of the Holy Spirit to become his Church and spread the Good News of Salvation to all who would listen.

            They would no longer need to go to the temple to encounter the presence of God.  Instead, to use the image of today’s second reading, they would become living stones, built up through the power of the Holy Spirit into a spiritual house.  As living stones, they would eventually understand what Jesus is talking about when he tells them that they would do greater ones than the works of Jesus himself.  You and I benefit from that promise, because the works of Jesus have gone far beyond the geographical limits of the Holy Land to reach South Bend!  Like those first disciples, we have become living stones through the waters of Baptism.  We are being built into a spiritual house.  As living stones, we trust that death will not destroy us either.  We trust that through encountering the Lord in the Sacramental life of the Church, and through our daily dying and our final deaths, we will be joined with him in his eternal dwelling place.

            We know that we are living stones in a fallen world, affecting even those who have become living stones through Baptism.  We can see this reality in our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles.  Both the Hellenists and the Hebrews are living stones being formed into a spiritual house.  But there are tensions and divisions.  The Hellenists complain that they are not being treated as equals.  Their widows are being neglected in the daily distribution of the goods of the community.  The twelve do not tell them to shut and deal with it.  Instead, they listen to their complaints and agree that something must be done.  After discussion and prayer, they choose seven men and lay hands on them to commission them.  These seven men are the first deacons.  They accept the mission of overseeing the distribution of the goods, so that the Apostles can continue to devote themselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.

            We are blessed as a parish to enjoy the presence of a descendant of one of these original deacons.  The Bishop, a successor of the Apostles, laid hands on him, ordained him a deacon.  When it became clear that there are not enough diocesan priests to serve this parish, Bishop Rhoades discussed the issue with his advisors and prayed.  Instead of closing our parish or merging it with another parish, he called one of the retired priests of the Diocese and asked him to be the priest at Saint Augustine.  That old priest could not say “no,” because too many people had not been able to say no to him in his former parish.  Bishop Rhoades then appointed Deacon Mel to be the administrator of the parish.  The old priest now has the freedom to devote himself to prayer and to the ministry of the word.  The deacon is the administrator, handling all the issues that drove the old priest crazy in his former parish!

            We believe that Jesus is in the Father and the Father is in him.  We trust the way he shows us how to return to the Father.  As living stones, we walk together in our journey of faith.