Easter Sunday

Reflection

Easter is the most important teaching of our faith. The resurrection of Jesus is the hinge on which the door of our faith swings open. As St. Paul admits in his first letter to the Corinthians: “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified of God that he raised Christ.” The testimony that Jesus was raised from the dead is the very foundation of our faith. It is our greatest mystery and surely our greatest hope.

Liturgically we enter the Easter season after what seems like a thirteen-month desert experience of Lent. Acknowledging that we have faced unique and extraordinary challenges as a world community during the pandemic, our Easter faith this year is ever more important. Today and in the coming days, we will have the opportunity once again to pray with the Gospel passages telling the Easter story as Jesus appears to His disciples. These are some of my favorite narratives of our faith.

The discovery of the empty tomb does not prove that Jesus was raised from the dead. The subsequent experiences of the disciples encountering Jesus as being alive is the spark that set our Easter faith aflame. These post resurrection stories of encounter are truly nourishing. We are told that the disciples “did not yet understand the Scripture that He had to rise from the dead.” Resurrection faith was not instantaneous for the disciples. It was rather a process of reflecting on their experience. They remembered what Jesus said and did as a preacher and teacher and they put that into the context with these post resurrection appearances. In the garden, on the road to Emmaus, in the Upper Room, on the beach at the Sea of Tiberius, they encountered the risen Lord.

My hope is that believers will use their imagination and prayerfully enter these scenes of Jesus appearing to His discouraged and hopeless followers. Perhaps in the past year we ourselves have been in a similar state of despair and darkness making the light of the risen Lord’s presence our consolation once again this Easter.

Prayer

Risen Lord, strengthen our Easter faith so we can encounter You again during these holy and joy-filled days. Amen.

Fr. Brian Cummings, S.S.E. ‘86, Director of Edmundite Campus Ministry

Scripture

First Reading: Acts 10:34a, 37-43

Psalm 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23

Second Reading: Colossians 3:1-4 or 1 Corinthians 5:6b-8

Gospel: John 20:1-9, Matthew 28:1-10, or Luke 24:13-35

Daily Scripture readings can be found online at the USCCB website

Holy Saturday (Easter Vigil)

Reflection

The Easter Vigil begins in darkness.  But the gathered community of faith know already that the blessed fire will soon light the Easter Candle.  And its flame will be shared as it is borne in procession through a darkness now pierced with the growing points of light which celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.  In this year's cycle of feasts and seasons, that growing light is also a hope-filled metaphor of faith pointing a way beyond the dark experiences of the year past.  The dark will not prevail where the light and life of the Risen Lord leads and energizes.  There is reason for the Alleluias.  And we insist on them.

Prayer

A prayer for this day (say it and mean it):  "Alleluia!"

Fr. Richard Berube, S.S.E. ’66, Emeritus Professor, Religious Studies

Scripture

First Reading: Genesis 1:1-2:2 or 1:1, 26-31a

Psalm 104:1-2, 5-6, 10, 12-14, 24, 35 or Psalm 33:4-7, 12-13, 20, 22
Second Reading: Genesis 22:1-18 or 22:1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18
Psalm 16:5, 8-11
Third Reading: Exodus 14:15—15:1
(Psalm) Exodus 15:1-6, 17-18
Fourth Reading: Isaiah 54:5-14
Psalm 30:2, 4-6, 11-13
Fifth Reading: Isaiah 55:1-11
(Psalm) Isaiah 12:2-3, 4-6
Sixth Reading: Baruch 3:9-15, 32—4:4
Psalm 19:8-11
Seventh Reading: Ezekiel 36:16-17a, 18-28
Psalm 42:3, 5; 43:3-4
Eighth Reading: Romans 6:3-11
Psalm 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23
Gospel: Mark 16:1-7

Daily Scripture readings can be found online at the USCCB website

Good Friday

Reflection

But he was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins; upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole, by his stripes we were healed. Isaiah 52:5

Good Friday.  What is good about it?  There are several speculations on the meaning of the name, among them that it derives from an archaic form of “God’s Friday,” or from an archaic meaning of “good” as “holy,” which makes it fit nicely between Holy Thursday and Holy Saturday.  But, apart from linguistic questions, what makes Good Friday good is that this is the day on which Jesus gave His very self in love for the salvation of all humanity, and of you, and of me.  It is a day of both universal and very intimate significance.

A major part of the Good Friday liturgy consists of the Solemn Intercessions that conclude the Liturgy of the Word, ten prayers for the Church and the world.  That is big, and they direct our attention and spiritual energies outward.  But the third part of the celebration is Holy Communion, which is as ever an intimate experience: “Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof.”

In Luke’s Passion—today we have John’s—we find the example of “the good thief,” whom we call Dismas, hanging on a cross adjacent to Jesus’ on Calvary.  In all the commotion and horror of the day, and of his own agony, Dismas either knew or could intuit enough about Jesus’ unconditional love to be able to turn to Him one-on-one with the simple prayer, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom,” to which Jesus replied, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”

 Prayer

Jesus, remember me: I know that You always do.  Give me the grace to remember and be mindful of You and Your unfathomable love for me, and to give my very self in bringing that love into the world around me.

 Fr. David Cray, S.S.E. ’68, Saint Michael’s College Board of Trustees,

Scripture

First Reading: Isaiah 52:13-53:12
Psalm 31:2, 6, 12-13, 15-17, 25
Second Reading: Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9
Gospel: John 18:1—19:42

Daily Scripture readings can be found online at the USCCB website

Holy Thursday

Reflection

He loved His own in the world and He loved them to the end. 

I was honored to be invited to a Seder Service held at the home of Jewish friends a few years ago.  It was not the first time I had participated in this special meal.  However, this time, I got the “feeling” this is a very old ritual, one that gives a special identity to our Jewish sisters and brothers.  It also linked my own religious genealogy with a much longer tradition.  In 1987, Pope John Paul II spoke in a Rome synagogue, praising the Jewish people as “our elder brothers in the faith of Abraham.”  The Seder meal seemed to ground the love of the God the Father we Catholics know in Jesus, in an “eternal timeline.”

In the Gospel reading, St. John testifies to this love of God in the statement that Jesus “loved his own in the world and he loved them to the end.”  Jesus is well aware of His imminent fate.  The next sentence bears witness to this fact in speaking of Judas’ plot against Him.  Yet this does not outweigh Jesus’ desire to share a special meal with those He loved as His own.  A lot is made of the fact that the Gospel of St. John has the washing of the disciple’s feet in place but not the institution of the Eucharist found in the other Gospels and in St. Paul.  But, it is notable that the middle reading should be taken from St. Paul’s account.   It is as though the Eucharist—which is the setting for this evening Mass—were looking back at our Old Testament, Exodus, while at the same time, looking forward to the Washing of the Feet, is meant to emphasize that God’s love is present ALWAYS for the one who is able to see God’s love on the journey of life.

For Jesus, the “wasteful” love of the Father for us finds its equivalent in our humble, selfless love of one another.  In the washing of the feet, Jesus signals to us that in God we are family with all peoples, and that the Eucharist is our constant reminder of the love we owe each other.

Prayer

Gracious God, give us Your Holy Spirit, so that in offering our hearts and minds to You this Lent, we may reverence Your presence both in the Eucharist and in our Service to our neighbor. We make this prayer in the name of Jesus, Your Son, our risen Lord.  Amen.

Fr. Marcel Rainville, S.S.E. ’67

Scripture

First Reading: Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14
Psalm 116:12-13, 15-16bc, 17-18
Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 11:23-26
Gospel: John 13:1-15

Daily Scripture readings can be found online at the USCCB website