5th Sunday of Easter – Year B

Who belongs to Christ?

 

Introduction

 

“There is no salvation outside of the Church.” This statement is famous, delivered in the third century by Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, and is not always correctly interpreted.

 

Many Christians in the past have made the mistake of identifying the kingdom of God with the ecclesial institution to which they belonged. They flaunted arrogant certainties, cultivated prejudices against other religions and called the others impure and far. In the most abhorrent cases they also resorted to force to coerce others to conversion and baptism.

 

Church and Kingdom of God do not match. There are gray areas in the church that exclude themselves from the kingdom of God, because sin thrive in them  and there are huge margins beyond the confines of the church that can be included in the kingdom of God, for the Spirit acts there.

 

“Practitioner” is not equivalent to “inserted into the Body of Christ.” “Believer” is not one who limits himself to religious practices: mass, sacraments, prayers, devotions, but one who, in imitation of Christ, practices justice, brotherhood, sharing of goods, hospitality, loyalty, sincerity, the rejection of violence, forgiveness of enemies, commitment to peace.

 

The line of demarcation between one who belongs and one who does not belong to Christ does not pass in the domain of the sacred, but in that of love to persons and “in all nations he listens to everyone who fears God and does good” (Acts 10:35).

 

To internalize the message, we repeat:
“Wherever love, joy, peace and forgiveness sprout, the Spirit of the Risen Lord is present there.”

 

4th Sunday of Easter – Year B

The Epiphany of God—the Shepherd who gives life

 

Introduction

 

No wonder that, even in times of religious crisis, the majority of people continue to believe in God. However, in verifying the identity of this God, we often notice that he is quite different from the one Jesus revealed. He is a God who adapts to the justice of man. He rewards and punishes according to merits, welcomes the worship, bestows blessings to his devotees, forbids adultery. He approves the accumulation of assets and their free management. In fact, at times, he becomes a business associate. He is a God who allows killing in self-defense and, above all, he is infinitely great, all-powerful, able to gain respect.

 

This reasonable God found shelter also in some Catholic catechisms and is easy to accept.

 

But one day, in Jesus, the true God has made himself known to people  completely different. He was in company with sinners and stayed with the excluded. He allowed people to spit in his face without reacting. He loved those who nailed him to a cross; he was neither omnipotent nor infinite. In the face of this weak, unable to defend themselves God, the faith of all staggered. Peter, when he vowed not knowing him (Mk 14:71), spoke—I think—in the name of the great majority of Christians.

 

Believing in a God like this is so difficult: it means to pin one’s glory on making oneself humble or small for love.

 

To internalize the message, we repeat:
“I’ll have to go through dark valleys, but I do not fear. I trust the shepherd who guides me.”