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First reading Acts 10:25-26,34-35,44-48
The pagans have received the Holy Spirit just as much as we have
As Peter reached the house Cornelius went out to meet him, knelt at his feet and prostrated himself. But Peter helped him up. ‘Stand up,’ he said ‘I am only a man after all!’
Then Peter addressed them: ‘The truth I have now come to realise’ he said ‘is that God does not have favourites, but that anybody of any nationality who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to him.’
While Peter was still speaking the Holy Spirit came down on all the listeners. Jewish believers who had accompanied Peter were all astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit should be poured out on the pagans too, since they could hear them speaking strange languages and proclaiming the greatness of God. Peter himself then said, ‘Could anyone refuse the water of baptism to these people, now they have received the Holy Spirit just as much as we have?’ He then gave orders for them to be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ. Afterwards they begged him to stay on for some days.
Responsorial Psalm 97(98):1-4
The Lord has shown his salvation to the nations.
or
Alleluia!
Sing a new song to the Lord
for he has worked wonders.
His right hand and his holy arm
have brought salvation.
The Lord has shown his salvation to the nations.
or
Alleluia!
The Lord has made known his salvation;
has shown his justice to the nations.
He has remembered his truth and love
for the house of Israel.
The Lord has shown his salvation to the nations.
or
Alleluia!
All the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God.
Shout to the Lord, all the earth,
ring out your joy.
The Lord has shown his salvation to the nations.
or
Alleluia!
Second reading 1 John 4:7-10
Let us love one another, since love comes from God
My dear people,
let us love one another
since love comes from God
and everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God.
Anyone who fails to love can never have known God,
because God is love.
God’s love for us was revealed
when God sent into the world his only Son
so that we could have life through him;
this is the love I mean:
not our love for God,
but God’s love for us when he sent his Son
to be the sacrifice that takes our sins away.
Gospel John 15:9-17
You are my friends if you do what I command you
Jesus said to his disciples:
‘As the Father has loved me,
so I have loved you.
Remain in my love.
If you keep my commandments
you will remain in my love,
just as I have kept my Father’s commandments
and remain in his love.
I have told you this
so that my own joy may be in you
and your joy be complete.
This is my commandment:
love one another, as I have loved you.
A man can have no greater love
than to lay down his life for his friends.
You are my friends,
if you do what I command you.
I shall not call you servants any more,
because a servant does not know
his master’s business;
I call you friends,
because I have made known to you
everything I have learnt from my Father.
You did not choose me:
no, I chose you;
and I commissioned you
to go out and to bear fruit,
fruit that will last;
and then the Father will give you
anything you ask him in my name.
What I command you
is to love one another.’
Reflection
JESUS is our saviour, rescuing us from many different ways in which we are enslaved: to routine, to meaningless drudgery, to sin and to despair. He does this as the Readings tell us by revealing God’s love to us.
Saint Bernard reflects on the ways in which Jesus comes into our lives and speaks of three: ‘We know a threefold coming of the Lord. … In the first coming, he came in the weakness of human nature, in this intermediate coming he comes in the power of the Spirit, and in the final coming he will come in the majesty of glory.
Therefore this intermediate coming is, as it were, a way of connecting the first coming to the final coming. In the first coming Christ was our redeemer, in the final coming he will reveal himself as our life, in this present coming he is our rest and our consolation’ (Bernard, Sermon 5 on Advent).
We read about Jesus’ first coming in the gospels. We look forward to his final coming, which essentially takes place for each of us at the moment of our death, when we hope that he will come to raise us with him into the embrace of God.
Now in this present life and here in this liturgy our focus is on what Saint Bernard calls his intermediate coming, that is to say on the many ways in which he comes to us ‘in the power of the Spirit’.
The author of Psalm 98 marvels at the ways in which God has demonstrated love to him and to his people. We are invited in this Easter season to reflect on the wonderful ways in which Jesus is continually coming into our lives as our ‘rest and our consolation’.
Fr Michael Fallon msc
