{"id":1588,"date":"2015-04-19T12:47:42","date_gmt":"2015-04-19T16:47:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1588"},"modified":"2015-04-19T12:47:42","modified_gmt":"2015-04-19T16:47:42","slug":"3rd-sunday-of-easter-year-b-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/3rd-sunday-of-easter-year-b-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"3rd Sunday of Easter, Year B – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

3rd<\/sup> Sunday of Easter, Year B<\/a>
\nActs 3:13-15, 17-19
\n1 John 2:1-5a
\nLuke 24:35-48
\nApril 19, 2015<\/p>\n

The story in our gospel passage today comes right after Jesus has appeared to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.\u00a0 They did not recognize Him until He broke bread with them.<\/p>\n

The two disciples immediately, and rightly so, go to the other disciples to tell them what has happened.\u00a0 Meanwhile the Lord also appeared to Simon.<\/p>\n

Hearing that Jesus was risen should have brought great joy to the disciples.\u00a0 Jesus Christ is Risen Today!\u00a0 The others might have begun to long to see Jesus risen for themselves.<\/p>\n

What happens?<\/p>\n

Jesus appears to them and says \u201cPeace be with you.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is their reaction?\u00a0 Are they overcome with joy?\u00a0 No, they are startled<\/em> and terrified<\/em>.\u00a0 Jesus knows they are troubled<\/em>.\u00a0 Why are they troubled?\u00a0 Why do they have questions in their hearts?<\/p>\n

As I have said in recent weeks, they did not yet understand what it means for Jesus to have risen.\u00a0 No one had risen from the dead before.\u00a0 Jesus had brought the dead, like Lazarus, back to life but that was not resurrection but merely (hardly merely as a miracle) a resuscitation, not a resurrection.<\/p>\n

Resurrection is not a return to physical life as we know it but neither is it devoid of our lives here on Earth.\u00a0 Jesus shows them His hands and feet that still bear the marks of the nails from His Crucifixion.\u00a0 He also eats with them to show that He is risen with<\/em> his body.<\/p>\n

Part of their troubles and questions is rooted in the fact that this is not what they expected to happen.\u00a0 They expected a messiah-king who would defeat their enemies and become a great earthly king.<\/p>\n

They did not expect the messiah to suffer, die, and rise but Jesus now explains what they could not have understood before His Death and Resurrection \u2013 how the prophets had foretold His Suffering, and how He himself had spoken of His coming Passion and that He would rise.<\/p>\n

The disciples experienced all of Jesus\u2019 ministry, passion, and resurrection one step at a time.\u00a0 We see it as a whole and know how it fits what has been foretold so we can look at it with joy, not with the troubles and questions that the disciples did.<\/p>\n

That means we have no troubles or questions, right?\u00a0 Won\u2019t that be nice?<\/p>\n

The reality is we still have troubles.\u00a0 We have questions.\u00a0 Why is there evil in the world, wars, violence\u2026?\u00a0 Why do people suffer great illnesses?\u00a0 Why don\u2019t we have enough money?<\/p>\n

Given what we see in this world, questions like this can seem quite natural.\u00a0 Questions like these can lead us to question if there is a god.\u00a0 Is this a sin?<\/p>\n

If we make a choice to believe God doesn\u2019t exist or, at least, doesn\u2019t care, I think it can be sin.\u00a0 But if our thoughts wonder why God allows suffering means we understand that the violence and suffering are not what God desires for us.\u00a0 God desires only good but God loves us so much as to give us \u201cfree will.\u201d\u00a0 That means we can make whatever choices we want.\u00a0 Sometimes, we, or others, make bad choices that lead to suffering.\u00a0 For instance, my mother smoked for thirty years and then ended up with emphysema and eventually cancer.<\/p>\n

Violence like the many shootings happen because people choose to do evil.<\/p>\n

This explains some of the suffering but not all.\u00a0 The reality is we aren\u2019t going to understand everything.\u00a0 In our human form, we cannot understand everything but in faith we can look beyond evil and the suffering towards what Jesus reveals to us in His Crucifixion and Resurrection, eternal life.<\/em><\/p>\n

This gives us peace and the ability to trust in God.\u00a0 Now, we must be witnesses to what we belief and tell others about Jesus.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

3rd Sunday of Easter, Year B Acts 3:13-15, 17-19 1 John 2:1-5a Luke 24:35-48 April 19, 2015 The story in our gospel passage today comes right after Jesus has appeared to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus.\u00a0 They did not recognize Him until He broke bread with them. The two disciples immediately, and …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘3rd Sunday of Easter, Year B – Homily’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[82],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-pC","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1588"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1588"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1588\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1591,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1588\/revisions\/1591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}