{"id":2156,"date":"2017-05-21T11:58:09","date_gmt":"2017-05-21T15:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=2156"},"modified":"2017-05-21T11:58:09","modified_gmt":"2017-05-21T15:58:09","slug":"6th-sunday-of-easter-year-a-homily","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/6th-sunday-of-easter-year-a-homily\/","title":{"rendered":"6th Sunday of Easter, Year A – Homily"},"content":{"rendered":"

6th<\/sup> Sunday of Easter, Year A<\/a>
\nActs 8:5-8, 14-17
\nPsalm 66:1-3, 4-5, 607, 16, 20
\n1 Peter 3:15-18
\nJohn 14:15-21<\/p>\n

The Samaritan people were despised by the Jews but Samaria is where Philip to proclaimed Christ to the people in today\u2019s reading.\u00a0 Philip was not one of the Twelve Apostles but he shared (just like all of us) in the mission to proclaim Christ to the world.<\/p>\n

The Samaritan crowds \u201cpaid attention<\/em>\u201d to Philip and \u201csaw the signs<\/em>\u201d he did, driving out unclean spirits and curing people.\u00a0 Because of what Philip said and did many people there \u201caccepted the Word of God.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

We are not able to do miracles but we can still proclaim Christ to others.\u00a0 Our psalm today says repeatedly today to \u201csing praise.<\/em>\u201d\u00a0 As first hearing, we think of the \u201csinging\u201d as referring to our music.\u00a0 Our music ministry is important for us in offering praise to God.\u00a0 Our music ministry is led by Tim as our music director and organist.\u00a0 Our cantors and choirs play a very important part in our music ministry.\u00a0 If you have the gift of musical ability I encourage you to consider being part of our parish music ministry.<\/p>\n

We are not all given the gift of musical ability but we can all join in signing our hymns and Mass parts but singing praise is more than music.\u00a0 Our psalm says to \u201cshout joyfully<\/em> to God<\/em>\u201d and \u201clet all the earth cry out to God with joy<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if we can\u2019t sing we can still speak of the tremendous deeds of the Lord.\u00a0 Everyone doesn\u2019t have to be a great preacher.\u00a0 Peter tells us to \u201cAlways be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve spoken before about how some people feel they don\u2019t know what to say.\u00a0 They feel that if they are even to mention Jesus to others, then they need to be able to answer any question the other person might ask.\u00a0 They know they can\u2019t answer every question so they don\u2019t say anything.<\/p>\n

To this I say two things.\u00a0 First, then do something more to learn about your faith.\u00a0 You\u2019ve just admitted you don\u2019t know enough.\u00a0 You can do something about that!\u00a0 Learn!<\/p>\n

Secondly, the most important thing we can do is to provide a reason for our hope.\u00a0 Even if your faith isn\u2019t as strong as you would like, the fact that you are here right now says that you have some faith.\u00a0 Why?<\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve said on previous Sundays, sometimes we might be here just out of a sense of obligation.\u00a0 Even if you are coming out of obligation, it means something <\/em>to you.\u00a0 Ask yourself why the obligation is important to you.\u00a0 Is there something about your answer that you can share with others?<\/p>\n

Sometimes the thing that keeps us coming back is the stories that we read in the Bible of how God rescued his people in distress.\u00a0 Such stories give us hope that God will rescue us.\u00a0 So we keep coming back.\u00a0 Then you should share these stories with other people.<\/p>\n

Maybe you have had an experience in your life where God\u2019s presence and help was evident to you.\u00a0 It may be a healing from sickness.\u00a0 It might be a sense of peace and comfort that the Lord has given you in a time of loss where the promise of eternal life gives you hope.<\/p>\n

Such experiences can involve a feeling of being loved.\u00a0 What does it mean to be love God?<\/p>\n

Jesus says, \u201cIf you love me, you will keep my commandments<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 This might be troubling to us.\u00a0 If another human being begins a conversation by saying, \u201cif you love me\u2026.\u201d We might immediately wonder what they are going to ask for.\u00a0 If they ask us to do something we know to be wrong, then our response to them might be, \u201cif you loved me, you won\u2019t ask me to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

With this in mind, Jesus tells us to keep his commandments but he doesn\u2019t know this to benefit himself.\u00a0 Jesus has nothing to gain for himself by us keeping his commandments.\u00a0 We are the ones who benefit from keeping Jesus\u2019 commandments.\u00a0 ALL of God\u2019s commandments are good for us<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

When we keep his commandments and see the good it brings us, we can know that Jesus loves us.\u00a0 We need to see with our hearts, not our human eyes.<\/p>\n

For instance, if we look at Jesus on the Cross only with human eyes, we see a man whose life was destroyed by his enemies.\u00a0 When we look at Jesus on the Cross with the eyes of faith, we see not a man defeated but Christ who loves us so much that he gives up his life for us.<\/p>\n

Our opening prayer asks \u201cthat we may celebrate with heartfelt devotion these days of joy.\u201d\u00a0 We are still celebrating Easter as our \u201cdays of joy.\u201d\u00a0 May we know with heartfelt devotion what these days mean for us.\u00a0 This is the reason for our hope.\u00a0 Jesus died and rose that we might know eternal life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

6th Sunday of Easter, Year A Acts 8:5-8, 14-17 Psalm 66:1-3, 4-5, 607, 16, 20 1 Peter 3:15-18 John 14:15-21 The Samaritan people were despised by the Jews but Samaria is where Philip to proclaimed Christ to the people in today\u2019s reading.\u00a0 Philip was not one of the Twelve Apostles but he shared (just like …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘6th Sunday of Easter, Year A – 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":[29,9,82],"tags":[294,293],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-yM","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2156"}],"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=2156"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2156\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2157,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2156\/revisions\/2157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}