12 April 2026 - peace like rivers

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

Jesus came and stood in their midst
and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.

The way people in the past had treated the prophets poorly and abused them had not resulted in peace. It brought, not the blessings of the covenant, but its curses. This was such a given that, in response to Jesus telling the parable about leasing the vineyard, in which the tenants finally killed the son of the landlord, his audience replied, stating how the landowner would respond: "He will put those wretches to a miserable death" (see Matthew 21:41). Therefore, they assumed that those in leadership roles who were responsible for the death of the son would themselves be put to death. Jesus did not immediately or directly challenge this notion. Imagine that looping through the disciples minds after the events of Good Friday! Once the true Son of the Father had in fact been put to death every shared in complicity to one degree or another. The fact that the disciples of Jesus had fled and failed him in his hour of need probably made it hard for them to imagine that they would not share in God's judgment against those responsible for the death of Jesus. But it turned out that God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but rather so that through him the world could be saved (see John 3:17). Jesus did not in fact pray for the death of his persecutors, but rather, for their forgiveness. The result of his death was not the immediately unleashing of curses but rather of blessings. The death of Jesus did not forever confirm and set in stone the enmity between God and humanity, but rather made true peace  possible.

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Having peace with God means that we don't act in ways that are hostile to his Lordship and that he in turn doesn't have to respond with punishment and judgment. Before Christ made peace with God possible we lived as his enemies, on a one way road to destruction. We were so committed in our opposition to him that he knew that we could not bear the fullness of his presence among us and would seek to destroy it. Yet he made precisely that the thing that would unleash peace and forgiveness. He set a trap for our sinfulness, showing that however great was our sin, love was still greater. Where sin abounded grace abounded still more (see Romans 5:20).

Peace with God is not merely meant to describe an external lack of hostility between man and God. It is meant to define our inner subjective experience as well. Our old ways of thinking in which we put our selfish egos first were ultimately death directed. But the the cross made it possible for us to receive the Holy Spirit, and through him, renewed minds. Those renewed minds could be at peace since they would need no longer experience the disproportionate fear of death as though it were an absolute evil. They would no longer harbor the subconscious fear that God was against them, waiting for an excuse to issue forth condemnation and judgment. They would believe that if God was on their side than nothing could harm them an any ultimate sense.

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace (see Romans 8:6).

that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery (see Hebrews 2:14-15).

Because of the death of Jesus we become convinced of God's love for us (see First John 4:16), allowing us to cast our cares upon him since he does in fact care for us (see First Peter 5:7). It is not that we don't have other concerns anymore, or that we only care about God and other purely spiritual things. It is rather that we are able to trust God with all of our other concerns.

do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus (see Philippians 4:6-7).

We do not always experience this level of transcendent peace that Paul describes. In fact, we are often more like Thomas. Others tell us about the power of the resurrection, the now unshakable reality of the peace of Christ, and we imagine it to be too good to be true. We imagine those witnesses of the resurrection to be exaggerating, or, if not, that what they received is meant for them but not for us. But if we missed the first round of blessing, it might be because God has a plans for a special second round which will have even more profound effects in us than would have been possible otherwise. He may allow us to experience some darkness for the sake of making our eventual conviction and belief all the stronger. So if we feel like we missed out when Jesus was passing out his gift of peace, we should know that he still intends for us to receive it. Unlike Thomas, we probably won't arrive at faith through the visible icon of the Lord's risen Body. But Jesus assures us that, if anything, we will be blessed no less because of it.

Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
Jesus said to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me?
Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.

To be clear, this is us! So too are we the ones described by Peter in his epistle:

Although you have not seen him you love him;
even though you do not see him now yet believe in him,
you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy,
as you attain the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls

So let us live in the peace and the joy that are the fruits of his Spirit, available to us because of his resurrection from the dead.  May they shape our hearts, and then, in turn, our communities of faith, as they did for the early Church:

They ate their meals with exultation and sincerity of heart,
praising God and enjoying favor with all the people.
And every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.

Michael W Smith - You Are Holy (Prince Of Peace)

 

11 April 2026 - witless to witness

Today's Readings
(Audio)

She went and told his companions who were mourning and weeping.
When they heard that he was alive
and had been seen by her, they did not believe.

No doubt they thought that, as a women, she was overcome by emotions, clinging to insubstantial dreams that she wished were true. But it was they themselves who clung to a false reality, an incorrect interpretation of the past, leading to a distorted view of the present. Mary Magdalene was in fact only affirming that what Jesus had once said would happen had in fact occurred. But the emotions of despair from seeing the crucifixion clouded their vision of both past and future, making it difficult for them to choose to believe in the possibility of hope. There was a certain sense of finality to the cross that it difficult to believe that things could ever be good or whole again. But it was their hopelessness that distorted the truth of reality, not the joy and hope of Mary Magdalene.

After this he appeared in another form
to two of them walking along on their way to the country.
They returned and told the others;
but they did not believe them either.

It must have been hard for both these two and Mary Magdalene to explain how it was that they hadn't recognized Jesus when he first appeared. This was, to be sure, an inconvenient detail. But he desired to be known by Mary specifically when he called her name. So too did desire to be known by the two on the road to Emmaus in the breaking of the bread. But these events were, of course, unprecedented. They only had their prior experiences of the pre-resurrection Jesus for comparison. These experiences held clues and even predictions. But they were not such that the shape of future events could be known in advance. The risen Lord was a new paradigm. He could not be seen by people trapped in old and carnal ways of thinking. He was the same Jesus, yes. But he was now glorified. And that changed everything.

But later, as the Eleven were at table, he appeared to them
and rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart
because they had not believed those
who saw him after he had been raised.

Their old and earthly attitudes had made them fail to believe witnesses who were in fact speaking the truth, good news that was better than anything they could ask or imagine. Jesus rebuked their hardness of heart, but not in order to make them feel condemned. He did so rather for the same reason that he had rebuked the storm at sea (see Mark 4:39). He did so to take control of emotional forces that were normally beyond direct human control, to change the internal atmosphere of the eleven, giving them the peace and great calm of his presence.

He said to them, “Go into the whole world
and proclaim the Gospel to every creature.” 

In order to function as his witnesses they needed to have their hardened, disbelieving, and despairing hearts replaced with new and living hearts filled with hope. It was not a hope which was derived from auspicious earthly circumstances, but rather a hope that was drawn from the resurrection of Jesus himself. Not only did they need to believe that Jesus had done more than they could ask or imagine, they needed to believe that this was now his modus operandi, the new normal from the nascent Church. We see this clearly in the way the power of the resurrection was at work amongst the disciples of the early Church described in Acts.

Everyone living in Jerusalem knows that a remarkable sign
was done through them, and we cannot deny it.

When we are convinced that the goodness of God is really at work among us we will yield to no human authority who tells us not to speak of it.

Whether it is right in the sight of God
for us to obey you rather than God, you be the judges.
It is impossible for us not to speak about what we have seen and heard.

It is then that we will know and resonate with the experience of the psalmist.

My strength and my courage is the LORD,
and he has been my savior.
The joyful shout of victory
in the tents of the just.

Newsboys - Million Pieces (Kissin' Your Cares Goodbye)

 

10 April 2026 - backtracking vs backsliding

Today's Readings
(Audio)

Zebedee's sons, and two others of his disciples.
Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing."
They said to him, "We also will come with you."

It seems the disciples were unclear on what came next. Was it now the end times, since the resurrection had occurred? Should they go back to living normal lives now that the mission had, it seemed, been finished? They did not know what to do next, and Jesus wasn't immediately proximate to ask, so they returned to the familiar. But although it seemed like they may have thought to exit their roles as disciples by the same way they entered, it was no longer possible. Jesus had forever transformed the idea of the disciples as fishermen. No aspect of their lives was untouched by him. There was no place to which they could return that was safely separate and normal. But perhaps on some level they knew this. They remembered that it was while fishing that they first gained a sense of their calling. Maybe they returned to it in hope of having a similar experience to provide them with the direction they now desired. It may have been only a semiconscious hope. But they knew that Jesus had revealed himself before even amidst their ordinary circumstances. Thus did he do again, fulfilling that hope.

When it was already dawn, Jesus was standing on the shore;
but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.
Jesus said to them, "Children, have you caught anything to eat?"
They answered him, "No."
So he said to them, "Cast the net over the right side of the boat
and you will find something."

Their services as fishers of men were still needed even and especially after the resurrection. As a symbol of how this would work the other disciples struggled to bring in the massive catch of fish, but the strength of Peter was somehow enough to move the whole thing single-handedly, signaling his unique role among his brother Apostles. But Peter was as effective as he was because he was wise enough to defer to the counsel of the apparently more spiritual John who recognized Jesus first. And this kind of humility has marked our better popes through the ages. They first listen and only then act decisively.

Jesus came over and took the bread and gave it to them,
and in like manner the fish.

In what does the joy of the Church consist if not the bread which Jesus gives us, together with the constant influx on new disciples from every land, tribe, and tongue? It is a feast compromised of both bread and fish. It is a table that is set for us primarily by the successors of the Apostles, our bishops, and their collaborators among the priesthood. Yet we, as laity, also work together with them, allowing ourselves to become fishers of men in the ponds, streams, and rivers of ordinary life to which they might not otherwise have access. We might think that Peter was unique in how he responded to the religious authorities in today's reading from Acts. But we too have been filled with the same Spirit they guided him. With Paul we can say, "we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, “I believed, and so I spoke,” we also believe, and so we also speak" (see Second Corinthians 4:13). And we are meant to receive the same level of conviction and even boldness of speech that we see Peter had.

then all of you and all the people of Israel should know
that it was in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazorean
whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead;
in his name this man stands before you healed.
He is the stone rejected by you, the builders,
which has become the cornerstone.
There is no salvation through anyone else,
nor is there any other name under heaven
given to the human race by which we are to be saved."

We need this conviction and confidence because it is so common for us to slip into believing that our earthly tasks, our own fishing in the natural sphere, are more pressing, or worse, more important than our spiritual priorities, even though we know that the former has only temporary significance, the later, eternal.

This is the day the LORD has made;
let us be glad and rejoice in it.

Hillsong Worship - No Other Name

 

9 April 2026 - be not afraid, he's no ghost

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

"Peace be with you."
But they were startled and terrified
and thought that they were seeing a ghost.

They had been wrong about this before. When he came across the waves to their boat during a storm they also "thought it was a ghost and cried out" (see Mark 6:49). But from this we might surmise that it wasn't just the fact on the presence of Jesus that startled and terrified them. On the lake he had been terrifying specifically because the event was revelation of his divinity, a theophany. So too here. He had crossed the greater stormy sea of death to return once more to his frightened flock in the little vessel of his Church. His risen humanity, now glorified, was now, in some mysterious way, transparent to his divinity. What Peter, James, and John, saw briefly during the transfiguration was now normalized. It wasn't that his old human aspect was gone. It was rather more like a new dimension of reality had opened up around him. No wonder people needed his graced assistance in order to recognize him. They could stare at him directly but not see his familiar humanity because of the blinding light of his divinity. No wonder, too, then, that this was not an experience that was given immediately to the whole world, but rather to chosen witnesses. These witnesses were able, eventually, to correctly interpret what they had seen because they had been with him the whole time. They had known the human Jesus. They were the ones who could understand that he was not some glorious angelic being or phantasm, but rather than same Jesus whom they had known. What was the ultimate link that definitively proved that the one they had known before was the same one whom they now beheld? It was his wounds.

Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.
Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones
as you can see I have."
And as he said this,
he showed them his hands and his feet.

As he had done for the disciples on the way to Emmaus so now he opened the minds of the others to understand the Scriptures. Specifically they came to understand the way that he was at the center of everything. Not only was he the one predicted in the obviously messianic passages of the prophets, but the law of Moses and the psalms as well ultimately found the true fulfillment of their deepest meaning in him as well. Although Jesus said so, it was not obvious to the untrained mind that it is written in the Old Testament "that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached". But once one saw it, he could not unseen it. Jesus was sacrificed in the figure of Isaac, offered as the lamb by Moses, prefigured as the suffering servant in Isaiah, shown as persecuted but eventually triumphant in the psalms of David, just to name a few examples. Even as recently as Vatican I prophecy was affirmed as an important external "motive of credibility" (motiva credibitatis) that makes the act of faith rational (see Vatican I, Session III, Ch. 3). We can see in our recent readings that prophecy has always been considered a vital part of the witness of the Church. Fulfillment was the foundation of Peter's message today in our reading from Acts, including fulfillment of the words of Moses and Samuel, and of God's promise to Abraham. But what is the eventual result of this conviction supposed to be, or what do we become as a consequence? Jesus tells us:

You are witnesses of these things.

Peter understood this, as we can see in the reading from Acts, when he  says "of this we are witnesses". But do we understand it? Are we persuaded that all of human history finds its fulfillment in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ? And if so, how can we help but proclaim it?

O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name in all the earth!

Passion - Holy Ground

 

8 April 2026 - heading the wrong way

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

That very day, the first day of the week,
two of Jesus’ disciples were going
to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus

They were heading in the wrong direction. The degree of their culpability for this is unclear. Jesus had told everyone what would happen. But no one really seemed to understand it beforehand. These two disciples had hoped that Jesus "would be the one to redeem Israel", implying that they no longer held that hope. After what they had witnessed in the horrific death of Jesus it is hard to blame them. But their readiness to give up on Jesus demonstrated that their initial hope in him was thin. Those with the strongest hope remained at the tomb, unable to accept that the light of the world could be dead. Besides them there were the other disciples who at least remained in the city and continued to gather in fellowship. They were well positioned to receive the revelation of the resurrection. Even the most famous doubter among them was unable to avoid that revelation for long. This shows us that it is among gatherings of other disciples that we find the privileged place for encounter with Jesus. Yet the story of Emmaus gives us hope for those who are heading the wrong way, that Jesus does not abandon them, but follows after them, finds them, and engages them. However, he does not force himself on them. Before he allows himself to be fully recognized they must signal that they desire him to do so. By opening the Scriptures to them he gives them a taste of the possibility that their hope indeed lives on. But before he fully opens their eyes to his presence he waits for them to say "Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over." They have to want it. And they do.

And it happened that, while he was with them at table,
he took bread, said the blessing,
broke it, and gave it to them.
With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him,
but he vanished from their sight.

They had known Jesus in a human way. This was good, valid, and useful. It allowed him to teach them, to lead them, and to instruct them by his example. But it was still too limited. The reason he allowed them to experience some darkness as to knowing him in a merely human way was so that they could experience his presence on a deeper level, one that was more spiritual, and obtained in some degree to his divinity. Knowing him as a man allowed him to be their Teacher. But knowing him as God allowed him to be their wisdom and their Eucharistic food. What was previously external to them was internalized, and they were transformed in the process.

Were not our hearts burning within us
while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?

When the Scriptures change from historical narratives about past events into a place of encounter with Jesus himself our hearts too will burn within us. And it is above all in the Eucharist that we not only meet Jesus as we might meet any man, but that, to a degree, we actually become one with him, one body through the one loaf of Eucharistic bread. But the fact that this is preceded both in the story and in the mass by a Scriptural exposition is no accident. Rather, it is the presence of the living one in his Word, in both the Old and New Testaments, that gives us the context of how and why he would choose to be present in the humble elements of bread and wine. We see that he is our lamb of sacrifice and our priest-king Melchizedek. And when we receive him in the Eucharist with hearts that are on fire for him there are no limits to what his grace is able to do in us.

Carey Landry - Known To Us

 

7 April 2026 - sorrow turns to joy

 

Today's Readings
(Audio)

And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”

She was weeping because she loved Jesus so much, and had placed so much hope in him. He had restored her, and for a time it seemed he would restore the world as well. Could she have merely imagined that Jesus was all that he seemed to be? In a way, it seemed that she must have. But still, she couldn't leave the tomb, refused to abandon the body, and therefore give up on the connection she had to Jesus. As a woman in a garden, she wept like Eve for all that might have been but now seemed lost. But then she encountered the gardener. How fitting a misapprehension this was, since she turned to see the new Adam who was in fact in the process of planting the seed of a new Eden. But, although she was looking at all the signs of a new reality breaking forth, she still naturally interpreted them according to the old paradigm of fallen world. Although she had a real and profound love for Jesus it was nevertheless still a love that clung to the way that things which had been, which was not immediately open to be led into a new future of hope. Her love averted the potential disaster of full blown despair, even when all hope seemed lost. It was not enough on its own. But it was enough in the light of the one who loved her even more than she loved him, who knew her even better than she knew herself. It was this feeling of transcendence that she experienced when Jesus called her name.

Jesus said to her, “Mary!”
She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni,”
which means Teacher.

She was beginning to experience the promise of Jesus, that she would see him again, and that her sorrow would turn to joy. But even on recognizing him, she still needed to realize that his resurrection implied that she must now relate to him in a new way. He was still Teacher. But the Teacher was now risen and glorified. He could, yes, still be touched, as she and others demonstrated. But in order to reign over his Church, send his Spirit, and guide the work of evangelizing the world, he could no longer be held to one specific place alone. He was preparing her for his ascension in which he would still be present, even more present in fact, but in a different way than before. The contact of touch would indeed still be possible, but only through faith, since by faith we may touch the risen Lord in the Eucharist. But even there we do not cling. We do not try to arrest a moment in time that is meant to be a transition. We do not build tents on the mountain but allow the transformation to surge forward, changing us and our world in turn.

But go to my brothers and tell them,
‘I am going to my Father and your Father,
to my God and your God.’”
Mary went and announced to the disciples,
“I have seen the Lord,”
and then reported what he had told her.

Like Mary we too are meant to encounter the risen Lord and become witnesses to his resurrection. We too are meant to spread the news that it is now possible for everyone to become sons and daughters of the Father through faith and baptism, in which we are united to Jesus, and are thereby adopted into the divine life of the Trinity. When we really encounter him and allow him to unleash his Spirit in our lives we gain the motivation and confidence of Peter on the day of Pentecost:

Let the whole house of Israel know for certain
that God has made him both Lord and Christ,
this Jesus whom you crucified.

Darrell Evans - Trading My Sorrows

 

6 April 2026 - missing body problem

Today's Readings
(Audio)

You are to say,
‘His disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep.’

The opponents of Jesus seemed to realize the implications of the empty tomb more quickly than did his own disciples. His disciples interpreted the missing body to be merely that, a missing body, still dead, but now lost. The chief priests and the elders knew all too well that the missing body implied resurrection. It was, perhaps, easier for them to understand, since they weren't emotionally invested in the way that the disciples were. And yet, though they understood the implications of the empty tomb they did not seem to consider the factual basis of those implications. Rather, they were more concerned with preserving the narrative they had created of Jesus as a false and failed messiah. They chose to say that the disciples had stolen the body, since it was the most logical option for maintaining the coherence of that scenario. Yet, they did this knowing that it could not have been the case. The disciples had not overwhelmed the guards and moved the stone. Inconvenient facts, such as the guards' witness to the overwhelming and awe-inspiring presence of one or more angelic beings, were summarily dismissed. These, were of course, Roman guards, not given to flights of fancy or making excuses to explain dereliction of duty. Yet the chief priests and elders would cram the details into their existing narrative, no matter how much violence was required to make them fit.

Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid.
Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee,
and there they will see me.”

The fact of the empty tomb could only be explained by the factual and historical resurrection of Jesus from the dead. In the same way, the subsequent spread of Christianity could only be accounted for if the disciples really were convinced that they had encountered the risen Lord himself. We have seen that they were not convinced easily or immediately. Only as their alternative explanations failed, and they were able to see, hear, and touch the very much alive Jesus himself, did they eventually allow their hearts to dare to believe. They must have been very certain of the fact of the resurrection by the time they left the upper room and began to preach in the name of Jesus, since, in an earthly sense, they stood to gain very little by doing so. They did not become powerful or wealthy. They did, it is true, become popular in a sense, but not so much amongst the upper crust of society. We hear this in Paul's description of the church at Corinth: "not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth" (see First Corinthians 1:26). In fact, such popularity as the leaders of the early Christian movement did obtain proved to be their downfall, at least in an earthly sense. We know that virtually all of the first Christian leaders (perhaps excluding John) were martyred. One does not die to perpetuate a hoax. And we can see from the clarity and persuasiveness with which they spoke that they were more fully in their right minds than ever before. Therefore, since the disciples could not be explained away as liars or lunatics, Jesus must truly be risen, and if risen, than Lord. The implications explained by Peter to the crowd on Pentecost must in fact be true:

God raised this Jesus;
of this we are all witnesses.
Exalted at the right hand of God,
he poured forth the promise of the Holy Spirit
that he received from the Father, as you both see and hear.

As Christians, the resurrection is at the core of our faith. But we must become fully convinced of it both as a historical reality and as the source of our spiritual transformation. When the Holy Spirit makes the power of the resurrection present in us we will surge out like the disciples from the upper room and again become effective witnesses, persuading the world of what really happened to the momentarily missing body of our master. We see as history what the psalmist saw prophetically:

Therefore my heart is glad and my soul rejoices,
my body, too, abides in confidence;
Because you will not abandon my soul to the nether world,
nor will you suffer your faithful one to undergo corruption.

Matt Maher - Resurrection Day