Peace be with you. Friends, we’ve come now to
the fifth Sunday of Easter. So we're entering the sort of
end of the Easter season, these Sundays five, six, and seven. And if the first Sundays of Easter
gave us a chance to meditate upon the strangeness and radicality
of the Resurrection, these last Sundays allow us
to meditate more deeply on the implications
of the Resurrection. What does it mean to live in the
space opened up by the risen Christ? We'll be reading now these
next weeks from the marvelous farewell
discourse of Jesus. So if you look in chapters,
14, 15, 16, and 17 —four entire chapters
of John's Gospel— you find by far the longest speech
of Jesus in any of the Gospels. The setting is the Last Supper,
and we don't find in John the institution narrative: Jesus taking the bread and
taking the wine, "This is my body, my blood." You don't find that in John. You find the foot washing —unique to him—and then you find
this lengthy discourse of the Lord. Can I recommend to everybody: now as the Easter season's coming
to a close, spend some time with those four chapters of John. Read them thoroughly,
read them in a meditative, prayerful way, because in many ways, I think the whole of the Christian
spiritual life emerges out of this meditation. Well, for today, we have
this marvelous image. Here it is. "I am the vine," Jesus says,
"and my father…the vine grower…. Remain in me, as I remain in you." Now, something of Christian
distinctiveness is on display here. We do indeed have within
Christianity a tradition of referring to Jesus as
Master or teacher, and to those of us who follow him
as disciples or learners, and that's altogether right. But here's the problem. All sorts of other religious figures
could be seen as a master who has disciples. Even someone like Socrates,
the philosopher, could be seen as the teacher who has
disciples or followers. "Disciple" from "discere" in Latin
just means to learn, right? Teacher and learners. Nothing wrong with that
when it comes to Christianity, but it doesn't go deep enough,
because in Christianity, we have not simply a relationship
of student to teacher when it comes to Jesus. Rather, we participate
organically in him. Let me say that again. He's not just our teacher,
not just our moral exemplar, not someone we'd simply imitate
from a historical distance. We live in him. We are rooted and
grounded in him. I've talked before about that
lovely verb in Greek “menein,” "to remain," and you see it here. It runs up and down John's Gospel. "To remain in me,
to be grounded in me, derive your life from me." That's the way a Christian
relates to Jesus. We live because of him. Listen to this: "Just as a branch cannot bear fruit
on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you
unless you remain in me." This is much more radical
than simply, "Unless you follow my teaching
like a good disciple…" Mm-mm. "Unless you are grafted onto me
in such a way, that your life comes from my life…" Now can you see this wonderful
Catholic spirituality of the sacraments? I mean, if Jesus' teaching were enough,
well then just listening to sermons and going to theology class
I suppose would be enough. But no, in the Catholic dispensation,
the sacraments—what are those? The means by which we are
grafted onto the life of Christ, the means by which he begins
to live his life in us. That's what Baptism means. Confirmation, Holy Orders,
Matrimony, the Eucharist —all these ways of
participating in his life: that's what Christianity
is finally about. Now, once we see this principle,
we can understand something of enormous importance. I remember, my friend Fr. Paul Murray,
who's the great Dominican spiritual master, he expressed it once this way: "Jesus wants to live
his life in you." That’s very simple to say,
but think about that. Jesus wants to live his life in you. Again, not just a matter of, "Oh, he's a great teacher
and I listen to him." No, no; much more radical,
dramatic than that. You're the branch, he's the vine. His life wants to flow into you,
so that he lives out even now, through you, his life. That's Christian spirituality. Now, once we get that, I think
the Christian life opens up. "What's my life all about?" Well, not just being a good disciple
who attends to the teachings of Jesus, but rather someone who in
his or her own life, is becoming the vehicle by which
Christ is living his life in the world even now. A little while ago, I happened
to come across this little video from Bill Burr, the comedian. I don't know if you know him
—kind of a brash, sarcastic comedian. And judging from his name
and from what he said, I'm gathering he's a Catholic,
because he talked about, "Ah, I don't get it. You go to church and you
hear these stories about Jesus, and you've heard them a million times,
and he's not coming back yet, and so what's the point?" And I thought, "No, no;
you're missing the point." The point is those stories
are not just, oh, nice tales about someone that lived long ago, or nice moral exemplars
for us to follow. Those stories are the template by
which we understand our lives even now. As we watch what he said and did,
we understand the dynamics of our own spiritual life. And for us Catholics,
who've been baptized, and received the Eucharist
and the other sacraments —see, Christ is living his life in us. So how do we interpret
what happens to us? See, that's the key. So I'm going to give you just a
couple simple examples here in the few minutes I've got. What's one thing we know
about Jesus for sure? He was a friend of sinners. Not a sinner. No, no; he's the sinless one. But he likes sinners. Jesus spent time with sinners. He ate and drank with them,
he associated with them. "I've come not for the healthy,
but for the sick." So if Jesus wants to live
his life in you right now, well then, you're meant
to become a friend of sinners. I mean, there are way
too many of us, I suppose, within the Christian and
Catholic dispensation, we love to judge sinners. Well, I mean, Jesus did that too,
but only in the interest of drawing them into his friendship. He didn't stand at a distance
passing judgment. No, no; his point was
to draw them into his life. So how much time do you
spend with sinners? Not judging them, but trying to
draw them into a better life? Jesus was a friend of sinners,
so we who live in him are meant to be friends of sinners. Jesus very clearly was a healer. So up and down the Gospels,
over and over again, Jesus heals. Now, there are some people,
I've met a few in my life —they're very, very rare—
but there are some people I think who have the charism
of actual physical healing. I don't deny that for a minute. But the vast majority of us
don't have that particular charism. But may I suggest: everyone
baptized into Christ Jesus is meant to be a healer
—someone who brings peace, and comfort, and deeper life
to those around him or her. Here's a little rubric
I would suggest to you. At the end of the day,
do a little review of your day, a sort of examination of conscience. Ask the simple question: Were people more alive? Were they healthier? Were they healed because
of my presence? Or was my presence today" —now, let's be honest,
fellow sinners, about this— "Was my presence today for people
more of a wounding presence?" You know what I mean. We all fall into this trap. Jesus was a healer. He wants to live his life in you. So then, you become a healer. You become a bearer of life
and health to those around you. Third thing we know for sure
about Jesus: he was a preacher. So from the moment we encounter him
on the hills of Galilee, he's preaching. What do we hear over
and over again? Jesus went from town
to town preaching. He left that place
because he said "I’ve got to go preachand
proclaim elsewhere." He was a proclaimer
of the kingdom of God. Okay. All of us who have been
baptized into Christ Jesus, we're like branches, he's the vine;
we're grafted onto him; he's trying to live
his life in us. Therefore, we have to be teachers. Now, some will do so explicitly,
and can I summon some listening to me right now? We need catechism teachers at
all levels of the Church's life. Do it. Do it. Maybe that's your special charism. But can I suggest: every baptized person
is meant to be a teacher —someone who speaks the truth
of the kingdom of God, someone who speaks about Jesus. Maybe ask this question at
the end of the day: "Did people know more about Jesus
and his kingdom today because of me? Did I teach the faith?" And I don't mean in some
browbeating way. I mean, I get it —not to be aggressive about it
and overbearing. But have we so taken in the etiquette
of our society that says, "Privatize your religion. Don't talk about religion." Well then, I'm not letting Christ
live his life in me if I privatize my religion. No, no; I’m meant to proclaim it
—yes, even from the housetops. Do people know more about Jesus
and his kingdom because of you? That's a good question to test
whether he's living his life in us. Just a last thing that I want
to reflect on, and maybe it's the most important, because gosh,
we all wrestle with this, because we all suffer. Something I've found in
my years of preaching, the minute you mention suffering,
everyone's ears perk up. Everyone begins to listen
in a fresh way, because we all suffer. How do we read our suffering? "Ah, just dumb, bad luck. It's just the way it goes, and I've just been abandoned,
and I'm stuck here in my physical, or psychological, or emotional pain." Or do I read it this way: Jesus is endeavoring to live
his life in me, and his life conduced toward his suffering
and death on the cross, and by that suffering and death,
Jesus redeemed the world. Might my suffering
—and at all different levels, I know; people listening to me right now,
you're suffering at different levels and different degrees of intensity—
might I interpret it as Jesus living his cross in me even now,
so that my suffering is contributing maybe in a manner
that I can't entirely see, but is contributing to the
salvation of the world? Dumb suffering, just dumb evil? No, no; John Paul II was so good
on this, wasn't he? He said, "Never pass up the
opportunity when you suffer." He didn't mean that masochistically;
he meant, never pass up the opportunity to interpret that
suffering as a participation in the suffering of Christ. He wants to live his life in you. You're the branch, he's the vine; so of course we suffer in this life,
because the Master suffered. Take a look at this image, everybody. Internalize it. He's the vine, we're the branches. And then use that to understand
the whole of your life —Jesus endeavoring to live
his life right now in you. And God bless you. Thanks so much for watching. If you enjoyed this video,
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