6th Sunday of Easter Year A - 25/5/2014 - Gospel: Jn 14, 15-21
The Promised
A promise is a statement to assure with oneself or with someone that one will try do or try to avoid something at some point in the future. In the Church there are different types of promises that I would like to call it as a covenant that a person makes with God. The most important of promises are in the sacrament of baptismal that parents make promises on behalf of their children. The same promise is repeated again when a person recites the Creed in Church in the communal form with other members of the faithful community. We try to keep our promises but at the same time we also fail to keep some of them. Keeping the promises may improve the level of trust and integrity of a person while failing to keep promises harms the interpersonal relationship. Being faithful to the religious promises is the sign of inner strength that implies that God's grace in us is active in our lives and our love for God comes from within.
Human capacity is incapable in keeping all promises made to God and to one another. The Church comes to our aid. She offers the solution in the form of the sacrament of reconciliation. When we fail to fulfil our covenant with God we rely on the sacrament of reconciliation for healing. It will restore the damage done by the broken promises and it will renew the person to be better than what it was. Every time we come to the sacrament of reconciliation we are more shining than the previous one. The admission of mistakes helps us to be an honest and humble person. The Church helps us to reconcile simply because she relies on the sacrifice Jesus made for us on the cross.
The death and resurrection of Christ has guaranteed that whatever God had promised to our ancestors in the history of salvation is completed in Jesus Christ who has the power to complete it. The defeat of death shows that Christ is the absolute conqueror and nothing can stop Him anymore, even death itself. We don't have the capacity to carry out all our promises to God and to others but we rely on Jesus for help. Jesus helps us to fulfil our promises and Jesus Himself has made promises and will do it for us in the future. Jesus has promised to give us something utterly new and that is the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus has promised that He will not leave us orphan and that He will return to take us to where He is and that He will love those who love Him by keeping the commandment of love. Judgment and eternal life rests on this new covenant. At dawn each day we need to examine how we live the commandment of love of the day? When we open ourselves allowing the Spirit to lead and guide us we are doing well but when we follow our own free will and ignore the voice of the Spirit in our heart we fall back into the way of the world simply because we ignore the voice of God's love in our heart. Not following the voice of love in our heart our actions and thoughts must be driven by other powers and that is the clear sign of failing to keep our Baptismal promises.
Human capacity is incapable in keeping all promises made to God and to one another. The Church comes to our aid. She offers the solution in the form of the sacrament of reconciliation. When we fail to fulfil our covenant with God we rely on the sacrament of reconciliation for healing. It will restore the damage done by the broken promises and it will renew the person to be better than what it was. Every time we come to the sacrament of reconciliation we are more shining than the previous one. The admission of mistakes helps us to be an honest and humble person. The Church helps us to reconcile simply because she relies on the sacrifice Jesus made for us on the cross.
The death and resurrection of Christ has guaranteed that whatever God had promised to our ancestors in the history of salvation is completed in Jesus Christ who has the power to complete it. The defeat of death shows that Christ is the absolute conqueror and nothing can stop Him anymore, even death itself. We don't have the capacity to carry out all our promises to God and to others but we rely on Jesus for help. Jesus helps us to fulfil our promises and Jesus Himself has made promises and will do it for us in the future. Jesus has promised to give us something utterly new and that is the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus has promised that He will not leave us orphan and that He will return to take us to where He is and that He will love those who love Him by keeping the commandment of love. Judgment and eternal life rests on this new covenant. At dawn each day we need to examine how we live the commandment of love of the day? When we open ourselves allowing the Spirit to lead and guide us we are doing well but when we follow our own free will and ignore the voice of the Spirit in our heart we fall back into the way of the world simply because we ignore the voice of God's love in our heart. Not following the voice of love in our heart our actions and thoughts must be driven by other powers and that is the clear sign of failing to keep our Baptismal promises.
Written by Fr Vũđình Tường
St Francis Xavier Catholic Parish
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Brisbane Australia
St Francis Xavier Catholic Parish
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Brisbane Australia