THE DAILY GOSPEL

May 6, 2013

Monday 6th Week of Easter

Psalter: Week 2 Ps 149:1b-2, 3-4, 5-6a and 9b The Lord takes delight in his people. 1st Reading: Acts 16:11-15

So we put out to sea from Troas and sailed straight across to Samothrace Island, and the next day to Neapolis. From there we went inland to Philippi, the leading city of the district of Macedonia, and a Roman colony. We spent some days in that city.

On the sabbath we went outside the city gate to the bank of the river where we thought the Jews would gather to pray. We sat down and began speaking to the women who were gathering there. One of them was a God-fearing woman named Lydia from Thyatira City, a dealer in purple cloth.

As she listened, the Lord opened her heart to respond to what Paul was saying. After she had been baptized together with her household, she invited us to her house, "If you think I am faithful to the Lord, come and stay at my house." And she persuaded us to accept her invitation. Gospel: Jn 15:26-16:4a

Jesus said to his disciples, "From the Father, I will send you the Spirit of truth. When this Helper has come from the Father, he will be my witness, and you, too, will be my witnesses for you have been with me from the beginning.

"I tell you all this to keep you from stumbling and falling away. They will put you out of the Jewish communities. Still more, the hour is coming when anyone who kills you will claim to be serving God; they will do this because they have not known the Father or me. I tell you all these things now so that when the time comes you may remember that I told you.

"I did not tell you about this in the beginning because I was with you.” Reflection:

In these modern times contaminated by much religious terrorism, it is easier to understand Jesus's words that say those who engage in violence would claim to be doing so as a service to God. A noble goal, but utterly sinful act. Thomas Aquinas once observed: "Every time someone sins, they are sinning under the guise of good.” They do so, because, as Jesus tells us today, they have not known the Father or Christ. "No ruler of this world ever knew this [wisdom]; otherwise they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory” (1 Cor 2:8). That is why Jesus prays for them at his death: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Lk 23:34).

Jesus informs his disciple about such ignorance so that when the time of their persecution comes, they would remember and find it in their hearts to forgive them, as he himself did. And we know that the martyrs of the Church have invariably remembered it and prayed for their persecutors, starting with Stephen, the deacon (Acts 7:60). Let us pray for the grace to do the same at the moment of our death.

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