May 18, 2025 Fifth Sunday of Easter

Welcome Father Daniel Today’s Readings: Acts 14:21-27 | Psalm 145:8-9, 10-11, 12-13 | John 13:31-33a, 34-35

Jesus had no illusion that the Christianity that evolved after his suffering, death, and Resurrection would be a glorious perfection of love and joy with fully realized justice and peace. Christian love is messy, conflicted, and often questioned. Resurrection and redemption never promised us a rose garden.

The only difference between Christian love and human love is that Christian love is professed. We profess Jesus as the Christ of God who is the truth of love realized and confirmed through his life, death, and Resurrection. Jesus is the model and example of all that is possible for human love through his self-emptying sacrifice for the sake of us all. Jesus himself expresses this when he says to the first disciples, “there is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” Jesus laid down his life, in love, for you and me whom he claimed as friends. In doing this, Jesus was fully aware that the promise of Divine union in heaven would be fraught with every messiness and challenge.

Consider the tension and contradiction of the gospel. The setting is the Last Supper. Jesus has just finished washing the feet of the disciples. This meal is rightly defined as a love feast. Yet, it is also marred by the reality of evil and its consequence against human nature. It seems odd, doesn’t it, that as Jesus is about to give us the new commandment to love one another that one at the table would betray him?

Jesus did not simply say, ‘love one another.’ He intentionally said, “as I have loved you, so you also should love one another.” Big difference. How we love and how Jesus loves are not very often the same. Consider the situation. Jesus knows Judas will betray him and hand him over to the religious authorities which will result in his death. He knows it is going to happen and he allows it to take place, not unlike the denials of Peter. Jesus is at table with his dearest friends sharing with them the legacy of his life mission. He is fully expecting, after his death and rising, that they will carry on the mission in his name.

Knowing what lies ahead, Jesus washes the feet of his betrayer with the same love as for each of the others. He washed the feet of the one who would deny his with the same love as if there were no denial. Jesus never asks or directs us to do something that he himself has not done. Friend and foe received the same love. Betrayer and denier get the same foot washing as each of the others at the table. Jesus knows human nature and the weakness that befalls each of us. Saints and sinners get the same forgiveness. It is said that the saints are just the sinners who keep getting up and coming back to a love and mercy they cannot deny or live without.

Human love and Christian love are the same love. Because Christian love is professed in the name of a person, Jesus, who directs his followers to love one another as he has loved them, Christians draw judgement and criticism, with rejection and persecution because we so often fail in fulfilling the love we profess. Why are such judgements cast when we all need, want, and are dependent on the same love?

Are non-Christians, non-believers in God, happier or better off because they do not hold to a commandment of love in the model of Jesus? I do not believe so. Every human being breathing air and wearing skin needs love. We die without love. People become irrational, lost, undeveloped, and too often violent when there is no interaction of love between or with others. This may sound harsh and discouraging. It is not. It is the reality of the human condition hindered by the deception of evil and the disorder of sin.

That is why we boldly acclaim Christ as the truth of love that reveals and shares with us the glory of our heavenly Father. We will fail. We will hurt others, and others will hurt us, but in the love of Christ our feet will be washed, our sins forgiven that we may begin again in the profession of faith to love as Jesus loves.

The Commandment to love another is not a burden but a gift. It is hard and our efforts will be imperfect. But as was once famously said, “never, ever give up.” You are in Christ. You profess Christ and his love. You were human before you professed Christ. If you had not been loved by those who gave you life, you would not be who you are today. The love that gave you life and nurtured you to this day was both human love and Christian love because they are both the same. We choose and commit to love in the name of Jesus who is the fulness of love. As he has loved us, so should we love one another and all others.

Do your best. When you fall, have your feet washed. Start over. Never quit.

Source: Father John Esper, https://stvincentferrer.net/sermon/homily-may-18-2025/ Image: Detail of Christ’s Farewell to his Apostles

News

• 18 May - Mass starts at 11am this Sunday.
• 18 May - After Mass, a special Social Gathering will take place. Make sure to bring some time and bring a dish to share with everyone. As well, the team hopes for volunteers supporting the set-up before Mass (10:30am) and the clean-up afterwards.