Homily for Thursday, 5th Week of Easter

Homily for Thursday
5th Week of Easter

May 19, 2022
Acts 15: 7-21
Christian Brothers, St. Joseph Residence, New Rochelle

Argument and disagreement are nothing new in the Church.  Yesterday’s reading from Acts ended with the apostles and elders coming together in Jerusalem to hash out a contentious issue—the contentious issue—of the early Church:  the relationship between Jews and Gentiles within the community of believers.  That’s where our reading today begins.

Did Greeks, Egyptians, Romans, Arabs, and others have to adopt circumcision and all the rest of the Law of Moses in order to follow Jesus and be saved?

Peter tells the assembly, “We believe that we are saved thru the grace of the Lord Jesus” (15:11), not by the Law.  The Collect stresses that:  By your grace, O God, “we are made just….  Stand by your gifts, that those justified by faith” may persevere.  The great gathering in Jerusalem recognized that Jesus offers salvation by grace.  God calls whomever he wishes, including the Gentiles, and freely bestows his Spirit also upon them.

Pope Francis has been repeating over and over that everyone is saved by God’s mercy, by grace.  The message bears repeating.  We sinners are liable either to discouragement on account of what the Collect calls our own “pitiable” state, or to harsh judgment of others who appear to us to be greater sinners than we think we are (like the Pharisee in the Temple scorning the tax collector [Luke 18:9-14]).  In either case, discouragement or judgment, we need the reminder of mercy, of grace.

As you’ve heard, today’s my 44th anniversary of ordination.  You know well that vocation is a mystery of grace.  Why did God call me or you?  Only he knows.  Why have you and I persevered thus far, while so many others haven’t?  In my SDB ordination class of 10, 3 left the priesthood entirely a long time ago, and 1 left the Salesians and became a good diocesan priest.  You probably have similar histories.

I know that many people have prayed for me and are still doing so.  They’re appealing to God’s grace—that by his grace I may be his faithful minister and an instrument of his grace.  By God’s grace may all of us persevere in our baptismal faith in the Lord Jesus, that his joy might be in us and our joy complete (cf. John 15:11).