Second Sunday of Easter - Climax of Divine Mercy Yr B. April 7, 2024.
Readings:
1st: Acts 4:32-35
2nd: I John 5:1-6
Gospel: John 20:19-31
Theme: "Give Mercy and Receive Mercy"
My dear people of God, today is second Sunday of Easter, the climax of Divine Mercy Novena, thus Divine Mercy Sunday. Our reflections would focus on the Theme. Mercy, another word for Love, is a mission, received unconditionally to give unconditionally and indiscriminately. "Set no bounds to your love, just as your heavenly father sets none to his" (Matthew 5:35). To say that God is merciful is saying the same thing and again because the very being and essence of God is mercy/love. Creation itself is an act of God's love. God is mercy itself, his every action is merciful. Why is second Sunday of Easter celebrated as Divine Mercy Sunday? This Feast was instituted during the Papacy of St. Pope John Paul II following a profound meditative and doctrinal study and scrutiny of reported apparations of Sr. Faustina Kowalska, (1905-1935) a Polish Nun of the Congregation of the Sisters of our Lady of Mercy. Among other things, the readings in all the 3 cycles (A, B, C) of the Catholic Liturgy (traditional process of directed/guided worship) of this particular Sunday recount the power of God's love to accept back, accommodate and reinstate fully. Suffice to say, that God would not demand from us what he himslf has not already done. Instances abound in scripture that support the being and essence of God as mercy/love and his actions as merciful/loving. The first couple (Adam and Eve), who represent humanity, was the first beneficiary of God's mercy. Following that miserable fall by abusing their freedom, God did not condemn and abandon them to doom. He mercifully searched for them and still called Adam by name, not by a label, as you and I would do. What is even awesome and renewing is the time God chose to search for them - in the evening, within the confines and privacy of a garden, a time of calm and tranquillity, when nature is at its best - and that is mercy, in the truest sense. What does that mean to me? What do I gain from the chronic trumpeting of mistakes/failings of others? How do I handle and manage issues of internal forum? Is violence the only means to correcting mistakes in others? Israel as a people can tell, from experience, the boundless nature of God's mercy. During that painful era of national struggles with foreign powers, due to their repeated infidelity and failures, God did not abandon them to an endless cruelty and permanent defeat by their enemies. Indeed, the battle was always the Lord's. All the prophets who met with God's favor would have their own experiences of God's mercy to share. Moses in particular, a fugitive murderer with a very terrible speech impediment, met with God's mercy and favor at the lowest level of his life. A scaring character, good enough to be despised and avoided by you and I, the transforming power of God's mercy picked him up from a prolonged hiding and "extracted" the best out of him - lifted as an escaping murderer of a single Egyptian to a savior of a whole nation (Israel). What does that mean to me? Write people off without giving them a second chance?
Similar instances abound also in the New Testament. Truly speaking, among the 12 called by Jesus, none of them was a credible candidate of any merit. The prejudiced Jews, like you and I, only looked at them and found "people we know" from whom nothing good could ever come. Jesus, personification of Mercy, saw in the same people future saints except a greedy Judas Iscariot. Eyes that only look at faults in others are different from eyes that see what unworthy persons can become, if given the opportunity. Mary, from whom 7 terrible demons were exorcised got transformed by mercy from prostitution to proclaiming mercy. Not only did she later anoint the feet of Jesus with an expensive perfume, she was also among the first to proclaim and spread the news of the Empty Tomb. Peter openly denied Jesus but the Lord sent out an eye of mercy to search for an unfaithful and lost friend. Our gospel today relates the story of how Jesus, after the Resurrection, is searching for the very people who shamelessly fled and abandoned him at the hour he needed their mere presence most, during and after the arrest - just to give friendship a second chance.
As we climax Divine Mercy week today, I pray God to let his face continue to shine on you, on your family and on your work/business. Aided by grace and mercy, may we each renew our resolve to be active agents of mercy, resist the temptation and tendency of always rushing to condemn [or] cancel (write off) people at the least offence. We pray for our brothers and sisters in jail, most of whom have no idea of the alleged crime that ended them up in there. We continue to pray for our judiciary, that noble arm of our democratic governance, staffed and even headed by Catholics and other Christians, to wake up to the national cry and call to revive and redeem the drawning image of our justice delivery system from its current rots in order to save and protect the dignity of innocent victims continuously locked [up] and forgotten. "The family is the basic unit of society, therefore, if society is not at peace with itself, then there must be something wrong at the family level" (St. Pope John Paul II). Scripture also attests that no sound tree bears bad fruits. We pray, therefore, that children may grow up in Christian Homes built by human Hearts and not in ordinary houses built by hands. We pray also for all collapsed marriages and those on the verge of collapsing that the affected couples would have the courage to give and receive mercy. We all have a role to play because "If the Lord should mark our guilt, who would survive?" Therefore, "Give Mercy and receive Mercy". "Eternal Father, I offer you the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of your dearly beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, in attonement for our sins and the sins of the whole world...For the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world". May the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Please continue to recite the Holy Rosary daily. God richly bless you and your family.
Rev. Fr. Thomas L. Debuo, Catholic Diocese of Damongo, Ghana (0244511306/0243711926)