Homily for 3rd Sunday of Easter

In this reading from the Acts of the Apostles, St. Peter explains the bad news of sin and the good news of redemption. He emphasizes that humanity put God to death through their sins, but God raised Jesus from the dead, offering salvation to all. St. Peter urges repentance and conversion as a response to God's grace. The importance of witnessing is highlighted, both Jesus witnessing to his disciples and the disciples being called to witness to the world. It is emphasized that the resurrection of Jesus is central to our faith, and encountering Jesus in the Eucharist and the Scriptures helps us to be witnessed to by him. In our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles, we have St. Peter speaking at Pentecost and kind of breaks down or condenses the Gospel into these, for our first reading, these few short words which are a beautiful way of expressing in a simple form what God has done. It's the bad news of sin and the good news of redemption, of salvation, of what God has done about sin. So as Peter is preaching, he says to the people that you denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murder be released to you, the author of life you put to death. So that's the bad news. The bad news is that God came among us in the person of Jesus Christ. He took on human flesh and what was humanity's response to that? Well, through our sin, through stupidity, through blindness, arrogance, pride, all of those things that Jesus suffered, we put him to death. So the author of life, we put to death. So that's the worst thing that's ever happened in the history of the world, putting God to death. That's the worst sin humanity has ever committed. Then we have the good news. St. Peter goes on to say, but God raised him from the dead, of this we are witnesses. Now I know that you acted out of ignorance, just as your leaders did, but God has thus brought to fulfillment what he had announced before him through the mouth of all the prophets, that his Christ would suffer. So St. Peter is explaining that God knew that this was going to happen. He didn't want us to fall into sin. He didn't want us to, again, get into arrogance, pride, cruelty, all of those things, and commit sin. But knowing that we did, he uses that sin to then bring a greater good out of it. And he not just doesn't bring just a greater good, but the greatest good. So the worst sin in the world, putting God to death, ends up being the best thing in the world that God draws out of that through salvation, salvation for the entire human race. There's nothing more important for you or I than going to heaven, that God has now opened the way to heaven through his son, Jesus Christ. So it should always be a good reminder and encouragement for us that if God can do that, if God can do that with the worst sin in the world, whatever might be my personal faults or failings or sins, however grave they might be, if I turn to the Lord, God can and will draw a greater good out of it. If, and this is the big if, as St. Peter says at the end, if we repent and are converted, so that's the last line here of our first reading, repent therefore and be converted that your sins may be wiped away. So Jesus has done all the hard work, he's opened the way to salvation, and then our responsibility, our response to what God has done is to repent, so to turn away from sin, but not just turn away from sin, it's an important part, but that's not the whole part of responding to the gospel, it's repenting and being converted, conversion, turning back to, so turning back to God, so that Jesus is now at the center of my life, that he's the reason for my existence, that I live my life with that intense, intense way, intense love and intentionality, that Jesus is at the center and heart of all that I do. If I do that, if I'm repenting of my sin and making sure Jesus is at the center of my heart and my life, then I experience the salvation, that joy that God has offered to me, that his Son Jesus has won for me on the cross. So it's always important to keep those elements together, right? That we've sinned, so we desperately need a Savior, we need Jesus, and God has done something about our sin, and then converting and repenting, right, repenting and being converted to the Lord, in order that we can experience the salvation that the Lord wants us to receive. And then the other element in our first reading and in our gospel, is the element of witnessing. And so both in our first reading and in the gospel, we hear the importance of witnessing being spoken about. So first and foremost, Jesus witnessing to his disciples, but then his disciples going out and witnessing to the world. So again, that two-fold dynamic of Jesus giving, right, witnessing to us, but then we're called to go out and witness to the rest of the world. And so in Luke's gospel account, which happens right before the Acts of the Apostles, so Jesus comes and appears to the disciples, and they're startled, they're terrified, they don't know what's going on. They think that maybe they're seeing a vision or a ghost, they don't know what's happening. And so Jesus has to reveal himself in this very physical way, and Luke records these physical details. And he says, why are you troubled, why are depressions arise in your hearts, look at my hands and my feet, they are by myself. He tells them to touch him and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have. Then he showed them his hands and his feet, and he asked them if they had anything there to eat, and they gave him a piece of baked fish, and so he eats it in front of them so they can see that no, it's really him, he's really risen from the dead. And Luke does this in part to show again the reality of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. This wasn't just an emotional resurrection of Jesus in their hearts, or the apostles having nice feelings about Jesus after he died, no, Jesus really died and really rose from the dead. And our entire faith depends on that fact. In one of his letters, St. Paul writes that if Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain. He goes on to say that we are the most pitiable people of all if Christ hasn't been raised, because we're believing in a lie. So if Jesus Christ hasn't been raised from the dead, we can all pack up and walk out of the church right now, because the rest of our faith is a lie, it hinges on the fact of the resurrection, that Jesus has broken the bonds of sin and death. And so after Jesus is proving that it really is him, that he is alive, he then preaches to them, witnesses to them. These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and Psalms must be fulfilled, and he goes on to say you are witnesses of these things, and that they are a witness to the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, and they're called to go out and witness to the world. And St. Peter says the same thing, as he says that God, after the author of life, he put him to death, but God raised him from the dead, of this we are witnesses. So this really happened, and since it really happened, it changes everything. So then repent and be converted. And so, just to end, I would like to just focus on two ways in which we can allow ourselves to be witnessed to by the Lord, because again, we can't give away what we don't have. So if we want to be able to witness to the power of Jesus's resurrection in our lives to the rest of the world, we have to allow Jesus to witness that power himself to us. And two of those things come right from our readings. So at the very beginning of Luke's Gospel, it says the two disciples recounted what had taken place on the way, and how Jesus was made known to them in the breaking of bread. So these are the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. So their eyes are only opened when they encounter Jesus in the Eucharist, when Jesus breaks bread with them. This is a beautiful, important lesson for us, that where do we encounter the risen Jesus? We encounter him in all sorts of ways, through other people, through the sacraments, but especially the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, that when Jesus comes and is present to us in the Holy Eucharist at every single Mass, he doesn't have an ounce less of glory than he had when he appeared to the disciples. Our mode of perceiving him is different, we don't see him in his bodily human form, but he is present, body, blood, soul, and divinity on the altar. And so we receive the exact same Jesus that suffered, died, rose again, and appeared to the disciples. So having a devotion to Jesus in the Holy Eucharist helps us to encounter him, helps us to allow ourselves to be witnessed to by him. Also, especially when we come to Mass, we come to Mass with kind of a plan, so to speak, a spiritual plan of coming to Mass, who am I going to pray for? What specific graces am I going to ask for? We have the offertory, and when the baskets are being passed around and the gifts are being brought forward, well it's also time for us to spiritually unite our prayers, our intentions, both for ourselves and our family members, to the sacrifice that is being offered on the altar. We can ask for the intercession of the saints and the angels, especially our guardian angels that are here with us at Mass, to help us to enter in, to worship well. And so if we live our life at the Eucharist, especially at Mass, with that kind of devotion and attention, we can receive more and more graces every time we come and receive Jesus in the Eucharist. And then also, encountering the Lord in the Scriptures. Jesus says that, again, everything written about him in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and Psalms must be fulfilled, and then he opened their mind to understand the Scriptures. Because all the Scriptures, both the Old Testament and the New Testament, point to Jesus, witness to Jesus' life, death, and his resurrection. So if we want to come to know Jesus, to be witnessed to by him, then we have to spend time with him, getting to know him in his Word, in the Scriptures. And as we do that, we come to start valuing the things that Jesus values, and thinking like he thinks, loving what he loves. And so as we approach Jesus in the Holy Eucharist at this Mass, my brothers and sisters, let's ask him for that grace to allow ourselves to be witnessed to by him through the Scripture, through the Eucharist, so we can then be witnesses of his resurrection to the rest of the world.