Thursday of the Octave of Easter
Acts 3:11-26; Psalm 8; Luke 24:35-48
Florence Kissane, Associate
One of the parts of this story told in Acts that impressed me is that Peter and John had laid hands on the lame man and he was healed. Peter says, “why are you surprised? As though we made this man walk by our own power and holiness.
The gift of healing is manifested in this community of Hope. There are many stories of God’s love, compassion, mercy and forgiveness being poured out through the sisters and associates. One story that has always touched me deeply was told by Sister Bridget Penny. She was washing the feet of a homeless man when she noticed he was crying. She asked if she was hurting him and he said “no”. He was overwhelmed because it was the first time anyone had actually touched him in many years.
We are healers in so many ways, besides the nursing, massage & physical therapy. By listening, affirming, being present to, journeying with, including and encouraging one another and those whom God sends to us, we are all healers. More people’s lives have been turned around because they came into contact with this Community.
When the two companions returned to Jerusalem and were telling others their story, Jesus appeared among them, and they were startled and frightened and thought Jesus was a ghost.
Jesus invitation to “touch me and see” is for all of us. How many times when we have been frightened or struggling with doubt have we reached out to touch Jesus to make sure he is real.
I had the most wonderful stepmother in the world. Her name was Alice O’Brien and she gave us the gift of her unconditional love. She was a high school business teacher and very well thought of. But her religious education as a child, consisted of fire and brimstone before a pot bellied stove in the living room of the farmhouse where she was raised. A few years before she died she said to me one day, “I don’t think I’ll get to heaven. I’m not good enough and I don’t think God even hears my prayers.” I was flabbergasted. I can still cry thinking about it. I told her to ask God for a very special favor. Just you and God I said. God will answer you, I promise. A real leap of faith on my part.
A few months later she told me that God indeed had heard her and answered her prayer.
One of the teenaged grandchildren had been really acting out and in desperation, had been turned out of the house. When Nana heard about it she was devastated. And she prayed. Within the hour of her prayer, the grandchild was back in the home, reconciled. Alice knew that God heard her prayer, God loved her and more important, God loved her grandchild. And she was at peace. Jesus is really here.
Toward the end of this passage from Luke, Jesus says, “It is written that the Christ would suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that in his name repentance for the forgiveness of sins would be preached to all nations”
I have always had trouble with “repentance for the forgiveness of sins,” as if we needed to repent before we can be forgiven.
I found that some translations have “repentance and the forgiveness of sins” and that was much more in keeping with my own experience of forgiveness. With the help of The Preachers Exchange web-site I was able to find that and is the correct translation for the Greek “Kai.”
Catherine of Siena in her Dialogue 18, quotes God as saying “My daughter, see now and know that no one can be taken away from me. Everyone is here as I said, either in justice or in mercy. They are mine; I created them and I love them ineffably.
Jesus explains the Scriptures to those present. Jesus teaches. He educates. This gift is also manifested so abundantly in this community of Hope. Has anyone ever added up the number of students that each of you has taught/influenced in your ministry? Has anyone added everyone’s numbers together just to get an idea how many people have been blessed by your lives, your giftedness? And that’s formal classroom teaching. What about all the other ways that we teach and preach with our lives?
When I read Psalm 8, I remember Sr. Elizabeth Johnson’s wonderful presentation a few weeks ago on the new cosmology. I know you are familiar with this theology, but she reminded me again that “the natural world is a sacrament that mediates God’s presence to us”, and we are standing on Holy Ground. Miriam Teresa Winter’s “Mystery” makes all this very real for me.
Elizabeth Johnson goes on to say that our contemplation on creation should move us to “action on the part of justice” for the earth and all its creatures, and our reaction to the destruction of the earth must be prophetic. The presentation yesterday on the “Sustainable Earth Community”, was all of that.
In his book, “The Holy Web”, Cletus Wessel, OP, asks if the indwelling Spirit and the psyche are in fact describing one underlying reality.
If the Holy Spirit is the biblical way of explaining the power and presence of God within the life of the community, the lives of individuals and the whole of creation, then the psyche in its deepest dimension is the psychological way of explaining the power and presence of God within the life of the community, the lives of individuals and the whole of creation.
The Holy Spirit is present within the life of this community of Hope, the lives of each one of us here, and in all of creation. “ God’s power, working in us, can do more than we can ask or imagine.”
Moses promises that God will raise up prophets among us. A prophet is a person who speaks for God under Divine guidance. As a spokesperson for the deity, the prophet does not choose this profession, but is chosen, often against the prophet’s will to convey the word of God to God’s people regardless of whether or not they wish to hear it. Prophets were often reluctant to accept their calling. I believe that the Dominican Sisters of Hope have been called by God to be the prophetic voice in the Dominican Family, the Church and in the world. These three readings make it very clear to me and I find it wondrously exciting.
I close with these lines from the poem, “The Beginning,” by Denise Levertof
We have only begun to imagine the fullness of life. How could we tire of Hope?
We have only begun to imagine justice and mercy for all. How could we tire of Hope?
We have only begun to invision a world at peace. How could we tire of Hope?