Homilies for May 2024

For the Sixth Sunday of Easter, the Solemnity of the Ascension, the Seventh Sunday of Easter, Pentecost Sunday, and the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Note: Homily for Pentecost Sunday by Rev. John P. Cush, STD;

all others for May 2024 by our monthly homilist, Fr. Stephen Yusko

Sixth Sunday of Easter – May 5, 2024

Readings: Acts 10:25–26, 34–35, 44–48 • Ps 98:1, 2–3, 3–4 • 1 Jn 4:7–10 • Jn 15:9–17  bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050524.cfm

“This is my commandment, that you love one another . . .” In our readings on this Sixth Sunday of Easter, we hear much about Our Lord’s commandment to love. Yet this seems a strange thing to modern ears: a commandment to love. For many in our society today believe that love is simply a feeling, an inclination caused in us by encountering someone or even something outside of us. And so, some may ask, “How can we be commanded to love?” More than this, though, even if we can will ourselves to love, what kind of love is Jesus commanding us to give?

Are we to love one another as one may love their favorite movie, or their favorite sport or their favorite drink? I think we all would agree that Jesus is not commanding us to love one another as one might love The Lord of the Rings, or the New York Yankees, or a smooth glass of Macallan. We love these things for the pleasure they give to us, not for the good we wish to give to them. We do not love them for their own sake, as if they were ourselves.

Okay, are we to love one another as we may love our pets? Though one may and likely should love his pet more than he loves that smooth glass of scotch, it would be wrong and disordered if he were to love it more than other people, especially his wife or his kids. Pets are not persons, and they are certainly not our children — even if our children sometimes act like our pets — and so, we ought not treat them as such. Consequently, Jesus is not commanding us to love one another as we love our pets, as this kind of love falls far short of the mark.

What about the love that we have for ourselves? Are we to love one another with this love? Given that Scripture gives this to us as the second greatest commandment, this must be our answer, and yet, many of us know that it is tragically possible for a person to hate his or herself. Consequently, there must be an even greater love than the love of self to which Jesus is calling us to love one another. What is this form of love?

Well, let’s listen to Jesus: “love one another as I have loved you.” Yes! We are to love one another with the same love with which Jesus loved us, and with which the Father loved Him. In other words, we are to love with the love of God. A love that is unselfish; a love that is disinterested; a love that looks outward toward the other; a love that understands that the person before you is made in the image and likeness of God, and so, should be loved, not used; cherished, not discarded; a love that asks what good can I give, rather than what good can I get. Every human being desires to be loved, yet every human being also desires to love. To pour oneself out for the other without counting the cost; to lose oneself in loving so as to find themselves in love, even to the point of loving to its most eminent degree — to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.

We are to love one another with the love of God, then. A love that is supernatural, and that loves not only friends, but also those who have the potential of becoming our friends, that is, we are to love even our enemies. As Jesus said, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Mt 5:44).

We have seen that we are to love one another with the love of God; however, our original question lingers: How can we be commanded to love? More specifically, how can we be commanded to love with a love that exceeds our natural capacities? Pope Benedict XVI helps us to answer this question when he states in his encyclical Deus Caritas Est that we can be commanded to love with God’s own love because it has first been given to us. As St. John tells us in our second reading: “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the expiation for our sins.”

You see, love is not merely a feeling, but is in the will. As such, no matter the situation or our emotional response to it, we can always will to love. As St. John of the Cross said, “Where there is no love, put love, and you will find love.” More than this, though, as Christians, who have had the love of God “poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us” (Rom 5:5), we are now enabled by God’s grace to love as God loves, and thus, to fulfill the commandment of the New and Eternal Covenant, to “love one another, as I have loved you.” Such was the experience of St. Maximilian Kolbe, St. Mother Teresa, Ven. Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan, and the countless other witnesses of God’s love, and such can be your experience if you but ask for it and carry it out in your own lives.

Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord – May 9, 2024

Readings: Acts 1:1–11• Ps 47:2–3, 6–7, 8–9 • Eph 1:17–23 or Eph 4:1–13 • Mk 16:15–20    bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050924-Ascension.cfm

“God mounts his throne to shouts of joy: a blare of trumpets for the Lord.” With these words taken from our responsorial psalm, we enter into the great Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, and with it, the completion of the paschal mystery through which we have been redeemed. And how fitting are these words taken from the forty-seventh psalm? A psalm of exaltation and enthronement that portrays a jubilant procession in which God is celebrated as conqueror and king of all the nations. For today we celebrate exactly this: that forty days after His resurrection, having emerged from the tomb as victor over sin and death, Jesus goes up into the Heavenly Jerusalem — into the presence of God Himself — and is exalted and enthroned at the right hand of the Father. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us: “Christ’s Ascension into heaven signifies His participation, in His humanity, in God’s power and authority. Jesus Christ is Lord: he possesses all power in heaven and on earth. He is ‘far above all rule and authority and power and dominion,’ for the Father ‘has put all things under his feet.’ Christ is Lord of the cosmos and of history.” (CCC 668)

With Psalm 47 in mind, then, the Ascension of the Lord can be seen as the triumphal procession of the Son of Man (Dan 7:13–14) into the very throne room and presence of God, receiving from the Father’s hand both kingship and kingdom. In fact, St. Paul seems to allude to this when he states in our second reading: “When he ascended on high, he led a host of captives and he gave gifts to men.” For in the triumphant processions of old, particularly those of the Ancient Roman Empire, the conquering king, emperor, or general would process through the city on a chariot parading before and behind him those taken captive, as well as the spoils of war and the soldiers of his own unconquered army. The procession would continue until it reached the temple, at which time the prisoners would be executed in a demonstration of definitive victory over the enemy, before concluding with sacrifices to the gods and a lavish feast.

And so, in an analogical sense, the Ascension can be seen as the event in which Jesus, having triumphed over the tomb through His death and resurrection, rides into the Heavenly Jerusalem on the cloud of glory with a host of captives in his train, accompanied by His army of saints who carry with them the spoils of war. That is, the merits won through their cooperation with divine grace, the greatest of which is the inheritance of the Kingdom itself. Indeed, Jesus enters the Heavenly Jerusalem, the very sanctuary of God, not only as King, but also as Victim and Priest. He is the Lamb that stands as though slain in the sanctuary of God, interceding for His Mystical Body and Bride, working with her members through the gift of the Spirit, so that those who believe may not end their days in the tomb, but like Christ, enter into the Kingdom where humanity is united to the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit. The Kingdom where God is all in all.

Consequently, with the completion of the paschal mystery, the Kingdom that the disciples ask about in our first reading has already been inaugurated and restored. It is mysteriously already, but not yet. This Kingdom already exists because Christ sits at the right hand of the Father. However, its perfect manifestation in the Church has not yet been achieved. It is for this purpose, that is, for the purpose of the “building up of the body of Christ” that Jesus gives the “great commission” in our Gospel today: “Go into the whole world and proclaim the Gospel to every creature. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved; whoever does not believe will be condemned.” Our charge and commission as disciples of Christ, then, is nothing less than the salvation of the world and the propagation of the Kingdom. Thus, having been incorporated into the Kingdom through faith and sacrament ourselves, we must now manifest the Kingdom and build it up by using our God-given gifts to bear witness to it. That is, by becoming martyrs (witnesses) of Christ for the salvation of our brothers and sisters.

Christ Jesus sits at the right hand of the Father in glory, and yet, His triumphal procession marches on. We do not know who will be counted among the sheep or the goats, the faithful soldiers of Christ or His rebellious enemies, when it concludes at His second coming; when the latter will be condemned to the second death with Death and the Devil, and the former will inherit the Kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world and enter into the wedding feast of the Lamb, a feast that we already partake of here at the Mass. And so, what we must do in the meantime is to allow Christ to conquer our hearts that He may lead us in triumph, so that where Christ the Head has gone before in glory, we, the members of His Mystical Body, may follow in hope (Collect). As St. John says, “Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world — our faith.” (1 Jn 5:4)

Seventh Sunday of Easter – May 12, 2024

Readings: Acts 1:15–17, 20a, 20c–26 • Ps 103:1–2, 11–12, 19–20 • 1 Jn 4:11–16 • Jn 17:11b–19    bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/051224-Ascension.cfm

On this Seventh Sunday of Easter, the last before the great Solemnity of Pentecost, we find ourselves with the nascent Church as she patiently and prayerfully awaits the “promise of the Father,” who is the Holy Spirit in whose power the disciples would burst forth from the upper room, like the blood and water that burst forth from the heart of Christ, to sanctify the nations, gathering them into the Kingdom of Heaven through their witness to the risen Christ.

In this moment, however, within the decade of days that bridge Ascension Thursday — the day in which “the Lord set His throne in Heaven” — to the Feast of Pentecost, we hear of the eleven Apostles united as one body in deep and persevering prayer with the one hundred and twenty disciples, including the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of Jesus and the other holy women. Prayer that perhaps resembles the high priestly prayer, the last and longest that Jesus would utter in that same room before his arrest on the night of the Last Supper. In this prayer — the second part of which was heard in our Gospel — Jesus asked the Father to keep the Apostles, and the Church through them, in His name. That name has been revealed in its fullness in the person of Christ Jesus, through whom the disciples will experience the unity that the Father enjoys with the Son and the Son enjoys with the Father, a unity effected in the Church by the Spirit of Truth and Love. As St. John tells us in our second reading: “This is how we know that we remain in Him and He in us, that He has given us of His Spirit . . . God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him.”

Yet, while the Church keeps watch for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, something seems to be amiss. Like a missing note in a song, or a character that is absent from a story, the betrayal and absence of the twelfth Apostle looms large: the proverbial elephant that is not in the room. The seat has remained empty since that fateful night. Chosen and consecrated by Christ to be an Apostle; allotted a twelfth share of the ministry and counted as one of the twelve patriarchs and officers of the Kingdom, and so, destined with the eleven to “sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel,” Judas “turned aside” from this exalted calling “to go to his own place.”

I can think of no more tragic statement than this one uttered by St. Peter, as it alludes to the eternal fate of the “son of perdition.” Having used his exalted vocation to enrich and serve himself rather than Christ, he “turned aside,” a term used to describe Israel’s defection when they worshiped the molten calf (Ex 32:8). He defected from the Way, a defection that began and ended with his disbelief in the “sacrament of unity,” “the bond of charity,” the Most Holy Eucharist, and so, a defection that began and ended by disbelief in the identity of Christ Himself. By receiving the morsel of bread from the hand of his Friend and Master with a heart filled with deceit and disbelief, he withdrew from communion with Christ and became one with devil. He vacated the apostolic office of Christ to assume the one offered him by Satan. Consequently, where once he was destined to lead souls to Christ, he now leads them against Him. And now, having ratified this exchange with a rope, he, like Satan, has gone to “his own place” leaving behind him a wound that must be healed, an office that must be filled. For eleven is not the number of the restored Israel, but twelve, nor is the apostolic office rendered null and void because its occupant proved to be unfaithful.

Therefore, Peter, the prince of the apostles and the external principle of unity, who himself “turned aside” for a time out of weakness, now having turned back to Christ begins tending the Lord’s sheep, strengthening his brothers by leading them in restoring the twelve through the appointment of Matthias. The seat that was once empty has been filled; the office that was once vacant has been restored; the unity that was once wounded has been healed and the Church is now ready to receive the Spirit.

As we gather together as one body, then, at a time in which it appears as though the wounds of division are growing ever wider in the visible Church, as a consequence of those bishops, priests, deacons, and lay persons who like Judas, have “turned aside” from the call to holiness to seek their own place, we must neither be scandalized nor despair. For “we know that in everything God works for good with those who love him” (Rom 8:28). Therefore, may we do what the disciples did on this day. May we unite in prayer and recommit ourselves to the great task of doing those things that make for unity, namely: holding fast to the teaching and communion of the apostles, as well as to their successors; devoutly attending Mass and receiving the sacrament of unity, the Most Holy Eucharist, with souls made pure in the sacrament of reconciliation; and finally, by remaining vigilant in prayer, even making Christ’s High Priestly prayer our own by praying: “Father, may we be one even as you and the Son are one, that we may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you have sent your Son Jesus Christ and have loved us even as you have loved Him” (Jn 17:22) By our doing these things, may the Holy Spirit find our hearts united to Christ by the bonds of charity this Pentecost, ready to go out and bear witness that the Father has sent His Son for the salvation of the world. Today, then, with the Blessed Virgin Mary, let us pray as one: “Come, Holy Spirit, come!”

Pentecost Sunday – May 19, 2024

Readings: Acts 2:1–11 • Ps 104:1, 24, 29–30, 31, 34 • 1 Cor 12:3b–7, 12–13 or Gal 5:16–25 • Jn 15:26–27, 16:12–15      bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/051924-Day.cfm

By Rev. John P. Cush, STD

The Church is very wise in the planning of the liturgical calendar. It seems like we are always in preparation for the next big thing in the cycle. As you will no doubt recall, the liturgical year begins with the season of Advent, a time of preparation for the coming of Christ. However, even in Advent, this holy time can be viewed as a kind of two-part season. Beginning with about the first three weeks, the focus is on the figure of Saint John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Lord Jesus, and the coming of Christ in glory at the end of time. Following this remote preparation for the Lord, from December 17 onward, we kick into high gear with the proximate preparation for the recalling of the events of the Incarnation and Birth of the Messiah, marked with the use of the “O” antiphons in the Liturgy of the Hours.

The Christmas season, although among the shortest liturgical seasons, takes us in about two weeks from the infant Christ to the Christ beginning his earthly ministry following his Baptism. We then go for a short period of time into the season of Ordinary Time, this post-Epiphany season, in which we are fully immersed in the ministry of Christ.

The great and holy season of Lent, the time of penance and preparation before the yearly commemoration of the Easter mysteries can be seen as logically flowing from this time of Christ’s earthly ministry and can even be seen to be in two parts, in a similar way to Advent. The time of remote preparation for Easter can be seen from Ash Wednesday and the first three and a half weeks of Lent (in which the Lord Jesus gives us all those rich parables on prayer, fasting, almsgiving, and forgiveness) all the way to around the end of the fourth week of Lent, at which time we begin to engage in our Gospel with the confrontations which led Our Lord to undergo his Passion, Death, and Resurrection.

Following the time of the Sacred Triduum (which, truth be told, is its own liturgical season, clearly differentiated from Lent), we have the Easter season, which is, outside of Ordinary Time, the longest of the seasons. However, we can view even this Easter season, one in which we bathe in the light of His Risen Glory, Christ Our Lord, as a season of preparation. We can view all of the liturgical season of Easter as a remote and proximate preparation for the coming of the Holy Spirit in Pentecost. (And, if I may be candid, I find it a real shame that we do not have a season of Pentecost in the liturgical calendar; imagine how nice it would be to have around two weeks of red vestments at the start of Ordinary Time.)

This past week we begin the proximate preparations for the coming of the Holy Spirit in Pentecost. It is said that, in many ways, the Holy Spirit is the forgotten Person of the Most Blessed Trinity. Perhaps this is because, in many ways, He is the most intangible. We can envision the Second Person of the Most Blessed Trinity, in his Sacred Humanity, due to the Incarnation. We can even kind of envision God the Father, the First Person of the Most Blessed Trinity (or at least an anthropomorphized view of Him)! However, that Third Person of the Trinity, well, that’s the hard one to really grasp!

Make no mistake, though — the Holy Spirit is God. He is the Lord, the giver of life, as we profess each Sunday and solemnity in the Nicene Creed. But how do we experience the Holy Spirit? The sure and certain guide that is the Catechism of the Catholic Church can serve as a guide for us.

In the Catechism (#688), we read the following:

The Church, a communion living in the faith of the apostles which she transmits, is the place where we know the Holy Spirit:
– in the Scriptures he inspired;
– in the Tradition, to which the Church Fathers are always timely witnesses;
– in the Church’s Magisterium, which he assists;
– in the sacramental liturgy, through its words and symbols, in which the Holy Spirit puts us into communion with Christ;
– in prayer, wherein he intercedes for us;
– in the charisms and ministries by which the Church is built up;
– in the signs of apostolic and missionary life;
– in the witness of saints through whom he manifests his holiness and continues the work of salvation.

That’s a lot of places where we find this Holy Spirit whom we welcome liturgically today. He’s with us all the time, if only we have the eyes to perceive Him. Let’s examine just a few of the ways listed above by the Catechism, so we can know where to find the Spirit!

First, we can find the Holy Spirit in the Deposit of Divine Revelation, meaning we can see the hand of the Holy Spirit guiding the Bible and the Sacred Tradition of the Church. Do we recognize that the Sacred Scripture’s true author is ultimately God? Yes, God works through the divinely inspired authors, so that correctly conceived, accurately expressed, and truthfully composed the Bible in its Canon, but never forget that God is the author of the Bible. In our preparation for Pentecost, perhaps we might wish to read with open hearts and minds the book that we have been reading throughout the entire Easter season: the Acts of the Apostles. In many ways, this book is the sequel to the Gospel of Luke and they share the same author. Read Acts and look for the stories where that Third Person of the Most Blessed Trinity is the protagonist.

Second, we can find the Holy Spirit in the Sacred Liturgy. When you attend Holy Mass, look for the number of times that the Holy Spirit is invoked, especially during the Eucharistic Prayer. The Epiclesis is an essential part of the Mass and, in the consecration, the Holy Spirit is actively involved.

Third, we can find the Holy Spirit in the lives of the Saints. Try to learn about some of the saints, blesseds, venerables, and servants of God and look to where the Holy Spirit was clearly guiding them throughout their lives. Some figures whom you might want to examine include: St. John Henry Newman, whose conversion gave the Church one of her most important recent theologians; St. Josephine Bakhita, who rose from slavery to become a Sister and a witness of human dignity and forgiveness; Bl. Stanley Rother, the missionary priest from Oklahoma who died a martyr for his Guatemalan flock; Bl. Carlo Acutis, the website-building champion of the Eucharist; and the late Servant of God Michelle Duppong, known for her joyful service as a FOCUS missionary and in the Diocese of Bismarck.

The Holy Spirit comes to us in Pentecost, but He is actively present, powerfully showering us with his sevenfold gifts. Let’s rejoice in His sevenfold gifts and in the fruits of those gifts!

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity – May 26, 2024

Readings: Deuteronomy 4:32–34, 39–40 • Ps 33:4–5, 6, 9, 18–19, 20, 22 • Rom 8:14–17 • Mt 28:16–20    bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052624.cfm

On the first Sunday after Pentecost of each liturgical year, the Church bids us celebrate in a special manner “the central mystery of the Christian faith and life,” the mystery from which “all the other mysteries of the faith flow” (CCC 234). The mystery in whose name we sign ourselves with the sign of the cross and receive the Sacrament of Baptism. The mystery of God in Himself. That is, the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity. The mystery that God is one in three and three in one. One in essence and three in persons — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. “One God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity” as the Athanasian Creed tells us.

Though the Church dedicates every Sunday, and indeed, every second of every day to the Most Holy Trinity, it is fitting that we commemorate this mystery on this, the first Sunday after Pentecost because it was with the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost that the mystery of mysteries was fully revealed (CCC 732).

Now, this is not to say that God did not reveal himself before this. In fact, from the very beginning of creation God, “who dwells in unapproachable light” (1 Tim 6:16) has stooped down to human beings to communicate His very life to them, choosing them as “His heritage” (Psalm 33:12): guarding them; protecting them; saving them; forgiving them. Gradually revealing himself to them by speaking “in many and various ways” (Heb 1:1–2). Yet, it was only with the sending of the only-begotten Son of God, the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ, and through Him, the Holy Spirit, that the hidden life of God was shown forth in all of its splendor. For before Jesus one could have said that the one true God loves, but no one possessed the knowledge to declare with the beloved disciple: “God is love” (1 Jn 4:8). “That God Himself is an eternal exchange of love, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and He has destined us to share in that exchange” (CCC 221). Yes, God has revealed Himself fully to us by sending His Son and the Spirit of Love, yet even now we cannot fully comprehend this mystery. For the mystery of the Holy Trinity is a mystery in the strict sense of the word; that is, it is a supernatural truth that is hidden in God, which can never be known unless it is revealed by God, and even when revealed is still only partially comprehensible through faith.

The truth of this is beautifully illustrated in a story about St. Augustine. Legend has it that while St. Augustine was working on his treatise De Trinitate (On the Trinity), he was walking along the seashore, meditating on how the one God could possibly be three Persons, when he happened upon a child who was attempting to pour all the water of the sea into a tiny hole he had dug in the sand. In reply to the child’s strange pursuit Augustine said, “That is impossible. Obviously, the sea is too large and the hole too small.” To which the child replied, “Indeed, but I will sooner draw all the water from the sea and empty it into this hole than you will succeed in penetrating the mystery of the Holy Trinity with your limited understanding.”

While Augustine’s faith was not undone by his inability to comprehend the incomprehensible mystery of the Holy Trinity, there are many whose faith is. Unlike Augustine, they do not believe in order to understand, but they seek to understand in order to believe. And so, the limit of their minds strangles the love in their hearts. It is as if they say, “I do not understand you, so I cannot love you.” Unable to fit the sea into their tiny hole, they conclude that there is no sea, so they settle for what is in the hole. In so doing, they exchange the one true Triune God for an idol, a work of human hands that can be grasped by the mind. In the fear induced by the obscurity of the brilliance of the mystery of the Trinity, then, they shrink back and protest to the Spirit of God that seeks to lead them into the exchange of divine love. They refuse to be defined by their relation to God, as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are defined by their relation to one another. They reject the invitation to plunge into the depths of the mystery of love, and thus, refuse to become children of God (Rom 8:14–17).

We who have been immersed in the unfathomable depths of the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity and baptized “in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit” may ponder the above description and say, “That is not us. We have taken the plunge. We have leapt where reason could not go.” To this I ask: Have we truly? Yes, we may have intellectually assented to the truth that there is one God in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We believe that God is love. But have we handed God our hearts as well as our minds? Do we say we believe in God, but live contrary to Him? Do we honor Him with our lips, but find that our hearts are far from Him (Mt 15:8)? God wills to communicate His own divine life to us, and He truly does so when we are baptized in His Name, but this communication demands that we observe all that Jesus has commanded us (Mt 28:16–20). In other words, it demands nothing less than the free gift of our entire selves — body and soul; intellect and will. Love demands love.

This Trinity Sunday, then, do not settle for the idols that you have made with your own hearts and minds; rather, allow yourself to be taken up into the mystery of the exchange of Divine love. For, having freely given yourself to the “love that moves the sun and other stars” (Dante, Paradiso), you too will be moved to go out and invite all who believe to enter into this life of love. The life of the Most Holy Trinity — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The life of God Himself.