Dear St. Theresa family,

This is the season of graduations. The plague has changed the way we had hoped to mark them but that does not prevent them from happening.  Many inventive endeavors to celebrate our graduates will be remembered for a lifetime. I send best wished and prayers for happiness to everyone for whom endings will turn out to be beginnings.

Grab your bible and read Luke 24:46-53.

This moment when Jesus is visibly and physically present with his disciples for the last time is such a moment of ending and beginning. They have gone through much together. The relationship, as with all worthwhile relationships, has been severely tested. Jesus has known these people at their best and their worst. But despite everything, there is still the deep bond between the disciples and their Lord.

There comes a time in every human relationship when things must change. One of these times is when a group of people who have followed a revered and gifted leader must themselves accept responsibility for the future. The moment can be full of emotion, fear, gratitude, sometimes even anger. Why cannot things go on as they have been? 

Jesus is sensitive to these feelings. First, he tells his disciples that there is a purpose in all the events which have led up to this moment. Then, he says that this must now be communicated to others because it has a message for the whole human situation, and that they who have been with him through it all have the task. They must have been appalled at the responsibilities involved. Realizing this, Jesus adds one more thing. He promises to give them the grace to do what he has commanded them to do.

All Christians have to come to such a time within themselves. We all have a relationship with Christ by baptism, by worship, by some knowledge of the Gospel. Perhaps we need now to take full responsibility for that faith.  What might that mean?  Well, on that hill at Bethany Jesus spoke of the purpose of it all, the need to communicate it, the fact that only they could do it, and the promise that he would help them.  

Perhaps we need to put ourselves into the listening crowd. We might find ourselves asking what the purpose of being Christian is, of worshiping, of trying to pray, of trying to live out faith.  Jesus replies that his birth, life, death, and resurrection are the secret meaning of all human experience. Dying and rising again is what it is all about. That needs to be communicated and we who have been told that great secret need to live it out in our lives.  

A difficult assignment?  Very. But Jesus knows that; he lived it out totally. So he makes a promise guaranteeing to us that if we are prepared to try to embody his experience in ours then he will help. 

Notice that they came down the hill “with great joy.”  So, there it is. Great endings can be, and most often are, great beginnings.

Some Good News for today.

Fr. Larry