4th Sunday of Easter A - Homily 1

Homily 1 - 2005

I want to comment this morning on today’s first Reading from Luke’s Acts of the Apostles, specifically from Peter’s first address to the Jerusalem crowd that had gathered after the spectacular outpouring of the Spirit that first Pentecost day.  Without a deliberate effort on my part I find it difficult to hear it freshly.  But with that deliberate effort, something wonderful emerges.

According to Luke, Peter insisted that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ.  This Jesus was the one they crucified – the real flesh and bone Jesus, (whose life Luke had already written about so uncompromisingly in his gospel).  The crowd had crucified him, probably carried along by mass hysteria that always so easily taps into the violence in people’s hearts just beneath the surface (the similar violence that fuels road rage, mindless vandalism, terrorism etc.).  But not the leaders (or at least a determined, organised group among them) – they crucified this Jesus, because they saw him threatening precisely what they stood for – the comfortable “status quo” that they were doing quite well out of.  They calculatingly crucified the Jesus who, from his sense of the loving God – as Luke had made clear in his gospel – saw people, especially the poor, as having an innate dignity, and insisted on treating them with profound respect.

It was this radically consistent Jesus, that God made Lord and Christ: that God vindicated as having fulfilled all that authentic Judaism – the prophets and faithful Jews across the centuries – had been leading up to: he was the perfect flowering, the fulfilment, of their most authentic tradition.  His stand expressed the heart of God.

Peter invited the crowd to repent: to let go of their usual ways of thinking, to say Yes to what Jesus (and their tradition) had consistently called them to; to be set free from the domesticating but constricting power of their religious and cultural system, and in this way, to have their sins forgiven: sin – all that stifled their deepest longings and poisoned their interactions;  then, having let go of sin, to be baptised in the name of Jesus: to let themselves be plunged into the same spiritual vision, the same spiritual energy that made Jesus unique and so utterly attractive.  And in so doing, they would receive the gift of the Holy Spirit: they would begin to live as Jesus lived – inspired, enlightened and enlivened by the same Spirit that inspired, enlightened and enlivened Jesus.

The story immediately went on to describe the life style of those who came on board (you might remember the first reading from two Sundays ago): the lifestyle of those who got the message, who repented, who took on the vision of Jesus: The whole community remained faithful to the teaching of the apostles, to the brotherhood, to the breaking of the bread and to the prayers... they all lived together and owned everything in common

They remained faithful to the brotherhood, living together and owning everything in common.  They formed community where everyone was treated with the same respect: according to the vision of Jesus.  Indeed they went even further and shared assets, income and food.  They remained faithful to the teaching of the apostles.  They sought to penetrate the heart and mind of Jesus by gathering regularly to reflect on Jesus’ message from the standpoint of their own experience and by asking the twelve to enlighten them further.  They remained faithful ... to the prayer.  They kept close to God, the giver of the Spirit, the powerhouse behind the whole movement.  And they remained faithful to the breaking of the bread: they gathered regularly for the ritual meal where – freed to gather as friends around a common table – they sacramentally ingested the human Christ who continued to nourish them with his vision of community and, his commitment to life.

The story continues in the Church today as we continue to let go of our customary reactions and to see our world through the eyes of Christ – as we continue to let ourselves be caught up in the spiritual vision and the spiritual energy of the Christ we love, living into our baptism; as we find ourselves freed to follow our deepest longings, opening ourselves ever more to the same Spirit that inspired, enlightened and enlivened Christ – or, as Peter put it: as we repent, are baptised in a never-ending journey of baptism into Christ for the forgiveness of our sins and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.