Daily Retreat 05/21/06

2006 May 21 SUN: SIXTH SUNDAY OF EASTER

Acts 10: 25-26. 34-35. 44-48/ Ps 97(98): 1. 2-3. 3-4 (see 2b)/1 Jn 4: 7-10/ Jn 15: 9-17

From today’s readings: "In truth, I see that God shows no partiality. Rather, in every nation whoever fears Him and acts uprightly is acceptable to Him.... The Lord has revealed to the nations His saving power.... Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God.... If you keep My commandments, you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love...."

The Code of Silence

What do you tell people about God? Some people, I know, don’t talk much about God to anyone, treating Him like a taboo subject. Such people need a reminder: the word "gospel" literally means "good news" - if faith means anything in our lives, then we need to pass on those tidings of great joy of who God is, what He has done, and what He is doing, and what He has promised to do!

All of the faithful apostles spent their lives telling people (everyone they met!) the good news about God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The first reading, for example, relates that Peter was sent to Cornelius, a man he had never met before, specifically to tell him and his family the gospel, the good news about God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Curiously, God first sent His angel to Cornelius, but the angel’s job wasn’t to tell Cornelius the good news directly - the angel just told him to send for Peter, and then Peter was given the honor of telling the good news.

In other words, an angel, a heavenly messenger, was sent to prepare the way for Peter, a human messenger. Normally, we would expect things to be the other way around, but from the beginning, God insisted that Christians would have the dignity and joy of sharing the good news about who God is, what He has done, and what He is doing, and what He has promised to do!

The apostles were so dedicated to telling people the good news about God that soon, some of them decided to not just preach the gospel, but also, to write it down, and send letters, and carefully record the words and deeds of Jesus, so that peoples of all places and all times would be able to share the truth and good news.

So, St. John, the beloved apostle, fervently preached about his beloved Lord and friend, Jesus, and the eyewitness evangelist carefully wrote down the facts about what Jesus had done and said, so that everyone of all times and places could share in the truth that "God is love," and thus come to know the real Jesus, and never be misled by charlatan fiction writers and tawdry sensationalists.

The Da Vinci Code and other demonic twists of gospel truth are the craze in our country because of an even more sinister code: the code of silence. When faint Christians stop telling other people about God, when we’re content to stand by while the Christmas tidings of great joy are drowned out by commercial jingles, when the word "Easter" makes us and our children think about bunnies and eggs instead of an empty tomb, when we’re too busy or too lazy to pray, when we stop listening to Peter and John and the apostolic successors, when we silently tolerate abortion and the unraveling of family life, when we stop reading the word of God, then any false prophet can hawk a slick package of lies and claim that it’s the truth, simply because a gullible public buys it.

But when zealous Christians read the Gospel and pray the Gospel and live the Gospel and share the Gospel, when we prove ourselves friends of Jesus because we do what He commanded, when we love one another in truth and in deed, when we stake our lives on the only joy that is complete, when we herald the tidings of great joy of who God truly is, what He has verily done, and what He is really doing, and what He has indeed promised to do, then the code will be broken, and the Good News will be the final word!