VI Sunday Easter:2015:Acts10:25-26,34-35,44-48;1Jn4:7-10;Jn 15:9-17

VI Sunday Easter:2015:Acts10:25-26,34-35,44-48;1Jn4:7-10;Jn 15:9-17

Introduction:  Today’s Scripture passages declare the profound truth that those who believe in Christ are to obey his commandment of love – “Love others as I have loved you.” As we celebrate Mother’s Day in the United States let us remember with gratitude that it is generally our mothers who practice the agápe love of Jesus. 

Event: In 1941, the German army began to round up Jewish people in Lithuania. Thousands of Jews were murdered. But one German soldier objected to their murder. He was Sergeant Anton Schmid. Through his assistance, at least 250 Jews were spared their lives. He managed to hide them, find food, and supply them with forged papers. Schmid himself was arrested in early 1942 for saving these lives. He was tried and executed in 1942. It took Germany almost sixty years to honor the memory of this man Schmid. Said Germany's Defense Minister in 2000 in saluting him, "Too many bowed to the threats and temptations of the dictator Hitler, and too few found the strength to resist. But Sergeant Anton Schmid did resist." Name a person who better obeyed the admonition of the Christ in today's Gospel. "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends."

Exegesis: After telling the parable of the vine and branches, Jesus, in today’s Gospel, explains precisely how the disciples are to obey his commandment of love, just as he has obeyed his Heavenly Father’s will by fulfilling His commandments and remaining inseparably bonded with his Father.  Jesus’ unconditional, forgiving, selfless, sacrificial love for us must be the criterion of our love for others.  The highest expression of this love is our willingness to lay down our lives as Jesus did, for people who don’t deserve it. The goal and result of our abiding in love, in God, will be perfect joy. Jesus calls us friends. He tells us that he has chosen us, and that, if we use his name, we can ask the Father for anything. Rethink our relationship with Christ because, evidently, Christ himself prefers to relate with his disciples as friend to friend rather than as master to servant: "I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends" (John 15:15).

True love is a choice that demands sacrifice. People who fall in and out of love have not made a choice that demands sacrifice.  There is always a lot of talk about love when people are getting married. But, sadly, some of them don't see the Lord as the center of their love. So they want weddings with beautiful backgrounds, but not necessarily with the sacrament of marriage. Perhaps some of them do not even want the sacramental blessing in their living together. Perhaps they are not ready for true love. Perhaps they are not ready for a choice that demands sacrifice. Perhaps they really do not want Christ's love in their marriage. That costs too much.

Joke: These are few examples of our love, just to understand the motivations of love.

1) "Dearest Jimmy, No words could ever express the great unhappiness I’ve felt since breaking our engagement.  Please say you’ll take me back.  No one could ever take your place in my heart, so please forgive me.  I love you, I love you, I love you!  Yours forever, Maarie...  P.S. And congratulations on willing the 20 million state lottery

2) A young man wrote this to his girlfriend. “Sweetheart, if this world was as hot as the Sahara desert, I would crawl on my knees through the burning sand to come to you.  If the world would be like the Atlantic Ocean, I would swim through shark-infested waters to come to you.  I would fight the fiercest dragon to be by your side.  I will see you on Thursday if it does not rain.”  

Practical Applications: 1) We need to cultivate an abiding and loving friendship with Jesus and to express it in our relationships with others by loving them and showing them trust, faithfulness, equality, forgiveness, joy and sacrifice.

2) Today our mothers may receive Trinitarian Blessings in the church. But in our family life we should let our mothers bless us.  Commandments are summarized or divided into two: Love of God and Love of neighbors. In the second category of loving neighbors, priority is given to “honor your father and mother”. Getting a blessing from them is great expression of blessedness.

Introduction: Sixth Sunday of Easter; Mothers Day

Message: Let us love one another as Christ has loved us by offering himself for our sins.  His love is to be revealed to all the world, as Peter himself taught.

Saints and Events in this Week:  12 – Twelfth – Tuesday – Saints Nereus and Achilleus, Martyrs; Saint Pancras, Martyr; 13 – Thirteenth – Wednesday - Our Lady of Fathima; 14 – Forteenth – Thursday – Saint Matthias, Apostle; 15 – Fifteenth – Friday – Saint Isidore; 17 – Seventeenth – Sunday – Ascension of the Lord.