Sixth Sunday of Easter

The readings for Lectionary 57 are here. 

The Homiletic Directory offers the following Catechism points and themes for the Sixth Sunday of Easter:

• CCC 2746-2751: Christ’s prayer at the Last Supper
• CCC 243, 388, 692, 729, 1433, 1848: the Holy Spirit as Advocate/Consoler
• CCC 1965-1974: the New Law fulfills the Old
• CCC 865, 869, 1045, 1090, 1198, 2016: the heavenly Jerusalem.

For an updated doctrinal homily outline that focuses on the sending of the Holy Spirit and conscience, click here.

For an updated outline that focuses on the will of God, click here.

One takeaway in regard to God’s will that some readers might find helpful is as follows.

• It is easy to say yes to God’s will in good times. What about in bad times? Do we still say, “Thy will be done?” 
  • Nothing can happen that God does not permit. He does not positively will everything to happen that does happen–for example, he does not will people to do evil but he does permit it because he positively wills our freedom. Therefore, everything that happens to us falls under God’s permissive will.
  • Yet God loves us and only permits evil because he will bring a greater good out of it. As St. Paul said, “We know that in everything God works for good for those who love him” (Rom 8:28, see CCC 313). To explain, “Faith gives us the certainty that God would not permit an evil if he did not cause a good to come from that very evil, by ways that we shall fully know only in eternal life” (CCC 324).
  • We do have the freedom and often the duty to right every wrong, yet we must endure evils. This is an everyday occurrance, sometimes an every moment experience. 
  • Thus, as children of God, we can see everything that happens to us at every moment as coming directly or indirectly from the hand of God and all of it being used by God for our ultimate good and the ultimate good of many others.
  • The Catechism quotes three Catholic saints on the will of God in the face of difficulties (CCC 313). We can apply these to our lives, moment to moment. 

St. Catherine of Siena said to “those who are scandalized and rebel against what happens to them”: “Everything comes from love, all is ordained for the salvation of man, God does nothing without this goal in mind.”

St. Thomas More, shortly before his martyrdom, consoled his daughter: “Nothing can come but that that God wills. And I make me very sure that whatsoever that be, seem it never so bad in sight, it shall indeed be the best.”

Dame Julian of Norwich: “Here I was taught by the grace of God that I should steadfastly keep me in the faith. . . and that at the same time I should take my stand on and earnestly believe in what our Lord shewed in this time – that ‘all manner [of] thing shall be well.’”

• Thus, we can say yes to the will of God in difficult situations all day every day by playing a little game with God called, “I guess God wants”:
  • I guess God wants me to get up now.
  • I guess God wants me to have this headache.
  • I guess God wants me to do this work.
  • I guess God wants me to wait here now. 
  • I guess God wants me to listen to this boring person.
  • I guess God wants . . .