During the Easter season, I always enjoy hearing the readings from the Acts of the Apostles about the development and growth of the Early Church, of the missionary efforts of the leaders of the Early Church to evangelize and to preach the Gospel message out in the world. In our reading from Acts today, Philip goes to Samaria to preach Christ’s Gospel message. The people are filled with great joy at hearing this message and great miracles and healings take place. At the time of the Assyrian captivity 8 centuries before Christ’s brith, foreigners came to Samaria and intermingled with the Samaritan people. Their Jewish religion became mingled with idol worship, so Samaritans were seen as outcasts and not true followers of the Jewish faith. Thus, Philip going there and converting the people to way of Jesus would have been a big event in the Early Church.
One other aspect that we may question about this reading from Acts is the comment that even though they had been baptized, Peter and John went sent to Samaria so that they might receive the Holy Spirit, that the Spirit had not yet fallen upon them. But how could this comment be made, since we all are baptized in the name of the Trinity, which includes the Holy Spirit, right? Well, Scripture scholars sees this as connected to the Pentecost event, when the Holy Spirit came upon the apostles in a special way as Jesus ascended into heaven. The apostles brought the same spirit of what took place in Jerusalem at Pentecost to those in Samaria. We can also think of the way that the Spirit infuses us and strengthens us in a special way in the sacrament of confirmation, different from the way the Spirit is with us in our daily lives.
In our Gospel today, the sending of the Holy Spirit as our advocate to be with us and to accompany us is the work of both the Father and the Son. We have had some baptisms here at Holy Savior during these first weeks of the Easter season. Do we see the Trinity as accompanying us always on our journey of faith, the Trinity in whose name we are baptized? Sometimes we forget the reality of the sacraments we receive and the reality they are to have on our everyday life of faith. In our Gospel today, Jesus tells us that if we love him, we will keep God’s commandments. Love is connected to the obedience and faithfulness we are to strive for on our journey through life as disciples of Christ. We can never forget the love we have for Jesus and the love he has for us.
These past weeks of the Easter season, we have celebrate confirmation with our youth and first holy communion with our children. Next weekend, we will celebrate graduation with our graduates. I always say that God meets us in the reality of life. Those occasions have been very joyful for our families, our children, and our youth. Some of us face some very big challenges on our journey of faith. On Easter afternoon, I went to the state prison in Pearl where our Catholic inmates and I visited the new rehab unit they have now, where men who are facing severe addiction and mental health issues can go for rehabilitation and behavior modification. That is a needed addition to the prison and the men in the program are doing so well. One of them told me that he has not felt this good physically in more than 10 years, being able to leave the drugs behind him now and get clean. One of the men showed me this sheet of paper that he had made about 8 years ago before the pandemic when we were having a hard time getting the men to come to Mass. He would hold it up in the widow of the unit where he was living, asking the guard to let them out for mass. He saved it to remind him how he needs to be bold and courageous in living out his Catholic faith, that we cannot take for granted the opportunity to live out our faith. Thankfully, we have more access to the men right now.
As we are coming to the end of the Easter season in these next couple of weeks, may we feel the risen Christ and the three persons of the Trinity accompanying us in the reality of our journey of faith.
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