Scripture:
Acts 8:5-8, 14-17
1 Peter 3:15-18
John 14:15-21
Reflection:
In our first Scripture reading for this Sunday (Acts 8:5-8, 14-17), St. Luke writes: “Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed the Christ to them. With one accord, the crowds paid attention to what was said by Philip when they heard it and saw the signs he was doing.” How I wish that would happen to me wherever I go to preach, but the thing I need to remember is the phrase “when they heard it and saw the signs he was doing.” As a disciple, I cannot just “talk the talk,” I have to “walk the walk.”
The question I need to ask myself is “Is what I’m saying or doing a sign of God’s love in Jesus Christ?” A sign of God’s love doesn’t have to be some miracle of healing or some other supernatural feat. In our Gospel reading (John 14:15-21), Jesus says, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” The signs we can do simply have to do with following Jesus’ commandment to love one another as He has loved us (John 13:34 and John 15:12).
You see, God’s love for us in Jesus Christ is the reason for our hope (See our second reading: 1 Peter 3:15-18)! To know that God holds nothing back, even to the point of the Son of God dying for us on the Cross, means that we can trust in God’s love for us; the love that is the source of a mother’s love for her child, which we celebrate Sunday on Mother’s Day. To know that Jesus left the tomb empty on Easter means that we can trust in the power of God. And to trust in the love and the power of God means we can live in hope for the coming of God’s kingdom. It means we can do our part in helping build up that kingdom, even, as we hear in our second reading, that we might “suffer for doing good.”
We are called to work for justice and peace. We are called to work for a world in which every mother’s hopes for her children can be fulfilled, and every child can pursue his or her dreams. And thus we, like Philip and the early disciples, can do signs demonstrating God’s love, so that others can be led to Jesus and to hope.
In the love of God in Jesus Christ, I would like to end with a prayer for mothers:
We pray in thanksgiving for all mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers and beyond! We remember all those mothers who have gone before us. We pray for step mothers and those mothers who have adopted children. We pray for those grandmothers, who, because of varying circumstances, are raising their grandchildren.
We pray for those mothers who have lost a child, or are on the verge of losing a child. We pray for those in certain parts of the world whose children have “disappeared.”
We pray for expectant mothers, and for those who hope to be mothers.
We pray for those women who are pregnant, and are weighing what to do with their pregnancy. Some of them may not feel ready to be mothers, as their pregnancies were not planned or hoped for or even forced upon them. Others may feel that their options are very limited, and feel that there is no way they can raise a child. We pray that there are people who will not condemn them, but are willing to help them. And we pray for those women who are willing to adopt and take someone else’s child into their home.
And we pray for those who, like the character Big Mama in “Soul Food,” are considered everybody’s Mama.
Mary, our Blessed Mother, pray for us!
Fr. Phil Paxton, C.P., is the local superior of the Passionist Community in Birmingham, Alabama.