Fourth Sunday of Easter

May 6, 2001

The Sacred Heart Church on Summer Street was there for one hundred and twenty-five years. When Sacred Heart Church merged with Holy Name Church, Holy Name Church became the new church of the merger. I went by Summer Street the other day a saw a large empty lot where the Sacred Heart Church had been. Change is so difficult. Nothing is forever.

What about all the changes in our lives? When I was sixteen, I just thought about getting my license. When I was graduating form High School, I thought about whether the seminary would affirm my desire to be a priest. Now all of that seems so long ago. Now people my age are speaking about their grand children and about retirement. Time seems to keep us changing.

What about the paths that we want to take and the plans that we have made for our lives?

So often our plans are changed by unexpected situations: a death, a sickness, a tragedy. Not even our plans are certain or forever.

What does all this change mean? Where are we going? Where is this leading us?

The second reading presents the goal of our lives. We are moving toward eternity to be with Christ who died and rose for us. We are moving inside and outside toward the Lamb. Christ the shepherd is calling us to himself. He is leading us to our true home that is eternit

The voice of the Shepherd is found in the poor, the marginalized, the abandoned. We are moving in the right direction toward eternity when we listen to the call of the Shepherd in the lives of the poor.

We are called to abolish poverty not for people to establish a permanent home in this world.

We want to abolish poverty so that people can have a good life to then be able to see the true meaning of life and hear the call of the Shepherd to walk to eternity.

Pope John Paul II didn’t ask President Bush to stop Timothy McVeigh’s execution on May 16 because he approves of his bombing the federal building in Oklahoma City. The Holy Father wanted to give Timothy Mc Veigh a life sentence in jail in the hope that that long time could help Mc Veigh see the wrong that he did and use that time to prepare to meet the Lamb in eternity.

Science and medicine need to find cures for so many diseases. They are going beyond their field when they try to make this world permanent and work on eliminating the reality of death.

The Mass that we celebrate today is a foretaste of the eternity that we are moving toward.

One Russian theologian said that the Liturgy is heaven on earth. The Shepherd feeds us with his body and blood. He gathers us around the table one with another to praise and glorify the Lamb.