April 2025: Seeing Your Life Through The Lens of The Gospel

Seeing Your Life Through The Lens of The Gospel

Fifth Sunday of Lent

6 April 2025

These words of Jesus are spoken all the time: ‘I do not condemn you’. In prayer we often feel condemned for our past, or just for whatever in ourselves makes us feel shame. We condemn ourselves for meanness in the past, for our use of people for our own ends. We may also condemn ourselves for feelings we have or aspects of our personalities of which we feel ashamed. We can do nothing better than come before the Lord in shame and sin, and allow the words of mercy, ‘I do not condemn you’ fill the shame, the guilt which makes our hearts and souls so empty.

Jesus is the one who never condemns, even when we are most condemnatory of ourselves. The look of Jesus to this condemned woman saved her – the look of divine and everlasting love. In prayer we can bring all the shame and guilt of our lives to this story of forgiveness and hear words spoken to each of us – ‘I do not condemn you.’

As the people reflected on their lives and realised their need for forgiveness, they turned and went away. As I reflect on my life and consider my need for forgiveness I realise that I need to draw closer to Jesus, who loves me.

I hear the words of Jesus speaking to me – not condemning me, but giving me a new mission and anew vision of myself.

www.sacredspace.com

A Resource of the Irish Jesuits

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Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion

13 April 2025

The story we have just heard reveals both the worst and the best of the human spirit. The worst of the human spirit, the brutality of the absolute power of the Roman Empire, is there for all to see. Yet, as is often the way, the worst instincts of some drew forth the best instincts of others. It is above all Jesus who reveals the best of the human spirit in this hour. He dies as he lived, standing in loving solidarity with sinners, praying for those responsible for his death, promising paradise to a condemned criminal who turned to him for support.

Those best instincts of human nature in the story we have heard can inspire us. We all struggle to forgive those who have hurt or damaged us, but, like Jesus, we may find it in us to pray for them, asking God to forgive them. We can all be a Joseph of Arimathea to others, working to take the wounded body of Christ, our suffering sisters and brothers, off their crosses.

In the story of Jesus’ passion and death, we not only hear the good news of the Lord’s tremendous love for us, but we also hear the call to become that good news for others.

Fr Martin Hogan

curate in the parish of Finglas,

Finglas West and Rivermount

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Easter Day of the Lord’s Resurrection

20 April 2025

It is the ‘first day of the week’. Mary Magdalene is the first witness of an event which marks not just the beginning of a new week but the transformation of human history. But ‘it is still dark’ and she does not yet understand what has happened. I ponder the mystery.

Wherever we share compassion, justice, reconciliation, faith, and encourage each other to be people of hope, we are people of the resurrection and ministers of the resurrection. Jesus is raised from death each time we live his way of life. We do this in our various ways of showing care and concern for the lives and troubles of others. Easter prayer can be an asking in prayer to be ministers of the resurrection, as we discern how best to serve the risen Lord.

The tomb was empty and, for the faithful ones, this was a sign of new life. Some would remember Jesus saying he would rise from death. Others would feel down, cheated or just lost. It is the same with ourselves: the tough times of life can bring us close to God, or distance us; suffering can make us better people, or make us bitter and isolated. We may feel a bit of both at times. The empty tomb is the message that nothing is final in this life, not even death. God’s love is stronger than any human power, violence or cruelty. Love conquers all.

www.sacredspace.com

A Resource of the Irish Jesuits

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Second Sunday of Easter

27 April 2025 • Divine Mercy Sunday

Today’s Gospel presents us with the one disciple who is named: Thomas. In his hesitation and his efforts to understand, this disciple, albeit somewhat stubborn, is a bit like us and we find him likeable. Without knowing it, he gives us a great gift: he brings us closer to God, because God does not hide from those who seek him. Jesus shows Thomas his glorious wounds; he makes him touch with his hand the infinite tenderness of God, the vivid signs of how much he suffered out of love for humanity.

For us who are disciples, it is important to put our humanity in contact with the flesh of the Lord, to bring to him, with complete trust and utter sincerity, our whole being. As Jesus told Saint Faustina, he is happy when we tell him everything: he is not bored with our lives, which he already knows; he waits for us to tell him even about the events of our day (cf. Diary, 6 September 1937). That is the way to seek God: through prayer that is transparent and unafraid to hand over to him our troubles, our struggles and our resistance. Jesus’ heart is won over by sincere openness, by hearts capable of acknowledging and grieving over their weakness, yet trusting that precisely there God’s mercy will be active. 

What does Jesus ask of us? He desires hearts that are truly consecrated, hearts that draw life from his forgiveness in order to pour it out with compassion on our brothers and sisters. Jesus wants hearts that are open and tender towards the weak, never hearts that are hardened.

Pope Francis

Poland 2016

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