June 2025: Points to Ponder
The Ascension of the Lord
1 June 2025 • World Communications Day
Christians are often tempted to ignore the bodily aspects of Jesus’ ministry, death, and resurrection. It is easier to make sense of our relationship with God or the Easter mystery on the level of the metaphysical. But this Sunday, as we celebrate the Feast of the Ascension, we are confronted with the fact that bodies matter.
Scripture is clear that Jesus returns not as a ghost but as a physical human person. When he ascends into heaven, he does so not in some idealized form, but with all his particularities, with wounds in his hands and whip marks on his back. But also, with scars on his fingertips from cutting himself with a chisel while helping his father at work. Chicken pox scars. Callouses on his feet from the hundreds of miles he walked. Maybe he had weird tan lines or a broken toe that never healed correctly. This body is taken to heaven to rejoin God.
The Feast of the Ascension reminds us that Jesus is not the toned, beautiful white man we see in much of our art. Jesus was wounded, hurt, and scarred. His body told the story of his life from his birth in a manger until his death on the cross. And this wounded body was holy enough to enter heaven. Likewise, our bodies are holy too – not despite our disabilities, imperfections, and scars, but because of them.
This Sunday, I hope you take delight in your body. In how it has supported you, how it serves as a map of your past and of your future. Bodies more than matter– they are how the kingdom of God is revealed.
Emily Sanna
uscatholic.org
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Pentecost Sunday
8 June 2025
More than a century ago, a great sailing ship was stranded off the coast of South America. Week after week the ship lay there in the still waters with not a hint of a breeze. The captain was desperate; the crew was dying of thirst. And then, on the far horizon, a steamship appeared, headed directly toward them. As it drew near, the captain called out, ‘We need water! Give us water!’ The steamship replied, ‘Lower your buckets where you are.’ The captain was furious at this cavalier response but called out again, ‘Please, give us water.’
But the steamer gave the same reply, ‘Lower your buckets where you are!’ And with that they sailed away! The captain was beside himself with anger and despair, and he went below. But a little later, when no one was looking, a yeoman lowered a bucket into the sea and then tasted what he brought up: It was perfectly sweet, fresh water! For you see, the ship was just out of sight of the mouth of the Amazon. And for all those weeks they had been sitting right on top of all the fresh water they needed!
What we are really seeking is already inside us, waiting to be discovered, waiting to be embraced: The Holy Spirit of God, living within us from the moment of our Baptism. The Holy Spirit is saying to us at this very moment from deep in our heart, ‘Lower your buckets where you are. Taste and see!’ Come, Holy Spirit! Fill our hearts and set us on fire!
Fr Anthony Kadavil
Vatican News
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The Most Holy Trinity
15 June 2025 • Day for Life
There is a very old and much-repeated story about St Augustine, one of the intellectual giants of the Church. He was walking by the seashore one day, attempting to conceive of an intelligible explanation for the mystery of the Trinity. As he walked along, he saw a small boy on the beach, pouring seawater from a shell into a small hole in the sand. ‘What are you doing, my child?’ asked Augustine. ‘I am trying to empty the sea into this hole,’ the boy answered with an innocent smile. ‘But that is impossible, my dear child,’ said Augustine.
The boy stood up, looked straight into the eyes of Augustine and replied, ‘What you are trying to do – comprehend the immensity of God with your small head – is even more impossible.’ Then he vanished. The child was an angel sent by God to teach Augustine a lesson. Later, Augustine wrote: ‘You see the Trinity if you see love.’ According to him, the Father is the lover, the Son is the loved one and the Holy Spirit is the personification of the very act of loving.
This means that we can understand something of the Mystery of the Holy Trinity more readily with the heart than with our feeble mind. Evagrius of Pontus, a Greek monk of the 4th century who came from what is now Turkey in Asia and later lived out his vocation in Egypt, said: ‘God cannot be grasped by the mind. If God could be grasped, God would not be God.’
frtonyshomilies.com
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The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ (Corpus Christi)
22 June 2025
The Vietnamese Cardinal, Francis Van Thuan, who died in 2002, recounting his experience as a prisoner in a Communist re-education camp, wrote:
‘In the re-education camp, we were divided into groups of 50 people. We slept on a common bed, and everyone has a right to 50 centimetres of space. We managed to make sure that there were 5 Catholics with me. At 9.30 p.m. we had to turn off the lights and everyone had to go to sleep. It was then that I would bow over the bed to celebrate the Mass by heart, and I distributed communion by passing my hand under the mosquito net. We even made little sacks from the paper of cigarette packs to preserve the Most Holy Sacrament and bring it to others. The Eucharistic Jesus was always with me in my shirt pocket. In this way, the darkness of the prison became a paschal light, and the seed germinated in the ground during the storm. The prison was transformed into a school of catechesis. Thus, in prison, I felt beating within my heart the same heart of Christ. I felt that my life was his life and his was mine.’
The moment of communion in Mass, when we eat the body of Christ and drink his blood, is the moment of greatest intimacy that can exist between Christ and us – as the testimony of Cardinal Van Thuan bears witness. However, we cannot be in communion with the Lord without being in communion with one another. As St Augustine used to remind the assembled congregation as he held up the Sacred Host: ‘See what you are and become what you see, the body of Christ’. That is the constant challenge of the Eucharist.
Michael McCabe SMA
sma.ie
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SS Peter and Paul, Apostles
29 June 2025
SS Peter and Paul Apostles
What is remarkable about Peter and Paul is not just their personal conversions and faith journeys, but also their unity in diversity. They were two different individuals with distinct backgrounds, personalities, and approaches to ministry. Peter was the one who walked with Jesus during His earthly ministry, while Paul came later as a convert and a passionate advocate for the Gospel. Yet, despite their differences, they recognised their common mission and the need to work together for the sake of the Church.
Their collaboration was not always smooth. They had disagreements and even public disputes, but they ultimately sought reconciliation and unity. Both Peter and Paul understood that their shared commitment to Christ and the proclamation of His message superseded personal differences. They recognized that unity in the Church was essential to its mission and witness in the world. As we reflect on the lives of Peter and Paul, we are reminded of the importance of unity within the Church today.
The Church, like any human institution, is made up of diverse individuals with unique backgrounds, perspectives, and gifts. It is in embracing this diversity and recognising the common mission that we can truly be effective witnesses of Christ’s love and mercy. Peter and Paul also teach us about the transformative power of God’s grace. Peter, the impulsive fisherman, became the courageous leader of the early Church. Paul, the persecutor, became the ardent defender of the faith. Both experienced profound conversions and allowed God’s grace to shape their lives and ministries.
Fr Chinaka
chinakareflections.com
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