Sixth Sunday of Easter
Oneness. Jesus seems to speak of Oneness so often and in so many ways! In today’s Gospel, Jesus is direct, clear, and blowing our minds and hearts wide open. Not only does Jesus hold out to us the reality of Oneness, but he goes on to tell us what it will be like...
…you will know the Spirit of truth
…you will not be orphans (abandoned, on your own, not belonging)
…I will be with you…you will see me
…you will live because I live
…you are in me and I in you
…and together we will be in the Father
…I will reveal myself to you (an on-going revelation, a living truth)
I don’t know about you, but the truth and reality of this teaching rebirths my hope and trust in these scary and confusing times. We do not stand alone. We do not have to do it all on our strength. We have an advocate with us and for us. We have someone to hold the fear, the suffering, the boredom, the insecurity, the isolation with us. Hard as it might be…there is someone to whom we can entrust ourselves, our families, our friends, and our communities. It does not mean we will be taken out of our experience of these days, but it does mean that these days and our lives are held in the unconditional love of God who conquered death and destruction.
This Oneness is a gift experienced when we enter it with a spirit willing to engage in what Jesus asks of us…keep my commandments…
“‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
This is the greatest and first commandment.
And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” (Matthew 22:36-40)
I am so grateful for this clear and challenging commandment! It calls me to live the Oneness fully and concretely each day… with God, with myself, with my neighbor. So…how are we doing?
Are we turning to God with our whole heart as it is… fearful, questioning, wanting to trust but not quite there?
Do we love ourselves as we are and as we are invited to be through God’s mercy and compassion? Are we changing and growing as God is calling to in each moment and each relationship?
And, here is the big one, do we love our neighbor… believing them to be a child of God, loved and cherished, holding the Oneness of the Creator’s love for Creation, a vessel for the love and compassion God is pouring out to us?
Jesus is direct, clear, and blowing our minds and hearts wide open… we need to love God, we need to love ourselves, and we need to love our neighbor. Oneness lived spiritually, emotionally, communally, politically, financially, morally, relationally…privately and publicly…anything short of this is not of God and gives birth to the illusion that we are unrelated and not connected. And, given these days, we know that this is not true…
Blessings of Love and Light!
Sr. Didi Madden, OP
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