Acts 5:27-32, 40b - 41

The Acts of the Apostles tells the story of the early Church during the first 30 years after the resurrection of Jesus. It describes God's Spirit at work, directing, encouraging and supporting the members of the Church. Today's passage tells of the apostles being brought before the Jewish Sanhedrin.

Rev 5:11- 14

The Book of Revelation was written around 95 A.D. for Christians living in modern-day Turkey. The Roman emperor ordered his subjects to worship him as a god. When the Christians resisted, they were persecuted. The Book of Revelation was written to encourage them. Today's passage describes a vision of God's people enjoying heavenly life and singing God's praises for their victory.

John 21:1-19

Bishop Untener's Homily

It's a theme repeated in all four Gospels: The disciples have difficulty recognizing the Risen Jesus. Why? Because he has gone through death to the other side - not come back from death to this life like Lazarus - and Jesus now has a transformed human existence, the kind we will have after we pass through death.

The truth is, we have the same problem recognizing him today. Jesus did not go into retirement in some distant place. The Risen Jesus is present among us, as present to us as he was to the disciples. But, like the disciples, we have a hard time recognizing him.

Now, I have a question for you, actually, three questions. But I'm not going to ask you to respond, as in the old days of Confirmation. I'm going to answer my own questions and let you just think about all this.

The first is this: Where do you think it is hardest for us to recognize the presence of the Risen Lord? This one is not even a close call. Without doubt, it's hardest for us to recognize the presence of the Risen Lord in ourselves. He is with us, not just alongside, but within us. He told his disciples, "I will not leave you orphans. I will come back to you." He has come back. He has sent his own Spirit upon us, and he is with us "all days, even to the end of the age." But we have a hard time recognizing him right there as part of us who make up the Body of Christ. We don't think we're that good... good enough to have the Lord so close to us. Or, perhaps, we simply don't tune in to his presence.

I think there's a principle here: The nearer Jesus is to us, the harder it is to believe that he is present, and the harder it is to recognize him. We might travel a long way to a distant shrine where Jesus is supposed to have appeared. But when he is right here present, we hardly know it.

Through the sending of His Spirit, Jesus is with us every second of every day. It is a real presence, not an imaginary one. But in the ordinary stuff of our everyday life, our natural inclination is to think that he is in church somewhere, and not with us.

The nearer Jesus is to us, the harder it is to believe that he is present, and the harder it is to recognize him.

My second question is this: Where is the second hardest place to recognize the Risen Lord? It's the presence of Jesus in other people, especially people we don't necessarily get along with. Jesus said, "Whatever you do - or don't do - to the least ones, you do or don't do to me." That is our teaching, our belief. But, as it was for the disciples in all four Gospels, it's hard to recognize and be aware of the presence of the Risen Lord Jesus, present through his Spirit.

My third question is this: Where is the third hardest place to recognize the presence of the Risen Lord? Now this one may surprise you. I think it's in the Eucharist. Keep in mind the principle I gave you: The nearer Jesus is to us, the harder it is to believe that he is present, and the harder it is to recognize him.

In a way, it was easier to recognize Jesus in the bread and the wine not so long ago when people rarely came to Communion. They came to Mass, and looked at the bread and the chalice when the priest raised it up, and they believed that this was the real presence of Jesus. They struck their chests and said "My Lord and my God" and they knelt and adored Him. Children couldn't receive Communion until they were 14 or 15 years old.

But then, in the early 1900's, Pope Pius X lowered the age of Communion, and he encouraged Catholics to receive Communion often, not just once a year for their Easter Duty. And then we restored the original practice of the early Church by receiving Communion in the hand.

Remember... the nearer Jesus is to us, the harder it is to believe that he is present, and the harder it is to recognize him.

I worry about this. Jesus is present when the word of God is proclaimed. Jesus is present in the entire assembly, for we are the Body of Christ. Jesus is present in the bread and the wine. But I watch our body language here at the Eucharist when the word is being proclaimed. I watch the body language when we receive Communion, and I wonder if we truly believe that this is more than a symbol... if we truly believe that this is the Risen Lord fully present to us.

What is the solution to all this?

Well, if it's true that the nearer Jesus is to us, the harder it is to recognize him... the solution might be to put Jesus farther away, keep us more distant from him. But that's going in the wrong direction. The solution isn't to scale down our belief that the Lord is with us every second of the day. It's certainly not to scale down our belief that Jesus is present in others. And it's certainly not to say that people shouldn't come to Communion so often or take him in their hand.

It's simply a matter of awareness. We need to strengthen our awareness of what we truly believe - that the Risen Lord is within us every second of every day... that the Risen Christ is present in other people... that the Risen Christ is present in his word... and that the Risen Christ is present in the bread and the wine. We need to strengthen our awareness of what we truly believe, that the Risen Lord is as present to us as he was to his disciples in this Gospel.

I pray that at this celebration of Confirmation - the special gift of the Lord's own Spirit - we will all deepen our awareness and recognition of the Lord in each of us and all of us.I pray that at this celebration of First Eucharist - the special gift of the Risen Lord - we will all deepen our awareness and recognition of what we are doing, and in our hearts, in our body language, we will express our belief.

A celebration of Confirmation and first Eucharist is a wonderful time to think more deeply about what we truly believe. We can hear the Risen Lord say to us what he said to the disciples in Luke's Gospel when he ate with them: "Touch me and see... "that it is really I. And we can take to heart what the Risen Lord said to Thomas in John's Gospel: "Do not be unbelieving, but believe."

God bless you

Originally given on April 29, 2001 at St. Anne Parish, Linwood, St. Stanislaus Parish, Bay City, and St. John the Evangelist Parish, Essexville, for the celebration of Confirmation and First Eucharist