| 23-4-2010 Friday of the Third Week of Easter |
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23-4-2010 Friday of the Third Week of Easter Year II MEDITATION based on the readings for to-day’s Mass. These readings can be found in your bible or daily missal. FIRST READING from the Acts of the Apostles chapter 9: verses 1-20 The man with two names, Saul the Pharisee filled with hatred for the new Christian sect which he saw as dangerous and needing to be eliminated. He was also called by his Roman name, Paul, as he was a Roman citizen from the city of Tarsus. He was hurrying to Damascus with official papers to arrest men and women devotees of the trouble maker, the dead Jesus. “Suddenly, there came a light from heaven all round him. He fell to the ground, and then he heard a voice saying: ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ ” “Who are you, Lord?” he asked, and the voice answered , “I am Jesus and you are persecuting me. Get up now and go into the city, and you will be told what to do.” Saul was blind and had to be led by the hand into the city. “For three days he was without his sight and took neither food nor drink.” The three days in darkness and fasting were a type of Jesus’ time in the tomb. Jesus appeared to Ananias and instructed him to go to Saul and pray with him and restore his sight. Ananias knew Saul was a persecutor of Christians but obeyed the Lord’s instructions even at personal risk of being arrested as a Christian. Ananias laid hands on Saul and prayed. He called the persecutor “Brother” and told him the same Lord Jesus that met Saul on the road, also sent him “so that you may recover your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” “Immediately it was as though scales fell away from Saul’s eyes and he could see again. So he was baptised there and then. .. Saul began preaching in the synagogues, ‘Jesus is the Son of God’ “. Reference is made to restoring sight to the blind in other parts of the bible, see for instance the book of Tobit, and St. Mark’s Gospel chapter 8 verses 22 –26. Jesus restores sight to the blind to heal physical blindness, and to remind us of our spiritual blindness which turns us away from Him. He tells his disciples to “give sight to the blind”. Is there someone you know who is spiritually blind to the Lord Jesus? Pray for that person and claim in the name of the Lord Jesus the same graces of the” road to Damascus conversion” of St. Paul, so that the spiritual blindness will be lifted. Pray then with that person as they go through the “three days in the tomb”. Enter into the three person, trinitarian dialogue with Jesus, your friend and yourself, as did Jesus, Saul and Ananias. Saul needed Ananias to complete the human part of the work of his conversion. Your friend needs you, and Jesus. RESPONSE TO THE PSALM: Go out to all the world and tell the Good News PSALM 116 (117) O praise the Lord all you nations, acclaim him all you peoples! Strong is his love for us, he is faithful for ever. GOSPEL A reading from the holy Gospel according to John chapter 6: verses 52-59 The amazing John 6, the words of Jesus which turned many of his followers away. “If you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you will not have life in you.” ”For my flesh is real food and my blood real drink. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me and I in him” The mystery of the Eucharist, the mystery of the priesthood, the mystery of the Bread of Life. There is no other way to be nourished. It is God’s way – Easter -- The Paschal Lamb. The words of the priest at Mass calls us to look at the mystery; holding up the consecrated host to the sight of all, he proclaims – “This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Happy are those who are called to his supper.” Are you called to his supper?
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