Rev. Mr. Roger J. Landry
\nDomus Sanctae Mariae Guadalupensis, Rome
\nSaturday of the Seventh Week of Easter
\nMay 22, 1999
\nActs 28:16-20,30-31; Jn 21:20-25<\/p>\n
In today\u2019s liturgy, the last of the Easter season, the season of the great news of the resurrection and ascension of Jesus and the triumph over death and sin, the Church gives us two readings which bring to a close not only John\u2019s Good News, not only the Acts of the Apostles, but the stories of SS. Peter and Paul. The Church invites us to meditate upon these endings, as we prepare for a new beginning tomorrow on Pentecost.<\/p>\n
We can start with Peter in the Gospel. Our Lord was very simple with Peter, who sometimes was as dense as a rock. He had one simple message, one straightforward vocation, for Peter: \u201cYour business is to follow me.\u201d Follow me! How many times Jesus must have said this to Peter! The evangelists record it being said 21 times in the Gospels. We can recall a few of the more important ones. First at the seashore of Galilee: \u201cFollow me and I will make you a fisher of men.\u201d Then to Peter and others a few miles from the Sea: \u201cFollow me and let the dead bury their dead.\u201d Again: \u201cTake up your cross and follow me.\u201d In the Upper Room: \u201cWhoever serves me must follow me, and where I am my servant will be.\u201d Then, right before today\u2019s passage in John\u2019s Gospel, after Jesus had asked Peter three times if he loved him, he told Peter: \u201cVery truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.\u201d (indicating the kind of death [John tells us] by which he would glorify God.) After this Jesus said to him [again], \u201cFollow me.\u201d<\/p>\n
And Peter followed. He followed the Lord until the Way led him to \u2026 Rome. Here in Rome he continued in the Lord\u2019s footsteps until his own feet were bloodied and hammered to the top of a two-by-four in Nero\u2019s circus. This 60-something year old man \u2014 of retirement age by today\u2019s standards \u2014 was still following the Lord, while he stretched out his hands as they were tied by a belt to his definitive papal cathedra, on which he gave his finest and most glorious testimony of all.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Doctor of the Gentiles, the one whom the Lord had filled with an eagerness from his earliest days as a Christian to preach the Gospel here in Rome, was on the via Nomentana welcoming all who came to him and \u201cwith full confidence preaching the reign of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus.\u201d He had followed the Lord and the Lord\u2019s inspiration all the way to this city as well. Rome was where Paul was ultimately poured out as a libation. Rome was where he wrote his extraordinarily moving, triumphal words to his spiritual son Timothy: \u201cI have fought the good fight. I have the finished the race. I have kept the faith.\u201d Rome was Paul\u2019s finish line! And his race went down to the wire; just like a sprinter, Paul won that race by a head \u2014 his own, gloriously cut off for the faith in a forest just south of the ancient city.<\/p>\n
But there\u2019s more. Several years ago, Our Lord was in, of all places, California, Michigan, Iowa, Connecticut and even Massachusetts and said, \u201cFollow me!\u201d And each of us did. We picked up whatever crosses he gave us and began that journey, a journey which has led each of us \u2014 whether we eagerly wanted to come, like Paul, or were taken to a place we did not wish to go, like Peter \u2014 here to Rome, here to the city of the living Peter and the living Doctor of the Gentiles. It is here that the Evangelists in heaven are continuing to compile \u201cthe many other things\u201d that Jesus has done in each of us, which, if they were written about in detail, could not be contained no matter how big the earthly library. These are the details we hope to spend an eternity reading about in the Biblioteca del Cielo. My sisters and brother, let us thank God today for the unbelievable grace of being able to follow in his greatest apostles\u2019 footsteps here to this great saint-making city fertilized by their blood.<\/p>\n
Rome is our Upper Room. It is here that the Lord has gathered us around his apostles and his mother awaiting the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, tomorrow, when we celebrate the birthday of the Church. The Holy Spirit wants to fill us with himself and make us witnesses in life and in death to the greatest news ever told. He wants us to be part of the new Pentecost. He wants to inspire a new Acts of the Apostles, with each of us, whether silently or publicly, playing a starring role. There\u2019s no better place to start than in this Upper Room here in Rome. The original Cenacle, where the apostles and Mary gathered in the first novena, had been used, 53 days earlier, as the site of the beginning of the greatest event in human history which is about to be re-presented here. That Paschal mystery which began in the Upper Room culminated on Calvary when Jesus bowed his head and gave up his spirit. That same Spirit wants to come to us in a special way tomorrow and fill us with gifts just as he filled the first apostles. Let us then turn to the Holy Spirit, present at our baptism, present at our confirmation, present at our ordination or profession and present at every Mass, and beg:<\/p>\n
Come, O Holy Spirit. Fill the hearts of us your faithful. Set us on fire with the flames of your Love. Come forth and we shall be recreated, and through us renew the face of the earth!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rev. Mr. Roger J. Landry Domus Sanctae Mariae Guadalupensis, Rome Saturday of the Seventh Week of Easter May 22, 1999 Acts 28:16-20,30-31; Jn 21:20-25 In today\u2019s liturgy, the last of the Easter season, the season of the great news of the resurrection and ascension of Jesus and the triumph over death and sin, the Church […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1029,3,5],"tags":[8704,89,88,63,87,48,85,49],"class_list":["post-53","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1999-year-i","category-homily","category-year-i","tag-1999-year-a","tag-7th-week-of-easter","tag-acts-2816-20-30-31","tag-domus-sanctae-mariae-guadalupensis","tag-jn-2120-25","tag-rome","tag-saturday","tag-transitional-diaconate-year"],"yoast_head":"\n