Friday, May 10, 2019

Fr Ebuka Umekachikelu, MSP - Homily Saturday, May 11, 2019


TO WHOM SHALL WE GO? Owing to the incredible teaching of Jesus concerning his body and blood as food and drink, some disciples lost confidence in him and stopped following him. The disciples who left did not take time to reflect on what Jesus was saying. They judged the teaching only with human reason. There was no attempt to delve into the supernatural through introspection/prayer and enlightenment from the Spirit. Sometimes, we have erratically condemned, secretly in our mind, some of the teachings of the Church. We no longer believe in and teach them convincingly. This is because we have allowed only flesh and human reason to dominate us. Sometimes, we join mob action, forgetting that a mob does not think. Individuals do. The question Jesus asked the Twelve is very significant: Will you also go away? The Twelve were the closest disciples of Jesus. Among them were the core ones like Peter, James and John, who were the most intimate. Even if everybody went away, Jesus expected the Twelve to understand better because they had more opportunity to know the truth than the others. It could have been a heart-breaking experience if the Twelve also stopped following Jesus. Thank God that Peter gave a soothing answer: “Lord, to whom shall we go. You have the words of eternal life”. We, Christians, are in a privileged position to understand the identity of Christ and his mission to the world. The ordained ministers, the religious and the seminarians are even more privileged. We have the greater blame if we desert Jesus and his teachings. We also should not cause others to fall from the way of Christ.

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