Easter 5

Readings: Acts 8:26-40; 1 John 4:7-21; John 15:1-8

There is an ancient legend about St. John, 
evangelist and beloved disciple,
that is recounted by Thomas Aquinas 
at the end of his commentary on John’s Gospel.
John, who was the one apostle 
not to die a martyr’s death,
lived to a ripe old age.
When he was no longer able to walk,
he was carried to the church by the faithful
so he could teach them.
And he taught only one thing:
“Little children, love one another.”
Thomas Aquinas adds,
“This is the perfection 
of the Christian life” (§2653). 

The conclusion Thomas draws 
from this apocryphal story
rings true not only with the Gospel 
and the Letters of John,
but with Scripture as a whole.
We hear this morning from
the First Letter of John:
“If we love one another, God lives in us, 
and his love is perfected in us.”
As Aquinas uses the term, 
“perfection” is not 
some unobtainable ideal,
something true only of God;
it is in fact true of anything 
that fully realizes the kind of thing it is.
A knife is perfected by being sharp,
a racehorse is perfected by being fast,
food is perfected by being 
both tasty and nutritious.
For something to lack these perfections 
is to fall short of being 
the thing that it is meant to be.
And, seemingly, the life of a Christian
is perfected by loving others;
and not to love is, for us Christians, 
to fall short of being 
the thing we are meant to be.

Perhaps this leads us 
to breathe a sigh of relief.
Love? 
Who knew that perfection was so easy?
But of course, it’s not so easy.
And St. John, even if he did,
at the end of his life,
teach nothing except 
“little children, love one another,”
knew that love, as Christians understand it,
is something quite arduous and demanding.
It might seem quite easy to love God,
especially if the God we love 
is simply an abstract notion,
an omnibenevolent higher power
whom we encounter as a distant, hidden force.
But Christianity requires also love of neighbor,
the insistent close-at-hand human presence 
that demands of me 
some sort of concrete response.
 
Maybe this difficulty is why 
love is not simply suggested,
since suggestions are something
we feel free to ignore,
but commanded.
“The commandment we have from him is this: 
those who love God must love 
their brothers and sisters also.”
And the brothers and sisters 
whom we are called to love
might not seem to us very lovable.
They will probably seem weird 
or annoying or grubby 
or threatening or alien.
To love my neighbors 
in their insistent proximity 
will involve my heart traveling 
some distance from where it is
to where God wants it to be.

In our first reading,
the story of Philip baptizing 
the Ethiopian eunuch,
we get some sense of the distance 
the heart must travel
in order to reach the perfection 
of the Christian life.
Philip is a “Hellenist”—
that is, a Greek-speaking Jew
from the diaspora, outside Judea.
The Ethiopian is, well, an Ethiopian, 
which in the ancient world 
was a generic term
for anyone with black skin. 
Ethiopia, moreover, 
stood in the ancient imagination
as a place that was far distant 
and almost unimaginably exotic.
The Roman writer 
Pliny the Elder claimed 
that there were Ethiopians 
who were twelve feet tall,
and that they “never spit, 
do not suffer from 
headache or toothache 
or pain in the eyes, 
and very rarely have a pain 
in any other part of the body.”
They might as well be 
from another planet.
And in the Old Testament, 
when the writers want to speak 
of something as being at a great distance,
they say it is as far as Ethiopia,
in the same way we might refer 
to something being in Timbuktu
(which, in case you don’t know,
is an actual city in Mali).

But the Ethiopian’s distance from Philip
is not simply geographical or cultural.
For this Ethiopian is a eunuch,
and even though he is reading 
from Israel’s scriptures
his status as a eunuch would prevent him 
from joining in Israel’s worship,
for eunuchs were excluded from the Temple.
Philip’s heart must travel some distance
in order to be perfected by loving this Ethiopian,
in order to see him as a brother for whom Christ died
and welcome him into fellowship through baptism.
And so the story emphasizes 
at every moment
that it is the Spirit 
who is propelling Philip,
for only the Spirit can guide us 
across such distance.

Given events in the world today,
it is hard not to be struck by the fact
that the setting of this story
is the road that runs 
from Jerusalem to Gaza.
What better symbolizes for us
the seemingly impossible journey
that the heart must make
to the perfection of love
than traversing the road 
from Jerusalem to Gaza?
What better captures for us
the seemingly intractable complexity
of creating not simply a cessation of violence
(which would in itself be something)
but the creation of true shalom,
the true peace of God 
that is the fruit of love?
What situation better sums up
how cultural and religious difference
can erect barriers that block 
the path to love of one another?
 
The road from Jerusalem to Gaza
marks a journey whose distance is too great,
a journey that we cannot make on our own.
And while we see that unmade journey 
vividly displayed 
in the current conflict in the Middle East,
we also have roads from Jerusalem to Gaza
in our own nation,
in our own homes,
in our own hearts:
Intractable racial divisions,
long-festering family conflicts,
the gap between the good 
that I know I should do
that the evil that I actually do.
All of this and more
tells us that the love for one another
that is the perfection of the Christian life
often involves a journey 
too far for us to make.

But though we cannot ourselves
make that journey,
the Spirit can.
Though we cannot 
cross that distance,
the Spirit can.
For the Spirit,
who can traverse
even the infinite distance 
between God and us,
binds us to Jesus
and make us abide 
in his love for the Father
and the Father’s love for him,
so that the flow of love 
that is the life of God
begins to flow through us
and begins to flow from us
out across the distance 
that separates us from one another,
even the distance from Jerusalem to Gaza. 

Jesus tells us in the Gospel: 
“apart from me you can do nothing.”
But if we abide in him
through the Spirit…
well, who knows what is possible?
“Beloved, let us love one another.”
Let us love the weird, annoying, grubby, 
threatening, alien other,
“because love is from God; 
everyone who loves 
is born of God 
and knows God.”
And this is the perfection
of the Christian life.

 

Easter 5

Readings: Acts 9:26-31; 1 John 3:18-24; John 15:1-8

Maybe it is just a phenomenon of middle age,

but I sometimes find myself walking into a room

and having to stop and ask, “what was it that I come in here for?

What was it that I was going to do?”

More significantly, and this too might be a phenomenon of middle age,

I sometimes find myself stopping in the midst of my daily life,

in the middle of some part of my job or some family chore,

and asking myself, “why am I doing this?

What is the larger context that made this activity make sense?”
I think it's what they call a mid-life crisis.

But whatever our age, I suspect all of us have those moments

when we pause in the middle of our everyday tasks

and ask, “why am I doing this?”

I find this is no less true in the life of the Church.

It is possible to find ourselves pausing 

in the routine activities

associated with this thing we call “Church”

and asking “why am I doing this?

What was it that I come in here for?”

Maybe you are someone whose participation in the Church

is focused mainly on coming to Mass 

and trying to live a Christian life.

Or maybe you are one of those more “activist” parishioners,

who volunteers to help with all sort of parish activities.

Or maybe you are even what might be called 

a “professional” Catholic,

someone who works for the Church

or devotes most of your time to Church-related activities.

Whatever the nature and level 

of your connection to the Church,

I suspect all of us have those moments

when we pause and ask, 

“What was it that I came in here for?

What was it I was going to do?”

Whether your involvement is on the level

of being a “professional” Church person

or an “activist” parishioner

or even of simply coming to Mass

I think we can all lose sight of the larger reality

that helps us understand 

why we are doing what we are doing;

we can all lose the broader context

that makes this whole Church thing make sense.

And when this happens, we can become discouraged.

We focus on all the imperfections and disappointments

that go along with Church life.

If your contact with the Church is mainly coming to Mass

it might be changes in the translation of the liturgy 

that you stumble over

or silly and annoying homilies

or political stands taken by the Church 

that you disagree with.

If you are an “activist” parishioner

it might be a sense of being under-appreciated

or of frustration that there are not more people

who share your level of commitment.

If you are a “professional” Catholic

it might be anger at clueless or even bullying superiors

or what you perceive as the lack of response 

among those you serve.

Whether we are correct 

in our feelings about these things or not,

whether the things that irk us 

are truly irksome or not,

if we make them the focus of our attention,

without keeping in mind the larger context,

this is a recipe for discouragement 

and disappointment

that will end either in a perpetual state 

of low-level bitterness

or even an eventual abandonment 

of the Church entirely.

It is only if we keep in mind the larger context

of all the myriad activities 

that go into this thing called Church

that we will find the Church life-giving.

But what is this larger context?

Today’s gospel puts it very simply:

“I am the vine, you are the branches.

Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit,

because without me you can do nothing.”

If we forget that the Church

is really about our unity in and with Jesus Christ

then we will be overwhelmed 

by the Church’s human imperfections,

which is really a matter of being overwhelmed 

by our own imperfections.

If we lose a sense of the Church

as the reality of our being joined together in Jesus Christ

through the sacraments and the scriptures 

and our love for one another,

then disappointment and disillusion are inevitable.

If we cannot see the Church first and foremost

as that which connects us to each other

and to the one without who we can do nothing,

then it is just one more sphere of petty politics.

So when we find ourselves asking 

concerning our life in the Church

“what was it that I come in here for?”

perhaps we need to step back and look for the reality

of the vine onto which we have been grafted as branches,

the vine that unites us to one another,

the vine without which we can do nothing,

the vine that is the risen and living Jesus Christ.