Homily (Reflection) for Thursday of the Seventh Week of Easter (20th May, 2021) on the Gospel
Acts 22:30; 23:6-11;
Ps 15:1-2.5.7-11. (R. v.1);
Jn 17:20-26.
Topic: Knowing the Father.
Today’s gospel is the concluding part of Jesus’ prayer for His disciples. And the concluding verse reads, “I made your name known to them, and I will make it known, so that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” Jesus’ determination to make the Father’s name known to His disciples and the Father’s love it brings about could make one ask, ‘What does it mean to know the Father?’
While speaking to the Jews Jesus said, “But you have not
known him; I know him... I do know him and I keep his word” (Jn 8:55). Again, the first letter of
Saint John reads,
Now by this we may be sure that we know him, if we obey his
commandments. Whoever says, ‘I have come to know him,’ but does not obey his
commandments, is a liar, and in such a person the truth does not exist (1Jn 2:3-4).
Knowing the Father is far beyond one’s ability to say that
His name is God. It demands living as His child. Hence Saint Paul condemned the
attitudes of those who paraded themselves as Jews but never lived as Jews with
this quotation, “For, as it is written, ‘The name of God is blasphemed among
the Gentiles because of you’” (Rom 2:24;
cf. Is 52:5; Ezek 36:20-22). Whoever says that he/she knows God but does
not live it out will not be saved, cf. Jas
2:14.
Bible Reading: Rom 2:17–3:8.
Thought for today: Do you really know God?
Let us pray: Lord, give us the grace to know you
and to live it out – Amen.
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