Tuesday of the Second Week of Easter

Today's Mass Readings

Today’s gospel reading is a continuation of Jesus’ conversations with Nicodemus and, in this sense, is a continuation of the baptismal theme. Indeed, since “new life,” or as Maria put it in yesterday’s reflection, “born again” is such a prominent Easter theme, we can expect it to occur again and again during the Easter season. The repetition of theme is an invitation to reflect even more seriously on the Christian commitment that we made at our own baptism. In the passage we have today, Jesus emphasizes to Nicodemus how important it is to be baptized. Not only this, but after his conversation with Nicodemus, we have a rare account of Jesus himself baptizing with the disciples (Jn 3:22). Then again in chapter 4:1 Jesus’ disciples spend time baptizing. Thus we cannot underestimate the importance of this theme during this Easter season.

Baptism achieves multiple spiritual gifts for us. First, baptism brings to us “grace.” In other words, God really comes to dwell within each and every one of us at our baptism. Second, baptism also implies responsibility. As we see in today's first reading from the Acts of the Apostles, the early Christian community was of the same accord and shared with one another. No one was needy because they all shared what they had. This was an outpouring of their love for one another. In words, through grace God comes to dwell within us and by the same grace we become more and more like God who shared all things with us including his only Son.

At our baptism we received the God who is Love into our very lives in a special way. Let us take a few moments to thank God for the priceless gift of grace to us. Let us become conscious of the God within us. And then let us resolve to love one another. I think this Easter we should ask God in what ways He is calling us to love and serve one another. Why don't we spend some time today, or this week, but definitely sometime this season, and try and come up with one or two concrete ways we can help others around us who are needy. Helping the needy is not about what we can gain from it. For example we may experience joy at doing the good, praise, etc. Rather, the purpose of helping the needy is so that they are no longer needy. Let God’s presence in us help us to work toward the good of those around us with the Easter joy in our hearts.

Jeff Morrow & Fr. Satish Joseph