Reflecting on Acts 6: 1-7

It’s so embarrassing to look back on the behavior of the dominant culture in every age. We know, because we are living it right now, that the day will surely come when children will say to their parents, “You could have saved us from environmental disaster and you did WHAT?”

Looking back at the things we took for granted is so shocking now. We watch TITANIC and say, “WHAT? People lived and people died on that ship depending on how much MONEY they had?” The answer is YES. Financial status seemed the only proper way to decide who had access to the lifeboats.

Every day, it seems, another appalling injustice from generations ago is brought to light. As author Bonnie Garmus wrote, “some things needed to stay in the past because the past was the only place they made sense.”

I think of all this as I read that ultra embarrassing sentence from Acts today: the Hellenists complained against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution.

This is in the earliest days of the Church, when miracles abounded, and huge numbers were added to the Church every day! The eyewitnesses to the Risen Lord were walking and talking in Galilee and Jerusalem, giving witness to the greatest event in all history.

And yet. When the food was distributed to the community of believers, it was understood that the widows of the Greek-speaking Jews would be neglected. They didn’t speak Hebrew, they lived in the Diaspora (outside of Jerusalem), and they didn’t have any husbands to speak for them. They were invisible.

O God, save us from the blindness upon which later generations will judge us.

What behaviors of yours in the past do you particularly regret today?

Kathy McGovern ©2023

Reflecting on John 10: 1-10

We have, in Denver, two communities of the most radiant, joy-filled young people you ever saw. The Colorado Vincentian Volunteers have graced our city with energy, goodness, and a rock-hard commitment to companioning those who are marginalized, for 28 years.

Our newcomers, the Christ in the City missionaries, have served those living on the streets of Denver for 13 years. Both of these groups, shot through with the love of Jesus, come to mind so easily today, on Good Shepherd Sunday.

In a new documentary about the work of Christ in the City, Homeless but Human, It’s so obvious that those who suffer on our streets hear two voices (and those with mental illness, other voices too).

Imagine the first voice as the one you’ve heard for decades. It’s the voice that recalls all the ways you’ve been betrayed, abused, terrorized. It’s the voice that tells you to NEVER trust anyone, to hide your terrible loneliness, and to pull back into the isolation that has been your only friend.

Enter the voice of the Good Shepherd, in the delightful disguise of funny, love-filled young people who are CALLING YOU BY NAME. They are visiting you at your tent. They are ready to play cards. They are ready to sing songs with you. And not just for a day or a week. Both the CVV and Christ in the City kids are IN IT. They will listen to your heart, and touch your wounds, and remember your birthdays, until you trust them enough to apply for housing, or visit the clinic, or call home.

It’s the rod and staff of these beautiful young Believers that give comfort on our cold streets.

Have you ever heard the Voice of the Shepherd through the love of others?

Kathy McGovern ©2023

Reflecting on Luke 24: 13-35

My husband Cleopas and I decided to leave Jerusalem. We were heartbroken. We had hoped that Jesus, our beloved friend, would redeem Israel. But instead, the Romans crucified him. The Romans are beasts.

Our group spent the next hours huddled together, terrified of the soldiers. This morning, three of the disciples went to the tomb with spices to anoint his body. They came running back with the wildest tale! They were screaming that his body is gone, that he has been raised! And even Peter ran to the tomb and found the burial cloths just lying there in the empty tomb.

People are crying and laughing and screaming and singing, “He has been raised!” But we aren’t naïve. We won’t be taken in by wishful thinking. The Jerusalem group can keep their joy. We saw him crucified. He had no power over the Romans. He wasn’t the one we’d hoped for after all.

But here’s the thing. On the road back to Emmaus, a stranger appeared on the road. He asked us why we were weeping. How could he not know? We started from the beginning, from the day three years ago when we heard about Jesus, and came to find him, and fell so in love with him. We told him about the friends we had made, friends we thought we’d have forever. It felt good to tell the story. In fact, our hearts were burning within us, just remembering him.

That Stranger was a good listener. Ha! How did we not recognize him? It was Jesus! As usual, we thought we were running away from him, but he was running towards us the whole time.

How does remembering the Story bring Jesus nearer?

Kathy McGovern ©2023

Reflecting on John 20: 19-31

It’s the wounds that draw me. Show me your wounds so I can trust you. No perfect people need apply.

Most of the time a person’s wounds are pretty evident. We tend to wear our wounds as nametags, like  Hi, I’m Kathy. I don’t walk so great. But other wounds are less visible, and often those wounds are the worst.

I resonate with Thomas, who became the great Apostle to India after touching the wounds of Christ. I imagine him, reaching to actually touch the speared side, to put his finger in the nail marks, and dropping down in awe, crying out My Lord, my God!

I drop down in awe when I am in the presence of the wounded. When I consider what people live with, have lived with, and will live with in the future, it drops me to the floor. My Lord and my God! From whence does a person summon the strength to be generous, to be thoughtful, to continue to raise a child, maybe, when carrying physical or psychological wounds so overwhelming?

Consider Thomas, the recipient of Divine Mercy so great that, after his encounter with the Risen Christ, he traveled all the way to India to tell the inhabitants there, in 52 AD, that he had seen the Risen Lord, and had touched his wounds.

We are the generation about whom Jesus spoke. We have not seen him. We have not heard him. We have not touched his wounds. And yet, we believe. We embrace the faith that Thomas shouted from the rooftops. My Lord and my God! You are risen! You are here! You are living within us!

Oh Jesus, we trust in You.

In what ways have treating the wounds of those in need stirred your faith in Jesus?

Kathy McGovern ©2023

Reflecting on Matthew 28: 1-10

If you attended the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday you heard Matthew’s detailed and fascinating resurrection account.  It’s only here that we learn there was a “great earthquake” when an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and, like swatting a fly, rolled the stone away that had tried to keep Jesus chained in death.

And Mary Magdalene and “the other Mary” actually saw this!  This is the only account in the four gospels where eyewitnesses actually saw the stone rolled away!  The big scary Roman guards posted at the tomb were so terrified by that angel that they fell dead asleep.  But not those women!  They stood their ground and watched―not fainting, but full of a faith that only comes from Love.  They loved Jesus.  No angel was keeping them from him. 

And because of their Love they witnessed the greatest event of all history.

On this day, Easter Sunday 2023, I offer you this invitation:  Fall in love with him.  Soften your heart.  Enter the tomb and see that it is empty.  Enter into a life in Christ and see that is full to overflowing with grace and love for you.  I promise.

The guards could have been eyewitnesses too.  Instead, they helped start the rumor that Jesus’ disciples stole the body so that there would be an explanation for that empty tomb when people came to see for themselves.

The world is like that these days.  There are lots of explanations for that empty tomb.  Except for this: the earliest Christians gladly accepted martyrdom because they had seen, and utterly believed, that their BELOVED was waiting for them just on the other side of the grave.

What might be keeping you from accepting the WITNESS of the earliest Christians?

Kathy McGovern ©2023

Reflecting on Acts 2: 1-11

Come, oh Holy Spirit, come!

We feel You ever more, our own.

It’s You who’ve sent the personnel

Who’ve risked their lives to get us well.

It’s on You scientists alight

To give them wisdom in this fight.

And You, oh Spirit, whose cool breath

Companioned those we won’t forget.

Those loved ones, left alone, it seemed.

But You, sweet Spirit, who redeemed

Those last sad moments, with Your grace,

When they met Jesus, face to face.

It’s You, Oh Spirit, we received

On that day we first believed.

Please dwell in us, Spirit, once again.

We ask, in Jesus’ name, AMEN.

In what ways can you sense the Holy Spirit working in the events of these past months?

Kathy McGovern ©2020

Reflecting on John 17: 1-11A

I almost never get to talk about today’s gospel reading. I’m so glad I finally have the chance to tell you the greatest news you’ve ever heard. Here it is: YOU ARE ALREADY IN HEAVEN.

Now, at this moment in history that may seem like very bad news indeed, as in Seriously? Heaven is being stuck in the house all day and night, terrified of a horrible virus? If this is heaven, what’s hell?

Well, you make a point. It doesn’t seem like heaven, except for the most important fact about your life: you know Jesus. Now this is eternal life, that they should know you, the only true God, and the one whom you sent, Jesus Christ (Jn. 17:3).

If you were an infant on the day of your baptism, your Godparents answered those all-important questions for you: Do you believe in God? Do you believe in Jesus Christ, his Son? They answered YES for you, and your life’s task has been, with all your heart, to answer YES on your own.

It’s in that YES that eternal life begins right here on earth. That YES lifts the believers up into that realm that holds them, through sickness, and loss, and grief, and even pandemics. I can do all things in Christ, who strengthens me (Phil. 4:13),says the one whose YES has taken him or her into eternal life right here on earth.

The one who knows Jesus already has a taste of heaven. That does not mean that we are immune from the terrors of this life. It means that holding fast to Jesus anchors us to Him whose comfort and healing is a foretaste of the next.

How has knowing Jesus throughout your life lifted you up?

Kathy McGovern ©2020

Reflecting on 1 Peter 3: 15-18

How often do you cry these days? I admit that I cry nearly every day, always in response to some heroic act I see featured on tv. When I hear the first responders–the ambulance drivers and EMTs, especially–describe desperately trying to get a patient to the hospital before they die, I can barely watch.

But when they interview the exhausted nurses and doctors, and hear their answers to the inevitable questions about how they are getting through their shifts without breaking down, I long to hear just one of them reference that scripture text we have today from I Peter: Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope.

In Catholic New York, I Iong to hear at least one baptized and confirmed health care hero say, “Well, I’m Catholic. That means I’m never alone. I bring the whole Body of Christ with me when I put on my protective equipment and enter the ward. And, of course, I have all the angels and saints holding me through my shift every day.”

In my daily prayer I picture those angels and saints holding parents tight, giving them patience and strength as they face another ALL KIDS ALL DAY marathon. I picture angels guiding and holding every kind of First Responder .

The reason for our hope, right in the middle of this terror, is that the Holy Spirit is guiding the researchers and every person placing their precious lives on the line. Where is God in all of this? Right there in the ambulance, right there in the ventilator. God did not make death. That is the reason for our hope.

Do you ever share with anyone the reason for your hope?

Kathy McGovern ©2020

Reflecting on Acts 6:1-7

Every time I read that account from Acts that admits that the Greek-speaking widows were being left out of the daily distribution of food by the Hebrew-speaking men, I remember that horrible scene from Titanic. You know the one, where, in the panic for the lifeboats, those in third-class steerage were locked out of the gate that led to the boats so that as many of the wealthier passengers as possible could board.

It turns out that wasn’t actually the case. They weren’t “locked out,” but, in fact, a far higher percentage of those in steerage died that night than those on the upper decks. One explanation posited was that many of them were immigrants who didn’t speak English, and therefore didn’t understand the instructions that came over the loudspeaker.

It’s not hard to imagine that those earliest Christians, forming those communities of believers who “shared all things in common,” simply didn’t see the Greek-speaking widows. They were foreigners, and they didn’t speak the language of the dominant culture. The fact that the leadership assigned Greek-speaking deacons to make sure their widows were being fed betrays a huge crack in the Church from the get-go. If those in the minority were going to be fed, they had to find people who actually saw them so they could feed them.

This quarantine period has exposed the fissures in our own culture, hasn’t it? Today I saw a heartbreaking and inspiring story of an African-American mother who drives her two honor-roll students to the bus stop every morning and sits in the car with them all day so they can keep up with their school work. Why? Because they can get an internet connection there. I see her now.

Whom do you see more clearly now that the isolation period is winding down?

Kathy McGovern ©2020

Reflecting on John 10: 1-10

It’s so funny, isn’t it, watching the videos of lions sunbathing in the streets, and goats cavorting through towns as if they owned the joint? The delicious irony is that the humans are locked up, and the animals are running free.

I suspect that they are just as curious as we are about what’s going on these days. It must be surreal for them to have cities all to themselves. Where are all the humans? Is this a thing now, or will they be back tomorrow, shouting at us to get back to our designated habitats?

While they’re looking for us, we’re looking at them, and laughing. We can see firsthand what life was like before humans invaded, and dominated, the spaces once ruled by wildlife.

That will all change, of course, and humans will tame their plazas and streets soon enough. But for this one moment, writing as I am on this cleanest Earth Day ever, we can observe our beautiful planet from the magnificent views of pristine Los Angeles air, clear Venetian rivers, and the gorgeous snow-capped Himalayas.

Oh Jesus, Shepherd of our souls, take loving care of us during this most upsetting time. As we ask You, with every breath, to wipe the scourge of this virus from the earth forever, we also ask You for the wisdom and the will to change our hearts this time.

Good Shepherd, hold us carefully as you guide us through the months and years to come. Our planet cries out for You. Give us wise guidance and global solidarity. In these weeks before Pentecost, give us the wisdom to partner with your Holy Spirit in  renewing the face of the earth.

What will you ask the Good Shepherd for today?

Kathy McGovern ©2020