Discovering our identity as
disciples of the Risen Lord
The Liturgy helps us to rediscover our identity as disciples
of the Risen Lord.
In his reflection at the Regina Coeli, on the readings for
the Fourth Sunday of Easter, Pope Francis said the Liturgy “continues with the
intention of helping us rediscover our identity as disciples of the Risen
Lord.”
Beginning with the first Reading, from the Acts of the
Apostles, the Holy Father said that St Peter openly declared that the healing
of a crippled man was accomplished “in the Name of Jesus,” because there is “no
salvation through anyone else.”
In the man who was healed, the Pope said, we see ourselves
and our communities. We can all be healed of our spiritual infirmities “if we
put our very being in the hands of the Risen Lord."
But who is the Christ who heals, Pope Francis asked? The
answer is found in the day’s Gospel: Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd. A
good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” Precisely because He offered
His life for us, Jesus is the Good Shepherd par excellence.”
The second part of the Gospel, he continued, shows us the
relationship that must exist between us and the Lord. “I am the Good Shepherd,”
Jesus says, “I know my own, and my own know me, as the Father knows me, and I
know the Father.” This is not simply an intellectual knowledge, the Pope said,
but rather, a personal relationship, a reflection of the love between the
Father and the Son. Jesus knows us intimately, in the very depths of our
hearts.
And we in turn are called to know Jesus. That, Pope Francis
said, “implies an encounter with Him, who raises up in us the desire to follow
Him, abandoning self-referential attitudes in order to walk along new paths,
indicated by Christ Himself and opening on to vast horizons.” He warned that if
our communities see the desire to follow Jesus cool, we will fall into “new
ways of thinking and living,” which are not consistent with the Gospel.
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