May 14, 2025
Feast of Saint Matthias, Apostle
Lectionary: 564
Reading I
Peter stood up in the midst of the brothers and sisters
(there was a group of about one hundred and twenty persons
in the one place).
He said, “My brothers and sisters,
the Scripture had to be fulfilled
which the Holy Spirit spoke beforehand
through the mouth of David, concerning Judas,
who was the guide for those who arrested Jesus.
Judas was numbered among us
and was allotted a share in this ministry.
For it is written in the Book of Psalms:
Let
his encampment become desolate,
and
may no one dwell in it.
and:
May
another take his office.
Therefore, it is necessary that one of the men
who accompanied us the whole time
the Lord Jesus came and went among us,
beginning from the baptism of John
until the day on which he was taken up from us,
become with us a witness to his resurrection.”
So they proposed two, Joseph called Barsabbas,
who was also known as Justus, and Matthias.
Then they prayed,
“You, Lord, who know the hearts of all,
show which one of these two you have chosen
to take the place in this apostolic ministry
from which Judas turned away to go to his own place.”
Then they gave lots to them, and the lot fell upon Matthias,
and he was counted with the Eleven Apostles.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (8) The
Lord will give him a seat with the leaders of his people.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Praise, you servants of the LORD,
praise the
name of the LORD.
Blessed be the name of the LORD
both now and
forever.
R. The Lord will give him a
seat with the leaders of his people.
or:
R. Alleluia.
From the rising to the setting of the sun
is the name
of the LORD to be praised.
High above all nations is the LORD;
above the
heavens is his glory.
R. The Lord will give him a
seat with the leaders of his people.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Who is like the LORD, our God, who is enthroned on high
and looks
upon the heavens and the earth below?
R. The Lord will give him a
seat with the leaders of his people.
or:
R. Alleluia.
He raises up the lowly from the dust;
from the
dunghill he lifts up the poor
To seat them with princes,
with the
princes of his own people.
R. The Lord will give him a
seat with the leaders of his people.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I chose you from the world,
to go and bear fruit that will last, says the Lord.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
Jesus said to his disciples:
“As the Father loves me, so I also love you.
Remain in my love.
If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love,
just as I have kept my Father’s commandments
and remain in his love.
“I have told you this so that my joy might be in you
and your joy might be complete.
This is my commandment: love one another as I love you.
No one has greater love than this,
to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.
You are my friends if you do what I command you.
I no longer call you slaves,
because a slave does not know what his master is doing.
I have called you friends,
because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father.
It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you
and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain,
so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you.
This I command you: love one another.”
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/051425.cfm
Commentary on Acts
1:15-17,20-26; John 15:9-17
The First Reading is taken from the Acts of the Apostles and
recounts the choosing of Matthias to fill the vacant place left by the
treachery and death of Judas. This took place soon after the Ascension of
Jesus, but before the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (following the
timetable of Luke in Acts).
Matthias (who may have been one of the 72 disciples
mentioned by Luke in his Gospel) then took over with the other Eleven the
responsibility of an Apostle, which was to hand on, with accuracy and in its
entirety, the message of Jesus’ life, teaching, suffering, death and
resurrection as the Incarnate Son of God. This is what we now call
‘Tradition’ with a capital ‘T’. There were, of course, later traditions
which became part of the life of the Church which did not have the status of
Apostolic Tradition.
Perhaps the very heart of that Tradition is expressed in the
Gospel reading. It is part of the long discourse at the Last Supper which
is recorded for us in John. It begins with Jesus saying:
As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in
my love.
The word for ‘love’ throughout the passage in the original
Greek is agape. This is a very special kind of love. It
is not a grasping, clinging love. On the contrary, it is an outreaching
love, unconditionally wanting the well-being of the other. This is the
love which the Father extends to Jesus and it is the love that Jesus extends to
us. And we are to “abide” or remain (a favourite Johannine word) in that agape-love.
And how are we to stay in that love? We do it by
keeping the commandments of Jesus, just as Jesus himself remains in his
Father’s love by keeping his Father’s commandments. And what are these
commandments? They are not the Commandments of the Old Testament; in
fact, there is only one, and it is all-embracing:
This is my commandment, that you love one another as I
have loved you.
The whole of the Gospel, the whole of the teaching of Jesus
is there. If that was all we had of the Gospel, it would be enough.
And Jesus goes further:
No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life
for one’s friends.
This is the degree of agape-love which Jesus
will soon show. And who are his friends? He says:
You are my friends if you do what I command you.
That is, friends are all those who unconditionally
extend agape to their brothers and sisters. And if that
is the measure of Jesus’ love for us, it is also to be the measure of our love
for others. If we all kept this commandment, our world would be
transformed! We would become a world of people who spend their lives
caring for each other’s needs.
But there is another definition of Jesus’ friends:
…I have called you friends, because I have made known to
you everything that I have heard from my Father.
And the most precious thing he has told us is that central
command of agape-love. To have heard that message is a huge
privilege, but also a huge responsibility, because it is a message that the
whole world needs to hear. As Jesus put it himself:
By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if
you have love for one another.
This is to be the distinctive mark of our communities.
Would it describe mine?
This is the message that Matthias and his fellow-Apostles
inherited and which they passed on. It is for us to spread the same
message and it is done most effectively, not by words, but by the witness of
how we live our lives and interact with one another.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/f0514r/
Wednesday,
May 14, 2025
St Matthias, Apostle
Opening Prayer
Lord God,
Your apostle Matthias was a
witness to the life and death of Jesus Christ and to His glorious resurrection.
May your people also today bear witness to
the life of Your Son by living His life as best as they can, and radiating the
joy of people who are rising with Him to a new and deeper life.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Gospel Reading - John 15: 9-17
Jesus
said to his disciples: "As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain
in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I
have kept my Father's commandments and remain in his love. "I have told
you this so that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete. This is
my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than
this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. You are my friends if you do
what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know
what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you
everything I have heard from my Father. It was not you who chose me, but I who
chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that
whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you. This I command you:
love one another."
Reflection
•
John 15: 9-11: Remain in My love, the source of
perfect joy. Jesus remains in the love of the Father observing the commandments
that He received from Him. We remain in the love of Jesus observing the
commandments that He has left for us. And we should observe them in the same
measure in which He observed the commandments of the Father: “If you keep My
commandments you will remain in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s
commandments and remain in His love. In this union of love of the Father and of
Jesus is found the source of true joy: “I have told you this so that My own joy
may be in you and your joy be complete.”
•
John 15: 12-13: To love one another as He has
loved us. The commandment of Jesus is only one: to love one another as He has
loved us! (Jn 15: 12) Jesus surpasses the Old Testament. The ancient criterion
was the following: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Lev 18: 19). The
new criterion is this: “Love one another as I have loved you.” It is the phrase
that we sing even today and which says, “There is no greater love than to give
one’s life for one’s brother!”
•
John 15: 14-15: Friends and not servants. “You
are My friends if you do what I command you,” that is, the practice of love to
the point of total gift of oneself! Immediately Jesus presents a very high
ideal for the life of His disciples. He says, “I shall no longer call you
servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. I call you
friends because I have made known to you everything I have learned from My
Father!” Jesus no longer had any secrets for His disciples. He tells us
everything that He has heard from the Father! Behold the wonderful ideal of
life in community: to reach a total transparency, to the point of not having
any secrets among us and to have full trust in one another, to be able to speak
about the experience of God that we have and of life, and thus, be able to
enrich one another. The first Christians succeeded in reaching this ideal after
many years: “they had one only heart and one only soul” (Acts 4: 32; 1: 14; 2:
42-46).
•
This statement of Jesus is also a reminder of
what it means to believe in Him and be saved (Jn 3: 16). To believe is not an
idle thought or a wish. It is an action – many actions. “You are My friends if
you do what I command you” means action. Some communities think that one is
saved by just a thought on their part, and not doing what Jesus commanded. Love
not only describes a relationship, it is also an action verb!
•
John 15: 16-17: Jesus has chosen us. We have not
chosen Jesus. He met us, called us, and entrusted a mission to us to go and
bear fruit - a fruit which lasts. We need Him, but He also chooses to need us
and our work to be able to continue to do today for the people as He did for
the people of Galilee. The final recommendation: “This is My commandment: to
love one another!”
For Personal Consideration
•
To love our neighbor as Jesus has loved us. This
is the ideal of every Christian. What are my concrete and real actions that
show this?
•
Do I make distinctions and only love some, and
others not so much?
•
All that I have heard from the Father I make
known to you. This is the ideal of community: to attain total transparency. How
do I live this in my community, including family?
•
Using concrete examples, what does Jesus command
me to do? How much do I really do?
•
Is Jesus’ commandment only for certain people or
certain parts of the day or week, or is it for all day, every day?
Concluding Prayer
Praise, servants of Yahweh, praise the name of Yahweh.
Blessed be the name of Yahweh, henceforth and forever. (Ps
113: 1-2)
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