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Sixth Sunday of Easter (A)

May 10, 2026

Fr. John Colacino C.PP.S.

Introit

Rite of Sprinkling

Collect

Grant, almighty God,
that we may celebrate with heartfelt devotion these days of joy,
which we keep in honor of the risen Lord,
and that what we relive in remembrance
we may always hold to in what we do.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

First Reading Acts 8:5-8, 14-17

A severe persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered. 5 Philip went down to the city of Samaria and proclaimed the Messiah to them. 6 The crowds with one accord listened eagerly to what was said by Philip, hearing and seeing the signs that he did, 7 for unclean spirits, crying with loud shrieks, came out of many who were possessed; and many others who were paralysed or lame were cured. 8 So there was great joy in that city. 14 Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. 15 The two went down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit; 16 (for as yet the Spirit had not come upon any of them; they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus). 17 Then Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

Responsorial Psalm

Second Reading 1 Peter 3:15-18

In your hearts sanctify Christ as Lord. Always be ready to make your defence to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you; 16 yet do it with gentleness and reverence. Keep your conscience clear, so that, when you are maligned, those who abuse you for your good conduct in Christ may be put to shame. 17 For it is better to suffer for doing good, if suffering should be God’s will, than to suffer for doing evil. 18 For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit.

Gospel Acclamation

Gospel John 14:15-21

Catena Nova

Because Christ's disciples did not yet know who he was, it was likely that they would greatly miss his companionship, his teaching, his actual physical presence, and be completely disconsolate when he had gone. Therefore he said: “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor,” meaning another like himself.… By “He will be with you” he meant, “He will be with you as I am with you,” but he also hinted at the difference between them, namely, that the spirit would not suffer as he had done, nor would he ever depart….He said that the Spirit was another like himself, that he would not leave them, that he would come to them just as he himself had come, and that he would remain in them. Yet even this did not drive away their sadness, for they still wanted Christ himself and his companionship. So to satisfy them he said: “I will not leave you orphans; I will come back to you.” Do not be afraid, for when I promised to send you another counselor I did not mean that I was going to abandon you for ever, nor by saying that he would remain with you did I mean that I would not see you again. Of course I also will come to you; I will not leave you orphans (St. John Chrysostom).

The person who loves God cannot help loving every other person as himself, even though he is grieved by the passions of those who are not yet purified. But when they amend their lives, his delight is indescribable and knows no bounds. A soul filled with thoughts of sensual desire and hatred is unpurified. If we detect any trace of hatred in our hearts against anyone whatsoever for committing any fault, we are utterly estranged from love for God, since love for God absolutely precludes us from hating anyone else (St. Maximus the Confessor).

“My Father and I will come, and in the holy place will make our home”. This means that the Son of God will seek a holy place in your heart…. Why, then, are we sorrowful at times? Why are we troubled inwardly? Is it a matter of trying to find a fitting place for the Lord within ourselves? After all, which of us can provide Jesus with a really fitting place—He who is the Lord of Glory? Where is the place that is worthy of his majesty? I would count myself fortunate to be found worthy of worshipping at his footstool and being able to cling to his feet! Maybe I can at least cling to the feet of a saintly person who the Lord has chosen to be his dwelling place! Yet, the fact is that the Lord only needs to anoint me inwardly with the oil we call his mercy to enable me to cry out: “I have run the way of your commandments because you have enlarged my heart”! I may not be about to usher the Lord into a large place in my heart, one wonderfully furnished, and then invite him to refresh himself there together with his disciples. I only hope that I will be able to offer him a place to lay his head! One has to grow and be enlarged inwardly to become capable of containing God within oneself. The dimensions of a soul, however, are proportioned to its love. This is what St. Paul reminds us of when he calls upon us to “widen our hearts in love”. The soul is, of course, spiritual and can’t be measured in a physical sense. But grace makes possible what nature cannot. We expand spiritually as we make progress toward the perfection of our humanity called “the full stature of Christ”, as St. Paul notes. That is why we can grow into a temple sacred to the Lord. Love is the measure of our inward self, of our soul. Souls who love much are large and those that love little are small. The soul that has no love at all is nothing! St. Paul says it: “Without love I am nothing!” By Christ’s grace, we attain even to the stature, to the wideness and fullness, of the love that sets apart Jesus Christ. Let Christ's grace work this wonder in your heart! Then you will have truly prepared a place for the Lord to dwell. (St. Bernard of Clairvaux)

We become what we love and who we love shapes what we become. If we love things, we become a thing. If we love nothing, we become nothing. Imitation is not a literal mimicking of Christ, rather it means becoming the image of the beloved, an image disclosed through transformation. This means we are to become vessels of God´s compassionate love for others (St. Clare of Assisi).

With the well-tuned, harmonious harp of your divine heart, and through the power of your Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, I sing to you, Lord God, lovable Father. I sing you songs of praise and thanksgiving for all creatures in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, for all which are and were and will be born. I give you thanks to the best of my ability, Lord God. You created and re-create me. Thank you for your kind forgiveness and for reassuring me of your unending love, flowing down from up above. Be my honor, Lord, my joy, my beauty, my consolation in sorrow, my counsel in uncertainty, my defense in everything unfair, my patience in problems, my abundance in poverty, my food in fasting, my sleep in vigilance, and my therapy in weakness (St. Gertrude of Helfta).

Whenever I groan within myself and think how hard it is to keep writing about love in these times of tension and strife, which may at any moment become for us all a time of terror, I think to myself, "What else is the world interested in?" What else do we all want, each one of us, except to love and be loved, in our families, in our work, in all our relationships? God is love. Love casts out fear. Even the most ardent revolutionist, seeking to change the world, to overturn the tables of the money changers, is trying to make a world where it is easier for people to love, to stand in that relationship to each other. We want with all our hearts to love, to be loved. And not just in the family but to look upon all as our mothers, sisters, brothers, children. It is when we love the most intensely and most humanly that we can recognize how tepid is our love for others. The keenness and intensity of love brings with it suffering, of course, but joy too, because it is a foretaste of heaven. (Dorothy Day)

The first peace, which is the most important, is that which comes within the souls of people when they realize their relationship, their oneness with the universe and all its powers, and when they realize that at the center of the universe dwells the Great spirit, and that this center is really everywhere; it is within each of us (Nicholas Black Elk).

Homily

I have a lot less hope than I used to have. So when I'm told by Peter, Always be ready to give an explanation to anyone who asks you for a reason for your hope (II), I might be at a loss for words. True, I'm not speaking of my hope in Christ who restores us to eternal life by his Resurrection (cf. Prayer after Communion). Rather, it's the sense I sometimes have that we've indeed been left orphans in this world, despite Jesus' promise to the contrary (G).

But then I realize it's probably a mirage I'm hoping for — an imaginary oasis in the middle of a desert. Hoping for things like world peace, social justice, Christian unity, or the hope Lincoln had for this country which he expressed in his Second Inaugural Address: "With malice toward none with charity for all with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right let us strive on to finish the work we are in to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan—to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." Alas, forty-one days later, well, you know the rest of the story.

But that hasn't stopped people from enlisting our "better angels" in hope of a more perfect union. From the court of public opinion all the way to the Supreme Court, people have sought redress from everything that diminishes hope. And every so often a victory appears where justice prevails — only to see it dismantled by a thousand cuts or overturned in one fell swoop. Always, of course, claiming to rebalance the scales of justice. (Think of the Voting Rights Act).

Now if you were to build your case for such things, I counsel against hiring the Holy Spirit to be your Advocate before the court. You're probably going to lose. Not because the Paraclete isn't up to the task, it's just that the judge and jury, not to mention the prosecution, hold all the cards. Indeed, the world and its agents cannot accept the Spirit of truth, because it neither sees nor knows him. (G)

So it's hopeless after all. Right? Maybe Peter just wants me to talk about the afterlife if anyone asks a reason for my hope. But is it only then God will make good on all those promises I've been told about? Is eternal life really just another way of saying "heaven?" Do I have to wait until I'm dead before Dante's words at the gates of Hell ring true for those who run the world: "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here" (Divine Comedy, Inferno, Canto III)?

Well, it seems the answer to my questions must lie in Peter's further admonition. And assuming I have a clear conscience as Peter expects (and I'm not claiming I do!) all I can really hope for is being maligned and defamed — precisely because good conduct in Christ will only score a conviction. And I might as well be ready to suffer for doing good, For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that be the will of God, than for doing evil. Why? Because Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous. (II)

So it seems, every time I seek something from the world it cannot give, you can be sure I'm looking for an escape hatch from the Cross. Whenever I look to politics, or the economy, or technology, or society at large — or even the Church — perhaps especially the Church — I know I'm misplacing my hope. And that's a hard lesson to learn.

Remember last week when we spoke about the fool's errand of Christian nationalists trying to establish a theocracy? Talk about getting your hopes up! Oh, it's been done before, you know. Think Charlemagne's Holy Roman Empire, John Calvin's Geneva, the Puritans Massachusetts Bay Colony. Always with the same result as secular utopias: more suffering, persecution and and death. As von Balthasar put it,

This anxious flight of the Church and of Christians from the Cross was always, and is once again today, the flight into ideologies of world domination….and today, since the external forms of power are no longer within reach, the flight into…. the desire to be there, too, when the world is worldly, when the world is rising upward, when the world is taking possession of itself, as if it were possible to bestow Christian sweetness on the whole affair by tossing a saccharin tablet into this raging ocean. (Explorations in Theology, vol. 3: Creator Spirit)

And there you have it. My hope is too worldly. After all, hope is a theological virtue, meaning its object is God and not any particular outcome in time or space. So I think I've really been mistaking optimism for hope — that things things could be better, will be better, must be better. Maybe they will, maybe they won't. And I can certainly do my part. But in the end all I really have to go on — as if it weren't enough — is the way of Jesus and his commandments. (G) And we know very well what those are — loving as he loved us. And there you will always find the Cross.

So when I find myself world weary, and hope in short supply, I try to remember what, after all, we're celebrating these seven weeks. Von Balthasar again — "Without Easter, Good Friday would have no meaning. Without Easter, there would be no hope that suffering and abandonment might be tolerable. But with Easter, a way out becomes visible for human sorrows, an absolute future: more than a hope, a divine expectation." (To the Heart of the Mystery of Redemption)

Intercessions (Joe Milner; The Sunday Website)

For the Church: that we may grow in our awareness that Christ is in us and see the hand of God in the people, the events in our lives and in the created world around us.

For the renew of God’s Spirit in our hearts: that God will stir up into a flame the gift of the Spirit so that we may build up the Body of Christ and bring forth God’s reign in the world.

For a new spirit in our personal interactions: that we may speak with reverence and gentleness to one another, recognizing that we have become sisters and brothers in Christ.

For the unity of all Christians: that the Spirit of God will heal the misunderstandings and wounds in the Body of Christ and lead us to a greater unity of mind and action as we confront evil and work to ease human suffering.

For those who experience injustice: that God will raise up and heal all who are disrespected or treated unjustly and bring forth the truth that will set them free.

For all who are ill: that God’s healing Spirit will ease their suffering, give them strength, and restore them to wholeness.

For greater respect for God’s creation: that we may recognize our interdependence with the created world and work to preserve the balance in nature that God has established.

For government and business leaders: that God will inspire them to develop policies to protect the health and well-being of the human family and promote the renewal of the economy.

Faithful God, who love us in Christ Jesus, send your Spirit of truth to dwell within us, that we may always reject what is false, live by the commands of Christ, and be true to the love you have shown us. Grant this through Christ our Lord. Amen. (ICEL; 1998)

Offertory Chant

Offertory Motet (Charles Beaudrot)

I will not leave you comfortless, alleluia. I will come again to you.

Communion Chant

Communion Motet (Thomas Tallis)

If ye love me,
keep my commandments,
and I will pray the Father,
and he shall give you another comforter,
that he may 'bide with you forever,
e'en the spirit of truth.

Closing Hymn

Come down, O love divine, seek Thou this soul of mine,
And visit it with Thine own ardor glowing.
O Comforter, draw near, within my heart appear,
And kindle it, Thy holy flame bestowing.

O let it freely burn, til earthly passions turn
To dust and ashes in its heat consuming;
And let Thy glorious light shine ever on my sight,
And clothe me round, the while my path illuming.

Let holy charity mine outward vesture be,
And lowliness become mine inner clothing;
True lowliness of heart, which takes the humbler part,
And o'er its own shortcomings weeps with loathing.

And so the yearning strong, with which the soul will long,
Shall far out-pass the power of human telling;
For none can guess its grace, till he become the place
Wherein the Holy Spirit makes His dwelling.

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