Texts taken from the Missal “On Your Word” March-April 2024

4th Sunday of Easter (B)
4th week of the psalter

FIRST READING

From the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 4:8-12)
In those days, Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them: “Rulers of the people and elders, if we are being questioned today about a good deed done to a sick man and by what means he has been healed, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that it was in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazorean, whom you crucified and whom God raised from the dead; this man is standing before you in good health. He is the stone rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. There is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” – The word of God.

Commentary on the first reading

The name of Jesus means “God saves.” Every time we proclaim this name, we invoke an action. It is not merely a matter of remembering a person, but of making that person present in the act of coming to save. In the case of the paralytic, salvation is also physical, but Christ’s mission is much broader. God comes to save us and free us from the slavery of sin and death, from meaninglessness and the imprisonment of ourselves. Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, is a happy man because he is the first to feel saved. The philosopher Nietzsche had negative things to say about our religion and said of Christians: “Let them prove that they are saved. How can we believe them if they come to announce liberation with faces two spans long?” In this, we can also agree with him. Of course, Christians too have their sufferings and difficult moments, just as Our Lord did, but Christ was not a sad man; on the contrary, he was filled with the spiritual joy that comes from the certainty of being within the will of the Father, who is Love.

SECOND READING

From the first letter of Saint John the apostle (1 John 3:1-2)
Beloved, see what great love the Father has bestowed on us that we may be called children of God. And so we are! For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when he is revealed, we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. – The word of God.

Commentary on the second reading

A person’s relationship with their father is fundamental. We know how many problems there are in the life of a child who either has no father or lives in a wrong and difficult relationship with him; this child will not grow up well and, as an adult, will always show difficulties. Now, in Christian revelation, Jesus came precisely to speak to us about the Father and reveal his face to us. “No one has ever seen God: the only-begotten Son has revealed him,” John says in the prologue (cf. John 1:18). God, therefore, is not someone who remains solitary in his infinite blessedness without knowing us; on the contrary, he cares about us because he brought us into the world: he is our Father. The entire Christian journey is therefore recognizing ourselves as children and trusting in him. Our relationship with the eternal Father is thus fundamental from a psychological point of view as well: we grow well if we feel like children, if we move through the world always under the Father’s protection and with his benevolence, and we can be perfectly his children if, in Christ, we live his same sonship. We are “children in the Son,” and this is the great news!

GOSPEL OF THE DAY

From the Gospel according to John (John 10:11-18)
At that time, Jesus said: “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired man – who is not a shepherd and to whom the sheep do not belong – sees the wolf coming, abandons the sheep and runs away, and the wolf snatches them and scatters them; because he is a hired man and has no concern for the sheep. I am the good shepherd. I know mine and mine know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. These also I must lead, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one flock, one shepherd. This is why the Father loves me: because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me; I lay it down on my own. I have power to lay it down, and power to take it up again. This command I have received from my Father.” – The Gospel of the Lord.

Commentary on the Gospel of the day

In a few words, Jesus tells us what mission he received from the eternal Father. He hides nothing from us, and we know the Lord precisely because he reveals to us what he came to do in the world. Once again, we learn that Christianity is not simply one doctrine among others, to be followed if we consider it more or less right, but a relationship of love and sonship. It is total involvement; it is life together with the Shepherd. We look to Jesus as the shepherd who lives for the sheep, who has no interests other than leading the sheep to the fullness of life. “Everything is yours! – Saint Paul will say – But you are Christ’s and Christ is God’s” (1 Corinthians 3:23). Let us note this “of,” which indicates belonging. Whose am I? To whom do I belong? To the world, to passing fashions? Where is my true self? If I belong to no one, I am lost, because human beings are made to belong to someone. Just as a sheep lives in a flock, we too must walk with other people, because love demands unity. We cannot bear to be alone, nor can we bear for other sheep to be scattered in the ravines: they too will become part of the flock, Jesus tells us. This also depends on us, on our prayer for those who do not yet know the true Shepherd.