By: Daniel Cadrin, OP
Last week, with the Gospel according to John, we heard about branches, fruit, abiding, about connectedness and unity. It is still there today but through a language focused on relationships. Relations between Christ and the Father, between Christ and us, and relations between us, his disciples. They are all connected and seek to draw us closer to the mystery of God, of Christ and of ourselves. Three aspects stand out in this Sunday’s gospel: friendship, mission and giving one’s life.
Jesus, who is the Master and the Lord, sees his relationship with his disciples as a friendship. We have experiences of friendship, we know what it means: sharing, closeness, trust and faithfulness. We know the happiness and the challenges it brings, the paths and the attitudes it requires. Following Jesus calls us to enter into this friendship with him and with one another.
This friendship is rooted in a deep reality, the bond between Jesus and the Father, a bond of loving kindness. This bond gives rise to the same relationship between Jesus and his disciples and, ultimately, between the disciples themselves. It is like a spiral that expands but has a center. This circulating love gives solidness to our existence and it is a source of joy.
The love coming from God has priority: it is a gift, a grace to be received and communicated and not primarily the fruit of a conquering effort in which we would be the active center. Love is creative because it is received, it constitutes us and allows us to create in our turn.
But this friendly Jesus is not satisfied with being close to us: he sets us in motion. We are called not just to stay related to Jesus and to one another in a loving circle, or in some fusional togetherness. Jesus chooses and appoints, establishes, his disciples, which includes a more organized and consistent dimension as a community. And he sends them on mission: I appoint you to go and bear fruit. This community is called to move on.
This mission is not reduced to roles to be fulfilled, or to things to be done: it is rather about bearing fruit, being fruitful, generating life. It is much wider and deeper than roles and tasks. It is part of a call, a vocation, not just a function. These fruits may take time to come; it is not guaranteed that we will see them. It is a matter of transmitting life in the longer term: a fruit that will last.
This mission includes also intercession, a prayer to the Father, in the name of Christ, because it is not only a job and it does not depend only on us. It includes asking the Father, in trust. And this mission is not carried out alone, since it inscribes us in a community of disciples where mutual love is vital. It is already the very fruit of the sending.
For this fruit to come, for the prayer to be made, and for us to move on, we are invited to place ourselves before Jesus as a friend, in trust and truth. He will give us that joy which allows us to laydown our life. This expression is the same used in John 10,11 for the good shepherd. He lays down his life for his sheep. It is also very meaningful today on Mother ‘Day, celebrating these experts in giving life and giving one’s life.
In the 1st reading of Acts, we see that the call to follow Jesus is universal, for both Jewish and Gentiles. The Spirit, given by the Father and the Son, breaks all frontiers.
Laying down one’s life, and a friendship that is universal: our brother Pierre Claverie, OP, bishop of Oran, and the other 18 blessed martyrs from Algeria have been exceptional witnesses of this gift and this friendship. Yesterday, we celebrated their memory, on May 8th, the day of birth of Pierre. For their memory, the chosen Gospel in the liturgy happens to be the one of today, John 15, 9-17.
Pierre gave an homily in Prouilhe to our OP nuns on June 23th 1996, just a short time before his death, on August 1st 1996, when a bomb killed him and Mohamed, his young Muslim driver. In this homily, he commented this passage: giving one’s life for those one loves. Let us hear his words:
« For it is here indeed a question of love, of love first, of love alone. A passion of which Jesus gave us the taste and traced the way: There is no greater love than to give one’s life for those one loves. To give one’s life. This is not reserved for martyrs, or at least we are perhaps called to become martyrs who witness to the free gift of love, the free gift of our lives. This gift comes to us from the grace of God given in Jesus Christ. To give one’s life is this, and nothing else! In every decision, in every act, to give concretely something of oneself: one’s time, one’s smile, one’s friendship, one’s know-how, one’s presence, even if silent, even if powerless, one’s attention, one’s support, material, moral and spiritual, one’s outstretched hand… without calculation, without reserve, without fear of losing oneself. »
Let us give thanks for all those, and especially today our mothers and grandmothers, who in diverse ways are witnesses of this gift and love, through and with Jesus, the Risen One, who gave his life for all and who is our Lord and our friend. Amen