April B – Season of Witness with Msgr. David LeSieur and Patti Brunner. During Easter, the Passion and Holy Week we witness redemption, transformation, Eucharist and sacrifice. This LSC episode takes us from Palm Sunday through Holy Week, Easter, Mercy Sunday and the Third Sunday of Easter. To listen to the audio or read the transcript and other reference material please continue reading.
Link To Listen: Season of Witness audio
From the Journal of Patti Brunner: My Child, I am your help always. Those who turn towards me will always be answered. The answer, the kind of reply is not always what people expect but the Father has a plan. For your radio show for Holy Week and beyond, you may indeed turn to the Eucharist to guide the listeners or you may turn to the glorified Christ revealed by the Spirit. As you mention Palm Sunday and Holy Week the people need to know how the destruction of the body did not destroy Jesus. So, too, shall you rise for Christ is the “prototype”. As the Spirit guide s you to love one another and reveals the Way of obedience to the commandments, so shall you live the Easter message. You may point to John’s Pentecost. Speak of the Eucharist in the Holy Week readings. Most will not hear the full readings of the season. Dwell on the completion of the sacrifice foretold. When Jesus opened your minds to the scriptures you began to understand the passion and life of Christ foretold. So now the Holy Spirit continues to open minds of listeners to hear and believe, to hear and comprehend. The Acts of the Apostles is a thread to follow. How did they “act” at the Last supper? At the Passion? At the appearance of Jesus in the Upper Room? How do you, as disciples, now act and respond to the truth? To the story of salvation? To the call to repentance and obedience? Listen and believe. Listen and obey, listen and be healed. OTL 3/7/09
Call your show “The Season of Witness”. You witness redemption, transformation, Eucharist and sacrifice. There is much to report. Take the viewpoint of a witness who then lives to witness to others. OTL 3/14/2009
Transcript Easter LSC April B Season of Witness
Recorded 3/24/09
Patti Brunner: Welcome to Living Seasons of Change, and the Season of Witness. During Easter, the Passion and Holy Week we witness redemption, transformation, Eucharist and sacrifice. How do we, not just as witnesses but as disciples, now act and respond to the truth? To the story of salvation? To the call to repentance and obedience? I’m Patti Brunner and my co-host is Msgr. David LeSieur, a priest of the Diocese of Little Rock. Welcome, Monsignor, to the Season of Witness.
Msgr. David LeSieur: Thank you, Patti. Today we’ll discuss the readings from Palm Sunday through a couple of Sundays after Easter, We have Mark and John’s readings of the Passion of Christ and readings from Luke and Paul that begin to tell us “the rest of the story”.
Patti Brunner: On Palm Sunday Mark shows us Jesus’ triumphant entry into the city of Jerusalem. After our Procession of Palms the mood changes as the Gospel reveals the betrayal by Judas as we move to the Last Supper for the institution of the Eucharist.
Msgr. David LeSieur: Jesus foretells Peter’s denial then the group moves to the Garden for prayer and the arrest of Jesus. The Passion includes the Way of the Cross, the Crucifixion and the burial of Jesus. On Good Friday, we hear the Passion again from the Gospel of John.
Patti Brunner: Catholics are very familiar with these passages. We witness these scenes from the Passion of Christ when we pray the Stations of the Cross and the Sorrowful Mysteries of the rosary.
Msgr. David LeSieur: The Church uses the same readings every year for Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday except for the Gospel at the Easter Vigil. We do all 9 readings at the Easter Vigil here, for which I am glad.
Patti Brunner: Me too! We’re not required to read all 9 readings at the Easter Vigil but those 9 readings give us a glimpse of the whole story of redemption! We get the highlights from Genesis, Exodus, the prophets Isaiah, Baruch and Ezekiel; Paul’s letter to the Romans and then the gospel Resurrection scene. Our viewpoint is the witness that now lives to witness to others.
Msgr.: We have the story of creation in Genesis and the testing of Abraham. The Exodus reading[i] about Moses leaving Egypt behind is one that has to be read because it is so explicit about the symbol of baptism.
Patti: The nine readings at the Easter Vigil are given in the order of history. Baruch is considered to be the secretary of the prophet Jeremiah. That’s right before the time of the Babylonian Captivity.
Msgr.: Ezekiel is during the time of the Babylonian Captivity. He gives that beautiful vision of being free from Babylonia. “A New heart and a new spirit.” “I’ll give you a new spirit.”
Patti Brunner: On Palm Sunday we read two passages of Mark’s Gospel to key in on the eyewitness of the Passover, the Last Supper, and the Passion.
Msgr.: Mark’s Gospel begins with a woman who anoints Jesus with the perfumed oil in an alabaster jar at a dinner in Bethany. This woman comes in from nowhere. She pours the oil on his head. The others think it’s wasteful but Jesus says, “She has anticipated anointing my body for burial.”[ii]
Patti: It shows us that Jesus is fully aware of what is happening. He knows where He’s headed and what’s going on. Jesus instructs two of his disciples to go into the city to prepare for the Passover.
Msgr.: It’s funny how He used as a sign – “Follow the man carrying a jar of water.”
Patti: Again, it reveals that the Lord had it all planned out; that the following events were all part of His plan.
Msgr.: He knew exactly what He was doing.
Patti Brunner: The Apostles didn’t. Not even with him giving them hints. They didn’t figure redemption by death. Not until he laid it all out for them after he rose from the dead.
Msgr. David LeSieur: They probably had a misunderstanding of the Messiah. They thought He was going to reestablish the Davidic kingdom.
Patti: Are we so hardheaded that we, too, can’t see what the Lord is trying to do for us? Or are we docile enough to let the Lord move in our life? Are we patient enough to recognize the transformation God is working in our lives? Even so, we can imitate the disciples and hang around Jesus until it is clear what is going on and serve him as best as we can.
Msgr.: Think of the woman with the alabaster Jar. On some intuitive level she knew Jesus was going to die. She was, first of all, showing her great reverence for Him. She just walked into that area that was controlled by men. She understands who Jesus is; what He is about. She doesn’t care what the Pharisees think about it. She doesn’t say a word. She just acts. This witness is not named but she understood Jesus. She was anointing Him for His burial. She got it.
Patti Brunner: She steps out of her comfort zone to obey the prompting of the Holy Spirit. She was transformed. She was living the Easter message! As the Spirit guides you to love one another and reveals the Way of obedience to the commandments, so shall you live the Easter message.
Msgr. David LeSieur: When Peter realized that He had denied the Lord, he goes out and weeps bitterly. He finally breaks through some of his male pride or male fear and allows the Lord to touch his heart through sorrow. Maybe if we could look at it in a psychological way. There are feminine traits and masculine traits that are portrayed that might instruct all of us.
Patti: As disciples, whether we are male or female, we are transformed to act and respond to the truth. We witness God’s love and then live to witness to others. We receive God’s love and it transforms us. We are all “the bride”.
Msgr.: We all receive. From that we give birth; we witness to faith. We give birth to actions that are based on our faith. The gospels can provide us with some gender type images which can be very instructional for people’s spirituality today. We can be hardheaded. In Mark’s gospel, for example, the disciples are very hardheaded. Jesus said, “Don’t you get it? Come on.”
Patti: I was just thinking the disciples who walked back to Emmaus were obviously very hardheaded until the grief made then vulnerable. Then Jesus talked with them and opened them –
Msgr.: And their hearts were burning. That was in Luke’s exchange on the road to Emmaus; He opens the minds of the two disciples and gives them the understanding of scripture. Then later, as we read on the 3rd Sunday of Easter from Luke, Jesus appears in Jerusalem to the disciples and says, “Everything written about me in the Law of Moses and in the Prophets and Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures” too.
Patti: When Jesus opened our minds to the scriptures we began to understand the passion and life of Christ foretold. So now the Holy Spirit continues to open minds of listeners to hear and believe, to hear and comprehend. “Their hearts were burning” and Jesus opened their minds to scripture. We want to put aside all the suffering and the pain but, yet, sometimes it takes a traumatic experience like that to open our hearts, to make us vulnerable enough to open up, to receive what God is giving us.
Msgr.: The two disciples were grieving on the road to Emmaus. Their backs were to Jerusalem. They were probably giving up and heading home. They were trying to figure it out. They were discussing on the way these events that had happened during the past few days and they couldn’t get a handle on it. So, Jesus begins to ask them, “What are you talking about?” “About this person Jesus that we thought was the Messiah” and then He began to explain. It’s like they had all this raw material here, of all these events and their feelings about it and they couldn’t put it together until He began going back to scripture to sort it all out for them. Then it all began to make sense and their hearts began to burn. And when they recognized Him in the breaking of the bread, it all became clear.
Patti Brunner: That story is repeated in the lives of Christians everywhere. We can be around the truth, be raised with it, taught it, but it’s on the surface and doesn’t sink in until our hearts are open to Jesus. On Palm Sunday, we realize the disciples really didn’t understand what was going on. They were obedient to Jesus as they got ready for the Passover service. When Jesus rode in on the colt, that was a fulfillment of scripture.
Msgr.: The scripture is Zechariah 9:9 “The king comes in riding on a colt, the foal of an ass.[iii]”
Patti: But we have no indication that the eye witnesses comprehended what they saw and experienced. At the Last Supper, the disciples are just doing the ritual that has been laid down. Through the Passover feast, then at the Passion, they react. All of sudden, they are on a new page. They don’t know what is going on. Mark says they all ran away. “When the going gets tough, the tough get going”. Right. Often times, we run away too.
Msgr.: In John’s gospel, the beloved disciple has an “in” with the authority and enters the courtyard of the high priest with Jesus, but Peter hangs back. In the synoptics, all the disciples run away. Not in John’s Gospel. In the garden scene in John there is no arrest. There is no fleeing. The disciples don’t run away. That’s when Jesus says to the soldiers, “Who are you looking for?” They say, “We’re looking for Jesus of Nazareth.” He says, “I am He.” And the soldiers fall to the ground.
Patti: They were hit by a wave of grace instead of a sword. Then John says, “Simon Peter had a sword, drew it, and struck the High Priest’s slave and cut off his right ear.”
Msgr.: Luke has the same thing. There, Jesus said in reply, “Stop. No more of this.” And He touched the servant’s ear and healed him. In John’ Passion, Jesus just tells Peter to put away his sword.
Patti: Look at the reaction of Peter turning toward violence and Jesus trying to teach him, “That’s not the way.”
Msgr.: Whoever lives by the sword dies by the sword. “Put your sword away.”
Patti: It ties back to the Old Testament immediately before the Babylonian Captivity, how God, through the prophets, had told the Israelites to surrender and they refused to surrender. They ended up losing everything. Jesus is showing us, again in the Garden, that military might is not how the kingdom gains power. It’s not through violence and the sword. But the first emotional response of Peter, who has been named the head of the church, is retaliation.
Msgr.: Fighting. Using the sword is a symbol of power, of course.
Patti: Peter is chastised by Jesus and the next time we hear about him he is denying that he even knows Jesus. That’s not quite where Jesus was leading him, is it? To go from aggression to cowardice, denying Jesus.
Msgr.: If Jesus had let Peter defend Him, then and there with a sword, Peter would have probably been killed by the guards. There would have been a fight and a scuffle.
Patti: Interesting. Peter shows us his weakness. Once Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit, we see his strengths instead of his weakness don’t we? That’s the moment of transformation!
Msgr.: I love Peter. He is my favorite apostle because he is so human. He blusters and he falters and he fails but he is courageous and in Matthew’s gospel, he walks on water. He risked his life just to see if it was Jesus; the Lord fished him out of the water. He just had feet of clay. Jesus chose him anyway to be the leader. I think He picked Peter for his courage and for his fidelity. Even though he denied the Lord, he later wept and showed his sorrow over that.
Patti: Chapter 1 of Acts makes it pretty clear that before the Spirit the disciples are on the wrong page, even after the Resurrection!
Msgr.: Yes it says, “When they had gathered together, they asked Him, ‘Lord, are you going at this time to restore the kingdom to Israel’?
Patti Brunner: Jesus straightens them out. He answered them, “It is not for you to know the times and the season the Father has established by His own authority. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, then you will be My witnesses.[iv]”
Msgr. David LeSieur: So, the power Jesus talks about is spiritual power to preach and to be witnesses. And the power they are talking about is political power, Militaristic power. That is right before He ascends into heaven.
Patti: After talking and walking with Jesus for three years, the Last Supper, the Passion and Easter, they still thought the Messiah was a military, political king. How often are we confused about God’s plan? It is only after they received the promise of the Holy Spirit that they truly understand.
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Patti Brunner: Welcome back to Living Seasons of Change, I’m Patti Brunner and I’m talking with Msgr. David LeSieur about the “Season of Witness”
Msgr. David LeSieur: In the Gospel of John, on the evening of the Resurrection, He breathes on them and says, “Receive the Spirit of My Holy Father. As My Father has sent Me, so I send you.”
Patti: We get John’s story of the Pentecost on the second Sunday after Easter.
Msgr.: It’s John chapter 20. It happens the night of the Resurrection.
Patti: Jesus appears through the locked doors of the upper room, tells them “peace” and the disciples are filled with joy. Jesus breathed on them and told them to receive the Holy Spirit. Why do you think John just wraps it all so quickly –giving us Easter and Pentecost together? With Luke, Pentecost is 40 days after the Resurrection. What is the deal there?
Msgr.: In John’s gospel everything is the hour of Jesus, “My hour has not yet come.” “It was for this purpose that I came to this hour.” I think it is all tied into the concept of the hour, the right time. In John, the hour is one big event. The suffering, the death, the resurrection and the sending of the Spirit is all one event.
Patti: All one event. That makes sense.
Msgr. David LeSieur: When Jesus dies in John’s gospel, –this is Chapter 19, verse 30 – it says “when Jesus had taken the wine, He said, ‘it is finished’ and bowing His Head He handed over the Spirit.” This could mean two things – it could mean He breathed His last, He expired; but it also could mean—in His death—He is also handing over the Spirit, which He then kind of recapitulates when He comes back to life and says, “Receive the Spirit.” It’s as if He was releasing His Holy Spirit into the world by His death. It took His death for the Spirit to come.” Luke extends time to highlight his theology. For him the coming of the Spirit was the beginning of the church. The entire Acts of the Apostles, which begins with the coming of the Spirit, tells us how the Spirit plays out in the life of the early church and the lives of the apostles.
Patti: Right. Luke focuses on the Holy Spirit and activity by the church in the Acts of the Apostles.
Msgr.: So, John and Luke had two different theologies but they both accomplished the same thing. When Jesus gives the Spirit in the Gospel of John, He says, “Peace be with you, as the Father has sent Me so I send you,” then He breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven, whose sins you retain are retained.” He sends them out then, like they were sent out in the Acts of the Apostles. This is just more condensed.
Patti: A lot of times when we hear that gospel on the 2nd Sunday of Easter, Mercy Sunday, we focus on Thomas and his doubt about the risen Lord. Listen closely! John’s scenario tells us of the important fulfillment of the Passion–which is to reconnect us together with God, the Father, and to receive the Holy Spirit.
Msgr.: When Jesus says to “Doubting Thomas” “Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” It’s as though we have been watching this drama, sitting in a darkened theatre, watching it all happening on a stage. It’s as if the lights in the house come on and shine on us. We are the ones who have not seen and yet have believed. We have been transformed by a person we have not seen.
Patti: When John wrote his gospel, 50 or 60 years after the fact, most of the people had never seen Jesus. What is the average life span of people in that day and time – 45 years or so?
Msgr.: John wrote this in the 90’s, maybe even 100 AD. The people whom he sent it to may have just been born when Jesus was ascending into heaven. These are the ones that “have not seen but have believed” and were blessed. Right after that it says, “Now, Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples that are not written in this book. These are written that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through this belief you may have life in His name.”
Patti Brunner: So, this is written for people who were not there when Jesus did all these deeds.
Msgr. David LeSieur: If not for the Resurrection, if not for Easter, we wouldn’t have the Gospel.
Patti: People get caught up in Easter side-lines: Easter bunnies and a new dress, Easter baskets and Easter eggs. Generally, when you think of Easter you don’t really think about the crucifixion. But we should think of the Resurrection and living eternally because Christ rose from the dead. Christ is the “prototype” of rising from the dead. The crucifixion, the destruction of the body, did not destroy Jesus. His death and resurrection re-opened the gates of heaven.
Msgr.: Easter and the Resurrection apply to us through baptism. Although Jesus doesn’t mention baptism here, He does mention being born again of water and the Spirit in Chapter 3 of John, talking to Nicodemus. We believe that in baptism we receive the Spirit. Also, that if you go back to Genesis where God breathed into Adam the breath of life, it’s like Jesus is doing that here again as He breathes out His last breath, it’s the breath of the Spirit coming back into humanity, in a sense, recreating humanity.
Patti: Jesus shows us that His glorified body, after He rises from the dead, is a real body by eating with them. He eats.
Msgr.: Right. He eats fish. In John, He cooks breakfast on the seashore. There is very much a bodily element. They don’t recognize Him at first but Jesus does say to Thomas, “Here touch. Touch My Hands.”
Patti: Yet, He passes through the locked door.
Msgr.: Right. I think we’re looking at a new kind of life. It’s not like this kind of earthly life that we live in. It’s beyond that. It’s a super kind of life. Supernatural, but it is still life and it’s still human life, too. This is the neat thing about it. When we finally have our bodies resurrected at the end, it will be a human body, physical body in a sense, but it will have a spiritual nature to it. To me, that is why they didn’t really recognize Jesus right away, why He could do those things; pass through doors and, yet, still eat; although, He probably didn’t need to eat.
Patti: The last time they saw Him, He had been badly beaten.
Msgr.: It seemed the only thing remaining of that punishment was the holes. But the connection for us, Paul would say, is baptism. We are baptized into His death so we can share His life. In the Acts of the Apostles there’s a lot of talk about Baptism.
Patti: On the Easter Vigil, we give several references to baptism –in Romans we’re baptized into His death. In Isaiah he says “Come to the water.” In Exodus we get the story of Moses passing through the Red Sea.
Msgr.: Paul makes real clear in his theology in Romans that baptism is our connection to the death and resurrection of Christ. Matthew reports Jesus saying, “Teach all nations and baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.”
Patti: The Eucharist, too, is based on the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. It was instituted by Christ at the Last Supper. We hear about it from the gospel of Mark on Palm Sunday and from 1st Corinthians on Holy Thursday. The story of the Eucharist continues with Jesus at Emmaus and the breaking of the bread, the readings on Easter afternoon and the Third Sunday of Easter.
Msgr.: The Eucharist is the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb. If you go back to Exodus, they were told to take an unblemished year-old lamb and sacrifice it and spread the blood on the doorposts and the lintels of the houses to keep the angel of death from attacking them. The blood of that sacrifice was a sign to the angel of death. In a sense the blood saved them from death. We know, later on, that the blood of the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ’s blood, really did save us. It wasn’t a symbol or a warning; it is an actual fact. It was the shedding of His blood. In sacrifice, something has to be given up. In the case of the lamb, it was his life. The people who owned the lamb, who took it from their own flocks; they gave it to God by killing it. The blood is the seed of life. Once that blood flows out, it is no longer living. Then the Israelites were instructed to eat the sacrifice.
Patti: It was an important part of the original Passover to eat the Lamb, partaking of the sacrifice, to enter into the relationship with God as his people.
Msgr.: Right. God gives you the gift of your flocks. Then you give back to God through sacrifice. He gives back to you again in the form of food. It is constant giving and receiving. That’s true, too, of Jesus. God gives us the wheat. We form it into bread. We bless it, offer it to God. After it is blessed it becomes His Son’s body. He gives it back to us in the form of communion. Then we give back to God, from the strength that we receive from that holy meal, as we live our lives for Him.
Patti: Following Easter Sunday we have the feast of the Mercy Sunday to remind us again to turn to the Lord. Mercy Sunday expands the awareness of redemption and the overwhelming mercy of God and draws attention to the importance of Easter.
Msgr. David LeSieur: The Catechism reminds us that “Beginning with the Easter Triduum as its source of light, the age of the Resurrection fills the whole liturgical year with its brilliance. Gradually, on either side of this source, the year is transfigured by the liturgy as the kingdom of God enters into our time.”
Patti Brunner: So, Easter is the star of our show! It’s the source of life for Living Seasons! The Catechism also teaches that “Easter is not simply one feast among others, but the “Feast of feasts,” the “Solemnity of solemnities,” St. Athanasius calls Easter “the Great Sunday”[v]
Msgr. David LeSieur: Each Sunday mass we celebrate is a paschal celebration. We call to mind the night before Jesus died, His sacrifice is made present, and the power of Holy Spirit is evoked. The Eucharist is the “sacrament of our salvation accomplished by Christ on the cross.”[vi]
Patti: Do you think today’s Christians realize, as they come up to receive communion, that it’s connected to the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross?
Msgr.: I would hope they would. We certainly teach that. The crucifix near the altar in our churches should remind us. We call it the sacrifice of the Mass. It is a meal, but, as scripture shows us, meals are part of the sacrifice ritual.
Patti: I was raised Catholic but I don’t think I made the connection for the first two-thirds of my life. I just didn’t think about it. I connected Holy Communion to the Last Supper but I really didn’t connect it to the crucifixion.
Msgr.: Like you, I was raised with the Baltimore Catechism. I always remember the definition of the Mass as “the un-bloody sacrifice of Christ on the Cross”, His “un-bloody sacrifice”. That has always helped me make the connection.
Patti: You’re more perceptive than I was. It went right over my head until a few years ago.
Msgr.: Maybe I just memorized the answer better. Of course, the cross was bloody and the Mass is the same sacrifice presented in an un-bloody way. We don’t use those terms anymore – bloody and un-bloody. It is a striking image to me. But it is the same one sacrifice extended down through time that we are renewing every time we offer the Mass. Some non-Catholics think we are re-sacrificing Christ because we call it the sacrifice of the Mass. They have to understand that it is the same sacrifice extended in time.
Patti: Right, we are stepping into that eternal moment. Each Mass we attend is the one and same Eucharist throughout all time. That’s how it could be celebrated the night before the crucifixion. It is such a beautiful moment.
Msgr.: It’s always going on. We are renewing it but not redoing it.
Patti Brunner: Moses and the sacrifice of the lamb foreshadowed the Passion of Christ, the sacrifice of Jesus. So did the story of Abraham and the call to sacrifice his son, Isaac.
Msgr.: Certainly, I like to think that God was telling Abraham at the end of the day, “I will give my son; you don’t have to give yours. I’m going to give Mine.”
Patti: God provides the sacrifice. First, He provided Isaac to Abraham, the child given to the childless elderly couple.
Msgr.: Right. When Isaac said, “Where is the sacrifice?” Abraham replies, “God will provide.” What Abraham meant was “God will provide you, my son”. Later, God provided the ram as a substitute for Isaac.
Patti: God then provides Jesus to be offered as the perfect sacrifice. That is a marvelous love story.
Msgr.: He knows that we can’t possibly offer Him anything of our own that could match that. He had to give His Son as the sacrifice, the only worthy sacrifice. We don’t have anything that would ever forgive our sins. All the lambs and all the wheat offerings and all that in the world could never make up for it.
Patti: To honor the sacrifice, we should make it known. The reading from the Acts of the Apostles on Easter Sunday says “we are witnesses of all He did.” That’s our challenge today to continue to be witnesses of all Jesus does for us and what we have seen Him do for others.
Msgr.: It’s amazing that the gospel has been spread continually for over 2,000 years. Even so, it hasn’t touched all people, yet.
Patti: We need to be stirred into action and enter into the life of Christ and get passionate about it, get passionate about our faith. That will happen if we let the sting of the suffering and passion of Christ, the sting of His death, open our hearts to know his love– so that we can take in the fullness of the gospel message.
Msgr.: Because when we do, we become witnesses and not just repeaters of what we have read, but to really catch the Spirit and truly have our hearts touched, broken open, open to the Lord, fearless. Then we can be witnesses.
Patti: Jesus has done it all! Our responsibility as witnesses to the Gospel message is to: Listen and believe. Listen and obey, listen and be healed. When we are touched by the power of the sacrifice on the cross, awareness of our sin and the repentance has to come. Jesus would have died on the cross for any one of us. He loved us that much.
Msgr.: He would have.
Patti: The sinful choices we make today, that’s why Jesus died on the cross. He took that sin, our choices, our weakness, our failings.
Msgr.: Yes, even sins committed after His death. That sacrifice was so perfect that it continues to have its effect and still forgives long after the event and just echoes all throughout history.
Patti: This may be a weak analogy, but the sacrifice is like a black hole in a universe that absorbs everything into it. Our sin collapses into that energy source of his sacrifice. Jesus drew in every sin for all time. He drew it in to Himself. Through the sacrifice of the cross we are redeemed.
Msgr.: His forgiveness is like a black hole that just takes everything in and absorbs it and forgives it.
Patti Brunner: Monsignor, will you close our show with a blessing?
Msgr. David LeSieur: [Blessing]
Patti: Thank you Monsignor. To get a copy of the references in today’s show or to read the Liturgical readings please check the website PatriarchMinistries.com and to listen to this show or previous broadcasts click paduamedia.com and Living Seasons of Change.
[i] Exodus 14:15-15:1 Easter Vigil required reading of Moses and crossing the Red Sea
[ii] Mark 14:8“She has anticipated anointing my body for burial.”
[iii] Zechariah 9: 9 “Rejoice heartily, O daughter Zion, shout for joy, O daughter Jerusalem! See, your king shall come to you; a just savior is he, Meek, and riding on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass.”
[iv] Chapter 1 of Acts. “When they had gathered together, they asked Him, ‘Lord, are you going at this time to restore the kingdom to Israel’? And He answered them, “It is not for you to know the times and the season the Father has established by His own authority. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, then you will be My witnesses.” ss
[v] 1168 Beginning with the Easter Triduum as its source of light, the new age of the Resurrection fills the whole liturgical year with its brilliance. Gradually, on either side of this source, the year is transfigured by the liturgy. It really is a “year of the Lord’s favor.” The economy of salvation is at work within the framework of time, but since its fulfillment in the Passover of Jesus and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the culmination of history is anticipated “as a foretaste,” and the kingdom of God enters into our time.
1169 Therefore Easteris not simply one feast among others, but the “Feast of feasts,” the “Solemnity of solemnities,” just as the Eucharist is the “Sacrament of sacraments” (the Great Sacrament). St. Athanasius calls Easter “the Great Sunday” and the Eastern Churches call Holy Week “the Great Week.” The mystery of the Resurrection, in which Christ crushed death, permeates with its powerful energy our old time, until all is subjected to him
[vi] 1359 The Eucharist, the sacrament of our salvation accomplished by Christ on the cross, is also a sacrifice of praise in thanksgiving for the work of creation. In the Eucharistic sacrifice the whole of creation loved by God is presented to the Father through the death and the Resurrection of Christ. Through Christ the Church can offer the sacrifice of praise in thanksgiving for all that God has made good, beautiful, and just in creation and in humanity.
Outline of “The Season of Witness”:
We witness redemption, transformation, Eucharist and sacrifice. We are each a witness who then lives to witness to others.
Palm Sunday and Holy Week reveals how the destruction of the body did not destroy Jesus. We, too, shall rise for Christ is the “prototype”. As the Spirit guides us to love one another and reveals the Way of obedience to the commandments, so shall we live the Easter message.
John’s Pentecost on Resurrection Day
The Eucharist in the Holy Week readings.
The completion of the sacrifice foretold. When Jesus opened our minds to the scriptures we began to understand the passion and life of Christ foretold. So now the Holy Spirit continues to open minds of listeners to hear and believe, to hear and comprehend.
The Acts of the Apostles is a thread to follow. How did they “act” at the Last supper? At the Passion? At the appearance of Jesus in the Upper Room?
How do we, as disciples, now act and respond to the truth? To the story of salvation? To the call to repentance and obedience?
Listen and believe. Listen and obey, listen and be healed.
References used in Season of Witness
Scriptures and the liturgical readings are available at Liturgical Readings
Season of Witness covers Palm Sunday- 3rd Sunday of Easter. See Readings outlined below:
Palm Sunday
Mark 11:1-10 untie the colt, procession “Hosanna!”
Or John 12:12-16 The crowd went to Jesus with Palm Branches, he found and sat on an ass.
Isaiah 50:4-7 “well-trained tongue…a back to those who beat me”
Phil 2:6-11″emptied himself…obedient unto death…name above all names”
Mark 14:1—15:47 or 15:1-39 “alabaster jar…betrayal…This is my Body…deny me 3 times, garden, passion” Last Supper/Eucharist (only time during Holy Week)
Holy Thursday
Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14 Moses Passover
1 Corinthians 11:23-26 “in the same way he took the cup”
John 13:1-15 washing the feet
Good Friday
Isaiah 52:13-53:12 “it was our infirmities that he bore” “like a lamb to slaughter”
Hebrews 4:14-16; 5:7-9 high priest, “son though he was, he learned obedience” “when he was made perfect”
John 18:1-19:42 Passion starting in garden
Easter Vigil
Genesis 1:1-2:2 creation
Genesis 22:118 Abraham tested
Exodus 14:15-15:1 sea to dry land for Moses
Isaiah 54:5-14 “I hid my face from you; but with enduring love I take pity on you” Noah promise
Isaiah 55: 1-11 “come to the water” “seek the Lord while he may be found” “My word shall not return void” Baruch 3:9-15, 32-4:4 “who has found the place of wisdom?”
Ezekiel 36:16-17a,18-28 “for the sake of my holy name” “nations shall know that I am the Lord” “new spirit…heart”
Romans 6:3-11 “baptized into his death”
Mark 16:1-7 He has been raised
Easter Sunday
Acts 10:34a, 37-43 “We are witnesses of all that he did”
Colossians 3:1-4 “Think of what is above”
or 1 Corinthians 5:6b-8 “clear out old yeast”
John 20:1-9 “Peter went into the tomb”
Easter Sunday-afternoon Gospel
Luke 24:13-35 on the road to Emmaus
2nd Sunday after Easter; Mercy Sunday
Acts 4:32-35 “believers of one heart and mind” Transformed by Spirit, sins forgiving, Understanding, God’s generosity, no one claimed any possession was his own, everything in common, no needy person among them
1 John 5:1-6 Begotten by God: Jesus, conqueror of the world; loving God is keeping his commandments
John 20:19-31 John’s Pentecost, Through locked doors, Jesus “Peace”, Breathed “Receive the Holy Spirit”, Doubting Thomas, again locked doors, Jesus “Peace” “My Lord and my God!” Much more happened than is written
3rd Sunday of Easter
Acts 3:13-15, 17-19 Peter’s speech.
1 John 2:1-5a Know him? Keep his commandments; Jesus is our Advocate, expiation for the sins of the world
Luke 24:35-48 Emmaus continued [from Easter pm] 2 report back to Jerusalem and tell of “breaking of the bread”; then Jesus appears, shows his wounds and eats: to prove not an apparition/ghost but truly present. Jesus “scripture fulfilled” then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures [gift of the Spirit]
