Christmas III
John 21: 15-25
Now is proclaimed the end of the entire gospel
according to John in the 21st chapter:
After they had had held their meal together, Jesus
said to Simon Peter: “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than the others
here?
Peter answered, “Lord you know that I am your friend”.
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| Do You Love Me? |
Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.”
And he said to him again, a second time, “Simon,
son of John, do you love me?
Peter answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I am devoted to
you.”
Jesus said to him, “Shepherd my young sheep.”
He asked him a third time, “Simon, Son of John, Are
you my friend?”
Peter was heartbroken that he could say to him the
third time, ‘Are you my friend’, and he answered, “Lord, you know all things;
therefore you know that I am devoted to you.”
Jesus said, “Feed my sheep. Amen the truth I say to
you, when you were younger you girded yourself and walked wherever you wished.
But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands and Another will gird you
and lead you where you do not wish to go.”
He told him this to indicate the kind of death by
which he would bring the divine to revelation. Then he said to him, “Follow
me.”
But Peter, turning, saw the disciple whom Jesus
loved, following him. He was the one who had leaned upon his breast at the
supper and had asked, “Lord, who is it who betrays you?” When Peter now saw him, his asked, “Lord,
what of this man, what is his task?”
Jesus said to him: If is my will that he remain
until my coming, that does not affect your path. Follow me…”
From this day the story spread among the brethren
that this disciple would not die. But Jesus did not say to him that he would
not die, but, “If it is my will that he remain until my coming, that does not
affect your path.”
Christmas III, Day
December 25, 2013
John 21: 15 – 26
On the day when we celebrate
the birth of the Christ Child, this reading may seem an odd choice. Yet hidden
in this story from the end of all the gospels is the secret, the goal of
humanity’s future.
It is after Christ’s
resurrection. He has fed his disciples bread and fish, after they had fished
all night. After feeding them, the Risen One asks Peter three times about his
love. He indicates that Peter’s love for Christ is to develop into a love for
others, a love that nurtures. He gives the image of feeding lambs, of shepherding
young sheep, feeding the full-grown. It is a love with a maternal quality, at
once tender and at the same time objective. This love that Christ asks us to
develop could be summed up by saying: Give them what they need.
Odd perhaps too is the
prediction of death that follows. Yet perhaps not so odd, since the only thing
that survives death is an active, objective love. And this is the secret of
humanity’s future: that we develop ourselves to become mothers, Virgin-Mothers,
giving birth to the Christ within; feeding and guiding the Christ within
others, giving them what they need.
Today our resolve along the long path of development toward this our goal
on earth can be renewed in the words of the poet:
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| Carl Bloch |
Now
let the sky more brightly beam,
The
earth take up the joyous theme:
The
orb a broadening pathway gains
And
with its erstwhile splendour reigns.[1]
www.thechristiancommunity.org
[1] Hymn
XI From Cathemerinon ("The Hymns of Prudentius"), Aurelius Clemens
Prudentius (348-405), Translated by R. Martin Pope.
