Sixth Sunday of Easter, cycle C

John 14:23-29

The reading from the Acts of the Apostles represents a profound step in  the life of  the church.  Circumcision of men was a common custom among people living in the near East over many hundreds of years.  It wasn’t something unique to the Jewish people.  However, the Israelites made circumcision a religious act, and Nobody thought to question this.  When the Church began enrolling gentiles, circumcision became a controversial issue.  On the one hand, it was  obvious that the gentile converts were truly incorporated into the church.  They manifested the marks of the holy spirit.  On the other hand, they were not following the Jewish law, which included circumcision.  And in today’s reading we see the Church prayerfully reflecting and making the decision that the Gentiles  would have the same status as the Jewish Christians.  In other words, the Holy Spirit, even after Jesus had ascended into heaven, was guiding the Church as it faced new challenges.  

And that's what Jesus means when he tells his disciples that the Holy Spirit will teach them everything and remind them of  all he has  already told them.  Jesus promises that as new things happen,  as new challenges  arose, the Holy Spirit will be there guiding the Church.  

That’s a difference between Protestants and Catholics.  Our Protestant brothers and sisters have  read the same scriptures  we read, and yet if you  go  around the world  and count the different protestant denominations, I think the last time I looked that up  there were about 3000 of them.  You would find that although  some denominations are very dogmatic about belief and practice, the vast majority hold to a watered down Christianity which makes no hard and fast rules.  But look again at the reading from the Acts of the apostles.  The early Christians were very serious about remaining a united body while they faced these divisive  questions.  They undoubtedly remembered that their Lord had prayed that all might be one.  

Jesus makes an incredible promise in the gospel.  If we love him we will keep his word, and the Father will love us and Jesus and the father will come  and dwell in us.  That’s an awesome promise, but it means that loving Jesus is not a feeling, it’s the conscious effort to keep his word.  And of course that means we need to know what he tells  us.  Because Jesus, as promised, is  present in our midst, and will  be until  the end of time.  How is he present?  First, he is present in the Eucharist.  None of us can really understand this mystery, but we know by faith that it is Jesus we receive when we receive communion.  Jesus assures us that he wishes to become one with us, he seeks to dwell in us together  with  the Father, from whom he cannot be separated.  Jesus  loves our bodies and our souls, that’s why he feeds himself  to us.  

The second way Jesus is present is in each other..  He promised that he would live in us, and so he does.  When you look at another person you need to presume Jeus is united to that person, that Jesus lives in that person.  This should stir up love  for each other and the desire to bring peace to that person in whatever way we can do  so.  In  the Eucharist God shows that he loves us; in  the other person, God calls  us to go out of ourselves and love each other in whatever way we can.  Love is action, of course, not a feeling.  

The third way Jesus is present is in the scriptures and the teachings of the Church which ultimately elaborate on what is in  the  scriptures.  Long ago in a manner similar  to  the decision to allow gentiles  to be full members of  the Church  without circumcision, the Church decided which among many writings showed inspiration by God.  The Church leaders trusted that the Holy Spirit was with them, and the outcome was the Bible -- the word of God.  The Church continues to rely on the Holy Spirit.  Revelation continues and so we have various doctrines like the Trinity, the fact that Jesus is both God and man, the teaching that Mary was conceived without original sin, that she was taken up to heaven body and soul -- and of course the teachings of the Popes and the councils of the Church -- all of which cannot contradict scripture,  but can elaborate on those ideas. 

Someone said that those of us who are baptized and who are in the state of grace are closer to Jesus and the Father than the apostles ever were during Jesus’ lifetime.  So let us continue to grow in love for each other and in continuing to study what he has revealed to us so that we can keep is word.  The Holy Spirit is with the Church, but dwells in each of us as well.  

Third Sunday of Easter, cycle C

 John 21:1-19

If you were to read the four gospels, there is an interesting thing that stands out. It has to do with the chief of the apostles, Peter. The gospel writers refer to him consistently as “Peter” or “Simon Peter”. John seems to prefer “Simon Peter”. The other gospel writers are not so consistent.

We all know how the fisherman Simon got the name of Peter. It was at that moment when Jesus asked, “Who do you say that I am?” The apostles had various guesses, but Simon said, “You are the Messiah of God” or words to that effect. And Jesus answers, “Blessed are you, Simon, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father in Heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church”. The so-called synoptic gospels all tell the same story with slightly different words. In the Gospel of John, though, it is when Peter’s brother Andrew introduces Peter to Jesus, that Jesus looks at him and says, “You are Simon, son of John, You will be called Cephas *(which is translated as Peter). Because Cephas means rock, and so does Peter.

But that is literally the only place that Jesus calls the leader of the apostles by a name other than Simon, and the writer of John’s gospel takes pains to translate the term Cephas, so as near as we can tell, according ot John, at least, Jesus never addresses him as Peter; it’s always “Simon” or Simon, son of John”. And yet, John the gospel writer freely uses the name Peter, or sometimes “Simon Peter” when he is telling his story. And so here we are at the end of John’s gospel, as he describes the last encounter Jesus will have with his apostles, before his ascension into heaven. And Jesus only uses the name “Simon” in the last conversation he will have with Peter.

The conversation is recorded in today’s gospel. If we heard it in Greek, it might sound something like this: “Simon, do you love me enough to die for me?” Because Jesus uses the greek word “agape”. And Simon replies “Lord, you know that I love you like a brother” because Simon uses the word “phylia” which means “to love like you would love a brother.”. Jesus askes the same question a second time, and Simon replies the same way. Finally Jesus asks the question a little differently: Simon, do you love me like a brother?” and that is when Simon gets distressed and replies, “You know I love you like a brother”.

Peter has been Jesus’ disciple for three years; he’s followed him up and down the roads of Galilee, and finally to Jerusalem. Peter has more than once spoken from his heart about his love and loyalty to Jesus. But when it comes down to proving his loyalty and love, Peter claimed that he never heard of Jesus, not once but three times. And in all the appearances Jesus made after his resurrection up till now, he never speaks directly to Peter. And I wonder what was going through Peter’s mind. Guilt, sure. Regret, most likely. But Peter has been tested, and failed the test. And he knows it. Remember how this scene at the lake started? Peter said to his fellow disciples, “I am going fishing”. Did he decide to go back to his old way of life because he felt that Jesus would never forgive him?

And then Jesus speaks to him. He calls him “Simon” not Peter. In doing so he brings Peter back to the time they first met. And in his question, Jesus is asking about the depth of Peter’s love, about it’s quality. And Peter can only answer, not as much as I should, not as much as I want to. I love you as much as I can, but not as much as you want. And in Jesus’ third question, he accepts what Peter has to offer. Jesus accepts that Peter’s love is not complete, not enough to die for him. And yet Jesus doesn’t take away Peter’s position as the leader of his church, in fact, he reinforces it in front of the other apostles. Feed my lambs; tend my sheep; feed my sheep. And Jesus promises that a day will come when Peter will love him enough to die for him; they will stretch out his hands and dress him and lead him to where he does not want to go -- a reference to Peter’s crucifixion, when he dies like his master. To me this scene on the shore is consoling. It tells me that Jesus accepts my imperfect love, and despite all my imperfections and lack of boldness, he will continue too love me and use me, a very imperfect instrument. And while I live I can hope to grow in my love for Him.

Jesus names Simon Peter, which means “Rock”. But the name Simon has a meaning as well. It means “the one who hears”. Let us all hear those words, “Do you love me?” and let us respond, “As much as I can, Lord”.

Second Sunday in Easter 2025

 Second Sunday of Easter 2025

John 20:19-31

Our gospel tells us that when Jesus made his first appearance in the locked room Thomas was not with them.  We don’t know why.  We do know that the apostles were afraid for their lives because of their association with Jesus -- Maybe that was Thomas’ motivation.  Or maybe he was like those disciples on the way to Emmaus -- he’d given up when Jesus was crucified; he was heading home trying to beat the traffic.  In any event he is there now, listening to his brother disciples telling him with great excitement that Jesus is alive again.  They are talking about how the Lord gave them authority to forgive sins, authority to spread the good news.  And they were very afraid when this first happened but now their courage has returned, and they are essentially proposing that Thoams take their claims on faith.  

Thomas comes across in the few places we meet him as someone who asks questions -- When Jesus tells them he is going away but one day they would follow him, he exclaims, “Lord, wew don’t know where you are going; how can we know the way”?  And in another palace when Jesus gives his prediction that he will suffer and be crucified, Thomas says, “Let us go and die with him.”  Thomas has speaking parts in the scriptures, but he clearly isn’t one of the favored three -- Peter, James and John; and he isn’t one of the favorite five -- those three plus Andrew and Philip.  And yet during Jesus’ life Thomas is faithful.  But Jesus is dead, Thomas thinks, and the apostles are blowing smoke.  But when I hear Thomas’ words, “Unless I put my fingers in his hands and my hand in his side, I will not believe” it may sound like doubt, but I think there is some anger there as well.  If Jesus has appeared to the ten, why did he leave Thomas out?  

And I feel like that sometimes.  I read about great saints and small saints, and how the Lord worked miracles in their lives.  Some saints were holy almost from birth; others were great sinners.  But when you read their biographies, it’s as though they were given a special privilege -- an apparition; a miracle of some sort; an impossible healing -- whatever it was, it kick-started them on the way to become saints.  Even Mary, his mother, saw an angel who assured her that she was full of grace, beloved of God, destined to be remembered for all time.  I sympathize with Thomas.  I think he is angry and hurt.

In the time after the crucifixion Jesus was betrayed.  Peter swore that he did not know the man.  The other apostles were nowhere to be found when Jesus drew his last breath, except the apostle whom Jesus loved.  His mother and a couple of other ladies that followed him were there at his cross, but the vast majority of his friends were gone.  From 2000 years later and from all the Easters we’ve celebrated personally we can’t possibly appreciate the emotions those apostles experienced when they met the risen Christ.  So why does Jesus return to these men and women who betrayed him, who didn’t believe him, some of whom witnessed impossible miracles, some of whom heard the voice of the father at the transfiguration.  

That’s kind of what Mercy Sunday is lal about.  Jesus loves us so much that despite our failures, despite our doubt, our betrayal, he wants to form a loving relationship with each one of us. And that’s a message that comes through loud and clear in the post resurrection stories.  He is so changed that many don’t recognize him at first.  But he calls Mary’s name, he breaks the bread, he cooks a fish on the fire by the lake and in those moments he is recognized.  That is the first step towards forming that relationship, and Jesus takes that step.  It’s no different with Thomas.  Jesus says, in effect, “if that’s what it will take for you and I to have this relationship, then so be it.  “Put your fingers in my hands, your hand in my side, and believe.”

And that’s one of the reasons this is Mercy Sunday.  Sister Faustina, whose writings so influenced John Paul II, had a mystical insight.  She writes that at death Jesus calls the soul to himself not once but three times.  If the soul remains unresponsive, God grants it a final grace, a special light by means of which the soul begins to understand God’s effort.  The soul knows this is a final grace, and if it shows even a flicker of goodwill, the mercy of God will accomplish the rest.

The writer of the fourth gospel refers to Thomas, also called Didymus.  Thomas is a nickname in Aramaic which means “the twin”.  Didymus in Greek means the same thing.  Maybe the gospel writer means for us to see ourselves in Thomas, our twin, who doubts, who is hurt, who is angry.  But the Lord’s great mercy overcomes all of that in order to call Thomas to himself -- and he calls you and I to himself as well, and will do so as long as there is any effort on our part, however poor and weak our effort is.  His mercy has no limits and that’s what we celebrate today.

Easter 2025

John 20:1-9

Richard Dawkins is one of the most outspoken atheists in the world.  He’s written books proving, at least in his eyes, that there is no such thing as God or an afterlife.  He’s a very smart man and his logic has shored up many others who are atheists.  Today’s gospel is about belief, and I’ll get back to Richard later.

Today’s gospel describes three encounters with the empty tomb.  The first is Mary Magdalene.  If all we had was John’s gospel, we would have heard about her first when she stood at the foot of the cross, and this would be the second time.  She must have been well known to the early Christians.  It’s said that after the Resurrection Mary went about proclaiming the “Resurrection all through the Roman empire.  According to some early writers, Mary was independently wealthy and moved among the rich and famous.  In some icons she is shown holding a red egg; this is because of the story that she was having supper with the emperor Tiberius.  In the course of the conversation he told her that he would as soon believe the resurrection as he would believe the egg she had in her hand was red.  And it became so.  But we meet a younger Mary in the gospel story, who confronts the empty tomb and doesn’t believe, not yet anyway.  To her the empty tomb means that the grave4 has been robbed.  It will take the personal appearance of Jesus to convince her otherwise.  

The second character is the beloved disciple.  John never calls himself the disciple whom Jesus loved.  IN fact it probably isn’t John the apostle who wrote the gospel of John.  Frankly we don’t know who the beloved disciple is.  Many people think John is saying something like “the beloved disciple is the ideal disciple, in contrast to the real people around him.”  The beloved disciple sees what Mary saw, and believes, even though as the gospel says, he did not understand the scripture that Jesus had to arise from the dead.  I assume the beloved disciple believed on the basis of the empty tomb, and that’s a hint as to the kind of faith we must have. Because in the end, you can find evidence for the Resurrection, or you can claim Resurrection is a myth.  But there is no proof one way or another, and it ultimately comes down to faith, faith which is not just belief but acting on that belief.

The third character is Peter.  In the light of all the gospels, Peter stands out.  He’s a real person.  We can all identify with him.  He’s a man of great enthusiasm, and he makes powerful statements.  “You are the Messiah of God” he exclaims. He steps off the boat into the sea to walk on water, but it doesn’t work and Jesus has to rescue him.  He tells Jesus that if it means fellowship with him, then wash my hands and my head as well as my feet!  He pledges to be with Jesus even if it means death.  And then he betrays him in the courtyard of the high priest.  You and I are Peter, and like Peter, we see the evidence, the empty tomb, the burial cloths , the covering of the head.  And our gospel does not tell us what Peter believes.  Like the beloved disciple, he also did not understand the scripture that said Jesus must rise from the dead.  Later, of course, Jesus will appear to him, several times, but at this moment he’s somewhere between Mary Magdalene and the beloved disciple.  Sometimes if you are like me, you are there as well.  

But we have more than Peter had.  We have two thousand years of history.  We know what life was like before the Resurrection.  Things were pretty much the same from the earliest recorded history to the time when Jesus was born.  Empires rose and fell, tribes distrusted and fought other tribes, people worshipped gods by sacrificing their children to them.  Kings built monuments to themselves and great tombs to assure themselves of immortality -- it didn’t matter whether it was in Egypt or China, or the Aztec empire.  All over the world the bottom line was power.  But after the resurrection, the world has changed.  Sure, there’s always the tendency to revert back to those primitive times when might made right.  It’s going on in the middle east, in Russia and the Ukraine, in Iran, in North Korea.  But we have societies where there is compassion for the poor; where people are motivated to wipe out diseases, to dispel ignorance through education.  We have societies in our world where people cooperate to improve the lives of  citizens.  We have a world where more and more people have the time and opportunity to  become better versions of themselves.  Do we take advantage of this? Is the work of building up God’s kingdom complete?  Of course not.  But there is no denying that the impact on the world of the Resurrection is real.  Jesus walks among us.  We encounter the resurrected Christ in scriptures, in love, in beauty, in wisdom, and in a world gradually being transformed into the kingdom Jesus promised.  

Richard Dawkins, the author of “The God Delusion” has made it clear that even if he doesn’t believe in God he has called  himself  a "cultural Christian," appreciating the traditions, hymns, and ethos associated with Christianity,. Dawkins has also stated that if he had to choose between Christianity and other religions, he would choose Christianity, because of its societal and cultural impact.  Even he recognizes the impact that Jesus Christ has made and continues to make.  

You and I, Mary Magdalene and the beloved disciple, and Peter, all stand before the empty tomb and in the end, what is our response?  Let it be that  Jesus Christ is risen from the dead and death has been defeated, and our world is continuing to be transformed into God’s kingdom even now.  

Good Friday 2025

John 18:1-19:42

The Passion we read on Good Friday is taken from the Gospel of John.  It’s long and there are so many things we could think about.  Towards the end of the gospel we hear this passage:  “Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdala.  We also assume the disciple whom Jesus loved was there as well, since Jesus spoke to him from the cross.

Mary, his mother, was there.  Long ago when she was a teenager she had a vision of the angel Gabriel, who informed her that she was to become the mother of the Redeemer.  And Mary said “Be it done to me as you say”.  She didn’t know what she was getting into.  None of us do when we tell God to use us as he wishes to use us.  Mary  speaks two more times in scripture -- when she says to Jesus “Son, why did you do this?  Your father and I have  been searching for you”.  And another time, when she tells the waiter to “do whatever he tells you”.  If you had met Mary you would probably not have been impressed.  She probably wore something like a hijab when she went out of her home.  Her clothing was coarse, and she probably had woven the cloth herself.  If you saw her on the streets of Nazareth she would be carrying a basket, taking something from her garden to the market, bringing something else home.  And every day was like every other day, except when Jesus was lost; except when she and her family celebrated a Jewish holiday; except when Joseph died, and except when she heard about the fact that her son was going to be executed.   And she is standing there, looking at her son, suffering with him, her heart broken.  The one God chose as his mother, the woman conceived without sin, the most perfect human -- and yet she isn’t spared pain and poverty and all the sufferings human life offers.  Can we expect otherwise?

Then we meet Mary, the wife of Clopas, the sister of Jesus’ mother, according to John.  In the gospel of Luke two disciples of Jesus were on the road to Emmaus, despondent because the one they thought would save Israel had been crucified.  One was named “Cleopas”.  It’s not unlikely that the other was his wife.  Some of the Christian writings that never made it into the bible said that Cleopas, or Clopas, was the brother of Joseph.  It would seem unlikely that Mary’s parents would have named two daughters “Mary”, so if all this is true, Mary’s sister was probably her sister in law.  Mary, the wife of Clopas must have made an impression on the early Christians, because she is probably the Mary in Mark who is the mother of James and Joses, two of Jesus’ cousins.  I suspect that Mary of Clopas and Jesus’ mother were good friends, and Mary of Clopas is there,risking her own life to lend support to her sister in law.  She is an example of real friendship, the kind that we Christians are called to.  Do we go out of our way to comfort those we know who are on the margins, who are ill, who are old and unable to get around anymore?  True friends are there when you need them the most and don’t drift away like Jesus’ other friends.

And there is Mary Magdalene.  I picture her as younger -- Maybe because I was heavily influenced by that old Movie, “Jesus Christ, Superstar”.  In the movie and the broadway musical, Mary Magdalene is  depicted as someone who is more or less smitten by Jesus -- she’s in love with him.  And that’s consistent with some of the early Christian writings as well, where she is depicted as Jesus’ confidant, his closest disciple.  We really don’t know much about Mary’s background -- all we know is that Jesus at some point drove seven devils out of her.  Mary was lost -- possessed -- and then rescued by Jesus.  No wonder she loves him.  And she is at the foot of the cross, grateful.  And after the resurrection her loyalty and love will be rewarded because she will be the first to meet the risen Lord.  She is the apostle to the apostles.  

And finally there is the beloved disciple.  Down through the ages that individual is identified with the writer of the gospel of John, who in turn is thought to be the apostle John.  But neither is true.  John’s gospel is very different from the others, and emphasizes Jesus’ divinity.  And whenever you meet the beloved disciple, John wants you to put yourself there, in that scene.  It’s like a place marker for his readers.  And in this place John invites you to put yourself at the foot of the cross, and think about what God has done for you in the person of  Jesus, and how the church springs forth from his side when he is lanced, and how he offers his mother to be your mother, and how he is the perfect image of the Father’s love. 

So today on Good Friday you are there -- with his mother, with her best friend, and with the woman who loves him because of what he has done for her.  YOu are the beloved disciple. Go and tell everyone you know that they are beloved as well.    

Palm Sunday cycle C

 Palm Sunday

Luke 22:14 - 23:56)

Once again we read the passion, this year, Luke’s version.  All the versions tell us that Our Lord suffered severely and died in a shameful way.  We always see pictures of Jesus nearly naked except for a loincloth, but we know from historical documents that the Romans usually crucified people with no clothing at all.  This was to humiliate them even further.  We aren’t sure that  capital punishment in the modern age is really a deterrent to crime, but it was in Roman times.  Our scriptures tell us that Jesus was beaten until he couldn’t stand up, nailed to a cross, and suffered death by asphyxiation, since if you are hanging on a cross your respiratory muscles eventually  don’t work anymore.  It was a horrible death, and the question down through the ages is why did Jesus have to die for us?  I think we have to assume that he had to die, because at the last minute Jesus begged his Father to allow him to avoid the cup of suffering, the Father did not grant his prayer. 

John tells us that Jesus is the light of the world, the true light that enlightens everyone,  but that the people loved darkness rather than light.  What is this light?

Jesus revealed the true face of God -- no longer a God who executes, a God who is to be feared, but a God who wants to save every person.  Jesus also shows a new way for humans  to be -- he overturns this world’s values and pronounces that true greatness is service to one’s brothers and sisters.  Jesus proposed a new religion, not built on rituals and obedience to commandments,  but rather, a religion that draws its followers to act out of love -- love of God, love of neighbor, even true love of self.  And Jesus called for a world where the poor, the marginalized, the weak, widows and orphans come first and those who have everything come last. 

Jesus in a sense did not choose to die, but if he avoided death he would have to renounce all those proposals.  He would have had to adopt the mentality of the world and resign himself to the possibility that there would never be a change, that evil would triumph, and that people -- his  brothers and sixers, would be abandoned into the hands of the “prince of this world.  If he had embraced the ways of this world he probably would have been adorned with honors -- after all, more than once the people were set to make him king, and in the shaky peace of the Roman empire, who knows what might have been possible?  But he would have become part of the kingdoms of this world that Satan had promised in the  beginning of his ministry.  

During this holy week, let us ask ourselves if we have accepted the kingdom, his kingdom, his revelation of God, his new religion, his new vision of man and society.  Are we living that way in our own lives?  Or are we like the apostles at the last supper, asking “Is it I Lord, is it I who is standing in the way of your kingdom?”

Fifth Sunday of Lent, cycle C

John 8:1-11

People who hear this story of the woman caught in the act of adultery first ask, what about the guy?  Wasn’t he just as guilty?  And then they wonder, “What is Jesus writing in the dirt?” But the story doesn't tell us those things, and so we won’t bother to answer those questions.  And we all agree adultery is bad.  But maybe that’s not the issue either.

This little story was probably not in John’s original gospel.  Some people say it sounds more like Luke, and in fact there are some very old manuscripts that seem to support that some poor old scribe put the story from Luke into the Gospel of John.  There was even a debate about whether the story should be considered part of Sacred Scripture, but the story survived.  It's a dangerous story and one of the early fathers of the Church, as well as a couple of protestant biblical scholars, wanted to leave the story out of the official bible because of the worry that it might encourage people to commit adultery.  After all, if it was so easily forgiven, even when the woman didn’t even ask for forgiveness, what’s the big deal?

But just to set the record straight, Jesus is not ok with adultery.  In fact, Jesus, who does nothing that is not approved by his father, is against all sin, even things we think of as little.  IF you fight with your spouse, not good.  IF you get back more change than you should have and stick it in your pocket, Jesus is not ok with that.  IF you leave bulletins behind in the pews, even that’s not ok.  Some country comedian once said, “I love women best and then whiskey, my neighbor a little, and God hardly at all.” And we laugh uncomfortably because there’s a little of that in all of us.  IF God made us to know love and serve him in this world to be happy with him in the next, as the old catechism said, why is it so hard?  Even the great saints felt this tension.  Our natural instincts seem to be at odds with what God wants from us.

Saint Augustine spent a lot of time on this.  He talked about how he had lost himself in all the pleasures of the world until he finally found God in the center of his being.  He wrote, “You have made us for yourself, Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.”  When we look at our natural instincts, our natural desires, we see that they all draw us beyond what we think we want.  When we satisfy a desire, sinful or good or neutral, moments later we are seeking something else.  There is no rest.

One theologian said that there are those explicit desires -- love for another person, friendship, a piece of art, a vacation, a good meal, winning at a game or winning in our profession, even desires which lead to sin -- and we see that beneath all of these is a desire for completion, for what will make us whole, a desire for God.  Our human nature does, in fact, direct us toward God.  All human beings live in a state of desire.  Sometimes these instincts seem selfish and even immoral, but ultimately, they make us reach out for what keeps us alive and ensure that the human race keeps on going.

God who created us with all these desires wants us to enjoy the good things he’s made for our benefit.  In fact, he loves for us to do this.  But it’s like my grandfather giving me a pocketknife when I was five.  He didn’t just hand it to me; he made sure I knew how to open and close it without cutting off my finger; he demonstrated how to whittle a stick by pushing the blade away from me; and he told me never to stick it in a pet or one of my friends.  Our enjoyment of God’s good things is accompanied by instructions that are built into us -- common sense is a name for them.  Sin is when we don’t follow the instructions.  

And the implicit desire is that we want what is behind all these good things, all these earthly pleasures; and that’s where Jesus comes in, because he tells the woman caught in adultery to sin no more, or as one translation has it, do not do this sin again.  Sin, even small sins, make it harder to see past those instincts that come from our human nature to what our whole being longs for -- God.  

The Church puts this gospel story close to Easter, close to Holy Week, because it is a reminder that all of us, like the people who turned away from stoning the woman, are sinful.  If we carefully look at our lives, we see that there are things we do over and over again that we shouldn’t.  We see that time is wasted, that we use our resources unwisely at times; that our tempers are not totally under control, and we could go on and on.  If you think you are without sin, think again.  And we are like the woman caught in adultery -- condemned for our sin, and there is nothing we can do about it.  And we are like that woman because Jesus crosses the divide between God and man and is there to rescue us through his passion, death and resurrection. As with the woman caught in adultery, Jesus does not condemn us but offers his forgiveness.