Gospel – Luke 24:35-48

The two disciples recounted what had taken place on the way,
and how Jesus was made known to them
in the breaking of bread.

While they were still speaking about this,
he stood in their midst and said to them,
“Peace be with you.”
But they were startled and terrified
and thought that they were seeing a ghost.
Then he said to them, “Why are you troubled?
And why do questions arise in your hearts?
Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself.
Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones
as you can see I have.”
And as he said this,
he showed them his hands and his feet.
While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed,
he asked them, “Have you anything here to eat?”
They gave him a piece of baked fish;
he took it and ate it in front of them.

He said to them,
“These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you,
that 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.
And he said to them,
“Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer
and rise from the dead on the third day
and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins,
would be preached in his name
to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.
You are witnesses of these things.”

Reflection on the Gospel

Let us remember that we are in the holy presence of God.

“…Proximity to the condemned and incarcerated made the question of each person’s
humanity more urgent and meaningful, including my own….”
Bryan Stevenson, Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption, 2014.

The bulk of the text in the first reading is the second of three courageous public speeches by Peter in the Acts of the Apostles (see Acts 2: 14-36, Acts 3: 11-26, Acts 10: 34-43). Luke goes to great pains to demonstrate Peter’s leadership in these speeches; Peter has come a long way from the follower who denied Jesus three times (Luke 23: 54-65).

When I read Peter’s speech in the First Reading, Acts 3: 13-15, 17-19, I was touched by Peter’s words (Acts 3: 15), “…The author of life you put to death but God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses…” Peter not only uses language and images of Jesus’ execution while introducing Jews to the special status of Jesus of Nazareth, he also reminds them and us that a murderer was released at the time of Jesus’ trial.

I am reminded of the work of Bryan Stevenson and the Equal Justice Initiative (Montgomery, Alabama). As Peter reminded his audience how Jesus’ opponents sentenced an innocent man to die, I thought of the many innocent people that Stevenson and his staff have gone to bat for, those on death row and subjected to other forms of excessive punishment in various states of the U.S. Jesus the executed is a star actor in Peter’s speech.

Peter reminds us that the executed Messiah was bound to suffer and that bold spokespersons often come from within their own communities. Moses spoke of this in Deut 18: 15 but it is as valid for us today. Indeed, I am writing this two days before the 41st anniversary of the murder of Saint Oscar Romero and the Third Sunday of Easter is two weeks after the 53rd anniversary of the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King.

As Peter emphasized the circumstances around the death of Jesus, in a major public speech soon after the Ascension of Jesus, it behooves us to remember that even amidst the glorious and joyful images surrounding the resurrection of Christ, the seminal event in Christianity cannot be
separated from unjust judgements and executions that existed in Jesus’ time and in our own culture.

Steve is a professed member of St. Norbert Abbey, De Pere, Wisc. Besides his work in Catholic social
action, he is an archivist for the Diocese of Green Bay and office administrator for a Green Bay
nonprofit. He blogs at stevenherro.wordpress.com.

Saint John Baptist de La Salle – Pray for us.
Live, Jesus, in our hearts – Forever.