These reflections during Eastertide 2026 are reblogs from 2023.
Our readings for that year were the same as this year’s, and some of the thoughts might be worth rethinking. I hope my long-timers enjoy them a second time, and that my new-timers appreciate a trip back in time. I thank all of you for journeying with me on Lavish Mercy.
These reflections during Eastertide 2026 are reblogs from 2023.
Our readings for that year were the same as this year’s, and some of the thoughts might be worth rethinking. I hope my long-timers enjoy them a second time, and that my new-timers appreciate a trip back in time. I thank all of you for journeying with me on Lavish Mercy.
These reflections during Eastertide 2026 are reblogs from 2023.
Our readings for that year were the same as this year’s, and some of the thoughts might be worth rethinking. I hope my long-timers enjoy them a second time, and that my new-timers appreciate a trip back in time. I thank all of you for journeying with me on Lavish Mercy.
These reflections during Eastertide 2026 are reblogs from 2023.
Our readings for that year were the same as this year’s, and some of the thoughts might be worth rethinking. I hope my long-timers enjoy them a second time, and that my new-timers appreciate a trip back in time. I thank all of you for journeying with me on Lavish Mercy.
These reflections during Eastertide 2026 are reblogs from 2023.
Our readings for that year were the same as this year’s, and some of the thoughts might be worth rethinking. I hope my long-timers enjoy them a second time, and that my new-timers appreciate a trip back in time. I thank all of you for journeying with me on Lavish Mercy.
These reflections during Eastertide 2026 are reblogs from 2023.
Our readings for that year were the same as this year’s, and some of the thoughts might be worth rethinking. I hope my long-timers enjoy them a second time, and that my new-timers appreciate a trip back in time. I thank all of you for journeying with me on Lavish Mercy.
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In God’s great mercy, we have been given new birth into a living hope through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade.
1 Peter 1:3-4
They woke up one morning beside each other as they had for fifteen years. The scent of last night’s acrid argument lingered in the corners of the room. After a few moments, he turned to her and said, “We need to learn how to love each other again. Can we try?”
Over the course of long-term relationships, the parties change. Phil and Judy wanted to remain committed to their marriage, but they found themselves strangled by years of unpruned misunderstandings. All heart commitments meet similar challenges. All dreams fray a little on their way to fulfillment.
We have followed Jesus through Holy Week on such a road. Passover Sunday filled his spirit with the fresh scent of palms and possibilities. But as the week waned, the Father led Jesus in a daunting direction. He asked his Son to give the ultimate price for love.
Our lives too will teach us this: every ride on a palm-strewn road meets a fork toward Gethsemane. There is no true love without sacrifice. But the road does not end at the foot of the cross. Loving sacrifice lifts us to see this morning’s Easter sunrise. The life that had lain hidden in darkness now rises triumphant in our hearts. Today, we are offered the grace to live this mystery on our own journeys. Amazingly, Easter invites us to fall in love again with God and to begin our lives anew
Music: Love Is Come Again (Now the Green Blade Riseth)
Suggested Reading: John 20:1-9
For Your Reflection:
April 20, 2025
Isaiah Zagar is a noted mosaic artist whose artistic materials are primarily broken and discarded scraps. His unique genius lies in his ability to reshape unwanted fragments into inspiring art. Viewing one of his pieces, one considers the past existence of each remodeled element. What had that delft tile once adorned? Whose uniform had been secured by that battered brass button? That rose-colored glass, whom had is shaded?
We imagine each piece in its wholeness and wonder what fractured that former existence. We imagine the journeys carrying each particle to this new expression, locked now in harmony with every element surrounding it. We begin to discern what our own story might look like fragmented into so many parts. The effect is profound amazement that a wall plastered with debris can evoke such deep reflection.
Like these mosaic pieces, our Lenten journey has brought each of us to a new place. In the company of Christ, we have been broken, healed and lifted into new life. We share the astonishment of Christ’s disciples. Like so many of us, fragmented by our hectic lives, they had forgotten his promise. “I shall rise again,” he told them. Yet they go seeking him in an empty tomb.
Today, remade by Easter grace, we leave the vacant graves where our broken hearts may have lingered. We are new beings in the Resurrected Christ. The world’s disguise has been rolled away, like the boulder at the tomb. We see all creation anew as the expression of the Holy Spirit. With those first disciples, let us run rejoicing to our sisters and brothers. Let us assure them by our actions that Christ is indeed alive!
Music: Se impassibile, immortale – from La resurrezione by George by Frideric Handel
An Aria of Mary Magdalen at the tomb:
Se impassibile, immortale
sei risorto o Sole amato,
deh fa ancor ch’ogni mortale
teco sorga dal peccato.
If immovable and immortal
You are risen, oh beloved Sun,
ah, let all mortals rise with you
out of their sinful state.
For Your Reflection
Suggested Scripture: John 20:11-18
Today’s Readings:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050724.cfm
About midnight, while Paul and Silas were praying
and singing hymns to God as the prisoners listened,
there was suddenly such a severe earthquake
that the foundations of the jail shook;
all the doors flew open, and the chains of all were pulled loose.
When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open,
he drew his sword and was about to kill himself,
thinking that the prisoners had escaped.
But Paul shouted out in a loud voice,
“Do no harm to yourself; we are all here.”
Acts 16: 25-28
As their persecutors try to imprison Paul and Silas, Divine Intervention shakes up their intentions! Not only are the disciples freed by the earthquake, but they courageously hang around the prison environs to salvage the guard for Christ.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We might prayerfully consider the interventions God has made in our lives – those unexpected turns in the road that eventually led us to grace. How have we responded?
We might also wish to pray for some little quakes of grace in our own lives and in the world where we need to be shaken up, released from unholy chains, and re-ordered in faith.
Poetry: Unless the Grain of Wheat Falls – Irene Zimmerman, OSF
Easter!
But I’m still torn with grief,
disbelief.
I’m not ready yet!
I clutch the old familiar pain—
I’ve gotten used to the dark,
grown calluses against the rub of walls.
I feel secure confined within the grain.
Easter!
This unseen Presence signed in Bread,
this utter homey-ness of meal
still leaves a loneliness that gnaws.
It almost would be easier
had you stayed dead.
I would not have to try to learn
to know you in this strange new way
and when my time came, I could say
good-bye behind a finished smile,
without a thought or care
for those I had not fed.
But now to have to live from day to day
on Bread and promise of Bread—
to eat and pass the loaves along
and not to store!
This call to grow to Easter ripeness
shakes my familiar ground,
quakes the very kernel of myself.
I thought I had secured my walls so well.
But you roll away, like a child’s toy,
the rock I had sealed against you
and make me an empty shell of wheat
to witness that you are alive in me.
Music: Earthquake – by 2nd Life
Today’s Readings:
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/040824.cfm
Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
Hebrews 10:5-7; cf: Psalm 40:7-9
but a body you prepared for me;
in holocausts and sin offerings you took no delight.
Then I said, ‘As is written of me in the scroll,
behold, I come to do your will, O God.
On this Feast of the Annunciation, we remember Mary’s choice to love the world according to the manner of God. It was not a choice she made for the first time during the angel’s visit. Mary had always lived her young life patterned on grace and fidelity. Therefore, she was ready when the angel offered her the choice that changed the world.
Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
As human beings, we may be inclined to think of “God’s Will” as a pre-ordained pattern for our lives – rather like a document that, if we could get hold of it, we could follow exactly to achieve salvation. We may even mistakenly think that it is God’s Will that we, or our sisters and brothers, suffer.
We might ask ourselves instead, “What is God’s Will, really?”. The life of Christ, reflected in the Gospel, tells us this: God’s Will is Love. So when Psalm 40 interprets Mary’s Fiat as ” … behold, I come to do Your Will…”, what we might understand is this:
Your Will, O God, is Love.
I open my heart to be your Love in the world,
in whatever pattern your grace may come to me,
whether it be through the joys or the sorrows
of the human condition.
Poetry: Fiat – Robert Morneau
On her bed of doubt,
in wrinkled night garment,
she sat, glancing with fear
at a golden shaft of streaming light,
pondering perhaps, "Was this
but a sequel to a dream?"
The light too brief for disbelief,
yet its silence eased not her trembling.
Somehow she murmured a "yes"
and with that the light's love and life
pierced her heart
and lodged in her womb.
The room remained the same
- rug still need smoothing
- jug and paten awaiting using.
Now all was different
in a maiden's soft but firm fiat.
Music: O Santissima – interpreted by Andrea Montepaone
| O sanctissima, o piissima, dulcis Virgo Maria! Mater amata, intemerata, ora, ora pro nobis. Tu solatium et refugium, Virgo Mater Maria. Quidquid optamus, per te speramus; ora, ora pro nobis. Ecce debiles, perquam flebiles; salva nos, o Maria! Tolle languores, sana dolores; ora, ora pro nobis. Virgo, respice, Mater, aspice; audi nos, o Maria! Tu medicinam portas divinam; ora, ora pro nobis. | O most holy, o most loving, sweet Virgin Mary! Beloved Mother, undefiled, pray, pray for us. You are solace and refuge, Virgin Mother Mary. Whatever we wish, we hope it through you; pray, pray for us. Look, we are weak and deeply deplorable; save us, o Mary! Take away our lassitude, heal our pains; pray, pray for us. Virgin, look at us, Mother, care for us; hear us, o Mary! You bring divine medicine; pray, pray for us. |
Lavish Mercy 