Second Sunday of Easter . . . "Lure of the Chameleon Parish"
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Second Sunday of Easter - April 16th, 2023 (Click Here for Readings)
With individualism and self-expression being core personal values today, more churches are marketing to these values and building communities radically departed from those described in this Sunday's reading from Acts.
In contemporary church cultures, traditional “old fashioned” community worship is often being eclipsed by individual and crowd preferences.
In our modern high-tech world of contemporary Christian music, big screen displays and sophisticated sound systems, worship services have often become centered around its artists and performers, leaving little space for the word of God as the center of worship. And when we worship the entertainment too much, it can become our modern-day “golden calf.”
Many Catholic churches are also following suit by livening up their liturgies with varieties of music and more exciting homilies, focusing on the whims of the people instead of encouraging them to put themselves aside for sixty minutes, step into the wonderful presence of God and become part of a divine worshiping community.
When people mainly come to Mass to get personally “filled” by a favored priest's or deacon's homilies, they can quickly become solo Catholics instead of communal Catholics.
The church in the time of the apostles was an ordinary one; unified, unadorned and unspectacular with everyone collectively devoting themselves to prayer, the word of God, the breaking of bread and communal life, and with everyone doing ordinary work for the benefit of the community.
As most of us reflect on this reading, we’re fine with it except for the verse (45) where everyone sells their property and possessions and divides them to those in need. Obviously not a common practice today, but consider the spirit part of these actions more than the physical part.
If we were experiencing a hurricane or flood with everyone nearby searching for power, water and other necessities, would we be the first to go out onto our streets to lend a helping hand to those in the same way the communities in the apostles’ time did?
Could we be in that state of unselfish innocence as they were? They were all “birds of a feather,” giving of themselves and their belongings with a community fervor that we could at least admire and emulate to the best of our abilities today.
Our second reading from the letter of St. Peter says that by God’s boundless mercy, we are privileged to be born again with an eternal inheritance given to us by the resurrection of Christ.
To display our gratefulness for this inheritance, let us always strive to live all our moments for God’s glory. Though our faith will be tested by the challenges and sufferings brought upon us in our secular world, there is no better environment for cultivating our inheritance than in the communities in which we live, worship and participate.
The better “Doers of God’s word” we become for our communities, the brighter our pathways will be lit toward the eternal salvation of our souls and companionship with Jesus in heaven.
For more reflections on the Sunday readings, Go Here
