We are on the 6th Sunday of Easter. Have we met the risen Christ? In opening the Scriptures and breaking of the bread, the Church has been leading us to have an intimate experience with Christ present amidst us. He is recognised as Lord and God, walking along with us amidst our doubts and fears, caring, guarding and healing as a good shepherd, holding us all together as branches in a vine. Then, He calls us to the ultimate aim of his incarnation, passion, death and resurrection; the communion with the Father. He says, “abide in me,” “remain in my love.”
That is not so exciting, isn’t it? But it is the truth that Christ opened for us that our joy may be complete, and may bear fruit. We are often excited and enthusiastic in adoring and worshiping a super-spiritual divine being. The communion with him does not excite us much. Not because it is difficult or mysterious, but the communion involves a commitment to love others also.
God of superpowers can be worshiped very safely in a cultic system, and we can go free. Bit worship that Christ seeks happens in communion, and only in communion. All that we do in the name of God and in the name of the Church devoid of this communion only affirms what St John wrote, “God’s love is not in them.”
This abiding in God is a deep mystery, a bond of love. Let us listen to Christ in love! He says, “I am in the Father,” “you abide in me. I abide in you,” thus, we remain in the love of the Father. Jesus called us to follow him, Jesus asked us to love God and love others. It is a communion with God and others. The gospel passage today teaches us what it means and how it is essential for us.
Jesus loved us from the love he received from the Father. “I have loved you as the Father has loved me.” The call to abide in him is to be made real after the example of how Christ abides in the Father, and has loved the Father. “… just as I have kept my Father’s commandments,
and remain in his love, if you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love.” The life that we have received in Christ makes known the love of the Father whereby we have the joy of Christ himself and that our joy may be complete.
If we are to live in that communion, primarily we need to be filled with a constantly reminded awareness that we are all God’s children, “and that is what we are!” This reality and the primary commandment to love is what compromise at the risk of communion with God. Keeping aside this commandment, we are strict with all commandments that we have made in the name of God. We teach and preach them as God’s commandments. We have reinterpreted the commandment and justified our boundaries and prejudices. There is no communion with the Father. When we create divisions in the name of God, traditions, liturgy, and authority, Father’s love does not remain with us, because we have chosen not to have communion. When we surrender our spirit to immoral and inhuman structures that spread lies and hatred, we don’t remain in Christ and his love. This is very much visible in our lives and in the life of the church, in the very moments we have multitude of activities, increasing devotional practices, shrines, and religious festivities.
Being in communion with God, just as Christ loved God, and being in communion with others as Christ loved us, really means a life of goodness, justice, love, authenticity, and compassion. It also means a readiness to accept all as the children of God, beyond all prejudices. Then our families, our parishes, religious communities will be truly living in Christ and in his love. We will have joy, and we will have fruits that will last.
