You have heard me ask, “Where did Jesus go after the Resurrection?” The early Fathers of the Church would have answered, “Into the Church”. Jesus kept his word when he said to them,
“And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
Jesus lives in the Church, as he promised, present to us in the Sacraments. The only reason we have sacraments is because Jesus is in the sacraments. Jesus is in the Church. Jesus is the sacraments. The sacraments are Jesus.
Today’s Gospel reading from Luke’s Gospel is about events that happened on the same day as Jesus’ Resurrection. Luke tells of the two disciples walking seven miles from Jerusalem to Emmaus and Jesus joins them and explains the scriptures to them, but they don’t recognize him until he breaks and blesses the bread. When they recognize him he disappears. They then run seven miles in the darkness back to the upper room and the other disciples in Jerusalem. Now, picture the fact that they had just seen him in Emmaus.
These two guys, are out of breath from running, probably for an hour or more, in the dark. When they got to the upper room, …
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.”
Note that Jesus is not out of breath. I can imagine the two from Emmaus saying something like, “Wait. We just saw you. We ran back the seven miles, but here you are again!” Jesus never left them. He had walked and spoken with them on the road, and blessed the bread in Inn at Emmaus. And here he was again, in the midst of the Church. But he is not out of breath. And he says to them,
“Why are you troubled?
And why do questions arise in your hearts?
Remember, he hadn’t actually eaten with them back at Emmaus.
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.
These stories confirm his Resurrection of Body and Soul, not just a spiritual resurrection, but body and soul. He was not a ghost. This is the only way we can receive him, body and soul, flesh and divinity in the Eucharist. Remember he had said,
“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”
And, he taught us,
“… this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die.”
And, he continued,
“Whoever eats* my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.”
Jesus lives in the Church until the end of time, body and soul.
I can imagine that the disciples were struggling to wrap their minds around this.
In his post-resurrection appearances, Jesus was finishing the job of forming his Church. He gave the Church their work, to preach repentance to the whole world, teaching,
“… that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins,
would be preached in his name to all the nations ….”
That is our job. It’s up to us. If you have had experience with Protestant churches, you know they have left the sacraments of the Church. They have no anointing with oil, they have no Eucharist and no priesthood. They do not practice the sacrament of Confession.
We see that Saint Peter, learned what he was supposed to do. In the first reading, we hear Peter tell the people in Jerusalem,
“Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away.”
St. John in the second reading, writes,
My children, I am writing this to you
so that you may not commit sin.
But if anyone does sin, we have an Advocate with the Father,
Jesus Christ the righteous one.
Jesus is present in the Church. Jesus gave the Church authority over sin, because he is in the Church. When we confess our sins in the sacrament, we encounter him, and he forgives our sin as he promised. St. John knew this.
Moreover, John teaches us the importance of obeying God’s Commandments.
The way we may be sure that we know him is to keep
his commandments.
Those who say, “I know him,” but do not keep his commandments are liars, and the truth is not in them.
Here at Sacred Heart Parish, we have three priests, and we make ourselves available for confessions five times each week, providing about 15 manhours of confessions each week.
The Church teaches us to go to confession at least once per year. If you are not doing that, I suggest you stop going to Holy Communion. We have taken confessions outside the Church since the pandemic, often in the classrooms in the Hallway of the Saints.
It is better to go to confession more frequently. I go to confession about once a month or every two months. I find that frequent confession open us up to great gifts of Jesus’ Grace, and people grow in spiritual wisdom when they go to frequent confession.
“Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be wiped away.”