The opening prayer for this Sunday asks the “almighty and ever-living God” that “those you were pleased to make new in Holy Baptism may, under your protective care, bear much fruit…” Perhaps many of you have attended a Holy Saturday Easter Vigil and seen the joy of adults and older children being baptized and confirmed. An unusually large number of new Easter Catholics were received into our Church in the U.S. this year. But their Catholic journey is still fresh, and it needs protective care to grow strong enough for a lifetime of faith and hope.
Our second reading today is from 1 Peter, a letter written for new Christians in Asia Minor. Like us, these new Christians were people who never saw Jesus. Their faith was based on the faith of other believers who handed on to them the words and deeds of Jesus. The other thing we know about these new first century believers from the epistle is that they were suffering. It is likely this letter is written during the time of one of the Roman persecutions, possibly that of the emperor Domitian (81-96 CE). The author of this epistle encourages new Christians by comparing their lives with that of Jesus: “Beloved, come to him, a living stone, rejected by human beings but chosen and precious in the sight of God, and, like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house….”
Our Christian faith may not require us to face lions in Roman coliseums. But it has to endure threats from the world we live in. Our world does not give us a lot of support for living lives of truthfulness, faithfulness, love of enemies, care for the poor, forgiveness of those who hurt us. Hopefully belonging to a community of other believers, a “church,” helps us be those living stones, “a people of his own.” As we pray for our new Catholics today, may their willingness to face the lions of our time renew our own faith.
— Blog entry by Sister Mary Garascia
The post May 3, Fifth Sunday of Easter, Living Stones: a Sunday Scriptures blog first appeared on Sisters of the Precious Blood.