Jesus returns: he breathes the Spirit upon and within us.  The Spirit was already given but now it is given through Christ in an incarnate manner where we know he is ‘flesh of our flesh’.  We ‘know’ in our experience that ‘we move and live and have our being’ in, through and with Christ, the complete manifestation of God.  In the book of Ezekiel we hear God say: “I shall give you a new heart, and put a new spirit in you; I shall remove the heart of stone from your bodies and give you a heart of flesh instead.  I shall put my spirit in you, and make you keep my laws and sincerely respect my observances” (36:25-27). 

He is departing so that he may be with us always, through the Spirit…Departing and then returning in another way….a way that asks us to be aware, present, listening, listening in the monastic sense of ‘listening with the ear of the heart’.  This new encounter with Jesus had to be different for the disciples who knew him in the flesh…perhaps it was easier for them than for us, for our senses today are so directed to the outer, so preoccupied with things that are not ‘eternal’. 

• “I am giving you a new commandment: Love one another.   As I have loved you, so you too must love one another” (Jn 13:34).  What is new about this commandment that Jesus left his disciples with and he leaves us with?  We know the love of God was rooted in God’s covenant with his people: ‘My love for you will never leave you’ (Is 54:10), says the Lord.

‘Faith and Recognition’: could these two words together encapsulate what the Easter season calls us to?  From the second Sunday after Easter where we have the appearance before Thomas whose weak faith takes a huge leap when he recognizes Jesus in and through his wounds.  We recognize through hearing and we recognize through seeing.  Many of the resurrection gospels show us this: ‘They recognized him through the breaking of the bread’.  When the risen One says ‘Mary’ at the tomb, Mary Magdalene, through the voice calling her name, suddenly recognizes the person standing before her as Jesus.

Sisters and brothers, we are being ‘summoned’; we are summoned to an ‘encounter’, to a living encounter with Jesus.   This summoning, as Fr. Casey told us on Palm Sunday, asks that we come with our whole being: ‘our minds, our hearts and our feet’.  The backdrop for our encounter with Jesus during these days of the Holy Triduumis God’s love.  With Jesus love will always have the last word and will be his orientation towards us as we meet him in this present moment.    The horizon of God’s love that Jesus embodies, which is brought to the encounter, meets the present horizon of our lives.  We encounter the expansive horizon of Jesus’ life and consciousness:  an horizon, which embodies the immensity of God’s love and truth and overshadows the very limited horizon of our lives where we strive to expand our minds and hearts to be more Christ like in our everyday living and in the choices we make.