A brief homily for the Sixth Sunday of Easter, May 10, 2026
Acts 8:5-8, 14-17, 1 Peter 3:15-18, John 14:15-21
Important stuff first:
- Happy Mother’s Day to all mothers, grandmothers, godmothers, and everyone who cares for people the way a mother does. I send you joy and deepest thanks, especially as I miss my long-deceased mom.
- Congratulations to the youngsters in our parish and all over the world who received their First Holy Communion this weekend, and throughout the Easter season. May you always feel the love of God at the center of your lives.
• • •
The other day, I heard a promo for an NPR program whose host intended to detail how having strict limits or rules or other constraints can actually enhance creativity.
She pointed to the story about how Dr. Seuss bet publisher Bennett Cerf $50 that he could write a book using a vocabulary of only 50 words. And we all came to like Sam I Am, even if we may disagree about “Green Eggs and Ham.” The meal, not the book.
On one hand, I notoriously chafe at being told what to do or how to do it. I identify with Jack Klugman’s portrayal of Oscar Madison in an episode of “The Odd Couple”: “Every time somebody tells me something is for my own good … none of it is for my own good.”
But on the other hand, I worked for 40 years against nearly impossible deadlines and almost unattainable standards, and I thrived. I absolutely cherished the structure.
Many of us do.
Professionally.
Personally and interpersonally.
Spiritually.
Jesus doesn’t burden us with nearly impossible deadlines and almost unattainable standards. Yes, there’s always an urgency to what he commands, and yes, divine standards are quite high. Many, many things in our individual lives and in the world at large need fixing, and need fixing now.
But Jesus gives us a simple, two-part, interwoven set of commandments. Love God. Love our neighbors as ourselves, otherwise known as love each other as Jesus has loved us.
When he tells us that these rules are for our own good, they really are for our own good.
What’s more, these rules are the furthest things from limits to our creativity. These orders challenge us to imagine a better world, a safer and healthier world, a happier world, a world of justice and peace.
Jesus Christ’s Law of Love, the commandments referenced in this weekend’s passages from Scripture, do not chain us or leash us. They give us goals, horizons, lights at the end of life’s tunnel that we can head to, because we know they’re not a train barreling toward us.
The Law of Love invites each of us to express our individuality for the betterment of the whole of humankind, because this great jigsaw puzzle of the Earth’s people needs every one of us to fit together as only each of us can.
And just as a jigsaw puzzle has a finished shape, so too a just and kind world has a definite shape.
If we do as Jesus asks us, if we follow in the footsteps of the Apostles, then more of the pieces will click into place.
And our communal reward will far exceed a gentlemen’s bet.
