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Whenever we embark on a journey, we need directions or we are likely to venture off course and get lost. Apps like Mapquest come in handy for those who are tech savvy. Until smartphones came along, we depended on maps and if we didn’t have one, we often stopped and asked for directions.

Life is much like taking a trip. For some, life has been very satisfying, for others not so. Some people just ramble through life day be day, oblivious of any ultimate destination, while others plan life down to the last detail, mindful of where they are going and where they intend to be. Think of the Olympic athletes. None of them would have made it to Tokyo had they not planned out their trip well.

A successful high school teacher once commented, “There is nothing more beautiful than watching young people preparing to go off to college to begin an exciting new life. And that’s the way it should be. It’s an exciting time for them. The world is out there, just waiting for them to enjoy everything it has to offer.

“But the day will come when these same young people will discover that what the world has to offer will leave them more hungry and more thirsty than they were before. The day will come when they will discover the truth of Jesus’ words, ‘Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life.’”

That teacher was right. What motivated me along the way in making the significant decisions of my life was the quest for happiness and satisfaction. Quite likely, they were your motivations as well but have we found the lasting satisfaction that makes life so meaningful? Are we happy with what God has given us?

The Declaration of Independence proclaims we have the right to pursue happiness but the founding fathers did not provide the blueprint for finding happiness. We presume happiness will be ours when we pursue the American dream, which for many people is symbolized by wealth and good health. Many graduates leave school bent on that pursuit but do they find lasting happiness in the process? The happiness many experience may be as fleeting as a breeze on a humid summer evening, enough to provide a moment’s relief but nothing lasting. In spite of their material success, some are left feeling dissatisfied.

The passages from Exodus and John suggest that humans have always struggled with dissatisfaction. Forgetting how miserable they had been in Egypt, the Israelites bemoan their plight in the desert. “If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt when we ate our fill of bread. But Moses, you had to lead us into this desert to make the whole community die of famine!”

In the gospel, Jesus observes that in spite of having been fed with their fill of loaves, the crowd was not yet satisfied. They came to Capernaum looking for him. To remedy their emptiness, Jesus offers them the assurance that lasting happiness can be found in him. “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

Such reassuring words! To celebrate that truth, Catholics have gathered countless times to celebrate Eucharist, a sacramental moment of thanksgiving wherein we partake of bread and wine that have become for us the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ himself. The Catechism teaches that the Eucharist keeps us moving in the right direction by separating us from sin, those acts that draw us away from God and lasting happiness.

Should life seem empty for you at the moment, Paul provides a useful prescription. He is urging us to lay aside the old self of our former way of life, corrupted by deceitful desires, and acquire a fresh spiritual way of thinking. We can do this by putting “on the new self, created in God’s way in righteousness and holiness of truth.”

Does what you value guide you toward God’s kingdom? At times we bypass Paul’s advice. After all, ridding ourselves of our self-centeredness isn’t an easy thing to do. Yet as Paul notes, if we are to acquire a fresh spiritual way of thinking, we cannot be both pagan and Christian. Otherwise, we could find ourselves becoming less Christian in our way of thinking, judging, and acting since we live in a society that is saturated with non-Christian values.

To be truly Christian being with Christ must be our ultimate goal in life. “Have faith in me,” Jesus tells us. Like tourists on a vacation, we are often tempted to veer off course with countless daily distractions and temptations yet the direction for getting to lasting happiness is simple. That route is daily prayer. Be renewed in Christ each day through prayer and you are likely to remain on course in your pursuit of lasting happiness, namely the kingdom of heaven.

Soon we will share the Bread of Life and as we do, let’s ask for the grace never to forget the great truth that Jesus teaches in today’s gospel. May God give us the wisdom to live lives grounded in this food, the Bread of Life that endures beyond the fleeting and the perishable, and feeds us for our lifelong journey to the dwelling place of God.

Anyone who has ever complained about water spots on their glasses following a sprinkling rite ought to count their blessings! Would you rather be sprinkled with blood as a reminder of our covenantwith God?

The ritual described in Exodus sounds gory. Splashing blood on the altar and then on the people, Moses said, “This is the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made with you.” The Israelites viewed blood as the source of life from the mother’s womb to the moment the heart stopped beating. As ordinary as blood is, its presence leaves an impression. I’ll never forget seeing Jacqueline Kennedy returning from Dallas in her pink suit stained with her late husband’s blood.

Moses used blood to seal the covenant between God and the Hebrew peoples in the Sinai. Being a word we don’t use often, we could confuse covenant with contract. A contract is a legal document while a covenant is a relationship, a lasting bond between two parties. One example of covenant is a sacramental marriage, a permanent relationship between a man and a woman made in the presence of God.

Throughout the Hebrew scripture, God repeatedly offered a covenant for one reason: to be passionately one with us. “You will be my people and I will be your God.” For the Hebrew people, this solemn bond was nothing trivial. They pledged fidelity to God’s commandments. With one voice, they answered, “We will do everything the Lord has told us.”

If a covenant is to survive, both parties must fulfill their obligations. While God never fails to keep the divine end of the deal, we fail to keep our end whenever we sin. In ancient Jerusalem, when the people desired to atone for their sins, the priests of the temple would slay sacrificial animals, then sprinkle blood and ashes on the penitents.

Jesus radically altered this practice, shedding not the blood of animals but his own blood on the cross for our sins. The Eucharistic prayers remind us of what happened. “When supper was ended, he took the chalice and, once more giving thanks, he gave it to his disciples, saying, ‘this is the chalice of my blood, the blood of the new and eternal covenant, which will be poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins.’”

Jesus is telling his disciples that he is totally giving them himself, complete, whole and very much alive. His message did not have a lasting impression on all believers however.

The letter to the Hebrews was written to an early Christian community in danger of turning away from Christ and his new covenant. They were on the verge of returning to their old faith and the covenant offered by Moses but the letter offers a logical concern. “If the blood of goats and bulls can sanctify those who are defiled so that their flesh is cleansed, how much more will the blood of Christ cleanse our consciences from dead works to worship the living God.”

Many Catholics have entertained the same notion of turning away from the Eucharist. Their choice to do so reminds me of a couple sitting on their porch during a sunset. They had both worked hard that day and in the cool breeze of the evening, the man dozed off. His wife watched what became a stunning beautiful sunset. She woke her husband to tell him what was happening. “Dear,” he mumbled, “it’s just another sunset” and he went back to sleep. 

If we are tempted to think of the Eucharist as a very ordinary event, then we fail to appreciate the fullest love God has for us. What can we do when we think of the Eucharist as just another ordinary or even boring encounter with God?

The opening line of today’s psalm asked, “How shall I make a return to the Lord for all the good he has done for me?” The question is quickly answered, “The cup of salvation I will take up, and I will call upon the name of the Lord.”

Each of us can experience God’s love as deeply as we choose to. Each of us can experience God’s love freely if we dare to honestly answer this one question. If Jesus died for me, how might I die for him?

Something will always die in us when we love deeply and selflessly. Doing what we know is right in the sight of God is not always easy or popular in the sight of others. By offering his body and blood very concretely, Jesus established the new covenant. When we share in the Lord’s Supper, we repay the goodness of the Lord by laying our own flesh and blood on the line. Nothing less.

I suspect many who receive communion see themselves as only being recipients of Jesus Christ. But there is more to the Eucharist than receiving the Lord. We affirm our acceptance of our covenantwith God. The original intent of this feast was to remind us that we are also the body of Christ, a congregation of believers, a gathering of the community of faith. As the body of Christ, we exist for the sake of others.  We are expected to bring the real presence of Jesus to them by what we say and do. The grace of this sacrament empowers us to honor our covenant by doing so, namely “we will do everything that the Lord has told us.”

Jesus nourishes us with his body and blood so that we in turn can nourish the world with our body and blood, that is, with love and compassion we make others aware that Jesus Christ is truly present in the world around us.

In the classic comic strip, Shoe, irascible Shoe is at the counter trying to attract a woman sitting at the next stool. “Listen,” Shoe says, “I don’t mean to be a pest. You say the word and I am out of here.” She responds, “Why that is very sweet of you.” She then says, “Commitment.” When she turns around, the entire place is empty.

Fortunately for us, that didn’t happen when Jesus spoke much the same message to the disciples shortly before he ascended into heaven. His ascension became a moment of commitment for the disciples. They could have gone back to their past lives: fishing, collecting taxes, whatever, but they didn’t. Jesus had entrusted them with the mission to go forth from Jerusalem to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. “Go into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature.” Since then, the Church has done just that, living up to its name, “Catholic,” which means universal.

Little did the apostles realize what was in store for them when they asked Jesus, “Are you going to restore the kingdom?” Indeed he would, but not in the manner they ever imagined. The Church has since then become the most widespread faith in the world. What has drawn so many to the Catholic faith is that the Church continually shows us how to best live our lives, bringing about God’s kingdom, for example, safely guarding and respecting all life from conception to natural death and caring for our planet.

Like many of you, I am a “cradle” Catholic, baptized as an infant because my mother was intent on raising her children in the Catholic faith. As a young adult, I made the personal decision to remain Catholic, inspired largely by my father, who became Catholic while stationed in Korea a year before he died.

My father’s family was not Catholic. Growing up, I assumed that his family had been Protestant for generations. While in the seminary, I was surprised to learn that I had distant cousins who were Catholic and that my great grandfather left the Church when he remarried after being widowed. Is that the work of the Holy Spirit that a century later, I, his great grandson, would become a priest?

While I was growing up, my father rarely went to church. I never asked him what prompted him to become Catholic but the change I saw in him inspired me to remain Catholic while in college and become involved in campus ministry. Never underestimate the impact your faith has, not just on your family and friends but also on future generations.

Although this feast brought Jesus’ earthly mission to a close, his final words were more of a commencement address than a farewell discourse. In effect, he challenged the apostles to go forth and make a difference in the world around them by proclaiming the good news to every creature.

What he charged then is the same mission Jesus entrusts to us today. He isn’t sending us out on our own to stand on some street corner in Langley, thumping a Bible and preaching to anyone who would listen. The promise of the Father that Luke mentions in our first reading is the Holy Spirit, who empowers us at our baptism and confirmation to be witnesses to the faith we profess. We do this best by striving to live our faith in its entirety, adhering to Christ-centered moral values, caring, loving and respecting others, summed up for us as the corporal works of mercy.

A popular folk song that I first heard in college at Mass sums up our mission well: “They’ll know we are Christians by our Love.” Setting an example by loving others, being patient with those who annoy us, forgiving those who have offended us, working side by side to create a better world by striving to respect all life from conception to natural death and all peoples regardless of their gender or race are examples of how we can effectively proclaim the gospel message that God loves us unconditionally. Act toward others just as we hope Christ would act toward us at our last judgment. After all, actions do speak louder than words. St. Francis said to preach the gospel and use words if necessary.

There is the notion in education that we never truly learn a subject until we teach it ourselves. For good reason, Jesus is calling on us to proclaim the good news. Doing so, we better know what being Catholic entails. If you need a refresher course, pick up your bible during the week and read a chapter from one of the gospels. Witnessing to Jesus is the mission entrusted to us, but for that to happen, we must first strive to deepen our relationship with the Lord and better understand what he is asking of us as his followers.

I think of the Ascension as the moment in a relay race in which Jesus passed the baton on to the disciples, which in due time has been passed on to us to pass on to others. Your personal testimony and conviction evidenced by your love and commitment to Christ, could very well make a lasting impression on someone in your life, just as my father did on me when I was a teenager.

Today and for the next two Sundays, our Gospels have a special message for those whom the Church calls the elect, folks who will be baptized at the Easter Vigil. Today, we heard the story of the woman at the well. Next Sunday we will hear the story of the man born blind and on the following Sunday, the story of Lazarus being raised from the dead. These stories are not just for the Elect, they are vitally important for the rest of us as well. The Church is using these gospels to help all of us look into our lives, examine our hearts, to know and name where we thirst, and to ask ourselves, “Is God there for us?”

Lets consider the woman at the well. None of us have literally traveled her path. We haven’t had to trek many miles to any well at high noon to tote water back to our homes. Instead, we take water for granted. With the turn of the tap, we have clean safe water for drinking, bathing, cooking and washing. Unlike the Israelites in the desert, I doubt any of us ever experienced thirst that left us grumbling.

On the other hand, we may relate to the thirst expressed by the Samaritan woman. She is craving for something more than plain stagnant water to quench her physical thirst. Scandalized at first that Jesus, a Jew, would converse with her, much less ask a favor, she listens to what he has to say and realizes that what he has to offer is of more value that all the water she could ever draw from the cistern.

Jesus points out that the water he has to offer is living water, even better than the flowing water she first envisioned, which sounded so refreshing beneath the midday sun. “Everyone,” Jesus asserts, “who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I shall give will never thirst.”

Jesus is making a point that is often ignored. Our souls thirst just as our bodies do. If you are feeling spiritually empty, you are yearning for God. We may not realize that because our lives are filled with many distractions, which we are tempted into believing will bring us the lasting satisfaction we seek.

If you are feeling empty, despite all that you have (a place to call home, clothes to keep you warm and dry, food to nourish and sustain you, and companions who journey with you), that means there is a gaping hole in your heart, a hole that only God can fill.

Since this encounter at the well, human nature hasn’t changed much. We spend much energy and time trying to fill the emptiness of our hearts with something other than God, as though we are trying to plug a round hole with a square peg. Whatever our indulgences may be, sooner or later, we will learn that they can’t quench the thirst of our inner being.

Trying to quench our spiritual thirst with material things is like trying to satisfy our physical thirst with salt water. The more we drink, the thirstier we get. Describing this as spiritual restlessness, St. Augustine points out, “Our hearts are made for God, and they will not rest, until they rest in God.”

One doctor, known for the Christian principles he practiced, was seldom seen without a beautiful fresh rosebud in the lapel of his suit. It remained fresh for a long time because he kept the stem in a small vial of water hidden behind the lapel. The doctor would explain that just as the rose was kept fresh with the water in the vial, the secret of beautiful and fragrant Christian living lies in drawing refreshment from the living water of Jesus.

That is a message many people across the country have been discovering. Invited by someone in their lives “to come and see” what believing in Jesus is all about, they are now discovering for themselves through prayer, discernment and instruction, the joy of becoming a Catholic. Like the Samaritans in the gospel, those preparing for baptism at the Easter Vigil are realizing that Jesus is the source of living water that will bring them eternal life.

We who are already Catholic may have forgotten just how refreshing the living water of Jesus can be. We come here to have our hunger satisfied in the Eucharist, but are we giving Jesus the opportunity to quench our spiritual thirst the rest of the week?

Lent calls us to reflect and scrutinize seriously on our own faith journey. Are you striving to draw closer to Christ through prayer, alms giving and fasting? Are you giving witness to the Gospel in what you say and do?

If not, what’s stopping you? Perhaps your faith is a head-trip, rather than a journey of the heart.  Our relationship with Jesus, however, demands more than simply knowing the principles for being a Catholic. Jesus is inviting us to a deeper faith that calls for holding on to values and moral choices, however counter-cultural they may be.

Admittedly, drawing closer to God isn’t easy. Moving into a mature faith relationship confronts our usual way of acting and thinking. But just think, if we would truly accept the challenge Jesus gives us, we would no longer find ourselves thirsting for what really matters. Like the Samaritans, we would say to others what some have said to the elect, “We know that this is truly the savior of the world.”