Preaching


The OP after our names stands for “Order of Preachers,” the formal name of the religious order founded in 1216 by St. Dominic. As Dominicans, we preach with our lives—in both word and deed—guided by a search for truth (veritas) and a commitment to contemplate and share the fruits of our contemplation (contemplate et aliis tradere). 

Our Dominican lives are shaped by the interconnecting movements of study, prayer, communal life, and ministry. 

Dominic so firmly believed in the importance of study to the preaching mission that he provided a rule of “dispensation” from other responsibilities in the event they interfered with study. We are women committed to study. Through prayer and contemplation we interiorize our learnings and enter into communion with the Source of all truth. Our communal life orients us to the common good of the whole Earth community. And in ministry, our preaching takes effect.

As women of the Gospel, our preaching is also expressed in word. Read reflections on the Word of God posted by Adrian Dominican Sisters and Associates on the Praedicare Blog below.

 


Holy Thursday 2022
Preaching by Sister Mary Margaret Pachucki, OP

April 14, 2022

Sister Mary Margaret Pachucki, OP

This evening as we celebrate Holy Thursday, we recall the final meal that Jesus had with his friends before his crucifixion. This is implied rather than explicitly mentioned. There is no actual breaking of bread and pouring of wine in John’s gospel. What we do have is Jesus washing the feet of his closest friends.

I would like to reflect on this intimate gesture from two perspectives: First, from the perspective of receiving love and being served; second, from the perspective of giving love and serving others.

Receiving Love and Being Served

As we heard in Tuesday’s gospel reading from John 13, Jesus knows Judas will betray him and that in the coming hours each one of his closest friends will fail him. And so, Jesus is not surprised when Peter first refuses to have his feet washed. Peter is bewildered, unprepared to receive this generous act of love.

He may have been out of his comfort zone to accept such a powerful expression of Jesus’ love for him. Like Peter, the disciples feel unworthy of Jesus’ unconditional love, but it is not theirs to deserve. Despite their shortfalls and inadequacies, Jesus freely gives them the gift of his love.

The only time we usually let someone else wash our feet is when we can’t do it ourselves: we’re too young, too old, or too sick. To wash another person’s feet is a very intimate act. In her poem “God in an Apron,” Macrina Wiederkehr describes Jesus’ actions with these words:

…He touched my feet
He held them in his strong brown hands
He washed them.

I can still feel the water
I can still feel the touch of his hands
I can still see the look in his eyes.

Many people are not comfortable with this degree of intimacy with another person, or do not feel “good enough” to have others show them this much love. We often are accustomed to seeing the face of Jesus in others that we serve, but it is difficult sometimes to see Jesus’s face in those who wish to serve us. We need to be open to receive Jesus’ love through the hands, and feet, and hearts of others. They have been called by Jesus to be servant, to be Jesus for us.

Giving Love and Serving Others

Holy Thursday has deep roots in selflessness, a call to service and putting the interest of others first. As scripture often does, John’s words invite us to go deeper into the spiritual quest that is ours.

In her poem Macrina continues her reflection of Jesus’s actions with these words:

…He then handed me the towel and said,
“As I have done so you must do.”

Let your tenderness encircle everyone you meet.
Wash their feet
Not because you have to,
Because you want to.

As people of the Eucharist, you and I are called to be people of the basin and towel. Jesus hands us the apron, the towel and water basin. We are invited to emulate this Jesus through lives of loving service to others. We wash feet when we make a phone call to a friend. We wash feet when we smile at someone and wish him or her a bright “Good Morning.” We wash feet when we write to our Congressperson to support a proposed bill to enhance human welfare.

Bread and Wine, basin and towel. These symbols are at the very center of our identity as followers of Jesus. They are countercultural because they challenge the “Me First” thinking that often prevails in our society. They signify an approach to life different from the one that tells us to look after the needs of others only after we have taken care of our own needs.

Jesus asks us to love each other as he loves us. Love is not simply an emotion or feeling; it is a decision. Our love for each other calls to be seen and experienced practically and expressed through the quality and actions of our daily lives. When we love and serve each other, we do it in memory of Jesus.

On this first day of the Triduum, we recognize God’s unfailing gift of undeserved, unconditional, and unifying love for us. Let us ask for the grace to respond to God’s call to love and serve one another and to let others love and serve us. Let us do this in memory of Jesus.

 


Palm Sunday 2022
Preaching by Sister Elise García, OP

April 10, 2022
Luke 22:14 - 23:56

Sister Elise Garcia, OP

As we celebrate this Palm Sunday, with a bright sunny day marking the final days of our Lenten journey, our readings from Luke’s Gospel reflect the pivot we are again about to take.

We entered the chapel waving palms in a joyful procession. After hearing the Passion, we are now left in the shadow of an excruciating death that devastated all the hope that Jesus had inspired through his radical love and Way of being.

Jesus himself intuited what lay ahead. He prayed that God would “remove this cup from me” – yet accepted what seemed inevitable precisely because of his Way. He emptied himself, as Saint Paul wrote. Humbled himself.

It would not become clear until the women returned to the tomb after the Sabbath that a much larger story was at work here, in the shadow of this gruesome death. It is a story that is as alive today – in the shadow of gruesome deaths in Ukraine – as it was then. It is alive today in the shadow of whatever anguish we each might carry in our hearts.

English mystic Julian of Norwich put it this way: “There is a force of love moving through the universe that holds us fast and will never let us go.”

Etty Hillesum, a Jewish girl in the harrowing misery of a Nazi concentration camp, spoke of a feeling that soared “straight from my heart – like some elementary force – … that life is glorious and magnificent, and that one day we shall be building a whole new world."

Twentieth century African-American mystic Howard Thurman said in his Lenten prayer: “Listen to the long stillness. New life is stirring … Humankind is forging a new mind. God is at work. This is the season of Promise.”

As we step into this Holy Week, let us turn our hearts to one another, emptying ourselves, humbling ourselves, readying ourselves to feel – and to be – the force of love moving through the universe.

It is holding us fast and will never let us go.

 


Feast of the Three Kings 2022
Preaching by Sister Patty Harvat, OP

January 2, 2022

Sister Patricia Harvat, OP

Happy feast of the Three Kings – Feliz dia de los reyes – Kapistahan ng Tatbng Hari

Throughout history, different countries have expressed the revelation of God Incarnate through their particular culture. For example, in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic the children cut grass and put it in a small box under their bed the night before for the camels to eat and also water for them to drink. And the next day they find the presents the Three Kings brought for them. 

The Three Kings came bearing gifts. Gifts reveal something of the person giving it. It reveals a sense of what that person thinks you would like or need, often based on their relationship with you. And then of course there always is the reaction to the gift by the recipient… sometimes spoken out loud and sometimes spoken with an inner voice. And the reaction can vary with the age of the recipient. For instance, a small child with wonder in their face and eyes might say, "Wow I was hoping I would get this!" Or an adolescent might react with the words, "What were you thinking? What am I supposed to do with this?" Or an adult might say, with deep gratitude, "This is beautiful. It means so much to me."

This morning let us imagine that the Three Kings are represented in God’s image and likeness... a God who encompasses the image and likeness of all cultures and all languages. And our gifts surround a very large tree called General Chapter of 2022. We have been gifted with three lovely wrapped packages and we have been invited by one another to unwrap them. 

The first gift is of awakening.

The second gift is of encuentro

The third gift is of transformative change.

What has been your response as you hold the first gift of awakening? Holding it gently, wondering what does this new way of thinking mean? New words that I may not be familiar with connecting God, creation and myself. A new consciousness.

Our second gift of encuentro is quite large and inside there are three smaller boxes of people we know, people in need, and our Earth. It’s hard to embrace because of it’s size and weight. We gaze on it and ponder who will we be with each other? How will we be with each other after our prayer-filled encuentros during these months?

Our third gift of transformative change is a curious looking box, that opens our eyes to discover new things. It’s difficult to open and find we need help from others to unwrap and find what lies inside.

Our Incarnate God is made manifest to us in these gifts. Holy Mystery gifts us with what we need at this time. And our responses as women of faith we now say, “I was hoping this is what I would receive, it’s what I needed," or "I wonder what this means for me in my life?" Or we simply turn our face to God and say with deep gratitude, 

Divine Love, we receive these gifts with our desire to live a fully authentic, loving life. Who and how will we be with one another? What is our Epiphany? What Epiphany does the world await from us? 

Enkindle our creative fire. 

Awaken us to Love – to your love, our love for one another, and our love for this created world we live in.

Post script:  One of the humble privileges of being called into servant leadership in the Congregation these five and a half years is the gift we are given to preach and to pray with you. I was struck yesterday in listening to Elise’s homily how each of us has gifted you with reflections this Christmas season that hopefully have enabled you to deepen your understanding of the Incarnation. Pat and Fran spoke to the light we bear to others, Mary Margaret talked of the many families we are a part of, Elise spoke to the contemplative silence of our ponderings, and our thoughts today on our awakening prayer will continue to provide more reflection on who and how we want to be with each other in 2022.  

For this we say: Thank you – Gracias Señor – Maraming Salamat.

 


New Year's Day 2022
Preaching by Sister Elise García, OP

January 1, 2022

Sister Elise Garcia, OP

Happy New Year! ¡Feliz Año Nuevo! Manigong Bagong Taon! Sana Saeeda!

I think we are all – all of us around the world – more than ready for this new year. One we hope and pray, among many other things, will mark the end of the global Covid-19 pandemic. 

It is a rarity that people throughout the world experience the same hardship. The whole Earth is groaning under the weight of this pandemic, now entering its third year. And it has become clear that until we start seeing ourselves as a whole-Earth community, a single people of God – interconnected and interdependent – we will continue to be susceptible to new variants and continue to prolong this historic pandemic. 

How good it is then that on this first day of the new year our Church throughout the world honors Mary, the Mother of God. A day when most of us, no doubt, are, like her, pondering many things in our hearts. 

In today’s Gospel, we are drawn into an intimate touching scene: A humble stable in a small town in Judea – a distant outpost of the Roman empire – out of which a speck of Divine light shines into the vast darkness of space as Earth makes its ambling orbit.

As the shepherds enter the stable and share the good news of great joy that an angel had proclaimed to them, all were amazed. “But Mary,” as Luke tells us, “treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart.”

That’s a vibrant image for us to hold in our hearts: A young Mary, in deep contemplation of an amazing event that filled her heart with joy but also, perhaps, tinged it with an inchoate sense of the crushing sorrows to come.

I have been reading Carmelite Sister Constance Fitzgerald’s extraordinary essays1 and talks2 on the dark night and contemplative prayer, our “inheritance from the mystics.” Suffering is at the core of it, she says – whether our own suffering or that of others or of the world. It is in this contemplative prayer, in the darkness of our experience of suffering, of impasse, that we can open ourselves to the “secret inflow of God’s love into our lives.” An inflow of God that Connie says “changes our identity, changes our consciousness.”

Are we not witnessing, in Luke’s story, the inflow of God’s love changing Mary’s identity, changing her consciousness? An inflow of love that, over time, begins to change the world through the power of the Divine light she birthed into being that is also alive in each one of us.

Connie says that today we are called to enter into a new consciousness – what she calls a “Christ consciousness” – that our troubled world urgently needs. It’s a consciousness that arises out of the dark night in contemplative prayer. A silent prayer in our hearts that opens space for the inflow of God’s love, uniting us with Christ and his way of being – one with God, one with Spirit, and one with every person and creature on Earth.

Entering into a Christ consciousness is an awakening that enables us to see our whole Earth community as one body, emerging from the same speck of Divine light. It’s an evolution of consciousness, Connie says, that humanity needs in order to address racism, white supremacy, climate chaos, the extinction of species, and all the divisions that are tearing us apart. It’s the awakening we need to ensure that all people in our Covid-infected world, north and south, have access to life-saving vaccinations. 

We Dominicans have dedicated our lives to reflection, to contemplating and sharing the fruits of our contemplation, to following the Way of the one Mary brought to life. That Spirit-filled vow continues to deepen in each of our hearts, even as with age or unexpected circumstances our eyes and ears, our minds and bodies fail us in challenging ways. Each of us is uniquely suited, as Connie beckons us, to be pioneers of the evolution of human consciousness in our time. To let the inflow of God’s love permeate our lives for whatever time we have remaining, and to illuminate that love for the good of the whole Earth community – into the distant future.

Holy Mary, Mother of God. Pray for us, as we bring the Christ light that was first illuminated in your humble heart deep into ours – on this day and throughout this sparkling new year.


_____

1 See Laurie Cassidy and M. Shawn Copeland, Desire, eds. Darkness and Hope: Theology in a Time of Impasse, Engaging the Thought of Constance Fitzgerald, OCD (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2021).
2 Notes from “Conversation with Janet Ruffing, RSM, and Constance Fitzgerald, OCD,” in Transforming Spirituality in a Time of Plague, online presentations sponsored by the Carmelite Sisters of Baltimore, Maryland, November 12-13, 2021.
 


Feast of the Holy Family
Preaching by Sister Mary Margaret Pachucki, OP

December 26, 2021
1 Sm 1:20-22, 24-28
Lk 2:41-52

Sister Mary Margaret Pachucki, OP The Feast of the Holy Family is an essential part of the Christmas Season. It makes clear that the Incarnation means not just that the Divine Word assumed a human body, but entered into every aspect of human life.

Today we hear the stories of the awakening of two prophetic leaders to their Divine Call.

The first reading recounts an old story of Samuel, the prophetic leader who anointed David as king. The Old Testament story is a legend that serves as an introduction to a collection of historical traditions in which Samuel plays a key role. Well, one of the interesting things is that in Jewish tradition – not the Bible, but in Jewish tradition – the boy Samuel was 12 years old when he went into the tabernacle and was called by God, heard the voice of God, and began to prophesy.

What some scholars have suggested is that one of the reasons Luke tells us that Jesus was 12 years old is because he wants to reveal to us that Jesus, likewise, is coming into his own and into his role as priest and prophet and king. What Luke offers is a glimpse of Jesus beginning to make the break from his family life in order to commit himself more closely to God. Jesus is bringing to light his divine vocation. He has found his voice and taken his place. That voice and place is “in his father’s house.”

The setup for Jesus’ coming out and entrance into the religious community is a family trip. On this particular trip, the twelve-year-old and his parents became separated. Since children in ancient times transitioned into adulthood around the age of thirteen, the disappearance of Jesus may not have been all that traumatic, young as he was. It would have been typical for a twelve-year-old boy, who was coming of age, to be with the men of the group, rather than his parents. It would have been natural for Mary and Joseph to believe that he was with relatives or friends elsewhere in the caravan returning home. Entire villages were known to make the pilgrimage together.

When the Mary and Joseph finally realized he was not in the caravan, they went back in haste to Jerusalem, and after three days, were astonished to find Jesus in the midst of the temple rabbis. When Mary speaks to him, there is great distress in her voice: “Son, why Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety."

Jesus replied, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”

Mary struggles to make sense of her young son’s response and just as she pondered in her heart the inspired events of Bethlehem, Mary chooses to keep these temple events in her heart as well. In this, we recognize the ongoing fidelity of Mary, as she came to accept and identify with the response of her Son, as the first of all his disciples. She begins to know the ‘sword’ Simeon foretold would ‘pierce her soul.’

Today is the Feast of the Holy Family. Is this story the reason for the feast? Or is it that Joseph, Mary and Jesus each possessed a unique identity, but together they experienced God’s eruption into their lives? Opening their hearts to God interrupted and changed the course of their lives radically. Mary became a contemplative at heart. Joseph became deeply attuned to the silence within. And Jesus incarnated the presence of the compassionate God-with-us.

Jesus fully enters into the human experience, with all its peaks and valleys. And a part of that human experience, with more than its share of peaks and valleys, is family. The Gospel story ends with these words: “He went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them; and Jesus advanced in wisdom and age and favor before God.”  Jesus discerned, understood and embraced his divine vocation as he lived each day with his family.

St. Paul in his letter to the Colossians reminds us that we are God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved. Pope Francis wrote in Gaudete Et Exsultate, “The important thing is that each believer discern his or her own path, that they bring out the very best of themselves, the most personal gifts that God has placed in their hearts. Like Jesus, how many of us discerned our own path in life and the most personal gifts that God has placed in our hearts in the environment of family?

So on this day, I invite you to pause and think about the “Holy” families that have been an integral and precious part of your life. For me this list includes my Family of Birth, my Family of Faith, my Family of Choice, the Adrian Dominican Congregation, my Family of Dominic, my Multi-cultural Family in our world, and my Family of Earth. I also include the families of friendship and support that were part of my life during my many years in ministry.

In each of these precious families, I discovered and grew in my unique identity and call in life as God’s chosen one, holy and beloved.

In these families, God was and continues to be revealed to me through the heartfelt compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, and forgiveness of my parents; my siblings; you, my religious sisters; my friends and co-ministers; the people of other nations, especially South Africa; and my family of Sacred Earth. I am also thankful for the times and ways I offered these same gifts to those in each of my families.

So on this day I invite you to reflect on the list of “holy” families you have come to treasure in your life. Give thanks and praise for the many ways God was revealed to you in each family and for the many ways you revealed God to them. Today we celebrate the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph and our Holy Families. Let us rejoice and be glad.
 


Christmas Day 2021
Preaching by Sister Frances Nadolny, OP

December 25, 2021

Sister Frances Nadolny, OP

Good Morning and Happy Christmas Day!

“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.” These are the opening words of today’s Gospel and the opening words of the Gospel according to John. Scripture scholars indicate that the author was probably embellishing an old liturgical hymn of the day in order to awaken us to something new: that God, the Creator, from the beginning, was becoming one with humanity.  

John continues, “What came to be was life and this life was the light of the human race.” Theologian Elizabeth Johnson commented in an interview that this unimaginably gracious Creator God was not confined and that we human persons were the recipients of Christ, the light. And, for me, to think that the Creator chose a woman, Mary, to be a partner in this endeavor is a gift in itself.

We use lights in many different ways. And I propose to you on this Christmas Day:  Who is Christ the Light for you? Is your Christ light the one that guides you out of the dark into new insights that enable you to live a life focused on the other, as Jesus learned from the Samaritan woman? Has the Christ light turned on and awakened you to a new appreciation for the other?   

Is your Christ light the one that is bright and shiny and multi-colored, that enables you to bring joy in the simplest of ways as Jesus did at the wedding in Cana? Or is your Christ light the more natural one that awakens you in the morning and gently puts you to sleep in the evening? Has this Christ light awakened you to be less stressed and as beautiful and trusting as the birds of the air or the lilies of the field?

Or perhaps your Christ light is like those little emergency lanterns that enable you to bring healing of body, mind or spirit by your listening or reaching out, as Jesus did with the lepers or being with Martha and Mary as they mourned their brother or as he welcomed Zaccheus.

I know that our experiences of Christmas are different with words like nostalgic, heart-warming for some, heart-wrenching for others, joyful or sad, crowded with people – or alone and lonely. But, on this Christmas Day, we are together in this chapel, in these buildings, on our livestream. We are a community unique to this day. We celebrate, as John wrote, that what came to be was life and this life was the light. Let us be true gift-givers this season as each of us shares our unique Christ light with those who most need to see it.


Christmas Eve
Preaching by Prioress Sister Patricia Siemen, OP

December 24, 2021

Again, a Merry Christmas to each of you! As we gather in the midst of Christmas lights glowing here in Chapel, and hopefully in your homes, we are mindful of the opening verse of tonight’s first reading from the Prophet Isaiah. “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light: those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them light has shone.”

This feels particularly fitting tonight, after a year of so many different kinds of darkness and shadows pervading our lives. Again, as Isaiah promises: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light: those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them light has shone.” May this be so as we remember and celebrate the simple birth of Jesus, born to Mary and Joseph. This child, who revealed to all creation that it is truly incarnated with Divine Love and Light, called himself, “the Light of the World.”

Luke’s Gospel tonight also speaks of light: the great light that the shepherds saw while “keeping their flock by night.” Interestingly, Luke adds, “and the shepherds were terrified” by this light, wondering what it could mean, yet decided to follow the light of the Star leading to the stable where the babe lay. Perhaps there are times when we too are fearful when we experience Divine Light shining in our and through our lives. We wonder, what does this light mean for me? 

As we lean into the Light, we discover that we can trust it and live by its light providing guidance and inspiration. Sometimes we see this light shining in others. Other times it shines through us and others can see by our light. We become, like the child of Bethlehem, humble light-bearers in times of darkness and joy.

Christmas is a time of many lights, and has many specific cultural expressions across the world. For example, I remember being in the Philippines during Advent a few years ago the City of San Fernando, Pampanga, was filled with colorful lighted “lanterns”; there were neighborhood and regional competitions for the most beautiful lantern displays. 

Jesus identified himself as “the Light of the World.” How we hope that this “light of the world’ continues to shine in and around our fractured world. Tonight we are mindful of so many who are spending Christmas in the midst of grieving loved ones who died due to the global coronavirus pandemic. We remember that last year at this time we were just beginning to experience the deluge of COVID-19 cases that took place right here on our own campus. We continue grieving the ongoing consequences of a devastating, disturbing, disrupted democracy in our nation as we approach the first year anniversary of the insurrection in Washington, DC. 

So people may rightly ask, where is the Light of the World in the midst of such political and physical violence? Where is the Divine Light of the World in the midst of ongoing racial, gun and immigration violence? 

I submit my friends that the Light of the World shows up and shines in and through people like you; people who are unknown and unseen, yet care about the well-being of others. People who are humble, vulnerable, ordinary folks like our families and ourselves. Anyone who has the quiet courage to be a beacon of light as they care for others in need, like the frontline medical personnel. Truly, they are at the forefront of our shining lights. Plus the teachers who work so diligently to keep a love of learning alive among our children. They are our beacons of light and hope for so many of us. 

Indeed, our world is filled with ordinary light-bearers and at times like Christmas, we celebrate and honor their many gifts of light. This is what Christmas, the birth of Divinity as human child, has done for us: It makes all of us into lights for the world. We are each to give birth to the Divine Light that is uniquely ours to radiate.

As I conclude tonight, I want to mention two symbols that are glimmering light here in Chapel tonight. The first, behind me on my right, is the stunning panel of green and purple hues that our dear INAI artists, Sisters Barbara Chenicek and Rita Schlitz created for St. Patrick parish near Dallas, Texas many years ago. That church has since been dismantled and we now have some of the beautiful panels that Barb and Rita designed and sewed – along with the prayers and stitches of those parishioners. Tonight this beautiful panel shimmers its light for all of us to see and appreciate on this beautiful feast. 

The other symbol is behind me on my left: the simple, unadorned Christmas tree with its host of tiny white lights providing a warm mantle light. As I looked at it early this week, its flickering lights reminded me of the 213 sisters whose lights have gone out on Earth over these past 5 ½ years since our team took office; yet they remain shimmering as light-bearers, providing light, wisdom and guidance to those of us who remain behind. Their lights, along with the lights of all of our beloved Sisters who have gone before us, continue to provide light to all of us. Despite death, their inner, divine light did not go out. Rather, they are now like the stars in night sky – pouring forth their light upon all of us and cheering our weary world onward!    

We give thanks to these light-bearers for their star-studded lives, and for their faithful following of the babe of Bethlehem, the Light of the Christ. On this Christmas 2021, let us rejoice in the ongoing birth of Divine Light in our midst. May we each radiate a ray of light that shines uniquely through us, and rejoice as we say, O Come, Light of the World!


 


Easter Sunday
Preaching by Sister Elise D. García, OP

April 4, 2021

Scripture Readings:
Acts 10: 34a, 37-43
Corinthians 5: 6b-8
John 20: 1-10

Here we are on this glorious Easter morning! And yet the Gospel passage the Church gives us for reflection today is, well, not quite so glorious. 

It is not one of the scenes of the risen Christ, like the passage that immediately follows where Jesus appears to Mary Magdalen as a gardener whom she recognizes as soon as he calls her by name. Or the passage after that when Jesus appears that evening to the disciples, entering the locked house where they hide in fear, showing them his wounds and breathing the Holy Spirit on them. Or the passage after that when, a week later, Jesus appears to the doubting Thomas and blesses those who have not seen yet come to believe. 

No, this passage holds no such beloved familiar scenes, no such epiphanies. This passage leaves us suspended – perplexed, in confusion, not knowing. 

Something significant has happened: The stone on the tomb has been rolled away. The linen cloths that were wrapped around Jesus’ body, with a mixture of myrrh and aloes that weighed about a hundred pounds, are lying in one pile. The cloth that had been wrapped around his head was rolled up in a place by itself. The new unused tomb was once again empty. The body gone.

The disciples did not understand and returned home. And we know from the next passage that Mary Magdalene remained standing outside the tomb, weeping.

Is this not where we so often find ourselves? Knowing that something significant has happened but not yet able to make sense of it? Not yet knowing what it means or what comes next?

Is this not where we are right now with the coronavirus pandemic? It feels like we have reached a threshold moment, with so many of us vaccinated. Yet rising cases with new fast-spreading variants are keeping us suspended, still apart from one another. No fullness of new life just yet. There is still great weeping in the land. 

As I reflect on this passage, I realize that one of the things it does allow is for us to linger a bit longer in the reality, the crushing reality of the immense suffering that our ancestors in the faith – Mary, Peter, John and other very real women and men – were experiencing on this day, some 2000 years ago. As a people living under the yoke of a terrible oppression, with its daily indignities and constant threat of violence, one of their own was hung from a tree.  

And this one among them, Jesus, had given them hope for a new order where hatred, deception and fear would give way to a radical freedom and love that he himself preached and lived. This one among them, Jesus, preached a powerful liberating spirituality, as Black mystic Howard Thurman, PhD, wrote in his prophetic book, Jesus and the Disinherited.1

What do you preach to a people in a world where you are despised – as the occupying Romans despised the Jews, as white segregationists and supremacists despised Black people and other people of color – to this day? In Jesus, Dr. Thurman writes, we discover someone who issues a profound call to each and every one of us to live out of our “inward center” – out of the depths of our heart and soul – as he himself did. This profound liberation of heart and soul leads to an inner freedom, the kind the world witnessed in Nelson Mandela, when he walked out of prison “in graceful triumph”2 after 27 years of incarceration.

As we rightly celebrate the great joy of this day of new life, let us also accept the invitation to linger long enough by the tomb to remember how Jesus lived this new life, during his life, as one among the disinherited. Jesus calls us all to fulfill our own high destiny through a liberating spirituality of dedication and discipline, practiced daily in our current reality, living out of the inward center of our hearts and souls where we are all one in the Spirit.3

And for the gift of this new life, we give great thanks and sing, alleluia, alleluia!

 

1 See Howard Thurman, Jesus and the Disinherited (Boston: Beacon Press, 1996).
2 Vincent Harding, Foreword, Jesus and the Disinherited, xvi.
3 Thurman, 99.


Easter Vigil
Preaching by Prioress Sister Patricia Siemen, OP

April 3, 2021

As we hear the words from Mark’s Gospel, we find ourselves walking along with Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James, and Salome, as they approach the tomb where Jesus is buried. It is dawn, with the new day’s light breaking around them. They have just spent the Sabbath in darkness and anguish. They were present at the foot of the cross and witnessed the soldiers putting the nails into Jesus’ hands and feet, crucifying him, their loved one. They saw his side sliced open with a sword and witnessed the taking of his body off the cross and being laid in the tomb they were approaching now. They had to wait until the Sabbath was over before they could come to the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body with the aromatic spices they carefully carried with them, as was the Jewish custom.

We can hear them discussing their concern about how they will get into the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body for they know it was sealed closed by a huge stone set in front of it. With heavy hearts they discuss, “Who will roll the stone away for us?” Their hearts are heavy with grief and powerlessness at not being able to stop the brutal crucifixion of their loved one. No doubt, they worry about what will become of their vulnerable, remnant community without the Teacher being with them. However, they cannot speak of that right now. Instead, they worry about who will roll away the stone for them so they can lovingly anoint the body of their loved one. 

The question, “Who will roll away the stone for us so we can enter into the space where Jesus is present?” resonates within each of us. Who will roll away the stones that allow us to be reunited with our loved ones in the midst of a year-long pandemic? Who will roll away the stones of grief and isolation at not being able to have been present and at the side of loved ones as they died – and were buried without us and other family and friends to grieve them properly during this past year?  

Our hearts ache at the stones that continue to block our doors to receiving dear friends, family and favored guests. We anticipate the days when we can once again enter the doorways of our friends and loved ones freely, without any stones blocking our ability to eat together and touch those we love. 

Mark’s Gospel does not tell us who removed the stone in front of Jesus’ tomb; that is no longer important because the stone is no longer blocking contact with the Beloved. Stunned, the women enter the tomb, and are astonished, as they no longer encounter death. Rather, an angel sitting there tells them that Jesus is no longer in the tomb. In addition, he tells them, “Do not be amazed.” Really? Don’t be amazed at Jesus not being dead and lying in the tomb? One can almost hear the small glimmer of hope awakening in them. The words of the angel are strong and clear: “He has been raised; he is not here. Go and tell his disciples that he is going ahead of you on his way to Galilee.” 

Dare they believe this? Dare they believe that suffering, rejection, even death are not the last word? Dare they believe in the transformative power of God to raise up new life even out of death? Dare they believe in a new trajectory, a new pathway in the mystery of evolutionary time, that life transforms and continues, even after death?

So the women set forth in amazement – and puzzlement – to tell the others that they have just experienced a new awakening, a new surge of hope. Their joy and belief deepens as they tell the other disciples of their experience, “the teacher now lives and goes before us into Galilee. We can catch up with him there."

The Risen One goes before us too. We can travel with the Resurrected One as we go into the many Galilees of our daily lives. The Risen One stirs our imaginations and awakens us to the transformative changes lying before us, individually and as a community. 

In our beautifully resilient, yet fractured and broken world, we are drawn towards becoming women and men awakened to resilient hope, compassionate truth telling and transformative action. Called to join with all our sisters and brothers of good will who are also awakening to a new consciousness, we commit to remove the stones and boulders that block access God’s ways within our church and society. We particularly commit to removing the stones that block the fullness of life for all, especially the stones of racism and white privilege that are deeply buried within our institutions.

We go forth filled with hope and joy, and perhaps a little trepidation, as did Mary Magdalene, Mary, and Salome. May Easter joy ignite our creative fires of love and inclusion and burn through any stones that block our joy in the experience of abundant life of divine presence – and spring – rising in our midst!


Good Friday
Preaching by Sister Mary Margaret Pachucki, OP

April 2, 2021

Good Friday is the best love story we can ever imagine.

Love is total self-giving. 

And Jesus showed us the perfect example. 

He gave himself up for us: “There is no greater love than for one to lay down their life for another.”

Pope Francis, during his very first general audience said, "Living Holy Week means increasingly entering into God's logic, the logic of the Cross, which is not first of all that of pain and death, but of love and of self-giving that brings life. This is love extravagant.”

Ronald Rolheiser, in his book The Passion and the Cross, uses the image of a prism as he reflects on Jesus’ death on the cross. “If light is shone through a prism, the prism refracts the light, literally breaking it up so that we see inside it. And the result is exquisite.” 

The cross we adore today is a prism that refracts the breadth and depth of God’s love. We see right into the heart of God, and what we see, like the colors in a rainbow, is stunning and spectacularly beautiful. We see and learn who God really is, a God of unconditional love.

The mystery of the Passion of Christ is the mystery of God’s power and love transforming evil to good; darkness to light; despair and disbelief to hope and faith; and hatred to love.

May the the cross we reflect on today be a prism that sees right into our very being, that helps us refract the spectacularly beautiful and unconditional love of God to those who suffer from racism, discrimination of any kind, poverty, climate change, COVID-19, despair, and political divisions.

We are a living prisms of God’s love. Through our words, actions, and our very being, God’s love is made visible in our world.

Through our lives may we reflect the colors of the rainbow of God’s love and color the world beautiful.

Good Friday is truly the best love story we can ever imagine.



 

LINKS

word.op.org - International Dominican Preaching Page

Catholic Women Preach - Featuring deep spirituality and insights from women

Preach With Your Life - Video series by Adrian Dominican Sisters

 


 

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