30 May 2022

Monday of the Seventh Week of Easter

How can we have the kind of security and confidence in Jesus that he has in the Father? Today’s Gospel reading continues Jesus’ words to his disciples at the Last Supper which we have heard for several weeks now. And in this excerpt, Jesus tells the disciples that they will fall away and leave him, but in the next breath states, “But I am not alone, because the Father is with me” (John 16:32b). Despite the fact that Jesus knows he is going to his death, and despite the fact that he will soon experience a complete desolation and abandonment on the Cross, he nonetheless professes his confidence in and oneness with the Father.

As he says to the disciples, Jesus tells us this so that we might have peace in him (16:33a). In our prayer today, then, let us meditate on Jesus’ confidence in the Father, even on the eve of his abandonment, and let us pray for the gift of peace in him that he wants to share with us. Then we might live and act with courage, knowing that the Lord is present to us even when we too feel alone and abandoned.