{"id":3986,"date":"2016-05-15T10:05:59","date_gmt":"2016-05-15T14:05:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/?p=3986"},"modified":"2016-05-12T14:00:14","modified_gmt":"2016-05-12T18:00:14","slug":"reflections-on-the-scriptural-readings-for-this-weekend-20160515","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/?p=3986","title":{"rendered":"Reflections on the Scriptural Readings for this Weekend — 20160515"},"content":{"rendered":"

When the Most High descended and confused tongues, He scattered the people;
\nbut when He distributed the tongues of fire, He called all men to unity. <\/span>
\nTherefore, with one voice, let us praise the Most Holy Spirit. <\/span>
\n<\/strong><\/h4>\n

\"Pentecost\"<\/a>On this glorious feast of Pentecost, our Church uses John\u2019s Gospel to present an important quote of Jesus: \u201cI am the light of the world. No follower of mine shall ever walk in darkness; no, he shall possess the light of life.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u201clight of life\u201d is truly presented in the story of Acts that is our Epistle today. It says:<\/p>\n

\u201cStaying in Jerusalem at the time were … Jews of every nation\u2026. They were much confused because each one heard these men speaking his own language\u2026. They asked in utter amazement, \u201cAre not all of these men \u2026 Galileans? How is it that each of us hears them in his native tongue?\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed the revelation made on Pentecost is that all people are part of the same human family. The apostles were understood by all. Nothing should separate us from our fellowmen, neither language, culture, religion or race. God\u2019s Spirit calls us to accept one another as brother or sister – as a sibling.<\/p>\n

Like any family, we must, if we wish to be followers of Jesus and children of God, overlook how others treat us. Our response to others must always be unjudgemental, unconditional love. We are called to develop this ability to unconditional love precisely because we are children of God.<\/p>\n

What is important for each of us to learn is how to live in this manner and be true followers of Jesus. This is life\u2019s challenge! God revealed to us through Jesus that this is how humans are meant to live. Christians are called to imitate Jesus and interact with others in the same way that Jesus did. He, Jesus, is the ultimate example of how we should think and live.<\/p>\n

The reason why God become Incarnate in the Person of Jesus was to give us a concrete example of how humans should live in order to benefit from this earthly existence. We are here to learn how to be truly human, God\u2019s children. As Eastern Christians we embrace the idea that life\u2019s journey is to grow in our likeness of Jesus, our brother and the only-begotten of our Heavenly Father.
\nHow do you choose to live? <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When the Most High descended and confused tongues, He scattered the people; but when He distributed the tongues of fire, He called all men to unity. Therefore, with one voice, let us praise the Most Holy Spirit. On this glorious … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-liturgy-of-the-day"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3986"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3986\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3988,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3986\/revisions\/3988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stmichaelarchangel.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}