The thing that strikes me about today's Gospel is what a deep pnuematology Jesus lays out in this snippet from John's Last Supper Discourse. It is a wonderful opportunity to unpack what it means to be Spirit-filled.
Speaking of Spirit-filled, after last week's reacing about the seven men called by the primitive Church in Jerusalem and set apart for service by the apostles, today picks up a thread of one of those seven: Philip. Remember, there were three criteria set forth for those called: men of good reputation and who were "filled with the Spirit and wisdom" (see Acts 6:3).
We only hear more about two of the seven: Stephen and Philip. Unlike Stephen, who was stoned to death Jerusalem, Philip fled the persecution and went to Samaria. Undaunted, he preached the Gospel, like Stephen. Many responded to his preaching by coming to faith in Christ. If you take these seven men as the first deacons, something done in the Church since at least Irenaeus, who lived from the second into the third century, then, from the beginning, deacons have been evangelists. Today this highlighted by the deacon reading the Gospel at Mass. In the absence of a deacon, a priest reads the Gospel at Mass as a deacon.
Without a doubt, today, many were subjected to a Mother's Day sermon instead of a homily. Oddly, this tends to happen in places where there is a lot of loud protesting about the Church capitulating to the culture. Well, Mother's Day is a secular observance. It's not on the liturgical calendar. Not many Christians in the U.S. conceive of family eschatologically, which stands in contrast to natural/biological family. God's eschatological family really couldn't be much clearer in the Gospels and in the authentically Pauline letters. At least in the U.S., Christians tend to make an idol of family. If not an idol, then settng forth an unrealistically idealized version of family.
I will content myself with a few thoughts barely sketched out today.
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