5th Sunday of Easter.
Once there was a very famous priest who did miracles and wonders, and a man came to the priest and said, "Please, Father, pray for my hearing". The priest right away touched the man's ears and prayed for him for forty minutes and then he looked at him and said, "How is your hearing and how is your hearing now?" The man said, "I don't know Father. My lawyer said that my hearing isn't until next week".
Once the man who was so proud of himself said to his wife, "You won't believe I ran behind a bus and saved $2.00 and the wife wasn't happy and said, "why didn't you run behind a taxi and save $20..."
Today one of the greatest challenges is "Isolation". There are more than 25% of people live alone. Parents, spouses and children live as strangers to each other. Today especially children do things alone, playing alone, eating alone, dealing with their challenges alone. But as believers of Christ, we don't need to be alone at all. Because the indwelling of God, the presence of God is always with us.
Jean Paul Satre says, "By the way, if you feel lonely when you are alone, you are in bad company".
We who are baptized, and we come to church and practice our faith, should know that Christ is always with us. But the question today is, "Are we attached with Christ?" We the branches cannot survive Christ the vine.
They say that in the late 1980, a fire destroyed a building on the lower side of Manhattan. An alarm was sounded, and the trucks and the personnel arrived in plenty of time to fight the fire. The exit door worked properly. The steps were clear, and the people got out of the building quickly and in order.
And still they could not put out the fire. But unfortunately, the fire destroyed the building. It's because the city water line had never been connected to the building fire-system.
Today there are so many people running around place to place and doing so many wonderful things. They spent their time, energy and resources to make things happen in their community and in their country. But if we closely follow them, we could easily be shocked to know that many of them would be disappeared in five to ten years without any trace. What happened to those people? They got burned out, depressed and got some physical or deep psychological problems. It's all because they forgot to abide with the source who gives us all life. When we are not with Christ and when we don't abide with Him, we cannot bear much results. To grow stronger, we need Christ.
Once I visited a dying person and spent time in prayer with her. She was almost involved with so many church's activity. Her presence was so powerful and helpful for so many people and at one point, I said, "Let us pray the rosary together..." She then looked at me and said, "Father, I don't know how to pray the rosary..." And I didn't know what to say. What was the point of running around and doing so many things but not attached to the vine. She didn't know many prayers or the rosary. We should stay with Christ first and all other things should follow next.
Last weekend, Jesus talked about Him being the shepherd and we His sheep and this weekend, He says that He is the vine and we are the branches. Jesus uses everyday language and parable to explain the unexplained mysterious connection that we have with Him.
What should we do to be connected with Him?
We must continue to do what we are doing now. If we are connected with Christ, the result is happiness and joy. If we are with, the result is producing more and if we are in Christ, we will be so ready to invite others to the source and life.
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