Third Sunday of Easter, May 8, 2011

(Acts 2:14, 22-33; 1 Peter 1:17-21; Luke 24:13-35)

Acts has Peter quote Ps.16:8-11 and suggests that David (who was thought to
be the author of the Psalms) was referring to Jesus in this Psalm. This is done
frequently by New Testament authors who saw many Old Testament passages
fulfilled in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.
The fact that these authors related the Jesus material by using the Old
Testament background as though they were direct prophecies of the Jesus event is a
common practice in the New Testament. It was also a necessary one for Christians
to justify the claims they were making about Jesus. In order to justify the break with
Judaism that their teachings entailed, they had to show that God’s revelation in
Jesus fit the prophetic passages of the Old Testament including the Psalms as in
today’s passage from Acts.
Scholars have debated the point endlessly about whether Peter, or the early
Church in Jerusalem, or Luke (the author of Acts) is meant to be the real speaker in
this speech. I am attracted by the suggestion that the early Church preserved some
recollection of Peter’s early preaching, maybe even in Jerusalem, and that some
element of that recollection is contained here (Read more about this in Fr.
Fitzmyer’s Commentary on Acts in the Anchor Bible, p.249).
The Gospel is about how two disciples on the road to Emmaus (one named
Cleopas, the other unnamed) discover the identity of Jesus during the breaking of
bread. Only Luke mentions this appearance, which leaves us nothing with which to
compare it.
The two were “conversing and debating” all that had happened in the previous
couple days. When Jesus appeared to them he entered right into their dialogue by
asking about their discussion. The question is a setup because he obviously knew
what had happened. After letting them explain it all, he then set out to explain all
that referred to him in the Old Testament. Thus, it is important to note that he did
not dismiss their conversing and debating as useless. Rather he joined in with his
unique contribution to the discussion.
Nonetheless, it was not until the clearly Eucharistic setting of the meal where
he “took bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to them” that they recognized
who he was. To this point he had only been a teacher to them, an extraordinary
teacher, but a teacher all the same. “Were not our hearts burning within us while he
spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?”
It was kind of like that with Fr. Ted Thomas, my seminary classmate, and
Pastor of St. Mary’s in German Village, who died on Easter. The articles about the
Saints he used to write for the Catholic Times always revolved around a theme
about food. It was my good fortune to have celebrated with him the last time I saw
him over food and drink (what else?). He found in table fellowship a proper setting,
the only one really, for settling all matters of Church and State.
Those of us who knew him did find our hearts burn with delight when we had
occasion to be with him. If at least a part of our calling as priests is be more like
Christ, then it doesn’t get any more Christ-like than the way Fr. Thomas shared
himself with all of us, whether at Mass or in a gathering of friends.
The Church of Columbus is richer for having known him and the poorer for
having lost him. May he join the Lord Jesus and all those saints he used to write
about in the heavenly banquet, where there is food and drink in abundance.

Fr. Lawrence L. Hummer