April 26, 2020
Fr. Ricky Montañez
Homily
Lk. 24: 13-35
Last Friday, the President decided to extend the Enhanced Community Quarantine until May 15 to enforce social distancing and give the authorities more time to do what is necessary to further impede the spread of the virus in the country. The announcement drew mixed reactions from different sectors. A good number of us comprehend the wisdom in taking on these extreme measures but there are those who were dismayed because they had been eagerly anticipating the lifting of the quarantine. (Sorry guys, I’m afraid, we have to wait longer to enjoy Fr. Steve’s promised ramen treat. We have not forgotten that promise.)
The ECQ extension is disheartening for all of us who have been restless in lockdown for almost six weeks now. I am thinking Cleopas and his fellow disciple travelling on the road to Emmaus in today’s Gospel were feeling a similar agitation and despondency. Note that the gospel never ascertains that both travellers were men. Some Bible scholars even assert that Cleopas might have been travelling with his own wife, the one referred to in the gospels as “Mary, wife of Clopas” who was present at the crucifixion and witness to the empty tomb. (Now before you react, I assure you that “Clopas” is a variant spelling of “Cleopas”). Whatever the case may be, it is safe to say that both disciples had come to know Jesus closely in His lifetime, enough to pin all their hopes on Him, believing, without a doubt, that He is the much-awaited redeemer of all Israel! Bearing witness to Jesus’ trial, shameful crucifixion, His death, and the disappearance of His corpse were enough to make them question their beliefs and the manner in which Jesus had inspired them to live their lives. With their hopes dashed, they left Jerusalem, the place of defeat and death of their hopes and headed to a village called Emmaus.
Distressed and depressed, they allow a stranger to walk with them. As is common, when people are overly emotional, they fail to note the obvious and do not recognize it is Jesus walking with them. He accompanies them and stays with them. Interpretation of scripture makes for odd conversation for strangers travelling together, right? But that kept them preoccupied until it was time to rest and eat. After they recognized Jesus in the breaking of the bread, things start to become clear to them. Only after He disappears do they realize that through their discussions, their TEACHER had taken them out of their narrow perception and opened them up to fresh insights and new possibilities. “Weren’t our hearts burning within us while [Jesus] spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures for us?”
In the same light, the circumstances brought about by this health crisis prevent us from easily recognizing Jesus in our midst. But He is here, with us, always! This crisis is shaking us out of our complacency and forcing us to envision ourselves in a new light. Hopefully, we have grown more astute in spotting the many ways Jesus approaches us and joins us walking along the path of life. The suspension of our public masses since March 16, challenged the church to discover how it encounters Christ under these circumstances. Where do we see Jesus today? Christ is here, interpreting for us the Scriptures through the inspired homilies of preachers in our livestream masses and prayer services. He is also present among our families when in attendance of these online services, we listen to the word, receive spiritual communion and pray together as a domestic church. (I recall this meme where Satan boasts to God saying “With Covid 19, I have closed all your churches. Then God calmly responds, “On the contrary, I just opened one in every home.”).
Christ is very much in our midst today. Christ is very much alive in the husband who tirelessly pushes his wife on a borrowed wheelchair for 6 kilometres from Batasan to Fairview thrice a week so she can have her dialysis treatment; He is alive in the loving ingenuity of a mother who successfully stretches her dwindling food stocks and makes an effort to provide her family with healthier meal options instead of just canned goods. Yes, Christ is in the motorcycle-riding couriers of food and supplies, our garbage collectors, our news reporters, supermarket clerks, bank personnel, military and police force that keeps order on our streets, and of course our medical teams— all of them putting their health at risk to keep society safe, all of them hero-frontliners. If we only focus our eyes away from the things we miss about our usual lives we will see that Christ lives and continues to make His presence felt among those who help us all to survive this crisis.
When moving forward can be confusing and uncertain there is always the great temptation to go back to the Emmaus of our old habits and ways of life — of what is familiar. The two disciples, defeated and disillusioned, were leaving Jerusalem in search of a new hope, essentially leaving behind all the wondrous things they had learned and experienced through Jesus. They are not the only disciples who ran away. Other Gospel accounts, tell of disciples who went back to a life of fishing — to who they were before meeting the Messiah. We look at ourselves and see how quickly, we too, return to our former life and its patterns when things don’t go as we expect. We slip back into old routines, relive old practices, taking us backwards instead of forward. This Covid 19 crisis compels us to evolve and form new mindsets to help us adapt to what may be the ‘new normal’ — a situation so unlike what we have grown accustomed to. More importantly, we have to move into the future bearing the wealth of learnings that we have gotten from our ECQ-Covid 19 journey. That is the real challenge. My dear brothers and sisters, if we fail to be conscientious and sensitive, reflective and observant, we may miss out on the many plusses, the many lessons learned, the many relationships forged and renewed while we journeyed through this ECQ.
Michael Baylosis wrote an article in the Inquirer asking: “Is society ready for a world after quarantine?” He proposes that “there is no normality to return to. Only a “new normal to live.” The experience of Jesus in the breaking of the bread gave the two disciples the courage to return to Jerusalem at the end of the Gospel passage—returning to the place of their disappointment, shame, and helplessness, to face their New Normal. No longer were they filled with incredulity but with hearts burning, eyes and mind open, ready to embrace life renewed by having known Jesus.
Let us therefore continue to pray that the confines of our Covid 19-ECQ journey will be, for us, an Emmaus where we encounter the Risen Christ in our families and small communities, setting our hearts afire, preparing us to bring Christ alive for others to the world we return to after the ECQ.
Amen.
Sunday Gospel Reflections 