The Easter season is slowly coming to a close. In many places in the world this coming Sunday will be the celebration of the Ascension. In other places, including my own diocese, it will be observed as the 7th Sunday of Easter, Ascension having been celebrated this Thursday, May 13.
You'll find the readings for both observances and commentary on the 7th Sunday of Easter here. Some background on the Ascension readings can be found here. The Sadlier site provides hints for helping children prepare to hear the Ascension readings here and the readings for the 7th Sunday of Easter here.
The texts for the 7th Sunday of Easter include the story of the martyrdom of Stephen in the early days of the Church. You'll do well to open your bible and read Chapter 7 of the Acts of the Apostles to better understand the portion of that story in Sunday's first lesson. The second lesson gives us the last verses of the Book of Revelation and thus the last verses of the canon of Christian scriptures - and beautiful words they are! The gospel, another passage from Jesus' farewell discourse at the Last Supper, is the Lord's prayer over the gathered apostles and thus also a prayer over all of us, apostles in these later times. This prayer's for you!
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I once belonged to a prayer group called "Both Feet." Why? Because that's the last the apostles saw of Jesus....
ReplyDeleteI read this earlier in the week, but thought I would comment now, as I am doing some final preparing for tomorrow-
ReplyDeletegood advice to read the whole of chapter 7 to better understand the 1st reading- thank you.
But, even doing this, I still found it kind of difficult to understand- but I will trust that even in my bit of confusion I have more understanding than even I know (if that makes sense).