Reflection

Gospel

I have loved you just as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my own joy may be in you and your joy be complete.  This is my commandment: love one another, as I have loved you. No one can have greater love than to lay down his life for his friends.                                   You are my friends, if you do what I command you. I shall no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know the master's business; I call you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have learnt from my Father.  You did not choose me, no, I chose you; and I commissioned you to go out and to bear fruit, fruit that will last; so that the Father will give you anything you ask him in my name. My command to you is to love one another.    John 15: 9- 17

Reflection

Within a few days we will have read all of chapter 15 in John’s gospel. Throughout the chapter, back and forth, in and out, John calls our attention to the fundamental theme of all the gospels - LOVE. Maybe with this or that verse, I will hear Jesus’s repeated invitation to fall into Love, to live in Love. To know, taste and feel the strength of Love – all in the midst of our humanity, our lives.

Fr. Larry Gillick, S.J. once wrote about being covered with fingerprints- God’s fingerprints. Fingerprints are unique. Using proper equipment the owner of the fingerprint can be identified. Whose fingerprints are these? Who was here? Who disturbed or intruded? Who ventured in to clean up the mess, to set things right? Who went through my personal possessions? Who rifled my heart? Whose fingerprints cover me? How would anyone know?

Recently 4 treasured little people came for a visit to my home. Holy, sacred, blessed chaos reigned from the moment they entered through the front door until the moment they left through the back door. Laughter and tears, peaceful sleep and restless sleeplessness, exuberance and exhaustion - life was especially lifey, rich and abundant in my home that week. A garden of earthy delights!

They left and my home was eerily silent and still, yet vibrating, smeared and sticky with their presence. Children and adults alike, left prints – theirs and God’s -everywhere! Coloured chalk on the driveway, Finger-painted mud pictures left on the side of the house along with footprints on budding plants. Chocolate dripped icing left on the linen cloth and little  and big fingerprints on glass doors and windows, on walls and furniture – everywhere. 

My favourite prints are the translucent ones on the glass sliding door. As the sun shines through, each fingerprint glistens and each little line vivid and vibrant. I see not only the print, but my heart warms to presence – theirs and God’s. In being who they are meant to be they leave a print – on the window, in my home and in my heart. Each print is meaningful. All freely given and joyfully received. Whose fingerprints are these? The children’s of course, but God’s most definitely. They have Love smeared and stuck all over them.

I like to think, and I pray God’s fingerprints are on me and the prints I leave behind are just as noticeably God’s prints. These children make leaving behind a trail of God’s loving fingerprints seem so easy. For me, leaving behind a trail of God’s fingerprints is not easy, but God’s prints are readily identifiable. It is God who intrudes and rifles our  hearts. It is God who sets things right. God dwells among us. God dwells in us. God’s fingerprints are everywhere.

The Good-News: God’s lovely fingerprints are smeared and permanently stuck to us.  We just have to stand where the light can shine through.  

Julie Leonard Religious Education Leader/Wellbeing Leader