Monday May 29
It often happens that solemn declarations of faith are denied by concrete and everyday life choices. This happened in the Upper Room on the evening of the Last Supper. The disciples profess their faith in Jesus, they are able to understand his message and recognize his divinity (we believe that you come from God). Bitterly, Christ presents before them the abandonment, the betrayal, which his disciples will soon do. But Jesus will not be left alone because the Father is with him always; and the time for conversion and peace will come for the disciples.
Alternative
The great threat for the Jews of old was that they would be scattered. “The Lord will scatter you among the peoples” (Dt 4:25), “I saw Israel scattered on the mountains like sheep without a shepherd” (1K 22:17), “On the impulse of the moment I forsook you, but with tender affection I will bring you home again” (Is 54:7), “The One who scattered Israel will gather them again” (Jer 31:10).
The New Testament reverses this. To be scattered is not a danger now but a challenge received with joy. “You will bear witness for me in Jerusalem… and away to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8), “As for those who had been scattered, they went through the country proclaiming the word” (Acts 8:4). Peter wrote to “those of God’s scattered people who lodge for a while in Pontus” (1P 1:1). Jesus sent out the disciples two by two, and when he spoke of the Kingdom of God he used metaphors of salt, yeast, seed: things that are useless in a jar, but which come into their own when scattered and lost.
The time described in today’s reading is a time between two Testaments, two worlds. To be scattered is still a terrifying prospect, but Jesus is preparing them for it. “You will be scattered.… I have told you this so that you may have peace.” Someone described our time as a time of exile between two worlds, “one dead, one powerless to be born.” But our faith tells a positive story, “It is the Spirit that gives life” (Jn 6:63).
