“Constantly accomplish the Paschal Mystery within us” (Collect, 5th Sunday of Easter)
It was one year ago today. This very day. This most sacred night. The night Jesus instituted the Eucharist and established the priesthood. The night when Jesus entered into the Paschal Mystery, the fulfillment of his mission to “reveal the mystery of the Father and his love.” (Gaudium et Spes, no. 22)
One year ago, prior to the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, I received the call from the Cardinal informing me that I had been elected as the 22nd president of Seton Hall University. Little did I realize at that point how much impact that phone call that evening would have on my own life of faith and the living out of my priestly vocation.
That phone call for me – and this Sacred Night for each one of us – serve as a reminder of and realization that our lives in Christ are linked to his Person, embedded in his Mystery, and consecrated for service in his Name. There is a palpable unity between faith and life – between Christ’s Paschal Mystery and the mystery of our own share in God’s divine plan of salvation.
Over the past year, I have come to see and experience that Christ’s suffering on the Cross is not off-putting to me or foreign to my life as his disciple and priest, but rather at the heart and center of his invitation to embrace the Paschal Mystery. In his deeply personal love for me, when Jesus asks me “Can you drink of this cup,” I offer him my heartfelt, and at times hesitant, “yes,” and I trust the One who loves me. I trust that his love is sufficient, more than enough for me. May it be so for you as well.
