6600 block on south Rockwell.
That’s where I grew up.
That was our family home.
6600 on south Rockwell.
It’s called the Marquette park area.
There was the women’s religious convent
Right at the end of our block.
The sisters of St. Casimir were there.
Our parish was a couple blocks away.
That home was certainly important to us
Because that’s where we grew up
And that’s where we had our home,
Our family, my father and mother’s livelihood.
That’s where they raised their children.
That’s where we came back from school
After we went to school every day.
That home is uniquely important, uniquely beautiful,
And carries lots of memories for us, right?
What was your home?
Maybe it was many homes growing up,
But what was the one that captures your memory the most?
What was the address of that home?
How much love did you share with your sisters and brothers,
Mom and dad, in that home?
I invite you to reflect on that home
Because that’s the image that Jesus gives us.
He’s going to prepare for us a new home
With love, with peace, with everlasting life.
A home to be with our loved ones who have gone before us.
That’s the image that Jesus uses, a new home.
And he shares that image when he’s giving the bad news
That he’s going to be taken away.
He’s going to be delivered to death.
He shares that good news
As a way of comforting his disciples.
He shares that good news with us as well to remind us
That we too will receive a new home.
And then when Thomas can’t quite figure it out,
Can’t quite set his gaps towards that new home,
Jesus gives him that powerful reminder.
“Thomas, follow me on the way and the truth and the life.”
“just follow me, Thomas, I’m the way and the truth and the life.”
He goes on to have to explain then to Philip.
He goes on to explain to Philip, who wants to know
How to get to the father.
He probably, rather in a frustrating way,
Says, “Philip, you’ve been with me for a long time.
Don’t you know the father and I and the spirit, we’re one?
Don’t you know that where I am is also where the father is?
Philip, don’t you know?”
So Jesus reminds Philip.
As we come together in this easter season,
May we be reminded of some of these gifts that Jesus gave us.
First of all, a new home in the kingdom of paradise.
Second of all, a proximity to the father
In a way we could never ever imagine.
Certainly our Jewish brothers and sisters
Could never have imagined that proximity to the father.
But yet, here we are, proximate to God
The father through the son, Jesus.
May we be mindful of the resurrection that’s offered us.
May we be mindful of that proximity and unity
We have with the father, son, and spirit.