Tuesday of the 5th Week of Easter
May 5, 2015 6:30am
Jesus says: “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.
Not as the world gives do I give it to you.”
I imagine we could talk a long
time about peace and about how the peace Jesus offers is different from the
peace we usually experience.
I have a couple of ideas on this.
First, I connect the peace Jesus
offers with Saint Paul’s classic description of love in First Corinthians.
Paul lists quite a number of
traits or virtues that comprise love.
One of them strikes me as
especially central to the peace that Jesus offers.
Paul says: “Love does not seek its own interests.”
The idea is that with the love of
Jesus, we look to the well-being of the other person in addition to the
well-being of ourselves.
This means that even if we feel
injured and think that we are an aggrieved party, we also look to what is going
in the other person.
We refrain from demonizing and
try to understand that person’s story and perspective.
This tends to slow us down and
tame vengeful, unpeaceful feelings.
“Not seeking our own interests” also means that we look to the common
good of all.
We do this even when that may not
be to my best advantage but when it is to the overall good of all.
This also seems central to the
peace that Jesus offers.
And then the other thing that
makes Jesus’ peace different is Jesus himself – his presence and life and
strength that comes to us through the sacraments.
This empowers us to be focused on
the good of the other as well as ourselves.
Jesus’ grace enables us to do
this.
And with this, we can have a
peace first with God and then a peace in our relationships that is far
different from what we can achieve in any other place.
