This really is a laughing matter

Mark My Words

16-17, 22-23

April 18

MONDAY WITHIN THE OCTAVE OF EASTER

April 19

TUESDAY WITHIN THE OCTAVE OF EASTER

April 20

WEDNESDAY WITHIN

OCTAVE OF EASTER

April 21

THURSDAY WITHIN THE OCTAVE OF EASTER

According to belief. net, hundreds of years ago, a monk, whose name was lost in history, was pondering the events of the Triduum. He was especially taken by the astonishing event of Easter.

He thought to himself, “What a surprise ending!” And then, surprising himself, he let loose with a trumpeting laugh, disrupting the silence of his fellow monks.

“Don’t you see?” exclaimed the monk. “It was a joke! A great joke! The best joke in all history! On Good Friday, when Jesus was crucified, the devil thought he’d won. But God had the last laugh on Easter when he raised Jesus from the dead!” teries to churches, and the day after Easter became known as a “Day of Joy and Laughter,” when people told jokes to celebrate God’s great joke on the devil.

FRIDAY WITHIN THE OCTAVE OF EASTER

April 23

SATURDAY WITHIN THE OCTAVE OF EASTER

14-15b, 16-21

Mk 16: 9-15

SECOND WEEK OF EASTER

April 24

SECOND SUNDAY OF EASTER (OR SUNDAY OF DIVINE MERCY)

Acts 5: 12-16

Ps 118: 2-4, 13-15, 22-24

Rv 1: 9-11a, 12-13, 17-19

Jn 20: 19-31

April 25

MARK, EVANGELIST

1 Pt 5: 5b-14

Ps 898: 2-3, 6-7, 16-17

Mk 16: 15-20

April 26

Tuesday

Acts 4: 32-37

Ps 93: 1-2, 5

Jn 3: 7b-15

April 27

Wednesday

Acts 5: 17-26

Ps 34: 2-9

Jn 3: 16-21

April 28

Peter Chanel, priest, martyr; Louis Grignion de Montfort, priest

Acts 5: 27-33

Ps 34: 2, 9, 17-20

Jn 3: 31-36

April 29

Catherine of Siena, virgin, doctor of the church

Acts 5: 35-42

Ps 27: 1, 4, 13-14

Jn 6: 1-15

April 30

Pius V, pope

Acts 6: 1-7

Ps 33: 1-2, 4-5, 18-19

Jn 6: 16-21

Thus was born “the Easter laugh.” The idea spread from monas-

What a fun way to usher Easter joy into our families and world. To get you started, enjoy this wonderful letter: Dear Stella,

I’m writing this letter slow because I know you can’t read fast. We don’t live where we did when you left for college. Your dad read in the newspaper that most accidents happen within 20 miles from your home, so we moved. I won’t be able to send you the address because the last family that lived here took the house numbers when they moved so that they wouldn’t have to change their address.

This place is real nice. It even has a washing machine.

I’m not sure it works too well, though. Last week, I put a load in, pulled the chain and haven’t seen the clothes since.

The weather isn’t bad here. It only rained twice last week: the first time for three days and the second for four.

The coat you wanted, your Uncle Stanley said would be too heavy to send in the mail with the buttons on, so we cut them off and put them in the pockets.

John locked his keys in the car yesterday. We were worried because it took him two hours to get me and your father out.

Your sister had a baby this morning, but I haven’t found out what it is yet, so I don’t know if you’re an aunt or an uncle.

Uncle Ted fell in a whiskey vat last week. Some men tried to pull him out, but he fought them off and drowned.

We had him cremated and he burned for three days.

Three of your friends went off a bridge in a pickup truck. Ralph was driving; he rolled down the window and swam to safety. Your other two friends were in back; they drowned because they couldn’t get the tailgate down. There isn’t more news. Nothing much has happened.

Love, Mom P.S. I was going to send you some money, but the envelope was already sealed. (Found in Brian Cavanaugh’s “Sower’s Seeds that Nurture Family Values: Sixth Planting.”) May your Easter laugh last all through this joyful season. Smile extravagantly, be grateful for all you have and keep your eyes peeled for the humor around you. The Lord is risen! And we are glad indeed!

God’s answer to the darkness of the human condition? Jesus!

Across the ages, artists have portrayed the Gospel scene we hear proclaimed on Easter Sunday, namely Mary Magdalene’s encounter with the risen Jesus soon after his resurrection.

One particularly evocative depiction is the mid-15th century painting titled “Noli Me Tangere,” completed by Fra Angelico, the renowned Dominican friar artist.

Mary Magdalene kneels in astonishment as the risen Lord calls her by name and she reaches out to touch him. The risen Jesus, radiating light, reaches out his hand to Mary Magdalene to assure her of his enduring presence, now transformed into his glorious, resurrected body.

Our Easter faith invites us to a similar transformation patterned after Jesus’ passing from life to death to glorious, new, resurrected life.

“This is the day the

Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad,” sings the psalmist.

On this Easter Sunday, we join in this hymn of praise at the great mystery of our new life in the mystery of Jesus’ resurrection. The world has been weighed down by a global health crisis, the war in Ukraine, and the endless spread of violence, poverty and fear.

We might wonder what the way is out of the darkness of the human condition.

Faith gives us a new perspective as we hear Peter preaching boldly in Sunday’s first reading when he says of Jesus: “Everyone who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”

At Easter, we celebrate the mystery of Jesus’ resurrection and our rising to new life in him. Our Easter festivities mean little to nothing if we do not experience in ourselves the renewing life of God’s love and the new life of hope and peace that comes from God alone.

As St. Paul reminds the Colossians: “If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above. . . . For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ your life appears, then you too will appear with him in glory.”

As people of faith, we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus as God’s answer to the darkness of the human condition of sin that leads to separation from God. Easter is a gift of faith because our faith is in vain without the resurrection of Jesus.

In the light of his resurrection, everyone and everything is capable of being made new.

As we rejoice in God’s victory over sin and death in the resurrection of Jesus, we seek to have eyes of faith to recognize God’s presence transforming our lives this Easter day as we pray, “Speak to me, Lord.”

Pope: Smaller nations must lead charge against ideology of the powerful

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Smaller countries like Malta are called to set an example of true freedom in a world that can seem overwhelmed by powerful nations that seek to extend their own economic, military or ideological interests, Pope Francis said.

Reflecting on his recent visit to the Mediterranean archipelago during his weekly general audience April 6, the pope said Malta “represents the rights and power of the ‘small’ nations,” which exemplify the respect, freedom and coexistence that stands “opposed to the colonization of the most powerful.”

“After World War II, the attempt was made to lay the foundations of a new era of peace. But unfortunately — we never learn, right? — the old story of competition between the great powers went on. And, in the current war in Ukraine, we are witnessing the impotence of the United Nations,” he said.

Pope Francis told people at the audience that the motto of his April 2-3 trip described the “unusual kindness” of the people of Malta when St. Paul shipwrecked on the island nearly 2,000 years ago.

That “unusual kindness,” Pope Francis said, not only describes how countries should treat migrants today, but how countries should treat each other and everyone “so that the world might become more fraternal, more livable, and might be saved from a ‘shipwreck’ that menaces all of us.”

Do you begin your Lent setting expectations?

If our Lenten journey went how we expected, every Sunday we would pray “My will be done.”

Lent is the time of year when we give up our favorite food, chocolate or social media, and we pray one more Our Father every day hoping to have some life-changing “God experience.”

Do we also consider that we are supposed to draw close to Jesus in his 40-day journey in the desert and his passion and crucifixion on Calvary where he was submitting himself completely to the will of the Father?

JOSHUA RUOFF

If your Lent didn’t go as planned, praise God because his will for our life is prevailing. He is calling us to submit ourselves to him and to trust him. This doesn’t apply just during Lent. This should be our focus every day of our lives.

As I started my position as the lead consultant for special needs for the archdiocese last August, I found myself struggling to make this my focus. I felt obligated to make things how I wanted them or how others expected.

It didn’t take long for God to quickly stop me and remind me that I am not in charge. Some people that God placed in my life suggested I pray something called the “surrender novena.” A novena is normally a nine-day prayer; I just start over at the beginning after the ninth day. Taking time to do this is a great reminder of who is in control of your day and your life.

As we come to the end of our Lenten journey, things for the office of special needs are about to get busy. In June, we will have the opportunity for specialneeds family camp at Prairie Star Ranch.

In July, we will be offering a specialneeds Totus Tuus. We are so excited to have the opportunity to grow in our faith through these opportunities.

If you would like to also experience this as a participating family at family camp, or if you have a loved one with special needs who you would like to have involved at Totus Tuus, or if you want to volunteer and have the opportunity to be the hands and feet of Christ, contact me at (913)647-3054 or by email at: jruoff@ archkck.org or visit our website at: archkck.org/ special-needs/home.

“You are sleepless; you want to judge everything, direct everything and see to everything, and you surrender to human strength, or worse — to men themselves, trusting in their intervention — this is what hinders my words and my views. Oh how much I wish from you this surrender, to help you and how I suffer when I see you so agitated! Satan tries to do exactly this: to agitate you and to remove you from my protection and to throw you into the jaws of human initiative. So, trust only in me, rest in me, surrender to me in everything.” (Day 6 of the Novena of Surrender to the Will of God by Father Don Dolindo Ruotolo)