Patrick Comerford
Our Easter celebrations continue in the Church Calendar. Easter is a 50-day season that continues until the Day of Pentecost, and this is the Third Sunday of Easter (Easter III). In the Orthodox Church, this is known as the Myrrh-Bearers’ Sunday.
Later this morning, I am involved in the Parish Eucharist in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church in Stony Stratford, leading the intercession and singing in the choir. Before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, reading today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
John 21: 1-19 (NRSVA):
1 After these things Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he showed himself in this way. 2 Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. 3 Simon Peter said to them, ‘I am going fishing.’ They said to him, ‘We will go with you.’ They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
4 Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5 Jesus said to them, ‘Children, you have no fish, have you?’ They answered him, ‘No.’ 6 He said to them, ‘Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.’ So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. 7 That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’ When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the lake. 8 But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off.
9 When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. 10 Jesus said to them, ‘Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.’ 11 So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. 12 Jesus said to them, ‘Come and have breakfast.’ Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, ‘Who are you?’ because they knew it was the Lord. 13 Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. 14 This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.
15 When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?’ He said to him, ‘Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs.’ 16 A second time he said to him, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me?’ He said to him, ‘Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Tend my sheep.’ 17 He said to him the third time, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me?’ Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, ‘Do you love me?’ And he said to him, ‘Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my sheep. 18 Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.’ 19 (He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, ‘Follow me.’
Today’s Reflections:
The Easter Gospel reading at the Eucharist today (John 21: 1-19) can be divided into two parts. We read the first part (verses 1-14) ten days ago, on the Friday of Easter Week (25 April 2025). The second part (verses 15-19) is the Gospel reading read the following day at the funeral Mass of Pope Francis (26 April 2025).
In the second part of this reading, Christ has three questions that he puts to Peter this morning. They appear a little confused or repetitive in most English translations, but the difference is clear in the original Greek.
In his first two questions to Peter, Christ uses the verb ἀγαπάω (agapáo).
CS Lewis talks in one of his books of The Four Loves:
• The first, στοργή (storgé), is the affection of familiarity;
• the second is φιλία (philia), the strong bond between close friends;
• the third, ἔρως (eros), Lewis identifies not with eroticism but with the word we use when we say we are in love with someone;
• the fourth love is ἀγάπη (agape), the love that takes no account of my own interests, that loves no matter what happens – it is the greatest of loves, it reflects the love of God.
Perhaps, the first time, Christ asks: ‘Simon son of John, do you love me more than you and your friends love one another but in the way God loves you?’ (John 21: 15).
But Peter is either evasive or misses the point, and answers with a different verb: φιλέω (phileo): ‘I’m fond of you, I like you like a brother, I agree with you. I’m OK, you’re OK’ (verse 15).
‘OK,’ says Christ, ‘feed the little ones the Good Shepherd welcomes into the fold’ (verse 15).
Then a second time, we can imagine him asking more simply: ‘Simon son of John, do you love me the way God loves you?’ (verse 16).
But Peter once again misses the point, and answers with the verb φιλέω (phileo): ‘I’m fond of you, I like you like a brother, I agree with you. I’m OK, you’re OK’ (verse 16).
‘OK,’ says Christ, ‘look after those in the flock the Good Shepherd tends’ (verse 16).
But then he asks a third question: ‘Simon, son of John, do you love me?’ (verse 17).
Our English translations say Peter was upset, felt hurt, when Christ asked him a third time. We might be tempted to think this is because he was asked the same question repetitively, three times, that his answer was not listened to the first or second time round.
But this third time, Christ asks a different question, using Peter’s verb φιλέω (phileo), as if to ask: ‘OK Peter, do you love me as your brother?’ (verse 17).
This time around, Peter replies using the same word Christ uses in his third question. But, more importantly, he confesses Jesus as Lord (verse 17), as Lord of everything. This confession of faith comes the third time round from the disciple who earlier denied Christ three times (see John 18). And Christ then asks him to feed the whole flock, all the sheep of the Good Shepherd, lambs, ewes, lost ones, found ones, white sheep, black sheep, fluffy sheep, bedraggled and dirt-covered sheep – the whole lot (21: 17).
The disciples do not recognise Jesus as he stands on the beach just after daybreak (verse 4). But despite their initial blindness, their initial failings, their initial denials, God continues to call them.
And so too with us. God calls us in all our unworthiness to feed his lambs, to tend his sheep, to feed his sheep, not just the little ones, not just the big ones.
Do you love him enough, as he loves you, to see this as enough fame to bask in?
Do you love him enough to feed his little ones when others want to ignore them, despise them, call them racist names, see their children as extra added burdens, want to send them back?
Do you love him enough to see this as the benchmark against which you and I, society, the Church, priests and people together, all we are involved in, mark how we relate to the myriad, the thousands and thousands, to all living life?
Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!
Today’s Prayers (Sunday 4 May 2025, Easter III):
‘Inconvenient Migration’ provides the theme this week in ‘Pray With the World Church’, the Prayer Diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel). This theme is introduced today with Reflections from Carol Miller, Church Engagement Manager, USPG:
I was comfortably sat in a camp chair on the Glade for the Eucharist Service at Greenbelt Festival, surrounded by several thousand people. They were gathered, mostly on blankets, in family or community groupings. Host Guvna B, rapper and author, took the stage and said:
‘Let’s pray for refugees. But let’s pray with our bodies. We’re gonna do something here, together. Could everyone please stand up. Now, I want you to move a few meters … just two or three meters. Yeah, I know it’s uncomfortable. Just gather up everything you came here with and move a bit. We’re doing this as an embodied prayer for refugees. Look out for the little ones, please. It’s not easy, is it?
Having spent two full days at our USPG stall telling people about our work in Calais and around Europe, I felt I knew the journey of refugees. I’d done all the research and read countless articles and statistics. And our team thoughtfully challenged those who stopped by. But to physically and collectively act out that inconvenient migration, small as it was, undid me. What momentary discomfort I felt in being displaced would need to be multiplied countless times over and amplified through fear and grief and physical exhaustion to even begin to understand the lived experience of refugees in the world today.
A definition of compassion: to suffer together, a feeling that arises when you are confronted with another’s suffering and feel motivated to relieve that suffering.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Sunday 4 May 2025, Easter III) invites us to pray, reflecting on these words:
‘[We praise you] God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.’ (Based on II Corinthians 1: 3-4).
The Collect:
Almighty Father,
who in your great mercy gladdened the disciples
with the sight of the risen Lord:
give us such knowledge of his presence with us,
that we may be strengthened and sustained by his risen life
and serve you continually in righteousness and truth;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Living God,
your Son made himself known to his disciples
in the breaking of bread:
open the eyes of our faith,
that we may see him in all his redeeming work;
who is alive and reigns, now and for ever.
Additional Collect:
Risen Christ,
you filled your disciples with boldness and fresh hope:
strengthen us to proclaim your risen life
and fill us with your peace,
to the glory of God the Father.
Yesterday’s Reflections
Continued Tomorrow
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
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