There is a family in a small parish — let’s call them the Rodriguezes — whose story many of us who know them will never forget. A few years ago, their youngest daughter, eight-year-old Sofia, was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive form of leukemia. The doctors were honest but grim. The family was devastated, as any family would be. But they did something that changed not only their own lives, but the life of their entire community. They prayed. Not quietly, not privately, not alone — they opened their home every Friday evening and invited their neighbors, their parish friends, and even strangers to gather around their kitchen table and pray together to God the Father, through Jesus His Son, and in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Week after week, that kitchen filled up. People who hadn’t been to Mass in years came. People who weren’t even Catholic came. They prayed the Rosary, they read Scripture, they laid hands on one another and asked the Holy Spirit to move among them. And six months later, Sofia’s oncologist called with results that left the entire medical team without a ready explanation. The cancer was gone. Completely. Sofia walked back into her school, back into her life, and back into the arms of a community that had been transformed by what they had witnessed together.
But here is the most remarkable part of the story. It wasn’t just Sofia who was healed. Something happened in that neighborhood that no one fully planned. People who had come to pray for a sick child left believing — really believing — in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And belief, as today’s Gospel tells us, changes everything. That community went on to build a food pantry, a clothing drive, a tutoring program for at-risk children. They built, in their own small and beautiful way, the Kingdom of God. And it all began because they believed.
There is a family I know—a mother, a father, and three children—who arrived in America with nothing but hope and the clothes on their backs. They had fled unrest in their homeland, crossing an ocean, believing in the promise of a new life. But when they arrived, the world was not so welcoming. The language was foreign, the winters bit through their thin jackets, and neighbors eyed them with suspicion. The children were teased at school for their accents. The father’s hard-earned degree meant nothing here; he swept floors at night while the mother cleaned houses. They grew weary, and bitterness crept in. But then, one Sunday, they wandered into a small Catholic church.
There, a kind parishioner greeted them, and soon the parish wrapped them in unexpected warmth. Yet the pain lingered—until one evening, during a prayer service, the pastor spoke about forgiveness: how it is not just for those who have wronged us, but for our own hearts’ healing. The family prayed for those who had mistreated them. Slowly, a new peace took root. Not long after, they began volunteering at the church, helping other newcomers. The love they received, and the forgiveness they offered, built something beautiful—a small reflection of the Kingdom of God, right here in their new home.
When JRR Tolkien set out to write The Lord of the Rings, he included in the foreword of The Fellowship of the Ring a line about his detestation of allegory. He stated “I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence.”
And yet, Tolkien has also stated about the trilogy that it is “a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.”
Is the greatest fantasy author of all time trying to pull the rug out from under us? How can these two seemingly opposite ideas about storytelling, specifically about his own storytelling, be true?
There’s a story from the streets of Calcutta that I think about often. It’s the story of a woman so small in stature you could miss her in a crowd, but whose spirit somehow filled entire cities. Mother Teresa, now Saint Teresa of Calcutta, walked into the slums with little more than her faith and the conviction that the Holy Spirit was alive within her.
She once wrote, “I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.” Through her, God’s love was not just spoken, but lived—heart to heart, hand to hand, life to life. Mother Teresa allowed the Spirit of God to flow through her, reaching the most forgotten souls and building up, out of dust and poverty, the Kingdom of God.
There was a man named John who, for much of his life, felt lost. He grew up in a small town, knew the routines of daily life, but a shadow seemed always to hover at the edge of his spirit. John tried to fill the emptiness with work, with distractions, even with the approval of others. None of it lasted. He wandered, like a sheep without a shepherd, never feeling truly at home, never truly at peace. One day, in a moment of quiet desperation, John found himself sitting alone in a church, staring at the crucifix. He whispered a prayer he wasn’t sure he believed: “Jesus, if you’re real, help me.”
Something shifted. Over the next days, John felt drawn back to the church, to Scripture, and to prayer. He met a priest who listened, who encouraged him to read the Gospels, to come to Mass, to let Jesus lead him. John gradually realized that Jesus was not a distant figure, but a Shepherd who knew him by name, who had been calling him all along. As John learned to trust Jesus and follow Him, his life changed. He found hope where before there was only emptiness. And, slowly, almost without realizing it, he began reaching out to others who felt lost as he once did. He listened, he prayed with them, he invited them to experience the same peace he’d found. John became a shepherd of souls, leading others to the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ.
Once in a quiet convent in France, a young woman named Thérèse lived her “little way” with a heart overflowing with hope. St. Thérèse of Lisieux believed that holiness was not found in grand deeds, but in simple acts of love and kindness. Even as a child, Thérèse prayed for her “spiritual eyes” to be opened—to see Jesus in everyone, especially those who challenged her patience or seemed difficult to love.
When a fellow sister would irritate her, Thérèse would smile all the more, telling Jesus in her heart, “I see You hidden in her.” Her days were filled with ordinary tasks, yet every moment was a chance to encounter Christ. Through the eyes of love, she discovered Jesus in the faces around her, and her whole life became a song of joy. Thérèse’s hope never faded, even in suffering, because she recognized Jesus walking with her in every circumstance, in every person she met.
Recognizing Jesus on the Road: From Sorrow to Burning Joy in the Light of the Resurrection
Today’s Gospel takes us on another road—a dusty path to Emmaus—where two disciples walk with heavy hearts. They have witnessed the death of their hope. Jesus, whom they loved, is gone. As they journey, a stranger joins them. They do not recognize him. The Gospel tells us “their eyes were prevented from recognizing him.” Yet this stranger listens to their sorrow, invites them to retell the story of their dashed dreams, and walks with them patiently.
Editor’s Note: Originally published April 18th, 2017.
Love is an open door.
Christianity across the world celebrates the Resurrection of Jesus Christ this past Sunday. Easter is a celebration of a miraculous—and seemingly impossible—event. The feast of Jesus’ Resurrection holds a special place in my heart. I wish to share the basic biblical proof of the Resurrection, examples from some saints, and my own personal experience.
Note: If you still have questions related to a more cerebral and logical argument for the Resurrection of Jesus I highly recommend Carl Olson’s: Did Jesus Really Rise from the Dead?
Gospel evidence
Since there a lot of evidence to refer to and I prefer to keep today’s post as concise as possible I will only focus on the two strongest pieces of evidence I found to be convincing for me in showing validity in Jesus’ Resurrection. First, the witness of the women being the initial people to notice the empty tomb is strong evidence. The reason for this is due to in 1st century Palestine life women did not enjoy the benefits of voting, membership in the workforce, or even respect to be witnesses in events like today.
The Gospel writers uniformly state that women were the first witnesses to the empty tomb and the first to proclaim Jesus as risen. This does not make sense unless it was true. Why would the gospel writers embarrass the apostles by placing women in a place of honor as the first evangelizers of Jesus’ Resurrection, unless that was the truth?
Saint Mary Magdalene is known as the Apostle to the Apostles.
Secondly, the Gospel of Matthew already shows alternative explanations already surfacing to explain the disappearance of Jesus’ body when the tomb was opened. According to Matthew, the priests and elders charged the Roman soldiers to create a story to explain why the tomb was empty. They [priests and elders] state, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came during the night and stole him while we were asleep’. If any word of this gets to the procurator, we will straighten it out with him and keep you out of trouble.” (Matthew 28:13-14). This never made sense to me. If the apostles were fraudulent, why the Matthew plainly write about the theory of the stolen body of Jesus? Such a theory only makes sense as a lie developed by the priests and elders.
Saintly Sources
Because of the vast array of saints to attest to the truth of the Resurrection, I will only focus on two for conciseness’ sake—St. Peter and St. Paul. The thing that I really love about St. Peter is his fervor to follow the gospel after Jesus’ Resurrection. In addition to being the 1st pope of the Catholic Church, Peter testified to the truth of the Gospel as a martyr via crucifixion.
St. Paul represents arguably the greatest conversion in the history of Christianity. Paul went from being a murderer of Christians to the Church’s great evangelizer and writer of almost 2/3 of the New Testament. These two men show us that they encountered someone who transformed them. Peter and Paul’s conversions are an effect of the power of Jesus’ Resurrection!
My Testimony
While my own testimony does not hold the same weight at Scripture and Tradition, I still am convinced that certain things in my life transpired due to a power outside of my control and full understanding. During my darkest days a few years ago I learned of the power of God. He rose me up from the loss of a job and our miscarriages. God continues to demonstrate the glory of His Resurrected Son in seemingly ordinary things too. For example, I asked my cousin to pray for my wife for an important interview. My cousin told me, “Of course, and incidentally she [my wife] was the person my cousin and his fiancée scheduled to pray for, in a special way, anyways.” This is not the first time this seeming coincidence happened to my cousin.
Through Scripture, Tradition [the saints], and my personal experience with daily and extraordinary events I have come to more deeply realize the Resurrection of Jesus as an historical fact. I pray that you come to enjoy this truth in Scripture, Tradition, and your own life’s experiences!
