A priest was visiting with some friends and while he was there some Jehovah’s Witnesses came to the door, so they invited them in for a chat. They started talking about the Bible. The JWs quoted to the priest the very verse that we read this Sunday, that the followers of Jesus will speak other tongues, they will pick up serpents in their hands, they will drink deadly things unharmed, and they will lay hands on the sick and they will recover. One Jehovah Witness asked the priest if he believed those things. The priest said, “Yes, I am a follower of Jesus.” The JW then took from his pocket a bottle of very disgusting looking stuff, it was oily in nature the priest recalled. The JW slid the bottle with the mystery substance in it and said, “Then you won’t mind drinking this then.” The priest picked up the bottle, looked at it and slid it back to the JW and said, “You drink it and when you get sick I will lay hands on you and you will recover.”
I think the Jehovah Witness does have a great point: where are the deeds of power in your Church? I know we can quote saints and show them, but where are the deeds of power in St Ann’s Quesnel? How come we don’t see them? I feel we only expect what is merely humanly possible. If we go see Father we might get some good advice but that is all that could be expected. I believe we don’t see the power because we are not engaging in the mission of the Church, the deeds that accompany the mission. Jesus won’t let others to be drawn to us by deeds of power because we are stuck here in our church. We are not going forth and bringing the Good News. We are not bearing fruit for all eternity because we are stuck. We have an inward focus in our parish. Our thought is not, “Let us see how we can preach the Good News as a collective body,” so instead we turn and attack each other. Whenever you find a community attacking one another, you have a community that has lost its mission. That mission is go forth and preach the Good News. We are all called and when we go forward, we will see the deeds of power. Until then, we will just sit expecting what is human and continuing to harm one another.
Not only will there not be deeds of power, we will also not see that power that is being offered each Sunday. I was reading a story about the Chinese Martyrs. People think that the Catholic Church does not exist in China but it does. They suffer and live under pressure all the time. The Bishop whom I am reading about right now, spoke of how he celebrated Mass in prison, how he would be in danger but he did it and how they would get the Eucharist out to the Catholics, even though torture or punishment would happen if they were discovered. Yet they did even at grave costs. I think we often take Mass as an honour that God is lucky we are here because we could have chosen many other things. We are the ones that are blessed. We are the ones that are honoured because in our very midst we have Jesus who enters into our lives. To heal and bless and inspire if we would only ask Him to.
I recently listened to a talk about a former Satanist who returned to her Catholic faith from some pretty bad things. She said she is shocked often by us Catholics who simply walk by the Blessed Sacrament. They will expect healing from her when she prays over them but not healing when Jesus Christ physically enters them. We need to expect more. The power of Christ is working in us. Today marks the Feast of the Ascension where our Lord entered into Heaven. It reminds us that our faith must be moving forward and upward. Next week will be the feast of Pentecost where the Church came alive. We cannot live our mission and therefore work deeds of power if we are not alive in our faith. I beg you all, please pray to the Holy Spirit that He will set us on fire again with our mission, that He will give us the grace to come alive. You can do the novena to the Holy Spirit. Pray in your own way but as Catholics we must return to our mission so God can do the great works He wishes to do in us.