By Father Rich Tomkosky
Jesus is the Way
By getting to know the Lord in prayer, by meditating on the Sacred Scriptures in the Bible, by participating in the Holy Mass, by contemplating the beauty of Jesus’s love for us in Eucharistic Adoration, by uniting our daily life and any sufferings we experience with Jesus, instead of trying to bear them alone. All these things should remind us that Jesus is the way to ultimate salvation.
He came to earth to teach us the way back to the Father after we have gotten lost in sin and spiritual darkness, in selfishness, despair and hopelessness, as most humans became slaves of the devil and death.
Jesus’ life is the divine light that illuminates for us the narrow path back to Heaven. His life is like a divine road sign to point out to us the right direction to take in the midst of many false paths in the world, which is why He has given us the gift of the Catholic faith, which is protected and guided by the Holy Spirit to keep us on the right track if we open our hearts and minds to His holy teaching.
The saints have often used the image of the Church as the Ark of Salvation transporting us over the stormy seas of life into the safe port of Heaven if we stay on board. Let’s always pray for that grace of ongoing conversion and final perseverance and pray and work to try to draw fallen away Catholics back into the fold, and to introduce the Catholic faith to those who don’t know about it and thank the Lord daily for showing us the Way back to Heaven.
Jesus is the Truth
His teaching, which is handed down as the Sacred Deposit of Faith through the centuries by our popes and bishops and pastors and all the saints is the saving message of salvation.
Truth means correspondence to reality, so when Jesus says He is the Truth, it means that if we stay close to Him and learn from Him then we will be in tune with what is real rather than what is make-believe or false. So much of what the world today concerns itself with in the end will be seen in the light of God as make-believe: fame, fortune, passing pleasures, money, earthly power and control, etc. In the end all these things will disappear like a puff of smoke. What will last forever will be Jesus’ teaching on Faith, Hope and Love and becoming like Him, hopefully, in all that we say, think and do.
On earth the great gift of truth the Lord left us was His holy teaching on how we are to live, which the Church teaches us and the Holy Spirit protects it down through the ages — see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which shows us the Catholic faith in its full splendor and is the sure norm for teaching the Catholic faith with integrity. It truly is the message of salvation.
Jesus is the Life
He is the one who gives us true life; the only life that will last forever. It begins in our Baptism when the seed of eternal life is planted in our souls. Then He feeds us with His Divine life literally in the gift of the Holy Eucharist. It tastes like mere bread and wine, but we know in faith that it truly becomes His Body and Blood at every Mass when the priest invokes the Holy Spirit and prays over the bread and wine at the Consecration. When we then receive Jesus in Holy Communion, again if our heart and mind and will are open to it, we are transformed more profoundly into the image of Jesus and brought into deeper union with Him, and the Father, and the Holy Spirit, in the depths of our soul. This is why it is so important as we get older and become adults to never turn our lives away from Jesus by committing serious/mortal sin; and if we ever do fall into that unfortunate state, to repent and come back to Jesus and His friendship in the beautiful sacrament of Confession/Reconciliation ASAP.
Do we realize what a gift Holy Communion is, and how we should do everything in our life to stay in communion with our loving Savior, Jesus? I pray all of us will thank Jesus for His infinite, amazing, love for us in Holy Communion, and for the children receiving Him for the first time during this Easter season, and that we will always strive to follow Jesus faithfully, who alone is the WAY, the TRUTH and the LIFE, the one Savior of the human race, the only One who can save us from sin, and eternal death, and the wiles of the devil, and enable us to live in communion with Him and the Father and the Holy Spirit in this life, in the depths of our soul in the Divine Indwelling, and then in the fullness of the life to come in Heaven if we cooperate.
Never forget what Jesus says in the Gospel, “… I am going to prepare a place for you, and I will come back and take you to myself, so that where I am (in Heaven) you also may be.” That is something to look forward to! May God bless us with that special grace today and always to never stray from communion with the Lord Jesus since it leads to eternal life. God bless you.
Father Rich Tomkosky is the Pastor of Saint Thomas the Apostle Parish in Bedford and the Pastor of Seven Dolors of the Blessed Virgin Mary Parish in Beans Cove.
