The Love That Makes All Things New
Julián Carrón - “Little children, yet a little while I am with you,” Jesus said to his disciples during the Last Supper. He had not yet left, and already he was worried about his friends. How would they manage when he was no longer with them in the same way he had been until then? He had told them: “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete” (Jn 15:9-11).
When the disciples heard these words at the Last Supper, they could not yet imagine that Jesus would not remain present only through a commandment or in the memory of his love. In fact, he compares his relationship with them to the relationship he has with the Father. The Father is the permanent source of his being a son, not a mere memory of the Father’s love. Jesus too will always remain the source of their being his. “I have made your name known to them and will make it known, so that the love with which you loved me may be in them and I in them” (Jn 17:26). If they do not want to remain orphans, they too must remain in his love and welcome him continually, as he does with the Father.
With his resurrection, “the former things have passed away.” “Behold, I make all things new.” The newness of which the Apocalypse speaks in the second reading is the newness that his living presence communicates to everyone he meets: Mary, Thomas, Peter, and the others. In an instant, the newness of life of the risen Lord, which has enveloped his body laid in the tomb, begins to pass on to those he meets. Now they know who they are, because the risen Christ has enveloped their lives with his newness, bringing them to a level of fullness and intensity they could never have imagined before. This new source of life that is the risen Christ makes possible things that would have been impossible before, as St. John will say: “We love because he first loved us” (1 Jn 4:19).
Only the experience of being loved, of being filled with his presence, can bring forth love for others in us. Being loved first is an experience that is lived in the present. Without this experience, we will be constantly searching for our own interests, which are incapable of bringing any significant newness to life. Only if Christ’s love pervades us can we truly be different, new, and love with the same gratuitousness with which we are loved. Love for others will not be possible unless it overflows from the love with which we are continually loved. Now we can fully understand the meaning of Jesus’ words in today’s Gospel: “As I have loved you, so you also should love one another.” Jesus tells his disciples that they will be able to love one another only if they accept his love. Only when we experience the newness of being loved can we succeed in loving in turn. Only when we are struck and filled with his love will we discover this impulse to love within ourselves. It is from a fullness of life and love that our capacity to love springs forth. If it is impossible to love one another in this way, the very fact that we love one another will bear witness to his living presence, risen among us. “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” There is no sign of his resurrection more powerful than the love that is among you. It is through this love among you, among us, that everyone will know that you are my disciples and that you allow yourselves to be continually generated by my newness. It is so impossible for human beings to love one another in this way that your love will cry out to everyone where the source of life is that makes it possible to love everything, to have this capacity to love.
From that moment on, this initial gift given to some began to spread to others. The account of Paul and Barnabas on their return to Antioch bears witness to this: “When they arrived, they gathered the church and reported everything God had done through them and how he had opened the door of faith to the Gentiles.” This is how God’s method is revealed before our eyes, as it was before theirs, and how it continues throughout history. He does not offer this gift to some at the expense of others, but begins by giving it to someone, such as Paul and Barnabas, and then spreads it to others through them. This is a foretaste of what will be forever, as the Book of Revelation describes in a most moving way in the second reading: “I, John, saw a new heaven and a new earth [...]. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven.” Only a gift from heaven can do such a thing. “Then I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, ‘Behold, the dwelling place of God is with men. [Only if God is among men can this happen.] He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and he will be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the former things have passed away.’ And the one seated on the throne said, ‘Behold, I make all things new.’” Everything we experience, everything we touch, can begin to become new if we continually open ourselves to this newness that the risen Lord continually generates in those who welcome him.
Fifth Sunday of Easter – Year C - Notes from the Homily by Julián Carrón
May 18, 2025 (First Reading: Acts 14:21b-27; Psalm 144 (145); Second Reading: Rev 21:1-5a; Gospel: Jn 13:31-33a, 34-35)
