Dear Friends,

  I write here a postscript to the letter I wrote two days ago.

  Today is Holy Thursday.  It is the day the Lord Jesus gave us His all through what He did with the Passover meal from His own tradition as a Jew. He gave it a new and much deeper meaning than it had had--which was already a beautiful commemoration of God's rescuing the Israelites from a terrible state of slavery and hopelessness.  I want to say a few words about His gesture.

  Most of us truly admire anyone who gives their life for a loved one, for a child especially.  We are greatly touched by such deeds and wonder whether we could ever do the same.  Yet it seems that something deeper than our own means  is given when the moment comes to choose to give one's all, to pour out all that you have, even your own life if necessary.  Maybe we know of someone who has done such.  We are blessed to know such people.

   This evening we commemorate Jesus making that decision, choosing to give His best and all He had and is when giving us His body and blood.  The word 'Body' for a Jew means "my whole self."  'Blood' for a Jew means "life."  There is something about the circumstances surrounding the moment Jesus does this that should touch us deeply.  In Luke 22, verse 15, He is quoted to say, "It is with desire that I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer."  It is so Jewish to repeat a word as Jesus does in that sentence, the word 'desire' It is a rather strong way for indicating how deep is the feeling, how deeply He has looked forward to that moment.  It indicates how much He had wanted to express to us something very, very deep inside Himself.  What must we mean to Him for Him to say what He said and to do what He did, to give us what He gave us on that night?  What a moment it is for anyone to come to that point in their life when they want to give everything they have and are to someone who means that much to them.

   When we talk about the riches of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, it is this that we are seeing in Jesus' gesture--giving everything and leaving nothing unspoken or held back.  It seems to me that a person is never more than their best self, their deepest self than in the moment when they give everything they are, especially when it is their life.  And it strikes me that we do not really become who are meant to be until we make such a gift of our self.  Until then, we are partial, incomplete and  limited.  Jesus is never more Jesus than in that moment when He gives us His Body and Blood.  How profound, how deep are His longings to connect with us, to give Himself to us, for us to know what He knows and to love what He loves and in time for us to make the same gift of our own self, all that we are and have.

  A blessed Easter to you.  God bless!

Bernie Owens