Yearn for everlasting life with holy desire! -St. Benedict
Homily by Father Michael Kwatera, OSB | Sunday, May 3, 2026
Fifth Sunday of Easter, Year A
Join the Sisters of St. Paul’s Monastery on Sundays! Morning Prayer is at 10:00am with a short break before 11:00am Mass followed by an incredible homecooked Sunday Brunch. Evening Prayer is celebrated at 5:00pm. Please call 651-777-8181 at the Monastery to arrange your visit (especially if you’d like to share in meals with the Sisters).
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Some of you may be making or finalizing your vacation plans. And heaven knows how important such preparation is! I remember how my mother and father prepared for our yearly week or two at a resort in northern Minnesota, on one of the 10,000 (really more like 11,000) lakes in our state. My Dad always found ways to make the trip interesting. We would always stop at the “Maid-Rite” hamburger joint along the way; and we would stop again at a roadside store in Royalton called “Treasure City” for souvenirs. It is still open for business. I can’t tell you how much hard-earned money I spent there on shells and rocks and other collectibles—And, I’ve lost track of how many historical monuments, scenic overlooks, and wayside rests we stopped at over the years.
My Dad knew well what travel guides wisely recommend regarding vacation travel: make the travel itself part of the vacation. Certainly, the many stops my parents and I made years ago were a memorable part of our vacations, and sometimes the best part. Yet how often have you and I set out on a journey, so intent on reaching our destination that we don’t make time to admire the beautiful scenery, or skip an enjoyable meal in a local café, or miss an opportunity to dip into the past at a historical site? But shouldn’t the process of getting to where we want to arrive be part of the vacation—maybe even the best part?
Jesus our life is the way that leads to eternal life with God. This is to be the happy ending of our human journey with Jesus. And yet, how often we act as if this life, our earthly pilgrimage to God, is really something secondary or second-best, something to be endured in view of a greater goal. How often we think that if we somehow manage to survive the peris in this valley of tears and get to haven, everything will be just fine; we will have made it! How often we act as if our salvation lies in rejecting or avoiding the circumstances of our lives in this world, instead of in accepting them and transforming them. Certainly, we should look forward eagerly to more than this world can offer, for we are to live in the everlasting dwelling-places of heaven. “Yearn for everlasting life with holy desire,” St. Benedict tells us. And yet, the process of getting there is important, too. It is nothing less than sharing in this world, the joys of the world to come. Why? Because Jesus makes our journey through life with us.
Where is Jesus? He is here in the midst right now. He is not “way up there” somewhere beyond outer space. He is with us in our Monastery, at our tables and desks, in our offices, bedrooms, and kitchens. Here are the “altars” where we can exercise our royal priesthood and offer the spiritual sacrifices of our lives, with all their contents, in company with Christ. Mothers know how to make this kind of offering. Jesus is the way, right now, today; he is not “out there,” waiting to be our reward at life’s end; rather, he is our way to God right now. To accept him as the way, the truth, and the life is to receive a taste of heaven here and now. To follow Jesus through the ups and downs of human life is to share in his journey through death to resurrection. And to go his way is to share even now in his joy and peace in God’s presence. Mothers know the many joys and sorrows of this journey. It takes a whole lifetime to make our human journey to heaven with Jesus. But he is the indispensable guide for those who have been baptized into his death and resurrection. Mothers know how indispensable a guide Jesus is.
Just as there is much to do along the way to our vacation spots, so there is much to do as we journey with Christ to our heavenly home. Our human journey with Christ is to be marked by the same service to God and neighbor that marked his own. Our baptism and monastic profession commit us to do the same life-giving works that Jesus did. Jesus assures us that whoever has faith in him will do the works he has done, and greater far than these. Really? Can this be true? The disciples of Jesus will do greater works than his? How could the apostles—and I hardly need point out, WE—ever hope to do greater works than the teaching and miracles of Jesus?
And yet, Jesus has spoken the truth. Yes, we do the works he did, and greater far than these. What works? Works of Christian love and service on this and every continent, in this country and all countries, close to home and far away. Jesus, after all, never left the tiny area of the Holy Land; he never engaged in world-wide tours or speaking engagements. Yet his followers have become wonder-workers as they make him known throughout the word. And, aren’t mothers the best wonder-workers! In terms of sheer numbers of people helped, Jesus’ saying is true: believers in him HAVE done greater works than he did in his earthly lifetime. But our success in doing the works of Jesus comes from doing them in the NAME of Jesus, for the glory of his God and our God. The only reason we can do the works of Jesus as we journey through life is that he works through us and in us, just as he worked in Thomas and Philip and all the apostles. For us, as for the, Jesus must be the way, the truth, and the life.
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Michael Kwatera, OSB, is a monk and director of liturgy for Saint John’s Abbey, Collegeville, Minnesota.
He taught courses in liturgy at Saint John’s University in Collegeville and at the College of Saint Scholastica
in Duluth, Minnesota, and served as pastor of several local Benedictine parishes. He has authored numerous
articles and several Liturgical Press books, including The Liturgical Ministry of Deacons and Come to the Feast:
Liturgical Ministry of, by, and for Everybody.
