Year C

June 1, 2025

On this page you will find:

The readings for Mass, the Mass leaflet with the choice of hymns
A sample universal prayer available for download , in PDF and editable Word formats.
A meditation on the Sunday Gospel , a spiritual text and a commentary by Marie-Noëlle Thabut

7th Sunday of Easter

That all may be one
as you, Father, are in me, and I in you.
May they, too, be one within us.
so that the world will believe that you sent me.

John 17:21

Readings from the Mass

https://www.aelf.org/2025-06-01/romain/messe

Mass leaflet

Universal Prayer

Lectio Divina
Consult this page for a prayerful preparation for the liturgy and then read the meditations below.

SERMON OF SAINT LEO THE GREAT FOR THE ASCENSION

The Ascension of the Lord strengthens our faith. In the Easter solemnity, the Resurrection of the Lord was the cause of our joy; likewise, his ascension into heaven gives us cause to rejoice, since we commemorate and venerate as is fitting this great day when our poor nature, in the person of Christ, was raised higher than all the host of heaven, higher than all the choirs of angels, higher than all the powers of heaven, to sit beside God the Father. It is upon this arrangement of divine works that we are founded and built. Indeed, the grace of God becomes all the more admirable when, having seen the disappearance of that which inspired their adoration, their faith has not known doubt, their hope has not been shaken, their charity has not grown cold. This is the strength of great minds, this is the light of souls full of faith: to believe without hesitation what the eyes of the body cannot see, to fix one's desire where the gaze cannot reach. But how could such piety be born in our hearts, how could we be justified by faith, if our salvation consisted only in realities offered to our eyes? What was visible in our Redeemer has passed into the sacramental mysteries. And to make faith purer and firmer, sight was replaced by teaching: it was to the authority of this teaching that the hearts of believers, enlightened by the rays of heaven, were to submit. This faith, increased by the Ascension of the Lord and strengthened by the gift of the Holy Spirit, feared neither chains, nor prisons, nor exile, nor the bite of beasts, nor the refined tortures of cruel persecutors. Throughout the world, it is for this faith that not only men, but women, and even young children and frail girls have fought until they shed their blood. This faith has cast out demons, warded off diseases, and raised the dead. The holy Apostles themselves, strengthened by so many miracles and instructed by so many sermons, had nevertheless been terrified by the Lord's cruel Passion and had not readily accepted the reality of his Resurrection. But his Ascension enabled them to make such progress that everything that had previously filled them with fear now brought them joy. They had directed their contemplation toward the divinity of him who had taken his place at the right hand of the Father. The sight of his body could no longer hinder them or prevent them from discerning, with the keenest of minds, that in descending to us and ascending to the Father, he had not turned away from his disciples. It was then, my beloved, that this Son of Man was known, in a higher and holier way, as the Son of God. When he returned to the glory of his Father, he began, in a mysterious way, to be more present in his divinity, even as he was more distant in his humanity. It was then that faith, better instructed, drew near, through a spiritual journey, to the Son who is equal to the Father; it no longer needed to grasp in Christ that bodily substance by which he is inferior to the Father. The glorified body retained its nature, but the faith of believers was called to touch, not with a carnal hand but with a spiritual understanding, the only Son, equal to the one who begot him.

The Little Way of the Gospel

Interview with Bernadette Dumont

for Magnificat

(I highly recommend subscribing: here )

I will not leave you orphans, says the Lord; I will return to you, and your hearts will rejoice.

◗ Today we celebrate the 7th and final Sunday of Easter…

You are referring to the Sundays "of" Easter, not the Sundays "after" Easter. The Sundays of the Easter season are considered by the liturgy as one single "Great Sunday" of Easter. An uninterrupted celebration where we commemorate our passage from death to life with the risen Christ: "Alleluia: He is alive!"

◗ What signs does the liturgy give us?

The most important element is the large Paschal candle near the altar. Lit at every Mass, it symbolizes the risen Christ present in the heart of his Church. There is also the white color of the clergy's vestments: it signifies the light of the Resurrection.

◗ If Easter time celebrates the same mystery, does not each Easter Sunday highlight a different aspect of it?

Yes, of course. On this 7th Sunday of Easter, which comes just after the Ascension and just before Pentecost, the verse of the Alleluia highlights a particular dimension of the Paschal Mystery: "I will not leave you orphans, says the Lord; I will come to you, and your hearts will rejoice."

This particular dimension is manifested in a profoundly moving way in this Sunday's Gospel…

Indeed, this passage from the Gospel is poignant. Just before his death, Jesus prays to God his Father for us. Note that he does even more than pray: for the one and only time in the Gospel, he says to him, "I want…" Jesus entrusts his last wishes, his testament, to his Father. And what does he want? "That they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I in you. That they also may be in us… That they may be one as we are one: I in them, and you in me."

◗ This testament of Jesus is in our favor, isn't that the greatest good news there could be?

Yes, that is the promise that the Lord wants to make wonders of our lives!

◗ But how can this be done?

The risen Jesus has returned to the Father, but he does not abandon us: he will send us his Spirit so that the testament he made to his Father in our favor may be fulfilled. And it will be fulfilled because the Holy Spirit is the communion of love that makes the Father and the Son one in God. The gift of the Holy Spirit will therefore be for us the grace to live in the communion of love that unites Jesus and his Father! Today's Gospel calls us to share in the very life of divine love: "Father, […] may the love with which you have loved me be in them, and I in them."

Catechist and author of children's books, Bernadette Dumont is a mother and grandmother.

Better understanding the Gospel
with Marie-Noëlle Thabut

Better understanding the Gospel

with Marie-Noëlle Thabut

GOSPEL according to Saint John 17:20-26

SO THAT THE WORLD MAKES THEM BELIEVE

We are at the end of Jesus' last conversation with his apostles, a few hours before his death. The conversation now takes the form of a prayer: he prays in their presence; this means that he is drawing them into his innermost thoughts; he is sharing his deepest desires with them. But who does he speak of most in his prayer? He speaks of the world; what he wants with all his might is for the world to believe: “That they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I in you. That they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” A little later, he repeats: “That they may thus become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you have sent me.” And why is it so important that the world recognize Jesus as the one sent by the Father?* Because only then will the world know how much God loves it. The sending of his Son is the most beautiful proof of love that God can give to the world: “Let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” It is indeed the same Saint John who recounts Jesus’ words to Nicodemus: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). Rereading these lines, one is struck by Jesus’ insistence on the words love and unity; once again, we must recognize that God’s history with humankind is a great adventure, a love story. God is Love, he loves humankind, and he sends his Son to tell them so directly! This is precisely what Jesus will say a few hours later to Pilate, during his interrogation: “For this I was born, and for this I came into the world: to bear witness to the truth.” “(Jn 18:37) As he departs, as he passes from this world to his Father, as John says, Jesus passes the torch to his disciples, and through them to all disciples of all times: “I do not pray only for these, but also for those who will believe in me through their word.” From now on, the witness is entrusted to them; Jesus had said it a few moments earlier: “As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.” (Jn 17:18). He will say it again to them on Easter evening: “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” (Jn 20:21). Like all those who, before them, throughout biblical history, have been chosen by God, these are chosen for a mission; and this mission is always the same for all the prophets of all times: to proclaim that God loves humankind. Following Jesus Christ, every Christian can say, or should be able to say: "I was born, I came into the world for this: to bear witness to the truth." This truth is God's boundless love for humanity, or, if you prefer, that famous "benevolent purpose" spoken of in the letter to the Ephesians.

THE TRAGEDY OF MISUNDERSTANDING

But there is, however, something strange about all this: one might wonder why this message is so disturbing that Jesus paid for it with his life, like so many prophets before him and his apostles after him. Jesus addresses this very question in the final sentences of our reading for this Sunday; he says: “Righteous Father, the world has not known you.” For him, the explanation lies there, it is the tragedy of ignorance. It is this ignorance of God’s love that is the root of humanity’s misfortune, as the Book of Genesis already reflected. And the prophet Isaiah noted: “The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master’s crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand” (Isaiah 1:3). This is precisely what Saint John says in the prologue of his Gospel: “He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not recognize him.” He came to his own house, and his own people did not receive him” (John 1:10-11). Like Jesus, the disciples will experience this anguish, this tragedy of rejection by those to whom they will nevertheless proclaim the best news imaginable. The world is the object of God’s and his prophets’ love, but also, and at the same time, the place where that love is rejected. Jesus expressed this tragedy on several occasions: on the one hand, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son… God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him” (3:16-17; 12:47). On the other hand, “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first… But take heart! I have overcome the world” (15:18; 16:33). It is on this cry of victory that we must remain: we know that God's song of love for humanity will ultimately be heard. At the very moment when Jesus offers this great prayer, when he entrusts himself thus to his Father before his disciples, he knows full well that he has already been heard; he who said: “Father, I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me…” (John 11:41-42). It is only to hasten the day that he insists so much on the instruction of unity that he gives to his messengers: “That they also may be one in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” Until the day when the angel will sound his trumpet to announce, “The kingdom of the world has now become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign for ever and ever” (Revelation 11:15).

-------------------

Note 1 — This is why John attaches importance to the meaning of the name of the Pool of Siloam: it means "The Messenger," precisely. And John points this out when he heals the man born blind and rebukes the spiritual blindness of those who refuse to believe in him. (Jn 9).2 —

Echoing Isaiah's preaching, a Christian legend dating from approximately the seventh century AD (the Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew) recounts that upon the arrival of the Infant Jesus at their stable, the donkey and the ox knelt to worship him. This is said to be the origin of the presence of these two animals in our nativity scenes, as an invitation to worship in turn.