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HOMILIES

3. Homily - Sunday, March 29, 2020

Fifth Sunday of Lent - Year A (Jn 11:1-45)

What are your sufferings?

These difficult times bring suffering. What are your sufferings?

When a loved one dies, we suffer, and these days, people are suffering such a loss, plus they are
grieving the loss of a loved one at a time when the opportunity to gather as a group to mourn
or pray publicly is extremely restricted.

This in itself becomes a new source of suffering. It is as though someone, at the moment he or
she departed from this world, did so unknown to anyone and completely unnoticed.

However, God is always near to us, even in death. Indeed, God is never closer to someone
than at the moment of his/her death. And God is never closer to us than when we lose some-
one we love.

There are also other sources of suffering arising from the insecurity in which we now find our-
selves. Suffering felt while awaiting test results: Are we infected or not? Suffering brought on
by worrying about family members who could be affected by this virus. Suffering associated with
economic insecurity: Will I lose my job? Maybe it already happened or is about to happen. Will I
receive the help that I need to make it through this? And there are other forms of suffering
that are part of daily life but now merge together as we live through this pandemic.

Is it possible to move forward, to deal with suffering and still have hope?

When we hear Jesus speak in today’s reading from the Gospel of John, He says: “I am the
resurrection and the life.” He knows who He is: He is the Lord. He is the Lord who is life. He
is the Lord who gives life, and He is the resurrection and the life. Yet, when Jesus reaches
Lazarus’s tomb, He suffers the loss of his friend. He weeps, experiencing the depths of our
humanity. He does not leave our humanity behind, but He experiences every aspect of it,
including the experience of suffering. He draws closer to us in our suffering.

(cont’d)

Collection of texts by the Most Rev. Christian Lépine 109