A reading of the holy gospel according to John. Jesus showed himself to the disciples once again at the Sea Of Tiberias, and this is how the appearance took place. Assembled were Simon Peter remember, this is now up in the northern part. They've left Jerusalem. Assembled were Simon Peter, Thomas the twin, Nathaniel from Cana in Galilee, Zebedee's sons, and two other disciples.
Simon Peter said to him, notice, always Peter taking the lead, I am going out fish to fish. In other words, I'm going fishing. They can't even say that simply, you know. We will join you, his friend said, and went off to get into their boat. They fished all night and caught nothing.
Just after daybreak, Jesus was standing on the shore, though none of the disciples knew that it was Jesus. He said to them, children, have you caught anything to eat? Not a thing, they answered. Well, cast your net off to the starboard side, Jesus suggested, and you will find something. So they made a cast and took so many fish that they could not haul the net in.
Then the disciple that Jesus loved cried out to Peter, it is the lord. On hearing it was the lord, Simon Peter threw on some clothes, he was stripped, and jumped into the water. Meanwhile, the other disciples came in in the boat towing the net full of fish. Actually, they were not far from land, no more than a 100 yards. When they landed, they saw a charcoal fire already laid with a fish laid upon it and some bread.
Bring some of the fish that you have caught, Jesus said to them. Simon Peter went aboard and hauled ashore the net loaded with sizable fish, 153 of them. Despite the great number, the net was not torn. Come and eat your meal, Jesus said to him. Not one of the disciples presumed to ask, who are you?
For they knew it was the lord. Jesus came over, took the bread, and gave it to them, and did the same thing with the fish. This marked the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after being raised from the dead, and this is the gospel of the lord. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen.
There are many human touches to this account of our lord's appearance to the disciples at the Lake Of Galilee. Now notice once again how at first they don't recognize Jesus. This is mysterious. Now why did John recognize him? I don't know, but it's it's it's an intriguing fact that in these accounts, from the very beginning, Mary Magdalene in in the garden right at the tomb, she sees Christ and she thinks it's the gardener.
And she doesn't recognize Jesus until he says Mary. On the way to Emma house now that's a considerable walk, say, about two hours or more. All during that time, the disciples did not recognize Jesus. They didn't recognize him when they went into the house after they had invited him to stay with him. They didn't recognize him.
It was only when he broke the bread that they recognized. Now notice with Mary, what is more commonplace than one's name? Of course, it's not commonplace to to the person who owns the name, but it is a very ordinary thing that goes with the person that is your name. Again, breaking of a bread, the bread. What is more simple than that?
Nothing extraordinary or abnormal or spectacular or dramatic, just breaking of the bread. Remember, they didn't cut bread. You had a loaf of bread and you broke it, and it was done day in and day out. But they recognized after hours with Jesus, walking along the road, hearing hearing him explain in detail all the scriptures of the Old Testament having to do with the Messiah and how he had to suffer and then rise from the dead, they did not recognize it. With all that learning, with all that information, with all they knew of Jesus personally, they did not recognize him only with a humdrum commonplace ordinary gesture of breaking bread did they recognize Jesus.
Now here, in this instance, we're not told why John recognized We're not given a hint why he said it is the lord. He his eyes were probably no better than the others. What did he detect in Jesus, that prompted him to say it is the lord? Notice it was Peter who threw on some clothes and jumped overboard. He ought to have left his clothes off.
He wanted to swim ashore. It's a 100 yards. That's a pretty good swim. So there's a there's a mystery here. But the thing to me you know, was just reading an interview with Graham Greene.
Graham Greene is he is not the ordinary Catholic, let us say, or the ordinary convert. But Graham Green this was last week. Maybe you read it. Graham Green said I am merely telling you what he said, that the most convincing evidence for the factuality of the resurrection of Jesus Christ was this, that John outran Peter to the tomb. And that's recorded.
I think what Green is saying is it's a very human touch that in this tremendous, tremendous event of Christ rising from the dead, they note that the younger man ran outran the older man. John was a better runner. Notice how commonplace it is. I think that's what Graham is saying. Now a person who was interested in in trying to to pull the wool over your eyes to deceive, they'd be more subtle.
They would have it they certainly would they would have something more dramatic or spectacular. Look at this scene today. Christ, God almighty, risen from the dead, a little fire and some fish cooking and some bread. What is more commonplace? Practically every man, the poorest of the poor in the whole of Galilee probably was beginning the day just about that way, at least if it was around the Lake Of Galilee.
And so God almighty, if there's I'm I I had this is all kind of mysterious. But what does appeal to me is this, how commonplace god almighty is. And if you're ever going to come into contact with Jesus Christ, the son of god, it's going to be in your ordinary daily life. And that goes for me too. Not in the far distant future, not when you make it, not when you succeed in this, not when you do something very ennobling for god.
Forget it. If you don't recognize Jesus Christ in the humdrum, ordinary, unspectacular, undramatic, boring, monotonous activities of daily living, you are never going to recognize it. Never. Because what where else are you in life? And if there's any no.
This is just in my opinion. But it seems to me that and remember, in every one of our lord's appearances, it's extremely commonplace. Nothing nothing like Mount Tabor. Nothing like the baptism in the Jordan. Nothing like that.
And so it is in our lives. Some time ago, a young man came to see me and he had been away from the church and he had heard about some of the especially well, he had heard about some of the religious experiences that people had when they came back and took up their religion again. So he came back and started to go to mass and say some prayers, and for the full expectation that he was gonna have some of these luminous experiences, he didn't get them, and he was disappointed. What right have we to expect that kind of thing? That's not the way it was with Jesus and his disciples, and that's not the way it ordinarily is.
Can that happen? Of course it can happen. There was a Mount Tabor. There was a a baptism in the Jordan. There was plenty of spectacular things about Jesus.
By and large, it wasn't. If he lived thirty three years on this earth, at least 30 of them were absolutely anonymous. That's a pretty good percentage of being commonplace. And so if there's maybe this is a thought we can take into our daily life, to recognize Jesus in our daily living. Opus Dei, the work of the lord.
In the name of the father, the son, and holy spirit. Amen.