23. And in that day you shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say to you, Whatsoever you shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you.
24. Hitherto have you asked nothing in my name; ask, and you shall receive, that your joy may be full.
25. These things have I spoken to you in proverbs; but the time comes, when I shall no more speak to you in proverbs, but I shall show you plainly of the Father.
26. At that day you shall ask in my name; and I say not to you, that I will pray the Father for you:
27. For the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God.
28. I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father.
CHRYS, Again our Lord shows that it is expedient that He should go: And in that day shall you ask Me nothing.
AUG. The word ask here means not only to seek for, but to ask a question: the Greek word from which it is translated has both meanings.
CHRYS. He says, And in that day, i.e. when I shall have risen again, you shall ask Me nothing, i.e. not say to Me, Show us the Father, and, Where do You go? since you will know this by the teaching of the Holy Ghost; or, you shall ask Me nothing, i.e. not want Me for a Mediator to obtain your requests, as My name will be enough, if you only call upon that: Verily, verily, I say to you, whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My Name, He will give it you. Wherein He shows His power; that neither seen, or asked, but named only to the Father, He will do miracles.
Do not think then, He said, that because for the future I shall not be with you, that you are therefore forsaken; for My name will be a still greater protection to you than My presence: Hitherto have you asked nothing in My Name; ask, and you shall receive, that your joy may be full.
THEOPHYL. I or when your prayers shall be fully answered, then will your gladness be greatest.
CHRYS. These words being obscure, He adds, These things have I spoken to you in proverbs, but the time comes when l shall no more speak to you in proverbs; for forty days He talked with them as they were assembled, speaking of the kingdom of God. And now, He says, you are in too great fear to attend to My words, but then, when you see Me risen again, you will be able to proclaim these things openly.
THEOPHYL. He still cheers them with the promise that help will be given them from above in their temptations: At that day you shall ask in My Name. And you will be so in favor with the Father, that you will no longer need my intervention: And I say not to you that I will pray the Father for you, for the Father Himself loves you. But that they might not start back from our Lord, as though they were no longer in need of Him, He adds, Because you have loved Me: as if to say, The Father loves you, because you have loved Me; when therefore you fall from My love, you will straightway fall from the Father's love.
AUG. But does He love us because we love Him; or rather do not we love Him, because He loved us; This is what the Evangelist says, Let us love God, because God first loved us (1 Jn 4:19). The Father then loves us, because we love the Son, it being from the Father and the Son, that we receive the love from the Father and the Son. He loves what He has made; but He would not make in us what He loved, except He loved us in the first place.
HILARY. Perfect faith in the Son, which believes and loves what has come forth from God, and deserves to be heard and loved for its own sake, this faith confessing the Son of God, born from Him, and sent by Him, needs not an intercessor with the Father; wherefore it follows, And have believed that I came forth from God.
His nativity and advent are signified by, I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world. The one is dispensation, the other nature. To have come from the Father, and to have come forth from God, have not the same meaning; because it is one thing to have come forth from God in the relation of Sonship, another thing to have come from the Father into this world to accomplish the mystery of our salvation. Since to come forth from God is to subsist as His Son, what else can He be but God.
CHRYS. As it was consolatory to them to hear of His resurrection, and how He came from God, and went to God, He dwells again and again on these subjects: Again, I leave the world, and go to the Father. The one was a proof that their faith in Him was not vain: the other that they would still be under His protection.
AUG. He came forth from the Father, because He is of the Father; He came into the world, because He showed Himself in the body to the world. He left the world by His departure in the body, and went to the Father by the ascension of His humanity, nor yet in respect of the government of His presence, left the world; just as when He went forth from the Father and came into the world, He did so in such wise as not to leave the Father. But our Lord Jesus Christ, we read, was asked questions, and petitioned after His resurrection; for when about to ascend to Heaven He was asked by His disciples when He would restore the kingdom to Israel; when in Heaven He was asked by Stephen, to receive his spirit.
And who would dare to say that as mortal He might be asked, as immortal He might not? I think then that when He says, In that day you shall ask Me nothing, He refers not to the time of His resurrection, but to that time when we shall see Him as He is: which vision is not of this present life, but of the life everlasting, when we shall ask for nothing, ask no questions, because there will remain nothing to be desired, nothing to be learnt.
ALCUIN. This is His meaning then: In the world to come, you shall ask me nothing: but in the mean time while you are traveling on this wearisome road, ask what you want of the Father, and He will give it you: Verily, verily, I say to you, Whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My Name, He will give it you.
AUG. The word whatsoever must not be understood to mean anything, but something which with reference to obtaining the life of blessedness is not nothing. That is not sought in the Savior's name, which is sought to the hindering of our salvation; for by in My name must be understood not the mere sound of the letters or syllables, but that which is rightly and truly signified by that sound. He who holds any notion concerning Christ, which should not be held of the only Son of God, does not ask in His name.
But he who thinks rightly of Him, asks in His name, and receives what he asks, if it be not against his eternal salvation; he receives when it is right he should receive; for some things are only denied at present in order to be granted at a more suitable time. Again, the words, He will give it you, only comprehend those benefits which properly appertain to the persons who ask.
All saints are heard for themselves, but not for all; for it is not will give simply, but will give you; what follows, Hitherto have you asked nothing in My name, may be understood in two ways: either that they had not asked in His name, because they had not known it as it ought to be known; or, you have asked nothing, because with reference to obtaining the thing you ought to ask for, what you have asked for is to be counted nothing.
That therefore they may ask in His name not for what is nothing, but for the fullness of joy, He adds, Ask and you shall receive, that your joy may be full. This full joy is not carnal, but spiritual joy; and it will be full, when it is so great that nothing can be added to it.
AUG. And this is that full joy, than which nothing can be greater, viz. to enjoy God, the Trinity, in the image of Whom we are made.
AUG, Whatsoever then is asked, which appertains to the getting this joy, this must be asked in the name of Christ. For His saints that persevere in asking for it, He will never in His divine mercy disappoint. But whatever is asked beside this is nothing, i.e. not absolutely nothing, but nothing in comparison with so great a thing as this. It follows: These things have I spoken to you in proverbs; but the time comes when I shall no more speak to you in proverbs, but I shall show you plainly of the Father.
The hour of which He speaks may be understood of the future life, when we shall see Him, as the Apostle said, face to face, and, These things have I spoken to you in proverbs, of that which the Apostle said, Now we see as in a glass darkly (1 Cor 13:12). But I will show you that the Father shall be seen through the Son; For no man knows the Father save the Son, and he to whom the Son shall reveal Him (Matt 11:17).
GREG. When He declares that He will show them plainly of the Father, He alludes to the manifestation about to take place of His own majesty which would troth show His own equality With the Father and the procession of the coeternal Spirit from both.
AUG. But this sense seems to be interfered with by what follows: At that day you shall ask in My name. What shall we have to ask for in a future life, when all our desires shall be satisfied; Asking implies the want of something. It remains then that we understand the words of Jesus going to make His disciples spiritual, from being carnal and natural beings.
The natural man so understands whatever he hears of God in a bodily sense, as being unable to conceive any other. Wherefore whatever Wisdom said of the incorporeal, immutable substance are proverbs to him, not that he accounts them proverbs but understands them as if they were proverbs. But when, become spiritual, he has begun to discern all things, though in this life he see but in a glass and in part, yet does he perceive, not by bodily sense, not by idea of the imagination, but by most sure intelligence of the mind, perceive and hold that God is not body, but spirit; the Son shows so plainly of the Father, that He who shows is seen to be of the same nature with Him who is shown.
Then they who ask, ask in His name, because by the sound of that name they understand nothing but the thing itself which is expressed by that name. These are able to think that our Lord Jesus Christ, in so far as He is man, intercedes with the Father for us' in so far as He is God, hears us together with the Father: which I think is His meaning when He says, And I say not to you that I will pray the Father for you. To understand this, viz. how that the Son does not ask the Father, but Father and Son together hear those who ask, is beyond the reach of any but the spiritual vision.
Catena Aurea John 16
Regnum Christi
Saturday of the Sixth Week of Easter
Father John Doyle, LC
John 16:23b-28
Jesus said to his disciples: “Amen, amen, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in my name he will give you. Until now you have not asked anything in my name; ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete. I have told you this in figures of speech. The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures but I will tell you clearly about the Father. On that day you will ask in my name, and I do not tell you that I will ask the Father for you. For the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have come to believe that I came from God. I came from the Father and have come into the world. Now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father.”
Introductory Prayer: Lord, as I begin this prayer I offer you my whole self: my thoughts, desires, decisions, actions, hopes, fears, weaknesses, failures and petty successes. I open my entire being to you, aware that you know everything already. I’m certain of your mercy and of the purifying power of your penetrating, loving gaze.
Petition: Father, help me to confide in you.
1. Ask and You Shall Receive: As a child I was often bashful to the extreme when dealing with strangers. I remember once my dad asked me to leave a food package at the rectory office as a contribution to the parish food drive for the poor. I was scared stiff. Finally after I got up the courage, I rang the doorbell, dropped the box and ran. At times we can feel the same apprehension and uncertainty before prayer. We are not sure if God will take kindly to “being disturbed” in his care for the universe to listen to our request. Ultimately, we need to remember how much God likes to be asked and to trust that, if what we are asking for is for our good or that of another, God will certainly grant it.
2. God’s Self-Revelation: Language is a vehicle of communication, and like every means of expressing ideas, it is limited. Speech, however, is really pushed to its limits when it tries to express realities about which humans have no clear conceptualizations. God’s power, his awesome majesty and his very being are far beyond our limited scope of comprehension. Jesus, as true God and true man, becomes the bridge between our human language and God, whom he knows intimately. Jesus uses the most adequate expressions possible for God –– such as Father ––, but he also reminds us that he is speaking in figures. One day he promises to tell us clearly and even introduce us to him. Is this my greatest hope? Would I be ready right now to be introduced to God the Father?
3. “The Father Himself Loves You” – Our Holy Father, Pope-Emeritus Benedict XVI, reminds us of the Father’s love: “True, no one has ever seen God as he is. And yet God is not totally invisible to us; he does not remain completely inaccessible. God loved us first, says the Letter of St John, and this love of God has appeared in our midst. He has become visible in as much as he ‘has sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him’ (1 John 4:9). God has made himself visible: in Jesus we are able to see the Father (cf. John 14:9). Indeed, God is visible in a number of ways. In the love-story recounted by the Bible, he comes towards us, he seeks to win our hearts, all the way to the Last Supper, to the piercing of his heart on the cross, to his appearances after the Resurrection and to the great deeds by which, through the activity of the apostles, he guided the nascent Church along its path” (Encyclical Letter Deus Caritas Est [God Is Love], December 25, 2005).
Conversation with Christ: Jesus, you have revealed the immense love the Father has for all people by the ultimate self-giving of your life. Help me never to doubt your love for me. Help me to respond to your love though fidelity to your will and the practice of exquisite charity.
Resolution: I will say a decade of the rosary for missionaries who are preaching God’s love to others.
Image: Stained glass of Apostle to the English | photo by Lawrence, OP
St. Augustine was the agent of a greater man than himself, Pope St. Gregory the Great. In Gregory's time, except for the Irish monks, missionary activity was unknown in the western Church, and it is Gregory's glory to have revived it. He decided to begin with a mission to the pagan English, for they had cut off the Christian Celts from the rest of Christendom. The time was favorable for a mission since the ruler of the whole of southern England, Ethelbert of Kent, had married a Christian wife and had received a Gaulish bishop at his court. Gregory himself wished to come to Britain, but his election as pope put an end to any such idea, and in 596 he decided to send an Italian monk following the comparatively new Rule of St Benedict. Augustine set out with some companions, but when they reached southern Gaul a crisis occurred and Augustine was sent back to the pope for help. In reply the pope made Augustine their abbot and subjected the rest of the party to him in all things, and with this authority Augustine successfully reached England in 597, landing in Kent on the Isle of Thanet. Ethelbert and the men of Kent refused to accept Christianity at first, although an ancient British church dedicated to St Martin was restored for Augustine's use; but very shortly afterwards Ethelbert was baptized and, the pope having been consulted, a plan was prepared for the removal of the chief see from Canterbury to London and the establishment of another province at York. Events prevented either of these projects from being fulfilled, but the progress of the mission was continuous until Augustine's death, somewhere between 604 and 609.