"BORN AGAIN"

Readings: Acts 4:23-31; John 3:1-8

After Nicodemus asked the question, “How can a man be born again?” Jesus goes into an explanation that is stretched into four days of gospel readings for us this week. The Church wants to be sure we become aware of the importance of being born again.

Christ must be born in us and his Spirit permitted to take up residence in us before we can ever expect to grow spiritually as God wishes us to. We must be willing to let God change us in any way he sees fit. We must be willing to leave behind us our old habits, our old ways of thinking, our grudges against others, and we must especially be willing to leave behind us our sins. We must not only be willing but actually working at never sinning again.

When our Blessed Mother told the angel Gabriel, “Let it be done to me as God wills,” Jesus was conceived in her. That must happen to us. Nine months later Mary gave birth to Jesus so he could save the world. That must also happen with us. In us and through us we are to let Christ be born in us, then into the world so he can spread the fruits and benefits of his salvation. We are to be channels, we are to be instruments through which God comes into the world and does his work of love. When we notice that happening we can be sure a birth has taken place within us. “You must all be begotten from above,” Jesus said. We must be born again by the Holy Spirit and filled with the likeness of Christ. Let it happen!