Fifth Sunday of Easter
TREASURES FROM OUR TRADITION
	Frequent fliers today have many ways to accrue air miles, so one doesn’t always have to endure long hours in cramped seats to earn free hours in cramped seats. In St. Paul’s day, there were no such perks, nor would there have been any legal system for him to protest the shipwrecks he endured. He had other rewards in mind. The churches that he established in the catalogue of cities from today’s first reading must have been very different from one another. Language, culture, customs, religious history, obstacles to community, social challenges, the places where they met, their clothing, their bread and wine, all distinct, particular to the area.
	There were social customs as well: in a Christian household, the only place where a slave would be able to stand legally as an equal with the master would be at the table of the Lord, because at that table a new world of reconciliation was imaged. While Paul revered local customs, he was relentless about challenging the ways that people lived their Christian lives and how their worship reflected them. It is much the same today, as a global Catholic Church seeks to respect local customs and culture, allowing for differences in many things, yet always giving expression to the underlying presence of Christ, who binds us all together into his body.
—James Field