Fr Paolo Consonni, MCCJ
5th Sunday of Easter – Year A
Affordable housing is one of the biggest problems affecting Macau. Even though due to the pandemic rental and property prices have significantly fallen, Macau’s current housing prices are still so high that the dream of owning an apartment is considered a utopia, especially for young people. The government has made plans to increase public housing projects, but it will take years to materialize.
To have a decent roof over our head is a basic human right, but by itself it is not enough. We also need spaces where we feel welcomed, accepted, and protected. We need places where we feel we belong. In other words, we need a home and someone who loves us.
Looking at the high-rise buildings all around me, with thousands of apartments stacked on top of one another, I wonder how many of them are genuinely “homes.” The modern lifestyle (long hours of work-study, smartphone dependency, stressful competition at school or in the workplace) has so impoverished family relationships that many apartments have become dormitories. Nowadays young people find more sense of belonging on social media than in their families.
In the famous Maslow’s pyramid of needs, physiological needs and the need for security must first be met in order to allow the development of one’s personality and to achieve one’s fulfilment. But a growing number of experts are questioning this logic. The sense of belonging and other spiritual values are equally important and even more prominent in the process of growth. When our homes and communities lack human relationships, this emptiness is often filled with many kinds of addictions. Teachers are increasingly aware of the fact that it is impossible to deal with students’ problems without first considering family relations. We recover from traumas and heal from inner wounds only in a community setting, by establishing loving relationships with reliable people who care about us. They do not need to be perfect people (nobody is!), but they must be consistent in their presence and caring.
God created us to live in communion, with Him and with one another. Unfortunately, sin tragically entered history by breaking relational bonds and by isolating individuals. The story of the Original Sin in the first chapters of Genesis describes how, step by step, we lost our true home, our original sense of belonging: lack of faith in God, greed, mistrust of each other, violence, solitude… Humanity unfortunately is still perpetuating this pattern.
But in this Sunday’s Gospel (John 14:1-12), Jesus utters truly reassuring words: “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. […] And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back again and take you to myself, so that where I am you also may be.” He is not talking about giving us a “house,” a physical place in which to live in the afterlife. True, we usually imagine Paradise as an idyllic spot surrounded by wonderful scenery. But since it is a reality outside of our space-time conception, any description is just symbolic. Jesus is not making an advertisement about a real estate project. He is talking about bringing us “home,” into the loving embrace of the Father, within the life of the Trinity, the only place where we truly belong.
Christ died and rose from the dead so that we might receive the grace to become children of God, partakers of the love which flows between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. As the Catechism puts it, “Grace is a participation in the life of God. It introduces us into the intimacy of Trinitarian life” (1997). This intimacy is the home Jesus is offering to us as our eternal dwelling. The Catechism insists on its relational and communitarian aspect that Heaven is “This perfect life with the Most Holy Trinity – this communion of life and love with the Trinity, with the Virgin Mary, the angels and all the blessed – is called ‘heaven.’ Heaven is the ultimate end and fulfillment of the deepest human longings, the state of supreme, definitive happiness” (CCC 1024).
Jesus spent his whole life offering us a relationship of love and a sense of belonging to those who were outcast, lost, lonely, abandoned. Before ascending to the Father, He wanted to be sure we will continue to follow Him to find our way home. This way is through the Church where each one of us is a member of His Body. Today’s Gospel is an invitation to build parishes, families, and communities which are a reflection (though imperfect) of our final dwelling: “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” (Rev 21:3-4). This is the only real estate development worth investing in and, thanks to Christ, affordable to anyone.
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