The meaning of the Sunday Mass Readings for May 2025 is made clearest by Catholic Doctrine. God communicates most clearly to us through Catholic Doctrine. Doctrines are the essentially unchangeable clarifications of Revelation and Faith that only the pope and bishops have the God-given authority to make, that must be accepted as objectively true in order to be Catholic, and that not even the pope and bishops may contradict.
As Father Paul Scalia has recently written:
Everything else in the Church depends on doctrinal clarity. Without it, we don’t have faith but only religious opinion. Without it, we don’t know how to worship “in spirit and truth.” (John 4:23) Without it, we don’t know how to love God and neighbor because we don’t know the truth about God and man.
Let’s find always-true doctrines in the Catechism of the Catholic Church that we can take away from this May’s Sunday Readings.[1]
May 4, The Third Sunday of Easter
Since verses in today’s Gospel are cited by the Catechism for doctrines about Christ’s risen humanity as were verses in the Gospel for the Second Sunday of Easter, let’s focus on verses that support other doctrines.
Jesus’ telling Peter to feed His sheep is cited by the Catechism to show “papal primacy” – the doctrine that the pope has primacy in, or leadership of, the college of bishops. “Jesus entrusted a specific authority to Peter: . . . authority to govern the house of God, which is the Church.” Jesus had given this authority to Peter during His public ministry when He gave only Peter the keys to the Kingdom. Jesus “confirmed this mandate after his Resurrection: ‘Feed my sheep.’” (CCC 553[2]). Each pope is the successor of Peter (CCC 880).
We should also know that only some of a pope’s teaching is infallible. Papal decisions about Church governance (called “discipline” because they are rules about discipleship, not just about punishment) are never infallible. Neither is every doctrine taught by a pope infallible (https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/doctrinal-commentary-on-concluding-formula-of-professio-fidei-2038). It might be important to add teaching from the Youth Catechism (YOUCAT): “The infallibility of the pope has nothing to do with his moral integrity or his intelligence” (YC 143).
Since so many of us suffer or see the sufferings of others, it is good to be reminded that “because in [Jesus’] divine person he has in some way united himself to every [person], the possibility of being made partners, in a way to known to God, in the paschal mystery is offered to all [persons]” (CCC 618). “The lives of the faithful, their praise, sufferings, prayer, and work, are united with those of Christ and with his total offering,” especially at Mass (CCC 1368). Our suffering can be offered to help others. See also CCC 307, 1460, 2031, and 2100.
- From the First Reading[3] (Acts 5:27-32, 40b-41): Acts 5:28 is cited in CCC 597; Acts 5:29 in CCC 450, 2242, and 2256; Acts 5:30 in CCC 597; and Acts 5:41 in CCC 432.
- From the Second Reading (Revelation 5:11-14): Rev 5:9-14 is cited in CCC 2642; Rev 5:9-10 in CCC 1546; and Rev 5:13 in CCC 449 and 2855.
- From the Gospel (John 21:1-19): Jn 21:4 is cited in CCC 645; Jn 21:7 in CCC 448 and 645; Jn 21:9 in CCC 645; Jn 21:12 in CCC 1166; Jn 21:13-15 in CCC 645; Jn 21:15-17 in CCC 553, 880, 881, 1429, and 1551; and Jn 21:18-19 in CCC 618.
May 11, The Fourth Sunday of Easter
Important doctrines are supported by today’s Second Reading. The verse in which St. John, the author, sees a great multitude before God’s throne means that the Catholic Church not only has Sacraments, but that she herself is a sacrament. She “both contains and communicates the invisible grace she signifies” (CCC 774); she is “a sign and an instrument” (CCC 775). In the case of this verse, the Catholic Church is “the sacrament of the unity of the human race” (CCC 775). She ultimately is “the universal sacrament of salvation” (CCC 776) – God’s primary vehicle for saving human beings from the time of Christ until His Second Coming. The Catholic Church alone has “the fullness of the means of salvation” (CCC 830). For more on the uniqueness of the Catholic Church, see CCC 758-776, 781-782, and 830-831 among many other paragraphs of the Catechism. We should note: “Nevertheless, many elements of sanctification and of truth are found outside [the Catholic Church’s] visible confines” (CCC 870).
The great multitude before God’s throne should be understood as among “the ones who take part in the service of the praise of God and the fulfillment of his plan (CCC 1138), that is, in the liturgy in Heaven “where celebration is wholly communion and feast” (CCC 1136). It is in this eternal liturgy that we participate “whenever we celebrate the mystery of salvation in the sacraments” (CCC 1139).
- From the First Reading (Acts 13:14, 43-52): Acts 13:48 is cited in CCC 2640.
- From the Second Reading (Revelation 7:9, 14b-17): Rev 7:9 is cited in CCC 775 and 1138.
- From the Gospel (John 10: 27-30): Jn 10:30 is cited in CCC 590.
May 18, The Fifth Sunday of Easter
The new commandment Jesus gives in today’s Gospel – to love one another as He has loved us, in which the “entire Law of the Gospel is contained” (CCC 1970) – only makes sense in union with all that Christ commands and all Catholic Doctrine (CCC 1824). Real love binds all the virtues in perfect harmony (CCC 1827). But it does not squash or obliterate any of the other virtues, such as prudence. We should always remember “To love is to will the good of another” (CCC 1766). To love others is to seek what Catholic Faith and Reason tell us is good for them, not what their or our emotions and desires tell us what is “good” for them. “As I [God the Son] have loved you, so you should also love one another.”
This law of love is one of the ways that the Catholic Church “is marked by characteristics that clearly distinguish it from all other religious, ethnic, political, or cultural groups found in history” (CCC 782). Not that every member of the Church always obeys this law. The fact that baptized Catholics sometimes do very evil things only shows the truth of and need for the law of love. The law of love, understood in its totality, reveals what evil is.
- From the First Reading (Acts 14:21-27): Acts 14:22 is cited in CCC 556 and 2847.
- From the Second Reading (Revelation 21:1-5a): Rev 21:1-2 is cited in CCC 756; Rev 21:1 in CCC 1043; Rev 21:2-4 in CCC 677; Rev 21:2 in CCC 757, 1045, and 2016; Rev 21:3 in CCC 756 and 2676; Rev 21:4 in CCC 1044 and 1186; and Rev 21:5 in CCC 1044.
- From the Gospel (John 13:31-33a, 34-35): Jn 13:34 is cited in CCC 782, 1823, 1970, 2822, and 2842.
May 25, The Sixth Sunday of Easter
Today’s Gospel about Jesus and the Father making Their dwelling with those who love Them means: “The ultimate end of the divine economy [the work of God] is the entry of God’s creatures into the perfect unity of the Blessed Trinity” (CCC 260). We should add this doctrine about eternal salvation to other doctrines about it. Salvation is an eternal liturgy, as we saw in the Fourth Sunday of Easter. It is “communion of life and love with the Trinity, with the Virgin Mary, the angels and all the blessed . . . the state of supreme, definitive happiness” (CCC1024). It is new heavens and a new earth unified in the Kingdom of God (CCC 1043) which includes glorified human bodies (CCC 1042) free of sin and suffering (1044). It is an everlasting banquet (CCC 546, 1402).
In today’s Gospel, Jesus says that the Holy Spirit will teach and remind, and so the Spirit “teaches the Church and recalls for her everything that Jesus says” (CCC 2623). The Catholic Church is the place where we best encounter the Holy Spirit: in her canon of Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, doctrine, worship, prayer, the examples of her saints, and her ministries and discipline when they are in harmony with her doctrine (CCC 688).
The Catechism uses verses from the Second Reading to teach: “The Church is ultimately one, holy, catholic, and apostolic in her deepest and ultimate identity, because it is in her that ‘the Kingdom of heaven,’ the ‘Reign of God,’ already exists and will be fulfilled at the end of time” (CCC 865). For a brief summary of how the Church is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic, see CCC 866-870).
- From the Second Reading (Revelation 21:10-14, 22-23): Rev 21:10-11 is cited in CCC 865; Rev 21:12-14 in CCC 765; Rev 21:14 in CCC 857, 865, and 869; and Rev 21:22 in CCC 586.
- From the Alleluia (John 14:23): see below.
- From the Gospel (John 14:23-29): Jn 14:23 is cited in CCC 260; and Jn 14:26 in CCC 243, 244, 263, 692, 729, 1099, and 2623.
May 29, Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord
This is a Holy Day of Obligation only in the Archdioceses of Boston, Hartford, New York, Omaha, and Philadelphia. In other archdioceses and dioceses, the Ascension is celebrated on June 1.
The First Reading and the Gospel Reading report Jesus’ Ascension into Heaven and His parting words to the Eleven Apostles. The “historical and transcendent event of the Ascension” (CCC 660) is “the irreversible entry of [Jesus’] humanity into divine glory” (CCC 659). In other words, Jesus ascended with the glorified body He had from the moment of His Resurrection. When Jesus physically left the world, He did not leave behind His glorified body. He still has and always will have a glorified body. As we saw in on the Fifth Sunday of Lent and on the Second Sunday of Easter in last month’s column, eternity involves a soul united with a body – a body transformed to remain physical and yet transcend space and time. This is true not only for Jesus, but it will also be true for every person at His Second Coming whether they enter the Kingdom or Hell.
- From the First Reading (Acts 1:1-11): Acts 1:1-2 is cited in CCC 512; Acts 1:3 in CCC 659; Acts 1:6-7 in CCC 672; Acts 1:7 in CCC 474 and 673; Acts 1:8 in CCC 672, 730, 735, 857, and 1287; Acts 1:9 in CCC 659 and 697; Acts 1:10-11 in CCC 333; Acts 1:11 in CCC 665.
- From the Second Reading (Ephesians 1:17-23): Eph 1:16-23 is cited in CCC 2632; Eph 1:18 in CCC 158; Eph 1:19-22 in CCC 272 and 648; Eph 1:20-22 in CCC 668; Eph 1:22-23 in CCC 830; and Eph 1:22 in CCC 669, 753, and 2045.
- From the Alleluia (Matthew 28:19a, 20b): Mt 28:19 is cited in CCC 189, 232, 543, 691, 730, 831, 1122, and 2156; and Mt 28:20 in CCC 80, 788, 860, and 2743.
- From the Gospel (Luke 24:46-53): Lk 24:46 is cited in CCC 627; Lk 24:47-48 in CCC 730; Lk 24:47 in CCC 981, 1120, and 1122; Lk 24:48-49 in CCC 1304; and Lk 24:51 in CCC 659.
[1] There are too many citations, or references, in the Catechism to the verses in a month of Sunday Mass readings to identify all the pertinent doctrines, so I will use my best judgment to select which verses and doctrines to cover in a column that may not exceed 2,000 words. The bullet points allow you to explore further the Biblical basis of Catholic Doctrine.
[2] CCC abbreviates Catechism of the Catholic Church. Any number after it is the number of a paragraph in the Catechism. For example, “CCC 553” means paragraph 553 of the Catechism.
[3] If a Reading is not listed, then none of its verses is cited by the CCC.
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