A reading from the Book of the Acts of the Apostles
10:34a, 37-43
Peter proceeded tospeak and said:
“You know what has happened all over Judea,
beginning in Galilee after the baptism
that John preached,
how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth
with the Holy Spirit and power.
He went about doing good
and healing all those oppressed by the devil,
for God was with him.
We are witnesses of all that he did
both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.
They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.
This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible,
not to all the people, but to us,
the witnesses chosen by God in advance,
who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.
He commissioned us to preach to the people
and testify that he is the one appointed by God
as judge of the living and the dead.
To him all the prophets bear witness,
that everyone who believes in him
will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”
A reading from the Letter to the Colossians
3:1-4
Brothers and sisters:
If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life appears,
then you too will appear with him in glory.
From the Gospel according to John
20:1-9
On the first day of the week,
Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peter
and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them,
“They have taken the Lord from the tomb,
and we don’t know where they put him.”
So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter
and arrived at the tomb first;
he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in.
When Simon Peter arrived after him,
he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there,
and the cloth that had covered his head,
not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place.
Then the other disciple also went in,
the one who had arrived at the tomb first,
and he saw and believed.
For they did not yet understand the Scripture
that he had to rise from the dead.
Meditating on the mystery of the Resurrection, we find an answer to our thirst for meaning. Faced with our fragile humanity, the Paschal proclamation becomes care and healing, nourishing hope in the face of the frightening challenges that life presents us with every day on a personal and global level. In the perspective of Easter, the Via Crucis, the Way of the Cross, is transfigured into the Via Lucis, the Way of Light. We need to savour and meditate on the joy after the pain, to retrace in the new light all the stages that preceded the Resurrection. Easter does not eliminate the cross, but defeats it in the miraculous duel that changed our human history. Even our time, marked by so many crosses, invokes the dawn of Paschal hope. Christ’s Resurrection is not an idea, a theory, but the Event that is the foundation of faith. He, the Risen One, through the Holy Spirit, continues to remind us of this, so that we can be His witnesses even where human history does not see light on the horizon. Paschal hope does not disappoint. To believe truly in the Pasch through our daily journey means revolutionizing our lives, being transformed in order to transform the world with the gentle and courageous power of Christian hope. (Pope Leo XIV – General Audience, 5 November 2025)
Gospel and Word of the Day – 05 April 2026 –
A reading from the Book of the Acts of the Apostles
10:34a, 37-43
Peter proceeded tospeak and said:
“You know what has happened all over Judea,
beginning in Galilee after the baptism
that John preached,
how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth
with the Holy Spirit and power.
He went about doing good
and healing all those oppressed by the devil,
for God was with him.
We are witnesses of all that he did
both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.
They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.
This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible,
not to all the people, but to us,
the witnesses chosen by God in advance,
who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.
He commissioned us to preach to the people
and testify that he is the one appointed by God
as judge of the living and the dead.
To him all the prophets bear witness,
that everyone who believes in him
will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”
A reading from the Letter to the Colossians
3:1-4
Brothers and sisters:
If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life appears,
then you too will appear with him in glory.
From the Gospel according to John
20:1-9
On the first day of the week,
Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peter
and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them,
“They have taken the Lord from the tomb,
and we don’t know where they put him.”
So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter
and arrived at the tomb first;
he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in.
When Simon Peter arrived after him,
he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there,
and the cloth that had covered his head,
not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place.
Then the other disciple also went in,
the one who had arrived at the tomb first,
and he saw and believed.
For they did not yet understand the Scripture
that he had to rise from the dead.
Meditating on the mystery of the Resurrection, we find an answer to our thirst for meaning. Faced with our fragile humanity, the Paschal proclamation becomes care and healing, nourishing hope in the face of the frightening challenges that life presents us with every day on a personal and global level. In the perspective of Easter, the Via Crucis, the Way of the Cross, is transfigured into the Via Lucis, the Way of Light. We need to savour and meditate on the joy after the pain, to retrace in the new light all the stages that preceded the Resurrection. Easter does not eliminate the cross, but defeats it in the miraculous duel that changed our human history. Even our time, marked by so many crosses, invokes the dawn of Paschal hope. Christ’s Resurrection is not an idea, a theory, but the Event that is the foundation of faith. He, the Risen One, through the Holy Spirit, continues to remind us of this, so that we can be His witnesses even where human history does not see light on the horizon. Paschal hope does not disappoint. To believe truly in the Pasch through our daily journey means revolutionizing our lives, being transformed in order to transform the world with the gentle and courageous power of Christian hope. (Pope Leo XIV – General Audience, 5 November 2025)
A reading from the Book of the Acts of the Apostles
10:34a, 37-43
Peter proceeded tospeak and said:
“You know what has happened all over Judea,
beginning in Galilee after the baptism
that John preached,
how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth
with the Holy Spirit and power.
He went about doing good
and healing all those oppressed by the devil,
for God was with him.
We are witnesses of all that he did
both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.
They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.
This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible,
not to all the people, but to us,
the witnesses chosen by God in advance,
who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.
He commissioned us to preach to the people
and testify that he is the one appointed by God
as judge of the living and the dead.
To him all the prophets bear witness,
that everyone who believes in him
will receive forgiveness of sins through his name.”
A reading from the Letter to the Colossians
3:1-4
Brothers and sisters:
If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life appears,
then you too will appear with him in glory.
From the Gospel according to John
20:1-9
On the first day of the week,
Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peter
and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them,
“They have taken the Lord from the tomb,
and we don’t know where they put him.”
So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter
and arrived at the tomb first;
he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in.
When Simon Peter arrived after him,
he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there,
and the cloth that had covered his head,
not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place.
Then the other disciple also went in,
the one who had arrived at the tomb first,
and he saw and believed.
For they did not yet understand the Scripture
that he had to rise from the dead.
Meditating on the mystery of the Resurrection, we find an answer to our thirst for meaning. Faced with our fragile humanity, the Paschal proclamation becomes care and healing, nourishing hope in the face of the frightening challenges that life presents us with every day on a personal and global level. In the perspective of Easter, the Via Crucis, the Way of the Cross, is transfigured into the Via Lucis, the Way of Light. We need to savour and meditate on the joy after the pain, to retrace in the new light all the stages that preceded the Resurrection. Easter does not eliminate the cross, but defeats it in the miraculous duel that changed our human history. Even our time, marked by so many crosses, invokes the dawn of Paschal hope. Christ’s Resurrection is not an idea, a theory, but the Event that is the foundation of faith. He, the Risen One, through the Holy Spirit, continues to remind us of this, so that we can be His witnesses even where human history does not see light on the horizon. Paschal hope does not disappoint. To believe truly in the Pasch through our daily journey means revolutionizing our lives, being transformed in order to transform the world with the gentle and courageous power of Christian hope. (Pope Leo XIV – General Audience, 5 November 2025)