In today’s readings we hear of how we come to love. Repentance, conversion, and forgiveness—these experiences are met by God’s love and lead us to return that love to God and others.

It is a challenge for those raised in the faith to hear today’s readings with the freshness the first Christian converts had. Like the confused disciples, it may be difficult for your listeners to comprehend that Jesus isn’t a “ghost” or some otherworldly figure.

Last week in John’s gospel Thomas took the rap for demanding tangible signs of the resurrection of Jesus. This week in Luke’s account Jesus spontaneously offers concrete evidence of his presence to quell his disciples’ unuttered questions.

Some people are born with the knack of putting names and faces together and never forgetting that connection. That is a real blessing to have in life.

Business lunches are not what they used to be, and even power breakfasts are waning, but meeting face-to-face and sharing a meal with someone with whom you’re interested in doing business is still a good idea.

When my kids were little, if they fell down and hurt themselves, they would usually run to my wife or me to show us their “boo-boo.” And we would swoop them up in hugs and kisses and tend to their bruised egos as well as their skinned knees.

Let us pray with faith in the risen Christ that God who saves us will hear our prayers.

Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have. Jesus appears, both to the disciples on the road to Emmaus and at other times after his Resurrection, in a physical body.

Just as the sight of the risen Christ helped the disciples to believe in the church that was to follow, so the spectacle of the same church helps to confirm our faith in the Resurrection of Christ. —Saint Augustine (354-430)