Reubens, Resurrection of Christ, 1612
After Easter in RCIA we enter into the mystagogia period for the neophytes and those received into the church at the Vigil. Part of the change in our gatherings is the way we engage Scripture. So, this past week I designed a very simple lectio divinia exercise using the four readings for today, the Second Sunday of Easter.We had a different member of the class proclaim the first three readings as we would at Mass, including the Psalm, reciting back the responsorial, and I proclaimed the Gospel in the usual manner. Between each reaching, to which we listened instead of reading along, we took several minutes, picked the word or phrase that jumped out at us, meditated on it, and prayed it a bit. After all the readings and the silent periods, I invited one person to share the word or phrase for each reading, telling us what it was and why, after reflection, they think they chose it.
Then, I had everyone synthesize their words and/or phrases, using them to form a sentence, or maybe two. Finally, we shared these with each other. Here is mine:
"The apostles bore witness to the resurrection, it is wonderful in our eyes; the victory that conquers the world is our faith, do not be unbelieving, but believe."