This past week has been a week filled with tragedy, specifically in Orlando Florida. First a popular singer is gunned down; then the horrendous shooting spree in a nightclub; and finally the snatching of a two year old by an alligator in Disney World. The news has been filled with the grief and the sorrow and the shock of all that has happened. So many people who lost their lives or had their lives forever changed by these tragedies! We all come face to face with this great mystery of life and premature early death.
And that is all I could think about as I picked up the scripture readings for this weekend. In both the first reading from Zechariah the Prophet and in the Gospel reading, we read about untimely death. “They shall mourn for Him as one mourns for an only son and they shall grieve over Him as one grieves over a firstborn” says Zechariah. In the Gospel Jesus tells his disciples that the Son of Man must suffer greatly, be rejected and killed. Both these readings are referring of course to the early and untimely death of Jesus Himself.
            But St. Luke goes on to say in that gospel that the Son of Man will be raised up from the dead on the third day. And that is the mystery that ties all these tragic deaths together. In the face of death, the resurrection provides hope, a promise that life goes on in the kingdom of God’s love.
The sorrow and shock and mourning does not disappear with this hope. Grief is the natural process that leads to healing. But that hope sustains us who believe through it all.
            This weekend as we celebrate Father’s Day. Remembering those men who have provided for us through the years, we encounter God the Father in these readings who provides for us the ultimate gift – the gift of eternal life.
Let us pray today for all our Fathers, living and deceased, and for all those who died tragically this past week. May the hope and the promise of the Resurrection bring light and love into all of their hearts.