Sunday, April 26, is the Third Sunday of Easter. May 1 is the feast of St. Joseph the Worker.

Canonizations

In St. Peter’s Square, at 10 a.m., Pope Benedict XVI will canonize these five new saints. You can watch at EWTN.com (U.S. central time is seven hours after Rome):

1. Blessed Arcangelo Tadini, an Italian diocesan priest and founder of the Congregation of Worker Sisters of the Holy House of Nazareth (1846-1912).

2. Blessed Bernardo Tolomei, Italian founder of the Olivetan Benedictine Congregation (1272-1348).

3. Blessed Nuno di Santa Maria Alvares Pereira, Portuguese religious of the Order of Friars of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel (1360-1431).

4. Blessed Gertrude Comensoli (nee Caterina), Italian virgin and foundress of the Institute of Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament (1847-1903).

5. Blessed Caterina Volpicelli, Italian virgin and foundress of the Institute of Handmaidens of the Sacred Heart (1839-1894).

Easter Sundays

You observed Lent: Plan something special for your family this Easter Season. How about a special Sunday morning breakfast each week? Or ice cream after Mass? A family Sunday outing? Maybe a special Easter dessert? Here’s the Easter schedule:

1. April 12: Easter Sunday

2. April 19: Easter Sunday II, Divine Mercy Sunday

3. April 26: Emmaus Sunday

4. May 3: Good Shepherd

5. May 10: Vine and Branches

6. May 17: ‘New Commandment’

7. May 24: Sunday after the Ascension (or, in some dioceses, Ascension Sunday)

Readings for Mass

Acts 3:13-15, 17-19; Psalm 4:2, 4, 7-9; First John 2:1-5; Luke 24:35-48

Our Take

NCRegister.com is the website of the National Catholic Register.

In today’s Gospel, Christ gives several proofs of the Resurrection: He explains it from Scripture, invites the apostles to touch him, and demonstrates that he can eat fish. In that spirit, here are 10 reasons to believe in the Resurrection. For more information, at the Register website search: Tim Drake Easter Evidence

1. The testimony of the texts. It is significant that Scripture, Tradition and the Church thereafter all agree that Christ rose. That kind of unanimity of witness is rare — and meaningful.

2. The testimony of the Twelve. If the apostles were making up a religion, they were making themselves look really bad in the process. In the Gospels, cowardly apostles flee in fear and embarrassment; they even greet the news of the Resurrection with doubt, at first. Says the Catechism: “The hypothesis that the Resurrection was produced by the apostles’ faith (or credulity) will not hold up” (No. 644).

3. Transformation of Saul. St. Paul went from persecutor to believer after seeing Christ alive.

4. No early Church debate. The early Church debated many fundamentals, but not the Resurrection.

5. Centuries of martyrs. Christians, from the Church’s first days to our own day, have been willing to die for their conviction that Christ rose from the dead. For them, the Resurrection wasn’t a sweet dream that they indulged in, but a hard reality they suffered and died for.

6. Diverse sources. Gospel writers included different details and material from different sources — all of which agreed on the fact of the Resurrection.

7. Eyewitnesses. St. Paul spoke of how Christ appeared, alive, to 500 at once. If it weren’t true, he couldn’t make that claim so soon after the event occurred.

8. Non-Christian historical accounts. Tacitus and Josephus mention Christ and describe how Christians endured torture when simply renouncing him would end it.

9. Not dead again. Other resurrections are mentioned in the Bible — chiefly Lazarus — but of these, Christ’s is unique in that it is never suggested that he died again.

10. Rise of a historical religion. Christianity spread and grew, even though, as St. Paul told Christians from the beginning, and here in 1 Corinthians 15:17, “If Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain.”