The Resurrection of the Lord
March 31, 2013
While the apostles huddled in safety behind locked doors, three women, perfumed
oils in hand, bravely set out early one morning to anoint the dead body of their
friend. They came to his tomb with heavy hearts; they left with hearts on fire.
They came slowly, cautiously; they left running, casting caution to the wind.
They came to the tomb in search of Jesus of Nazareth; they ran from the tomb
with news of Christ the Lord. They came convinced that all was over; they left
knowing that all was new.
My friends, Easter is God’s way of saying that all
is new. It is a message that flies in the face of human experience and common
sense. For common sense and human experience only know the ancient,
cynical wisdom that there is “nothing new under the sun.” But Easter says
that everything is new now that Jesus is new, now that Jesus is risen.
Easter says that God is building new heavens and a new earth and that it all
started in the dark despair of a dead and mangled body, mourned by a few brave
souls and hastily planted in a borrowed tomb.
This Easter, the message that all is new fits
perfectly with what we are experiencing in the Church with the election of
Francis as Pope. Does it feel like spring to you? It does to me. And it feels
like Pentecost has come early! Francis has been breathing newness and freshness
and hope into the Church by just about everything he’s said and done: by asking
the people for the blessing of their prayers before blessing them, by passing up
the limousine to ride in the van with his brother cardinals, by stopping to pay
his own hotel bill and carrying his own suitcase, by greeting parishioners at
the church door like any pastor, by refusing some of the more ornate and
elaborate papal outfits and giving up the papal palace, by choosing to celebrate
Holy Thursday at a prison for young people instead of in the splendor of St.
Peter’s Basilica!
In a Church for whom signs and symbols are our first
language, Francis is speaking loud and clear. And we like what we hear, we like
what we see! What we are hearing and seeing is the Gospel, and a very
convincing gospel it is because of the simple and humble way in which he lives
it. And, no, he cannot erase overnight or heal all the pains that have plagued
the Church over the past years – pains from the abuse of persons and the abuse
of power; and he can’t overhaul in a week or two the inner workings of the
Church’s unwieldy governing structures, but in his gentle embracing of the heart
of the gospel and in his resolute insistence on walking in the steps of the
servant Christ, Francis is making a statement, charting a course, putting Christ
-- not the Church -- front and center.
No surprise, then, that Easter feels more like
Easter this year, or that we feel more like celebrating! Along with those
courageous, faithful women on the first Easter, we arrive at the tomb and find
the stone rolled back, and we hear with new ears the words of the two men in
dazzling white garments: “Why do you search for the living one among the dead?
He is not here! He has been raised up!”
This astonishingly good news should change
everything, my friends, although it will mean different things depending on who
we are and where we are in our journey of life and faith. If we are among
those who have been disillusioned or cynical about the Church, this Easter is
our invitation to renew our faith in Christ who may let the Church struggle but
who never abandons it, and whose Spirit makes all things new. If we find
ourselves in the grip of old patterns of sin and selfishness and feel
discouraged, Easter, this Easter, is our invitation to believe that things can
change, thanks to the risen Christ who is our forgiveness and our hope. If we
find ourselves frightened by illness or embittered by old age, Easter, this
Easter, is our invitation to look to Christ risen and know that for us as for
him, death will not have the final word. If our cherished hopes and dreams for
our children have come to naught and they have left us with a heavy weight of
sorrow and disappointment, Easter, this Easter, is our invitation to see in
Christ risen the assurance that, although our children may run away from God,
God never runs away from them.
My friends, no matter what burdens we carry or what
doubts or questions dog us, this great day of Easter is our invitation to hear
the risen Jesus gently calling us by name as he did the weeping Mary Magdalene,
to hear him assuring us as he did her that he is with us in our pain and
confusion, our uncertainties and our doubts, and that he will lead us out.
The popular contemporary spiritual writer, Father
Ron Rolheiser, once wrote that the real issue of faith for us today is not so
much believing in God, or in the resurrection of Christ, or in the resurrection
of our bodies after death. The real issue, he says, is believing that God
can bring about resurrection and newness into our lives right now; that God can
raise the world, the Church, and each of us from the dark, hopeless tombs in
which we too often find ourselves buried.
I think he’s right. And there’s no magic
formula for coming to that kind of belief. There is only the risen Christ,
and he is in our midst, and in this and every Eucharist he comes to us with all
his power, all his hope, and all his life. And his message to us is one
that can change everything: “I am risen,” he says. “I make all things new!”
Father Michael G. Ryan
