Homily for Easter 2020

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Christ is risen! He is risen indeed, alleluia, alleluia! In these days of darkness and fear, we need this message more than ever! Some years ago, as I was sorting through an old family file, I discovered a copy of an old anthem that was sung by the Sanctuary Choir of men and Boys here at Blessed Sacrament on Easter in the 1960’s. The Latin words begin: “ Terra tremuit…the earth trembles.” This stirring piece of music described well the evangelist Matthew’s description of what the women encountered on their early morning visit to the tomb of the crucified Jesus. Matthew wants us to believe that a new era was dawning. As in all the accounts of the resurrection, details are significant. Who were the first to discover the empty tomb? Who did they encounter? What were they told? What was their mission?

The gospel of Matthew says: “After the Sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the tomb" (Matthew 28:1). Over sixty years ago, scholar Daniel-Rops wrote of these women that they were “bolder than the men, responding more readily to love than to prudence, perhaps better equipped by nature to accept facts beyond the power of reason to analyze, but which their unconscious being could perceive with extraordinary certainty” (Daniel-Rops, Jesus and His Times, p. 424). The apostles had fled the scene of the tragedy and were likely cowering in fear behind locked doors. A little more than one hundred years ago, the desert mystic, Charles de Foucauld wrote that what defines the Christian is not that that person loves God, but, rather that he or she believes God loves us. These women had encounter God in Jesus at significant moments in their lives. They were not about to let go of him now. In fact, one of the most moving passages of Scripture, is the account told by John of Mary of Magdala’s meeting the Risen Lord in the garden. He said to her: “Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father” (John 20:17).

 In the account from Matthew’s gospel, the women first met an angel who urged them not to be afraid and pointed out to them the evidence of the empty tomb; but, on their way, to tell the “good news,” they also met the Risen Jesus. Is it not significant that these women encountered him while in the midst of fulfilling their duties? I cannot help but think of all those many “first responders” who risk their lives and, amid their exhaustion, persevere for the sake of those in most need. Little by little, in the midst of the stories of anguish and pain, stories are being told of hope and love. Might the same Lord that these women met also be present in these encounters?

What was the message given by the angel and by the Risen Lord to these women? They simply said: “Be not afraid!” How desperately do we need that admonition?! During his long pontificate, St. John Paul II frequently spoke to young people and encouraged them with these very same words. He reminded them that “it is Jesus that you seek when you dream of happiness; he is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you. He is the beauty to which you are so attracted. It is he who provoked you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise. It is he who urges you to shed the masks of a false life. It is he who reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle.”

What was the “mission” of these startled women? Jesus said to them: “Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me” (Matthew 28:10). They have been called the “apostles to the apostles.” No one really saw Jesus rise from the dead. The evidence of an empty tomb was dismissed by the Jewish leaders and by many sceptics to this day. Few, however, can doubt the effect of the resurrection on the apostles and on the world that was changed by this event.  How else could the one who had denied him proclaim so boldly “You know what has happened all over Judea…” (Acts 10:34a).

We, too, are being commissioned to proclaim the same message more by how we live than by any words we speak. As St. Paul said to the people of Colossae: “Think of what is above, not of what is on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:2-3).
 
Yours in the Risen Lord,
Father Bill Foley