HOMILY
Easter Sunday – March 31, 2024
Welcome to our cathedral on this day of Resurrection that defines who we are as Christians. Welcome to our parishioners and to all of our Catholic family. And welcome to our friends from different religious and faith traditions, especially our Jewish brothers and sisters as they prepare to celebrate Passover in a few weeks. … It is good that we are able to offer praise to God – together – in gratitude for the hope that is ours through Jesus’ resurrection.
With the entire Church of Scranton, we give thanks today for 177 catechumens and candidates who listened to the voice of the risen Lord speaking to their hearts and said yes to God’s invitation to be baptized and received into full communion in the Catholic Church, including Nicholas Medina-Almanzar, who was baptized here in our cathedral during last evening’s great Vigil of Easter. How blest we are by their presence and commitment to journey with us in faith.
In today’s gospel, Mary Magdalene, followed by Peter and the disciple whom Jesus loved, made their way to the tomb. The stone had been removed from its entrance. Jesus’ burial clothes had been rolled up. And then we are told that while the disciples entered the tomb, saw and believed, “they did not understand the Scripture that Jesus had to rise from the dead.”
These words from Saint John’s gospel confronted the first followers of Jesus on the day of his resurrection and boldly affirmed God’s promise to save his people. Yet, despite the hope that such words imparted, the followers of Jesus were still amazed and fearful. They didn’t understand. They would come to faith in the resurrection – but not immediately.
We know from accounts recorded in the Acts of the Apostles that despite the challenges and suffering they faced, the early Christian community eventually did come to embrace Easter faith. We know too that because of their encounter with the risen Jesus, their lives were changed and the gospel message of life was proclaimed.
Not unlike the experiences of those first Christians, the harsh realities of life continues to impact the best of us and cause us to question the reality of the resurrection, don’t they? We have only to look to the Holy Land and the war raging between Israel and Hamas – to Ukraine – to Haiti – to those who grieve senseless deaths from terrorist attacks – and to far too many areas of the globe enveloped by unrest, abuse and blatant disrespect for human life. The scope of suffering and pain in our world is incomprehensible, not to mention the grief and pain that we encounter in our own land, in our families and in our personal lives.
In the face of such human turmoil and pain, we can despair. Or, like the first disciples to approach the tomb, we can turn to the only thing that enables our broken world and lives to find healing, hope and peace: the Easter miracle – the promise of redemption won for us through the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus!
The great Christian martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, reflected upon this choice amid the human suffering that he experienced living and dying in a Nazi death camp during World War II. “The resurrection does not merely promise us life in God’s eternity. Rather, the risen Christ “takes hold of human beings in the midst of their lives. … Christ did not die to take us out of the world, but to affirm our existence in it. Yes, we have the hope of resurrection in the future. But we have the faith of redemption in the here and now.” Jesus walks with us to sustain us in our suffering and to give us hope and peace at our center, come what may in our lives.
Let me put these thoughts into some perspective. Many years ago, I attended the funeral of a young man in his 40’s. He was the son of a widow, whose name was Jen, whom I had gotten to know from one of the parishes where I had been assigned. Sadly, Jen had buried another son about ten years earlier.
Jen was a strong woman, but at around 80 years of age, the loss of her second son seemed to many to be more than she would likely be able to handle. Yet, she surprised everyone and faced the days leading up to his funeral and during it with grace and dignity. As she was leaving the cemetery following his burial, I walked beside her. She didn’t have much to say but these words that I have never forgotten, “Life goes on – for me and for my son.” … “Life goes on.”
Pretty powerful words, aren’t they? Yet, for all that we profess, how does one make such an affirmation of faith and hope in the midst of grief and pain? My friend Jen taught many of us that it begins first with accepting the reality of our lives, the recognition of our powerlessness to change certain things and our dependence upon God when we can no longer sustain ourselves.
Reflecting upon our need for hope as we navigate our complicated and challenging lives, Pope Francis put it best. “To experience the hope of Easter, we must be willing to enter into the mystery of God. … The mystery demands that we not be afraid of reality: that we not be locked into ourselves, that we not flee from what we fail to understand, that we not close our eyes to problems or deny them, that we not dismiss our questions. … To enter into the mystery of God, we need the humility to recognize who we really are: creatures with strengths and weaknesses, … in need of the mercy and love of God.”
Brothers and sisters, our powerlessness and dependence upon God become the very seedbeds for faith – a faith born not from some sort of proof, but born within hearts that are humble enough to seek the presence of God – a faith that grows when we look beyond ourselves to serve one another as the selfless Jesus served – and a faith that ultimately leads to an unshakable trust in a person: the person of Jesus, risen from the dead. That is Easter – our true and lasting hope!
May this blest day fill our hearts with the peace that surpasses all understanding – a peace that assures us that “life goes on” – here, now and into eternity – for all who are humble enough to enter into the Easter mystery of the suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus.
This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad!