Easter (B)

Acts 10:34a, 37-43
Ps 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23
Col 3:1-4 or 1 Cor 5:6b-8
Jn 20:1-9

“There is no tale ever told,” author J.R.R. Tolkien once wrote in an essay on storytelling, that people “would rather find was true.” Hello, I’m Franciscan Father Greg Friedman, with the “Sunday Soundbite” for Easter Sunday.

The Catholic author of theThe Lord of the Rings was speaking of the story of Jesus. Today, as we accompany Peter and the Beloved Disciple, making their way to the tomb, we might echo Professor Tolkien’s comment.

Our faith, as St. Paul tells the Corinthians, rests on the reality of Jesus’ Resurrection. We base everything on the truth of the story. But establishing that truth is not a matter of science, history or archaeology. It’s a matter of faith. We must call upon the Holy Spirit, who is present to the Church, to assist us.

In the Easter Gospels, we hear the witness of the first followers of Jesus: Jesus was risen; they had experienced him, alive in their midst. Their testimony in the Spirit moves us to a faith-filled “Alleluia.”

We live in a skeptical age. And yet in his essay, J.R.R. Tolkien pays tribute to the power of the Christian proclamation. He notes that there is no other story which so many skeptics “have accepted as true on its own merits.”

Our Easter Gospel is a story of living faith, in which we are participants, and to which we are now witnesses.

Scripture:

•They put him to death by hanging him on a tree. (Acts 10:39b)

•The stone which the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. (Psalm 118:22)

•For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. (Colossians 3:3)

•On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning… (John 20:1)

•…the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed. (John 20:8,9)

Reflection:

•What was Mary of Magdala seeking at “the tomb early in the morning”?

•What did the other disciple see in the empty tomb?

•What are you seeking this Easter from the resurrected Jesus?

•How is your life hidden “with Christ in God”?

•How do you enter the tomb (death) or die to self to live in Christ?

Real death is separation from God, and this is unbearable; real death is faithlessness, hopelessness and lovelessness.…

Real death is the chaos where human beings find themselves when they disobey the Father, it is the tangled web to which they are reduced by their passions, it is the total defeat of all their dreams of greatness, it is the disintegration of their whole personality.

Real death is emptiness, darkness, desolation, despair, hatred, destruction. So…Christ agreed to enter this death, into this separation, so as to identify himself with all who were in separation, and to save them.

When he touched the depths of their despair he announced hope with his resurrection.

When he was immersed in their darkness he made the brightness of the truth burst forth with his resurrection.

When engulfed by the abyss of their lovelessness he showed them the infinite joy of love with his resurrection. By rising from the dead he made all things new.

By rising from the dead he opened new heavens.

By rising from the dead he opened new life.