Sunday, March 31, 2024
Jesus Christ is risen today, alleluia! Wishing you and your loved ones a most blessed Easter. May the joy of Christ’s resurrection fill your hearts for the Easter season.
We come to worship and celebrate this, our faith’s greatest of Sundays. Flowers and plants adorn churches, symbolizing new life in Christ for all who believe in Him. The Easter season begins today with the celebration of Christ’s resurrection from the dead and culminates in 50 days with the feast of Pentecost.
To fully realize and appreciate today’s significance and impact on the followers of Jesus, let’s go back a few days to Holy Thursday. “Jesus said to them, “This night all of you will have your faith in me shaken.” (Matthew 26:31). Jesus warned His disciples, and we read how Judas betrayed Him, and Peter denied Him. When Jesus was arrested at Gethsemane, we read that His disciples “all left Him and fled.” (Mark 14:50). Indeed, the disciples had their faith in Jesus shaken, and they were afraid to suffer the same fate of being arrested as Jesus had. They are human with weaknesses, just as we are. But after the resurrection of Jesus and after He appeared, spoke, and ate with them, they were changed men. They realized that God is greater and He can Help them overcome anything that could happen to them. They suffered for their faith, and most died violent deaths because of their courageous proclamation of the Good News and their faith in Christ. They witnessed a truth and were moved to bring it to the world with the help of the Holy Spirit.
St. Paul wrote, “And if Christ has not been raised, then empty is our preaching; empty, too, your faith” (1 Cor 15:14). If Jesus is not God, if Jesus was an imposter pretending to be the Son of God, and if Jesus’ remains are still buried in a grave, then why would the disciples risk their wellbeing, even risk their life to tell His story? They did it because they saw and believed that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God who was risen from the dead. The fear and sadness that came upon them in the three days before that Easter morning was now changed to joy and hope of promised everlasting life that would carry them for the rest of their lives.
We carry worries, fears, and challenges that can be disheartening, even debilitating. Perhaps guilt, disappointment, and defeat brought about by our sins make us feel this way. But Easter brings the certainty of God’s mercy and love into reality. Every year during the Easter Vigil mass, we renew our baptismal promises. Our sponsors did it for us because we were baptized as infants. Let us avow to live up to those promises of rejecting Satan and believing in the triune God.
Go in Peace to Love and Serve the Lord.