THE RESURRECTION OF THE LORD

The Resurrection of the Lord
The Mass of Easter Sunday

Lectionary: 42, 46, 41

Reading 1 Acts 10:34a, 37-43

Peter proceeded to speak and said:
"You know what has happened all over Judea,
beginning in Galilee after the baptism
that John preached,
how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth
with the Holy Spirit and power.
He went about doing good
and healing all those oppressed by the devil,
for God was with him.
We are witnesses of all that he did
both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.
They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.
This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible,
not to all the people, but to us,
the witnesses chosen by God in advance,
who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.
He commissioned us to preach to the people
and testify that he is the one appointed by God
as judge of the living and the dead.
To him all the prophets bear witness,
that everyone who believes in him
will receive forgiveness of sins through his name."

Responsorial Psalm Ps 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23.

R. (24) This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,
for his mercy endures forever.
Let the house of Israel say,
"His mercy endures forever."
R. This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or:
R. Alleluia.
"The right hand of the LORD has struck with power;
the right hand of the LORD is exalted.
I shall not die, but live,
and declare the works of the LORD."
R. This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or:
R. Alleluia.
The stone which the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
By the LORD has this been done;
it is wonderful in our eyes.
R. This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or:
R. Alleluia.

Reading 2 Col 3:1-4

Brothers and sisters:
If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life appears,
then you too will appear with him in glory.

Or 1 Cor 5:6b-8

Brothers and sisters:
Do you not know that a little yeast leavens all the dough?
Clear out the old yeast,
so that you may become a fresh batch of dough,
inasmuch as you are unleavened.
For our paschal lamb, Christ, has been sacrificed.
Therefore, let us celebrate the feast,
not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness,
but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

Gospel Jn 20:1-9

On the first day of the week,
Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peter
and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them,
"They have taken the Lord from the tomb,
and we don't know where they put him."
So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter
and arrived at the tomb first;
he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in.
When Simon Peter arrived after him,
he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there,
and the cloth that had covered his head,
not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place.
Then the other disciple also went in,
the one who had arrived at the tomb first,
and he saw and believed.
For they did not yet understand the Scripture
that he had to rise from the dead.

Scripture Study

HAPPY EASTER! May the Risen Lord grant you a most holy and blessed Easter. This Sunday, the church celebrates Easter, the original Christian feast. The Resurrection of Jesus is the great foundational event of Christianity and is at the very center of our beliefs about Jesus. This event established the pattern for our new relationship with the Father and carries within itself the promise of our own resurrection.

NOTES on First Reading:

* The portion of the text in brackets is left out of the reading.

* 10:34-43 Peter's speech to the household of Cornelius is probably fairly typical of early Christian preaching to Gentiles. 

For this speech Luke has taken material that was already part of the Christian tradition and reworked it to some extent. It is full of Luke's universalist themes and language. 

* 10:35 God's choice of Israel to be the people of God so that He might reveal Himself did not mean that he withheld Divine favor from all the other peoples of the earth. All the peoples of the world are loved by God. 

* 10:36-43 This speech has the ring of Luke speaking more directly to his Christian readers rather than Peter speaking to the household of Cornelius, as is indicated by the opening words, "You know." The speech traces the continuity between the preaching and teaching of Jesus of Nazareth and the proclamation of Jesus by the early Christians. The emphasis on this divinely ordained continuity (Acts 10:41) is meant to assure Luke's readers of the fidelity of Christian tradition to the words and deeds of Jesus. 

* 10:38 The early church saw the ministry of Jesus as an integral part of God's revelation. For this reason they were interested in conserving the historical substance of the ministry of Jesus. Under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit this tradition lead to the writing and preservation of the four gospels. The passion and urgency in the tone of the remaining verses (up to 44) of this speech clearly show this desire to pass on the teaching of Jesus.

NOTES on Second Reading:

* The portion of the text in brackets is left out of the reading.

* 5:6 Paul uses a proverbial expression here. Yeast is a common biblical symbol for a source of corruption that becomes all-pervasive (sin). 

* 5:7-8 In the Jewish calendar, Passover was followed immediately by the festival of Unleavened Bread. In preparation for Passover all traces of old bread were removed from the house, and during both celebrations only unleavened bread was eaten. Paul uses the sequence of these two feasts as an image of Christian life. Jesus' death (the true Passover celebration) is followed by the life of the Christian community, marked by newness, purity, and integrity (a perpetual feast of unleavened bread). Paul may have been writing around Passover time (See 1 Cor 16:5). This is often called a little Easter homily. If it really is then it is the earliest one in Christian literature.

NOTES on Alternate Second Reading:

* 3:1-4 This section summarizes the teaching of the preceding section of this letter as a foundation for the instruction on behavior that is to follow.

* 3:1 This verse is a creedal statement based on Ps 110:1 that was used in the early church to show that the messianic promises were fulfilled in Christ.

* 3:3-4 Here, although the resurrection of Christ has occurred and it will be followed by the resurrection of the believer, the complete manifestation of Jesus in His glory which He will share with us are portrayed as part of the completion of the end time which although partly here has not yet arrived in its fullness. Paul emphasizes that some of the elements of the end time are still missing.

NOTES on Gospel:

* 20:1-31 In Chapter 20 of the Gospel of John, the risen Jesus reveals his glory and confers the Spirit. This story fulfills the basic need for testimony to the resurrection. It is not a single record but a series of individual stories strung together. 

* 20:1-10 While the story of the empty tomb is found in both the Matthean and the Lucan traditions, John's version seems to be a fusion of the two stories. 

* 20:1 John says it is "Still dark". According to Mark the sun had risen, Matthew describes it as "dawning," and Luke refers to early dawn. In John, Mary sees the stone removed, not the empty tomb. 

* 20:2 Here, Mary runs away. She is not directed by an angel (young man) as in the synoptic accounts. The plural "we" in the second part of her statement might reflect an older tradition of more women going to the tomb. 

* 20:3-10 In Luke 24:12, This same basic narrative is told of Peter alone. It is missing in some important manuscripts and may be borrowed from a tradition similar to John. See also Luke 24:24. 

* 20:6-8 The text seems to indicate that some special feature about the state of the burial cloths caused the beloved disciple to believe. Perhaps the details implied that the grave had not been robbed or the body simply removed. 

* 20:9 This is probably a general reference to the scriptures as in Luke 24:26 and 1 Cor 15:4 rather than to any specific quote. Several Old Testament passages suggest themselves:Psalm 16:10; Hosea 6:2; Jonah 2:1,2,10.

 (St.Raymond Catholic Parish)

Meditation: "As yet they did not know the scripture, that Jesus must rise from the dead"

Early Sunday morning the women went to the tomb to pay their last tribute to a dead body. The disciples thought that everything had finished in tragedy. Neither were ready to see an empty tomb and hear the angel's message,  Why do you seek the living among the dead (Luke 24:5)? Mary Magdalene is the first to report the startling news of the empty tomb! She assumed that Jesus' body had been stolen! She was not yet prepared to meet the risen Lord who would reveal himself to her while she later lingered in the garden near the tomb (John 20:11-18).
What is the significance of the stone being rolled away? It would have taken several people to roll away such a stone. And besides, the sealed tomb had been guarded by soldiers! This is clearly the first sign of the resurrection. Bede, a church father from the 8th century, comments: "[The angel] rolled back the stone not to throw open a way for our Lord to come forth, but to provide evidence to people that he had already come forth. As the virgin's womb was closed, so the sepulcher was closed, yet he entered the world through her closed womb, and so he left the world through the closed sepulcher." (From Homilies on the Gospels 2,7,24) Another church father remarked: "To behold the resurrection, the stone must first be rolled away from our hearts" (Peter Chrysologus, 5th century).  It is significant that the disciples had to first deal with the empty tomb before they could come to grips with the fact that scripture had foretold that Jesus would die for our sins and then rise triumphant. They disbelieved until they saw the empty tomb.
John, the beloved disciple of Jesus, wrote his gospel as an eye-witness of  the Word of God who became flesh and dwelt among us, and who died and rose for our salvation. John was the only apostle, along with the women who stood with Jesus at the foot of the cross, who witnessed Jesus' death on Good Friday. Now John is the first of the apostles, along with Peter, to see the empty tomb on Easter Sunday morning, after the women returned and gave their report. What did John see in the tomb that led him to believe in the resurrection of Jesus? It was certainly not a dead body. The dead body of Jesus would have disproven the resurrection and made his death a tragic conclusion to a glorious career as a great teacher and miracle worker. When John saw the empty tomb he must have recalled Jesus' prophecy that he would rise again after three days. Through the gift of faith John realized that no tomb on earth could contain the Lord and giver of life.
John in his first epistle testifies: What we have seen, heard, and touched we proclaim as the word of life which existed "from the beginning" (1 John 1:1-4). John bears witness to what has existed from all eternity. This "word of life" is Jesus the word incarnate, but also Jesus as the word announced by the prophets and Jesus the word now preached throughout the Christian church for all ages to come. One thing is certain, if Jesus had not risen from the dead and appeared to his disciples, we would never have heard of him. Nothing else could have changed sad and despairing men and women into people radiant with joy and courage. The reality of the resurrection is the central fact of the Christian faith. Through the gift of the Holy Spirit, the Lord gives us "eyes of faith" to know him and the power of his resurrection. The greatest joy we can have is to encounter the living Lord and to know him personally. Do you celebrate the feast of Easter with joy and thanksgiving for the victory which Jesus has won for you over sin and death?
"Lord Jesus Christ, you have triumphed over the grave and you have won new life for us. Give me the eyes of faith to see you in your glory. Help me to draw near to you and to grow in the knowledge of your great love and victory over sin and death."

(Don Schwager)

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad

In him everything is reconciled in heaven and on earth.
Easter is a time to celebrate the central concept of our faith—Jesus’ rising from the dead. But the Resurrection is more than this. It reminds us that like Jesus we too have both human and divine qualities. This is what makes us ‘Christ-like’. As St Paul tells us in Colossians: ‘The life you have is hidden with Christ in God.’

We come to realise that matter and spirit are all one and God is in all. Knowing this, that God is an inherent part of all creation, natural and human, we begin to see the world with fresh eyes. How, then, can we hurt our fellow humans or deny them comfort? And how can we damage our earth, the supplier of all our needs and also the source of the spirit that makes us whole and connects all?

(Daily Prayer Online)

THOUGHT FOR TODAY

GOD SPEAKS INTO THE STORY

If human hope is like a bird in flight

then story is the air. It's where we live.

Story fuels the fire of the mind

for when we find our theme, we find ourselves.

It is God who speaks into the story of our lives

for God is the meaning maker of the world.

- Rod Cameron OSA, The Australian Experience of the Sacred, Alcheringa, p.30

 

From A Canopy of Stars: Some Reflections for the Journey by Fr Christopher Gleeson SJ [David Lovell Publishing 2003]

Fruit of Salvation
Easter is the victory of life and love. The grain of wheat that fell to the earth has borne the abundant fruit of salvation from sin.
— from The Sacred Heart for Lent

April 8
St. Julie Billiart
(1751-1816)

Born in Cuvilly, France, into a family of well-to-do farmers, young Marie Rose Julie Billiart showed an early interest in religion and in helping the sick and poor. Though the first years of her life were relatively peaceful and uncomplicated, Julie had to take up manual work as a young teen when her family lost its money. However, she spent her spare time teaching catechism to young people and to the farm laborers.

A mysterious illness overtook her when she was about 30. Witnessing an attempt to wound or even kill her father, Julie was paralyzed and became a complete invalid. For the next two decades she continued to teach catechism lessons from her bed, offered spiritual advice and attracted visitors who had heard of her holiness.
When the French Revolution broke out in 1789, revolutionary forces became aware of her allegiance to fugitive priests. With the help of friends she was smuggled out of Cuvilly in a haycart; she spent several years hiding in Compiegne, being moved from house to house despite her growing physical pain. She even lost the power of speech for a time.
But this period also proved to be a fruitful spiritual time for Julie. It was at this time she had a vision in which she saw Calvary surrounded by women in religious habits and heard a voice saying, "Behold these spiritual daughters whom I give you in an Institute marked by the cross." As time passed and Julie continued her mobile life, she made the acquaintance of an aristocratic woman, Françoise Blin de Bourdon, who shared Julie's interest in teaching the faith. In 1803 the two women began the Institute of Notre Dame, which was dedicated to the education of the poor as well as young Christian girls and the training of catechists. The following year the first Sisters of Notre Dame made their vows. That was the same year that Julie recovered from the illness: She was able to walk for the first time in 22 years.
Though Julie had always been attentive to the special needs of the poor and that always remained her priority, she also became aware that other classes in society needed Christian instruction. From the founding of the Sisters of Notre Dame until her death, Julie was on the road, opening a variety of schools in France and Belgium that served the poor and the wealthy, vocational groups, teachers. Ultimately, Julie and Françoise moved the motherhouse to Namur, Belgium.
Julie died there in 1816. She was canonized in 1969.

Comment:

Julie's immobility in no way impeded her activities. In spite of her suffering, she managed to co-found a teaching order that tended to the needs of both the poor and the well-to-do. Each of us has limitations, but the worst malady any of us can suffer is the spiritual paralysis that keeps us from doing God’s work on earth.

 HAPPY EASTER !