IT IS EASTER

 

Life can become rather bleak when we look at the invasion and destruction of the Ukraine, the killing of police officers in Canada and the garbage on our streets that nobody cleans up. We do not run away from the blackness of reality or the power of evil in our world. 

 

Now reflect on what God is doing. Open yourself to be gripped by the working of God in our world. Too many people have this very polite and sugarlike quality to their belief in God. Nice; but it does not make too much difference to our daily life.

 

God has become flesh and made of his life and his death a sacrifice of service and love for all humanity. In the death of Jesus, all humanity is brought to God. The arms of Jesus on the cross embraces all humanity. 

 

But the great mystery of the cross is made real in the revelation, the pouring forth of the Son of  God in the resurrection. The Son of God has been given to all humanity. 

 

Now this is not a goodwill gesture on the part of God. This is the living part of the plan of God to redeem humanity. Now, the resurrected Jesus is being given to each believer. Now, the mystery of Jesus Christ must happen in each person.

 

Now, the person, the mission, the compassion and the justice of Jesus must happen in us. This is a dynamic and transforming presence. There is nothing polite about the resurrection and its effects. You are meant to be transformed into the likeness of Jesus Christ.

 

The resurrected Jesus must come alive in your prayer life. You seek the presence of God when you see the morning light after you get out of bed. You seek the presence of God when you take your first coffee in the morning. You share your plans for the day with God as you drive to work.

 

The resurrected Jesus is meant to come alive in your faith community when it gathers each week for the Sunday Eucharist. The people of the Church come to be touched, molded , challenged and empowered each week by the Word of God and the Eucharist. It is here that we share in the great act of redemption, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

 

The resurrected Jesus is given to us to come alive when we reach out to the poor with their many faces. The poor person that you may help may be your co-worker who shares her fears and pain that her thirty year old son is into the drugs. She is so afraid that he will overdose and she will become childless. You can only listen and walk with her in her fears and her frustrations  that she can do nothing to help on this end. The resurrected Jesus is coming alive in your compassion and understanding. It may not be as successful as you want (that the son would stop doing the drugs and seek help) but the hands of Jesus are present in your empathy, you listening.

 

Easter is the giving of the resurrected Christ to us. Be conscious how the resurrected Christ wants to come alive in your prayer, your service to others and your love for your fellow human beings.