Easter Sunday
John 20:1-9
March 31, 2013
“…and he saw and believed (John 20:8).”
I have written a lot about sufferings and
the meanings of hope in the midst of these human tragedies. Yet, not to lose hope
is not really the terminal point of being a Christian. Blaise Pascal, a French
Catholic philosopher, was once overheard that ‘Nobody is as happy as a real
Christian.’ He said the truth, but how many of us, in practice, possess the
happiness of which Pascal speaks? More
closer to our reality is the words of German Existentialist philosopher,
Friedrich Nietzsche – a foremost critic of Christianity – that ‘Christ’s
disciples should look more redeemed!’
True enough! We are redeemed people and it
is the source of greatest and overflowing joy. Jesus indeed dies to redeem us
from our sins and death, but what assures us that He truly redeems us, is His
Resurrection. In the words of Antonio Cardinal Tagle, Archbishop of Manila, ‘we
are Easter People!’ If the climax of Easter Triduum is Easter Sunday, and this
Holy Sunday is all about Christ’s Resurrection, then joy is indeed the summit
of our Christian characters. St. Thomas Aquinas once mentioned that ‘Joy is the
noblest human act.’
Unfortunately, some of us do not manifest
this Christian joy. Even, other complain precisely for being Christians! Some
just sleep during the homily of the priest, and make a Church’s liturgy a good
lullaby. In some countries where Christians are minority, being Christian
sometimes is considered as a curse rather than a blessing. People with
Christian name are discriminated if not persecuted. Yet, where the Christians
are the dominant group, we turn to be perpetrators of these injustice and
harassment. After all, how we can be really happy if human world is so broken
and full of sufferings?
We might miss the entire point if we simply
associate the joy of the redeemed with mere pleasant emotions or good feelings.
It does not mean we are going to laugh out loud during the funeral and say to
every one, ‘Hi, we are Christians, we should be happy all the time!’ Neither
does it flow from alcohol, illegal drugs and illicit sexual acts. Christian joy
has to be more substantial and deeper.
Let us see today’s Gospel to have a glimpse
of this joy. When the disciples found the tomb was empty, it was nothing but
natural for them to be confused and greatly saddened. Where is the Lord? Who
dared to take His Body? Peter looked at the tomb in confusion and went home
puzzled. Mary Magdalene remained, yet she wept bitterly. Only the beloved disciple
saw the bare sepulcher, and he believed. John gazed the emptiness, but he did
not simply perceive nothingness. He saw beyond and discovered a meaning. The
Easter Sunday begins with empty burial place, and indeed our faith in
Resurrected Jesus commences in this very emptiness of the tomb!
Our joy is not about feeling ‘great’ and
‘good’, but ours springs from God’s grace by which we are able to see meaning
in our lives, and even in the emptiness of life itself. To remain faithful and
hopeful in the bitterness of lives is indeed a finest quality of Christian, but
to be able to unearth the meanings behind those events brings us to another
decimal level of being Christian. Allow me to end this reflection to tell the
story of Evelyn.
In 2006, after Zimbabwe president, Robert Mugabe,
won the election, he decreed operation Murambatsvina, “the cleaning out of the
rubbish”. He ordered the demolition of the houses of those people who refused
to vote for him during the election. More than 700,000 people watched their
home bulldozed. They became refugees in their homeland and begun their life
again out of the rubbles of their home. At the heart of this place of refuge,
was a small plastic tent, called ‘the young Generation pre-school’. This was a
home of a young woman called Evelyn, and she used it as a school in the day.
There were around a dozen of her students under the age of eight, nearly all
HIV-positive and with TB. Sometimes there was food to eat, but usually, there
was none. Yet, Evelyn never gave up taking care of the children and even the
children sang welcome songs happily every time guests would visit them. Fr.
Timothy Radcliffe, OP once visited her and seeing her condition, he asked her
why she did that. She just had one simple reason that she loved the children so
much and indeed found meaning and joy in what she was doing. [1]
Br. Valentinus Bayuhadi Ruseno, OP
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