Easter

We are in the Easter season and every day we follow how, after Christ’s resurrection, the community of the first disciples develops, that is, those who believed that the Lord really lives. The common feature of Jesus’ followers is a special love. The love that is special for people of their time, which makes them say to themselves: “see how they love each other“. Love becomes a hallmark, a showcase of Christians.

Today Jesus leaves us anew His commandment of love, but it is not only a pure commandment, but an invitation to “love one another as I have loved you“. In this way, He shows that our love is born of an encounter with His love. We can very often experience the fact that we are unable to love on our own. Only the experience of God’s disinterested love for us, a love that is undeserved, can give us the strength to love others. God’s love is not a reaction to our good behavior. He loves us, because He loves us. On the other hand, our human love is often a response to the kindness of others; I love because someone is nice to me. That is why Jesus’ commandment is new – it invites you to love like God, that is, to love for nothing.

St. John, in the text of the Apocalypse, writes to us about God’s dwelling with people, about God’s “tabernacle” with us, which is a manifestation of His closeness. This “tabernacle” is every Eucharist, during which we can hear anew the confession of Jesus contained in today’s Gospel: “I have loved you.”

First day after the resurrection. Here, after 33 years of absence, the Son returns to the Father. Home again. Who will express the joy of their meeting after such a long separation, the need for a celebrated presence that is not disturbed by anything and no one anymore? Father, Son and Spirit – finally are together. And it would be seem that the custom of people – these three Divine Persons should finally enjoy themselves. However, the Gospels record that almost immediately after the greeting, the Son again “slipped away” back to the earth. He talked to Mary Magdalene in the morning; in the afternoon He traveled for several hours with His disciples to Emmaus; in the evening He still had a time to meet in the Upper Room.

Jesus entered the Upper Room on the evening of the first day of the week, where He celebrated the first Mass and said goodbye with His disciples. He stood in the center and, as reported by a witness there, wished them peace. He said, Do you have anything to eat? They gave Him a piece of roasted fish – the Galilean national dish. And as He ate, they felt the fear left their hearts. Peace was slowly coming in this place – the only reality He had given them as a gift. Returning from eternity, He took nothing else with Him, but “the peace”. This word is  unreadable for many people. The word “peace” is more often on the lips of politicians and propagandists than of Christians. And yet –  behind this word is hidden the first and most important gift from God that Jesus brought to man on the day of His resurrection. This gift must be a result from discussions between the Son and the Father.

The world hidden behind the words: Peace be with you is real. This peace given by Jesus to His disciples on Easter evening, it can also be shared by all people in their days. He brings the same gift during the celebration of the Eucharist and it descends upon each one as much as he opens up. The peace must come in the midst of wars below and above, in marriages and in families, in environments and among nations, if they are to survive and to develop. And it will not come into the world except only through human hearts.

It is the greatest miracle in the world! Jesus rose from the dead to testify to the man that there is no obstacle that cannot be overcome by believing in God. We have probably found out about it many times. Remember how many times Jesus helped you when you were in need, when you put your trust in Him. Remember those times that were humanly hopeless, and everything ended well because you believed that Jesus would help you.

There were times when you came out of the grave of your sins to be resurrected and start your life anew with God. It was your miracle of resurrection by the power of Christ who rose first from the dead. This world will be better only when we will be better, when we have the courage to live God’s life. Then, when you live like this, you will be a witness of the Risen Jesus. We must live in such a way that Jesus will be not ashamed of us. We must to resurrect, to wake up and at all costs turn back from this wrong path of pursuit of material goods. Well, you will have many goods and you will not be happy. Your future – heaven or hell – depends on what kind of person you are.

At the final judgment, Jesus will ask you – what good have you done for others? He will not ask you how much you do have in your account, what kind of house and car you had. He will only ask you – did you have a heart for those with whom you lived. A wise man  asks God only for bread, so that he does not stop on his way to heaven, because he knows the time is short and there is nothing to strive to have, but to be. When you die, people will ask you how much have you left on your account? The Lord will ask you – what kind of man you were. I should live each day as if it would be my last. The Lord will knock unexpectedly to our door, and when He knocks you cannot say: Lord, maybe knock tomorrow because I didn’t have my confession yet, I haven’t reconciled with my brother yet, I haven’t fixed the wrong what I had done, I did not reconcile with my wife yet. We need to be vigilant so as not to sleep through the grace of meeting the Lord.

Jesus is alive. He lives in us through holy life. We cannot be like the soldiers guarding the tomb who slept through the moment of Christ’s resurrection. We cannot sleep through our lives. We must proclaim with our lives that Jesus is risen, that he is risen in you!

The disciples are exactly the same as us; in today’s Gospel account we find that the disciples are afraid and have locked themselves away in a room. Now they are hearing that Jesus is alive from the dead; if it’s true, what will He have to say to them? Perhaps they are thinking that Jesus might have good reason to come back to the disciples in a foul mood: ‘Where were you when I needed you, how could you have run away, did you not promise that you would die for Me?’ Maybe Jesus realizes that the disciples are confused and have not really taken in His gift of peace, and so He says for a second time, ‘Peace be with you.’ This is something for us all to take to heart. Jesus is speaking the same words of peace to us. This peace comes from the prince of peace. With this peace of Jesus gifted to us, we can be people at peace with ourselves, at peace with the Lord himself; and then become people of peace in our world, which truly needs peace.

It is easy to imagine Thomas’ disbelief when the disciples tell him their incredible story. We today often call him “Doubting Thomas”, as if we are thinking that we would have done much better than poor Thomas. But he had witnessed the horror of the passion of Jesus. Many of us would have reacted in exactly the same way as Thomas does in this Gospel passage. What once again, are the first words out of Jesus’ mouth? As the prince of peace, He says, “Peace be with you.” After Thomas and Jesus have a catch-up, Thomas says, “My Lord and my God!” Thomas has the privilege of being in the presence of our living Lord and he is inspired to salute Jesus in this way: “My Lord and my God!” Today, as we continue to be an Easter people, let us take the peace of Jesus deep into our lives and let us be true ambassadors of the Lord, taking His peace into the world.

The Gospel for this Easter Sunday tells how Mary of Magdala arrives early in the morning and sees that the stone has been rolled away and the tomb is empty. She has come to grieve and spend some quiet time with her beloved friend and to try to make some sense of what has happened. She is greatly surprised to find that the tomb is empty and she runs off to find the apostles. John waits for Peter to enter first. We don’t hear Peter’s reaction when he sees the linen clothes and the empty tomb. We know that when John enters, he sees and believes. All that Jesus taught and preached suddenly becomes clear and John knows that Jesus is the Son of God who has risen from the dead. Suffering, evil and death have been conquered. The kingdom of God can continue to be preached. From this joyful scene at the tomb, the fact that Jesus has risen from the dead spreads to Peter and then to other apostles and discipes. We are people who carry the light of Christ to others and have the responsibility to hand on this faith.

This new life invites us to model our attitudes and actions on those of Christ: to love the weakest members of the community, to be generous to those who are poor, to forgive wrongs, to heal those who hurt. To help each person to rise up to meet Christ through us. We pray that God who has begun this good work in us may bring it to fulfillment. May we, and the whole world, know peace and joy this Easter Day.

Today’s Gospel begins with a summary statement: “When Judas had gone…” Four words which are so poignant. We know exactly what Judas is going to do, even though it is not spelled out for us: he goes to complete the process whereby he will betray Jesus to the authorities. The next time Jesus and Judas will meet is when Judas leads the guards sent by the chief priests and the Pharisees to the place where he knows Jesus would be. In four words, our Gospel passage reminds us of the role Judas will play in this narrative. Those same four words also prompt us to recall what has already happened in the room that Judas just left. After the meal was concluded, Jesus scandalized Peter by wanting to wash the feet of all present. In the ancient world washing the feet of another was a task for all the lowliest of slaves. That’s why Peter is so scandalized at Jesus’ behavior: his Lord wants to degrade himself totally by washing the feet of sinners. Judas was one of those whose feet were washed by Jesus. Jesus then announces that one of them will betray Him: the one to whom He will give the piece of bread that he shall dip in the cup. This has clear Eucharistic implications. When He gives Judas the piece of bread, He says: “What you are going to do, do quickly.” Judas goes out into the dark. Judas leaves the light of Christ to go into the dark of Jesus’ enemies. But Jesus has demonstrated His total love for every human being who ever did exist or ever will exist. His double outreach to Judas makes it plain that no one is excluded from Jesus’ love.

The Son of Man, who came not to condemn the world but so that through Him the world might be saved, will make His ultimate, total and infinite act of love when He is lifted up on the cross. The story does not end there, however. Jesus issues a commandment – for His disciples to love one another as He has loved us. But how can love be commanded? If love is only seen as emotional, then it cannot be commanded, but God’s love is total God’s commitment. When we love as Jesus has loved us – by total commitment to any and all children of God – we make God’s love visible. We show ourselves to be Jesus’ representatives on earth – His disciples.

Disciples’ expectations as followers of Jesus kept changing. Through the early days of basking in the glory of Jesus, the popular preacher and miracle worker, through the despair of the passion and death of their Lord, they found themselves driven by the power of the Holy Spirit to proclaim the Good News to the whole of creation. But they had no plan, no instruction manual. They discovered that they were sent not just to announce the coming of the Messiah to the Jews. The message of the Gospel was for everyone. The Holy Spirit made it clear that faith in Jesus was possible for anybody of any nationality who fears God and does what it right. They came to understand that what Jesus wanted was a community of people who loved one another. This was the way they would experience God, rather than in the rituals of the Jewish law. They knew that the risen Lord was living among them as they reached out in love to one another, but especially to those most in need. The beloved disciple, John, reflected for years on the life and teaching of Jesus and summed it up in His Gospel and letters: God is love and what God wants is for us to live in love just as Jesus has shown us, by loving one another. The whole message of scripture is to be found here: love one another as I have loved you. This is the mission Jesus gives to His disciples: as His chosen friends, they are to go out and bear fruit that will last.

In these weeks after Easter, we discover with disciples that Jesus calls us in our turn to be His friends and to know His love for us. He wants us to continue His mission by bringing His love and peace to the people of our own day. We recall what an unlikely bunch of characters Jesus chose to carry on His work. They were transformed by the Holy Spirit. Their old ideas had to change. They had to let go of their prejudices and fears and allow God to use them to build the Church, a community of love and service for all people, especially the poor. So it is with us. We are ordinary people, struggling with our own lives, our fears, our weaknesses, but we believe. We believe that Jesus is risen from the dead. We believe that He continues to be present in the world is us. We believe that He uses us to bring His mercy and love to the world. If the Holy Spirit could transform Peter and the rest into an effective tool for evangelisation, and continue this work of transformation through the saints of every generation, then we can believe that the same Holy Spirit can transform us and empower us to go out in joy and hope to bear fruit.

The traditional grapevine is one of the world’s most important agricultural crops. At the time of Jesus vineyards were everywhere, and practices relating to their cultivation would be familiar. In today’s Gospel Jesus emphasizes that a vine needs to be carefully tended, and that is has a living and connected structure. The vine produces fruit through the branches and the branches are dependent on the central vine. Jesus describes himself as the “true vine”. The motif of the grapevine is present in a great deal of Christian art as a metaphor of the ongoing presence of Jesus. On the mosaic floors of churches of the Byzantine period in the Holy Land and its vicinity, the grape is often seen and it is a symbol of Jesus. The love and connection between God, Jesus and our community is described in John’s Gospel using the image of the vine and the branches. The organic unity suggests a community of many people who are sharers in a single life. Union with Christ is the condition of fruitfulness. Being followers of Jesus gives our lives meaning and direction. Fruit is possible only if we are in union with Him, for He is the productive source of it all.

Our opportunity of bearing any fruit worthy of our natures and of God’s purpose concerning us is by vital union with Jesus Christ. If we don’t have that, there may be plenty of activity and mountains of work in our lives, but there will be no lasting fruit. The next time you eat a grape, reflect upon the fruits that we share in our lives because of our relationship with God. The Christian faith is an experience of being in relationship to God, to each other, and to all our family and friends. Caring and love bind us all together. And remember in this Easter season that resurrection fuels and nurtures growth, hope and love.