Easter Sunday
Once upon a time our Institute of Mercy was “founded on Calvary,
there to serve a crucified Redeemer.”
So said our Catherine.
So said our Holy Rule.
Ah, but that was then: the nexus, the Calvary moment,
a Good Friday that was never a Bad Friday.
Then, immediately after Calvary and the tomb,
came the explosion beyond boundaries.
Mary of Magdala was the first, a solo witness,
at the dim dawn of the day,
with hardly enough light to determine what was lurking,
who was there in the shadows.
No wonder St. Augustine would come along a few hundred years later and after prayerful study, grant her a wonderful new appellation,
“Mary Magdalene, Apostle to the Apostles.”
She it was who first announced a crossing of the borders for Jesus,
the Beloved,
making the grand leap into the new life of Resurrection.
Jesus the Christ pulled back all the earthly curtains.
Our faith-filled imagination staggers onto brand new terrain.
Go slowly!
Hold your sweet breath, lest you imagine an erroneous resuscitation
of a bloody crucified corpse. Ah, no!
This is New Life, upright, with a trajectory moving forward,
all the edges bursting out of sight and mind.
So, welcome to the forever new moment, here and now,
a new marriage of the heavens and the earth.
Fait accompli!
Done!
Done?
Yes, yet ever surging into an unknown future.
Welcome to the place where we can all bow our proud heads.
The Cosmic Christ, the Divine Connector reigns here!
Step right in, with Easter joy, toward a celebration like no other.
Surely it is time to lean contemplatively into the energy of this Easter.
The God of Mystery is working subversively, planting signs we discover, as we find divine traces in our earthly really real, today, here, now.
Jesus told us all about it in his earliest preaching, as recounted in the ancient Marcan Gospel:
“The time is now;
God’s Reign is here;
change your mindset;
believe Good News!”
Pope Francis has invited us to wake up to what is real, and then to wake up the whole world.
No solo flights. No auto pilot. We go as One, stumbling along together.
Didn’t you always wonder why we nicknamed the Baptismal parties: “Christening”?
Behold. I am not the Christ. You individually are not the Christ. Our Easter miracle is that we, together, are the Christ, Rising and Present.
There is no other.
Centuries ago in Spain, St. Teresa of Avila proclaimed it in the absolute: “Christ has no body now but yours.”
Oh, Wonder of Wonders!
The Resurrection keeps tumbling down years and lands, future-ward!
Recently, the philosopher Ken Wilber reminded us, that the next Christ will not be some kind of larger than life superhero, but a collection of rather ordinary people, living out the Good News.
Yes, Jesus really died as a first century Jew in Jerusalem. Yes, Jesus is still coming alive as the Christ, in us and beyond us today. Ah, Eastering us!
Faith binds us together. Mercy impels us. Fidelity carries us forward. Loving service ever defines us. The divine love affair centers us.
Our own Sister Pat McDermott encourages us to watch prayerfully and listen carefully for signs of the One, beckoning to us from the future.
The Muslim Holy Book shines a magnificent, clear light onto our pathway of discovery. There, in the second sutra of the Koran, it is boldly announced:
“Whichever way we turn, there is the face of God.”
Grace overflows reality
God speaks
Revelation happens
No turning back
So come now, let us step forward with Easter joy, alive to our pregnant surroundings, reality waiting to be discovered and Christened anew. Teilhard opined that the infallible sign of God’s presence would be joy.
It was Pope Francis who located the source of our joy in the Gospel.
So, Happiest Easter Ever! AMEN.