By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK
Alleluia! He is risen as He said! Alleluia!
A most joyful and grace-filled Easter celebration to all of our readers and their families.
The octave of Easter is one long Easter day, the Sunday of Sundays. On this extended Easter “Day,” and every Sunday throughout the year, we identify ourselves as members of the one Body of the risen Lord, the Church, by worshipping as one people in the Eucharistic Sacrifice.
The early Christians called this day “the Day of the Sun” as did everyone else in the Roman Empire. What they meant by that was much more than could be said for the typical Roman, for whom the day marked merely one more rising and setting of the fiery orb that coursed through the skies. For Christians this was the day on which the rising of the “Sun” ever reminded them of the glorious rising of the “Son” of God.
Many today habitually profane the Lord’s Day, going about their business with no thought of the Lord’s Resurrection.
If we desire to live forever in light and love, we must share now in the new dawn of the Lord’s Resurrection. We do so when we learn to celebrate the Lord’s Day in a worthy way, and according to the ancient discipline of the Christian communio, or communion, and the law of Christ.
In the Eucharistic Sacrifice we offer the perfect prayer of Christ, the perfect means of keeping the Lord’s Day holy. Our indifference to the Mass condemns us as indifferent to Christ Himself. Worship with the Christian communio is not an option among options. It expresses and makes present the core reality of our identity as Christians. Without the Lord, as He manifests Himself in word and sacrament, it is impossible for us to look forward to Heaven and eternal joy. “Without me,” He warns, “you can do nothing.”
The Catechism teaches that the day of the Resurrection is the beginning of the new creation.
“Jesus rose from the dead ‘on the first day of the week’ [John 20:1]. Because it is the ‘first day,’ the day of Christ’s Resurrection recalls the first creation. Because it is the ‘eighth day’ following the Sabbath [Mark 16:1], it symbolizes the new creation ushered in by Christ’s Resurrection. For Christians it has become the first of all days, the first of all feasts, the Lord’s Day (he kuriaka hemera, dies dominica) — Sunday:
“ ‘We all gather on the day of the sun, for it is the first day [after the Jewish Sabbath, but also the first day] when God, separating matter from darkness, made the world; on this same day Jesus Christ our Savior rose from the dead’ [St. Justin, Apology]” (CCC, n. 2174)
At Emmaus Jesus gave His Body and Blood as He celebrated the Eucharist. There the disciples encountered the Easter Christ: “They had come to know Jesus in the breaking of bread” (Luke 24:25). “The breaking of the bread” is an ancient name for the Eucharistic Sacrifice of the Mass and recorded in Scripture.
Each of us relives the wonder and awe of Emmaus at every Mass. We “know Jesus the Lord” in the most perfect way outside of Heaven itself as the priest, acting in the person of Christ, offers the Mass. In this way we encounter the Resurrection as a historical and transcendent event. Earth and Heaven come together in Jesus the God-Man as He appears before us on the altar of sacrifice. Thus, the place in which this event takes place becomes the “house of God and gate of Heaven.”
“The mystery of Christ’s resurrection is a real event, with manifestations that were historically verified, as the New Testament bears witness. In about AD 56, St. Paul could already write to the Corinthians: ‘I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve….’ [1 Cor. 15:3-4]. The Apostle speaks here of the living tradition of the Resurrection which he had learned after his conversion at the gates of Damascus [cf. Acts 9:3-18]” (CCC, n. 639).
The Gospel records the appearances of the risen Christ and tells of the panic and fright, the joy and wonder of the women and the apostles who first saw Him. This is put down in writing so that we may know, even as we experience the same lack of belief as they surely did, that Christ really and truly rose from the dead. We must through God’s grace overcome our lack of belief and embrace the virtue of faith more and more. “Lord I believe, help my unbelief.”
Without faith we cannot freely choose to love God as He commands us to do. It is through the virtue of love, freely chosen, of Jesus the risen Lord, encountered in faith, that we hope to share in the Resurrection of the Lord. Even the beautiful accounts of Jesus in the Gospel are only fully understood and accepted by faith. The Easter gift of the Eucharist is the font of these and all the gifts of grace.
“Mary Magdalene and the holy women who came to finish anointing the body of Jesus, which had been buried in haste because the Sabbath began on the evening of Good Friday, were the first to encounter the Risen One [Mark 16:1; Luke 24:1; John 19:31, 42]. Thus the women were the first messengers of Christ’s Resurrection for the apostles themselves [cf. Luke 24:9-10; Matt. 28:9-10; John 20:11-18]. They were the next to whom Jesus appears: first Peter, then the Twelve. Peter had been called to strengthen the faith of his brothers [cf. 1 Cor. 15:5; Luke 22:31-32] and so sees the Risen One before them; it is on the basis of his testimony that the community exclaims: ‘The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!’ [Luke 24:34, 36]” (CCC, n. 641).
Mary Magdalene and the other first witnesses of the empty tomb and the risen Christ spread the joyful news with tears and smiles of heavenly joy. We, too, are messengers of the Resurrection; we live the glory of Easter through the transcendent gifts of faith, hope, and love in action.
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(Follow Fr. Cusick on Facebook at Reverendo Padre-Kevin Michael Cusick and on Twitter @MCITLFrAphorism. You can email Father at mcitl.blogspot.com@gmail.com.)
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