Pastor's Message

                 EASTER Sunday 

                                       “This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad!     Psalm 118:24

Rejoice, Heavenly Powers! Sing, Choirs of Angels. Exult, all Creation around God’s throne! Jesus Christ, Our King, is Risen! Rejoice, O Earth, in shining splendor, Glory fills you!  Darkness vanishes forever! Rejoice, O Mother Church!  Exult in Glory! The Risen Shines upon you!

             This is the proclamation made, announcing the Holy and Great Easter Night. It is a call to be joyful as we behold and accept God’s Greatest Miracle; That moment when He rained down Graces of New Life upon the tomb and His Son rose from the dead.

             Easter Festivities always begin with the “Miracle of Light;” Light illumining the darkness of Sin. On that Holy Night, Christians enter the Sanctuary with Light progressively growing brighter and brighter from a single Easter Candle.

            The same reality is then repeated in the Proclaimed Readings of the Night; Readings from the Old Testament beginning in the Genesis with the Creation to the Time of Fulfillment in the New Testament. We, the disciples of Christ, listen and reflect on the Whole of Our Salvation History, as we visualized it pass, as it were on a Screen, from Creation to Redemption: Adam, Abraham, Moses, the Prophets; the Old Covenant to the New and Eternal Covenant sealed by the blood of Christ Jesus.

            On this Holy Day, God’s Plan to Save us reached its Peak in its fulfillment. This is a cause of Great Joy! As we hear yet again the Words of the Angel to the women;  

            See after the tragic evening of Good Friday, when “the power of darkness,” seemed to have prevailed over the One who is “the Light of the World.” And while all his friends deserted Him and all seemed hopeless, Jesus remained determined to fulfill the Will of His Father. He had to fulfill all that the Scriptures had foretold about Him. He was the New Adam who unlike the first remained perfectly obedient to the Will of the Father leading him to death, death on the Cross. On Good Friday, we heard those liberating words; “It is Finished,” and with them Jesus announced the completion of his Mission. The reaction of his disciples was that of fear; They were scared, hidden behind locked doors! 

            You can imagine then, how they felt, when Mary Magdalene came on that Easter Morning with the news; “they have taken the Lord from the tomb and we do not know where they have laid him.” This meant the end of all hope! Anxiety propelled Peter and John to the tomb!  A Race without Faith: to find out, whether, what the women had reported was true; They had removed the body. What they saw; the empty tomb, the shroud and the napkins; transformed them, as John the Evangelist wrote; they “saw and believed.” The Pilgrim Journey of Faith, from moments when anxiety, doubts and fear had enslaved them was Illumined by the Spirit of God into Joy beyond any human fathoming.

            The Events of the Day, were to become even more dramatic! That evening with the doors still closed, for the fear of the Jews, Jesus appeared to them. “Peace to you,” He greeted them. The disciples were breathless! What an amazing turn of events! They were in the Presence of the Risen Lord, we can almost see the Joy, that victory brings, shinning on the Faces of the Disciples. You can almost hear them explode with the exclamation of today’s Responsorial Psalm; “This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad!”

             We should also come to this Great Joy, on this extraordinary Day, because Christ’s Victory is our Victory. And He tells us in John 14:19, “I live and you will live also.”