Today is the morning we have been
anticipating throughout our Lenten journey.
Lent has been a very special time of preparation for us as
Catholics. We have been kneeling at the
beginning and ending of mass during Lent, signifying for us the penitential
nature of this season, of the need to repent, to seek forgive, and to change
our lives. The Church asks us to go to the Sacrament of Reconciliation during
Lent, and to practice the Lenten disciplines of prayer, almsgiving, and
fasting.
We knew that this Lenten time of
preparation would lead us to this joyful celebration of Easter. But it is interesting for us to see the
reactions of those in our Gospel today as they come to the empty tomb. Mary Magdalene is worried and anxious,
wondering what they have done with our Lord’s body. Peter and the other beloved disciple ran to
the tomb to see what was going on, trying to figure out why the stone had been
rolled away and why the burial cloths were sitting there in a pile. There is not a lot of joy in their responses,
but rather anxiety, worry, and activity.
Sometimes it takes us a long time to
realize the significance of an event, for it to penetrate our hearts and our
lives, to reflect on its meaning and to ponder it. We have talking about the pilgrimage to
Santiago de Compostela – the Way of St James – all during the Lenten
season. Being a pilgrim is a spiritual
journey, but sometime it takes a while to really have that journey make
sense. In the pilgrimage group that I accompanied
to Spain back in April, one of the members of that group was an 80-year-old
parishioner from St Richard parish in Jackson named Lyons. I cannot even imagine what I would be like to
go on that pilgrimage at 80 years old, walking about 200 miles over the course
of 2 weeks. While we were walking on the
pilgrimage route, Lyons kept on remaking to me – “Father Lincoln – I just don’t
feel like a pilgrim. I don’t feel the
Spirit on this journey.” When a pilgrim
is hiking 15 or 16 miles a day in rough terrain and through whatever weather
there is – through snow, sleet, rain, and hail that we had throughout our
journey – it is tough not concentrating on what is going on physically during
the pilgrimage. The spirituality of the
pilgrimage is there, but a lot of times it is not until the pilgrim has some
time to pray and reflect upon what has gone on, then the real profound
spiritual lessons hit home. When we
finally arrived at the Cathedral in Santiago de Compestela, when we hugged the
statue of St. James and went to mass and did all the other pilgrimage rituals
upon arriving at our destination, the spirituality of the pilgrimage took hold
a bit more. And when the pilgrims arrive
back home, the spirituality of the pilgrimage starts to resonate more and more
with each passing day. I still have
insights and reflections about my pilgrimage experiences as the days and weeks
and months go by.
The Passion of Christ, our salvation
through his death and Resurrection, his real presence in the Eucharist – these
are all mysteries of our faith. And by
the word “mystery”, we mean that its fully meaning can never by fully absorbed
or understood by us, that on our faith journey, we will always grow in our
understanding and comprehension of God and the divine presence in our
lives. I always think about what St
Augustine once said – that when we think we fully understand God and know what
he is all about, then we know we really don’t understand God at all. Think again about Mary Magdalene and the
disciples that found the empty tomb that morning. Their first reaction was not initially
“Alleluia! Praise the Lord! Christ has risen!” They had not expected the resurrection, and it
took them a long time to figure it out.
But even on that morning, our Gospel says that the “other
disciple,” the one who first arrived at
the tomb, “he saw and believed.” Our
belief will help us grow in our understanding, and our understanding will help
us in our belief.
During Lent, many of us took on
disciplines that helped up in our preparation during this Holy Season. When I was visiting one of the CCD
classrooms, one of the teachers was remarking to the students that those Lenten
disciplines should not end with Easter, but should influence our life of
discipleship throughout the year. I
recall one young man from St Richard parish in Jackson who started praying the
rosary and offering support to the women at the abortion clinic in Jackson as
part of his Lenten observance one year.
Many years later, he now is one of the most active Christians in the
pro-life movement in the Jackson area.
As a new priest, this young man often came to me and tried to get me
more involved in my pro-life efforts. I
started going out to the abortion clinic myself during Lent my first year as a
priest to pray the rosary with a group of parishioners, and that group still
continue that practice to this day.
So, as we celebrate the resurrection of
Christ today and the salvation we have in him, may we ponder its significance
in our lives as we now journey through the Easter season, and may we live out
the reality of the resurrection in our lives each day.
No comments:
Post a Comment