A RISEN PEOPLE
Jesus our Lord is risen. Alleluia! This Jesus who was condemned to death, scourged and mocked and crowned with thorns, he who was jeered when he died on the cross, is risen and alive! Since that day God guarantees that his love is stronger than death. He also reassures us on this day: look to my risen Son: with him you are already rising from your pain and loneliness and wounds. With my Son and his Church your task is to lift up people from their miseries, to revive hope and joy and happiness until the day when you will fully rise to the happiness that can never be dimmed or taken away from you. Let the joy of the risen Christ light up your faces.
First Reading: Acts 10:34a,37-43
Peter fairly exploded with his good news:
“You know the story of what happened in Judea. It began in Galilee after John preached a total life-change. Then Jesus arrived from Nazareth, anointed by God with the Holy Spirit, ready for action. He went through the country helping people and healing everyone who was beaten down by the Devil. He was able to do all this because God was with him.
“And we saw it, saw it all, everything he did in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem where they killed him, hung him from a cross. But in three days God had him up, alive, and out where he could be seen. Not everyone saw him—he wasn’t put on public display. Witnesses had been carefully handpicked by God beforehand—us! We were the ones, there to eat and drink with him after he came back from the dead. He commissioned us to announce this in public, to bear solemn witness that he is in fact the One whom God destined as Judge of the living and dead. But we’re not alone in this. Our witness that he is the means to forgiveness of sins is backed up by the witness of all the prophets.”
Second Reading: Colossians 3:1-4
So if you’re serious about living this new resurrection life with Christ, act like it. Pursue the things over which Christ presides. Don’t shuffle along, eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Christ—that’s where the action is. See things from his perspective.
Your old life is dead. Your new life, which is your real life—even though invisible to spectators—is with Christ in God. He is your life. When Christ (your real life, remember) shows up again on this earth, you’ll show up, too—the real you, the glorious you. Meanwhile, be content with obscurity, like Christ.
Gospel: John 20:1-9
Early in the morning on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone was moved away from the entrance. She ran at once to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, breathlessly panting, “They took the Master from the tomb. We don’t know where they’ve put him.”
Peter and the other disciple left immediately for the tomb. They ran, neck and neck. The other disciple got to the tomb first, outrunning Peter. Stooping to look in, he saw the pieces of linen cloth lying there, but he didn’t go in. Simon Peter arrived after him, entered the tomb, observed the linen cloths lying there, and the kerchief used to cover his head not lying with the linen cloths but separate, neatly folded by itself. Then the other disciple, the one who had gotten there first, went into the tomb, took one look at the evidence, and believed. No one yet knew from the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.
Prayer
God of life and of love,
we rejoice today that Jesus is risen
and that he has begun
to raise us up with him in baptism.
Continue in us the work of resurrection,
lift us above our faults, our mediocrity,
to joy and unselfish love
as we serve you in one another.
Let your Spirit make us free
to bring hope and justice to all around us,
until you raise us up to share
in your happiness without end.
We ask this in the name of Jesus, our risen Lord,
who lives with you and the Holy Spirit
now and for ever. Amen.
Video available at: bibleclaret.org
