HAPPY EASTER!
We have heard the refrain: There is no Easter without Good Friday. If your life is more Good Friday than Easter, please remember:
We do not have to look far to see suffering. It is in our world, in our community, in our life. Why does God allow this? Where is God when there is pain? It is at these times that we need to look at what happened to Jesus. All the questions we ask about pain could have been asked of Jesus on the cross. Jesus felt God-forsaken but he endured because the resurrection was just over the horizon. How do we endure? Same reason. We long for the resurrection, but like Jesus, we only get there through the cross. The cross and resurrection is the lens through which we must look at all suffering.
A few thoughts from God’s Holy Word if your life these days is, if you will, more of a Good Friday.
But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. Is. 53:5
For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Rom.8:38-39
And even in the face of what we fear most….death:
Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” Jn 11:25-26
Byzantine Catholics sing over and over to much ringing of bells during the Divine Liturgy (Mass): Christ is risen from the dead! By death he trampled death and to those in the tombs he granted life!
Saint James Catholic Church 