Homily

Saturday passed; the days of men are finished. Here is a new day. True, it begins in a manner all together sad; sad like often is our life, above all when one stands before a tomb. Jesus’ tomb is not special, just one among many other tombs of men and women. And here is what is even sadder: in that tomb, not only has the body of a friend come to an end, but also the hope for a new kingdom that had sparked that group of men and women that Jesus had brought with him all the way to Galilee. If only the world had the courage to stop in front of the tombs! In our chests we would feel a knot of anxiety, of fear, facing life’s end, the death of hope, the end of the future. Cemeteries? Not only. Today there are nations that have become like tombs, enormous cemeteries of victims (often innocent) of oppression, violence and war. Faced with this panorama of death, many flee, as did Jesus’ disciples. Only a few of the women remained; three, according to the Gospel of Mark. There is Mary Magdalene, a somewhat strange woman: she had been healed from seven demons. There is the other Mary, mother of James, and then there is Salome. Three poor Galilean women who had come to Jerusalem following Jesus. Now, lost after the sad events that happened to their teacher, they do not know what else to do but go to his tomb. At dawn they are already there, worried about how they can enter the tomb. The stone sealing the tomb is too heavy, heavy like the stones that crush the lives of the weak. But, as soon as they arrived, they see that the stone had been rolled away and they see an angel, wrapped in white robes, seated on the right. They are taken by fear, but the angel says to them, “Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here.” This is the Gospel of resurrection.
This is the first Easter; and it is for a small community of three lonely, poor, despised, foreign women. Once more what Jesus said comes true: “The poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offence at me.” This is the first Easter. And even if it is only for three poor women, it is not a private matter. It is for all disciples: “But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee.” And from there the disciples were supposed to announce the resurrection to everyone to the ends of the earth. The announcement of the resurrection shakes up the entire life of men and women. It shakes up life from top to bottom to give it a new face, to shake off and free us from the stones that weigh on our hearts, to illuminate the darkness that hangs over our life and shines forth the light of mercy. The one rising again is the one who was crucified. The one who died on the cross is now clothed in God’s power. And the cross, which seemed death’s definitive victory, now becomes God’s power in the world. Often in the iconographic tradition of the Easter Churches, the image of Christ crucified is depicted on one side of the cross and the risen Jesus is on the other. In the apparitions after Easter the crucified appears risen to show the power of his love for us: as he was crucified for us, he is now risen for us.
This is the message, causing both joy and fear, that those women received from the angel of Easter. Joy because they understood that Jesus will stay with them always, but also fear because they find themselves completely immersed in the day of God—and so, they flee from the tomb. They do not remain where they were. A singular impulse to go enters them. After hearing the announcement of the resurrection we cannot linger. We have to hurry! We have to hurry to proclaim the release of the captives imprisoned by evil, of those buried by wickedness, of those enslaved by pride and hatred, of those crushed by hunger and war. Even three poor women are able to do this! Despised and counted as nothing, those women were the first to be sent out to announce the Gospel. And then the disciples were invited to go to Galilee, to the extreme periphery of Israel, where the region of the pagans began, where Jesus began his mission: there the disciples encounter the risen Lord and from there set out again along the roads of the world. Galilee is the immense, poor periphery of the world that awaits the announcement of hope, but perhaps it is also the heart of each one of us waiting to see the Lord. “Christ is risen, truly he is risen!”