Homily

We have reached Easter after having followed Jesus through the last days of his life. We joyfully waved our palm branches last Sunday to welcome him as he entered Jerusalem. Then we followed him through the last three days: he welcomed us in the upper room, with a heart-rending desire for friendship, so great that he lowered himself to the point of washing our feet and giving himself as bread “broken” and blood “poured-out”. And then he wanted us by his side in the garden of Olives, when sadness and anguish oppressed his heart to the point of making him sweat blood. His need for friendship, which had become even more powerful, was not understood: his three friends first fell asleep and then abandoned him like everyone else. The next day we find him on the cross, alone and naked. The guards had stripped off his tunic; in truth he was the one who had stripped off his life. He and truly given his entire self for our salvation. Saturday was sad: an empty day for us, too. Jesus was on the other side of the heavy stone. And yet, despite being lifeless, he continues to give his life by “descending to hell,” to the lowest possible point; he wanted to carry his solidarity with men and women as far as possible.
The Gospel of Easter begins at this farthest point, in the darkness of night. The evangelist John writes that “it was still dark,” when Mary Magdalene came to the tomb. It was dark outside, but it was especially dark inside that woman’s heart (as it was in the heart of anyone else who loves this prophet who “had done all things well): the darkness of the loss of the only one who had every understood her. Not only had he told her the things that were in her heart, he had freed her from the things that oppressed her the most (Mark writes that she had been freed from seven demons). Mary went to the tomb with a sad heart. Perhaps she remembered the days before the passion, when she had dried his feet with her hair after having washed them with precious ointment, and the years, few but intense, that she had spent with this prophet. Friendship with Jesus is always capturing; we could say that it is impossible to follow this man from a distance, as Peter had over the past few days. The time comes for a settling of accounts and the choice of a definitive relationship. Friendship with Jesus is the sort of friendship that leads us to consider others more than ourselves: “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (Jn 15:13). Mary Magdalene experiences this personally this morning while it is still dark. Her friend is dead because he loved her and all the disciples, including Judas.
As soon as she reaches the tomb she sees that the stone place at the entrance, a block as heavy as any death or separation, had been rolled away. She does not even go in. She immediately runs to Peter and John: “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb,” she cries out, breathless. They do not even want him dead, she thinks. And she sadly adds, “And we do not know where they have laid him. Mary’s sadness at the loss of her Lord, even just his dead body, is a slap in the face of our coldness and our forgetfulness of Jesus even when he is alive. Today, this woman is an important example for all believers. Only with her feelings in our heart can we encounter the risen Lord.
It is Mary and her desperation that move Peter and the other disciple, whom Jesus loved. They immediately “run” towards the empty tomb; after having started to follow the Lord together during his passion, although from afar (Jn 18:15-16), now they find themselves “running together” to keep from being too far from him. This running is a good expression of the anxiety that is felt by each disciple, and each community, that is searching for the Lord. Perhaps we have to learn how to run again. Our going has become too slow, perhaps weighed down by our love for ourselves, the fear of slipping and losing something of ours, or the fear of having to give up fossilized habits. We need to try to run again, leaving the upper room with its locked doors and going towards the Lord. Easter is also about hurrying. The disciple of love reached the tomb first. Love makes him run faster. But even Peter’s slower stride brought him to the threshold of the tomb, and together they went in. Peter entered first, and he saw perfect order: the wrappings were in their place, as if they had been emptied of Jesus’ body, and the cloth that had covered his head “rolled up in a place by itself.” Jesus had neither been rescued nor stolen: he had freed himself. No one had to unwrap the linen cloths as they did for Lazarus. The other disciple entered and “saw” the same scene: “he saw and he believed,” the Gospel notes. They found themselves in front of the signs of the resurrection and they let their hearts be touched.
Indeed, until that moment, the evangelist continues, “they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.” This is often our life: a life without resurrection and without Easter, resigned before the great suffering and drama of humanity, closed up in the sadness of our habits. Easter has come, the heavy stone has been rolled away, and the tomb is opened. The Lord has defeated death and lives forever. We can no longer remain closed up as if the Gospel of the Resurrection had never been communicated to us. The Gospel is resurrection; it is rebirth to new life. And it needs to be shouted from the rooftops; it needs to be communicated to hearts so that they will open to the Lord. This Easter cannot pass by in vain; at cannot just be a ritual that we more or less by force habit repeat each year; it needs to change the heart and the life of every disciple and every Christian community. We need to throw our doors open to the risen one who comes among us, as we will read over the next few weeks in the apparitions to the disciples. He places in their hearts the breath of the resurrection, the energy of peace, and the power of the Spirit who renews. The apostle writes, “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Col 3:3). Our life has been drawn into the risen Jesus and participates in his victory over death and evil. Together with the risen one, the entire world will enter our hearts, with its expectations and its suffering, just as he showed the disciples the wounds still present in his body, so that we can work with him for the birth of a new heaven and a new earth, where there is no mourning or lamentation or death or sadness because God will be all in all.