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Easter Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons


Giotto, Scrovigni Chapel, Padua

Giotto, Scrovigni Chapel, Padua

Christ is Risen: He is Risen Indeed!

The media seems to delight in grubbing up odd stories that poke fun at the Christian festival of Easter, we've had the usual run of 'Eostre' stories, how it's really a pagan festival celebrating the goddess and so on and so forth! There was even an article in one of last weekend's supplements written by a young woman who had given up her evangelical Christian faith, the main idea being that she had rejected celebrating and honouring somebody who had been dead for over 2,000 years in order to have relationships with the living. These sort of articles would be risible except for the fact that some people take them seriously.

How do we respond? Well firstly look outwards, our faith is universal, we are a global community. Historically it is East and West, our growth now is North and South. The root festal word used outside of anglo-phone communities is Pascha, no connotation of old northern gods here, instead it is resonant with scripture, theology and living faith of a community that loves, experiences and knows its Lord. For us Christ IS risen!

We know as Peter tells us, that there were a number of witnesses who ate and drank with Jesus after his resurrection, this was so that they would finally understand and believe what he had said to them. Yet we experience him still, for the preaching of the Apostolic community is about proclamation, testimony and encounter. Through the gift of the Holy Spirit ,the risen and glorified Christ is made present to us in so many different ways, including one area neglected by so many critics, the interior life, the heart and soul of each one of us.

Peter talks about the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, which should be our hallmark. The Christian's life is not a dualistic separation of body and soul but and integrated oneness in God's loving presence. That's what Christ's resurrection from the dead is all about, becoming whole again.

Never mind our media and its ways, look outwards to Christians daily being martyred for their faith. They are our brothers and sisters who less and less are troubled by ancient divisions, for the ecumenism of suffering and martyrdom draws them together in the Lord. We all bear his name as 'Christians', with the martyrs we witness to His presence, hope and love!. Through Him death and sin are vanquished, whatever happens in the end, good will triumph!

Christ is Risen: He is Risen Indeed!

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