3rd Sunday of Easter 2021
Acts 3:13-15, 17-19; 1 John 2:1-5; Luke 24:35-48
Many many moons ago, speaking to a gaggle of urchins in the now long defunct Junior Seminary, I asked “Which is the longest season in the Church’s year?” One smart youth raised his hand and replied “Ordinary Time”. Clever so-and –so! No wonder he is now Vicar General of the Diocese.
At one level, he was correct. The greater part of the year is indeed what we term “Ordinary Time”, when vestments are common or garden green, and we are not focusing on any particular event in the life, death, and resurrection of Our Lord. Ordinary Time, though, is not usually reckoned as a season, and it was not what I had in mind.
The answer for which I was searching was Easter, which is, to some people’s surprise, longer than Lent, the latter appearing to be endless because of the penances we undertake. The season of resurrection, the season of joy, is longer than the season of penitence and mourning.
Indeed, there is a sense in which it is always Easter because Christ is risen. Notice that we say “Christ IS risen” rather than “Christ HAS risen, because the resurrection is a present state, and not only a past event.
Every Sunday is a celebration of the Resurrection: every Mass is a celebration of the resurrection. Yet there is a note of caution to be sounded: every Mass makes present, not only the resurrection of the Lord, but also His Passion and death. Those events of Passion, death, and resurrection are interwoven, inseparable: we cannot have one without the others.
We live in the light of the risen Christ, but we live also in the mystery of His suffering and death. We are the Easter People, as Pope St. John Paul II was fond of reminding us, but we are also the Ash Wednesday People, the Holy Thursday night People, the Good Friday People.
These are not simply truths which we profess: they also play out in our lives. We too have our seasons of wilderness wandering, of Gethsemane anguish, of Calvary darkness, as well as our seasons of Easter joy. They may coincide with the Church’s seasons, or they may not. Often they are woven together, suffering shot through with joy: celebration tempered by sorrow.
It is important that we recognise them for what they are—sharings in the suffering, in the death, and in the resurrection of the Lord. All of these Christ-events are present realities, and all of them find a place in the pilgrim journey of His people.
There is another event too which we must not neglect. The season of Easter leads us to Pentecost, the feast of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We are also the Pentecost People, filled, guided, and moved by the Holy Spirit; though we should never forget that the Spirit came not only in the wind and flame of Pentecost, but also in the gentle breathing of the Lord on Easter Sunday evening, when he breathed on the disciples and declared “Receive the Holy Spirit”.
So we are at one and the same time the Lent People, the Passiontide People, the Easter People and the Pentecost People. I might add that we are also the Advent People, constantly looking forward to the return of Christ in glory, but also seeking to recognise His present coming in the people and events of everyday. And in deference to that canny youth of yesteryear, perhaps it should also be said that we are the Ordinary Time People, living in the presence of, and sharing the life of, the God who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, in the mundane apparent non-events of everyday life.
