EASTER SUNDAY
9 APRIL 2023
The last
time we encountered Simon Peter was on Good Friday. In the Garden of Gethsemane, he and the sons
of Zebedee could not stay awake as Jesus agonized over his impending death,
which would be the expression of perfect love.
When Judas, one of his closest friends, betrayed Jesus in the Garden,
Peter and the other disciples ran away in fear.
In the courtyard outside the high priest’s house, Peter denied knowing
Jesus three times.
We meet
Peter again in today’s Gospel. Mary
Magdalene had reported that the body of Jesus had been stolen. Peter and the Beloved Disciple arrive at the
tomb, which is in a garden. Both see the
burial bands laid aside. The Beloved
Disciple contrasts those burial bands with the burial bands that had clung to
Lazarus. He believes that the Lord had
been raised from the dead. Peter is not
yet at that point of faith.
In our first reading from the Acts
of the Apostles, we meet Peter again. By
this time, Peter had encountered the risen Lord later on Easter Sunday and
received the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
Peter’s conversion has been complete. Now, Peter has the courage to
enter into a pagan house and baptizes Cornelius and his household. He boldly proclaims the truth about Jesus
Christ and the Paschal Mystery. The
risen Lord has transformed him.
As we celebrate the triumph of the
Lord over death on this Easter Sunday, we can trust that the Lord has the power
to transform us through his resurrection.
The key to understanding this power lies in the garden. Gardens in
Scripture are not just locations where vegetables and flowers are grown. Gardens are where lovers meet. Our first parents experienced perfect love in
the Garden of Eden. It was in the Garden
of Gethsemane where perfect love was betrayed and abandoned. It was in a garden of the tomb that Mary
Magdalene later in the day mistakes the risen Christ for the gardener. In that garden, Jesus reveals himself to her
as the risen Lord and tells her to announce the good news to his disciples.
As we grow
in faith and in our encounters with the risen Lord, we find ourselves in a variety
of gardens at different times in our lives.
All of us have experienced glimpses of the intense love of the Garden of
Eden. But, we have also participated in
what happened to Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. We have betrayed the Lord by our
actions. We have abandoned him out of
fear. Now, Mary Magdalene invites us to
encounter him in the garden of the resurrection. He calls her by his affectionate name, and
she recognizers him. He does the same to
us. He speaks to us in the Word. He invites us to recognize his risen
presence in this Eucharist. He feeds us
with his Body and Blood. He sends us
forth to reflect more deeply on the ways we can share in the Lord’s sacrificial
dying and rising during these next fifty days of Easter.
That is why
we need to celebrate the Sacred Paschal Triduum year after year. No matter which garden we find ourselves in
at this moment, the Lord invites us to recognize his risen presence and
encounter him in the many ways in which he reveals himself to us. The risen Lord eventually transforms Peter
into the leader he had been called him to be:
The Rock of the faith of his Church.
Peter has learned to live the sacrificial love of Jesus Christ. Instead
of running away, he will rejoice and suffer for the sake of the name.
As we renew our baptismal promises,
Jesus extends the same invitation to us.
We can renounce sin and the lure of evil and Satan, the author and
prince of sin. We can embrace the
absolute love of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. We too can learn that in sharing in the
sacrificial dying of Jesus Christ, we share in his rising.
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