Easter: A mystery to be lived

Even for Christians, the mystery of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ is more powerful than we generally understand or acknowledge. It is not an event of the past but a reality that still shapes our lives today. It is the central mystery of our faith. The power of the Resurrection is simply greater than our minds can fully comprehend because it breaks into our world from beyond time and space.

It is hard to imagine what the disciples experienced that first Easter morning. The Gospel accounts of the Resurrection are filled with mystery and paradox and misunderstanding. 

Our Risen Lord does many seemingly contradictory things. He can walk through locked doors and appear or disappear at will, yet he eats real food with his disciples, breathes on them, and invites Thomas to touch him and place his hand in his wounded side. The Resurrection is a profound paradox, just as the Cross is a paradox.

God cannot die – yet Jesus did.

All humanity returns to dust – yet Jesus did not.

Commenting on this paradox in his book, “Jesus of Nazareth,” Pope Benedict XVI wrote: 

“The paradox [of the Resurrection] was indescribable. He was quite different, no mere resuscitated corpse, but one living anew and while no longer belonging to our world, He was truly present there, He Himself.”

This was not like the other “resurrections” recorded in the Gospels. The son of the widow of Nain, Jairus’s daughter, and Lazarus were brought back to life, but only to resume their earthly journey and eventually suffer death again. 

It was not so with our Lord. He rose to new life not by a mere resuscitation of his former life but in a new category of life all together. Eternal life was revealed and walked among the passing things of this world. Heaven had broken into our mundane earthly realities.

Understandably, the disciples were utterly baffled by this new reality. They had known Jesus as a teacher and miracle worker and friend but now they recognized him as something infinitely greater. 

Every other great teacher of history is dead and buried, but Jesus Christ lives. As Saint Paul boldly proclaimed, “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and your faith is in vain” (1 Corinthians 15:14).

Something radically new in the course of human history had happened. The Resurrection was not merely a miracle – it was the re-creation of humanity itself. It was a new category of human existence: glorified, eternal and indestructible.

The author of life embraced our earthly existence and raised it to a dimension never before imagined or experienced.

During his earthly life and ministry, Jesus veiled his divinity, so that his disciples might come to faith through his humanity. He used familiar means to reveal and draw people to the Father – by walking, teaching, eating, weeping. 

Even his passion and death, while extraordinary in some ways, were fundamentally ordinary, as they mirrored the sufferings and deaths of countless others. The Resurrection, however, was radically new. It was the eruption of divine and indestructible life into our mortal world.

Pope Benedict XVI pointed out that for the few chosen witnesses, the Resurrection was so overwhelmingly real and powerful that every doubt was dispelled. It transformed a group of frightened, broken disciples into fearless witnesses of the Gospel. The apostles, who once fled in fear, now preached with boldness because they had seen, touched and spoken with the Risen Christ.

The power of the Resurrection is not confined to the past; it is a present reality that changes and renews our lives. In Baptism, we are buried with Christ and rise with him to new life. This means that the power that raised Jesus from the dead is at work in us. 

The Resurrection is not just an abstract doctrine to believe or a story to tell; it is a person to encounter and a transformative mystery of love that animates our faith, strengthens our hope, and fills us with unshakeable joy.

As we live out this Easter Season, let us remember that the Resurrection is not just an event to commemorate but new life to be lived. We are invited to let the power of Christ’s victory over death shape every aspect of our lives. 

Let us live with the boldness and joy of disciples who have encountered the Risen Lord, confident that the one who has conquered the grave walks with us, guides us and calls us to share in his glorious life.

Christ is risen! He is truly risen! Let this truth penetrate our hearts and transform our lives. Let us live as people of the Resurrection, bearing witness to a fallen world longing for hope and new life.