Today is the great Christian feast. We may be tempted to think that Christmas is the feast of feasts because it captures our imagination, and it is so much easier to relate to a vulnerable little child than to enter into, let alone understand, the mystery of a God who, having died a horrendous death as a public criminal, should be raised again to life. The apostles were struggling to understand what was happening. St. John describes the drama in the early morning of Easter Sunday when Mary of Magdala reports that the tomb is empty. He let us know that he was in on the act and ran with Peter to check for himself. It is worth remembering that John was writing his Gospel with the benefit of having been able to piece the story together after a lifetime of meditating on it. He notes that this was the moment that he began to see the connections and the fulfillment of what had been prophesied in the scriptures. He is not afraid to go on and tell us what happened in the evening of Easter Sunday when Jesus came to the apostles who were hiding behind locked doors. It is not insignificant that Thomas, who was absent, refused to accept the evidence of the others. We will hear more about this next Sunday. In the Acts of the Apostles, the disciples return to the key elements of the faith. We see them in Peter’s address to Cornelius and his household: Jesus is the awaited Messiah; He was crucified for us, He was raised from the dead; He is now appointed to judge everyone.
Today is enough for you and me to realize that we are being asked to accept our call to be faithful witnesses of the resurrection. Now, as heralds of this good news – we are proclaiming not only that Christ was brought back to life, but that we too have been brought back to life with Him. There is a temptation to think that we must wait until our earthly life comes to an end before we will experience this new life, if we deserve it. But it is clear from the writings of St. Paul that this is not so. We have already been brought back to life and freed from the sin that held us bound.