The Mass of Easter Day
Catechism Links[1]
CCC 638-655, 989,1001-1002:
The Resurrection of Christ and our resurrection
CCC 647, 1167-1170, 1243,1287:
Easter, the Lord’s Day
CCC 1212: The Sacraments of
Initiation
CCC 1214-1222, 1226-1228,1234-1245, 1254:
Baptism
CCC 1286-1289: Confirmation
CCC 1322-1323: Eucharist
 |
| “Resurrection of Christ” by Marco Basaiti, 1520 |
Reading 1: Acts 10:34a, 37-43
Peter proceeded to speak and
said:
"You know what has
happened all over Judea ,
beginning in Galilee after the baptism
that John preached,
how God anointed Jesus of
Nazareth
with the Holy Spirit and
power.
He went about doing good
and healing all those
oppressed by the devil,
for God was with him.
We are witnesses of all that
he did
both in the country of the
Jews and in Jerusalem
They put him to death by
hanging him on a tree.
This man God raised on the
third day and granted that he be visible,
not to all the people, but to
us,
the witnesses chosen by God
in advance,
who ate and drank with him
after he rose from the dead.
He commissioned us to preach
to the people
and testify that he is the
one appointed by God
as judge of the living and
the dead.
To him all the prophets bear
witness,
that everyone who believes in
him
will receive forgiveness of
sins through his name."
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Commentary
on Acts 10:34a, 37-43
This is part of Peter’s speech to
Cornelius and his family (Gentiles). Peter (according to St. Luke) assumes the
people know what has happened – namely that Jesus who was thought to be the
Messiah, had proven that fact in the resurrection. Now he reminds them, before
the creed was written, that Christ will come again to judge the living and the
dead.
He goes further, explaining that
his Apostles are also called to spread that word through preaching: to take
what they have been given, the Good News of Christ and him crucified, into
the world. This call, St. Peter explains, is so all peoples might come to
know and understand that God has fulfilled the promise he made through the
prophets by providing a sacrifice of atonement, his Only Begotten Son Jesus,
and that belief in him will lead to reconciliation to the Father
through the forgiveness of sins.
CCC: Acts 10:38 438, 453, 486, 1289; Acts
10:39 597; Acts
10:41 659, 995; Acts
10:42 679
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Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23
R. (24) This is the day the Lord has made; let us
rejoice and be glad.
or:
Alleluia.
Give thanks to the LORD, for
he is good,
for his mercy endures
forever.
Let the house of Israel
"His mercy endures
forever."
R. This is the day the
Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or:
Alleluia.
"The right hand of the
LORD has struck with power;
the right hand of the LORD is
exalted.
I shall not die, but live,
and declare the works of the
LORD."
R. This is the day the
Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or:
Alleluia.
The stone which the builders
rejected
has become the cornerstone.
By the LORD has this been
done;
it is wonderful in our eyes.
R. This is the day the
Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad.
or: Alleluia.
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Commentary
on Ps 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23
Psalm 118 is in regular use
during the Easter season. It is a liturgical song of praise and victory. The
messianic imagery is so strong that it has been used for the past three days,
reflecting the joy of the Church in the Eastertide. This litany of thanksgiving
features the cornerstone image that, in addition to Acts 10:34a, 37-43 (Easter
Sunday), was also used in the Gospel of St. Mark (Mark 12:10) and the first epistle of
St. Peter (1 Peter 2:7) (there
are 9 other scripture references not listed here).
CCC: Ps 118:22 587, 756
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Reading II: Colossians 3:1-4
Brothers and sisters:
If then you were raised with
Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the
right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not
of what is on earth.
For you have died, and your
life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life
appears,
then you too will appear with
him in glory.
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Commentary
on Col 3:1-4
Paul gives assurance to the
Colossians that they too have a home with Christ, who now is seated at the
right hand of the Father. In saying this, he points their aspirations to the
things of heaven, telling them that if eternal life with Christ is what they
desire, they should focus their thoughts on the Lord not on things of the
earth.
CCC: Col 3-4 1971; Col
3:1-3 655; Col
3:1 1002; Col
3:3 665, 1003, 1420, 2796; Col
3:4 1003, 2772
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Brothers and sisters:
Do you not know that a little
yeast leavens all the dough?
Clear out the old yeast,
so that you may become a
fresh batch of dough,
inasmuch as you are
unleavened.
For our paschal lamb, Christ,
has been sacrificed.
Therefore, let us celebrate
the feast,
not with the old yeast, the
yeast of malice and wickedness,
but with the unleavened bread
of sincerity and truth.
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Commentary
on I Cor 5:6b-8
Paul calls the Corinthians to
conversion with a metaphor. He uses the dual meaning or implication of leaven
in bread and the feast of the Passover to symbolize the new covenant. The
traditional Passover meal or Seder is lamb and unleavened bread. Christ, the
Lamb of God and the unleavened bread of the Eucharist is their meal.
CCC: 1 Cor 5:6-8 129; 1 Cor
5:7 608, 610, 613
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Gospel: John 20:1-9
On the first day of the week,
Mary of Magdala came to the
tomb early in the morning,
while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed
from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon
Peter
and to the other disciple
whom Jesus loved, and told them,
"They have taken the
Lord from the tomb,
and we don't know where they
put him."
So Peter and the other
disciple went out and came to the tomb.
They both ran, but the other
disciple ran faster than Peter
and arrived at the tomb
first;
he bent down and saw the
burial cloths there, but did not go in.
When Simon Peter arrived
after him,
he went into the tomb and saw
the burial cloths there,
and the cloth that had
covered his head,
not with the burial cloths
but rolled up in a separate place.
Then the other disciple also
went in,
the one who had arrived at
the tomb first,
and he saw and believed.
For they did not yet
understand the Scripture
that he had to rise from the
dead.
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Commentary
on John 20:1-9
In St. John’s account of the
discovery of the “Empty Tomb,” we hear how the disciple whom Jesus loved
understood what had come to pass before Peter did. Found also in Luke (Luke24:1-12), this story furnishes the testimony that confirms Christ’s
resurrection. The story of the discovery of the empty tomb describes St. John
(the disciple whom Jesus loved). “From these details concerning the empty tomb
one deduces that Jesus' body must have risen in a heavenly manner, that is, in
a way which transcended the laws of nature. It was not only a matter of the
body being reanimated as happened, for example, in the case of Lazarus, who had
to be unbound before he could walk (cf. John 11:44)”[5] It is interesting that St. John
arrives first but recognizes St. Peter’s primacy, waiting for him to enter the
tomb first. Note also that when St. John entered the tomb, he immediately
understood what happened and “believed.”
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Or: Matthew 28:1-10
(Gospel from the Easter Vigil may
be used at any Easter Mass)
After the sabbath, as the first
day of the week was dawning,
Mary Magdalene and the other Mary
came to see the tomb.
And behold, there was a great
earthquake;
for an angel of the Lord
descended from heaven,
approached, rolled back the
stone, and sat upon it.
His appearance was like lightning
and his clothing was white as
snow.
The guards were shaken with fear
of him
and became like dead men.
Then the angel said to the women
in reply,
“Do not be afraid!
I know that you are seeking Jesus
the crucified.
He is not here, for he has been
raised just as he said.
Come and see the place where he
lay.
Then go quickly and tell his
disciples,
‘He has been raised from the
dead,
and he is going before you to
Galilee;
there you will see him.’
Behold, I have told you.”
Then they went away quickly from
the tomb,
fearful yet overjoyed,
and ran to announce this to his
disciples.
And behold, Jesus met them on
their way and greeted them.
They approached, embraced his
feet, and did him homage.
Then Jesus said to them, “Do not
be afraid.
Go tell my brothers to go to
Galilee,
and there they will see me.”
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Commentary on Mt 28:1-10
St. Matthew’s account of the
empty tomb has much in common with Mark and Luke. Unique in this account is the
dramatic action which rolls the stone away from the tomb, and the proactive
angelic presence announcing the resurrection. In none of the Gospel accounts do
we actually see Christ rising from the dead. The empty tomb, and the reminder
that Jesus told his disciples that he would rise after three days, is the
evidence of the great salvific event.
The two women’s encounter with
Christ as they ran to tell the disciples is unique in the synoptic Gospels, but
is similar to the account from St. John. They embraced him, a physical form,
raised from the dead.
CCC: Mt 28:1 500, 2174, 2174; Mt 28:6 652; Mt
28:9-10 641; Mt
28:9 645; Mt
28:10 654
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Or, at an afternoon or
evening Mass: Luke 24:13-35
That very day, the first day
of the week,
two of Jesus' disciples were
going
to a village seven miles from
Jerusalem
and they were conversing
about all the things that had occurred.
And it happened that while
they were conversing and debating,
Jesus himself drew near and
walked with them,
but their eyes were prevented
from recognizing him.
He asked them,
"What are you discussing
as you walk along?"
They stopped, looking
downcast.
One of them, named Cleopas,
said to him in reply,
"Are you the only
visitor to Jerusalem
who does not know of the
things
that have taken place there
in these days?"
And he replied to them,
"What sort of things?"
They said to him,
"The things that
happened to Jesus the Nazarene,
who was a prophet mighty in
deed and word
before God and all the
people,
how our chief priests and
rulers both handed him over
to a sentence of death and
crucified him.
But we were hoping that he
would be the one to redeem Israel
and besides all this,
it is now the third day since
this took place.
Some women from our group,
however, have astounded us:
they were at the tomb early
in the morning
and did not find his body;
they came back and reported
that they had indeed seen a
vision of angels
who announced that he was
alive.
Then some of those with us
went to the tomb
and found things just as the
women had described,
but him they did not
see."
And he said to them,
"Oh, how foolish you are!
How slow of heart to believe
all that the prophets spoke!
Was it not necessary that the
Christ should suffer these things
and enter into his
glory?"
Then beginning with Moses and
all the prophets,
he interpreted to them what
referred to him
in all the Scriptures.
As they approached the
village to which they were going,
he gave the impression that
he was going on farther.
But they urged him,
"Stay with us,
for it is nearly evening and the
day is almost over."
So he went in to stay with
them.
And it happened that, while
he was with them at table,
he took bread, said the
blessing,
broke it, and gave it to
them.
With that their eyes were
opened and they recognized him,
but he vanished from their
sight.
Then they said to each other,
"Were not our hearts
burning within us
while he spoke to us on the
way and opened the Scriptures to us?"
So they set out at once and
returned to Jerusalem
where they found gathered
together
the eleven and those with
them who were saying,
"The Lord has truly been
raised and has appeared to Simon!"
Then the two recounted
what had taken place on the
way
and how he was made known to
them in the breaking of bread.
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Commentary
on Lk 24:13-35
This story of the disciples on
the road to Emmaus is only found in Luke’s Gospel. There is a mention in Mark (Mark 16;12) that is vague but
probably refers to this event. The actual location of Emmaus is not known, but
it is estimated that it was between 7 and 18 miles from Jerusalem. The focus of
the story is the unrecognized Jesus (similar: in John 20:11-18, Mary
Magdalene thought he was a gardener). Jesus interprets scripture and then
he is recognized in the breaking of the bread (the Eucharistic reference).
"In the course of their
conversation with Jesus, the disciples' mood changes from sadness to joy; they
begin to hope again, and feel the need to share their joy with others, thus
becoming heralds and witnesses of the risen Christ."[6]
CCC: Lk 24:13-49 1094; Lk 24:13-35 1329, 1347; Lk 24:15 645, 659; Lk 24:17 643; Lk 24:21 439; Lk 24:22-23 640; Lk 24:25-27 112, 601; Lk 24:26-27 572, 652; Lk 24:26 555, 710; Lk 24:27 555, 2625; Lk 24:30 645, 1166; Lk 24:31 659; Lk 24:34 552, 641
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Homily:
What would you do if a day
after you buried your best friend, someone ran up to you and told you they had
just gone out to put flowers on the grave and found it empty? In this day and age you might think perhaps
the cemetery workers had needed to exhume the casket, perhaps a mistake had
been made. You might think that grave
robbers had done something heinous. It
is highly unlikely, no matter how spirit-filled your best friend may have been,
that you would think: “Oh, they must have risen from the dead.” Whatever your
thoughts might be, we can bet those possibilities would be running through your
mind while you were rushing to the graveside.
This is the picture painted
by St. John in his Gospel story today.
Further, thoughts about officials having moved the body, or grave
robbers having stolen the body, were most likely what Peter and John were
thinking as they ran toward the tomb after Mary of Magdala told them she found
it open.
And when they arrived and saw
the tomb empty, we can only imagine the heart stopping shock they felt. It was as Mary had said, and things were even
stranger than that. They feared that the
temple guards had hired vandals to steal the body (No Jew would have defiled
themselves during the Passover by touching a dead body). Or perhaps, the Romans
had wanted to somehow discredit Jesus by taking his body away. But if they had done that, why leave the
burial cloths in the tomb? And even
stranger, why roll up the covering of the head and place it in a different
place? It would be like us arriving at
the disappearance of our best friend and finding they had taken the body but
left the clothing.
To understand how confounding
this event must have been, we need to understand what these disciples of Jesus
believed about him and about death. First,
and we must be clear about this, they absolutely knew Jesus was dead. They saw him die, and they saw the guard
shove a lance into his chest to make sure.
The Romans were experts at killing. There was no question, Jesus was
dead.
Jews of Jesus' day were
divided about what happened after death.
The Sadducees and most conservative Jews believed that when someone died
– that was it – you ended completely. We
find this expressed in the Psalms where we hear the psalmist pleading with God
to continue his physical life because once he has returned to dust he could no
longer praise God. Others believed in
some murky existence in a place called Sheol.
A place of the dead, not quite hell as we know it, but an unhappy
place. Others at the time of Christ, notably
some of the Pharisees, believed in the resurrection of the just, at the end of
the age, the end times.
The disciples of Jesus were
likely believers in this final view, that at the end of time Jesus would be raised
up with the rest of the just (those who lived lives in accordance with Mosaic
Law). In their wildest dreams, they did
not suspect that what they found at the tomb pointed to Jesus
resurrection. The Gospel even says
so. We hear at the end of St. John’s
In this Easter story, the
disciples would have been facing a huge mystery. They would not understand until later, when
Jesus actually appeared to them and invited them to inspect his wounds, letting
them know he was not a ghost. It was
only then that the magnitude of what had taken place would strike them. This revelation would send them scattering
across the known world proclaiming the Good News. That is the Easter Proclamation: Jesus is
risen from the dead and that was done for us so that we might understand and
believe all that he promised when he walked among us.
The question we must ask
ourselves, as we rejoice once more in this knowledge, is what does this event
mean for us? In what way does it affect us and the way we live our lives? To answer those questions we must answer this
one: Why did Jesus, the only Son of God, come to earth as man and endure suffering
and death at the hands of a people he came to save? It is a question that we each must answer for
ourselves, because it is only then that the answer will affect the way we live,
and our ultimate disposition at the end of time. If we believe that Jesus did this so that
each of us might enjoy the rewards of the peace and love of God in this life
and in the next, then it should be the most important thing in our life. If we have not yet come to that conclusion,
that Jesus’ sacrifice is supremely important in our lives, our decision will
show as well, and the benefits of faith will also be less evident.
Today we cry out rejoicing:
He is Risen! From this hour forward his
gift is once more in our hands. It is up to us what we do with it.
Pax
Please Remember Esther Ruth
Miles, September 18, 1925 to April 18, 2008
[1]
Catechism links are taken from the HomileticDirectory, Published by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the
Discipline of the Sacraments, 29 June 2014
[2]
The picture used today is “Resurrection of Christ” by Marco Basaiti, 1520
[3]
S.S.Commemoratio
[4]
The readings are taken from the New American Bible with the exception of the
Psalm and its response which were developed by the International Committee for
English in Liturgy (ICEL). This
re-publication is not authorized by USCCB and is for private use only.
[5]
The Navarre Bible, Gospels and Acts,
Scepter Publishers, Princeton, NJ, © 2002, pp. 699
[6]
The Navarre Bible, “Gospels and Acts”, Scepter
Publishers, Princeton, NJ, © 2002, pp. 513
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