Archbishop Aymond: Christ Completes the Puzzle

Clarion Herald (Archdiocese of New Orleans) – By Archbishop Gregory M. Aymond – April 10, 2010

Sometimes getting to the bottom of a very complex story is like putting a puzzle together. It is confusing when an important piece of the puzzle seems to be missing. It causes us to ask that all-important question: What really happened?

That was the question the women asked as they went to the tomb on that first Easter morning. What really happened? They were trying to put together pieces of this puzzle, but there were pieces missing.

They went to the tomb to anoint the body of Jesus. To their surprise, the stone already had been rolled back, but it became more complex because they could not find the body. Something was not right. As the Gospel tells us, they became not only puzzled but terrified.

When they could not find the body, their first thought was not about the resurrection. Rather, it was a question of, “Where is he? Who stole the body? Who took him from the tomb?” Then the messenger from God said to them, “He is not here. He has been raised. He is alive, just as he foretold.”

The Gospel very clearly tells us the apostles and the other disciples took the women’s story as nonsense. They did not believe. They could not believe. Peter ran to the empty tomb and saw the burial cloth of Jesus.

Let us be clear. For the women who came to the tomb, as well as for Peter, it was not the empty tomb that brought them to believe in the resurrection. It was their faith. It was placing faith in those words of Jesus when he said, “I will be crucified and die, and then on the third day I will rise again.” That faith allowed them to believe in the resurrection, and their faith was strengthened as the risen Christ appeared to them.

There was great confusion on that morning. But what became clear to the women and the other disciples was that Jesus had overcome death, sin and evil.

The Easter Vigil is our feast of hope. It reminds us that as Christians, we can never despair. It is our feast of light – we will never ever live in darkness. It is summed up in the ritual. Into a darkened cathedral comes one single light – the Easter candle. And as that candle breaks the darkness, we sing, “Christ, our light.”

What does this resurrection mean for us personally and also for all of humanity?

Personally, it reminds us that we are to look inside of ourselves. There are times when we sense darkness, which is caused by concerns about health, finance, tensions within our families or workplace or broken relationships. Tonight we acknowledge that darkness and acknowledge that Christ comes to bring light and hope into the darkness.

What does the resurrection of Christ mean to the world? In Haiti and Chile, there are earthquakes and people grieving and rebuilding. In Iraq and Afghanistan, there is war and the rumor of more war. In the U.S., civility in the public arena has been replaced by hostility, and we live in a time of instability of finances. In our own great city of New Orleans, we see darkness in crime, racism and murder.

As we look at that list, it would be very easy for us to become cynical or negative. But this is the feast of hope. This is the feast of light. As we embrace the sufferings and deaths of our own lives and in our own world, we have been promised that Christ, our light, comes to scatter the darkness and bring us his light, which gives meaning and depth to our lives.

Where is this risen Christ to be found in Easter 2010? Not in the tomb. We meet the risen Christ in this very celebration, when he becomes present to us in the word of Scripture and as he becomes intimately present to us in the Eucharist.

The risen Christ is in you and in me. He is among us tonight. And we can join St. Paul who said, “It is not I who live but it is the risen Christ who lives within me.”

We also go forth as the messengers. It is no longer the angels of old or those men with dazzling clothes at the tomb or Mary Magdalen or Peter. In 2010, you and I must become the messengers.

We have put the puzzle together. We know the story. He was crucified and he breathed his last. His body was dead and lifeless. He rose from the dead. The tomb was empty. He lives in you. He lives in me. And we are the messengers who bring his light to others in the world – to family, to coworkers and to friends.

Christ is our light. This is our feast of hope. This is our feast of light, and we will never ever live in darkness.