Easter Vigil 2003

There can’t be a single person here who does not know the meaning of Easter, that it is the day of the bodily rising of our Lord from the dead. But in order to highlight for you one salient point about the significance of the Lord’s resurrection, I want to back up just a bit to what happened "behind the scenes" after Jesus’ death on the cross, things believed but not seen.

We say it in the recitation of the Apostles’ Creed: "he was crucified, died and was buried; he descended into hell." Now the Jews believed that when one dies he would go to Scheol, that place of shadows, and live there in a kind of sleepy existence. In what is sometimes called the "harrowing of hell" Jesus, after his death, burst upon this dismal place where the souls of all the good dead had been waiting for this very moment. Who was in this place at the time of Jesus’ death? We can’t say all of them, but Tradition believes that repentant Adam and Eve were there, and we may well presume the presence of such persons as Noah, Abraham and Moses–among others. According to an ancient homily of the second century, which may well preserve an oral tradition that goes back to Jesus’ verbal account to the apostles about what happened during this time, our Lord is said to have ravished this place of Limbo, in order to liberate the captives who were detained there. And here is the interesting detail that relates to my Easter message. As soon as Adam in Limbo caught sight of Jesus (who was carrying his cross triumphantly), Adam struck his breast and cried out to everyone there: "The Lord be with you." And Jesus then answered back to Adam: "And with you spirit." Our Lord then raised Adam by the hand and said to him: "Awake from the dead, O sleeper."

Now that little exchange of words in the underworld is the origin of the greeting formula we use so often at Mass. "The Lord be with you" (as Adam said to the souls in Limbo), and then Jesus’ answer to Adam, "And with your spirit" (yes, that’s the literal and correct translation that we should have in our Mass, et cum spiritu tuo, and not "and also with you". It seems that the Vatican will order our translators to return to the right translation in the new text of the Mass that will be forthcoming.) This expression of Jesus, which may well be of apostolic origin, as I said already, refers to a truth about ourselves after death. For, when we die, we know that we will not have our bodies right away, but shall be ‘spirit’ only, in heaven, in purgatory, or in hell until the final day of the world when we will have our bodies again at the resurrection of the dead. That means that after death we are going to be incomplete, and therefore desiring reunion with our bodies. Even those in heaven, happy as they will be, will still be missing something, and they will long for the ‘other half’ of their nature: their bodies. We know of only two persons who have died and who already have their bodies: the risen body of our Savior and the glorified body of Holy Mary. For all the rest, there must be a "wait". And this brings me to my point.

The immense happiness of the Church for Jesus’ personal triumph today is that His body which was lying in the tomb incorrupt, has His spirit rejoined to it, and His risen body is now replete with refulgent glory. Christians are elated by the resurrection of Jesus, first, on His own account, and then also on their own account. After all, our Lord did all his suffering and rising in His sacred humanity for us, the effect being that one day–although not until the last day–we too will have our spirits reunited with our bodies, and in a state of glory, like the risen body of Jesus. This is the object of our great hope: hope being the signal word here. Our spirits–like those of Adam and the spirits in Limbo–will be longing, desiring reunion with our bodies, and hoping for the victory of Jesus’ resurrection to shine in our own flesh. We can’t adequately imagine all that this will be. Jesus used some metaphors to describe this happy condition of ours: like the joy of a wedding banquet, like a rich harvest. We might speculate just a bit further: here on earth I may be ugly, but on resurrection day there will be an arresting beauty in the body; here I may now be sickly, but then my vigor will enduring; I may be poor, but my wealth there will be abundant and secure.

I want to leave you with the message of Easter hope. If you would only hang on, stay true to our holy Catholic faith (challenging, in these turbulent times), remain in a state of grace, frequent confession, and communion when you’re in a state of grace and pray daily, you have every reason to be joyful. No matter how hard life’s battles, no matter how heavy the burden, there will be a day when we will "have it all", and not only ‘all’ but more than you could even dream. You will be like Christ! And there is no higher aspiration a human person can have.

This hope was born on Easter Sunday morning. We praise and thank our risen Lord, who is but first-born of all who hope to rise from the dead!