His Excellency,
The Most Reverend Edward K. Braxton, Ph.D., S.T.D.
Diocese of Belleville
Easter Sunday, the Resurrection of the Lord
April 9, 2023
St. Luke Parish, Belleville
Sermon:
"The Back to God Hour”
(This is the text as originally written. During the actual delivery, some passages were omitted and other comments were added spontaneously. Nota bene: This text has not been thoroughly proofread. Therefore, there may be errors in spelling, grammar and punctuation.)
“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. This is “The Back to God hour.” Let the church say Amen!”
Dear People of God:
“The Back to God Hour,” a Christian radio program, offered a special dramatic Easter Sunday morning broadcast featuring a reporter walking the streets of Jerusalem interviewing individuals who had witnessed the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Each person gave a vivid account of what happened at about sunrise on Easter morning.
“My name is Quintus Arius. I’m the captain of the guard. I saw the whole thing. Pontius Pilate charged me to oversee the crucifixion. I can tell you one thing: that man Jesus of Nazareth was dead alright. I personally took his body down from the cross and placed it in the tomb and ordered soldiers to roll a great stone over the entrance. As I was heading home, I received the order from Pontius Pilate to keep the guards at the tomb all night to prevent the body from being stolen. At about sunrise, I heard roaring wind. There was thunder and lightning. A stone that took four soldiers to move split open and Jesus walked out in glory. I could see Him clearly, but He was more radiant than the sun and I could not look at him. But He is alive!”
Anna and Caiphas, the Jewish high priests who brought the charges against Jesus for blaspheming and claiming to be the “Son of God” said, “We saw the guards seal the tomb. Yet, He strode into the temple precincts, looked at us with piercing eyes and said, “I am Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God, the one whom you condemned to death.” Then He showed us the wounds from the nails and walked away surrounded by a glorious light. We cannot believe what we have seen. But He is alive!”
The reporter made his way through the streets of Jerusalem to the palace of Pontius Pilate, the procurator of Judea. The streets were filled with people talking in amazement. “We saw Him. He stopped at my market and ate some fruit. He sat at my table and drank some cold water. We were there on Golgotha when the soldiers pierced His heart with a spear. The blood spattered on us. We didn’t believe the testimony of His disciples. But now we know, He is alive!”
Arriving at the palace of Pontius Pilate, the reporter was greeted by Pilate’s wife, Claudia, who said, “I told my husband to have nothing to do with the death of that just man. Now we both know He is more than a man. Pilate entered the room saying, “Last night I dreamed I saw thousands of millions crying for this man. And then I heard them mentioning my name. And leaving me the blame.”
“Moments ago, Jesus was standing right here, even after the soldier assured me that He was dead. He was silent during His trial. Now He spoke saying, “I AM The Messiah, and My Father has raised Me from the dead!”
Pilot said, “I must send word to Emperor Tiberius Caesar in Rome and tell him, “The world has been changed forever! Jesus Christ, whom I condemned to be crucified, has been raised from the dead by the power of His God. Jesus is alive. His God IS God!”
“The Back to God Hour” was a very powerful radio program, accompanied by dramatic music. I am sure that many people were moved by it that Easter morning. There is only one problem. NONE OF IT IS TRUE. The Letters of St. Paul and the four gospels are silent about the ACTUAL event of the resurrection. They do not say that any of these people saw the risen Christ. Jesus NEVER called HIMSELF the Messiah, or the “Son of God.”
This is what you will find in the four gospels:
Jesus is crucified. Jesus dies. Jesus is removed from the cross and buried in the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Early Sunday morning, women came to the tomb to anoint the body. A divine messenger rolls back the stone, revealing only the empty tomb. The body is missing. The angel says He has been raised from the dead.
The gospels contain different apparitions of the risen Lord to Mary of Magdala, the apostles, and the disciples. There are NO eyewitnesses to the event of the resurrection. The risen Lord appears ONLY to those who already believe in Him, only to people of faith. He does NOT appear to those who do not believe in Him, like Pontius Pilate, and compel them to believe. The resurrection is not a David Copperfield magic trick. The resurrection is an absolute inscrutable mystery, which is why the Bible does not attempt to describe it, or provide any eyewitnesses to the Lord’s triumph over death.
Faith in the resurrection was the source of the hope of the earliest Christians. Indeed, there would be no Christianity, no New Testament, and no memory of Jesus of Nazareth at all, apart from His disciples’ faith in the resurrection and their hope of sharing in Eternal Life.
The earliest account of the resurrection of Christ is not in the four gospels. It is in chapter 15 of the First Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians written about 54 A.D. Some of the Christians living in Corinth were expressing doubt about the resurrection of Christ. They were also questioning the belief that Christ’s followers are called to share in the resurrection. St. Paul challenges the Corinthians by reminding them of the good news about Jesus that had been handed on to him and that he had handed on to them.
He writes, “I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you. I taught you what I had been taught myself, namely, that Christ died for our sins, that He was buried, and that He was raised up to life on the third day. He appeared first to Peter and then to the Twelve. Next, He appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers …Last of all He appeared also to me, as one born out of season.” Paul is referring to his vision of the risen Christ when he was on the road to Damascus to persecute the Jewish followers of Jesus when Paul was a Pharisee.
St. Paul builds our hope of resurrection on the resurrection of Christ Himself. This comes as a surprise because many skeptical Christians today suggest that while they might believe that God raised Jesus from the dead, they remain doubtful about the Christian belief that God will raise all people from the dead at “the end of time,” at the Last judgment. Indeed, although many Christians continue to believe in the immortality of the human soul, surveys suggest that a growing number do not believe in the resurrection of the dead.
St. Paul expresses it this way, “Now if Christ raised from the dead is what has been preached, how can some of you be saying that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, Christ Himself cannot have been raised, and if Christ has not been raised then vain is our preaching, and vain is your faith…” If our hope in Christ has been for this life only, we are the most unfortunate of all people.
Dear People of God:
Once again the Church’s Year of Grace has called us to Holy Week, to the Sacred Triduum. Holy Thursday, the Liturgy of the Lord’s Supper, Good Friday, the Liturgy of the Lord’s Passion, and Holy Saturday, the Liturgy of the Easter Vigil. The whole of our faith flows from these days of the Passover of the Lord. This is the Easter mystery by which we are reborn in Baptism.
The risen Christ is with us especially when we gather for Mass, for the Eucharist. When we listen to the Word of God and when we offer ourselves to the Father with the gifts of bread and wine, God the Father, by the power of the Holy Spirit, nourishes us with the Body and Blood of His risen Son. In faith we recognize the risen Christ in the breaking of the bread. Dear sisters and brothers, your participation in Sunday mass really is “The Back to God Hour,” in which you encounter the risen Christ.
In a unique way, the risen Christ is the source of our hope for those who have died and “have gone before us to their rest in the hope of rising again.” Some of your beloved relatives and dear friends have died during this past year. Sometimes the funeral Mass, the Liturgy of Christian Burial, is incorrectly referred to as the Mass of the Resurrection, which it clearly is NOT. The Church does NOT teach or believe that Christians share in the resurrection of Christ simply by dying. If that were so, there would be no need for the living to pray for the dead. This is why on Sundays we pray, “look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come!”
“Happy Easter!” I suspect that to many Catholics, this traditional Easter Sunday greeting has more or less the same meaning as “Merry Christmas!” a cheerful, upbeat message that might be translated as, “Enjoy your ‘holiday’ with family and friends!” “Have a great Easter dinner and have fun with your children as they open their Easter baskets, enjoy chocolate bunnies and yellow marshmallow chicks, and hunt for Easter eggs!” “The cold clouds and snow of winter are gone. Spring is here!”
For Catholics, ‘Happy Easter’ usually does not mean, “Get out your New Testament and prayerfully read St. Paul’s teachings on the risen Christ Jesus and the Gospel accounts of the apparitions of the risen Christ and pray about what being raised from the dead might mean!”
But the Easter Celebration of the Eucharist truly is “The Back to God Hour.” You will not see the risen Jesus walking around on a cloud in your neighborhood this afternoon. But you can see Him in the breaking of the bread and in the loving service of the Christian Community, going about doing good.
Jesus Christ has been raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit. He is in our midst! King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And He shall reign forever and ever. Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And He shall reign forever and ever.
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
Praise Be Jesus Christ. Both now and forever! Amen.