A Lectio Divina Approach to the Sunday Liturgy
BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD (Series 5, n. 19)
Easter Sunday, Year C – April 8, 2007
“He Rose From The Dead”
BIBLE READINGS
Acts 10:34a, 37-43 // Col 3:1-4 or I Cor 5:6b-8 // Jn 20:1-9
N.B. Series 5 of BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD: A LECTIO DIVINA APPROACH TO THE SUNDAY LITURGY includes a prayerful study of the Sunday liturgy of Year C from the perspective of the First Reading. For another set of reflections on the Sunday liturgy of Year C, please go to the PDDM Web Archives: WWW.PDDM.US and open Series 2.
I. BIBLICO-LITURGICAL REFLECTIONS
Guy Keeler’s article in the newspaper FRESNO BEE (March 27, 2007, p. E1 & E4) entitled “The Help Guy” is about Dale Brannan, a Christian believer blessed by God with a passion for helping others. Brannan publishes and distributes NEEDHELP NOW, a tabloid-size 12-page brochure listing agencies in the Fresno area providing help for people in crisis. This publication, which is distributed for free, has a two-fold purpose: to guide the hurting to places where they can find help and to show the healthy where they can volunteer to serve the hurting. The faith story of this determined “Help Guy” has an Easter flavor and a missionary tone. Dale Brannan, 64-years old, avows that his desire to help others grew out of personal pain. He lost three children in accidents and a fourth was lost in a miscarriage. Brannan went through periods of despair and bitterness after their deaths and in rage he called God every name in the book. According to the FRESNO BEE reporter:
Brannan eventually came to terms with his grief when he realized he had not been abandoned by God. He says a simple sentence from II Corinthians 1:3-4 taught him there can be a purpose in suffering. He uses these words from The Message translation of the Bible to remind him to keep his eyes on others, not on himself: “He (God) comes alongside us when we go through hard times and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us.” As he thought about the anguish he endured while grieving the loss of his children, Brannan recognized there could be others who might not know where to turn during times of crises. So he put up a 4-by-8 foot sign in his front yard in 1985 that proclaimed: “THIS HOUSE BELIEVES THAT JESUS IS GOD’S SON AND THAT GOD RAISED HIM FROM THE DEAD. OUR DOOR IS OPEN TO YOU.” The goal in putting up the sign was to encourage passers-by to stop for help. As people knocked on his door, however, Brannan soon realized many had needs he could not meet – and he didn’t know where to send them to get assistance. Brannan brought his desire to help others with him when he moved to Fresno in 1989. He volunteered at the Fresno Rescue Mission and, a few years later, came across a pamphlet, published by the First Presbyterian Church in downtown Fresno, which listed all the nonprofit agencies within a one-mile radius. Suddenly, a light went on in his brain. He could bring hurting people together with helpers by compiling a comprehensive directory of not-for-profit agencies and blanketing Fresno County with the information … Brannan would like to see versions of NEEDHELP NOW published in every community, and he hopes to spread the idea throughout the central San Joaquin Valley and see others ultimately take it throughout the world.
The “Help Guy” Dale Brannan is a modern day example of an Easter witness and a firm believer in Jesus Christ, raised from the dead by God the Father. Having participated intimately in the paschal mystery of the Risen Lord, Brannan’s personal pain and resurrection made him a staunch Easter witness and bearer of God’s saving love and help to those in need. He is part of the long continuing tradition of Christian witnesses in salvation history, which springs forth from the Easter mystery and is founded in the witnessing of Peter and the apostolic community.
On this Easter Sunday, the third day of the Easter Triduum, the Church begins the fifty-day joyful celebration of the glorification of the Risen Lord who offered his life for all. In our prolonged celebration of the Easter mystery of Christ’s resurrection, the community of believers contemplates with wonder the marvelous missionary expansion of the Church of the Risen Lord by the power of the Holy Spirit, through the words and deeds of the first Christian witnesses.
On this festive Sunday of the Lord’s resurrection, the liturgical assembly hears a part of the Easter proclamation (Acts 10:34a, 37-43) of the apostle Peter to the Roman centurion Cornelius and his household in Caesarea. While at prayer, the God fearing Cornelius saw an angel who came in and commanded him to send for a certain man named Simon Peter at Joppa. Likewise, Peter, when he went to the rooftop to pray, had a vision of a large sheet, filled with all kinds of animals, reptiles and wild birds, being lowered by its four corners from heaven. This vision of the clean and unclean animals that Peter was commanded to eat by the voice from heaven and the revelatory word: “What God has made clean, you have no right to call profane” (Acts 10:15) convinced Peter that Gentiles were no longer to be considered impure.
Regarding the vision of Peter at Joppa and his meeting with Cornelius and his household, the biblical scholar Justin Taylor comments: “In this episode Peter undergoes a real conversion of mind and heart. The Spirit has commanded him to go to the Gentiles. He draws the conclusion that he expresses to the people in Caesarea; there is no longer any distinction between Jews and Gentiles, but all are equal in the eyes of God if they live according to God’s will … Enlightened by the Holy Spirit, Peter understands that he must welcome Cornelius and his friends into the community as they are, without obliging them to undergo conversion to Judaism … As Peter progressively absorbs the truth that Christ is risen and living in the Church through his Holy Spirit he is able to throw off old habits of thinking and acting – even those with the most respectable authority behind them – and to encourage others as well to live in a new way. At Caesarea, Peter gives a relatively long address (vv. 36-43) that is effectively the preparation of Cornelius and his companions for baptism. The core of this catechesis repeats the points of his speech before the Sanhedrin (5:30-33), which were the essentials of the primitive kerygma. At the outset Peter declares that Jesus has been the messenger of peace for Israel, but is the Lord of all. Then he reminds his listeners about the ministry of Jesus in Galilee, Judea and Jerusalem, beginning, like our four Gospels, with the baptism preached by John. God anointed Jesus with the Holy Spirit and with power (cf. Lk 1:17), and he went about curing all those who were oppressed by the devil. The apostles are witnesses not only to the death and resurrection of Jesus, but also to his whole wonder-working activity, the sign of the coming of the kingdom into which the Gentiles too are invited to enter by belief in Jesus and the forgiveness of sins in his name.”
Indeed, Peter’s address to Cornelius and his household (Acts 10:34-43) is a personal testimony of his intimate experience with Jesus, the Servant-Son of Yahweh and the glorious Risen Lord. Chosen beforehand by God, the apostle Peter was one of the privileged witnesses of the Easter mystery of the Christ who rose from the dead. He proudly declared that he was one of those who ate and drank with Jesus after he rose from the dead. The Easter experience was a stupendous and transforming event that changed a vacillating and parochial minded Peter into a great apostle and missionary of the Risen Lord, by the power of the Holy Spirit, his Easter gift to us. In order to be true and efficacious apostles of the Easter joy we need to have a first hand experience of the mystery of sacrificial death that leads to life. The Easter event is an experience of the power of God and the fulfillment of his promise of new life in Jesus Christ.
The Christian writer Harold Buetow concludes: “Our Christian life should be joyful. It may perhaps be compared to the egg. The Easter egg is a symbol of the resurrection, insofar as from the egg new life may spring. This feast of Easter, more than any other year, is a day filled with a new life of enthusiasm, praise and rejoicing. Some people feel that they have a little experience of the risen Christ. Perhaps the problem may be more of recognition. Today we should pause to recognize that heaven is not a special place apart from the universe. Heaven is the universe, recognized as being in God. Let us resolve to lead a heavenly life on earth, witnessing God’s power and love. May these joyous reflections help to give us a happy Easter!”
II. POINTS FOR THE EXAMINATION OF THE HEART
A. What is the significance of the Easter event of Christ’s resurrection in my life? Why is Easter the real Passover of the Lord? How do I participate personally, intimately and efficaciously in the rising of Christ to new life?
B. How do I celebrate this year’s Easter Sunday as part of the Christian worshipping community? Do I endeavor to fill it with joy, meaningful symbols and rituals, and acts of charity? How do I contribute to celebrate as a Christian community our new life in the Risen Christ? Do we live up to our vocation as an Easter people, happy and content that “Alleluia” is our song?
C. What transformation occurred in Peter as a result of the Easter event? What “newness” and breakthrough happened to him on account of his experience with the glorified Jesus, with whom he ate and drank after he rose from the dead? How did he become an instrument of Easter joy to the Gentile household of the Roman centurion Cornelius of Caeserea? Like the apostle Peter, how does our personal experience of the Risen Lord make us bearers of the Easter faith and joy?
III. PRAYING WITH THE WORD
(Cf. P. de la Tour du Pin, Une lutte pour la vie, N.R.F., Paris: Gallimard, 1970, 306-07: Fiche de chant I 77 // Days of the Lord, vol. 3, Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1993, p. 67)
Leader: Light of the world, O Jesus, although we have never seen your open tomb, whence comes this light among us, this feast among feasts, if not from you the risen one?
Assembly: Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining. Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning! Amen. Alleluia.
Leader: When someone we meet says to us: where is your Christ today and his miracle? We respond: whence comes the Spirit that turns us toward his Passover, if not from him?
Assembly: Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining. Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning! Amen. Alleluia.
Leader: Our hearts burn when your love descends and whispers to us: Love has come, the day will come in the hearts of all creatures, and the Lord will appear.
Assembly: Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining. Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning! Amen. Alleluia.
Leader: And if someone says to us: Now show us a worthy sign beyond yourselves! The sign is that at his return we must do what he loves in order to testify that he is love.
Assembly: Christ indeed from death is risen, our new life obtaining. Have mercy, victor King, ever reigning! Amen. Alleluia.
IV. INTERIORIZATION OF THE WORD
The following is the bread of the living Word that will nourish us throughout the week. Please memorize it.
“We 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.” (Acts 10:41b-42)
V. TOWARDS LIFE TRANSFORMATION
A. ACTION PLAN: Pray that the good news of Easter centered on Jesus Christ who rose from the dead may truly and personally be experienced as a transforming event by all. Endeavor to render a concrete service to a hurting person and/or community that needs the consolation of the Easter joy. See the possibility of collaborating in the preparation of NEEDHELP NOW publication in your own local community by contacting Dale Brennan, c/o Guy Keeler who can be reached at gkeeler@fresnobee.com or (559) 441-6383.
B. ACTION PLAN: To help us participate more intimately in the Easter joy of our glorified Lord Jesus Christ, make an effort to spend an hour in Eucharistic Adoration. Visit the PDDM WEB site (www.pddm.us) for the EUCHARISTIC ADORATION THROUGH THE LITURGICAL YEAR (Vol. 3, n. 19): A Weekly Pastoral Tool.
Prepared by Sr. Mary Margaret Tapang PDDM
PIAE DISCIPULAE DIVINI MAGISTRI
SISTER DISCIPLES OF THE DIVINE MASTER
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