9781644135945

The Easter Cycle
CHRISTUS
SURREXIT
Eastertide
Easter is the Solemnity of Solemnities, the center and climax of the Church year. All the mysteries
that we have commemorated from Advent until now have pointed toward Easter; all that
we shall yet celebrate in the weeks that follow has its foundation in the mystery of Easter, and
receives its meaning and importance from this mystery.
The resurrection of Christ is the consummation of the Incarnation (the Christmas mystery)
and of the Passion. St. Paul reveals the meaning of Easter when he writes to the Corinthians,
“And if Christ be not risen again, your faith is vain, for you are yet in your sins. Then they also
that are fallen asleep in Christ are perished” (1 Cor 15:17 f.). Even the Incarnation and the
Passion are not sufficient in themselves. Christ became man and died to deliver us from the
death of sin. But that was not enough. In order to give us immortal life, He rose from the dead.
He “rose again for our justification” (Rom 4:25). He rose that He might bring us the perfect
and eternal life which He merited for us by His death and which shines so brightly in Him.
By the mystery of Easter we are able to enter into the splendid life of His glorified body. We
were created for glory from the beginning, but we lost it with the sin of Adam. We won it back
through the resurrection of Christ. For this reason Easter is a time of joy. Through Christ we
have all risen from sin and have access to immortal and eternal life.
The life which we obtain at Easter is already a foretaste of the everlasting, heavenly life
which we shall eventually enjoy. The prayer said in the Easter Mass assures us that “God,
who on this day by Thy only-begotten Son has overcome death, has opened to us the gate
of eternity.” Over and over again in the liturgy of the Easter season we are reminded of this
truth, that in the temporal celebration of Easter we already touch the reality of the eternal life
of glorification. “I live, and you shall live” ( Jn 14:19).
The joy of Easter finds its natural expression in the joyous banquet of Holy Communion,
the Easter banquet, the paschal meal. Holy Communion is the food upon which this new life
is nourished. He who rose from the dead enters our soul in person, and illuminates it with the
fullness of His new life. What He is, we are also; as He rose from the dead, so shall we rise. We
now walk “in newness of life” (Rom 6:4).
The spirit of Eastertide is a spirit of sincere gratitude to the risen Christ, through whom we possess
eternal life. “I live, and you shall live.” We should acquire this spirit of joy, a spirit which will lift
us above sin and the world and death. The risen Christ will give us the strength to overcome the
powers of darkness and death. We must have a spirit of hope. We shall, since Christ rose, most
certainly rise on the last day, and our bodies shall be awakened to eternal life. “I shall not die,
but live.” We should have an unshakable faith, for Christ arose from the dead. His resurrection
attests to His divinity and the truth of His doctrine.
305