Holy Saturday morning. An open, empty Tabernacle. Strange praying without the Blessed Sacrament. Strange here where I am so used to having Jesus present to me in this way. It’s like having no reference point for this day.
Tabernacle open and empty.
Tomb closed and not empty.
Waiting. Silent.
I close my eyes, imagining myself to be in the tomb with the body of Jesus, in His body, wondering what it was like in the moment when He rose from the dead. But there’s no knowing. Only God was there. Only God knows. We don’t, and there’s something correct about this unknowing of ours, the realization that there are sacred mysteries that we will never know, that it’s not for us to know everything, even if we think we should.
There is a mystery within each of us, that place which belongs only to God, that is known only to God and ourselves, and maybe not even to ourselves. It is in that place, from that place that new life is called forth.
I see it in the fourteen adults who are baptized and confirmed at our Easter Vigil. The beautiful mystery of how they each came to this moment; God reaching into that sacred space of His within them, God leading them on, bringing them to this time and place. Each one has his or her own reason for being here but ever before they made their decision, God had already begun drawing them forth. And some of them have followed at great personal cost to themselves, to their relationships but what God is doing is too powerful to resist for the one who is open to Him.
At the Vigil we listened to and were powerfully immersed in the Word of God through the Old Testament, right into the New Testament of Resurrection. Our newly Baptised and Confirmed Adults are Testament in our time to God’s ways of working among us.
I imagine the moment of Resurrection to be like the dawn, like the singing of the first bird, the beautiful dawn chorus that happens here before the seagulls take over. Light breaking over the horizon, emerging from behind the clouds. The seemingly quiet but powerful light of the sun. The powerful Light of Jesus the Son of God defying the night of death and claiming the day of Life.
There’s a quiet revival taking place in England. Quiet revival is the title given to a survey carried out by the Bible Society which reveals a significant growth in the numbers of attending Mass in this country – rising from 23% in 2018 to 31% in 2024, with a particularly strong growth among Gen Z 18-34 year olds. Without boasting in any way, it is encouraging to know that the strongest growth is within the Catholic Church.
On a night like this we see evidence of the quiet revival among ourselves and thank God for it. New life, new creation.
We see it on Easter Sunday morning when the place heaves with young families and people of every generation all mingled in together. The presence of every single one is a significant moment of Resurrection, even for who are reluctantly there, even for the resentful.
God is doing something, leading us on.
And we come to it in our own personal way, as did Mary Magdalene, John and Peter in today’s Gospel. Mary most attentive is first witness, John and Peter run together to get there. John is young, faster and gets there before Peter. I think of Peter unfit and panting.
John represents the charismatic, free-spirit aspect of the Church. Peter the authority. John gives way to Peter who is first to go into the tomb, the place where death was and no longer is.
God leads us by our personality, our state in life, our disposition, so that we may journey to that hidden place within ourselves and there discover life where death once was, light where there was darkness, hope in place of despair.
We are One Body One Spirit in Christ. We have one faith, one Church, one way of life. Yet the variety is fabulous and necessary, God-given.
On Good Friday during the Adoration of the Cross my right arm went into spasm with the weight of the Cross and the sheer number of people lining up to venerate. Deacon Duncan, ever alert, moved in beside me so that we held the Cross between us. Though we are very different in many ways, it struck me in that moment how we were connected by the Cross, how we are always connected to each other in Christ and how less I am when he is absent. We are a microcosm of what Church can be and often is. And it always comes back to Jesus.
I referred to this connection at the end of the Easter Vigil and afterwards a young man thanked me for it, saying he has such a connection with his friend.
Thanks be to God.
Happy Easter!