PRAY Life- Easter Sunday April 4, 2021, Vol. 33, No. 25 giving God, easter in us. Complete the work of new life in us our baptisms began. Awaken us to all we can become in you. Amen. Easter the word means dawn, the hour of Jesus’ resurrection, the first light of a new promise that there is a road through death to life and Jesus walked it.

Easter is springtime, by Brett Johnson white lilies, grass greening, n high school you had to drag have no major quarrels with warming days, me to church. My mother the Catholic Church. I don’t new fire spreading, I hated to do that, so on Sunday I refuse to attend because of mornings I bided my time, trying to Rome’s politics. It’s just that when Christians’ candles outwait her. Inevitably she started. “Okay, I’m at Mass, I think of everything but lighting up the night. Brett, you should take your shower; we’re what’s happening in front of me. going to church.” My mind wanders through the readings, Easter is the slow Excuses such as “I’m too old to be I fidget during the presentation of the gifts dawning in each of us forced to go” and “I can decide for and daydream through the prayers after myself” passed over my mother like mist Communion. For some reason, I tune out that love is stronger on a breeze. She looked at me with the in an almost miraculous hypnosis. Like than any other energy determination of a sailor in a storm and people with the stigmata, I’m afflicted with and ours to give as said, “You can give one hour to God.” holy narcolepsy. So in college I started Like waves against her hull, I protested sleeping in my bed on Sunday mornings each other’s daily until Dad intervened and I went. instead of in the pew. bread. When the time came for me to leave I was becoming part of that large and for college, I couldn’t wait. Among my shameless group—the lapsed Catholic. many new freedoms, I could decide However, I still went to church on whether or not to attend church. Christmas, Easter, and some holy days (if I remembered them). Then, I glanced up when the last Easter I found more meaning in presider introduced an church. Ecuadoran priest who was It was the first Easter I was away going to baptize a child. from home, missing the annual Between the silhouettes gathering of family and friends. A of heads I spied this job kept me on campus during the priest, his brown face holiday, but I made sure to attend smooth and young, Mass that morning. Going to Mass his nose curled into a on this most important day of the fat hook. He spoke a religious year gave me a way to labored brand of English connect with my family. In some with a heavy Spanish way, I still felt I was going out of duty accent. He faltered rather than devotion. as he was handed the infant, cradling it awkwardly. ext, the father held the baby up over his he priest stood with N head, the tiny figure the baby near a tank of kicking its legs and arms like T water that rested like a marionette. All eyes focused low tide on the altar. When on this infant and I was startled. he began the ceremony, he might The people applauded for this wet, as well have been speaking from crying, naked, new Catholic. And I underwater. The reverberation from realized I had just been caught up in the hall and his accented faltering a holy moment—a sacrament. speech rendered him unintelligible. I was eight years old when I was However, the congregation hushed, baptized. An odd age, but my dad straining to hear his halting words. had just remarried and my new When the priest held the baby mother told me, “Catholics have over the water, I struggled to listen. more fun.” So I was baptized. My I feared he might drop the child. baptism is the first experience of “Eye-bap-tyzz youh een thee nahme church I remember. That Easter of the Father—” followed by silence. Mass reminded me of that day, my Then the splash of the child against own baptism. the water. Suddenly a wail filled It took the cry of a baby for me to the church. “And zee Son.” Again connect with a deeper meaning of church. My mother’s words of giving en and women in their a splash! “And the Ho-lee Spee- an hour for God came to mind. I best outfits crammed rit.” A third time the priest dunked was glad to be Catholic. the cathedral-like the child, finishing the baptism M flawlessly. Now back to my daydreams. church. I wondered how many of us came together just to fulfill a minimum obligation. I was ushered to a seat three rows from the back and submerged in dark suits, white dresses, and fresh hair spray. Only by stretching above shoulders and heads, could I glimpse the altar that seemed leagues away. I identified a priest and one, maybe two, altar persons. The voice on the microphone gurgled in an inaudible echo. My mind wandered. I studied the shimmer of the stained glass, re-read the bulletin, and looked at feet. SUNDAY GOSPEL Easter Sunday Mary Magdalene meets Jesus risen.

NARRATOR 1: Early in the morning on the the wrappings, but rolled up in a place by JESUS: Woman, why are you weeping? first day of the week, while it was still itself. Whom are you looking for? dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb. NARRATOR 1: Then the disciple who had NARRATOR 1: Mary supposed the man was She saw that the stone had been moved arrived first at the tomb went in. He saw the gardener. away, so she ran off to Simon Peter and and believed. MARY MAGDALENE: Sir, if you have carried the other disciple (the one Jesus loved) NARRATOR 2: Remember, as yet they did him away, tell me where you have laid and told them: not understand the scripture that Jesus him, and I will take him away. MARY MAGDALENE: The Lord has been had to rise from the dead. The disciples JESUS: Mary! taken from the tomb! We don’t know returned to their homes. But Mary stood MARY MAGDALENE: Rabbouni! Teacher! where they have put him. weeping outside the tomb. JESUS: Do not hold on to me, because I NARRATOR 2: At that, Peter and the other NARRATOR 1: As she wept she bent over have not yet ascended to the Father. But disciple started out on their way toward to look into the tomb. She saw two angels go to my brothers and say to them, “I am the tomb. They were running side by side, dressed in white, sitting where the body of ascending to my Father and your Father, to but then the other disciple outran Peter Jesus had been lying, one at the head and my God and your God.” and reached the tomb first. the other at the feet. NARRATOR 2: Mary Magdalene went and NARRATOR 1: He did not enter but bent ANGELS: Woman, why are you weeping? down to peer in, and saw the wrappings announced to the disciples. MARY MAGDALENE: They have taken away lying on the ground. Presently, Simon MARY MAGDALENE: I have seen the Lord. my Lord, and I do not know where they Peter came along behind him and entered have laid him. NARRATOR 1: She told them that he had the tomb. said these things to her. NARRATOR 2: She turned around and saw NARRATOR 2: He observed the wrappings John 20.1-18 Jesus standing there, but she did not know on the ground and saw the piece of cloth that it was Jesus. which had covered the head not lying by QUESTIONS 1 When has a holy moment in church caught you up? 2 What is the deeper meaning of church Brett experiences? 3 What do Easter and Baptism celebrate? 4 Why does one disciple believe and Peter doesn’t? 5 When have you recognized Jesus’ presence with you? 6 How did you become a believer?

esus’ death/resurrection is the aster is the first day of a new friends see and touch him, and he eats, yet founding event of Christianity. creation; it is the day after sabbath, he appears and disappears suddenly. In this Jesus’ death is inseparable from the seventh day that celebrates God’s J risen state, Jesus’ divinity permeates his E his resurrection, two moments in a single six days of creation. We have no scientific humanity. reality. proof God raised Jesus from the dead. We In the sacrament of baptism—in the way In his death Jesus is like every human, have only the witness of his friends, who Christians celebrated it in the early Church having to entrust himself to God. In the committed their lives to spread his message. and many parishes do now—a person who passion story, he feels forsaken and cries Many died in this work. wants to commit to following Jesus plunges out, “My God, my God, why have you under water to die with Jesus and comes up forsaken me?” from the water to rise with him. But, death cannot hold Jesus. By his By his death Christ Jesus’ death and resurrection happens at resurrection he changes the meaning of Passover in springtime. Christians believe liberates us from sin: death. No longer is it an end but a passage that the God who raises Jesus to new life by his resurrection he to life with God. and whom we trust to raise us up is the God opens for us the way The word resurrection means waking. we already know as the Creator and giver of Resurrection is not resusitation. The risen to new life. life in us and all creation. Jesus has a real but glorified body. His Catechism of the Catholic Church #654 OUR CATHOLIC FAITH Who is Mary Magdalene, apostle or prostitute?

ary Magdalene stands o improve on Mark’s account, Luke themselves contain evidence that out among Jesus’ women introduces the women disciples people in Jesus’ time did not value M disciples the way Peter T much earlier in his gospel but also Mary Magdalene as a witness of stands out among Jesus’ men disciples. adds a mysterious detail that contributes the resurrection because she was a In each of the four gospels she witnesses to Mary Magdalene’s mistaken identity. He woman. For example, in Luke 24.10-11 Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection. when Mary Magdalene and the other She is among the few faithful disciples women announce to the other disciples who stand at Jesus’ cross. She leads the that Jesus is risen, the men don’t women to anoint Jesus’ body three days believe them. Peter goes to see for later and discovers his tomb is empty Mary Charles McGough himself. Mark 16.11 repeats this same because he is risen. She is the primary refusal to believe Mary Magdalene. witness of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Later Jesus scolds his disciples for Not only does Mary witness the most this. important events in Jesus’ life, Jesus In its liturgy over the centuries, also sends her on the special mission of the Church has celebrated Mary telling the rest of his disciples the good Magdalene both as the apostle to the news of his resurrection. He makes her apostles and as a model penitent. In the apostle to his friends. our time, even though the Second Why then do so many people know Vatican Council expanded the system Mary Magdalene as a prostitute rather of Sunday readings from one cycle than an apostle, as a repentant sinner to three so that Catholics could rather than the first person sent to hear more scripture, the Sunday preach the gospel? In our time, we can readings for Easter leave out Mary blame Andrew Lloyd Webber a little. In Magdalene’s role as apostle to the his musical Jesus Christ Superstar, Mary apostles. The Church does, however, Magdalene is a repentant prostitute who remember her and the other women doesn’t know how to love a man like says that seven demons went out from her. resurrection witnesses in its Jesus. Just before introducing the women disciples weekday readings for Easter week: Her reputation as a prostitute comes (Luke 8.3), Luke tells the powerful story of a Easter Monday (Matthew 28.8-15); from people misinterpreting Luke’s sinful woman who bathes Jesus’ feet with Easter Tuesday (John 20.11-18). gospel. Luke was the third person to her tears, wipes his feet with her hair, kisses write a gospel. He used Mark’s gospel them, and anoints them with ointment (Luke as the basis for his story, but he tried 7.36-50). Jesus forgives to improve Mark’s story, too. Mark her many sins because FAITH in ACTION mentions Jesus’ women she shows such great 1 Icon artist Mary disciples, including Mary love for him. Prepare Charles McGough paints Mary Magdalene as the apostle to Magdalene, only after Some bible an Easter the apostles. How would you paint Mary Magdalene? Jesus has died. He interpreters think the homily for 2 Conduct a survey of 10 Catholics of varying ages. Ask teens about explains these women sinful woman of chapter how to followed and served seven must be Mary what each believes about life after death. Talk about any live Jesus and have been with Magdalene, the woman experience members of your group or class have had of Easter him from the beginning freed of seven demons, someone close dying. What do you believe about this every whom we meet at the day. in Galilee (Mark 15.40- person’s life with God? 3 Make a Easter banner for your 41). beginning of chapter meeting area or classroom. Express your understanding of eight. But they are two Easter and resurrection. different women. The gospels GoodGroundPress.com Nihil Obstat: J. Michael Byron Imprimatur: +Harry J. Flynn, Archbishop of St. Paul-Minneapolis, June 24, 2011. SPIRIT ©2020 by Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, 1884 Randolph Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55105. Editors, Joan Mitchell, CSJ, Julie Surma; Designer, Jennifer Poferl.