Bishop: Easter is a time of mercy, restoration

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Having had their past sins nailed to the cross with Him, Jesus’s disciples are obliged to put the mercy they have received into practice.

This time of pandemic only magnifies the opportunities to do that.

“Tonight, we are delivered from slavery to sin and the shadow of death, in order that we might walk in the light of mercy with our brothers and sisters,” said Bishop W. Shawn McKnight at this year’s Easter Vigil.

Celebrated after dusk on Holy Saturday, the Easter Vigil is the culmination of Holy Week and the Easter Triduum, casting out the shadows of Jesus’s passion and death with the light of His resurrection.

Priests and bishops throughout the world joined Pope Francis in blessing the fire outside their churches and using it to light the Easter candle and the other candles that would pierce the darkness.

They heard and preached on Old Testament readings in which prophets and kings foretold and prefigured God’s promise of eternal salvation.

They joined the hosts of angels in praising God for fulfilling that promise in the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

This year, through much of the world, the Easter Vigil and all of the Holy Week liturgies had to be celebrated in line with strict protocols for slowing the spread of the dangerous coronavirus.

Only eight people joined Bishop McKnight and Bishop Emeritus John R. Gaydos in the Cathedral of St. Joseph for the Easter Vigil.

Hundreds of others participated at home through livestream on social media and made a communion of desire in anticipation of the eventual return of public worship and the sacraments.

“May we look forward with firm hope and great anticipation to the celebration of Pentecost and the gift of the Holy Spirit,” Bishop McKnight proclaimed, “as we move from fear and isolation to gathering again as the whole Church, to celebrate the Eucharist of our Risen Lord!”

In the meantime, he reminded the people that throughout history, the Church has grown and thrived through times of persecution, martyrdom and suffering.

“Even the plagues afforded the early Church the opportunity to shine like the stars in the night sky, manifesting to many unbelievers tangible signs of God’s mercy through their charitable works,” he said.

Just as Jesus’s physical Body rose to new life on the first Easter Sunday, His Body of disciples that had been scattered by His arrest and crucifixion “was reconstituted and reestablished as the community of faith, hope and charity.”

And with the gift of the Holy Spirit 50 days later at Pentecost, “they would be reborn as a vibrant, thriving and growing Church.”

They would pass “from fear to fortitude, from discouragement and disappointment to joy, and from desperation and confusion to a bold proclamation of the many wonderful works of God,” said Bishop McKnight.

Such is the transformation for all who are baptized into Christ’s death and share in His resurrected life.

While the fullness of resurrected life will come only with the general resurrection of the dead at the end of time, “even now, the light of God’s mercy is given to us through the preaching of Christ’s Gospel, in the celebration of the sacraments and in our charitable and loving care for one another.”

“Our lives are different because of the mercy we have experienced!” said Bishop McKnight. “And living the resurrected life means living Christ’s peace with God and one another.”

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