"We are always expected in heaven."

From time to time, Jesus spoke to the disciples about his death, and they didn’t like to hear it. They also couldn’t understand it. What is he on about? This talk seemed to happen on the back of great pastoral successes that he and the disciples had when they went about Judea and Galilee preaching and proclaiming the word. They witnessed Jesus heal the sick, give sight to the blind, command the crippled to walk, even raise the dead. They saw the abuse he got from the established church leadership when he ate with tax collectors and sinners and even forgave them. For example, when they dragged the woman caught committing adultery before him and mortified her publicly, they really were not that interested in her sin. They were more interested in putting him on the spot. All eyes were on Jesus a lot of the time.

There was huge momentum building in their lives and Jerusalem and the Passover seemed to be the focal point. When they reached Jerusalem, Jesus entered in triumph riding on a donkey with people crying; “Hosanna, blessings on him who comes in the name of the Lord!” They are spreading their cloaks before him as well as palm branches and greenery. By the end of the week, things came to a crashing halt, there was a plot to arrest Jesus and no one in his company felt safe because one of his apostles, one on the inside betrayed him.

They all seemed to scatter after Jesus was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane. They saw him being led off to be brought before the Sanhedrin in the early hours of the Friday morning. From there he was tried before Pontus Pilate, the Roman Governor, Tiberius Caesar’s man in Judea. There were two prisoners in custody, Barabbas, a well-known troublemaker to the Romans, someone they would happily do away with, and Jesus. According to a custom, in honour of the Passover they could call for the pardoning and release of a prisoner. Much to the anger of the Romans, and despite Jesus being scourged within an inch of his life, the Sanhedrin called for the release of Barabbas. Pilate had no choice but to go with the will of the mob calling for the crucifixion of Jesus.

In the middle east, two thousand years ago, in the hierarchy of punishments meted out to criminals, crucifixion was the most barbaric, grotesque, and frightening of all the punishments. The criminal died slowly in excruciating pain gasping for breath and bleeding profusely. Crucifixion was also a public act of disgrace to ultimately shame the criminal. They were nailed to crosses which they had carried and there they died sometimes over days and the bodies were often left there as a Roman warning; ‘Do not cross us – this is what will happen to you.’

When Jesus died, his apostles and his other followers disappeared in fear and hid themselves away. They tried to get something, anything by way of information. Their friend, their teacher, their Rabbi was put to death and while they remember that he had prophesied this, they didn’t understand, it didn’t click. They were heart broken. They locked themselves away and they didn’t know what to do.

When the Passover was over, early on Sunday morning, women from their group went with oils and spices to the tomb where the body of Jesus had been placed. They wanted to properly anoint his badly damaged body and wrap it up in a clean shroud.  They wondered who would help them roll away the great stone which was placed at the entrance to the tomb. When they arrived, they met two men in dazzling clothes who said; “Why do you look among the dead for one who is alive? He is not here, he has risen. Remember what he told you when he was still in Galilee: that the Son of Man had to be handed over into the power of sinful men and be crucified, and rise again on the third day?” They remembered his words. This was stunning news. As the day went on, they learned that other disciples had had encounters with Jesus who reminded them of why this had to happen

As the Risen Jesus emerges from the death and darkness of the tomb, his followers need to do this too. And the challenge is to leave the tomb behind them and emerge into the light of the resurrection. Their encounter with the Risen Lord fortifies their faith and gives them the necessary push to further witness publicly to the faith. By doing this, they therefore leave the darkness of their locked rooms and fearlessly come out and stand boldly into the Easter light.

As a society, as a church, we have spent three days in the tomb with Jesus. We too have been hidden and locked into the darkness in a sense. These three years, the end of 2019, the whole of 2020, and the whole of 2021 and till now, has been like the three days in the tomb with the stone rolled in place. We have endured restrictions, quarantine, lockdown, and sickness. We learned words and terminologies like; asymptomatic, close contacts, contact tracing, community transmission, flatten the curve, hand washing, herd immunity, incubation, lockdown, masks, pandemic, PPE, quarantine, self-isolating, social distancing, super spreader, surge, testing, vaccine.   Please God it is time to emerge from this. We see the numbers going down. We give thanks for all who were at our service during the pandemic.

Then Russia invaded Ukraine and the madness of Putin’s war is destroying this country live on our televisions and on our social media. There is so much darkness and doom. Ukraine has already suffered enough God knows in her history, not least in 1986 when the infamous accident happened at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.  Daily we learn of more attacks on Ukraine by an aggressive bully but God willing soon the tanks will leave for good, and the process of rebuilding can start. On Good Friday, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, Pope Francis’ envoy in Ukraine knelt in prayer at a mass grave close to Kyiv. He said, “So many dead, as well as a mass grave of at least 80 people buried without a name or a surname…tears fail to fall and words do not come, yet thank God, that there is faith. We are in Holy Week – today is Good Friday when we can unite ourselves to the person of Jesus Christ and go up with him to the cross. Easter Sunday and the resurrection of Christ will come soon.”

We must not stay in the darkness of an empty tomb. We must run out into the daylight of the resurrection, and we start now. As St. John Paul II said; “We are an Easter people and Alleluia is our song.” Let us journey together to the Kingdom where the Risen Lord Jesus Christ lives. Let us befriend our ultimate destiny more and more, life with God in heaven. To quote two young saints; Derry girl, Sr. Clare Crockett (who died in Ecuador on April 16th, 2016) saying good-bye to a friend she said; “Until heaven…” And Blessed Carlo Acutis, the first Millennial saint, (who died in 2006) said; “Our goal must be the infinite and not the finite. Infinity is our homeland. We are always expected in heaven.”

Christ is Risen! Alleluia!