Maravi

Easter is about life

Easter is about life
By Editor
Sunday April 08, 2007 [04:00]

Probably the oldest and most important Christian festival, Easter marks the end of the fasting season of Lent and Jesus Christ’s death on Good Friday and His resurrection on Easter Sunday, which is today. Today, there are many customs and traditions associated with Easter, and this festival is celebrated by both Christians and non-Christians alike. The Easter period is very important for a number of reasons. Easter is not just an ordinary period. Easter is about life, it is about turning things for the better.

The message from Chipata Catholic Diocese Bishop George Lungu on Easter is very precise because this period should also be used as an opportunity for us to reflect on the many issues that confront us. This period should offer us hope in the face of the numerous challenges that we face both as individuals and even as communities.

Our message for the Easter period remains consistent. For us, Easter is a time to reflect on, and re-examine, our lives, our principles, convictions and faith. Adherence to principles and loyalty to our convictions and commitment to our faith can be a great source of peace. And faith can be a great source of courage.

It was faith that gave Jesus the necessary revolutionary will for carrying out the scheme of life, even by sacrificing his own life in confrontation with the forces of death, such as oppression, injustice, and religion made sclerotic by rules and rites.

As we celebrate Easter we should ask ourselves what kind of society we are trying to build in this country that has declared itself to be Christian.

Let’s not forget that Jesus’ spirituality was life in the spirit, within the historical conflict, in a communion of love with the Father and the people. And this spirituality was the result of his opening to the Father’s gift and his liberating commitment to the life aspirations of the oppressed. For Jesus, the world wasn’t divided between the pure and the impure, as the Pharisees wished; it was divided between those who favoured life and those who supported death.

Everything that generates more life - from a gesture of love to a social revolution - is in line with God’s scheme of things, in line with the construction of the kingdom, for life is God’s greatest gift. Whoever is born is born in God to enter the sphere of life. At the same time, Jesus’ spirituality contradicted that of the Pharisees which consisted of rites, duties, asceticism and the observance of discipline.

Fidelity is the centre of life for the Pharisees; the Father was the centre of life for Jesus. The Pharisees measured spirituality by the practice of cultural rules; Jesus measured it by the filial opening to God’s love and compassion.
Like all those who truly believe, Jesus had faith and spent hours in prayer to nourish it.

And in that communion with the Father, he found strength for struggling for the scheme of life, challenging the forces of death, represented particularly by the Pharisees, against whom the Gospels present two violent manifestos (Matthew 23 and Luke 11: 37-57). And in this sense, all who struggle for life are included in God’s scheme, even if they lacked faith.

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see thee hungry and feed thee, or thirst and give thee drink? And when did we see thee a stranger and welcome thee, or naked and clothe thee? And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these brethren, you did it to me’” (Matthew 25: 37-40).

It is your fellow man, and especially one who lacks life and needs justice, in who God wishes to be served and loved. They are the ones with whom Jesus identified. Therefore, there is no contradiction between the struggle for justice and the fulfilment of God’s will. One demands the other. All who work along that line of God’s scheme for life are considered Jesus’ brothers and sisters (Mark 3:31-35).

This is the best way to follow Jesus, especially in our country’s present situation. We prefer to say that Jesus had a spirituality of the conflict - that is, a vigour in his commitment to the poor and to the Father who granted him immense internal peace.

Jesus’ way of fulfilling God’s will was through a commitment to the scheme of life. That is, man’s material needs, the basic foundation of life, was the most sacred thing for Jesus and he found the hunger of that man to be an offence to the Creator himself.

A religion that cares for the sacredness of its objects but turns its back on those who are the real temples of the Spirit is worthless. They don’t understand that, to Jesus’ way of thinking, there’s nothing more sacred than the right to life.

Clearly, a Church that places its patrimonial interests ahead of the demands of justice, life, and the people among whom it is inserted is certainly a Church that considers man less important than the Sabbath and, like the Pharisees, reverses evangelical priorities.

And at the risk of seeming ridiculous, we state that a true revolutionary - even if he is not a believer - is guided by the great feelings of love. It is impossible to think of a genuine revolutionary lacking this quality.

Genuine politicians must make an ideal of this love of the people, of the most sacred causes, and make it one and indivisible. They cannot descend, with small doses of daily affection, to the level where ordinary people put their love into practice.

And let’s not forget that there’s a great mass that follows its leaders because it has faith in them. It has faith in them because they have known how to interpret its aspirations.

Again, Easter is about life, it is about turning things for the better, for all our people - especially the poor, and all those who lack justice.

Labels: EDITORIAL

posted by MrK @ 5:39 AM