Easter Day – evening
Sunday 21st April 2019
Easter Day – evening
Isa 43.1-21
1 Cor 15.1-11
Revd Preb Maureen Hobbs
I want to remind you of lines from our first reading this evening.
“Bring forth the people who are blind, yet have eyes, who are deaf, yet have ears!
Let all the nations gather together, and let the peoples assemble.”
I wonder if any of you have been following the latest edition of the programme, Pilgrimage, on the TV?
Last year they followed a group of celebrities on the road to Santiago.
This year it was another group, following the Franciscan path to Rome.
The group included people of faith and people of no faith, and – at the risk of sounding like the beginning of a rather dodgy joke, A Muslim, a Jew and a Jehovah’s Witness – although these two last were somewhat lapsed. The programmes followed the group from their beginning on the Swiss side of the Alps, through the St Bernard pass – (an excuse to see some very cute dogs!), through Tuscany by way of many blisters, exhaustion, getting lost, walking as a group and alone, but with a growing sense of overarching fellowship, until they arrived, sixteen days after setting out, in the Eternal City, the city of S. Peter and of course the place where S Paul too ended his days.
The group was very diverse and included several nationalities as well as religions and as far as I could tell only the singer Dana could be described as a practising Catholic. For her – understandably – the whole trip from the beginning had deep spiritual significance. For the others less so, at least at the beginning.
The culmination of the trip was their entry to St Peter’s Square and Basilica in the Vatican and then a private audience with the Pope himself. Not quite sure how they managed to wangle that one, but it made for interesting viewing!
As always with these sorts of documentaries – the recent group climbing Kilimanjaro for charity is another example – as the programme proceeds and the individuals become more weary and vulnerable through their exertions, and as they bond as a group – fascinating back-stories emerge. Old hurts and new questions surface and may or may not find some resolution.
One had the impression that here truly were some people who had eyes, and yet were blind to the promise and attraction of faith, because they could only focus on the negatives of religion.
But by the end – in their audience with Pope Francis – they each of them fell visibly under the spell of a man who – while wielding great power – also came across to them as humble and vulnerable himself, and were able to voice some of their doubts and questions. In particular, Stephen K Amos, a black, gay comedian asked the Pope why he always felt the Church rejected people like him, because of the way they were made and the lifestyle they followed.
Knowing a little of the Pope’s nature and his previous statements, I wasn’t that surprised that he dealt with this deftly and with great compassion. Emphasising that it is our humanity that gives us dignity in God’s eyes, and not the many adjectives and labels we attach to ourselves and each other.
The programme ended with both a declared atheist –the dancer, Brendan Coles, and a Jewish Actress, Lesley Joseph, respectively blessing the Pope – which must have been something of a first for him!
And the whole experience – the journey they shared – had undoubtedly had a profound effect on all of them – not to turn them all into Catholics or even Christians, but to make them more aware of their own humanity and even their divinity.
An encounter with holiness does that to people. It changes them, transforms them.
The stories of the resurrection of Christ, can at best only help to persuade unbelievers that it’s worth investigating the evidence. But it’s the existing company of believers, the Church, that is the most compelling evidence that Jesus lives, risen and glorified, for ever in the Father’s presence. Christianity is narrowly based on one single claim – that Jesus, who died, was raised by God. We are a Resurrection People, or we are nothing. And our vocation, one shared by every one of us, is to be the evidence that the risen Jesus lives by his Spirit, in the broken body of believers who gather in his name.
And if – as St Paul tells us – we have been raised with Christ and experience the power of his Spirit, how can we not believe that we too will enter the fullness of his promise of eternal life? “Christ in you,” says St Paul, “the hope of glory.” Praise be to God!
Amen.