Easter 2009

Some of you may be attending Easter Vigil and some will be going to Mass on Easter Sunday and so once again I won’t write out the Gospel here. The Gospels are telling the story of the women and/or the disciples going to the tomb only to discover that Jesus has risen. Alleluia!

In one gospel the angel tells the women, “But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him just as he told you.”

In the Greek there are two words for “seeing”. The first one is “blepo”, to physically see with your eyes. When the women first came to the tomb they could see (blepo) that the stone had been rolled away.

The second word for ‘see’ is “orao”. It too means seeing with your eyes but it can mean much more than that. It encompasses experience, inner knowledge, perception and understanding. “…there you will see (orao) him just as he told you.” Jesus, through the angel, has left an invitation for his followers to come to Galilee to see him and experience him.

But, for us, over 2000 years later, there can be a stumbling block when we’re told we can see Jesus or experience him. Think of a tree; you can see and experience this tree. You can touch its bark and leaves and you can enjoy its beauty as the wind blows through the leaves or the frost turns the leaves gold and orange. You can write poems praising the tree and you can long to sit in the shade of the tree. But always, you know that no matter how much you love and enjoy the tree, it is not aware of you. It doesn’t know you are touching it, appreciating it or sitting in its shelter. It just does what a tree does: be a tree.

Or you can see a famous spiritual leader at a conference and you can experience that person to some degree by what you hear her saying about herself. Her teachings and experiences can influence you but one thing is lacking. She doesn’t know you. She is aware that there are many individuals listening to her and she is giving herself the best she can to this amorphous crowd of which you are just one small part. You are experiencing her but she is not experiencing you except as a tiny contributor to the group dynamics of the crowd.

For many people, the concept of “seeing Jesus” holds all the intimacy of beholding a beautiful tree or seeing a spiritual leader up on a stage from afar. Reading about Jesus’ followers discovering that he is indeed alive and wants to see them in Galilee is simply a story that can feel far removed from every day life.

What we all yearn to know is, does Jesus ‘orao’ me? Does Jesus see me? Does Jesus experience me? Does he want to?

It’s one thing to want to have an experience of Jesus but it’s quite another thing to understand that Jesus wants to experience you. He is not a tree. He is not this spiritual leader looking benignly down on an adoring crowd of billions. His saving act didn’t just save you because you are a member of the club and all club members are saved. He knows you. He sees you.

But then you may start to think, “Yeah, and what he sees is how I am not a very great person. He sees how I lack discipline in prayer and how I forget to trust him and how I keep doing all these shameful things I know very well are wrong and unhealthy for me. He sees me and is sad and disappointed because I don’t try harder to be worthy of his love.”

You might not believe me if I told you how theologically incorrect this idea of Jesus is, but perhaps you will listen to a doctor of the church, St. Catherine of Siena:

“...We should not act as unwise worldly folk act who transgress the precept of holy Church when they say, "I'm not worthy!'.... Oh, stupid humility! Who can't see that you aren't worthy! How long are you going to wait to be worthy? Don't wait; you'll be as worthy in the end as at the start, for even with all our uprightness we will never be worthy. God is the one who is worthy, and with his worth he makes us worthy.”

Our resurrected Lord is not as interested in critiquing our unworthiness as we think he might be. If that were so, he would have left this message with the angel in the tomb: Tell my disciples and Peter that they really screwed up and I am so disappointed in them and wounded by how they treated me. I will be in Galilee but I would prefer that they spend time contemplating what they did to me and only come to Galilee when they’ve realized their inadequacies and have done something about them. And they’d better be really sorry when they come.”

Jesus, in fact, said nothing about the disciples’ wounding actions. He just desired that they all come to see him, to ‘orao’ him. Because Jesus knew that if the disciples, especially Peter, would seek him out and look into his eyes they would experience the healing power of being looked upon, individually, by a risen king who loved each one stronger, better and deeper than anyone had ever loved them before.

No doubt, before they encountered Jesus in Galilee, the disciples, especially Peter, had to struggle terribly with crippling shame and even struggle with whether they wanted to face Jesus after what they did to him. They didn’t know he would be receiving them with overwhelming love and forgiveness. They didn’t know yet that what he did on the cross was to break the power of guilt and shame.

They did not yet know the Alleluia Joy of Easter, which is the joy of seeing and being seen by the risen Lord, the joy of knowing that the slate has been wiped clean and a new invitation sent out:

Come home. I love you. Come home.