+(Intro) Our Eucharist this morning is for the repose of the soul of Pope Francis who died yesterday. One of his striking aspects was his ability to acknowledge his own weaknesses and failings. I remember how on one occasion he treated a lady in the crowd harshly because she clung to his hand or arm after shaking hands with her. Within a day he publicly acknowledged his fault so let us now acknowledge our own failings.
(After the gospel) There is something very beautiful about the story of Mary Magdalene meeting the angels and then Jesus at the tomb. How could she not have recognized him whom she so deeply loved?
Jesus saying “Mary” opened up a whole new horizon as does this whole Easter season. Suddenly she knows that it is Jesus who spoke to her. What a deep human longing there is in each of us to hear Jesus call us by name. To be loved by Him called forth in her an immediate and total response so that he has to ask her to stop holding on to him.
This Easter season is to put the whole of our lives into a much larger context so that each of our present lives is but a very small fragment of the whole, of a life to come that will last for all eternity. So let us ask for a faith to see our lives even as God sees them.
Acts 2:36-41; John 20:11-18