3rd Sunday after Easter 22.4.18 Two worlds
In the Gospel today, Our Lord offers encouragement in our
time of sorrow: you are crying now, but later you will be laughing. You are
sowing in tears, but you will reap with shouts of joy. A woman in childbirth
feels pain, but later joy… there are many such images throughout the
Scriptures.
Can we allow ourselves to be so encouraged? Or shall we
wallow in self-pity and gloom?
While we pick our way through this valley of tears do we
look up to the heavens and draw inspiration from there; or do we look down at
the mud and slime around us, and generally lean towards despair?
Of course we will look upwards. This is more than just ‘looking
on the bright side’, the general advice to be as cheerful as possible.
When we look up to Heaven in prayer we are helping to bring
about the final victory.
Suppose our Lord had risen from the dead but not one person
believed Him! His triumph would still be real but it would not benefit the
human race - if there were no one to receive its fruits.
But when a community of believers emerges then the power of Our
Lord’s victory takes hold and transforms things.
It would be easier if a majority of people believed with us,
but we can get by with small numbers. The truth remains the same regardless of
how many or how few believe it.
The Resurrection is easy enough to believe as a fact of
history. Our problem is not so much with the fact, as with connecting it with
our own lives.
He is risen, but I am not, we might say! Nor do I have the
power or the goodness to break free from my sin and degradation. Nor, in
general does the world get any better.
Discouragement can set in – and this when we should be
brimming over with paschal joy, radiating faith and love to all around.
How do we get that sort of faith? By doing what we are doing
now, praying the Mass, confessing our sins, praying the Rosary, doing good
works, and all similar things.
This will help us maintain our strength. We have to be ‘on
call’ like emergency workers, ready for anything at any time.
We learn to be sensitive to pick up the signs. We do not
need a major miracle every day; we learn to read the signs around us,
To keep ourselves strong we learn to live in two worlds, the
earthly and the heavenly.
Living in the heavenly world we maintain the right values
and have true wisdom. And the hope of Heaven will sustain us. That is our true
home.
Meanwhile we live in the earthly world, the here and now. We
deal with whatever befalls us, with practical charity and wisdom, and trust in
God to steer us through.
We make things happen by our belief. We are not adding to anything
Christ did, but we are bringing His influence into our place and time – and
this is what He wants from us.
We evangelise the unbelievers, console the downhearted,
strengthen the weak. We may think we are weak, but there are many who are
weaker still.
We stay strong ourselves, and this with all the means we
have; every day of our lives affirming what remains true, and letting that
truth be the strongest influence in our lives.
To see the glory through the mud is not just a fairy story
but actual truth. It is what sustains us, and will sustain anyone who is
prepared to look ‘upwards’.
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