He Is Risen! Why Do You Seek the Living Among the Dead?

March 31, 2013 By Leave a Comment

I’ve seen many images of the Resurrected Christ, in oils and tempura and marble.   This year, though, I was struck by this image—of the empty tomb?

No, look again:   The stone is rolled back, but inside the sepulcher something wondrous is happening.  The blinding light, like an eclipse of the sun!  Why, the artist is gazing into the tomb at the moment that Christ’s body is reinfused with life.

In 2011, after five years of scientific experiments using different methods of coloring linen, Italy’s National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable  Economic Development concluded that the image on the Shroud is not the result of any process known to the modern world.  It may, scientists said, have been created by an intense source of light—but no man-made light would have produced the required strength.

At the University of Texas in Austin, physicists boast of the Texas Petawatt Laser, the brightest light in the universe.  (A petawatt is 1 million billon watts—far more than the power generated by all of the world’s power plants, which together produce only terawatts, a measurement of a mere trillion watts.)  The Petawatt Laser can blast out infrared pulses that each have more than one petawatt of power.

What the artist depicts, the miracle that happened on Easter morning, must have been measured in petawatts.

He is risen!

Filed Under: Easter, Resurrection Leave a Comment

With Weeping and Lamentations

March 30, 2013 By Leave a Comment

He is in the tomb. 

Holy Saturday is such a quiet day—a day of reflection and prayer, of introspection, of acute awareness of God’s abiding love.

Tomorrow He rises, and we celebrate with colored eggs and chocolate and a sumptuous glazed ham dinner with the people we love.  But for now, we think of this:  of Christ lying still, grey, in the cool gloom of the sepulcher.

This painting is titled Lamentation of the Dead Christ, and portrays the body of Christ supine on a marble slab.  He is watched over by the Virgin Mary and Saint John, who weep for his death.  The Renaissance artist Andrea Mantegna, a master of perspective, used tempura to create the work sometime between 1475 and 1501.

Mantegna had probably intended the painting be displayed in his own funerary chapel; but it was found by his sons after his death, and was sold to pay off debts.

A PRAYER FOR HOLY SATURDAY

O God, Creator of heaven and earth:

Grant that, as the crucified body of your dear Son was laid in the tomb and rested on this holy Sabbath, so we may await with him the coming of the third day, and rise with him to newness of life; who now lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Filed Under: Death, Prayer Tagged With: Leave a Comment

POP QUIZ: What Do You Tell Your Children About the Easter Bunny?

March 30, 2013 By 9 Comments

Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, on which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain.

– 1 Corinthians 15:1-2

Stop and think about this. No, really!  Read it twice.  Think about it.

It sounds pretty important, doesn’t it?

I bring this up because a poll published by The Barna Group in March 2010 shows that when asked what Easter is about, only 37% of Catholics in the United States responded with “The Resurrection.”

Only 37%!!!

Excuse me, but what are the rest of you thinking?! This is the high holy day of the Christian year, a commemoration of the day on which all our fortunes were turned and we were brought back to friendship with God.  The gates of heaven were opened.  Death was conquered.  Jesus was victorious over sin.

In fairness, the number of self-identified Catholics who said they celebrate Easter as a religious holiday was higher (65%). I’m not sure whether that means:  Did those who said it was a religious holiday, but who couldn’t think of the Resurrection, just have some squiggly, pastel-colored, bunny-soft idea of religion?  Or did they simply respond to the interviewer’s question generically, even though they did understand the significance of the feast.

*     *     *     *     *

The Barna Report had me thinking about how parents raise their children—specifically, what parents tell their kids about the Easter Bunny.

I remember, as a child, loving the Easter egg hunt. We loved painting the eggs on Holy Saturday.  On Easter Sunday, my sisters and I—after finding all the eggs and our baskets—would hide them again and again, all day and probably all week, for the sheer pleasure of once again peeking in cupboards and under tables to find the elusive eggs.

But there was an element of suspicion: I mean, if my parents lied to me about Santa Claus and about the Easter Bunny, couldn’t they also have lied to me about Jesus?  Eventually I came to understand the difference between faith and fantasy; but I do remember those childhood concerns, and I do see why some parents do not participate in society’s great fantasy about sneaky bunnies who love kids and give them lots and lots of chocolate.

PLEASE SHARE:

How do you celebrate the Easter holiday in your family?

What do you tell your children about the Easter Bunny?

(Note:  There are no right or wrong answers in this quiz!)

Filed Under: Easter 9 Comments
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