In order not to weaken the personal Encounter

(Jn 20:1-9)

In Jn the beloved disciple at the foot of the Cross together with the Mother is the figure of each one, and of the new community that is born around Jesus.

Rises the Church; not on the basis of a planned succession, but by full and spontaneous adhesion.

In Asia Minor the Lord’s friends, Hellenists less bound to custom, intended to oppose the uncertain and compromissory attitude of the Judaizers.

Most of the faithful of the Johannine churches thought of abandoning the synagogue and the First Testament, which delayed them.

Alternatively, they wished to embrace exclusively the New, through personal Faith in the living Christ, without uncertainty.

The Fourth Gospel attempts to rebalance extremist positions.

"Son" and Mother - that is, the people of the ancient Covenant [in Hebrew «Israel» is of the female gender] - must remain united (Jn 19:26-27).

In short, Faith and ‘works of law’ go hand in hand.

Faith is a progressive relationship that ignites in a ‘searching’ full of tension and passion [«to run»].

It conveys progressive perceptions, which give access to a new world [«to enter»], where we ‘see’ things we do not know.

This had already been in part the dismayed reaction of Mary Magdalene, who in Jn rushes alone to the tomb - not accompanied by other "women" as the Synoptics narrate.

A dismay that, however, pushes to the Announcement: the sepulcher (the condition of the Sheol, a ravine of darkness) was no longer in the arrangement in which it had been left after the burial of Christ.

And in fact, that «rewound [carefully] apart» sheet says it will never need any shroud. Death no longer has power over Him.

Thus, although the young man is faster than the veteran and arrives first to spot the signs of truth and the new world, he gives way and primacy.

Like a prophet who grasps everything ahead of time, the sincere disciple and the genuine community wait for even the slowest to come to the same experience, to the identical acumen of things; to believe in the mysterious process that brings gain in the loss and life from the death.

The eye of the fell in love immediately «perceives»; he has an intimate and acute gaze that grasps and makes its own the Novelty of the Risen One.

Earlier than mere admirers, the empathetic and true brother «catches Life amid signs of death».

As if by the relationship of Faith that animates us, in the attention of events, we were already introduced into a reality that communicates ‘new senses’. And the distinguish-and-hear of the heart.

A Listening that makes the eye sharp - projecting the Announcement.

In this way, a new People arises, which "sees inside", which feels the Infinite appearing in finiteness, and complete life that is revealed in the fragility of the (even obscure) event.

Perhaps not a few people are still surprised by the 'empty tomb': that is, a Risen Jesus only 'personal', lived in love, in the free normal, in the self-giving that overcomes death. But without any 'mausoleum'.

The Beloved Disciple - flowed from the Heart of the Pierced Jesus and who also brings Tradition to the top - in his sensitivity ‘intuits’ the living Lord well ahead of the one commemorated.

He is kidnapped from it, and in his experience he instantly ‘realizes’ the power of Life on any tie up.

Divine condition, enlightening, unfolded in history.

[Easter «Resurrection of the Lord»,  April 5, 2026]

The Easter Triduum and Easter [2–5 April 2026]

Holy Week, the most important week of the year for us Christians, allows believers to immerse themselves in the central events of the Redemption by reliving the Paschal Mystery, the great Mystery of faith. These are the days of the Easter Triduum, the fulcrum of the entire liturgical year, which help us to open our hearts to an understanding of the priceless gift that is the salvation obtained for us through Christ’s sacrifice. This immense gift is recounted in a famous hymn contained in the Letter to the Philippians (cf. 2:6–11), which we often have the opportunity to meditate upon during Lent. In it, Saint Paul traces the entire mystery of the history of salvation, alluding to the pride of Adam who, though not God, wanted to be like God. And he contrasts this pride of the first man—which we all feel to some extent within ourselves—with the humility of the true Son of God who, by becoming man, did not hesitate to take upon himself all the weaknesses of the human being, except sin, and went as far as the depths of death. This descent into the ultimate depths of passion and death is then followed by his exaltation, true glory, the glory of love that went to the very end. And it is therefore fitting – as Paul says – that ‘at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess: Jesus Christ is Lord!’ (2:10-1). St Paul alludes, with these words, to a prophecy of Isaiah where God says: ‘I am the Lord; let every knee bow before me in heaven and on earth’ (cf. Is 45:23). This, says Paul, applies to Jesus Christ. He truly, in his humility, in the true greatness of his love, is the Lord of the world, and before him every knee truly bows. How wonderful, and at the same time surprising, is this mystery! We can never meditate sufficiently on this reality. Jesus, though he was God, did not wish to make his divine prerogatives an exclusive possession; he did not wish to use his divinity, his glorious dignity and his power, as an instrument of triumph and a sign of distance from us. On the contrary, ‘he emptied himself’ by taking on the wretched and weak human condition – Paul uses, in this regard, a very evocative Greek verb to indicate the kénosis, this descent of Jesus. The divine form (morphé) was hidden in Christ under the human form, that is, under our reality marked by suffering, poverty, our human limitations and death. This radical and true sharing in our nature—sharing in everything except sin—led him to that frontier which is the sign of our finitude: death. Yet all this was not the result of some obscure mechanism or blind fate: rather, it was his free choice, born of a generous adherence to the Father’s plan of salvation. And the death he faced – adds Paul – was that of the cross, the most humiliating and degrading one imaginable. All this the Lord of the universe accomplished out of love for us: out of love he chose to ‘empty himself’ and become our brother; out of love he shared our condition, that of every man and every woman. A great witness of the Eastern tradition, Theodoret of Cyrus, writes on this subject: ‘Being God and God by nature, and being equal with God, he did not regard this as something to be grasped, as do those who have received some honour beyond their merits, but, hiding his merits, he chose the deepest humility and took the form of a human being’ (Commentary on the Epistle to the Philippians, 2:6–7).

Let us now pause to reflect briefly on the various moments of the Easter Triduum. The prelude to the Easter Triduum, with the evocative afternoon rites of Holy Thursday, is the solemn Chrism Mass, which the Bishop celebrates in the morning with his presbyterate, and during which the priestly promises made on the day of Ordination are renewed together. It is a gesture of great significance, a most propitious occasion on which priests reaffirm their fidelity to Christ, who has chosen them as his ministers. Also during the Chrism Mass, the oil of the sick and the oil of catechumens will be blessed, and the Chrism will be consecrated. These rites symbolically signify the fullness of Christ’s Priesthood and that ecclesial communion which must animate the Christian people, gathered for the Eucharistic sacrifice and enlivened in unity by the gift of the Holy Spirit.

In the afternoon Mass, known as the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, the Church commemorates the institution of the Eucharist, the ministerial priesthood and the new commandment of charity, left by Jesus to his disciples. Saint Paul offers one of the earliest accounts of what took place in the Upper Room on the eve of the Lord’s Passion. ‘The Lord Jesus,’ he writes in the early 1950s, drawing on a text he received from the Lord’s own circle, ‘on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and having given thanks, broke it and said: “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me”. In the same way, after supper, he also took the cup, saying: “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me” (1 Cor 11:23–25). Words steeped in mystery, which clearly reveal Christ’s will: under the species of bread and wine, He makes Himself present with His body given and His blood shed. It is the sacrifice of the new and definitive covenant offered to all, without distinction of race or culture. And for this sacramental rite, which He entrusts to the Church as the supreme proof of His love, Jesus appoints as ministers His disciples and all those who will continue His ministry throughout the centuries. Holy Thursday is therefore a renewed invitation to give thanks to God for the supreme gift of the Eucharist, to be received with devotion and adored with living faith. For this reason, the Church encourages us, after the celebration of Holy Mass, to keep vigil in the presence of the Most Holy Sacrament, recalling the sorrowful hour that Jesus spent in solitude and prayer in Gethsemane, before being arrested and subsequently condemned to death.

Good Friday is the day of the Lord’s Passion and Crucifixion. Every year, as we stand in silence before Jesus hanging on the wood of the cross, we sense how full of love are the words He spoke the evening before, during the Last Supper. “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many” (cf. Mk 14:24). Jesus wished to offer His life as a sacrifice for the forgiveness of humanity’s sins. Just as with the Eucharist, so too with the Passion and death of Jesus on the Cross, the mystery becomes unfathomable to reason. We are faced with something that, from a human perspective, might seem absurd: a God who not only becomes man, with all the needs of man, not only suffers to save man by taking upon himself the full weight of humanity’s tragedy, but dies for man.

Christ’s death recalls the accumulation of pain and evil that weighs upon humanity in every age: the crushing burden of our mortality, the hatred and violence that still today stain the earth with blood. The Lord’s Passion continues in the sufferings of mankind. As Blaise Pascal rightly writes, ‘Jesus will be in agony until the end of the world; we must not sleep during this time’ (Pensées, 553). If Good Friday is a day full of sadness, it is at the same time a day more propitious than ever for reawakening our faith, for strengthening our hope and the courage to carry our own cross with humility, trust and surrender to God, certain of his support and his victory. The liturgy of this day sings: O Crux, ave, spes unica – Hail, O Cross, our only hope!

This hope is nourished in the great silence of Holy Saturday, as we await the resurrection of Jesus. On this day, the churches are stripped bare and no special liturgical rites are scheduled. The Church keeps vigil in prayer like Mary and together with Mary, sharing her same feelings of sorrow and trust in God. It is rightly recommended that a prayerful atmosphere, conducive to meditation and reconciliation, be maintained throughout the day; the faithful are encouraged to approach the Sacrament of Penance, so that they may participate in the Easter celebrations truly renewed.

The recollection and silence of Holy Saturday will lead us through the night to the solemn Easter Vigil, ‘the mother of all vigils’, when the song of joy for Christ’s Resurrection will burst forth in all churches and communities. Once again, the victory of light over darkness, of life over death, will be proclaimed, and the Church will rejoice in her encounter with her Lord. Thus we shall enter into the spirit of the Easter of the Resurrection.

Let us prepare ourselves to live the Holy Triduum intensely, so that we may participate ever more deeply in the Mystery of Christ. The Blessed Virgin accompanies us on this journey; she followed her Son Jesus in silence to Calvary, sharing in his sacrifice with great sorrow, thus cooperating in the mystery of Redemption and becoming the Mother of all believers (cf. Jn 19:25–27). Together with Mary, we shall enter the Upper Room, we shall remain at the foot of the Cross, we shall keep vigil in spirit beside the dead Christ, awaiting with hope the dawn of the radiant day of the Resurrection. In this spirit, I offer you all, even at this early stage, my warmest wishes for a joyful and holy Easter, which I ask you to extend to your families, your parishes and your communities.

+Giovanni D’Ercole

Fossilized in reminiscences, or Announced by Brethren

(Jn 20:11-18)

Mk tells of a young man dressed in white, Mt of an angel, Lk of two men dressed in white, Jn of two angels.

The stories on the annunciation and on the heralds of the Resurrection do not fit together according to our way of telling.

To avoid a limited view on the victory of Life, it is appropriate to understand that we are not celebrating the week of the apparitions of the Risen One, but of his Manifestations [Greek text].

He does not appear only to some - to others He does not: manifests itself. We experience Him.

And there is a new Creation: now we do not recognize Jesus when we see, but when we ‘listen’ Him (v.16).

The Lord makes himself ‘seen’ not in the moment of the vision, but in the time of the Word, of the personal Appeal that «turns» the gaze from the irrelevant direction of travel that clings to the image of "yesterday".

The experience of the living Christ excludes the memories to be kept crying.

It is a current and well-founded relationship, convincing, multifaceted and accessible - direct.

The very observance of ancient law [v.1: in the particular case, the sabbath] seems to delay the experience of the disruptive force of rebirth, in the Spirit.

Gradually, in the first communities those personal primordial energies were being reactivated that not even the blackmail, intimidation and marginalization of the institutional apparatus could touch.

The faithful were on the virtuous and exciting wave of a further fundamental change: now they felt «brothers» of the Risen One (v.17).

The ‘discipleship’ relation (Jn 13:13) growing in ‘friendship’ (Jn 15,15) were becoming that of the blood relatives who felt they were ‘sons’.

[Jn 1,11-12: «He came among his own, and his own did not welcome him. But to those who received him he gave them ‘power’ to become sons of God; to those who believe in his Name» - that is: adhering to all his word, story and action; also problematic, painful, denouncing].

Thus began the explicit Announcement, despite the fact that the truly vital and increasingly determined part of the "church" proved to be that wich was peripheral and came from the pagans [in the figure of Mary Magdalene].

Woman: authentic Assembly in the Spirit.

An endless field of humiliated people, who nevertheless in the Risen Christ «see themselves within» and are unblocked; by acquiring new breath, overcoming discouragement, disorientation, uncertainty.

Even today, the search for our Guide can also arise from the sense of loss, or from the beatings suffered - but it is marked by Easter encounters and stages of new awareness.

New Listens, which break the reassurances. The Risen is a radical novelty: a wound inside and an impulse.

Only in the experience of being «reborn by transmitting» Him, is the Spirit unleashed that thrills and charges - and the Living One does not remain a stranger or someone of whom we have already made up an idea.

There is an unprecedented situation.

But who notices? In spite of the neglect they suffer, only the bridal souls catch it - the very ones who are disregarded.

[Tuesday between the Octave of Easter, April 7, 2026]

The New Creation, from Hearing

(Jn 20:11-18)

"In those days, in Israel, the testimony of women could not have official, juridical value, but women experienced a special bond with the Lord, which is fundamental for the concrete life of the Christian community, and this always, in every age, not only at the beginning of the Church's journey" [Pope Benedict, Regina Coeli 9 April 2012].

Mk tells of a young man dressed in white, Mt of an angel, Lk of two men dressed in white, Jn of two angels.

The stories about the annunciation and the heralds of the Resurrection do not fit together according to our way of telling.

In order to avoid a limited view of the victory of Life, it should be understood that we are not celebrating the week of the apparitions of the Risen One, but of his Manifestations [Greek text].

It does not just appear to some - to others it does not (depending on the lottery): it manifests itself. We experience this.

And there is a new creation: now one does not recognise Jesus when one sees him, but when one hears him (v.16).

The Lord makes himself seen not in the moment of vision, but in the time of the Word, of the personal call that makes the ancient gaze "turn away" from the irrelevant direction that clings to the image of "yesterday".

The experience of the living Christ excludes memories to be wept over.

It is present and grounded, convincing, multifaceted and accessible - direct. Definitely better than that offered later by the apostles, without pierced hearts (or proclamations).

But the face-to-face still remained closed, to the extent that one seemed to be looking for dead or distant museum pieces - to be found almost as before and at best kept without too much shaking.

Conditioned by excessively "usual" expectations, we would claim to trace Jesus to the wrong campsites and places. But in Jn the Ascension is placed on the same day as Easter (v.17).

The very observance of archaic religious law [v.1: in the particular case, the Sabbath] seems to delay the experience of the disruptive power of rebirth, in the Spirit.

Gradually, those primordial personal energies were being reactivated in the first communities that not even the blackmail, intimidation and marginalisation of the institutional apparatus could touch.

The Incarnation continued, unfolding in the believers; awakening new creative states in them.

The faithful were on the virtuous and enthusiastic wave of a further fundamental change: they now felt themselves to be 'brothers' of the Risen One (v.17).

The relationship of 'discipleship' (Jn 13:13) grown into 'friendship' (Jn 15:15) became that of kinsmen who felt like 'sons'.

[Jn 1:11-12: "He came among his own, and his own received him not. But to those who received him, he gave them power to become children of God; to those who believe in his Name" - that is, adhere to his entire word, event and action; even problematic, painful, denunciation].

Thus began the explicit Announcement, despite the fact that the part of the "church" that was really vital and increasingly determined proved to be the peripheral and from the pagans [in the figure of Mary Magdalene].

They wanted the reviving redemption, and thus pointed the right way to the assembly leaders themselves.

The Judeo-Christian community of the apostles was in fact all out for compromise with the distant and conflicting religious institution, that of power, which had wanted to destroy the Master.

The 'apostolic' hard core always lagging behind and to be evangelised: he is converted only by the one who feels himself a nothing (vv.2.18). And when she becomes aware that the realm of dead things will no longer surround her.

Woman: Authentic Assembly in the Spirit.

A boundless field of the humiliated, which nevertheless in the Risen Christ "sees itself" and is unblocked; it acquires new breath, overcomes discouragement, disorientation, uncertainty.

Still filled with Infinity, like pilgrims, the dreamers from below and the periphery seek their way.

They are activated with passion, to rekindle and resonate every fold of the human being - previously commanded by a world of calculated alternatives.

It is again the experience of "Mary of Magdala", who, by gaining confidence, can complete the perceptions and thoughts of even the top of the class.

The Risen One is always somewhere else... than what the expert or an average religious soul not ready for change expects.

His Person has unforeseen physiognomies, unconventional and out of pattern - like life, all to be discovered.

These are unseen profiles - to be grasped and internalised, sometimes almost without a struggle.

Only a call by name - his direct Word, the personal Appeal - makes us realise that by external influence we were perhaps chasing a Lord [of the past, or fashionable] too recognisable, to be commemorated as before.

To be carried in the saddlebag as always, with closed and normal love, the child of sorrow.The search for our Rabbuni may also arise from a sense of loss, or from the beatings suffered - but it is marked by Easter encounters and stages of new awareness.

New listening, shattering reassurances.

He remains a lukewarm stranger - at room temperature - for those who allow themselves to be influenced by limited (packaged) ideas and pretend to understand him with knowledge, recognise him with their eyes, or use him as a sleeping pill.

The Risen One is radical newness: wounded within and impetus. An itinerary that embraces and takes on the whole of humanity and history.

He acts in us by shattering all security; the very security that still does not let us out of the small circle.

And while labouring in the tension of the elusive [that cannot be made one's own] it is in the excitement of perceiving the treasures of atypical and personal intuitions that regenerated life attracts and opens up, amazes.

It is only in the experience of being born again by transmitting it that the Spirit is unleashed and charged - and the Living One does not remain a stranger or someone of whom one has already formed an idea.

"I have sought and seen the Lord!" [v.18: sense of the Greek text].

We do not experience Christ with intimism, nor with reminiscences and trinkets; not even in a cerebral way or by being content to fulfil pious memorial offices on the body.

There is an unprecedented situation.

But who notices? In spite of the neglect they suffer, only the souls who are brides - the poorly regarded.

To internalise and live the message:

What transmutation took place in you and your neighbour when you accepted the Call and the invitation to the Announcement?

How did the Person of Christ make you aware that you are fully wanted: inalienable subject, by Name?

Personal Manifestation: a law we find carved into many pages of the Gospels. But... soft happiness or the wave that sweeps everything away?

In these weeks our reflection moves, as it were, in the orbit of the Paschal Mystery. Today we meet the one who, according to the Gospels, first saw the risen Jesus: Mary Magdalene. The Sabbath rest had recently ended. On the day of the passion, there had been no time to complete the funeral rites; that is why, in that dawn filled with sadness, the women go to Jesus' tomb with perfumed ointments. The first to arrive is her: Mary of Magdala, one of the disciples who had accompanied Jesus all the way from Galilee, putting herself at the service of the nascent Church. Her journey to the tomb mirrors the faithfulness of so many women who are devoted for years to the cemetery paths, in memory of someone who is no longer there. The most authentic bonds are not broken even by death: there are those who continue to love, even if the loved one is gone forever.

The gospel (cf. Jn 20:1-2, 11-18) describes Mary Magdalene by immediately making it clear that she was not a woman of easy enthusiasm. In fact, after the first visit to the tomb, she returns disappointed to the place where the disciples were hiding; she reports that the stone has been moved from the entrance of the tomb, and her first hypothesis is the simplest that can be formulated: someone must have stolen Jesus' body. So the first announcement that Mary brings is not that of the resurrection, but of a theft that unknown persons perpetrated, while all of Jerusalem slept.

Then the gospels tell of a second journey of Magdalene to Jesus' tomb. She was stubborn! She went, she came back ... because she was not convinced! This time her pace is slow, very heavy. Mary suffers doubly: first of all for the death of Jesus, and then for the inexplicable disappearance of his body.

It is while she is bending over by the tomb, her eyes filled with tears, that God surprises her in the most unexpected way. The evangelist John emphasises how persistent her blindness is: she does not notice the presence of two angels questioning her, nor does she become suspicious when she sees the man behind her, whom she thinks is the guardian of the garden. And instead she discovers the most shocking event in human history when she is finally called by name: "Mary!" (v. 16).

How beautiful it is to think that the first appearance of the Risen One - according to the gospels - happened in such a personal way! That there is someone who knows us, who sees our suffering and disappointment, and who is moved by us, and calls us by name. It is a law that we find engraved in many pages of the gospel. Around Jesus there are many people seeking God; but the most prodigious reality is that, much earlier, there is first of all God who cares for our lives, who wants to raise them up, and to do this he calls us by name, recognising the personal face of each one. Every man is a story of love that God writes on this earth. Each one of us is a story of God's love. Each of us God calls by name: he knows us by name, he looks at us, he waits for us, he forgives us, he has patience with us. Is it true or not? Each one of us has this experience.

And Jesus calls her: "Mary!"The revolution of his life, the revolution destined to transform the existence of every man and woman, begins with a name that echoes in the garden of the empty tomb. The gospels describe to us Mary's happiness: Jesus' resurrection is not a joy given with an eyedropper, but a cascade that invests one's whole life. Christian existence is not woven with fluffy happiness, but with waves that sweep over everything. Try to think too, in this instant, with the baggage of disappointments and defeats that each of us carries in our hearts, that there is a God close to us who calls us by name and says: "Get up, stop crying, because I have come to set you free!" This is beautiful.

Jesus is not one who adapts himself to the world, tolerating that in it death, sadness, hatred, the moral destruction of people endure... Our God is not inert, but our God - if I may say so - is a dreamer: he dreams of the transformation of the world, and he has achieved it in the mystery of the Resurrection.

Mary would like to embrace her Lord, but He is now oriented to the heavenly Father, while she is sent to take the announcement to her brothers and sisters. And so that woman, who before meeting Jesus was at the mercy of the evil one (cf. Lk 8:2), has now become an apostle of the new and greater hope. May his intercession help us to live this experience too: in the hour of weeping, and in the hour of abandonment, listen to the Risen Jesus who calls us by name, and with a heart full of joy go and proclaim: "I have seen the Lord!" (v. 18). I have changed my life because I have seen the Lord! Now I am different from before, I am a different person. I am changed because I have seen the Lord. This is our strength and this is our hope.

[Pope Francis, General Audience 17 May 2017].

The event of the Resurrection as such is not described by the Evangelists: it remains mysterious, not in the sense of being less real, but hidden, beyond the scope of our knowledge: like a light so bright that we cannot look at it or we should be blinded. The narratives begin instead when, towards dawn on the day after Saturday, the women went to the tomb and found it open and empty. St Matthew also speaks of an earthquake and a dazzling angel who rolled away the great stone sealing the tomb and sat on it (cf. Mt 28:2).

Having heard the angel’s announcement of the Resurrection, the women, with fear and great joy, hastened to take the news to the disciples and at that very moment encountered Jesus, prostrated themselves at his feet and worshipped him; and he said to them: “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brethren to go to Galilee, and there they will see me” (Mt 28:10). In all the Gospels, in the accounts of the appearances of the Risen Jesus, women are given ample room, as moreover also in the accounts of Jesus’ Passion and death. In those times, in Israel the testimony of women could not possess any official or juridical value, but the women had had an experience of a special bond with the Lord, which was fundamental for the practical life of the Christian community, and this is always the case in every epoch and not only when the Church was taking her first steps.

Mary, Mother of the Lord, of course, is the sublime and exemplary model of this relationship with Jesus, and in a special way in his Paschal Mystery. Precisely through the transforming experience of the Passover of her Son, the Virgin Mary also becomes Mother of the Church, that is, of each one of the believers and of their whole community.

[Pope Benedict, Regina Coeli 9 April 2012]

Meditation on the Easter season

1. The Easter Sequence takes up the proclamation of hope that rang out at the solemn Easter Vigil: "The Lord of life was dead; now, alive, he triumphs", and gives it a new impact. These words guide the reflection of our meeting which is taking place in the luminous atmosphere of the Octave of Easter.

Christ triumphs over evil and death. This is the cry of joy that bursts from the heart of the Church during these days. Victorious over death, Jesus offers to those who accept and believe in him the gift of life that dies no longer. His death and his Resurrection therefore constitute the foundations of the Church's faith.

2. The Gospel narratives refer, sometimes in rich detail, to the meetings of the Risen Lord with the women who hurried to the tomb, and later, with the Apostles. As eye-witnesses, it is precisely they who were to be the first to proclaim the Gospel of his death and Resurrection. After Pentecost, they were to affirm fearlessly that what the Scriptures say about the Promised Messiah is fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.

The Church, the depository of this universal mystery of salvation, passes it on from generation to generation to the men and women of every time and place. In our time too, with the commitment of believers, we must make the proclamation of Christ, who through the power of his Spirit now lives triumphant, ring out clearly.

3. So that Christians may properly carry out this mandate entrusted to them, it is indispensable that they have a personal encounter with Christ, crucified and risen, and let the power of his love transform them. When this happens, sadness changes to joy and fear gives way to missionary enthusiasm.

John the Evangelist, for example, tells us of the Risen Christ's moving meeting with Mary Magdalene, who, having gone very early to the tomb, finds the sepulchre open and empty. She fears that the body of the Lord may have been stolen, so she is upset and weeps. But suddenly someone whom she supposes to be "the gardener" calls her by name:  "Mary!". She then recognizes him as the Teacher, "Rabboni", and recovering quickly from her distress and bewilderment, runs immediately to announce this news enthusiastically to the Eleven: "I have seen the Lord" (cf. Jn 20: 11-18).

4. "Christ my hope is arisen". With these words, the Sequence highlights an aspect of the paschal mystery that men and women today need to understand more deeply. Perturbed by latent threats of violence and death, people are in search of someone who will give them peace and security. But where can they find peace other than in the innocent Christ who reconciled sinners with the Father?
On Calvary, Divine Mercy manifested his face of love and forgiveness for everyone. In the Upper Room after his Resurrection, Jesus entrusted the Apostles with the task of being ministers of this mercy, a source of reconciliation among men and women.

In her humility, St Faustina Kowalska was chosen to proclaim this message of light that is particularly fitting for the world of today. It is a message of hope that invites us to abandon ourselves in the hands of the Lord. "Jesus, I trust in you!", the saint liked to repeat.

May Mary, Woman of Hope and Mother of Mercy, obtain for us to personally encounter her Son, who died and rose! May she make of us tireless workers for his mercy and his peace.

[Pope John Paul II, General Audience 14 April 2004]

In the last few weeks, our reflection has been moving, so to speak, within the orbit of the Paschal Mystery. Today we meet the one who, according to the Gospels, was the first to see the Risen Christ: Mary Magdalene. The Sabbath had ended not long before. On the day of the Passion, there had not been enough time to complete the funeral rites. For this reason, at that sorrow-filled dawn, the women went to Jesus’ tomb with aromatic oils. The first to arrive was Mary Magdalene. She was one of the disciples who had accompanied Jesus from Galilee, putting herself at the service of the burgeoning Church. Her walk to the sepulchre mirrors the fidelity of many women who spend years in the small alleyways of cemeteries remembering someone who is no longer there. The most authentic bonds are not broken even in death: there are those who continue loving even if their loved one is gone forever.

The Gospel describes Magdalene by immediately highlighting that she was not a woman easily given to enthusiasm (cf. Jn 20:1-2, 11-18). In fact, after her visit to the sepulchre, she returns disappointed to the Apostles’ hiding place. She tells them that the stone has been removed from the entrance to the sepulchre, and her first hypothesis is the simplest that one could formulate: someone must have stolen Jesus’ body. Thus, the first announcement that Mary makes is not the one of the Resurrection, but of a theft perpetrated by persons unknown while all Jerusalem slept.

The Gospels then tell of Magdalene’s second visit to Jesus’ sepulchre. She was stubborn! She went, she returned ... because she was not convinced! This time her step is slow and very heavy. Mary suffers twice as much: first for the death of Jesus, and then for the inexplicable disappearance of his body.

It is as she is stooping near the tomb, her eyes filled with tears, that God surprises her in the most unexpected way. John the Evangelist stresses how persistent her blindness is. She does not notice the presence of the two angels who question her, and she does not become suspicious even when she sees the man behind her, whom she believes is the custodian of the garden. Instead, she discovers the most overwhelming event in the history of mankind when she is finally called by her name: “Mary!” (v. 16).

How nice it is to think that the first apparition of the Risen One — according to the Gospels — took place in such a personal way! To think that there is someone who knows us, who sees our suffering and disappointment, who is moved with us and calls us by name. It is a law which we find engraved on many pages of the Gospel. There are many people around Jesus who search for God, but the most prodigious reality is that, long before that, in the first place there is God, who is concerned about our life, who wants to raise it, and to do this, he calls us by name, recognizing the individual face of each person. Each person is a love story that God writes on this earth. Each one of us is God’s love story. He calls each of us by our name: he knows us by name; he looks at us; he waits for us; he forgives us; he is patient with us. Is this true or not true? Each of us experiences this.

And Jesus calls her: “Mary!”: the revolution of her life, the revolution destined to transform the life of every man and every woman begins with a name which echoes in the garden of the empty sepulchre. The Gospels describe Mary’s happiness. Jesus’ Resurrection is not a joy which is measured with a dropper, but a waterfall that cascades over life. Christian life is not woven of soft joys, but of waves which engulf everything. You too, try to imagine, right now, with the baggage of disappointments and failures that each of us carries in our heart, that there is a God close to us who calls us by name and says to us: ‘Rise, stop weeping, for I have come to free you!”. This is beautiful.

Jesus is not one who adapts to the world, tolerating in it the persistence of death, sadness, hatred, the moral destruction of people.... Our God is not inert, but our God — allow me to say — is a dreamer: he dreams of the transformation of the world, and accomplished it in the mystery of the Resurrection.

Mary would like to embrace her Lord, but he is already oriented towards the heavenly Father, whereas she is sent to carry the news to the brethren. And so that woman, who, before encountering Jesus, had been at the mercy of evil (cf. Lk 8:2) now becomes the Apostle of the new and greatest hope. May her intercession also help us live this experience: in times of woe and in times of abandonment, to listen to the Risen Jesus who calls us by name and, with a heart full of joy, to go forth and proclaim: “I have seen the Lord!” (v. 18). I have changed my life because I have seen the Lord! I am now different than before. I am another person. I have changed because I have seen the Lord. This is our strength and this is our hope.

[Pope Francis, General Audience 17 May 2017]

(Mt 28:8-15)

The Gospels do not offer entirely reconcilable chronicle data about the unfolding of events after the discovery of the «empty tomb», but the Message of those traces (of the first events) is self-evident.

No mausoleum, no relics... but rather the ability to see the graves open - and to guess life amidst footsteps of death: dangerous Truth.

Hence the unleashing of engaging enthusiasm.

Two processions depart from the empty crypt: sounding Messengers of unheard-of life, though uncredited, and sepulcher guards:

Welcoming aimed at witnessing, and rejection of those who do not read the meaning-filled 'sign'.

The gendarmes of the ancient world go from pit to pit; dragging behind them the same burial chamber.

In fact, to the priests they announce the empty vault as if it were a factual little story, controllable, of mere chronicle (v.11) that then turns to rumor, to legend (v.15).

By the time Mt writes there were already fervent discussions between Jews and Christian converts from Judaism.

Believers felt fulfilled in Christ - in this way also able to spread this Word-event.

Disputes were heated: the Gospel passage places us in a reality that dragged on throughout most of the first century.

As time went on - even before the separation from the institutional synagogue - the very existence of the fraternities, their lifestyle and witness, became a denunciation against the authoritarian spirit, greed, teaching and roles of religious leaders (e.g., Acts 3:1-8).

Amidst a thousand upheavals, the new world was beginning - heralded with high forehead.

The waiting was over: one just had to be convinced of reality - no more dreaming of a future that while proceeding would return to the past, or adhere to conformity and self-interest.

Mt's beginning and ending recall each other.

Jesus is the Immanu-'El of the ancient Scriptures: God-With-us. The hope of the outcasts from the round, and of wavering ones - always given over to the mercy of others, enslaved, and subjugated.

A radical change was expected in the unlivable situation of injustice and social collapse, spiritually dull and habitual - endured by the wretched in the humiliation of the whole being.

By getting busy in the Announcement, Women do not stumble upon a packaged Christ, to be impersonally conveyed.

It is in their going the Way that a new Spirit is kindled - with the contagious jubilation of Exodus.

The Encounter with God's world becomes a decisive event because all (first without-voice) receive a fervent invitation to the preaching and living of the Beatitudes [the Mount of Galilee, v.10: the "periphery" of life resuming its normal activity; land of Jesus' ministry and disciples' following].

Now as limpid, complete and pure protagonists to whom the Mystery does not resist. 

In short, for us: if someone does not take the field but shuns, does not transmit, or considers neutral the News of the victory of life over death, it is in danger of becoming a humbug, nonsense.

Instead, now it is the Risen One who comes to meet the revived ones (v.9) - just as he had done with the one born blind (Jn 9:35).

We are no longer the excommunicated, or prolongers of the tombs’ world, nor the merely awakened.

We are those who convey impetus, verve, character, a sense of fullness and Mystery that saves - heralds of open contradiction.

Progeny springing not from the grave, but from God's world - the source of indestructible being, in which we finally stand firm.

«Rejoice!» (v.9).

In community, cheerfulness for the sense of personal esteem and relational depth related to the new pattern of life overcomes fears.

The first realities of communion [the «Women»] make their own the same Path of the Master [clasping and worshiping his «Feet»].

A conscious and autonomous proposal arises.

The Announcement of a startling experience is born: in the Living One we are ourselves, and the Gift of self - whatever it may be, even previously despised - produces personal completeness and coexistence.

He who spends what he authentically is, values his story: he does not waste existence, but recovers, realizes and sublimates it.

New people flourish, inwardly reborn and no longer left to their own devices.

Seeing far ahead and proceeding in the same 'footsteps' as the Lord, all the unsteady ones overcame the sense of unworthiness inculcated by ancient religion.

Aware of esteem, personal quality, and other resources, the early believers immediately demonstrated a marked aptitude for frankness.

Even the little ones gained courage - recovering the opposite sides of themselves. And no longer suffocated by fears of bogus authority, capable only of retaliation.

Obviously the ancient world wanted to perpetuate itself, and defended itself with pirouettes and lies. As still today, by handing out favours (vv.12-15).

To internalize and live the message:

What inner and outer powers accentuate the disturbances and fight your ability to proclaim the Good News?

Angel of Counsel and ministers of Christ

However the Angel of the Resurrection also calls to mind another meaning. Indeed, we must remember that as well as describing Angels, spiritual creatures endowed with intelligence and a will, servants and messengers of God, the term "Angel" is also one of the most ancient titles attributed to Jesus himself. We read, for example, in Tertullian: "He", that is, Christ, "was also the «Angel of counsel», that is, a herald, a term that denotes an office rather than a nature. Effectively he was to proclaim to the world the Father's great plan for the restoration of man" (cf. De Carne Christi, 14). This is what the ancient Christian writer said. Jesus Christ, the Son of God was therefore also called the "Angel of God the Father": he is the Messenger par excellence of God's love. Dear friends, let us now consider what the Risen Jesus said to the Apostles: "As the Father has sent me, even so I send you" (Jn 20: 21); and he communicated his Holy Spirit to them. This means that just as Jesus was the herald of God the Father's love, we too must be heralds of Christ's charity: let us be messengers of his Resurrection, of his victory over evil and death, heralds of his divine love.
By our nature, of course, we remain men and women, but we have received the mission of "Angels", messengers of Christ.

(Pope Benedict, Regina Coeli, April 5, 2010)

[Easter Monday, April 6, 2026]