Archbishop of Sydney

His Eminence,
Cardinal George Pell
Cardinal Priest of the Title of S. Maria Domenica Mazzarello

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Home > Our Archbishop > Homilies 2003 > Article	Printable Version

Easter Sunday

St Mary's Cathedral

By + Cardinal George Pell
Archbishop of Sydney
20 April 2003

"May the light of Christ, rising in glory dispel the darkness of our hearts and minds."
"By his holy & glorious wounds may Christ Our Lord guard us and keep us."

These are two beautiful prayers from the Easter Vigil service. They sum up the extreme claims of mainline Christians, of the Catholic Church at Easter.

Jesus, as Son of God, stripped himself of his power and allowed the forces of evil to make him suffer and then to kill him. Not only did he die, the universal human fate, but he died in pain and in disgrace. That was on the first Good Friday.

His resurrection is a sign that the hard times for him are over. But it is also a fantastic claim that death is not the end of the human story, that goodness will eliminate evil in the next life, that God raised his only Son from the dead.

I believe that human reason can take us most, if not all the distance, towards a Creator God, using the beauty, patterns of order and goal-directed development of evolution. But belief in the resurrection requires faith. The resurrection of Christ has been believed from the beginning by those who saw the post-Resurrection Lord. They were prepared to die for this belief. His opponents were not able to produce any body to disapprove the claim. But these are not scientific claims.

Christians also affirm that the resurrection is a sign that Christ is the Redeemer of all creation; all men and women; the earth, the planets and stars in every galaxy. A mighty claim.

But we celebrate this Easter with our nation at war in Iraq. The Australian military involvement is small in comparison with that of U.S.A. and Britain, and our personal suffering - we have no reported casualties so far - is nothing in comparison with the soldiers and civilians killed and wounded on the battlefields. Thousands are dead.

Especially in a time of war with its violence and suffering, which always embraces some civilians as well as the hapless soldiers, this Christian claim that Jesus Christ was a redeemer can strike outsiders as bizarre, and strike us in a way that is different from such a claim in times of peace and easy prosperity.

Once again we have to recognise that the world is not the way we would like it. The cosmic flaw that also runs through the human heart confronts us. There have always been wars. As weapons of mass destruction become more and more available to lawless nations, tribes and even fanatical individuals, what grim future lies ahead? Such a world, our world, needs a redeemer. And the 20th century saw more tyrants than any other time, who decided to set things right, their way, and made the situation worse.

But, a sceptic might claim, if Christ has redeemed the world he has not done a very good job. We have many blessings, especially in this country, but personal suffering continues even in prosperity and occasional outbursts of murderous violence recur tenaciously. How is Christ a redeemer?

Mainline Christians believe Jesus Christ is Son of God as well as Mary's Son, and the first plank in our claim that he is our Redeemer recognises that Christ suffered too. He lived in our mess, in a society much closer to Saddam's fascist regime of poverty, violence and injustice than ours. Millions, indeed probably billions of people have found even this much to be a consolation when they are at their lowest ebb.

Most Australians do not know too much about their distant ancestors, further back beyond 100 to 150 years ago. We know a lot about Jesus' ancestors, many of whom were crude, passionate and thoroughly disreputable people. Even the great King David was a man of intrigue and violence; successful intrigue and violence. Rehoboam, Ahab and Jezebel, Jehu, Athaliah, Manasseh and Amon were all violent criminals. The good God has often used evil and muddle for his purposes.

The second distinctive element in the Christian claim is that Christ redeemed through his suffering and death, which was one essential element in the ultimate triumph of love. That is the whole message of Holy Week as it moves to its triumphant conclusion.

History and world today show that Christ's redemption is incomplete, or a fiction. But this is only the first part of the action. We believe Christ will return at the end of time, not to take vengeance on his persecutors, but to offer forgiveness for those who repent of their evil and turn towards love and light. The possibility of Godly forgiveness is a fruit of the Son of God's redeeming activity, a major cause for our hope.

Christians have a peculiar attitude to suffering which helps explain why the cross and the crucifix are the best known Christian symbols. I repeat that Christians believe good can come from suffering and in fact, that Christ redeemed us, through his failure and rejection, his suffering and death, not in spite of them. As followers of Christ we are called to be agents in completing the redemption, using our failures as well as our successes. We can make up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ. We can in fact extend the warm hand of God to others.

Christ was crucified between two thieves. One repented and was offered eternal life. We should make his prayer to Christ our own: "Remember me when you come into your kingdom". His prayer was heard. The first Easter made that possible. "The power of this holy (feast) dispels all evil, washes guilt away, restores lost innocence, brings mourners joy; it casts out hatred, brings us peace, and humbles earthly pride". This is our Easter claim. This is how we are blessed in Christ.

So I pray as began, that the light of Christ, rising in glory, may dispel the darkness of our hearts and minds so that we may live worthy of the mysteries we celebrate.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen