FIRST READING: Acts 10: 34; 37-43. Peter opened his mouth and said: “You know the word which was proclaimed throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee after the baptism which John preached: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. And we are witnesses to all that he did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and made him manifest; not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. And he commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that he is the one ordained by God to be judge of the living and the dead. To him all the prophets bear witness that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”
SECOND READING: Colossians 3:1-4. If you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
GOSPEL: John 20:1-9. On the first day of the week Mary Magdalene came to the tomb early, while it was still dark, and saw that the stone had been taken away from the tomb. So she ran, and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Peter then came out with the other disciple, and they went toward the tomb. They both ran, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first, and stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb; he saw the linen cloths lying, and the napkin, which had been on his head, not lying with the linen cloths but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed for as yet they did not know the scripture, that he must rise from the dead.
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Peter gives the synopsis of Jesus’ public life and mission in Palestine after a crucial eye-opening experience. At the moment he was at the house of Cornelius, a Roman army officer stationed in Caesarea. Peter had had a deep antipathy towards pagans like Cornelius, and had never entered a pagan household. Even after his long acquaintance with Jesus, he nonetheless continued to be victim of the chauvinism and intolerance conveyed to him by the Jewish priests and scribes. His understanding of what ‘People of God’ meant was overpoweringly sectarian. By inviting Peter from Joppa to Caesarea, the pagan Cornelius—a good-living man, and a believer in the God of the Jews as the true God—prompted Peter to recognize the universality of Jesus’ message, death and resurrection, and announce them to him. In a way, through this experience Peter himself ‘buried’ his old prejudices and outlook, and ‘resurrected’ the new life in Jesus.
This ‘burying-resurrecting’ image is taken up also by Paul. He links the image to baptism, which in those days was administered by immersion. Paul proclaims that being ‘buried’ with Jesus meant laying to rest the old values contrary to Jesus’ philosophy and spirituality. Correspondingly, being ‘resurrected’ with Jesus meant taking up Jesus’ new vision, beliefs and attitude. Jesus and the Christian are heralds of a new social and political order.
The gospel narrative proclaims this new order. John presents three equal witnesses to it: Mary Magdalene, Peter and John. Mary represents the dispossessed (as a woman she had no social, political, religious or legal significance whatsoever), Peter the institutional aspect of the Church, and John the prophetic aspect of the Church. The three of them, together and equal unto each other, bear witness to Jesus’ revolution. Easter is the celebration of Jesus’ continuing reality and call to the transformation of the world.
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