Easter Sunday

Lectionary: 42

This man God raised on the third day and granted that he be visible,
not to all the people, but to us,
the witnesses chosen by God in advance,
who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.

So which is more important, Christmas or Easter? The question might generate lively discussion at your family gathering. 
If the secular symbols of Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny were dismissed out of hand, and the debate were confined to religious importance for Christians, the two feasts might be more balanced. If the debaters had to be regular church-goers the balance might tip toward Easter. If practicing Catholics checked the calendar, as the Easter party would insist, they would find the Easter cycle is 90 days long; whereas Christmas is, at best, about forty. 
Some would argue that God could not redeem what he has not created already, thus favoring Christmas. But what would be the point of creation without redemption? 
Many Franciscans prefer Christmas because, we argue, God intended to enter human life as the Incarnate Son from the very beginning. God could not have remained remote from his gorgeous world until after Adam's sin. Surely he intended to be born of the Virgin Mary since time immemorial.  
But Easter is God's crowning achievement. We could not have known the Infinite Love of God without Jesus' display of perfect love on Calvary. Though his love is manifest in the wonder of the universe -- and continues to grow more manifest as we explore our world -- we could not imagine how deep that love would go until we saw it penetrating the darkest shadows of human existence. Sin became that "happy fault" which revealed the mysterious, unfathomable abyss of human depravity; and Easter revealed the infinite mercy of God. 
The debate about Christmas and Easter may be like the sound of one hand clapping. But it's a koan that actually takes us somewhere. 

The passage above, from the Acts of the Apostles, reveals another enigma about Easter. Some thoughtful people have challenged the Church, "If God wanted us to believe in Jesus why did he appear only "to us, the witnesses chosen by God in advance?" Shouldn't he have appeared to his tormentors; to Pilate and Herod and the high priests and the screaming mobs who taunted him on Good Friday? Shouldn't he appear in every age to scorners and doubters, as he did to Saint Thomas? 

The answer, as unsatisfying as it might be for debaters, is faith. Seeing is not believing. Believing penetrates far more deeply the abyss of human sin. The skeptic who sees the Risen Lord is not so blessed as the one, like the Beloved Disciple who sees the empty tomb and believes. 
Belief, unlike seeing, works slowly, like a penetrating oil. If I am working with a rusted bolt locked into a corroded nut, slathering it with oil resolves the problem only with more time and effort. Eventually the lock will break, as the oil seeps into every microscopic crack my efforts open. 
For us, that means a lifetime of effort. But, fortunately, the work gets easier as we experience success. Frozen immobility gives way to creeping progress which finally becomes total freedom. 

Catholics pore over the Acts of the Apostles throughout the Easter Season. There we see the penetrating power of faith to liberate terrified men and women. Those who fled the Garden of Gethsemane will follow Jesus into the torture chambers and riotous Coliseums of the Roman Empire. 

As we see Europe and North America descending into a "post-Christian, post-family" era, and given more and more to coarse entertainment and incivility, the Christian remains within the Church and shout, "This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad. Alleluia."