A PILGRIM’S NOTES: EASTER IS JOY!

FAUSTO GOMEZ OP

Every Easter I am joyfully surprised by the attitude of Jesus’ disciples after the Pentecost experience. The first Christians are a happy people. Two qualities adorn their lives: the joy of their faith in the Crucified and Risen Lord and the courage to suffer persecution for his sake. When I was a young student I could not understand why some of my teachers appeared to be sad.

Joy is a passion and an emotion of the human person. It stands for true satisfaction and delight, for the gladness produced by goodness, beauty, God. Pope Francis underlines this joy in his Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, or The Joy of the Gospel (2013). How can Christians not be joyful? We believe that God is our Father, Jesus is our savior and brother, and the Holy Spirit, our advocate and consoler. Christian joy is a shared joy: We are all brothers and sisters. Fraternal/sisterly love increases our personal joy: “When many rejoice together, the joy of each is richer; they warm themselves at each other’s flame” (St. Augustine).

Believers with others rejoice contemplating God’s creation: “The hillsides are wrapped in joy, the meadows are covered with flocks, the valleys clothed with wheat; they shout and sing for joy” (Ps 65: 12-13). Joy is one of the fruits and blessings of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22).

If we go through the main events of the life of Jesus we feel the presence of joy in his life and message. Contemplate the Annunciation to Mary: “The angel came to her and said: ‘Rejoice, full of grace, the Lord is with you’” (Lk 1:28). The Visitation of Mary: How is it, Elizabeth says, “that the mother of the Lord comes to me? The moment your greeting sounded in my ears, the baby within me suddenly moved for joy” (Lk 1:44). The angel announcing to the shepherds the Birth of Jesus: “Don’t be afraid; I am here to give you good news, great joy for all the people. Today a Savior has been born to you” (Lk 2:10-11 and 20).We perceive the joy of Zacchaeus welcoming Jesus to his house (Lk 19:6). The lovely parables of the lost show the joy of the Father in heaven over the found sheep, silver pieces and prodigal son: “Let us rejoice and celebrate for my younger son has come back home” (see Lk 15:6, 9, 32.

The core of Jesus’ preaching is The Beatitudes, which are eight forms of happiness: Happy are the poor in spirit, the merciful, and the peacemakers – and even those who mourn! The path presented to us by Jesus is the path of joy and happiness, and not the path of wealth, of pleasure and power but the path of spiritual poverty. Therefore, Jesus tells us, “Be glad and rejoice!”(Mt 5:12). In truth, the Beatitudes say to us: “O the bliss of being a Christian, the joy of following Christ” (W. Barclay).

Jesus calls sinners to conversion, which causes joy – joy in the sinner, in the community and in heaven: “I tell you, there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one repentant sinner than over ninety-nine upright people who have no need of repentance” (Lk 15:10).

Jesus is conversing with his apostles during the Last Supper. He is going to be crucified and die the next day Good Friday.  He tells them that God loves them, that they are the branches attached to the vine, that is, to him. Jesus adds: “I have told you this so that my own joy may be in you and your joy be complete” (Jun 15: 11). A little later in the evening, and after announcing to them his departure, He tells them: “You are sad now, but I shall see you again, and your hearts will be full of joy and that joy no one can take away from you” (Jn 16:22).

There is great joy in the presence of the Risen Lord: “They were still incredulous for sheer joy and wonder” (Lk 24:41). There is wonderful joy in the disciples after witnessing the Ascension of Christ: “As he blessed, he left them, and was taken up to heaven, they fell down to do him reverence, then returned to Jerusalem filled with joy” (Lk 24:52).

After the Resurrection of Christ, the apostles preached the Gospel with great courage and joy. They were often persecuted, imprisoned, flogged for doing so. They were “glad for having had the honor of suffering humiliation for the sake of the name” (Ac 5:41). What name? Jesus our Lord! Indeed, the Resurrection of the Lord is joy! The converts of Paul and Barnabas “were filled with joy and the Holy Spirit” (Ac 13:51). The jailer of Paul and Silas in Philippi rejoiced with his whole household at having received the gift of faith in God (cf. Ac 16:34). After baptizing the Ethiopian eunuch, Philip was snatched away by the Spirit and disappeared, “but the eunuch continued on his way rejoicing” (Ac 8:39).

How did the first Christian communities experience Christ’s Resurrection?  By being faithful, joyful and passionately in love with the Crucified and Risen Lord: “They remained faithful to the teaching of the apostles, to fraternity, to the breaking of the bread, and to prayer… They shared their food gladly and generously; they praised God and were looked up to by everyone”! (Ac, 2:42, 46-47).

Pascal says: “No one is as happy as an authentic Christian” or, we may add, as an authentic believer or an authentic human being! Are there many authentic Christians? Mary Our Lady rejoices: “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (Lk 1: 46-47). The saints are true Christians and that is why they are all joyful: “The saints rejoiced all their lives long, like men at a feast” (St. Athanasius).

The disciples to Emmaus are sad. They have a reason to be sad: they believe Jesus is dead. What is bad is that those who believe that Jesus rose from the dead are sad (J. L. Martin Descalzo). Christians who are sad, Bonhoeffer says, have not understood the Resurrection, the joy of the resurrection! “It is impossible to be sad in the presence of the Risen Lord” (Schillebeeckx). No wonder, the monk and theologian Evagrius Ponticus (4^th century) added, to the traditional seven capital sins, the eighth capital sin: sadness.

What is the main cause of Christian joy? True love is the source of real happiness and joy. Love is joyful. Indeed charity as love of God and of all neighbors causes real joy: Love is, with peace and mercy, an internal act of charity.  You and I ask: Why should we rejoice always? Life is full of sufferings and pains and violence and injustice! Why should we? Because in spite of our miseries God loves us, and Jesus heals us, and the Holy Spirit consoles and strengthens us! Disciples of Jesus through the centuries even when persecuted and martyred were and are “full of joy” (Ac 5:41).

Life, our life on earth is also visited by suffering. Suffering, however, is not opposed to happiness: “It makes me happy to suffer for you” (Col1:24). There is a time to mourn: “Blessed are those who mourn; they shall be comforted” (Mt 5:4). When we are hurting, Jesus our Savior, brother and friend invites us to come to him: “Come to me all you who are weary and find life burdensome, and I will refresh you” (Mt 11:28). Suffering is part of our life, yes, but suffering is not the word that gives meaning to our life: love is. And love, only love can make suffering light, joyful and hopeful. One of my favorite priest writers is José Luis Martin Descalzo who passed away at sixty after years in dialysis. He wrote: “I confess that I never ask God that he cures my sickness. This would seem to me an abuse of trust. I ask him, yes, that He helps me bear my suffering with joy.” To the Ten Commandments, Descalzo adds the eleventh: “Be joyful.” The poet and mystic Rabindranath Tagore writes: I was sleeping and dreamed that life was joyful; I woke up and saw that life was service; I began to serve and saw that serving was joy.

The virtue of loving hope is permeated by joy: “Be joyful in hope” (Rom 12:12). Hope is the virtue of the pilgrim. We are pilgrims on the way to our Father’s house. We cannot be perfectly joyful here on earth, but we are certainly joyful already because God’s love is in our hearts. Love is hopeful: we believe in heaven, in eternal life as the object of our hope and the end of our longing (cf. 1 Jn 2:25). We strongly believe that we shall be outrageously happy in the life to come – after a happy ending! On the way, we truly rejoice because we believe, love and hope.

We Christians are Easter People and Alleluia is our song! On the journey of life, St. Augustine invites us to sing joyfully with him: “Let us sing now… in order to lighten our labors. Sing but continue your journey, making progress in virtue, faith and right living.” He adds: “Make sure that your life sings the same tune as your mouth.”

We joyfully hope and pray that Jesus will tell us at the end of our earthly pilgrimage: “Come, share your master’s joy” (Mt 25:21-23).

(Published in O Clarim, The Macau Catholic Weekly, April 8, 2016)