We are still within
the Octave of Easter. The Resurrection is still fresh in the experience of the
Apostles. It should be ours as well. Sadly, all around, we are reminded that we
might still be in the tomb. So, let us focus on what the Resurrection is and
what it implies for us.
Have you watched DC’s
Justice League of 2017? There you get a glimpse of the “resurrection”. Superman
has died and the world is deep in disturbance. Fuelled by the selfless
sacrifice of Superman, Bruce Wayne, our Batman makes a stand against the evil
forces of Steppenwolf bent on retrieving the three Mother Boxes. But then,
Batman cannot do it without Superman. So, with his newly-formed band of
superheroes—Wonder Woman, Aquaman, The Flash and Cyborg, they devise a way to
bring Superman back. Using one of the Mother Boxes, they managed to
“resurrect” Superman.
That is where the
analogy ends.
Superman was revived.
He was not resurrected. Much like Lazarus when he was brought back to life.
Both Lazarus and Superman are a type of Christ, but both needed to be revived.
Even the mighty Superman who is formidable needed outside help to return. If
anything, Superman’s revival shows us how stupendous the Resurrection is. It is
beyond this world.
Today we catch the
Resurrected Christ appearing to His disciples behind closed doors. He alone is
the Risen one because He rose through His own power. He fulfilled the challenge
He issued to the authorities: “Destroy this temple and in three days I
will raise it up again”. The Resurrection was not the result of the
Apostles’ faith. It was not because they believed in the Resurrection that it
was so. Rather, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, their many
experiences of Jesus after His death paved a path for them to embrace the reality
of the Resurrection.
The Resurrection is
ultimately a statement about the human body. It is not easy to accept that the
human body can be raised to life. If Lazarus, the son of the widow of Nain,
Jairus’ daughter or even Superman have anything to teach us, it is that they
are merely foretastes of the Resurrection.
However, our current
cosmology is scientifically based. It is not established on a foundation of
abracadabra or magic. There is no place in science for this possibility. Dead
means dead. The truth is, then and now, ever since the Fall, humanity has
struggled with the idea of the Resurrection. Man has grappled with the
feasibility that fallen humanity can be raised from the dead. In one shape or
another, we have contended with the practicality of salvation. One of the
earliest forms was the Gnostics who rejected created flesh as a worthy vehicle
for salvation. How could God take upon Himself fallen flesh? The Resurrection
is not necessary for salvation, hidden knowledge is.
In our days, a subtle
indicator of the rejection of the Resurrection is to be gleaned from the
dystopian movies and series available. Dystopia is the unacknowledged stepchild
of the Culture or Civilisation of Death. It is an apocalypse that projects
despair and desperation into our future. Hence, in place of The Lord of
the Rings, we have The Game of Thrones. In place of
angels welcoming us, we have zombies falling over themselves trying to eat us
alive. There you have it, a grim a picture of a future doomed to hell.
The belief in the
Resurrection belongs to the cosmic battle that is taking place and if are
unaware of it, then we are merely pawns. But if we are, then our task is to
enrol ourselves as soldiers. Firstly, as soldiers, we do not die. No. it does
not mean that there is no death. War memorials to the fallen soldiers are
testimonies that soldiers live on in memory and in a way, they represent
eternity. As a symbol of the Resurrection, a monument to the dead reminds us
that death is not the end of our story.
Secondly, as
soldiers, the cosmic conflict we are embroiled in, can be observed in the war
on humanity that seeks to render humanness, meaning, that which makes us
essentially human, a danger. We have been introduced to the ultimate anxiety of
the 21st century, that is, man is the virus. In Gen 2;7, when God
fashioned man out of dust, He breathed into his nostrils a breath of life.
Today’s Gospel has Jesus breathing on His apostles. The human breath which
stands as the biblical metaphor for life has become death. In Covid-19,
everyone is now potentially my death. Ironically, social distancing, which
seeks to preserve life actually proclaims rather loudly death’s potentiality: “Stay
away just in case you become my death”.
The war on humanness
has implications for our Sacraments as we see even now. The cancellation of
Masses is just one of them. The Sacraments are ritualised expressions of the
Incarnation. When God took on human flesh, He made it possible for us to
receive Him through the instrumentality or mediation of creation—hence, water,
oil, bread, wine, and the human person of the priest. Mediation is concrete and
real. It is not immediate or virtual because humanness by its nature is
“contactual”. For example, artisanal bakers or pasta/ramen makers and in our
case, the roti canai man. When they make the bread or ramen or prata with their
hands, what does that mean? Are we just eating bread, ramen or prata or could
there also be some skin shedding from the hands of the person who makes them?
The whole idea of
eating a piece of bread with the baker’s skin shedding or perhaps added with
his dripping sweat is rather revolting. We might not look at the artisanal
bread, ramen, or a roti canai in the same way again. But, if you think about
it, there is that much of “cannibalism” involved in these processes that they
make the Eucharist rather tame by comparison; eating the Body of Christ is not
revolting as anti-Catholics would suggest. Not that we are eating the skin of
Jesus or anything of that sort in the Eucharist but rather that there is humanness
involved when we interact with one another. In fact, the Body of Christ
contains the full humanity of Jesus more than the “humanness” that goes into
making of bread, ramen or canai.
On Friday 17th
April, the Pope warned of the danger that we may lose sight of the communal
dimension of Christian life. What is this “communal dimension” if not the mass
or sea of humanity? Life-streamed Masses are good because we seek a familiarity
with God, but this familiarity is communal in nature. It is intimate, it is
personal, but it is also communal. Otherwise, it is private and close to
Gnosticism when detached from the community.
Covid-19 reveals that
we may be living two separate lives. One which holds the belief in the
Resurrection. It is official and we profess it. But, in reality, it functions
like a social convention since Christianity is based on the Resurrection but it
does not have much of an impact on us. The other life which is more central to
how we behave is that we do not believe that there is more to life after death.
We have become so afraid of dying that the Resurrection makes no sense at all.
Whether or not Jesus rose from the dead is immaterial because there is no
humanity to save.
Without denigrating
the difficulties and the sacrifices of the men and women in the frontline who
are battling with Covid-19, the ban on religious services, in the case of
Catholicism, merely highlights this social veneer of the Resurrection. In this
climate of suspicion of anything that is human, what meaning does the
Resurrection have? It has none. Without our humanity, what is there to talk
about the Resurrection?
Today is Mercy
Sunday—a reminder that Christ entered the human situation in order to save it.
We are worth His Incarnation. He did not die for rubbish. He died for man so
that we can enjoy the Resurrection. We are worth His dying for as He is worth
our living for. This war on humanity readily viralises man, the Church, and the
Sacraments. Both the Church and the Sacraments are concrete expressions of the Incarnation
and therefore they touch on our humanness. According to Pope Francis, “This is
the Church of a difficult situation, which the Lord allows but the ideal of the
Church is always with the people and with the Sacraments”. The Church was sent
by the Risen Christ to the teeming masses of humanity; not to hide in the cave
of the isolation. So, let us pray for the end to this seclusion so that we can
come out of the tomb and once again, through His Church, be touched by the Lord
in His Sacraments.
