This is my 63rd Easter and after having gone through most of these participating in one way or another, I'm pretty much convinced that Easter doesn't work very well. So, I'd like to try to talk about why I don't think it works very well and what might make it work better. If you look at all of the great festivals we celebrate, - the feast of All Saints has become an occasion for little kids to go around with pillowcases collecting candy; Christmas is marginally better we can deal with babies and that's part of what Christmas is about at least. But Easter, we're stymied by and large. We can do with bunny rabbits and colored eggs. But once you get beyond that, I'm not so sure.

There is a pattern in the way we've domesticated, and in a certain sense, denatured these great Christian feasts, in that we've taken what is familiar and basically, non-threatening, and latched onto that, and then forgotten the rest. Even in the seminary, where my uneasiness began. The seminary ceremonies were impeccable. Beautifully executed. Not a misstep. Yet it was very clear, in the course of sitting through these ceremonies, that we were far more worried about not making any missteps or making sure that no one else did. This became a substitute for what it was we were supposed to be celebrating. It's a puzzling kind of thing. But then, I take some comfort. If Easter has to do with the heart of our Christianity, if Easter has to do with, therefore, the most fundamental choices and expectations we have of our human existence, it is not so surprising that we don't do very well by it. I mean if you sit back and try to think of every time, in your life, when you tried to draw from yourself an articulation of what is deepest and most significant to you - how awkwardly and gracelessly we bring that off. Think of our responses, for instance, when somebody says to us (and we believe them) that they love us. For the most part, we're flummoxed. Or think of the time when we’ve tried to say to another person that we love them and we want to say it with all the power and persuasiveness and depth and reality that is in us, to communicate that to somebody else. We don't do it very well, I think. Think of the times when I want to say I really do forgive you. Or maybe more difficult even, the times when I say to somebody else, please forgive me. The structure is the same you see. Those things that arise from what is most central and significant and real about us, we don't carry off very well. Now, let us talk about tinsel, or masks or colored eggs, and we're okay. It's manageable. But when we come to these other matters, it's much more difficult.

To proclaim that God has raised this man Jesus from the dead means what? That some kind of divine spook has gone home finally after this little masquerade that he's carried on for a few years? I'm afraid that's the kind of Easter understanding that I carried with me for years and years and years. This great charade, Jesus pretending to be a real human being. Pretending to be anguished or confused and jubilant, as I am as a human being. I could not deal with that in terms of Jesus and yet that is precisely what the Easter proclamation is about. Let me get more specific. Jesus, like all of us, was tempted to lie, to falsify himself, to cut corners, to put his best foot forward, to con those people he wanted to influence. Just like me. Only I follow through on all those temptations. The extraordinary thing about this man, he was tempted to do that, and refused to. I, who so often want to set up relationship with those people who seem desirable to me, who I want in the worst way to trust me, for example, tailor my self-image in order to accomplish that kind of bond. And Jesus was tempted to do that too. The difference between him and me is that he resisted. I, who so frequently want to run away from hard issues; I, who am so easily intimidated by so many people, by so many things in my life, cave in. Consequently, I am different from Jesus who was, I am sure, intimidated too, but he had the courage not to be overcome by his own sense of intimidation. I, who want to make so many distinctions, to choose my friends, to say who's worthy and who's unworthy of my attention. Jesus I'm sure had that inclination as well but did not. In fact, he acted in precisely the opposite direction by opening up every possible avenue to himself, to everybody that he met. This man eats with sinners! This man breaks the Sabbath regularly! This man is not a good Jew. And yet he was a supremely good Jew. It is for this reason that God raised this man, Jesus. This one dead Jew, out of so many thousands of dead Jews, even crucified dead Jews. This one dead Jew, we say, God raised. We who look at this man's career and say, that is what it is to be a human being. The standard operating procedures of evasion, of disguise, of missing the point, of finding my place in the world by oppressing others in one way or another - the ways are infinite in their variety - this man did not do that, so God raised him.

This is why Easter is so difficult. We want to believe that illumination. We want to believe that this man really does spell out our humanity in the most perfect form and yet I think, at least in myself, there is something that resists going that far. It's too good to be true. It's too good to be true. Or maybe it's because the implications for my own life, the light that this figure casts on me and my mediocre humanity, is too painful to endure. In any case, to say that God has raised this man Jesus, is to say all that. But, because it is so unparalleled in our experience, in our hopes, in our expectations, we have a very hard time dealing with it. This awkwardness is almost inevitable.

Let me finish with this little scene that John or the authors of the fourth gospel, created between Jesus and Magdalene. What is happening there? All Jesus does is say her name. What does it mean to really say another human being's name? To acknowledge them, to give them room, to say, " You really are. You really are for me and with me and I know who you are and therefore you are safe with me." So Mary says in her response, "Teacher". The one who's taught her about herself, about life, about himself. This is resurrection from the dead and this is why we can't stand to look at it too quickly, because the earth and the world rather pours into our lives and washes away the startling image of this man and the way he lived.

But that's why we're here today: to try to resist that. No, I will not have it. I will not have it. I will not settle for a truncated, abbreviated, mutilated, deformed humanity. But, as the great spiritual says - Give me Jesus!

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Created: 30 Nov 1996
© Copyright: R. Trojcak, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002
London Ontario Canada
Last Update: September 05, 2005
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