EASTER’s WITNESSes

March 31, 2024 – Easter Sunday

Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/033124.cfm)

Today Christians proclaim to the whole world: “Alleluia, the Lord has risen, indeed. Alleluia.”

Our gospel today proclaims that on that Easter morning, the apostles found the tomb where Jesus was buried, open and empty. Inside the burial tomb, though the burial cloths are still around, the dead body of Jesus is not there and nowhere to be found.  Strange it may be, finding the tomb open and empty, for the apostles it means that what Jesus preached them are true indeed: “Jesus Christ has risen”.

On that very Easter morning, they gladly witness for themselves the Lord’s resurrection. There and then, they have seen and believed in Jesus’ promise and message of Hope to Life with God. On that day, they became dedicated believers and migrant missionary messengers of God’s offer of resurrection to life.  In effect, their very lives and our lives now change for the better.

Easter always announces to the whole world a message of hope in life. Through the resurrection of our Lord, God has given and offers us anew Holiness of LIFE with Him. Easter proclaims that our life in the world today is and can be better and meaningful as we believe in the Good News that our Lord Jesus Christ has risen again into our lives today and always.

There is hope then for a much better and meaningful life for the world now, as we Christians live our lives in faith with the risen Lord.

Also for this message of Hope in Life to grow and flourish in our lives today, we Christians are challenged to bear witness and share our faith in the risen Lord to all nations. Like the disciples, our Christian witness of faith in the risen Lord makes us also migrant sharers and messengers of resurrection in life with God to all.

As Peter proclaims, our witness of faith compels us Christians as chosen and commissioned by God to preach and testify to all nations God’s offer of new risen life with Him through Christ.  By our Christian faith-witness, we offer and share to our world today a message of hope for life with our risen Lord Jesus Christ.

In one of his early homilies, Pope Francis once said: “Today’s world stands in great need of witnesses. It is not so much about speaking but rather speaking with our whole lives”. Here our Holy Father Pope Francis gives importance for us today’s Christians to be witnesses and messengers of Christ’s resurrection to today’s world.

While in the midst of the world’s widespread culture of despair & death, we, Christians are blessed to have our faith in the resurrection of the Lord for us to share and offer to the world as alternative better way for the world and people’s life. Thus, it is our moral mandate and responsibility as Christian witness to share God’s offer of hope to life in our world today. 

To be and have Migrant Filipino Catholics here & abroad today brings great opportunity for the world to witness (to taste and see) God’s offer of life with the risen Lord. While others may perceived it as social issue or concern, the reality of migrants and refugees in the world can be the chance for us Filipino Catholics to do our part in proclaiming and sharing our faith in the Lord’s resurrection to our world today.

Same way as church persecution brought the Lord’s disciples to become migrant missionary messengers of Lord’s good news of salvation to all nations, our experience of migrations and refugees in today’s world gives us Christians also a chance to share our Christian faith to the world and with one another.

Again Pope Francis appreciates the great potential of having and being migrants in our midst may offer to our world today. He said: “We ourselves need to see, and then to enable others to see that migrants and refugees do not represent a problem to be solved, but brothers and sisters to be welcomed, respected and loved.” Instead of dealing the reality as social concern or problem, Pope Francis invites us here to realize that having and being migrants and refugees with our lives can bring about a time of grace for inculturation and evangelization – for exchanging our faith with one another and sharing such Christian faith with others and to the whole world.

Thus, having migrants and refugees with us obliges us to make Christ known to them by our welcome, love, and concern through our unique life of faith & culture. As well as being Christian migrants and refugees in a foreign culture calls for testifying and sharing one’s unique Christian faith to the new culture. And such sharing of faith and life-witness among us Christian both migrant and resident, make other non-Christians also witness (taste and see) the risen Lord in their own lives and our world today.

Brothers and Sister, Christians as we are – resident or migrant we may be, we have a message of hope to share to the whole world. We proclaim to the whole world today: “Alleluia. The Lord has risen, indeed. Alleluia.

May we never grow tired but be inspired and empowered to become migrant missionary messengers of God’s offer of meaningful life to our world today with the risen Lord. Amen.