Today’s readings give directly, the Good News of Jesus’ glorious resurrection from the dead; and indirectly, a picture of the Church and her Scriptures that is both admirable and reassuring.
Let us look at the Gospel reading first, which tells us about the Apostles Peter and John, and the appearance of the tomb with its contents, along with a passing mention of Mary Magdalen and the previously opened (by whom??) entrance to the tomb. However, all that we are told about what might have happened to Jesus is to be deduced from the following few words:
As yet, they did not understand the Scripture, that He must rise from the dead.
None of that is very surprising, People of God, to us who believe; because we know and appreciate that the Resurrection was a supernatural and transcendentally holy occurrence to serve God’s glory and mankind’s salvation, not an intriguingly mysterious event staged for the titillation of human curiosity. Let us therefore turn our attention to what we are told directly about the Apostles Peter and (presumably) John, and indirectly about holy Mother Church, her Scriptures, and her proclamation of Jesus.
On hearing from Mary Magdalene about the
empty tomb, Peter and the other disciple went to see for themselves:
Both of them were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. And stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths there, but did not go in. When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there; and the cloth that had covered His head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place.
The order of precedence is important
because some have tried to use the following words of the Gospel account to the
detriment of Peter:
Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed.
They have carpingly picked up on the fact that John is there reported to have seen ‘and believed’, whereas Peter is only said to have seen. This enhancing of John at Peter’s expense is shown in other ways by those who would say that John showed the greater courage at Jesus’ trial, by going into the High Priest’s house, whereas Peter remained fearfully outside. And, of course, John – alone of the Apostles – stood by Jesus’ cross on Calvary with Mary.
None of this special pleading, however, detracts from Peter or disturbs the faithful who are well aware that John was a very young man who could lean on Jesus’ chest at the Supper, someone whom the Temple guards or Roman soldiers would not have regarded as a possible threat; Peter, on the other hand, was known to be strong Galilean fisherman who had a sword which he had already used in an attempt to protect Jesus. As a result, the fully adult and manifestly strong ‘man-of-business’ was under far greater threat at the trial and thereafter, than John.
There is, I believe, further thought
to be given to the difference between Peter and John, between the fully mature
man and the gentle youth, John.
Simon Peter came, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen cloths lying there, and the
face cloth, which had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen cloths
but folded up in a place by itself.
Then the other disciple, who had reached the tomb first, also went in, and
he saw and believed.
John – who would become the great mystic among the Apostles and author of the supremely spiritual Gospel – was youthfully impressed by the atmosphere of the tomb and what he saw there, especially the cloth -- that had been used out of respect for the deceased to prevent the bottom jaw of Jesus from sagging – which was carefully rolled up in its own place, separate from the other cloths. Had he, John, ever seen one of those before? It is not outlandish to guess that, as a youngster with mystic inclinations, John might have seen and appreciated much in that ‘removed and separately-positioned cloth’ which would later stir him to deeply consider the ‘never-to-be-silenced’ aspect of Jesus’ Gospel preaching in his own unique writings
Peter however, who -- as leader of the Apostles -- was also being graced for that supremely responsible future role to be his, as head of the Church, carefully weighed up what he found in the tomb. He then went away, undoubtedly recalling what Jesus had said and done since he had known Him, and what the Jewish Scriptures had foretold about the coming Messiah. Again and again he would have gone over all these considerations together with what he had seen in the empty tomb, praying so, so much, that he might appreciate how such insights would come together into the one whole, and essential, Apostolic truth about Jesus.
Thanks to our first reading today we have the result of Peter’s thinking and praying, for there he proclaims the Good News, about Jesus, at the ‘command of God’ and in the name of the Church:
(Cornelius said) We are all here, in the
presence of God, to hear all that you (Peter) have been commanded
by the Lord.
Peter then gave his summary of the
Good News about Jesus:
He went about doing good and healing all those oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him. And we are witnesses of all that He did both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put Him to death by hanging Him on a tree. But God raised Him on the third day and caused Him to appear, not to all the people, but to us, who had been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with Him after He rose from the dead. And He commanded us to preach to the people and testify that He is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. To Him all the prophets bear witness, that everyone who believes in Him will receive forgiveness of sins through His name.
There, People of God, you can appreciate the wonder of Jesus pictured and proclaimed by Mother Church through Peter, under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit: with the Resurrection of Jesus as the centre-piece --the absolutely essential centre-piece indeed -- but nevertheless, a piece that fits into, and binds together, an even more wonderful and coherent mosaic of divine truth: giving us a sublime presentation of God’s goodness, love, wisdom, and mercy for the whole of sinful mankind through all ages.
John, the contemplative, understood and revealed
most beautiful and intimate truths of the relationship of love between Jesus
and His Father, truths in which one can immerse ones-self – not to proudly
investigate, but – to most humbly and gratefully admire, and hopefully imbibe
some of the heavenly honey contained there. For the whole picture, however, in
all its majestic embrace of God’s goodness and mankind’s needs and possibilities,
look to Peter and the proclamation of Mother Church, passed down to us and interpreted
for us today by St. Paul, the most providential link between the wisdom of the
Old, and the revelation of the New, Testaments, and our own, special, guide — as Doctor of the Nations – to a right
understanding of the fulness of the Church’s doctrinal truth and heavenly
spirituality:
If then you were raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ Is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.
