LET THE POWER OF CHRIST’S RESURRECTION TOUCH AND TRANSFORM OUR WORLD

"Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, has been raised." (Mark 6. 6)

A very desperate situation is overwhelming our world. Wherever we turn our eyes, we see the sharp-edged claws of death and destruction grindingly clasped over humanity. We see how people are left traumatized; buried beneath the unabated violence of war and the cruelty of oppression. The insatiable greed of people who are in power has robbed the future of our children and the forthcoming generations. For most people who have to struggle for survival day after day, life has become so miserable that they are left with nothing but to hope for renewal and redemption.

This hope is what we hold on as the whole of Christendom commemorates the mystery of Christ’s resurrection. We celebrate Easter as a dynamic proclamation of our faith in the resurrected Christ and in anticipation of the future when God will bring the rebirthing of the entire creation. Christ’s resurrection from the dead pours new life into our world as we are raised up to the vision of a future where God makes all things new.

This faith and hope are reasons enough to joyfully celebrate Easter. The dying and rising of Jesus is a proclamation of God’s intention to liberate the world from the clutches of death, reconciling humanity back with Him, and renewing the face of the whole inhabited world through the power of His Spirit

Easter bequeaths us with the message of Christ’s victory over death. It moves us to give witness to the redeeming love of God and to the renewing power of the Holy Spirit amidst a world fettered to despair and destruction. The spirit of Easter breaths to us the life-giving power of God’s Spirit that we may boldly confront and challenge the structures of death that overshadows humanity. The message of Christ’s resurrection emboldens our spirit to courageously struggle against the forces of evil that breed wars of aggression, massive poverty, social inequity, global terrorism, and tyranny of oppression, and to transform this chaotic world into one that manifests God’s life-giving grace.

More so, Easter gives us the assurance that our faith would prevail over the forces of evil and darkness. The good news that "Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, has been raised" engulfs our hearts with hope for a new heaven, a new earth, and a new life. We hold on to the promise that in God’s appointed time, Christ’s coming again in glory would be fulfilled, and the sad realities of agony and despair, of anguish and pain, of death and destruction would totally vanish from the face of the earth.

My dear sisters and brothers in the Lord, may our Easter celebration be a living testimony and a faithful reaffirmation of Christ’s victory over the power of death. Let us keep our faith and the flame of hope ever burning in our hearts. May the power of Christ’s glorious resurrection touch and transform the world.

† THE MOST REVD GODOFREDO J. DAVID, D.D.
Obispo Maximo

Easter 2009