[stephenkhoo]

SHARING THE GOOD NEWS AMONG DISCIPLES AS THE PRELUDE TO THE ANNOUNCEMENT OF THE GOOD NEWS TO THE WORLD
SCRIPTURE READINGS: ACTS 2:14; 22-33; MT 28:8-15
http://www.universalis.com/20140421/mass.htm

Jesus told the women, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers that they must leave for Galilee; they will see me there.” This command of Jesus is significant. The truth is that any encounter with the Risen Lord brings about the desire to share and proclaim Him to others.


Indeed, the sign that we have encountered the Risen Lord and that we are raised with Him is the desire to share the Risen Lord with others in our lives. The lack of enthusiasm to share this joy with others is a sure sign that we have not encountered Him yet. The Church is blessed to welcome so many new members into the Church at Easter. Yet one wonders whether after their baptism, which is supposedly to be an experience of the Resurrection, they will be filled with the desire to announce Christ as their Risen Lord to their friends and to the world. Of course, what is said of them is equally applicable to those of us who have already been baptized. How many Catholics are renewed in their desire to proclaim that Christ is risen in their words and deeds after celebrating the Easter Triduum?


Why, then, do we not have this spontaneous response to the Good News of the Risen Lord we received yesterday? Are we lacking faith or still in disbelief that the Lord is truly alive in our midst? The truth is that we cannot afford to remain inert in this state of disbelief and indifference. For this is what the secular world wants of us. The world wants us to believe that God is dead.


For with the declaration that God is dead, then the world can continue to live a life without love, a life of selfish desires and self-centeredness. Without God, there is no truth, no true love and no morality. Without God, the world can espouse its worldly values without any opposition from religion, especially Christianity. By not walking in truth and in love, society and humanity will ultimately destroy itself.


Isn’t this attempt to discredit belief in the Resurrection something that was already initiated at the very beginning of Christian faith? We read in today’s gospel how the chief priests bribed the soldiers to disseminate the lie about His body being stolen in fear that their positions would be compromised if people started believing in the testimonies of the disciples about the Risen Lord. Throughout the whole of history, we have individuals and collective forces seeking to destroy the fundamental tenet of Christian belief in the Resurrection of Christ.


How then can we find the courage to proclaim Christ to the world as Peter did in the first reading? We note that Peter and the Eleven were also cowards initially after the death of Jesus. They were hiding in the Upper Room for fear of the Jews and the Romans. What filled them with courage and boldness in not only declaring to the crowd that Jesus has been raised but to even accuse them of crucifying the “man commended to you by God by the miracles and portents and signs that God worked through him”?


The courage to announce the Good News of the Resurrection began from the fact they shared the Good News among themselves first. It is significant that Jesus did not tell the women to announce the Good News of His resurrection to the world, but to the disciples. Truly, before we can have the faith to announce that Christ has been raised, we must first share this experience of the Resurrected Lord among ourselves. Unless we share how Christ is alive in our lives and how we have encountered Him, how can we deepen our faith in the Risen Lord whom we cannot see except in faith? It is therefore vital that we seek to proclaim Christ by first proclaiming Him among ourselves as believers and disciples of the Lord.


How can this be done? Firstly, this entails that we share testimonies of what Christ has done for us and how we have experienced Him in our lives. Through the sharing of the Christ experience among ourselves, especially the signs and wonders He has worked in our lives, it will bring about an increase of the Resurrection faith in us. During this week of Easter Octave, what we will be hearing are the testimonies of the disciples encountering the Risen Lord. We too have our own experiences of the Risen Lord at work in our personal lives, when we conquer our sinfulness or when we overcome our struggles and trials. We too have seen the Lord work in the lives of others, in their conversion, transformation and even in miracles of healing and deliverance.

Of course, we must also proclaim His resurrection in the way we live our lives, in fraternal love and selfless service in humility. We must show ourselves to be forgiving people and most of all, people of hope that nothing, not even suffering or death can overwhelm us. For faith in the Risen Lord means that we will always live with hope because Christ has overcome sin and death; we need not be defeated by our struggles against the ongoing temptations to sin each day or be discouraged by failure, tragedy and injustice.


For this reason too, we must pray to the Holy Spirit given to us at our baptism to help us connect with the Risen Lord. This is the crux of the Easter experience as we read in today’s first reading. Only with the Holy Spirit can we come to know that Jesus is alive and that He is Lord. As St Peter said, “Now raised to the heights by God’s hand, he has received from the Father the Holy Spirit, who was promised, and what you see and hear is the outpouring of that Spirit.”


Yes, by testifying to the Resurrected Lord in our lives, we will strengthen each other in faith so that we will have the conviction and the courage to proclaim Christ to the world and to non-believers. We must therefore seek the grace of God to deepen our own personal experiences of Him so that we can share these with our communities. Let us pray that the Holy Spirit will fill us with the presence of the Lord so that we can promote and foster a culture of sharing our testimonies of the Risen Lord. If we take heed of Jesus’ command not to be afraid but “go and tell my brothers” and sisters as well, then we would be so filled with the conviction of His resurrection and find the courage to stand up for Christ regardless of the circumstances.

Written by The Most Rev Msgr William Goh
Archbishop of Singapore