Dearly beloved, Christ is risen!
What joy rings out at the sound of these truly holy words in every heart that has made even the slightest attempt to find God in itself, that has be it but once been inflamed by an encounter with the holy, has sped up when it heard the name of God! This joy is of the One, Who is “the first and the last, Who was dead and is alive” (Rev. 2, 8).
Through understanding and acceptance of this blessed message the mystery of God’s eternal union with man is revealed to us – the union “through His Christ”, the union of love that bears infinitude at its very core.
Should someone reject this blessed message, he, too, shall face the mystery of eternity and, by immersing himself deeper and deeper into the bottomless abyss of sin and rejection of God may eventually subside into it, already in this tellurian vale a partaker of the infernal deep. But even into that deep Christ will descend in his unutterable love following man to save him, for He “has descended into the lower parts of the earth”.
And this is why our joy is perfect, for according to the word of St. Ambrose of Milan “the resurrection of our Lord is life for the dead, remission of sins for the sinners, and glory for the saints.”
Still now, as in the past, millions of people, even churchgoers, seek proof or explanation for the fact of Christ’s resurrection from the dead. That fact can indeed be ascertained experientially: by accepting Christ into one’s life. Welcome Him we should in such a way as we would welcome the most beloved, dear person, whom we love without measure and without whom life loses its meaning. To accept Christ into one’s own life means to change one’s life so that it may be worthy of God, Who abides in it. To accept Him means to entrust one’s own life to Him. And not just the lips but our entire self must speak the words once spoken by the Most-Pure Virgin when She was entrusting Herself to God: “Lo, I am the servant of the Lord. Let me be according to your word.” And thenceforth listen to the voice of the Savior, Who speaks to us from the pages of the Holy Gospel, feel the benign breath of the Holy Spirit in the sacraments, sanctify life through His relentless presence in the prayerful dialogue with us.
The witness accounts of Christ’s contemporaries who saw and personally knew the Savior, before whom He appeared alive, risen, after His suffering on Golgotha, His death on the cross and His burial, bear a special significance for us. He appeared to many, and to each in a different way. It was Mary Magdalene, crying and standing alone and in grief in front of the empty tomb. Then it was Peter, who returned from the garden lost and confused, having found a sepulcher with the stone rolled away. Then Christ came to His disciples on the lake, where John felt and recognized Him with his heart and Peter threw himself into the water, rushing towards Him. And, as we read in the Epistles of Apostle Paul, it was he, Paul-Saul, who was ravaging the Church of God, that was among the last to whom the Lord appeared.
Even today Christ testifies to His resurrection. He, the Risen One, is not visible, but perceptibly appears to every one of us. Every one of us who has but for a brief moment felt the closeness of the other world has experienced an encounter with the risen Lord. He comes to everyone, knocking on the door of our hearts, finding the right words for everyone. It is up to us to hear this knocking and respond to it, because the Lord has come to save, to infuse with spirit and to change the life not only of all of us together, but of each one of us, individually.
This is why on this Paschal Day, going back home, let every one of us carry in his heart this joy and the thought that the Lord has appeared to me, too. He has risen for me, too, and for me, too, He speaks. He will stay with me and remain forever as my Lord, my Savior and my God.
I am wishing you, dearly beloved, this unceasing joy of Pascha!
Indeed Christ is risen!
†Mercurius,
Bishop of Zaraisk,
Administrator of the Patriarchal parishes in the USA
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to Hierarch PagePascha of Christ, 2004 New York City