Easter A
April 12, 2020

Every Easter for the last dozen years, I’ve read the story of The Three Trees from the steps to the chancel, surrounded by children of many ages. As I weighed whether to read the story in our livestreamed service, I realized that sitting alone on the empty steps seemed truer to the Easter story than ever before. I imagine you who are watching and missing the physical experience of being together in a full and carried-away church are having mixed feelings much truer to the Easter story too. 

I do hope that Sara Peattie’s puppets made you smile when you saw them. If you’ve never been physically present at Emmanuel Church on Easter Sunday, you should know that a traditional part of our processional hymn is a large puppet parade that typically includes puppeteers of all ages. But today is a different kind of observation of the Feast of the Resurrection. This is Easter in the midst of a dreadful pandemic. In spite of the fear and the grief we are feeling, in spite of knowing that things will continue to get worse before they get better: even at the grave we are going to make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia. In spite of our inability to be together, this is not an extension of Lent or Holy Week. This is Easter Sunday, and as the late Bishop Barbara Harris loved to sing Hallelujah Anyhow. (You’re going to have to imagine the Gospel choir!)

I say that this Easter is truer because I don’t imagine for a moment that the first day of the week following Jesus’ death was anything less than devastating, frightening, sad, and lonely. Those who loved Jesus were thoroughly traumatized by his torture and execution. None of them knew what would happen next or how long they would survive. And by the way, I don’t think that the healing or salvific resurrection of Jesus Christ took three days any more than I think that the creation of the world took seven. (Creation is ongoing, and so is resurrection.) 

According to the Gospel of John, Mary had gone to the tomb to weep. There was nothing else to be done because Joseph of Arimathea had already anointed Jesus with some of the myrrh and aloes provided by Nicodemus, and had bound his dead body with linen cloths. Mary found that the stone covering the entrance to the tomb had been rolled away. She ran to get Peter and the beloved disciple to tell them that Jesus’ body was gone. They raced back to the tomb to see for themselves. The Gospel of John says a curious thing then: they believed but they did not understand – or know – or comprehend. (And, in spite of what the Gospel says, there actually was no recorded scripture that would have indicated that Jesus must rise from the dead.) Whatever “believing” means, according to John, it is distinct from understanding or knowing or comprehending. Peter and the beloved disciple, of all people, these two did not yet understand that Jesus must rise from the dead; they are portrayed here as unknowing or agnostic believers. And then a detail that always amazes me: they returned to their homes where they locked the doors because of their fear. They had homes to return to in Jerusalem?

But Mary stayed weeping outside the tomb. The empty tomb was nothing like good news. Rather, it added insult to her broken heart. She just wanted to know where Jesus’ body was when she saw others sitting in the tomb with the burial wrappings neatly rolled up. “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him,” she said. Still weeping, she saw the risen Lord and did not know that it was Jesus. She saw and she still did not know. Mary is portrayed here as an agnostic seer! And I love that she is asked by two angels (or messengers of Love) and by a man she mistakes for the gardener, why she is weeping. Not one of them tells her not to weep – to quit crying. No one ever tells her to stop being sad or afraid, or that God needed Jesus in heaven. I love that. 

What she hears through her sobbing is the Risen Lord calling her by name. What she hears is an instruction from him not to hold onto his body. What she hears is an assurance that death has not had the last word. What she hears is that Jesus is going up, arising, ascending into the Holy One. Mary hears the Risen Lord say to her, “Go and tell the others.” They were in their homes trying to figure out how to put the pieces back together. She went to help them realize that they were the pieces. You know, according to the Gospels, Mary Magdalene was present at the crucifixion, and at the burial. According to John, she was the first to see the stone rolled away, the first to see that the tomb was empty, the first to see the Risen Lord, and the first to tell the others that Jesus was with God and in God. Mary was the first to testify to the death-defying power of Jesus’ love. She was the first apostle – the first one sent to tell (which is what apostle means). She was, as St. Augustine called her, “the apostle to the apostles.” 

Maybe you know that according to ancient legend, Mary Magdalene was a woman of considerable wealth and rank. There is a story that after Jesus’ crucifixion, she traveled to Rome to meet with Caesar to register her complaint about Pontius Pilate’s cruelty and insist that Pilate be removed from office. (Pilate was removed from office due to his notorious brutality.) The legend says that in her dinner conversation with Caesar, Mary Magdalene said that the crucified Jesus had been raised from the dead. Caesar replied that someone could not be raised from the dead any more than the white egg that Mary was holding could turn red in her hand. Immediately, the egg turned red. It is because of this that Orthodox icons often depict Mary Magdalene holding a red egg, having spoken truth to power and being vindicated by Love (capital L)!

You know, Caesar was still the emperor of an oppressive regime. It continued to be quite dangerous to claim that Jesus was Lord, instead of Caesar, that Jesus was the anointed, and not the emperor. Mary Magdalene, through her fear and through her grief, saw a way to say Hallelujah anyhow. She taught the others to say Hallelujah anyhow. I want you to hear that after the devastating crucifixion, after the tomb was found to be empty, things did not go back to normal for them. It took a while, and things got better than normal, but not because suddenly the world was a safe place to be. Things got better than normal because Jesus’ followers began to focus their vision and their imaginations on how to love and care for one another in the ways that Jesus had taught them. They began to realize that the love of Jesus had not been extinguished. As Margaret Mead famously said, “never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has!”

What I most want you to hear this Easter Sunday, is your own name being called by the Risen Lord – even if you don’t recognize it as such. I want you to hear your own name being called through your disappointments and devastations, your sadnesses and despairs, your humiliations and losses, the changes and chances of your life, even through the violences and degradations you have experienced and the hells to which you have descended. Hear that you are called by name to share in God’s lavish gifts of Life and Love. Hear that violence and terror and illness and death will not have the last word – not in this pandemic, not in the other traumas and losses that devastate our lives. The last words are compassion, kindness, humility, and patience: bearing with one another and forgiving; loving and being thankful. Hear that you are to go and tell the others that those are the last words. The everlasting Love of God is the last word. That’s what Mary Magdalene meant when she proclaimed, “I have seen the Lord!” What she meant is “Hallelujah anyhow!”

Easter lasts for fifty days so you have some time to marvel at the miracles of love and life especially when overwhelming evidence seems to point in the other direction. Look for the resurrection of the dead in reports of the significant drop in air pollution our planet is experiencing because of a world sheltering in place. Look for the resurrection of the dead in the creative collaborations taking place between scientists and medical professionals, teachers, artists, bread bakers, co-workers of all kinds, families, friends and neighbors. Look for the resurrection of the dead in the reduction, however slight, of our rapacious consumerism. Look for the resurrection of the dead in the exposure of structural and institutional racism, and other forms of systemic injustice. Look for the resurrection of the dead in the challenges to and disruptions of our deeply rooted habits and convictions. Look for the resurrection of the dead in the devastations and the delights each day. The message of Easter is that death doesn’t win after all. Love is most powerful and most contagious of all. Creation, resurrection or redemption, and inspiration are ongoing actions of God, of Love. We are not finished. After this service, let’s go and tell the others, “Hallelujah anyhow!”

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