Easter Sunday, April 1st, 2018

Easter Sunday, April 1st, 2018

First, I would like to take this opportunity to wish each and every one of you a very happy, a very blessed Easter to both you and your loved ones.  The events commemorated in Holy Week . . .  in particular, Good Friday and Easter Sunday . . . provide each one of us with an opportunity to reflect on what Our Blessed Saviour has done for us . . . what He has done on our behalf.  Let's get straight to the point.  What was the purpose for Our Lord to die a brutal death on the Cross?  What was the point of Our Lord to be beaten? . . . . mocked? . . . . spit upon?   Why was He so savagely tortured and humiliated?  Why was the King of Kings treated worse than a common criminal?  But even more to the point, why did He openly endure all of this?  The pain . . . the suffering  . . . the humiliation . . . . the beating . . . and finally . . . . an agonizing death on the Cross.   Why would He go through all of that?  What was the point?  What did all of this accomplish?  His efforts on our behalf did something we could never do ourselves:  He saved us from our sins and gave us the opportunity to spend eternity with Him in Heaven.  The media went on a frenzy this week when a certain famous clergyman . . .  this clergyman used to live in South America but now he resides in a beautiful city in Europe . . .  this clergyman was supposedly quoted as saying, "There is no Hell."  Now, of course, after this quote came out all the representatives of that famous clergyman scrambled to say that this quote was taken out of context.  But the point remains the same:   Why did Our Blessed Lord suffer and die on the Cross?  If there is no Hell, does this mean that Our Lord's suffering, pain, humiliation, and death meant nothing?  Of course, there is a Hell.  We read in the Book of Revelation:  " . . .  a lake of fire burning with brimstone."  (Revelation 19:20)  This is what most of us throughout history, I would suppose, picture Hell as.  But whatever it is, Christ suffered on our behalf so that He can save us from separation from God.   You see, whatever Hell consists of, the real tragedy of Hell is that it is ultimately, first and foremost, separation from God.  Christ died on the Cross to save us from our sins and thus the opportunity to be united with God for all eternity.  This is why St. Paul writes that we must "seek those things which are above" (Colossians 3:1).  So many of us seek the things below . . . and not the things above .  We spend our time, our effort, our energy seeking out the things below.  We live our lives chasing after the carnal pleasures with no regards for anyone or anything.  And yet, God loves us so much that He sent His Only Begotten Son into the world to save us from our sins . . . something that we could never hope to achieve ourselves.  And He did this because He loves us and wanted to save us.  He wanted to save us from ourselves and to save us from suffering the consequences of our living apart from God . . . . . eternal separation from God:  Hell.  This is the beauty of the events of Holy Week:  Christ did what He had to do in order to save us from ourselves.  For this, we should be eternally grateful and to fix our minds on Him and serving Him all our life.

Easter Sunday Mass will be held on Sunday, April 1st, 2018 at 9:30 AM at St. Margaret Church.  Mass is held at Marquette Manor, which is located at 8140 N. Township Line Road on the Northwest side of Indianapolis.

 Please note that on Easter Sunday, we will not be in the chapel as we normally celebrate there.  Rather, we will be on the Fourth Floor of Marquette Manor.