I love the Easter season. I love the flowers, the music, and the celebration. And we get to do it for 50 days which is way longer than any of the other liturgical seasons, barring Ordinary Time.
As Catholics, we sometimes tend to focus on the penitential seasons like Advent or Lent, and in a world where sacrifice and self-discipline tend to be overshadowed by self-focus or self-indulgence, I love that our Church offers these seasons of reflection. But who doesn’t also love a celebration, right?
I myself have struggled with a balance between self-sacrifice and discipline versus allowing myself to indulge in joy. I think growing up as a Catholic, I wanted to take my faith very seriously and sometimes that meant taking myself a little bit too seriously. I wanted to be the most holy or the most pious, the most serious. I was the one in the front of the Church, hands folded, giving an evil eye to anyone squirming or distracted. However, I have come to learn that piety and holiness doesn’t necessarily look like the most serious person in the room. Many of the saints were playful and joyful. I think of St. Therese the Little Flower who is one of my favorite saints and I wonder if she and I would’ve gotten along if I were living with her in her convent. Would her sweet smiles and small gestures be too much for me? Would I roll my eyes at her simple piety while I strove for more serious mortifications?
This time of Easter allows for us to celebrate and come out of our enclosed upper rooms. Jesus has risen from the tomb and so must we come out of our self-imposed tombs, whatever they may be.
In this time of the pandemic, we had to self-isolate and retreat to our upper rooms for our own safety and the safety of others. I can remember that Pentecost at the end of May of 2020 was the first Mass that I could attend in person at my Church with strict distance, sign-ins, and a mask. We are moving more freely about our workplaces and world now, but have we broken out of that self-imposed restriction interiorly yet? Are we out and about spreading Easter joy? I know that we will be dealing with this isolation and distance mentality for years to come, and some of it for our own safety as we are still seeing Covid cases rise and Covid-related deaths even two years later. The purpose of this article, however, is to challenge us to reflect on our spiritual tombs that we have placed ourselves in and allow ourselves to be more emotionally present and available in this Easter season to others around us.
When I was in my twenties, I spent some time discerning religious life. I actually was a postulant for a religious order for almost a year. Interestingly enough, I left the order on Pentecost after not feeling like my fullest self for that year. It had nothing to do with the order, but it was not my religious vocation. I had emotionally and spiritually put myself in a tomb where I was not fully myself to those around me. I can remember reflecting on the story in John 11 where Christ raises Lazarus from the dead and really connecting with the line about the crowd being afraid of the stench that may come from opening a tomb. I felt like I myself had a spiritual or emotional “stench” about me that I didn’t want to bother others with. But like the Scripture passage, Jesus was calling me out of my self-imposed tomb and back into the world where I needed to become my true self and interact more fully with others.
In two of the Easter narratives in the Gospels, Mary Magdalene encounters Christ outside of the tomb when she goes there Easter morning to attend to Our Lord’s body. She is not afraid of the stench that she may find. She bravely goes to attend to the Lord, and Christ rewards her with a personal encounter. When we bravely step outside of ourselves and leave our preconceptions or fears, we too can be rewarded with a Christly encounter. Whether that be an encounter with a new person or an experience, we must leave the enclosures we have made for ourselves and spread the Good News like Mary Magdalene with Easter joy. When we limit ourselves or try to protect ourselves, we risk staying inside our tombs and not fully encountering all that God has for us.
As I mentioned, I am aware that we are not fully past the need for restrictions due to Covid. These are not the restrictions I am talking about. If we need to physically restrict distance for the good of the community, we should continue to do that even though I know that we are growing weary of it after two years. I am talking about breaking out of the mentalities that have come with either the distance that we have put on ourselves due to Covid or prejudices or self-mortifications that we think we need.
I know many of us have increased anxiety now because we have been so restricted around people the last two years. These anxieties are real and like I said, I know that Covid is still very much present and we will be dealing with the ramifications of what we’ve experienced for years to come. In order to move past these anxieties and step outside of our tombs, however, we must take those first steps like Lazarus or Mary Magdalene. We have to risk the metaphorical “stench” that we might think that we have by reaching out to others again, even if it is just in digital form. Or if we have developed anxiety, maybe it is time to take a risk like Mary Magdalene and bravely take the steps we need to make closer encounters. This may mean seeking help from a therapist or professional to deal with the very real anxieties we may have developed.
During this past Lent, I used a devotional that reflected on the life of the painter Vincent Van Gogh who I didn’t even realize was a devoted Christian. He is known for his experimental, impressionist paintings and also the mental illness he suffered from at the end of his life. The time that he spent in an institution was actually the time when he produced some of his most memorable work. It struck me that even though he was confined to an upper room of sorts, he was still able to create and spread great joy and light; even amid suffering, he produced good. And isn’t that what Easter is all about?
Whatever our tombs or situations, it is the Easter season and in a special way we are called to follow Christ out of our Lenten enclosures and into the Easter light. Even if we think there is a stench around us or if we are afraid of leaving our upper rooms, we are called to be an Easter people and bring joy into a world that truly needs it.
