Bishop's Easter Message
The Easter message is not always easy for us here in Northern Ireland. At its heart is a key decision about how to live our lives – individually, in community and together in this country of ours. The disciples on the first Easter Day found themselves totally consumed by a past which had disappointed them. Their very purpose for living had been taken away; all their values and aspirations had been dashed; and they were deeply disappointed in what had happened to their leader. All there was to look back on now was a cruel cross and an empty tomb – the literal ‘last nail in the coffin’ of all they held dear.
Many of us in Northern Ireland, particularly in parts of the Protestant community, feel like that. There is a sense that all those things which held us and which we valued, have gone, and that there’s an emptiness in people’s hearts as they gaze into an empty tomb of a culture which they feel as been despised, rejected, and even crucified.
Whether those thoughts are true or illusory, they issued in the awful rioting of last summer and early autumn in many Protestant areas. There was quite palpably a sense of the emptiness and hopelessness of people who felt there was no future for them.
But the Easter story does not stop there. As the disciples gaze into the empty, cold, barrenness of the tomb, they do not realize that it is actually only one small step to turn around and see the Risen Christ behind them. He is waiting to take all of us into a new and yet uncharted future, which is hopeful and enlivening. What a wonderful Easter it would be if all of us, from all our communities, would together turn towards a future of mutual respect, unity, forgiveness, friendship and open welcome – the very values at the heart of what it means to be Easter disciples.
Happy Easter
+ Harold