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No Time Out to Rejoice!
There should be a liturgical day off after Easter Sunday, or at least a time out. Parishes, if they correctly celebrated Holy Week, should be tired.
Choir members, liturgical ministers, altar servers, the people who dress the altars, and the clergy should be exhausted by the demands and the emotions of our Holy Week commemorations. For many, there is a spiritual letdown after these days of intense prayer and ritual.
But the Church does not grant us a day off. Instead, it follows the example of the Apostles, who anxiously began to celebrate their new lives and insights, proclaiming the message which Jesus had brought, and spreading the Good News about the power of the Spirit among us.
Soon the gentiles would be invited to join what was beginning as just a transformed group of Jews into a worldwide movement. Under the impetus of St. Paul, the message spread throughout the then known world. The explosion of faith was intense and rapid.
The message of the early sermons of Peter and John, as recorded in the Acts and Epistles, is that Jesus Christ is risen and they wanted everyone to know about it. There was no rancor or anger against any segments of the Jewish or Roman population. There were only invitations to share the message.
All this leaves us with the newfound reality of Baptism, the realization that we are sons and daughters of the Father, sisters and brothers of the redeeming Jesus. It is difficult to pick up and live this reality anew, to make the Alleluias of the season real and transforming, but such is the call to the Church. It is both a gift and a mission.
We cannot rest on our knowledge and belief that Jesus is with us, calling us and in a sense relying on us to bring His message to all peoples. The grace of Easter, the mandate of Easter, is that we cannot rest on the laurels of Jesus’ victory over death, we must share the Good News that it brings.
At times, we identify religion with suffering and sacrifice, but to do so completely would be a denial of life. It would be a lessening of the life that Jesus brought us. Faith is about the renewal of life, a life that is meant to be enjoyed and celebrated. It is for us to have an Easter party to lift our spirits. Let there be a feast to renew us, body and soul.
There is a custom to have some sort of meal following a funeral and burial. The origin of that custom is to help us sustain ourselves as we move on, to pick up what has been lost. Should this not be our spirit as we mourn the physical death of Jesus to his new way of existence? His new life gives us all a new dignity and destiny which is meant to be celebrated.
So, during these days of the Easter season, let us continue to celebrate the new life Jesus has won for us. Let us undertake the spirit of that new life by displaying a sense of rejoicing. This is a baptized life in which we as members of God’s one family continue to do his work here on Earth.
He is risen! Flowers will bloom again and life will soon return to a warmth that will refresh our bodies and spirits. Let us continue the work of the Church so poignantly outlined by Pope Benedict XVI in his Easter message to the city of Rome and to the world.
Let there be peace on Earth. Let it be grounded in our belief that Jesus overcame death so that we all can live as brothers and sisters in one faith-filled family.
Again, Tuition Aid Denied
The enacted state budget for state fiscal year 2007-2008 eliminated a $1,000 tuition tax deduction that had been proposed by Gov. Eliot Spitzer. While the state Senate strongly supported and fought for the measure, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a close ally of the state’s powerful teachers unions, refused to consider it.
We weren’t crazy about the Spitzer proposal from the get-go because it would have yielded about a $50 rebate for most families. In other words, it was a smokescreen. It allowed the governor to say that he was in favor of helping families who send their children to private schools but he would not have been supplying real aid to those schools.
But it was a step in the right direction in the sense that a Democratic governor was admitting that the state could help the families with children in parochial schools.
Now, that’s a moot point. Politics has shown its power once again. The middle class and the poor suffer. Choice in education becomes more of an option for those who can afford it.
We would be remiss if we did not point out the excellent job that the diocese does in providing tuition aid to those who can least afford it. The State won’t do its job so the Church is forced to do something. It cannot do it all and should not have to do it all.
The diocese’s Futures in Education program, along with the Alive in Hope Foundation and the Annual Catholic Appeal has been exemplary in helping some poor children afford Catholic schools.
The future of state aid for Catholic school children, and perhaps the very future of Catholic schools, lies in the political resolve of those who stand with us on this issue. We hope this will not be the annual bone that is tossed to us, only to have it bargained away year after year.
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