Today we can, and we should, be beside ourselves with joy because we know that we can now, because of the resurrection of Jesus, entrust ourselves and everything and everyone that matters to us, to God, said Perth Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB, in marking the resurrection of Jesus.
Speaking at St Mary’s Cathedral for both the Easter Vigil at 7.30pm and then the Easter Sunday Mass at 11am, Archbishop Costelloe was speaking about the experience of the women and disciples who were the first to witness the resurrection of Jesus.
“They had listened to him preach and teach, they had seen him bring healing and hope to the broken and the suffering, they had come to know him as a true and faithful friend,” Archbishop Costelloe explained.
“They had come to believe, or at least to hope, that the God about whom he had spoken so passionately, the God of tender compassion and generous, open-hearted forgiveness, was indeed the true and only God – a God to believe in, a God to trust, a God to hope in, a God to love,” he said.
Concelebrating with Archbishop Costelloe for the 11am Mass was Cathedral Dean, Fr Sean Fernandez, Assistant Priest Fr Israel Quirit and guest priest Fr Richard Smith.
Archbishop Costelloe was joined by Cathedral Dean Fr Sean Fernandez, Assistant Priest Fr Richard Rutkauskas and assisted by Deacon Paul Russell for the Vigil Mass.
“And then Jesus died, in a brutal and cruel and agonising way, and with him so, too must have died this newly-born faith of the disciples,” Archbishop Costelloe said, continuing his homily.
“But for those first disciples the story was not ended, as they had thought.
“The women who had gone to the tomb to anoint the dead body of Jesus had found the tomb empty, and they came rushing in to tell the disciples that Jesus was alive.
What this meant for those first disciples, emphasised Archbishop Costelloe, was that their faith, so shattered by the horror of the death of Jesus, was not just reborn but “exploded into something new and completely life-changing”
“Everything that Jesus had said and taught about God, every unbelievable and wonderful thing, was confirmed.”
Speaking to media at the conclusion of Mass, Archbishop Costelloe said that during the time of Easter, the need for peace and the need for hope is really important.
“The Easter message is ultimately about the triumph of life over death and of hope over despair,” he said.