We Will Rise With Him

The reason why we should stand, and not kneel, when receiving Holy Communion” . . .

. . . the enthusiastic young catechist explained, “is because we are people of the Resurrection. Christ rose from the dead in a standing position, and we should stand for Communion because we are risen with Him.”

The young man’s logic – or lack of it – seemed to startle most of the group. Someone reminded him that, as we say in the Creed at Mass, Christ is now “seated at the right hand of the Father.” So, doesn’t it follow that we should remain seated when receiving Holy Communion? Even though Christ was standing when He rose from the dead (if He was standing), He eventually sat down, and shouldn’t we do likewise?

His Resurrection Is Our Resurrection

Some, however, were more impressed with his insistence that we are people of the Resurrection and that we have indeed risen with Christ. His grasp of this basic truth of Catholicism was far more important than what is sometimes referred to as his “liturgical reasoning.”

It is indeed a basic truth, one that we don’t consider often enough, that we are one with Christ and that His Resurrection is also our resurrection. It is a pledge and a guarantee that, one day, in God’s good time, we shall join Him ‘With our fully risen bodies to enjoy the eternity of happiness He has promised us.

But let us not anticipate the coming of the Kingdom of God.

We do not yet fully share in His Resurrection, for we have not yet fully shared in His suffering and death. Our time here on earth is a time of growing into the image of Christ, a time when we draw closer and closer to Him, a time when we prepare ourselves for the eventual glory of total participation in His rising from the dead.

The Meaning of . . .

And this is the meaning of Lent and of Easter for all Of the People of God here on earth. For Christians, there is no separation of Lent and Easter.   One is the preparation for the other, as Christ’s suffering and death were the preparation for His Resurrection.  During the season of Lent, we concentrate on making ourselves ready for the feast of Easter. Not only for the Easter that is marked on the calendar, but for the final Easter which will mark our joining the risen Christ in eternity. That is the goal that gives meaning to the six weeks of the Lenten season.

It is a time to meditate on our human condition. It is a time of conversion of mind and heart and soul. And it is a time to recollect that we are the body of Christ, the body of a Head Who became “like us in all things but sin,” as St. Paul reminds us. He chose to take on a “human condition” in order to bring us as close to Him as He possibly could.

. . . Lent and Easter

But while we fast and do penance because of our need for conversion, we must remember that we do so only to make ourselves worthy of our coming resurrection. Penance is not, and should never be, an end in itself, Christianity is no masochism, a desire to punish ourselves because we enjoy feeling miserable. Like the suffering and death of Christ, all penance should be directed to our being with the risen Lord. It should be a reminder to us that, just as we share the suffering of Christ, so shall we one day share in His glory.

Christ could have redeemed us in dozens of different ways.

He could have given us immediate paradise had He wished to do so. He could have done away with all suffering, sickness, disease and death from the first moment of His arrival here on earth.  did not have to become man in order to save us. The way of redemption is one that He chose: the way of the Cross and the way of the Resurrection.

The Lord’s Love For Us Led Him to Accept Our Human Lot

The Lord did not explain to us why we must suffer and die in order to rise with Him. There is probably no way for us to understand what it is that He sees of value for us in a life that entails suffering and death.  We only know that His love for us led Him to accept our human lot. “Was it not right,” He asked two of His followers, “for Christ to suffer and die and so enter into His glory?”

With an eye on our coming resurrection, let us make Lent a time for growing closer to our crucified Redeemer, with full confidence that our cross, our Lenten penance, our daily trials and sufferings, will result in our truly and fully rising with Him to the peace, the happiness and the glory of His Resurrection.