Why Christ had to Rise from the Dead

It was JUNE 19, 2006 when I wrote this entry here:

The Easter Season of this year 2006 has been quite impactful for me as a Catholic priest. While I admit having studied and learned my theology in the Chinese language, this year was my first time to encounter the difficulty understanding the Resurrection. Hence, in one of my reflections, I remember having asked the Lord "Why did you rise again from the dead?"

It was the Sunday before Ascencion Sunday, and the text from the Gospel of St. John rang so loud in me: "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you. Remain in my love. You will remain in my love if you do what I command you...My command for you is this: that you love one another...as I have loved you...and your joy will be complete."Human loving seems to be quite romantic, but selfish. My experience in the clinic assessing marital cases for declaration of nullity by the civil and Church courts has shown to me what human loving is all about: it can be filled with passion and desire, but as the years go by, love dries up. Our human friendship also shows the fickle nature of love. Once one of the parties starts to show some negative traits, a gap starts to creep in between the bond. Human loving seems to last for only as long as the other remains to be good. But when the other starts to hurt the other, the love is challenged. If we love the way we love, we most likely would fall out of love.

I was once assigned for chaplaincy at Lourdes Hospital. At 6AM, the phone rang from the emergency. A man was being revived by the nurses and doctors at the emergency room. The wife was busy picking the pockets of her husband's shorts as the doctors were pumping the chest of the man. I busied myself anointing the man. As soon as the doctors stopped and told the woman that her husband is gone, the wife started crying out with these words: "You said you'd love me and wouldn't leave me. Now where is your love. I cannot believe in your love anymore." This incident showed to me what death can do: death can falsify love!!!

AHA! Now I know why Christ had to rise from the dead! The Father has risen His only Son back to life because that was the only way to show the world what LOVE REALLY IS: It calls the dead back to life. The love of God is such that it can wait for the dead to rise back to life. And only the one who loves also rises in obedience to the One Who loves and calls him back to life.

No wonder the Church always goes back to the table of the Eucharist because it is here where each member receives the One Who can love with us as He loved us. It thus becomes possible to say in the words of St. Paul: "The life I live is no longer mine. It is Christ Who lives in me." Each one is gifted with the call to rise from our deaths and daily dying.

May we love as Jesus has loved us.

I find this original more dynamic than the one I shared in my Easter homilies this year 2007. But what I did add was this thought: that Christ rose from the dead because that was the only way to show the truth of love. Death erases love. With the victory of death (read: Christ not rising from the dead) love would have easily been nullified. Love without Christ rising from the dead would simply be fooling the other. Yet we all know how we strive to make our love real and long-lasting, but with the reality of death, and if God is not there, our efforts prove to be rather futile. The purely human situation apart from Christ can be quite doomed. Each person only wins the first prize of death, and remains there 6-feet below the ground!

It is thus hopeful to be shown the Resurrection: for with Him rising from the dead, love can really be love. The divine nature of being love, loving becomes self-evident. This reminds me of the Scriptures which says "Not for your sakes do I act, house of Israel, but for the sake of my holy name...I will prove the holiness of my great name...thus the nations shall know that I am the Lord, when in their sight I prove my holiness through you... (Ez. 36: 16-28 - I don't exactly know which numbers are these quoted verses since I am only copying from The Vatican II Sunday Missal).

It really is very consoling to have at least an insight into the Resurrection. May we live life as we have been given this: "life is called to live"