Happy Eastertide to all who celebrate it!
Fortuitously, Easter usually falls right around the time I am teaching about the Resurrection in my course on Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In our last class, we talked about the “now” and “not yet” qualities of the Kingdom. We can see glimpses of Kingdom thinking and behavior all around us (when people give without expecting a return, when people forgive others, when people refuse to discriminate), and yet we know, from all the ugly thinking and behavior that also surround us, that the Kingdom has not fully “come,” despite our praying for just that, every time we say the Lord’s Prayer.
The Resurrection that we celebrate on Easter was a joyous, affirming moment of “Now!” in the middle of a lot of what turned out to be “Not Yet.”
The persecution of Christians got worse, not better, after Jesus’ resurrection. During that first 200 years, all but one of his disciples were martyred, many just as horribly as Jesus was; and plenty of everyday Christians were humiliated and executed, even murdered in the arena for sport. In many parts of the world, Christians (and others) are still martyred today.
And I notice that our experience of the vaccine and the pandemic is following a similar pattern. The vaccine is a glorious, heartening example of “Now!” but it, too, is surrounded by plenty of “Not Yet.” Like the glimpses of the Kingdom and the miracle of the Resurrection, the scientific breakthrough of the vaccine is literally a “shot in the arm”: just the notion of what it foretells gives us the strength and stamina we need to face another pandemic-filled day. And yet...it is another pandemic-filled day.
We know how to do this: despite some evidence to the contrary, we have faith that the Kingdom will come, and we busy ourselves assisting that coming.
We have faith that love triumphs over death, and we busy ourselves strengthening that love. And now, we have faith that human ingenuity and resolve will help us outrun this virus; we can busy ourselves with that.
--The Rev. Barbara Talcott
Spread the word!
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