Brothers and sisters

May the Lord give you peace!

It is a great joy for me to celebrate the Eucharist with you on this third Sunday of Easter…. The characteristic here of our Lefkosia community is truly joy. The joy of the Risen Lord…. Yes, He truly lives…. He is truly risen! Alleluia….

The Gospel of this third Sunday of Easter asks us a question that is essential for our Christian faith… (when I talk about faith, Christian faith, I am not just talking about traditions… that we are Christians because our parents were Christians, etc…). The question is deeper: Do you believe that Jesus was resurrected because you met Him or just because you have heard about Him? And do we really believe that He is alive, risen, and is Lord of our lives, of our present, of our future? That He is truly the Lord of all?

The Gospel of Saint Luke that we have just heard invites us to look at the apostles… Although the Risen Jesus had already manifested Himself several times (The example of the disciples of Emmaus).  Despite this, the disciples were “shocked” and “filled with fear” and they thought they were seeing a ghost… Jesus freed the disciples from fear… Yes, the risen Jesus, alive and true, frees us from fear… and it is beautiful that the Gospel tells us how Jesus frees the disciples from fear.

How? By giving the gift of peace. Peace be with you… (Shalom…) And breathing on them the Holy Spirit. His Holy Spirit gives us true peace… The Spirit of the Risen One frees the disciples from fear. In the same way the Christian overcomes fear… and becomes witnesses of the risen Lord…

The second detail, that the Gospel tells us, in how Jesus freed the disciples from fear is: He shows them His wounds… The risen Jesus has the signs of His passion in his glorious body.  Even today, the signs of His passion are preserved in His glorious body… in His hands, in His feet, in His side. Brothers and sisters, the gift of the Risen One reminds us at every moment of our value… yes, my value, your value is the love of Jesus on the cross…. The gift of peace is not an ideology, or an idea. The gift of peace is in believing in God’s love for us. If you look at the signs of His passion, the signs of His love, you won’t have self-esteem problems.

For many years I worked as rector of the Franciscan seminary, and I trained many young people for religious life and priestly life. 15 years ago, in Italy, where the formation house was, the mother of one of the seminarians came to visit her son. They were Mexicans. The lady had a burn all over her face, her neck, her right arm. She made an impression on me… And I asked the seminarian what had happened to his mother. And he explained to me: “Father, when I was little, we lived in the countryside. One day my mother was cooking… and I was playing… playing I took the handle of the pot and pulled it on myself… (the pot was full of boiling oil), My mother, to save me, managed to take the pot and it poured on herself… to save me. Father, he told me: when I see my mother, with these signs, I remember her love for me…”

Brothers and sisters, it is the love of God that makes us sing the Paschal Hallelujah… it is the love of God that makes us announce the Gospel, that we walk in as a Church… and we will walk together… And as bishop I will be here for you… and together we will understand more and more the way to follow… and we will do it together, with the peace and the joy of the Risen Lord… Amen