Homily
for November 11, 2007
Liturgical Year C - Cycle I
32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
By Fr. Andrew Moyo Topic:
The Resurrection
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Gospel: Luke 20: 27-38 .
. . Some Sadducees, those who deny that there is a resurrection, came
forward and put this question to him, saying, "Teacher, Moses wrote for
us, 'If someone's brother dies leaving a wife but no child, his brother
must take the wife and raise up descendants for his brother.' Now there
were seven brothers; the first married a woman but died childless. Then
the second and the third married her, and likewise all the seven died
childless. Finally the woman also died. Now
at the resurrection whose wife will that woman be? For all seven had
been married to her." Jesus said to them, "The
children of this age marry and remarry; but those who are deemed worthy
to attain to the coming age and to the resurrection of the dead neither
marry nor are given in marriage. They can no longer
die, for they are like angels; and they are the children of God because
they are the ones who will rise. That the dead will rise even Moses
made known in the passage about the bush, when he called 'Lord' the God
of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; and he is not God
of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive."
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Dear friends,
As we draw to the close of the liturgical
year, the Church invites us to contemplate on these last things: Death,
resurrection, and judgment. Our reading
this Sunday speaks about the resurrection, next Sunday about the end of
the
world and finally, the last Sunday of the liturgical year, we
contemplate about
the kingship of Christ. In today’s Gospel, the Sadducees, who
did not believe in
the resurrection, present a tricky question to Jesus. It is a
question to ridicule and to demonstrate
that there was no resurrection of the body.
They used the Levirate marriage-law to present their case. The Mosaic
Law stated that if a man who had no children died, the man’s brother
must marry
the widow. The children born from this marriage are considered the dead
man’s
children ( Dt 25,5). Taking this law, the Sadducees cook a very nice
story. We
know, they say of a woman, who wore out seven husbands, one after the
other.
She too finally died. (Thank God before claiming an 8th victim). Now,
if we admit
the resurrection of the dead: to which brother will she be assigned in
the next
life? If she cannot be wife to the seven of them, what is the meaning
of the
resurrection for her and for the seven brothers? You can imagine
for a moment the smiles in
the faces of the Sadducees, telling one another, “We got him.” How did Jesus react? I think that he
probably laughed
with all the others and might have even commented on the exceptional
vigor of
that woman? But when he began to speak, he was very serious. The children of
this world take wives and husbands, but those who are judged worthy of
a place
in the other world . . . are the same as angels . . . they are children
of
God. His is telling these guys that
their assumption is wrong. Life after death is not a mere continuation
of the
present. Life after death will be
different. How will it be? No one can
say with certitude what it will be like. What we know is that we will
be extremely
happy. Thus, St Paul writing to the Corinthians says, What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor
the
heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him. God
has revealed to us through the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:9-10). Then Jesus goes to demonstrate the
reality of life after
death. Jesus observes that Moses calls God: The God of Abraham, the God of
Isaac and the God of Jacob…is not the God of the dead but the God of
the
living, for to him everyone is alive.
Note the use of the present indicative.
Although they had died, they must be alive. If not, then the God they
believe in, would be the God of the dead if not dead. They
believed that God is alive, not dead, so
Moses by addressing them in the present as the God of Abraham . . .
shows the
patriarchs are alive with God. God was
the friend of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob when they lived. That
friendship could
not cease with death. As Psalm 73:23-24 states: I am continually with
you; you hold my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and
afterward you
will receive me to glory. The ultimate proof of the
resurrection is
the Lord Jesus and his victory over death when he rose from the tomb.
Before
Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead, he exclaimed: I am the resurrection
and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live,
and whoever
lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?
(John
11:25) Yes, we believe this and we profess it
many times in the
creed . . . believe in the
resurrection of
the body and life everlasting.
Doxology: Christ has died,
Christ
is risen, Christ will come again.
Without the resurrection, all Christianity makes no sense at all.
Hence, Paul said, If Christ
has not been
raised from the dead, our preaching and faith are is empty. C.S.
Lewis said, I
believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen. Not only
because I
see it, but because by it I see everything else. We believe in
Jesus Christ,
we believe in the resurrection not only because it gives hope to the
future but
more because through the resurrection everything else makes
sense. Suffering, death, pain has meaning in the
light of resurrection. Our very
existence has meaning in the light of the resurrection. Since life has meaning in the
resurrection, this gives us
the courage and the reason to live our lives fully. It gives us a new
vision of
reality. Jesus died on the Cross and rose from the dead to save us from
our
sins and to open for us the way to eternal life. He died that we might
live. So
the resurrection gives us the vision that there is not only life after
death
but the very real possibility of life before death. It dispels the fear
of
death. It gives us the possibility to live our lives to the
fullest. “I have come that you may have life and have
it fully.” James 10:10. St Iranaeus
said, “The glory of God is a person fully alive. God’s glory is
therefore
diminished whenever a person comes to the end of life without ever
having
really lived.” In England, I came across this
inscription on a tomb,
“Remember
man as you walk by. As you are now, so once was I. As I am now, so
shall you be. Remember this and follow me.”
To this, some hooligan replied by
scribbling:
“To
follow you, I will not consent until I know which way
you went!”
The resurrection says we know which
way Jesus went and that we
have the courage to live, to live our lives fully and that we are
always ready to
follow him.
Let us pray.
May
the Lord Jesus put his hands on our eyes
also, for then we too shall begin to look not at what is seen but at
what is
not seen. May he open the eyes that are concerned not with the present
but with
what is yet to come, may he unseal the heart's vision, that we may gaze
on God
in the Spirit, through the same Lord, Jesus Christ, whose glory and
power will
endure throughout the unending succession of ages. (Prayer of Origen,)