A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Matthew. The women hurried away from the tomb, half overjoyed, half fearful, and ran to carry the good news to his disciples. Suddenly, without warning, Jesus stood before them and said to them, peace. The women came up and embraced his feet and did him homage. At this, Jesus said to them, do not be afraid.
Go and carry the news to my brothers that they are to go to Galilee where they will see me. As the women were returning, some of the guard went into the city and reported to the chief priests everything that had happened. They in turn convened with the elders and worked out their strategy, giving the soldiers a large bribe with these instructions. You are to say, his disciples came during the night and stole the body while we were asleep. If any word of this gets to the procurator, we will straighten it out for you and keep you out of trouble, so don't worry about The soldiers took the money, pocketed it, and did as they had been instructed.
And this is the story that circulates among the Jews, to this very day, and this is the gospel of the lord. The name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen. Yes. Saint Matthew says, this is the this is the report that has circulated even to this day, and we can say until the day 04/08/1985, Garrett Park, Maryland, USA.
First of all, I don't know whether you have noticed it, but in the last few years, I'm speaking now within our Catholic family, there has been a tendency, and in some instances more than a tendency, to downplay the physical resurrection of Christ, which of course is is first class gnostic doctrine, and to emphasize what we call a spiritual resurrection. That is the spirit of Christ in his church or in his people or whatever of a renewal. I've had very sincere Catholics tell me, you know, it doesn't make any difference to me whether Christ actually rose from the dead. That the physical part of it, that isn't important. What is important is whether his spirit rose from the dead and whether it still revives.
Well, course, my my response to that kind of thing is malarkey and moonshine. I mean that sincerely. This is nothing but the old Gnosticism that was in the early church. It's a it's a it's a manifestation of a spirit which emphasizes what is called the spirit, the ideal, and which downgrades the physical. This is a hangover of neo platonism, and the early church was filled with it.
It's called Gnosticism, and it's still with us. And of course, we're facing a new upsurge of it. Now down two thousand years, and on this score, Christianity is not divided. I mean, you're talking about the Orthodox Church and the Western Catholic Church. And remember, there wasn't any other Catholic Church until the sixteenth century.
And then the only splitter that claimed to be Catholic was the Anglican, which is an entirely different story from the Protestant Reformation. But the idea that the physical resurrection of Christ is not important just simply contradicts. Contradicts, I said. Contradicts the texts. And by text, I don't mean just the synoptics, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and then including John.
Today, you had a reading from the book of the Acts. And then yesterday, I read and quoted from Saint Paul's epistle to the first first epistle to the Corinthians chapter 15. Read it. And that was written in fifty seven AD, roughly. Maybe before fifty seven AD.
And he's talking to Greeks over in Corinth. Saint Paul said, if Christ be not risen from the dead, vain is my preaching and vain is your faith. And he wasn't talking about any spiritual resurrection. He was talking about Christ leaving the doom and appearing to his disciples and eating and drinking with them. Eating and drinking with making a fire so they could fry some fish, and that's God Almighty you're talking about.
Our faith is the most precious thing we have. And as Saint Paul says, if Christ be not risen from the dead, it is in vain. And that's the that's as simply as simple as you can as anybody can possibly say it. Because if Christ be not risen from the dead, then we know he was in some way our first rate charlatan. I'm now I'm not using these words carelessly because I have time and again tried to bring home to you.
You cannot say that Jesus Christ was nothing but a excellent, wonderful, good man. You cannot say it. Oh, you can say it. You can say anything. You can say the moon is made of green cheese, but that doesn't make the moon made of green cheese.
Either Christ is or was what he claimed to be. And how do we know he claimed to be God? What put him on the cross? His enemies, not friends. It isn't it wasn't his friends who claimed that he claimed to be God.
His enemy said, you claim to be God. That's how they interpreted what he said. Read the texts. That's the common sense. That is the the prima facie testament of our blessed Lord.
Not only did he claim it, but he acted the part and he fulfilled the old testament prophecies. It's one of the good things I can think of about the old testament. Now that's what our blessed Lord did. That is factual. And it rests upon, as I say, the testimony not of friends, not of his disciples, not of those who wanted to inspire and to further his influence.
It rests upon those who wanted to do just the opposite and to destroy him and to destroy even his memory, to blot and wash it out. Blot and wash it out. That put him on the cross. There were two charges against Christ. One of them, from the Jewish point of view, was he claimed to be God, and therefore he's guilty of blasphemy, and therefore by our law he should die.
Second, he claimed to be a king, therefore he was usurping the royal imperial right of Rome, and of course Rome wouldn't tolerate that. They were the two charges against our blessed Lord. And he and he was guilty of them both. He was guilty of them both. He claimed to be God because he was God, and he did not deny that he was a king because he is king.
And this all rests upon the fact as perfect past participle of the verb facio, something which has been done, something which has been accomplished. It rests upon a fact in time, in history that the son of God died on the cross. Died. There is can't be no doubt about that, and yet some people pretend there is. There can't be any reasonable doubt about Christ dying on the cross.
He claimed to be God because he was God. He claimed to be God from the cross, and he proved his claim with an empty tomb. In the name of the father, son, and holy spirit. Amen.