EASTER

Christ the Lord is risen today. Alleluia! The purple veil is lifted

from the Cross, the Altar, bare through Lent, is now adorned with

flowers, for the agony of Good Friday has given way to the rejoicing

of the Resurrection. Joyful people crowd the churches to proclaim

the yearly rediscovered fact that Christ has opened the way through

darkness into light and has turned man's sorrow into gladness.

Christ the Lord is risen today. Alleluia.

But for the thoughtful, I wonder if there isn't another theme that

runs in a minor key throughout the Easter music. I wonder if Easter

isn't for many a day of joyous farewells. Christ has risen to sit at

the right hand of the throne of God and we glory in that fact; but

don't we feel like saying with Thomas, "Lord, we know not whither

thou goest and how can we know the way." There may be many mansions

in the house of God but they seem so very remote. Even our Lord's

assurance that he is the way, the truth and the life does not quite

fill the place in our hearts left hollow by his departure.

For forty days and nights he has been among us sharing our humanity,

its problems and its pains. He has been with us in anxiety, in

sleeplessness, in sorrow. He has been so human, indeed, that we have

forgotten his descent. We are not prepared to lose our old familiar

friend.

It may be that in normal times, by which we mean in thoughtless

times, his absence is not greatly felt or is soon forgotten. But who

is there among us now that does not feel the burden of human war and

peace? Who is there that has not needed friendship to take the place

of loss, that has not looked for counsel and strength beyond the

limits of his own life?

And for these, the Lord has been a present help in time of trouble.

He has been a man among men, by our side, to lead us on our way.

Now Easter comes, our Lord has risen. Christ has become King, a God

of Gods. Yet here we remain, we haven't changed, our problems are

the same, our needs the same.

"Love's redeeming work is done, fought the fight the battle won,"

we sing. But there is still the overtone of sadness in the Easter

music which might even become a note of irony. Love's work is done?

The battle won? Not in our world it isn't, far from it. We'd better

postpone Easter till better times are come. Lent has meaning now,

one long unswerving Lent, with discipline and hard work.

But wait a moment. We see the veil is lifted from the Cross this

Easter day, and now the cross stands clear and shadowless upon the

Altar. Does that signify the end of suffering, or is there here an

Easter meaning for these times more potent and impelling than ever

Lent has brought? It is said that Constantine the Great, returning

from his victory over Maxentius, saw in the sky these words, "In hoc

signo vinces," and thereafter he placed the Cross upon his standard.

The cross is brighter still on Easter for it is an earnest that yet

again through its sign we shall conquer.

The cross reminds us too that though he is risen, he is in no way

further from us than before. He still bears upon himself the marks

of the cross--the marks of Lent made meaningful by Easter.

The cross has by no means disappeared, rather it has been

vindicated, death has not vanished but it has been overcome,

suffering will continue but it can be transformed. Let us then

rejoice and be exceeding glad this Easter of all Easters for the way

of the cross has proved to be the way of Life and Victory.

"_But the comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will

send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things

to your remembrance._"

Canon Quick of Durham wrote a most thought-provoking paragraph

in his book _Doctrines of the Creed_. "One essential paradox of

Christianity," he wrote, "consists in the fact that, although when

viewed from outside it is one of the religions of the world, when

it is known from within it is not a religion at all, nor even the

true religion only, but something inherently more than religion; it

is a whole social life of Communion in God among men, a communion

which embraces both sacred and secular activities and is altogether

transfigured by the pervading presence of God's love."

And what gives Christianity this extraordinary combination of

breadth and depth is the event of Whitsunday--the coming of the

Holy Spirit. As St. John says, "the Holy Spirit will teach you all

things"--that is the breadth--and will "bring all things to your

remembrance" about the earthly life and teaching of Christ--that is

the depth.

All through Christian history, but particularly today, two opposing

tendencies can be seen at work. One is the desire to liberalize

Christianity and make it more inclusive. Some, noting the good in

out of the way places--there is honesty among thieves and there

is sincerity among atheists, would push Christianity to a point

where it would include all good wherever found and in whatever

combination. The logical conclusion would be to turn it into a kind

of pantheism--a catch-all for all truth, goodness, and beauty. A

good Buddhist is really a good Christian whether he knows it or not,

they would say, in spite of the fact that he would be considerably

annoyed to be told so.

In this drive to be comprehensive, the specific doctrines of the

church would have to be scrapped or soft-pedalled and the emphasis

be put upon right living, whatever that is.

If you feel at this point like smiling in superior fashion at these

liberalizers, examine your own mind for a moment and see if at least

part of you doesn't agree with this. For example, have you ever felt

or said about so-and-so who is an agnostic and never darkens the

door of a church, that he is a better Christian than you, since he

is more generous, more courageous, more generally virtuous? And this

you say, not out of humility, but from a suspicion that he is in

better touch with the source of goodness than you are.

And I could go on to point out other reasons why we would like to

extend the label of Christianity as far as possible.

But the opposite tendency is also strong within us. Make

Christianity precise, define carefully its limits and make

membership within it rigorous and single-minded. I heard of a

clergyman, who when asked how his congregation was doing, replied,

"Fine-thinning 'em out, thinning 'em out."

We are aware of the strength that lies in narrowness and secretly

covet the simplification and order of an authoritarian church.

However forceful these opposing tendencies may be we know at least

that neither one can be allowed to run wild without disaster to

Christianity. There must be an integrating force that holds these

together and leads to the productiveness that flows out of the

tension between them.

That force is the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit proceeds from

the Father, through the Son. He always refers back to Christ as

the incarnate center of Christian life, and thence to God who

is the source of the love that binds men into one communion and

fellowship. Confusion exists because there are many spirits in the

world--spirits of a nation, of humanity, of progress. But these are

never to be identified with the Holy Spirit, who always brings to

remembrance Christ himself, who must become the corner stone of all

life everywhere. To be apart from him is to be apart from God. To

forget this is the danger of liberalism.

But on the other hand, the Holy Spirit will teach you all things,

and as Canon Quick says, "is the moving spirit in the Communion in

God among men, a Communion which embraces all things both sacred

and secular and cannot be confined to man-made limitations." In

forgetting this lies the danger of sectarianism.

The work of the Holy Spirit begins with Christ and continues to the

end of the earth. That is the spirit we pray for and can expect to

receive on Whitsunday. Don't be content with anything less.