Easter Monday is supposed to be a day of relaxation for parish priests and liturgists and R.C.I.A. directors, after the intensity of Holy Week and Easter, so I was looking forward to some rest and relaxation. Instead we had two funerals. What a powerful time of the year for death and funerals, wrapped around the holiest days of the Church year. For both of these families their beloved one died in Holy Week, the week when our Lord and Savior died. Then on Easter Monday these families gathered to celebrate the Eucharist for their beloved dead. Just like the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, still grieving for their crucified Master, so these two families, still grieving, gathered around "the breaking of the bread" to experience the Risen Lord in the midst of their sorrow. Even though the apostles saw and touched the Risen Lord, it still took them 40 days to believe that Jesus was really risen from the dead. I hope and pray over the next 40 days these families will not only be consoled over the death of their mothers, but also be slowly brought into a deeper conviction that Jesus, the conqueror over death, is the source of their hope for "the life of the world to come."
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