Fear not*

Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed, Alleluia!

The hallmark of the Gospel appointed for the Easter Vigil is the moment the angel, sitting in the empty tomb and emanating a brilliant light, says “Do not be alarmed,” or, in other words “don’t be afraid.” It is such a stark thing in the moment that I pondered it all by itself. It got me to thinking about fear, which, after all, is a pretty common thing. Fear is a powerful emotion. All of us live with fear at some level. Some fears are silly and some are life-preserving and it just takes maturity and judgment, and self-confidence I guess, to know the difference.
 
In the story, Mary Magdalene and Mary and Salome enter the tomb only to find this angel, who says to them “Do not be alarmed.” In the revised standard version he says, rather sharply: “Stop being afraid!” The Greek actually says something like: “be not greatly astonished;” and In the Jerusalem Bible, he says, calmly: “there is no need to be so amazed.” In every instance he is telling them to push past their fear, which is preventing them from seeing God’s reality. Of course there is more, because next he tells them: Jesus “has been raised.” God’s action has taken place, and Jesus has been pushed through to God’s risen reality. And finally the angel tells them to: “go” … “tell” … “there you will see him.”

This is the prescription for faith. First, stop being afraid! And then, go. Take action. Go and tell, and keep going and keep telling the story of the power of resurrection in your own heart. In the going and the telling you will see the glory that is the risen Christ. And so, for we who are lgbt Christians, this is the call to resurrection life, that we must push past our fear of being who God has made us to be; we must push through to God’s real reality, in that place where all of God’s children are equal in their diversity. And once there, we must tell our stories, because it is in the telling of the story that we will see revealed God’s truth. It is in the telling of our stories that we will understand resurrection life, to which we all have been called by a loving God whose power and glory is … love.

Fear not, my friends. Christ is risen.

The Great Vigil of Easter (Romans 6:3-11; Psalm 114; Mark 16:1-8)
©2012 The Rev. Dr. Richard P. Smiraglia. All rights reserved.