20/04/2025
Easter Vigil Homily:
SIMPLY TELLING THE TRUTH
SOME years ago, a journalist was assigned to cover a small village in Eastern Europe. This town had a legend: that during World War II, a local man had hidden dozens of Jewish families in underground cellars, saving them from N**i capture. But no written record existed. No plaque. No memorial. Just stories whispered from one generation to the next.
The journalist was sceptical. He wasn’t there to write a novel; he was there to write the truth. And so, he dug. He interviewed elderly villagers. He found maps and letters and eventually, descendants of the survivors. What began as a legend ended as history. The truth had simply not been told loudly enough. But it was still the truth.
That is the same kind of moment we meet in our Gospel Reading tonight. Here, we find a group of women arriving early in the morning at the tomb. They are not coming in hope—they're coming in grief. They're not expecting resurrection—they’re expecting to anoint a co**se.
But what they find shocks them: the stone rolled away, the tomb empty, and messengers from heaven asking, "Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; He has risen!" They run to tell the apostles, and even then, "they did not believe them." It was “an idle tale” to them—until Peter ran to the tomb and saw it with his own eyes.
Here is the heart of the gospel: Luke is not trying to start a religion. He’s not laying out a system of doctrines rituals or membership requirements. He’s not forming an institution. Luke and the other gospel writers were just doing what that journalist did: telling the truth about what happened. Something happened that changed everything. A man was crucified, buried—and then the tomb was empty. And people saw Him again. Luke is simply saying, “This is what we saw. This is what we heard.”
The Gospel is not an invention. It is not an idea we put our faith in to feel better. It is not the cornerstone of a new club. The Gospel is the truthful testimony of those who experienced something they never expected: Jesus alive again, just as He said.
We often think of faith as believing in something we wish were true. But here, Luke flips that idea. The Resurrection is not something the disciples were hoping for—it was something they were surprised by, shocked by, and in some cases, even slow to believe. They didn't create the story. The story interrupted their grief. The story changed their lives.
Why does this matter to us? Too often, we reduce Christianity to a system—beliefs, practices, and obligations. We say, “Christianity is my religion,” like it’s a label we wear. But that’s not how it started. That’s not how Luke and the first Christians tell it. Christianity didn’t begin as a religion. It began as a report. As news. As truth.
The Gospel invites us, not to join a new religion, but to wake up to reality: Christ is risen. The tomb is empty. And nothing—nothing—is the same anymore. When the women told the apostles what they saw, they were not giving a sermon. They were not forming a church. They were just doing what the evangelists do: telling the truth.
Tonight, THAT is our calling too. Not to convert people to a religion. Not to build walls. But simply to tell the truth of what happened.
He is not here. He is risen. It is not a new system. It is not an idea or a fantasy. But an encounter with a person who once lived; who really died and rose again from the dead and changed everything! It is an encounter with a new reality, a new understanding of being. So, brothers and sisters, live not as followers of a religion—but as people who know encounter the TRUTH. May that truth set us free.
HAPPY EASTER!
