Christ is risen! Indeed he is risen! In the darkness of earliest morning, our churches shining with festal light, we heard at Matins the wonderful Paschal sermon, the Catechetical Homily of Saint John Chrysostom, with its awe-inspiring refrain of “Christ is risen, and…”: “Christ is risen, and life reigns. Christ is risen, and not one dead remains the grave.” Perhaps we might be so bold as to add: “Christ is risen, and nothing else matters.” Saint Paul says that “if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile.” But Christ is risen, and this is the central fact of existence. No matter what events and circumstances may seem to threaten us, no matter what may weigh on our body, mind, heart, being—Christ is risen! And by his Rising, he has defeated sin and mortality. Christ is risen! And the power of his Rising is greater than any power in the world. Christ is risen! And we have a never-setting, uneclipsable hope, though we walk in the valley of the shadow of death. No matter how thick the night’s darkness is outside, in the Church, the dawn light of the Resurrection shines forth, and no darkness can overcome it. Christ is risen, and nothing else matters!
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