Homily for 2d Sunday of Easter

Homily for the
2d Sunday of Easter

April 27, 2025
Rev 1: 9-13, 17-19
The Fountains, Tuckahoe, N.Y.
St. Francis Xavier, Bronx
Our Lady of the Assumption, Bronx

The Alpha & the Omega,
the first and the last

“I am the first and the last, the one who lives.  Once I was dead, but now I am alive forever and ever.  I hold the keys to death and the nether world” (Rev 1: 17-18).

All this week we’ve been celebrating Easter Day, celebrating that our Lord Jesus who “once was dead now is alive forever,” and he opens for us our own escape from “death and the nether world.”  “The nether world” or hades is what the Apostles Creed refers to when it speaks of Christ descending into hell; that is, he died and was buried.

But not for long!  In his vision to St. John in the Book of Revelation, Jesus calls himself “the first and the last.”  He’s the first because as God he created the universe and is the first human being to pass from death into eternal life.  He’s the last because in him the universe, and humanity in particular, reaches its perfection.  Perfection is life with God thru Jesus Christ.

Having passed thru death and into life, Jesus has the keys that allow all of us to make that same journey; he opens the doors for us.  Or, in the words he addressed to St. Peter, “the gates of hell will not prevail” over his Church, over Christ’s people (Matt 16:18).

Christ holds the keys to life.  These are the keys of God’s mercy; for it’s an act of mercy that God forgives our sins and takes us to himself because we are Jesus’ people; we belong to him and in him we’re children of God.

Christ appears in the Cenacle (Tissot)

In the gospel—a passage we’re all familiar with—Jesus gave his Holy Spirit to the apostles, i.e., to the Church, for the forgiveness of sins (John 20:21-23).  How many times did we hear our beloved Pope Francis speak of mercy and forgiveness!  That’s the Church’s purpose, to extend what Jesus himself did until the end of time.  He gave St. Peter a set of keys, and he gave all the apostles the Holy Spirit so that those keys can be used to set us free from our sins and let us out of the doom of the grave.

We prayed a little while ago (in the collect) that we might understand that Christ’s blood has redeemed us, his Spirit has given us a new life, and his Baptism has washed us clean.  Thru the sacraments of Baptism, Reconciliation, and the Eucharist, Jesus takes away our sins and fills us with his own life.  Because he lives, “his mercy endures forever” (Ps 118:2).  Thru our belief in him and our sacramental union with him, we “have life in his name” (John 20:31).