Mystery of Faith: The wounds that remain

EASTER begins not with certainty, but with confusion. Mary Magdalene arrived on the tomb looking not for glory but for the dead — a reminder that the primary moments of resurrection will not be triumphant in the way in which we imagine them. They are bewildering, tearful, and strangely quiet.

That matters, since the Church can sometimes speak of Easter as if it were a neat resolution to every thing that got here before. Good Friday is terrible, but Sunday clears it up. Death is dreadful, but resurrection tidies the narrative. We move quickly to the flowers, the music, the enjoyment of the Alleluia; and all of that is true as a replacement.

Yet the Gospels themselves are slower, stranger, and more searching than that. The risen Christ will not be recognised immediately: he’s mistaken for a gardener. He appears in rooms still stuffed with fear. He involves disciples who will not be ready, and maybe never might have been. Of course, when he comes, he also comes with wounds.

THIS is one of the crucial essential details in all of the resurrection accounts. The marks of crucifixion will not be erased: they continue to be visible within the risen body. Resurrection doesn’t smooth them away as if glory relied on forgetting what has been suffered. The body that stands among the many disciples continues to be the body that was broken. That shouldn’t be an issue for Easter; it is an element of its truth.

It signifies that resurrection will not be the denial of pain, however the redemption of it. It signifies that suffering will not be declared unreal just because Christ is alive. It signifies that death doesn’t have the last word, regardless that its marks are still visible. That is a more demanding claim than easy optimism, but it is usually a more honest one.

PERHAPS that’s the reason Easter continues to talk so deeply to those that are faithful, but bruised. Many Christians come to this season loving the Church sincerely, while also carrying sadness about her. Many believers will not be untouched, but drained. They have known disappointment, grief, confusion, scandal, or long stretches of silence in prayer. They have seen things that they once trusted turn into more complicated than they hoped. In such a world, a resurrection that sounded too smooth wouldn’t ring true.

This, nevertheless, will not be the resurrection that we’re given. We are given Christ himself, alive and wounded.

Thomas understands this higher than he’s given credit for. He is generally treated because the one who missed the purpose; but perhaps he simply knows that low cost hope is not any hope in any respect. When Christ appears to him, he doesn’t offer a elegant explanation. He offers his wounds: “Put your finger here.” The first gift of Easter will not be an argument: it’s a wounded presence.

AS SOMEONE in a discernment process for the priesthood, I find that deeply consoling. It suggests that the Christian faith will not be for many who have someway remained unscarred, but for many who have been marked and never abandoned. It suggests that holiness will not be the absence of pain, however the refusal to let pain be final. It suggests that the church, to talk truthfully of latest life, needn’t pretend to be seamless.

Indeed, it might be precisely the other. The church’s witness becomes more credible when she stops attempting to sound untroubled and begins to talk with greater truthfulness, humility, and hope: not wallowing in injury, still less excusing it, but refusing the temptation to act as if resurrection meant tidy surfaces and restored composure. Easter will not be about looking recovered: it’s about meeting the living Christ.

In a culture shaped by presentation, filters, and image management, this matters. We are continuously invited to seem higher, cleaner, and more resolved than we actually are. Easter offers something more human and holier. It offers a Lord who’s alive, glorious — and still recognisably wounded.

THE church doesn’t must turn into sombre to be honest, or restrained to be reverent; but, perhaps, in Eastertide she is known as to talk of joy in a way spacious enough to incorporate memory, tears, doubt, and the long ache of what has been endured — not since the resurrection is weak, but since it is robust enough to carry all of those.

The risen Christ still bears his wounds. Because he does, those that are wounded should still dare to hope that nothing given to God is wasted, and that even what has been pierced may yet be made radiant.

The Hopeful Ordinand blogs at theemberpost.substack.com.