by Faith Central & Steve Welsh
Catholic TV Mass for Easter Sunday, The Resurrection of the Lord, April 1, 2018, from the Archdiocese of Toronto. [Click here for Mass Readings]
[featured image adapted from image at Creative Commons Wikimedia Commons Pjposullivan, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Loretto_Abbey_chapel_interior,_Toronto.JPG, with additional conditions stated at that link and in the alt-tag here]
“On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark,
and saw the stone removed from the tomb. … Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb. …”
“… Very early when the sun had risen, on the first day of the week, they came to the Tomb. … On entering the tomb they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a white robe … He said … ‘Do not be amazed! You seek Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified. He has been Raised; He is not here. …'”
“… So they took Jesus, and, carrying the Cross Himself, He went out to what is called the Place of the Skull, in Hebrew, Golgotha. There they crucified Him, and with Him two others, one on either side, with Jesus in the middle. …”
“… He took a towel and tied it around His Waist. Then He poured water into a basin and began to wash the Disciples’ feet …”
“… the Lord is fulfilling Passover. The priests and elders can plan all they want, but God is in control. …”
“They paid him thirty pieces of silver, and from that time on he looked for an opportunity to hand Him over. * * * ‘… woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed. It would be better for that man if he had never been born.’ …”
“Reclining at table with His disciples, Jesus was deeply troubled and testified, ‘Amen, amen, I say to you, one of you will betray Me.’ …”
“The Gospel … takes us to Bethany, where … Lazarus, Martha and Mary were giving a supper for the Teacher …. This banquet in the house of Jesus’ three friends was marked by presentiments of his imminent death: the six days before Easter, the suggestion of Judas, the traitor, Jesus’ answer that calls to mind one of the devout burial rites, anticipated by Mary, the hint that they would not always have Him with them and the attempt to put Lazarus to death that mirrors the desire to kill Jesus. … Mary of Bethany ‘took 300 grams [a pound] of costly ointment of pure nard and anointed the Feet of Jesus and wiped His Feet with her hair” … [an] expression of great faith and love for the Lord … Mary offers Jesus the most precious thing she has and with a gesture of deep devotion. Love does not calculate, does not measure, does not worry about expense, does not set up barriers but can give joyfully; it seeks only the good of the other, surmounts meanness, pettiness, resentment and the narrow-mindedness that human beings sometimes harbour in their hearts. Mary stood at the feet of Jesus in a humble attitude of service, the same attitude that the Teacher himself was to assume at the Last Supper, when ‘… He … began to wash the disciples’ feet’ …”
“Six days before Passover Jesus came to Bethany,
where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead.
They gave a dinner for him there, and Martha served,
while Lazarus was one of those reclining at table with him.
Mary took a liter of costly perfumed oil
made from genuine aromatic nard
and anointed the feet of Jesus and dried them with her hair …”