Resurrections Re-Create Us
Embodying Resurrection
In Eastertide
(April 5 – May 23)
Eastertide is the 50-day period in the Christian calendar that starts with Easter and concludes with the beginning of Pentecost. It is believed that “Easter” is connected to the Proto-Germanic word austron, which means “dawn” and reflects themes of rebirth and renewal associated with springtime.
During this Eastertide, Beth Biery and Robert Martin will continue WeCreating the offerings each Saturday, which will include two parts:
Beckoning: a reflection on the topic of resurrection in our lives.
Being: a meditation and questions for reflection (examen) that may serve us as a daily devotional practice, to help us dwell deeper in the Divine Story, let go of lesser stories, and live out our mystical vocation in the moment-to-moment as well as in momentous ways.
A new midweek email is coming out, called “Community Connection” with two main sections:
“Becomings of the Christophany Choir” in which community members share stories of living into their resurrections.
Opportunities for Community participation and contribution.
If you haven’t yet read the reflection on Easter Sunday, we invite you to do so. For it sets the stage for our subsequent reflections in Eastertide. Its main theme was articulated by pan-Christian theologian Raimon Panikkar: “resurrection is not limited to [Jesus] alone, it is the vocation of all of us…. Resurrection is ours, it is now."
Even if it feels odd to ascribe resurrection to yourself, nevertheless, all of us have suffered, all of us have experienced deaths of one kind or another, and we also experience renewal and rebirth. Beth and I heartily join in Luke Healy’s previous Easter proclamation: We are the resurrection of Christ among us.
So, during Eastertide, we will reflect on the resurrection of Jesus for insight into how we might live into our resurrections (renewals) more fully.
Resurrections Re-Create Us (John 20:11-17)
Today’s reflection is based on the well-known passage in John in which Mary Magdalene and two disciples run to the empty tomb. After the two disciples leave the scene, Mary is left weeping outside the tomb.
Usually when we read this and other scriptural accounts of the empty tomb, we tend to focus on the miracle of the resurrection. Or we focus on Mary’s experience. That’s perfectly fine.
But I invite us to take a different tact by noticing how the resurrection affected Jesus. I mean, rising from the dead must have changed him in some pretty significant ways, right?
Let’s ask: what insights about our resurrections can we discern from stories about Jesus’ resurrection? Perhaps we might ponder this by focusing on a few key phrases.
11 Now Mary stood outside the tomb crying. She turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus.
15 He asked her, “Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?”
Thinking he was the gardener, she said, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.”
16 Jesus said to her, “Mary.”
She turned toward him and cried out in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means “Teacher”).
17 Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
She did not realize that it was Jesus
Jesus was not recognized.
Passing through suffering and death to renewed life inevitably changes us. Sometimes subtly; sometimes dramatically. More times than not, the people who are closest to us can’t get their minds wrapped around our transformation. They can’t recognize us, just as Mary couldn’t recognize Jesus, even though she was one of his most devoted disciples and friends. They seem to see us clearly, but they can’t make sense of who we have become. They try to understand us in terms of the way things used to be. Even with the best of intentions, they often strive to draw us back into more conventional, more familiar patterns.
Resurrections are fragile and unstable. They need great care lest their power fades and the changes dissipate. To be sustained, renewal and rebirth require gentle and repetitive discipline,
so that we resist the gravitational pull toward the past,
so that we settle easefully into the changes,
so that transformation becomes embedded in who we are and what we do.
How have your experiences of resurrection changed you?
I wonder if Jesus was standing around outside the tomb, just hanging out that early morning because he was settling into his new life, his new reality. It takes time and effort for change to become the “new normal.”
Hang out in your renewing experiences; let them soak in.
Notice how they have changed you; notice how you are different.
Let the early morning divine light bathe you.
Meditate in it.
Let go of next steps or what you will do.
Let yourself be it, here, now.
“Mary”
Jesus initiates soul-to-soul communion
I’m struck by the directness, simplicity, and profundity of Jesus’ response. He pierces through her desperate attempt to weave a plausible story. He penetrates to her soul by softly, gently uttering her name: Mary.
In ancient Palestine, a name was not just a name. One’s name reflected the truth of one’s identity, one’s soul. To say her name initiated a heart-to-heart connection, and more, a soul-to-soul communion.
Resurrection intensifies our penetrating discernment. Having passed through death to new life, old distractions and triggers have less power over us. Confusion gives way to insight. Superficialities give way to depth. Pleasantries give way to communion.
How has resurrection experience deepened and clarified your discernment?
“Do not hold on to me”
“I am ascending”
If this were scripted as a Hollywood movie, Mary’s cry of recognition – “Rabboni” (teacher) – would have been immediately followed by a rapturous embrace accompanied by a John Williams soaring score. But in John’s Gospel, Jesus responds with a rather stern-sounding “do not hold on to me!”
Innumerable are the preacherly attempts to make metaphysical meaning of this command. I tend toward the most direct sense: “Don’t hold on to my role as a teacher. For I am not that person anymore: I have been transformed and will keep on changing. I am ascending, just as you are, to “my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”
Who are you no longer?
How are you ascending?
Abiding and Attending this Sacred Cycle, Here and Now
Resurrection transformation is not just a Jesus event; it is not a one-time occurrence for anyone. Disclosed in the life, death, and new life of Jesus, resurrection is the “way, the truth, and the life” for us all. It is the path of spiritual evolution.
Resurrection is the way of Jesus, and we are called to take up our crosses and follow him…through our passions, deaths, and transformations into new life.
May we be more attentive to this sacred cycle,
May we engage in it more fully.
May we welcome and settle into our recreated selves.
Dwelling in Our Resurrected Being
Living on the Other Side of the Stone
Eastertide Examen and Meditation
To help us settle into and naturalize our resurrections, we offer a short examen reflection and a recorded guided meditation. We hope that the practice of reflection and meditation will be a daily discipline for you, for it is only through regular repetition that we are spiritually formed by our resurrections. Otherwise, if only episodic, resurrection power fades and we revert to default patterns.
We live out our resurrections through consistent, regular practice.
We invite you to enter into these meditation exercises as regularly as you are able. The questions are modeled after the Ignatian examen. Take a couple minutes to ponder and write your reflections on these questions in a journal or tablet. No need to over-think; all reflections are welcome.
Examen Questions:
When today did the eternal shine through the ordinary?
What lesser story from today can I say, “It is finished”?
How is new life changing me?
When ready, start the recorded meditation.
Consider incorporating the Examen and Meditation in your WeSpace groups.
Statement of WeCreating Authorship
This article was WeCreated with authoring by Robert Martin and and light editing by Beth Biery.
All of the wisdom, creativity, and spiritual emergence in ICN comes from the communal field of wisdom and spirit speaking in and through the “We.”
All text in this article is human-authored without the use of AI, according to our AI policy: 0 out of 10
All Images are open-source, used with permission, or created by ICN with the use of AI