Easter Tuesday Reflection
Easter Tuesday
JN 20:11-18
Mary Magdalene stayed outside the tomb weeping. And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting there, one at the head and one at the feet where the Body of Jesus had been. And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”
She said to them, “They have taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus there, but did not know it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” She thought it was the gardener and said to him, “Sir, if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him.”
Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni,” which means Teacher.
Jesus said to her, “Stop holding on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
Mary went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord,” and then reported what he had told her.
Reflection
When my son was born, I was filled with all kind of mixed emotions. My labour did not go as I had planned. I was hoping to have him at home, but instead I needed to be induced in the hospital. Then after a range of complications, we ended up staying in the hospital for four days.
I had my daughter at a Birth Centre and everything was quiet, intimate. Just my husband and midwives were there. I was able to enter into prayer through each contraction. It was long, and it was the most pain I had ever experienced, but it was also the most intimate experience I have ever had with God. My birth experience with my son was the complete opposite. We were at a teaching hospital, so every doctor and midwife that came in the room had an intern or many interns. My husband counted and there were at least fifteen different people coming in and out of the room. The room was flooded with bright lights and I felt like I was tangled in a mess of wires that hooked me up to a number of loud machines. I tried so hard to focus on my breathing and enter into prayer but all I could think about was the incessant beeping above my head. To say the least, the whole experience was nothing like I had planned or hoped for. I was so happy to have my baby boy but I was also angry and confused with God. I felt his presence so deeply and intimately with my first labour and this time I didn’t feel him.
After a few weeks, I finally brought this to God. What did I do wrong? Why didn’t you show up? In a time of prayer, I realized that He was there and that I was more united with him than I could have ever imagined. My first labour and birth were like being with him in the Agony of the Garden: painful yet intimate and quiet. The second was like the road to Calvary: public, loud, and jarring.
But he was there.
He was there in the moment I walked into the maternity ward to the most beautiful statue of mother Mary that I had ever seen. I was united to the pain he experienced on the road to Calvary as I experienced my own labour pains. I recall when I laid eyes on my beautiful baby boy for the very first time and imagine a similar encounter when Mary gazed at Jesus moments after he was born. And he was there with me as I experienced the separation from my baby when he was in the NICU, like Jesus felt the separation from God on the cross. He is in our midst, even when we can’t see him, He is there in our grief and in our joy. Take time to look at the areas of your life where it seems like God isn’t there. Invite Jesus to show you where he his and to listen when he is whispering your name, just as he did with me and my less than desirable birth experience, and with Mary on that first Easter Morning.
O Jesus, give me the grace to recognize your presence in my life today, both in moments of joy and in times of suffering.
