Pastoral Letter April 2023
Fr Alan Hawkworth SSC
The Christian Religion stands or falls on the evidence of the, Resurrection. Many people have speculated on what happened but this discussion is meaningless without faith - the faith that results from the experience of the Risen Christ. The Resurrection experience is like trying to describe what it is like to be in love. It only makes sense when you yourself have been in love. Looking from the outside, it is a. mystery, but to the couple in love, it makes life worth living. This is the true proof of the Resurrection. The only one that truly convinces is the experience of those who have acted on the belief that it is true. When we start living as though Jesus rose from the dead, we discover that he is alive now in power and glory. We discover that he actually gives us new life and power and that he transforms ug beyond our wildest expectations. We discover that through the power of Jesus Christ good can overcome evil, strength out of suffering and life out of death. We discover that whether or not we believe in him, he still believes in us. We learn that he really does love and care for us as we are. He does not simply love us in spite of what we are. He loves us because of what we are. He loves us without any conditions attached. It is these that it becomes exciting, because if we let him, he loves us into loving him. Through pain and suffering and death on the cross, he offers us the chance to finish with the old ways of sin, gloom and death and in love offers us the gift of his resurrected life to endure what seemed unendurable and to love the unlovable. As St Anselm observed, we cannot reason ourselves into faith. Faith comes from having nowhere else to go, when nothing else makes sense except recognising our need of God and his love. He has overcome everything you and I can do to him. He is the proof that God really does love you and me.