Reflection on the Mass Readings: Sunday of the 5th Week of Lent

All of us know that there are two definite realities in our life. They are the paying of taxes and that we will die one day. But try having a talk about death and see where it gets you. Talk to your parents about making a will, and they come up with a million reasons not to have the conversation. Scan the newspaper in time of war and count the synonyms for the dead: “casualties,” “collateral damage,” “losses.” Even today, we have a virus that has abruptly reminded us that death is not out the picture with a tiny invisible creature invading our lives.

Instead, our society prefers to Botox and color away the stamp of aging from our bodies and a faction among our youth that mocks and denies that death is a possibility. We don’t want to use the “D” word in polite conversation, as if it described something obscene and shocking. At a recent funeral of a loved one, a woman proclaimed in total disbelief, “It never occurred to me that young Eddie would die!” But how could it not occur to us that someone would die, that all of us are marked for death and bound for it from the moment we are conceived?

The challenge for any priest today is to preach about resurrection and afterlife to an assembly that is out of touch with the certainty of death. It’s tough to announce good news about graves being opened when many of us have no intention of ever dying at all.

Yet the gospel brings us death in all its ways of sadness. First, there is the call of anguish from Martha and Mary: Illness has descended like a dark angel upon their home and threatens the life of their brother. But Jesus does not go to them. He does not deny that Lazarus will die, but neither does he confirm that he will not. “This illness will not end in death,” Jesus says. Appearances are deceiving. Sometimes what looks like the end is actually the start of something more.

When Jesus does turn toward Judea, his disciples protest on the grounds of their own fear of death: “They nearly stoned you the last time we were there!” As usual, they have failed to appreciate what Jesus said about death not having the last word in human affairs. While death may not be avoidable, it is not ultimately victorious. As Saint Paul might put it, if you can open the door of death and pass beyond it, death loses its sting.

Isn’t that the very image Ezekiel uses in his vision about the rebirth of Israel? God opens graves and breathes flesh back onto bones and spirit back into matter. No door is so closed that God cannot open it, not even the rock rolled against the mouth of a tomb.

The sting of death may not be evident to the one who has died, but it is apparent to those left behind in mourning. At the death of Lazarus, Martha is consumed with a rage that propels her to meet Jesus along the road to blame him for not coming earlier while her sister Mary, paralyzed by sorrow, remains at home. Death does not make Jesus angry, but the sight of his grieving friends does make him weep. Death causes unequal force on the side of the living, and it is for the sake of the living, not for Lazarus, that Jesus performs this greatest of his signs in John’s gospel.

Lazarus is called and out he comes, for no one can deny the Word of life when it speaks, any more than creation could have refused to emerge from the ancient void. The story may seem to have its peak in the loosing of Lazarus from death and from his burial bands, but actually the heart of the story comes earlier, in the exchange between Jesus and Martha. This is primarily a story about belief, not a story about death at all. The appearance of the enshrouded Lazarus at the mouth of the tomb is very dramatic, but we know of course that he will have to die again, and this revival of his earthly life is temporary. What is most important is the answer Martha gives—and we each must consider—to the question Jesus poses: “I am the resurrection and the life; do you believe this?”

When we stand in the presence of death, or more sharply in the hour of our own death, the question takes on greater significance than when we dwell in the denial of mortality that characterizes our culture. If death is simply too distasteful a topic to consider, then resurrection becomes a fairy tale that does not concern us. Yet at the same time that we deny death, we are immersed in what Pope Saint John Paul II called a “culture of death,” which includes the numbing list of abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, war, injustice, racism, and the acceptance of poverty and violence against those different from ourselves. One could argue that our refusal to acknowledge the reality of death makes it all the easier for the seeds of death to grow up all around us.

Out of the chaos of creation, God chose to call forth life. The choice for life remains God’s preference and intention, so much so that God opened the door of the tomb to usher us through to a fuller life in Heaven.

As I was composing this reflection, I stopped to watch Pope Francis and pray with millions around the world as he reflected and prayed an extra-ordinary Urbi et Orbi blessing on behalf of all who are suffering in one way or another from the effects of the Coronavirus. Two ideas that was evident to me from the Pope’s message was that Jesus does care about us and that we need to have faith that together with God, we will pull through this pandemic.

As Lazarus was released from his tomb, let us pray that we will be released from the “tombs” of sickness, fear, anxiety, and uncertainty that has changed our way of life today and be assured that our God is hearing our prayer. Together let us make our response as Martha did, “Yes, Lord, I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God…….”