G K Chesterton once suggested that a special monument should be put up on the spot where some courageous man first ate Stilton cheese and survived. It takes courage to do something when you can’t be sure of the outcome; so it takes courage to put yourself forward to test a new drug, just as it takes courage to tell someone you love her. Of course courage isn’t blind. Drug companies are supposed to make the risks very clear before experimenting on you; you hope that you are not making an entire fool of yourself when you tell someone you love him because you have thought hard about the way your relationship has developed so far; even the first man to take a bite of Stilton must have known something about cheese. Courage isn’t blind, but it accepts vulnerability. If you are invulnerable you don’t ever have to be brave. Courage looks danger in the eye but then takes the risk, the leap of faith for courage and faith are closely related.
But why talk about courage on Easter Day? Surely the first Easter was a time of joyful certainty and celebration. Except that is not what St Mark has just told us. He says that the women who first found the tomb empty and who were told that Jesus had been raised form the dead, ran away in panic and said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.’ But what were they afraid of? If we had been with them our first reaction would I suspect have been suspicion or even anger at this callous reaction to our bereavement of course he can’t be alive. But the women panicked. Was it something about the messenger that terrified them but all Mark says is that he is a young man in a white robe? Or perhaps it was because this message meant something more to them than we realise. As Jews they might have assumed that if Jesus were risen from the dead, then the end of the world had begun. For the resurrection of the dead was something they believed would happen only when God’s kingdom was coming in the end time. But surely they would have told the others such news. But they said nothing because they were afraid. So why were they afraid?
Fear is something we know about. Ironically in the West we are safer than we have ever been before because of our medicines, our supply of hygienic food and water, our wealth and security; and yet we are afraid. A dead swan, global warming, a hoody or a terrorist, an unexplained pain in my head, genetically modified crops, being alone or just growing old all these things can make us afraid; of course we are right to be concerned about all of these things in different ways but many of our fears are irrational – they exist at a level we find hard to cope with. And then there is our fear of one another. We live in the loneliest society there has ever been. In the past it was very unusual to live alone. In the past you were always part of a family or you were in a monastery and if you lived alone you were either a hermit or mad or a witch. In the past there was almost no opportunity to live alone. Nowadays there are many people living alone either as a matter of choice or because that is the way life has worked out for them. The reasons may be many and complex. But in a society where marriage is not a social constraint you have to do relationships for yourself and the search for relationship makes us very vulnerable. And even if we have many friends or even if we are married there are still times when we can feel very much alone. So fear and loneliness are things we know about.
It is conceivable that the women could have been afraid of meeting the risen Jesus, because he would be somehow too human and too close to them. When Peter preaches about his experience of the risen Jesus he says, God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear to us.’ As a Jew, Peter did not believe that after death we just go on as souls or spirits. He believed that if there is life after death then it has to be lived in a body; a newly created body which cannot know change or decay or fear or ignorance. Such a body could not exist in this world as it is. Only God could allow them a vision of Jesus as he is for eternity. But to see such a risen Jesus would mean being seen by him. Peter had been reluctant to accept that intimate moment when Jesus washed his feet at the Last Supper, but the intimacy of being seen by the risen Christ must at first have been more than any of them could bear. What it was like for them remains a mystery to us. But we know the consequences. Eventually they discovered that they were no longer afraid.
And so the church became a place where people could live their lives courageously. Though they were no longer able to see the risen Christ yet the church became the place where Christ is always present like a climate or an atmosphere (Rowan Williams). And in that atmosphere they found the courage not only to die for Christ but also to live for him. And to live courageously for Christ means living courageously with one another. In this climate we need no longer fear one another, we need no longer fear being seen for who we are, we need have no fear of our feelings or our failures, our needs or our neighbour’s needs.
Fear cuts us off from one another; the women were afraid so they said nothing to anyone. The disciples back home locked themselves away in the upper room because they were lonely and afraid. As St Catherine said, Only those are afraid who think they are alone.’ In this Eucharist you will notice that I say rather frequently, The Lord be with you.’ And you reply rather inelegantly but I hope with feeling, And also with you.’ We say this because we know that we are not ultimately alone; we are together in Christ and so together we may live our lives courageously. Amen.
Stephen Tucker
Some of the ideas and quotations for this sermon are taken from Timothy Radcliffe’s book, What is the Point of being a Christian?