If, each year, we are faithful

in sharing in Christ’s sufferings
during Lent and Holy Week,
each year, too, the celebration of Easter,
the contemplation of the glory
of Jesus triumphant over death,
makes us participate
more fruitfully and more abundantly
in the state of Our Risen Lord;

it increases our detachment
from all that is not God,
and, by grace, faith and love,
it makes the divine life grow within us.

At the same time, it enlivens our hope:
for, says St. Paul, when at the last day Christ,
Who is our Life and our Head, shall appear,
then we also, because we share in His life,
“shall appear with Him in glory" (Apoc. XXI, 4):
Cum Christus apparuerit VITA VESTRA,
tunc et vos apparebitis
CUM IPSO IN gloria (Col. III, 4).

This hope fills us with joy,
and it is because the mystery of Easter,
being a mystery of life,
strengthens our hope,
that it is also super-eminently
a mystery of joy.

Christ in His Mysteries,
Si Consurrexistis cum Christo
Blessed Columba Marmion