Second Sunday of Easter: Over to you!
When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and
Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and
anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had
risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, ‘Who will
roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?’ When they looked up,
they saw that the stone, which was very large, had already been rolled back. As
they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting
on the right side; and they were alarmed. But he said to them, ‘Do not be
alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been
raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. But go, tell
his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you
will see him, just as he told you.’ So they went out and fled from the tomb,
for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, they were afraid for ....
[Mark
16.1-8]
Second Sunday of Easter: Over to you!
There
is an age-old debate about the ending of Mark’s Gospel. Does it end at chapter
16 verse 8, which in Greek reads ‘they were afraid for’, or does it continue to
16.19? Former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams in his book on St Mark
believes that it end intentionally at verse 8, and that sudden ending ‘for’ is
intentional. It is not that the ending has been lost, or that Mark never got to
write the ending, it is rather that we are the ones who continue his Gospels
narrative. It's an explanation I find both compelling and plausible.
I want
to end my series of reflections with the image of Christ the Worker, which sits
in the Chapel of the Diocese of Southwark’s retreat house at Wychcroft. (It is
under this image that I, and many other Priests Ordained in the Diocese of
Southwark over the years, have taken our Vows, and received the Bishop’s Charge, his instruction
for our ministry.) The Jesus in this image we see is not the one usually
depicted in Easter Iconography or Western art, with soft hands and delicate
features. This Christ is muscular, used to work his hands are calloused. As
Graham Kendrick writes in his song ‘Servant King’ these are ‘hands
that flung stars in to space’. If we are to take forward the story of the
Resurrection, so to do we take fo rward the work of Christ. As St Teresa of
Avila writes:
“Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no
feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks compassion
on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the
hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are
the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth
but yours.”
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