Homily: Octave of Easter - Monday - Do not be afraid to witness

For much of the secular world, Easter is over now. They're back to normal life. For disciples of Jesus Christ, however, Easter means risen life is normal life.  Alleluia! Today is the second day of fifty days of glory.

It is also the second day of the Octave of Easter, meaning, we celebrate Easter each day this week.  We keep celebrating so that we might continue to enter into the meaning of the resurrection. 

In the early Church, the newly baptized would be at each liturgy this week, wearing their white garments.  Listen to the words the priest speaks to the newly baptized:

You have become a new creation
and have clothed yourselves in Christ.
Receive this baptismal garment
and bring it unstained to the judgment seat
of our Lord Jesus Christ,
so that you may have everlasting life.

At the Easter Vigil, and yesterday on Easter Sunday, all of us renewed our baptismal promises of rejecting sin so as to live in the freedom of God’s children, rejecting the glamour of evil and refusing to be mastered by sin, and rejecting Satan father of sin and prince of darkness. 

Having been clothed with Christ we are a new creature, a new creation, and we must live always according to that dignity. 

In Matthew's Gospel, we hear that right from the beginning there was a chilling conspiracy to hide the fact of the resurrection.  The chief priests and the elders gave a large sum of money to the soldiers, telling them, “You are to say, ‘His disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep.’  The early Church was well aware of the dark powers that continue to work at odds against the Church, against Christ.

Nevertheless, the first commands Jesus gives to those who first saw Him after His resurrection are: "Do not be afraid! Go and carry the news".  We cannot be afraid to witness.  Non-believers are waiting to meet Christ through your witness.

Some may sneer at us, others may even try to silence us, but some are waiting to meet Christians who are faithful to the promises of their baptism, who give witness to the Resurrection of Jesus, who witness through their integrity of life, through their conviction, through their conversion from sin.  They await your witness for the glory of God and salvation of souls.