3rd Sunday of Easter, Year A, Shaftesbury

I'll only offer a brief thought today because we have a mission appeal at the end of Mass:

Do we take in the reality of the Res’n, or is it just a rumour, as it had been to those 2 men on the road to Emmaus? They’d already heard, but they only treated it as a rumour.

When Jesus Christ appeared to the 2 disciples on road to Emmaus, it made a big change in them:
From Despair to hope”
“faces downcast”
“Our hope HAD been” –past hope
“so SLOW to believe the full message of the prophets”
changed to:
“Hearts burned within us”
“set out that instant” –late, dark, dangerous road to travel
but urgent and full of joy
They understood the Scriptures –that ordained that Christ should suffer, and so enter into his glory

What impact does faith in the Resurrection make on us?
Change us?
Cause for hope?
Focus of whole understanding of life?
Is Resurrection central to our thinking? Or is it just a rumour, like to the 2 men.

Do we understand that death and resurrection is the plan of God? As the 2 men came to understand?
That it is His victory over the sin and suffering that man has inflicted on himself and on God’s once perfect creation

There are many reasons to believe: There are many records of those he appeared to
Do we let it change us?
If not, then we are ultimately despondent, like the 2 men on the road, and Jesus’s words to them also hold to us: “You foolish men”. Foolish because not paying attention, not seeing what he has done for us, “so slow to understand”