1 Corinthians 15:12, 16-20
Brothers and sisters:
If Christ is preached as raised from the dead,
how can some among you say there is no resurrection of the dead?
If the dead are not raised, neither has Christ been raised,
and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain;
you are still in your sins.
Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.
If for this life only we have hoped in Christ,
we are the most pitiable people of all.
But now Christ has been raised from the dead,
the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.
Today’s reading from St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians is a harbinger of Easter Sunday, which will be on April 17, a little more than two months away.
In his letter, St. Paul was blunt and forthright in identifying the Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth from the dead as central to the Christian faith. He said, “if Christ has not been raised, your faith is vain“, i.e., worthless or futile.
Edicule encasing the Tomb of Christ in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre
Happily, we do have empirical evidence of the Resurrection, one of which is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Christian Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem — the site where Jesus was crucified (“Calvary” or “Golgotha”), and the site of the tomb where Jesus’ body was placed. The tomb is enclosed by an 18th-century shrine called the Edicule.
In 1809, during a partial opening of the Edicule by the architect Nikolaos Komnenos, a “sweet aroma” emanated from the tomb, the same “scent of sanctity” that often accompanies Marian apparitions and the tombs of some saints.
More recently, on October 26-28, 2016, scientists undertaking restoration work in the Edicule also smelled a “sweet aroma” when they removed the marble slab that covers the tomb. There were also electromagnetic disturbances: some of the measuring instruments used by the scientists, when placed vertically on the stone on which Christ’s body rested, either malfunctioned or ceased to work entirely. (Source: Aleteia)
According to scientists at Italy’s National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development (ENEA) who, in 2011, concluded their five-year study of the Shroud of Turin — the linen cloth in which Jesus’ body was wrapped — the image on the Shroud had been left by “a short and intense burst of VUV directional radiation,” stronger than could be created by any technology currently available to man. VUV is vacuum ultra-violet, a type of electromagnetic radiation.
Shroud of Turin
Imagine how powerful the radiation burst of the Resurrection must have been to leave electromagnetic traces after more than 2,000 years, which were detected by those scientists restoring the Edicule in 2016.
And if the Resurrection is true, then we and our loved ones will also be resurrected after our mortal bodies died, just as Jesus had raised from the dead Lazarus, the daughter of Jairus, and the son of the widow at Nain.
Colossians 3:1-4
Brothers and sisters:
If then you were raised with Christ, seek what is above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Think of what is above, not of what is on earth.
For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ your life appears,
then you too will appear with him in glory.
Keep the faith!
May the peace and love of Jesus Christ Our Lord be with you,
~E
