wfn.org | National Council of Churches Easter message

["Philip Jenks" <pjenks@ncccusa.org>]

Eds: Following is the National Council of Churches Easter message issued  today by His Eminence Archbishop Vicken Aykazian, President, and the  Rev. Dr. Michael Kinnamon, General Secretary.

"There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has  to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in  love. We love because he first loved us." - I John 4:18-19

>April 7, 2009

>Dear Sisters and Brothers:

Grace and peace to each of you as we approach the holiest time of the  Christian year. Easter is celebrated in the Western tradition on April  12, and Pascha in the Orthodox tradition on April 19.

As we reflect on our Lord's passion and crucifixion, we are reminded  that so many of God's children are burdened by suffering. The 17th  century mathematician and theologian Blaise Pascal, whose faith was  tempered by chronic physical pain, wrote that in the history of this  tortured world, every day is Good Friday.

In our own century, the litany of pain gets longer every day. Women and  girls in the Congo are raped and murdered daily by men who wish to  display their power. Myanmar has been described as the world's largest  concentration camp. Genocidal death squads roam with impunity in Darfur.  Innocent civilians are trapped in the murderous crossfire in Sri Lanka.  The death rate in Afghanistan continues to rise and insurgent forces are  still responsible for scores of murders in Iraq. In central Italy,  scores are dead and thousands are homeless as a result of a devastating  earthquake near L'Aquila and other towns.

Closer to home, the American appetite for illegal drugs has sparked  deadly skirmishes between authorities and drug dealers along the  Mexican-U.S. border. The threat of terrorist attacks has not abated. In  cities and villages throughout the United States, unemployment lines are  growing, tens of thousands have lost their homes and pensions and  millions ponder the future with fear and uncertainty. Many of the member  communions of the National Council of Churches have been forced to cut  programs and dedicated staff. In our meditations, we hear the agony in  our Lord's cry: "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mark  15:34). And our own hearts search for assurance that God has not  abandoned us.

The joy of Easter is precisely that assurance, and it comes to each of  us the very moment we connect to the reality of the most dramatic  two-word dialogue in world history, the exchange between the risen Lord  and a terrified woman. "Jesus said to her, 'Mary!' She turned and said  to him in Hebrew, 'Rabbouni!"

Easter is the feast day of our own transformation as we turn to  encounter the resurrected Christ. Easter marks the day God reached into  our lives and defeated that which we fear most: death. Easter is God's  assurance that no matter how bad the world may be, it is not God's final  word.

That, of course, doesn't make it easy to face the horrors of the world.  Fear is not so easily banished, and it may even have a legitimate role  in human life. It can move us to marshal our resources in the face of  crisis, to act on behalf of neighbors who are threatened (and there are  real threats in this sinful world). But fear can also turn neighbor  against neighbor and friends to enemies. God's power over death helps us  set that fear aside and enables us to accept God's call to be the  instruments of intervention in the anguish of the world.

Our most prayerful message to you at Easter is this: the God of hope is  calling us again to love one another, to uphold one another, to bear  each other's burdens, and to cast out the fear that leads to  destruction. This Easter let us renew our commitment to bring the gospel  to bear on the underlying fearfulness of our world. Let us offer a  witness, rooted in our faith, that engenders hope for a different  approach to common life.

Remember I John: "We love because God first loved us." It is the best  possible reminder that self-centeredness is the root of fear. If our  well-being is gained at the expense of others, we will live anxiously.  If our security is based on treating others as enemies, then we will  live anxiously. And if our focus is on the survival of "our church"  rather than on the one body of Christ and our common witness to God's  coming reign, then we will live anxiously.

Our calling as a community of Christians is to point beyond ourselves to  the One whose love casts out fear, and to demonstrate that love by  living it with one another.

>The Lord is Risen! He is risen indeed.

>H.E. Vicken Aykazian, President
>Rev. Dr. Michael Kinnamon, General Secretary

>___

National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA:  35 faith  traditions encompassing 45 million Americans in 100,000 local  congregations . . . joining hands and voices in witness to their unity  in Christ. 

NCC News contact:  Philip E. Jenks, 212-870-2228 (office), 646-853-4212  (cell) , pjenks@ncccusa.org