EASTER MESSAGE FROM BISHOP LEO O’REILLY


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EASTER MESSAGE 2016

Bishop Leo O’Reilly

At Easter we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus. We celebrate it this year in the context of the Jubilee Year of Mercy and also in the context of the centenary of the 1916 Rising. We remember also this year the centenary of the Battle of the Somme during the First World War.  Both conflicts resulted in the loss of many human lives, though clearly on vastly different scales. We mourn the loss of every life because every human life is sacred.

The resurrection of Jesus celebrates the victory of life over death, the victory of love over hatred and of reconciliation over enmity. It is the foundation of our Christian faith. So much so that St Paul could say: “if Christ is not risen then our faith is in vain”(1Cor 15: 14). Christ’s resurrection is the ultimate manifestation of God’s mercy in the world because it is God’s loving response to the most heinous expression of evil imaginable, the crucifixion and death of Jesus his Son. By raising Christ from the death God overcame the power of sin and death and opened for us the way to new life in him.

In the diocese of Kilmore we will commemorate all who died in the 1916 Rising at week-end  Masses on the week-end of 23-24 April – the actual anniversary of the Rising. Later in the year, in July, we will remember those who died in the battle of the Somme and the Great War.

We should not forget that faith in God was central to the outlook of almost all the 1916 leaders. Padraig Pearse proclaimed Ireland to be a Republic outside the GPO on Easter Monday in 1916 and he did so, ‘In the name of God and of the dead generations from which she [Ireland] receives her old tradition of nationhood…’ Then he went on to say ‘We place the cause of the Irish Republic under the protection of the Most High God, whose blessing we invoke…’ Seán MacDiarmada, one of the signatories of the Proclamation and a native of our diocese, wrote a letter to his own brothers and sisters on 11 May 1916, just a few hours before he was executed. His Christian beliefs are obvious in this letter.  He wrote ‘By the time this reaches you I will with God’s mercy have joined in heaven my poor Father and Mother…’  He advises his nieces and nephews to ‘always practice truth, honesty and straightforwardness in all things, and sobriety, if they do this and remember their country they will be all right.’ And he finishes off his letter by saying ‘God Bless and guard you all and may He have mercy on my soul.’

The 1916 leaders were very aware of their long Christian heritage and they wanted those Christian beliefs to be an integral part of the new Republic, though there are some in our country today who conveniently forget this and want to airbrush that Christian heritage away. The way we remember the past is important because it shapes our present and our future. So it is important that we remember 1916 faithfully and that means remembering the faith dimension that was integral to it.

As we celebrate the feast of Easter, I hope that faith in the resurrection of Jesus will continue to inspire our people and shape our society and our relationships. I take heart and hope from the responses of young people in our schools recently to the invitation to write their own Easter Proclamation.  Their vision is for a better Ireland and a better world and could be summed up as follows:

  • Those who are homeless should be given suitable shelter and accommodation.
  • Those who are hungry should be given the food and drink which they need.
  • The hearts of the people of Ireland should be large enough to welcome and accommodate the people of          Syria and others fleeing places of persecution.
  • The lives of all people should be respected and valued from beginning to natural death.
  • The people of every nationality and creed should live in harmony and peace with respect for each other and for the planet we live on.’

The Easter message – the message of the Resurrection – challenges us to work for the kind of society our young people dream of.  It reminds us that, at the end of the day, human happiness and wellbeing do not come from our own efforts or from ever increasing economic growth, but from the power and the grace of the Risen Lord.

I wish you all a very happy Easter.

 

Leo O’Reilly

Bishop of Kilmore

 

Bishop Leo

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