Praying with the Pope in the Month of October ~ The First Glorious Mystery ~ Christ's Resurrection

Our Father...

This is Matthias Grunewald's Resurrection of Christ painted between 1512-1516. It was created for the hospital chapel of St. Anthony's Monastery in Isenheim, Germany, where it offered a window into brightness for the sick and dying. We might look not just at it but into it, and ask for our Church and Nation, the restoration of hope and joy.

Hail Mary...

We need to call upon the mystery of Christ's rising, and the brilliant life of this image, which was meant for plague victims and those suffering from skin disorders, infections and hallucinations. Hate and anger are our "infecting plague" today - often accompanied by hallucinations about other people. 

Hail Mary...

Grunewald isn't trying to do what a camera would have done had photography been available in the 16th century. This master artist wanted to convey a vision beyond a newspaper report. Look closely! What vision of God does it share with me personally?

Hail Mary...

Here, a weightless Christ hovers over the stone tomb and the guards. These men are not sleeping, but reptile-like are slithering away, as if in pain, before Christ's Resurrection brilliance. They are dazzled and overwhelmed. Am I ever dazzled and overwhelmed by God? Or is that just God's technique to win over enemies?

Hail Mary...

Christ rises, held in a  yellow, red and orange body-halo. He streaks like a fireball against the black background. The darkness and the soldiers are in crisis! St. Oscar Romero said, "A Church that does not provoke crisis, a gospel that does not disturb, a word of God that does not touch the concrete sin of the society in which it is being proclaimed - what kind of gospel is that?"

Hail Mary...

But these soldiers are resistant to that crisis and disturbance. They are heavily armoured and padded. The soldier in the foreground has his head and upper body wrapped in impenetrable chain mail. Two hold onto their swords. What sadness - the Christian who does not surrender gracefully to Christ, but remains protective of old ideologies, prejudices, and resentments. 

Hail Mary...

I do not come to Christ to admire him, however brilliant and exultant, but to be transformed as his wounds are transformed. Here we see Christ's painful Good Friday wounds now radiant and jewel-like. Even my personal wounds can be transformed!

Hail Mary...

The long shroud, which had swaddled Christ in the tomb, is now swirling and rippling; full of color and light. The cloth, painted 500 years ago, seems to anticipate the photographs that super telescopes are sending back from outer space beyond our galaxy. A risen Christ whose message and meaning transcends everything we know!

Hail Mary...

There is a huge bolder behind the risen Jesus. It seems to be floating with him - an impossible heaviness lifted! Can I name that? An addiction? An illness or personal problem that seemed to be crushing me? Some loss or sorrow I survived and out of which I have even flourished?

Hail Mary...

The Risen-One stands in the midst of deep darkness. During the seven long decades of Soviet rule, a Romanian Christian who had witnessed the destruction of churches and every religious institution, and the exiling and death of countless priests, said about that encroaching darkness: "So long as one person stands before an icon, the presence of God endures." Let's hold onto that thought and this image, in our own time of menacing darkness.

Hail Mary...

Glory be to the Father...