Blessed Easter to all of you friends and foes; for the Lord God has brought us to his heart through the passion, death, and Resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ - Please take a few moments to read the thoughts of the great theologian Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) on the Resurrection of Christ - so beautiful...(here).
On this day when we recall the Resurrection of the Lord our God Jesus Christ, it is also the marvel and beauty that through the Fathers of the Church and particularly through the Theotokos the Virgin Mary the Mother of Christ and the Church, that he willed to reveal to us himself - Venerable Fulton Sheen showed the power of suffering that leads to the Resurrection of Christ (here). Of the great Fathers and Doctors of the Church, Saint Ignatius of Antioch (c. 35 AD - c. 107 AD) on his way to martyrdom praises Jesus Christ who delivered us from the darkness of sin by his death and Resurrection (here) - Saint John Chrysostom (c. 349 - 407 AD) dedicated a sermon to the Risen Christ on Easter (here). Saint John of Damascus (676 - 754 AD) wrote his "Fountain of Wisdom" defending the Christian faith and praising the Risen Christ which influenced the development of faith in Western scholasticism (here).On the beauty of love shown in the Risen Christ, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (1090 AD- 1153 AD) wrote about the four degrees of love (here). The Angelic Doctor Saint Thomas Aquinas composed the hymns of Corpus Christi in which the suffering and Risen Christ is praised (listen here).
In the 20th century, we recall to mind two scholars of mystical theology who wrote about the beauty of God in the cosmos: Teilhard de Chardin, S.J. (here); and Hans Urs von Balthasar (here) -
The great Jesuit theologian Cardinal Henri de Lubac was known for his work to retrieve the work of the Fathers of the Church, in what Blessed Cardinal John Henri Newman called "The Development of Christian Doctrines" - He was also a friend to the above theologians as were Pope Saint John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI who praised their works (see here and here).
On the Resurrection of Christ too Bishop Robert Barron expressed the beauty of Christ (here).
It is with the above in mind that loving Christians need to pray for persecuted Christians and help them in the many countries where they are suffering. Only today on Easter Day, in Sri Lanka, churches were attacked and Christians suffered - many killed and up to 300 wounded (See it here)...
Let us pray to the Risen Lord for all suffering persons in the world...
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