Often this is a decision we face many times each and every day. To look or not to look, to turn away not only from the darkness, but also the light? Just think about the last week of your life. How often have you looked when perhaps you shouldn’t have looked? How often have you stared for just a little too long? Also how often have you refused to look, when you really should have looked? How often have you turned away from life, because it seemed too much?
“To look or not to look? To become the keeper of the secret or the discover of truth?” to quote Mark Nepo when reflecting on the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurdyce. He wrote:
“There is an ancient Greek myth that carries within it, like a message in a bottle, one of the most crucial struggles we face as living beings. It is the story of a gifted musician, Orpheus, whose Lover, Eurydice is taken by Hades, the god of the underworld. Orpheus is so grief-stricken that he travels to the land of the dead to plead with Hades to give Eurydice back. After a cold and deliberate consideration, Hades says, "You can have her. It will take you three days to bring her back to the land of the living. There is one condition. You must carry her and you must not look upon her face until you reach the light. If you do, she will return to me forever."
Unfortunately, unknown to Orpheus, Hades tells Eurydice the opposite, "He will carry you to the land of the living, and you must look upon him before you reach the light. If you do not, you will return to me forever." Their colossal struggle fails, and Eurydice is lost forever.
The struggle for us, though, is ongoing. For there is an Orpheus in each of us that believes, if I look, I will die. There is also a Eurydice in each of us that believes, if I don't look, I will die. And so, the great spiritual question, after "To be or not to be?" is to look or not to look. The personal balance we arrive at determines whether we make it out of hell or not.”
Isn’t this what was going through the hearts and minds of the followers of Jesus that Easter morning, according to the Gospel accounts, as they returned to the tomb that first Easter morning? Many wouldn’t go, for they could not bear what they might see. Isn’t this the story of those who found something in the tomb and those who saw nothing? Isn’t this the story of those who reacted faithfully and those who fled in fear? Isn’t this the story of those who looked and responded to the light and those who turned away? All very human responses to what they saw with the eyes, what they found in that empty tomb, well those who looked at least.
The account from John’s Gospel, revolves primarily around the experience of Mary Magdalene who rises before dawn on the third day to visit the tomb. She is a broken woman as her beloved teacher Jesus has died a horrible death. Due to the generosity of a wealthy man, he had been placed in a tomb, rather than a paupers grave. Mary is going to prepare Jesus body, following the teaching of her Jewish faith. When she arrives at the tomb, she sees that the stone blocking the entrance has already been rolled away and there is no body inside.
She enters broken, in despair, grieving for the loss of her beloved Jesus. Then suddenly out of the corner of her eye she catches something. She dares to look. The man asks “Why are you crying? Who are you looking for? She asks the man, thinking he may be a gardener "sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you've put him and I'll take care of it. I won't tell anyone. I'll just take his body and clean him up so he can rest in peace," At this moment the man calls out her name saying “Mary”. As she hears her name she sees that the man is Jesus. As he names her, she recognises him and calls him “Rabbi”, meaning “Teacher”.
What on earth does all this mean? How do we make sense of this? What about resurrection? What does this mean?
I for one find it impossible to believe in the literal bodily resurrection. That though does not mean I do not believe in a kind of spiritual resurrection, an awakening that can occur in our all too human finite lives. This I believe is what happens to Mary. When she heard her name called, suddenly her eyes were opened to a new reality, she began to see perhaps for the first time. In this moment, through finally seeing with her own eyes, she is called out from her blindness, caused by grief and despair. Her eyes are opened and she is able to see for the first time; in this moment she truly began to understand her purpose in life; on Easter morning her life began again. She experienced a spiritual resurrection.
Some that is open to all of us.
Easter is after all the day of new beginning. Easter calls us to open our eyes in a new way. To see not only what we expect to see, but something more, something new and unexpected. We need to look, to see, despite the pains and troubles of life and the temptation not to look. Look we must, we must always choose life, despite its very real troubles. We must awaken to life, to answer the call and to pour out the love we carry within us onto life.
Mary Magdalene is in utter despair, having lost her teacher, until she once again heard the voice of hope, born from that same place of total hopelessness. As she did she was able to see life through new eyes, new vision came and she was able to turn away from despair to hope. There in the tomb of despair, hope was born again. A new hope, a fresh hope, it was a moment of respair.
This is Easter for me, a story of hope for all of us, that whatever happens in our lives, if we keep on turning in faith, new vision will come, new hope will be born. We can give birth to respair, a new fresh hope. Easter time, in the midst of spring, truly is the turning season, it is the day of new beginnings. Easter teaches that we can begin again in love each and every day. This begins as we dare to look and see, in so doing we see new hope and by turning from whatever despair may keep us trapped in our empty tomb we are once again turned toward the light. We give birth to respair.
How we look at life and how we look at others is so important. How we respond to how we see matters too, everything matters every thought, every feeling, every action and every single look. It matters how we respond to what we see too. Do we turn away in fear or respond in love? Do we look or do we not look. There is much in this world that we may wish to avert our eyes from, but if we do we will also fail to see all that is wonderful and beautiful. For each act of violence there are 100 acts of love. Do we look with loving eyes or do we turn away into our own tombs of despair.
We need to look. We need to choose life, we need to become seekers of the truth and not keepers of the secret and we need to give our love away in our small, humble, human ways. The choice is our ours. “To look or not to look? To become the keeper of the secret or the discover of truth?”
Happy Easter. Let’s begin again in love.
Please find below a video devotion based on the material in this "blogspot"
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