Along with joy, there’s a lot of fear in the days after Easter – no less for Jesus’ disciples than in our news today. It has made me think about doors. The door behind which Jesus’ disciples hid after his death, the heavy stone that blocked the tomb where he’d been laid, the doors today that keep people out, or in, or protect property or borders. And symbolic doors – to peace or security – that still feel so definitely closed.
This morning the metal-shuttered door at the Whitechapel Mission in the east end of London opened as it always does at 6 AM – exactly on time so guests can count on it. Breakfast service will start in a few minutes at 8, and it’s likely over 200 will eat a full English, complete with mushrooms and bacon, sausage, egg and hashbrowns. Today these homeless guests will be served by wonderful volunteers who left their own doors well before dawn.
Having a key to open my front door and a safe place to live is a real blessing – I like being safe. And yet I think about the women who went up to Jesus’ tomb to anoint his body on Easter morning: wisdom would say stay home hiding with the men. And having left the safety provided by one door, they didn’t know how they’d get through the next. The Gospel records their conversation: who would move the stone to open the tomb ? Yet, they went.
We might think of Jesus’ resurrection as a miracle, but it was actually just what he said would happen, even if no one had understood. God will redeem the world. However these women going out while the danger was still present - that feels to me a miracle no less real, hiding in plain sight.
And it gives me hope. Easter is not about things being safe, but about things being different. Doors open where we do not expect. The power to do miracles given to people forgotten by headlines – women and men who go out in faith and change history.
On Saturday I heard the BBC’s Lyse Doucet speculate about one possible turn of events in Iran: ‘…God help the world,’ she said with real emphasis. …God help the world indeed … because, I fear, nothing else has.’
Maybe, this Monday, the beginnings of the miracles we hope for are in our power already. Long term solutions to intractable problems – they are not cost free. But in the end real safety doesn’t come from bigger doors or stronger locks.
Österreich