Easter Hope – joint statement by the Archbishops of Armagh

One of the words which we associate most strongly with Easter is “hope”.  It is a word that has become a bit debased in the way we use it nowadays.  “I hope so” very often means “I would like to think this or that might happen, but I doubt if it will”. Nothing could be further from the victorious and positive nature of our Easter hope.

Easter falls at a season of the year that is full of hopefulness. Longer evenings, Spring flowers, birdsong, and the sap rising in the trees.  The whole creation (at least in the Northern hemisphere) is bursting with hope and the promise of new life. And the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead brings that hope to a new level of reality. Far from the resurrection being simply a metaphor that religious people use for natural renewal, as some believe, it is the yearly renewal of the Earth in Spring which is an anticipation of the resurrection; a sign pointing to something greater than itself.  A shadow in search of a substance.  Transience moving towards permanence.

That is how the creator God has imprinted something of Himself into the fabric of the world.  He has made if full of intimations of eternity, for instance in beauty and in music which are where many of us find the strongest suggestions of intense joy and infinity.  These created things won’t fulfil our yearning for eternal fellowship with God, but they will arouse it, and prepare us to find it unexpectedly, in the servant life and death of Jesus Christ.

Even today there are other signs all around us, not this time in nature or in music, but in the human lives which our eyes have been opened to value, often for the first time.

It has been a tough year since last Easter, and many people, Christians and others, have found ways of making the best of a bad job by helping one another in ways that we haven’t been used to doing before. We’ve also found ways to show our appreciation and admiration for people who we don’t usually think about.  They aren’t sports people, or billionaires or even politicians.  They are nurses and delivery drivers and people toiling in cavernous warehouses and food factories for very low wages.  People who serve the fundamental needs of God’s world.  And, in its own way their hidden service is a shadow of the resurrection life; the life of heaven, God’s place.  Our sure and certain hope.

• Archbishop Eamon Martin is Catholic Archbishop of Armagh and Archbishop John McDowell is Church of Ireland Archbishop of Armagh

Pope Francis has been encouraging us to remember the role and witness of St Joseph during this year. On 19 March 2021, Pope Francis will launch a year dedicated to the family which will conclude on 26 June 2022 on the occasion of the Tenth World Meeting of Families in Rome. This date also marks five years since the publication of Pope Francis’ Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love) on the beauty and joy of love in the family.

Attached is a resource prepared by the Council for Marriage and the Family of the Irish Bishops’ Conference which offers a page per day guide to the Week of Prayer (13-19 March) and which can be easily followed in school and home.

Each day has a theme reflecting on family life through the lens of Saint Joseph. At its centre is the prayer from Pope Francis which he wrote for the Year of Saint Joseph and some inspiring reflections from The Joy of Love.

Hail, Guardian of the Redeemer, Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary. To you God entrusted his only Son; in you Mary placed her trust; with you Christ became man. Blessed Joseph, to us too,show yourself a father and guide us in the path of life. Obtain for us grace, mercy, and courage, and defend us from every evil.

SOME RESOURCES TO USE IN CLASS OR ONLINE