Fifth Sunday of Lent: Resurrection and New Life

by the Rev. Francis T. Gignac, S.J.

oday's liturgy invites us to reflect on the universal significance of the death and resurrection of Christ.

The author of the fourth gospel concluded his story of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem with an ironical statement put on the lips of the Pharisees, "Look, the whole world has gone after him." To illustrate this, he tells a story of some Greeks coming to see Jesus (John 12:20-33). Far from being incidental extras, these Greeks, like the magi in the infancy narrative of Matthew's gospel, symbolize the Gentile world in search of the truth of God. Their approach to Jesus is made through Philip and Andrew, signifying that access to Jesus has to be mediated to the world at large through his disciples.

The author then develops the point that all who would truly "see" Jesus must see him through his paschal mystery, i.e., in his death and resurrection. Only through his crucifixion will Jesus be accessible to all; only after his death can the gospel encompass both Jew and Gentile. It is an hour of paradox, when all realities change meaning: to die is to live and to lose is to find. In order to bear fruit, a grain must decompose in the earth.

Hence, he adds a saying about regeneration, "Unless a grain of wheat dies, it remains just a grain of wheat," and a saying of Jesus found in other forms in the synoptic gospels, "Whoever loves his life will lose it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life." Then by analogy he extends this principle of life through death to all would- be followers of Jesus, "If anyone would serve me, let that person follow me," i.e., along my way of life through death.

The Old Testament reading is the famous new covenant passage of Jeremiah 31:31-34. This is an oracle, written about 587 B.C., predicting the ultimate restoration of Israel after the exile. The prophet has Yahweh, the God of Israel, taking the initiative, as at Sinai. This new covenant will fulfill the original intention of the old; it will be expressed in personal response.

The prophet pictures Yahweh himself forming a new community, "I will be their God, and they shall be my people." The new covenant will rest on divine forgiveness; but this pardon must be preceded by Yahweh's discipline, the Babylonian exile. But in the time of restoration, Yahweh will give each Israelite a new heart.

In the second reading from the Letter to the Hebrews (5:7-9), we have Jesus portrayed as a compassionate high priest called by God, one who can sympathize with sinners, because in the time of his mortal life, "he offered prayers to God, who was able to save him from death." Jesus was heard, not because he did not die, but because God raised him from death. Then, availing himself of the learning-through-suffering motif common in Greek literature, he writes that Jesus, "Son though he was, learned obedience and so became the source of eternal salvation" for all who believe in him.

This is the paschal mystery that we are preparing to relive these next two weeks. When we are baptized into Christ, we are baptized into his death - we are called to die to sin in order to rise with him to live a new life. When we partake of the Eucharist, we celebrate the death and resurrection of our Lord and we try, as we encounter him in his sacramental presence, to be open to receive his Spirit.

Our Christian vocation is to be conformed more and more to the image of him whom we proclaim as God's Son. And the same spirit of Christ that enlivens us for holiness of life is the source of eternal life for all of us who believe in him and for all who seek God in truth and sincerity of heart.

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Revised: 27 October 1997

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