Living Catholic with Father Don Wolf
Father Don Wolf, a priest of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City, offers a Catholic perspective on the issues confronting each person today.
Living Catholic with Father Don Wolf
"O, Death, Where is Your Sting?" | April 20, 2025
What if graves no longer held the final word on human existence? On this Easter Sunday episode, we explore the revolutionary promise at the heart of Christian faith—that Jesus's resurrection fundamentally transforms our understanding of life, death, and eternity.
Throughout human history, graves have held mesmerizing power in developing cultural identity. From Arlington Cemetery to the Vietnam War Memorial, we gather at monuments to the dead to find meaning in sacrifice and remember shared purpose. Yet the resurrection story completely subverts this paradigm. The empty tomb became not a monument to death but a signpost pointing to eternal life—a reality so transformative that even Jesus's closest followers struggled initially to recognize him in his resurrected state.
The resurrection offers more than hope for an afterlife—it fundamentally reframes the significance of our present choices and actions. As C.S. Lewis wrote, we are immortal creatures whose decisions carry "the weight of glory." When Christ broke the bonds of death, he broke them for all who would follow him. This Easter, consider what it means to walk away from the chains and begin truly living.
Join us throughout the Easter season as we continue exploring the revolutionary implications of Christ's resurrection for our daily lives.
Easter Sunday represents the cornerstone of our faith where Jesus breaks the bonds of death and invites us to the fullness of life promised to Adam and renewed through Christ. We proclaim this essential truth: if Jesus is not raised from the dead, then our faith is in vain.
In this episode:
• Women approaching the tomb to complete burial rituals discovered it empty, fundamentally challenging human cultural understanding
• Graves traditionally hold power as places where communities gather to remember their dead and develop collective identity
• The resurrection subverts this paradigm—there would be no monument to a crucified Christ but a living reality
• Women as first witnesses to the resurrection is significant, challenging us to listen to those we might dismiss
• The promise extends beyond Jesus himself—his resurrection offers all believers the gift of eternal life
• Our decisions and actions take on "immortal weight" when we understand we are destined for resurrection
• Easter represents not just a historical event but our own invitation to walk away from the broken chains of death
Join us in the coming weeks as we continue our Easter season rejoicing in Christ's resurrection.
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Father Don Wolf is a priest of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City. Living Catholic also broadcasts on Oklahoma Catholic Radio several times per week, with new episodes airing every Sunday.
Welcome Oklahoma to Living Catholic with Father Don Wolfe. This is Living Catholic with Father Don Wolfe. This show deals with living the Catholic faith in our time, discovering.
Speaker 2:God's presence in our lives and finding hope in His Word. And now your host Father.
Speaker 1:Don Wolfe. It's also the cornerstone of the life of faith we proclaim. As St Paul says, if Jesus is not raised from the dead, then our faith is in vain. We gather and celebrate at this time not just because it's springtime and the weather invites us to new beginnings and a new hope, but because this is the beginning of the encounter with the promise of God to break the bonds of death and invite us to the fullness of life promised to Adam and renewed in Jesus Christ. Easter is the day for all of us who stare the cruel visage of mortality full in the face and are given the promise that life is changed, not ended. This is our day and a day for all people everywhere Jesus is risen from the dead.
Speaker 1:Easter Sunday opens with the women gliding through the dark toward the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. It was there. The body of Jesus had been placed in the twilight of Good Friday, hastily buried before the coming of dark. The women were on their way to render their last respects to the one whom they loved. Respects to the one whom they loved. Unable to comfort him in the last moments of this life, they were limited to caring for his body in death. It was their care that prompted their footsteps through the early morning.
Speaker 1:Jewish burial customs were elaborate, at least for those who could afford them. Not everyone could be placed in a tomb hewn out of rock. Not everyone could be anointed with quote oil and spices weighing about 100 pounds unquote a description from the Gospels and not every body was wrapped in linen and carefully placed in a tomb. But for those who could care for the bodies of their loved ones in these ways, it was a sign of their respect for those who were a part of the intersecting webs of their lives. Jewish notion of afterlife made it out to be grim at best. The place of the dead was drab and dark even for the souls of the just. Being here, alive and active in this world, was the blessing of God. Thus, the body of the one who enjoyed this blessing of being here in this world was treated as the blessing it was. It was cared for and respected, which was all these women were trying to do. Jesus deserved the care they could give. His body laid to rest in the way everyone wanted to treat the ones they loved. If there was any proof of the impact Jesus had made on the lives of those who surrounded him. It was the affection these women were willing to invest in ensuring a proper burial, and so they made their way through the awakening morning so as to get busy with the work of burial.
Speaker 1:As we read the Gospel passage on Easter Sunday morning, the freshness of spring and the season of hope are intertwined. Sunday morning, the freshness of spring and the season of hope are intertwined. We of course know the story and our hearts are attuned to what happens among the women as they draw close. But they didn't know. All they had to say of what they experienced came from the sum of what they saw and said as testimony to the resurrection. The accounts from the four Gospels vary somewhat. In fact, they're different enough for us to wonder what really happened. As these women began to encounter the unexpected and then began to realize something extraordinary had taken place, the Gospel writers obviously corrected fragments or opinions about this event and wrote down what they could make of the story. We readers are left to pierce together their point of view in order to make whatever sense we can of their experience.
Speaker 1:These women didn't come to the tomb expecting to tell a story of what they were to do. Lacking any expectation of journalistic descriptions, the unfolding events didn't leave a neat narrative trail. If you go to a football game with the job of writing the story, the details of the game are important and you pay attention to them. Touchdowns aren't just points scored, they're the product of careful plays and athletic accomplishment. Punts aren't just part of the game, they're the punctuation points of good defense, and on and on aren't just part of the game, they're the punctuation points of good defense and on and on. When prepared to tell a story, the events are shaped into a narrative framework that carries the story forward. But if you just go to the game to enjoy the Friday night lights, the story you tell won't look anything like the article written to describe it in the newspaper. The gospel stories seem much more like the hurried recall of harried participants than the careful massaging of all that happened into a good story.
Speaker 1:But of course, the women. They went to the tomb in the early morning mists to complete the burial of their friend, not to find out something new. As they made their way through the early lighting hours of day, their big concern was how to move the stone from the front of the tomb, which they were not equipped to do. In fact, in the confusing facts leading up to this moment. It's not clear how they set out on their mission without a proviso for tackling this number one concern getting into the tomb. Perhaps it was because they figured it would just all work out somehow. We Anglos don't think much of that as far as being a plan, but such self-counsel figures largely in other cultures, and so they went Above all. They arrived at the area of the tomb expecting to encounter the silence of the dead.
Speaker 1:The Gospels relate that the tomb was a new one, just hewn out of the rock there donated by Joseph of Arimathea. At that time, families used tombs over and over as the bodies deteriorated and the tombs were opened and the bones picked up in place, sometimes in bone boxes, where they were preserved, often for generations. The space in the tomb would then be occupied by other members of the family who had died. This seems somewhat gruesome to those of us addicted to cleanliness and tidiness, but it was a practice among the people there at that time. We like to put the dead away and keep them safely beyond us. In the ancient world, especially among those with such great focus on ancestors, this was typical. They remembered their dead Among us.
Speaker 1:We generally keep our cemeteries up and like to imagine there's something like a garden, and normally we keep them in good trim and are content to know they're not overrun with wild vines and uncut grass or are molested by people turning over gravestones or treating the place like a homeless encampment. But, all that being said, we don't visit there. It's unusual to see anyone visit a grave or to spend much time in a cemetery. We just don't have much of a connection to those buried there.
Speaker 1:Graves, though, have had a mesmerizing power in the process of human culture. The cultural theorist René Girard proposed that civilization began around the grave. As the people of a community gathered to remember the sacrifice of one of its own, they were drawn to the personality and the example of the one who had died and been buried. By focusing on his actions, the community was drawn together and focused on a mission or purpose much larger and more powerful than their divisions or disagreements. By gathering at the grave and remembering, they were empowered to develop their identity and vision of themselves. It was the inspiring dynamic of the invention of human culture. All through history, this has been true.
Speaker 1:We know how powerful the ceremonies and practices of Arlington Cemetery can be. For example, it's there where the story of the country is told, at least the story of sacrifice and duty, so important to the maintenance of our identity and purpose. We might not have all that much concern about the burial of our own ancestors, but we do take part in the purpose and power of our national founding and our collective purpose. As we see the old guard and their ceremonies at the tomb of the unknown soldier, we don't found civilization there, but we reinforce the one we have, with much less ceremony but with more pathos, the Vietnam War Memorial in another part of the capital performs something of the same purpose by memorializing the sacrifice demanded of the war in Vietnam were continually enlivened by those whose lives were taken in that conflict. The price of war and the example of national purpose are solemnly on display there. While it's not a cemetery per se, it is something of a national grave marker of those who died in the war. It also symbolizes the sacrifices of those who served in the war but who were not pressed to give their lives in it.
Speaker 1:Over the years, it has often been described as the most powerful monument in Washington. It's the place where the meaning of life and purpose we share is symbolized, and rightly so this is a powerful aspect of our culture, of all cultures, and it has its providence in human history as its long tendrils stretch into the past. What is the most powerful scene in the most powerful movie made in Hollywood over the last 50 years? The movie is Saving Private Ryan and the scene is of the American military cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach. The action there sets the theme of the entire movie and summarizes the themes of clarity and sacrifice that make the movie so powerful for American audiences.
Speaker 1:When groups visit the invasion beaches these days, they all ask to see the cemetery. Invasion beaches these days, they all ask to see the cemetery. It has become a newly unforgettable sign, because it's a living sign of the power of the dead, and they do have power. Even in our age, in which we have no more than a nodding relationship with our ancestors, we know the power of the dead can exert enormous influence on our thinking. When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, for example, about 2,500 people were killed. Over the four years of the war that followed, those 2,500 dead were invoked to justify our attacks on the cities of Japan, almost all of which we eventually destroyed from the air. In one raid alone, more than 100,000 people were killed. The shadow of those dead at Pearl Harbor loomed large over the decision-making, and then the war-making, of the whole country. It's a paradox we all acknowledge the memory of the dead sometimes have more power over us than the presence of the living. We can more likely coalesce around those who have died much more easily than we can agree concerning those who are living.
Speaker 1:When the women came to the tomb, although they were not driven by the deepest cultural instincts, they did understand how powerful it was that their friend, who had been unjustly killed as a victim of Roman justice, that this spot would be, at least for a time, the place around which so many emotions would surface and so many resolutions would be made. They wanted to express their love for their friend, but they also wanted to keep his memory alive and allow everyone to focus on the beauty of his example. They wanted the grave to become a sign of hope, not simply a reminder of the shortness of life and the cruelty of the system in which they lived. For a moment at least, the tomb of their friend could become a monument. But all of this was spoiled the moment they arrived and saw the stone rolled back from the entrance. Every expectation was dashed, every anticipation was fruitless. They had no idea what to expect. Nothing that was supposed to happen was happening. They were nonplussed. The prospect of honoring Jesus' body was gone. A hope to make this place a place of honor had evaporated In their minds.
Speaker 1:It may have been the case even that the power of Rome had extended to the disposition of Jesus' body, just so that his death would not become an indictment of Roman methods and Roman decisions. As Mary Magdalene says in John's Gospel, they've taken him and we don't know where they've put him. They weren't just reeling, because their plans were upset. The entire direction of human cultural understanding was off tilt. It's no wonder they didn't know what to do or how to continue.
Speaker 1:Which may be the most important message given to them by the visiting angel? This messenger of God informs them that Jesus has risen from the dead and their expectations are empty. But those expectations can be replaced with new expectations. Jesus goes before them and they will come to encounter him. While they mostly have no idea what this message means, they're prompted to return to their friends to begin to give them the news. We don't notice the subtle aspect of this announcement or its importance in the subsequent events, but they seem to catch on to the news as it was delivered to them. Perhaps it's most important that it be delivered by God's own messenger because of its import.
Speaker 1:When the truth of the resurrection dawned, it was clear there would be no more monument to the crucified Christ, who was laid in the tomb. The grave would not become the place where the followers of Jesus would gather and find the energy to remain together. No one was going to keep coming to the garden, to the place that was empty. To remain a follower of Jesus was going to be something different and would be sustained by something more than the memory of Jesus and the story of his cruel and unjust death. An empty tomb meant there was something more for them and for all of those connected to them.
Speaker 1:Not long after the message, they began to encounter Jesus risen. The most curious aspect of their encounter was that they had a hard time knowing him. At each encounter, they needed some kind of prompt, some way to see beyond what they had laid eyes on. While this may not seem like a genuine, validating experience of a witness of the resurrection, it is understandable. What does a resurrected body look like? We can't answer the question other than to say it's both like and unlike the body. Before the resurrection. They were seeing Jesus, and yet it was more than the Jesus they knew all at the same time when they encountered him. It wasn't suspicion that prevented them from knowing him, it was the limitation of their sight Combined with the confusion caused by the change of expectations they experienced. It was a hard day for those who had arrived there that first Easter Sunday morning.
Speaker 1:In the legal system of the time also, women's testimony was not regarded as valuable. In fact, women couldn't give evidence in any kind of official proceeding since it was generally not trusted. They were too emotional or something like that. Whatever the source of the prejudice or the justification of it, the women's words were not trusted. When others referred to what the women say when they come back from the tomb, they dismissed the reports as women's talk or some such. Who would believe them and remember? This attitude is from those who were fellow disciples. They were the ones who weren't interested in what these women had to say, which is something of an argument for the validity of their testimony.
Speaker 1:The gospel writers include in their descriptions that women were the first to encounter the truth of Easter and the first to see the risen Christ. If they were simply making things up or massaging the message as it was first delivered to the Christian community, they would have focused on when Peter or James or John or one of the prominent apostles first found out about the resurrection. Their testimony would have the gravitas to convince everyone. But the evangelists don't do this. They lay out a story as the whole community knows it. The women at the tomb were the first to see and the first to know. They communicated what they saw to the apostles. This is a lesson for us.
Speaker 1:Even up to today, the venue of our prejudices have changed. It's uncommon to imagine anyone would discount the testimony of women simply because it comes from their mouths. But prejudice hasn't changed. We easily write off the experience and the testimony of those whom we regard as unreliable and we hardly give them a moment's consideration in our imagination. As we do this and mostly we don't think about it it may be these misbegotten who are the most likely to tell us of the liveliest encounters with the work of God in their lives or tell us of the newest initiative of the divine. Among us, the misfits and the poor, the forgotten and the despised. They might have the message we long to hear.
Speaker 1:It has been the case over and over that those we dismiss because they dismiss us are the ones we're least likely to listen to, and by this I mean the unbelievers among us, they who have rejected the power of God in their lives, who cannot bear to hear the content of belief or the meaning of the revelation. They are often the most powerful voices speaking when the power of God comes among them In every age. We have to be ready to attend to the experience of those who have newly discovered the open tombs of their own hearts and are ready to tell us of what happened to them on their own Easter morning. We would do well to listen, lest we end up treating them the same way the disciples treated the women in their midst. Who knows who will encounter Christ next? Listening to those who do is an important part of living.
Speaker 1:Easter Sunday, because of the women's testimony, the rest of the community began to encounter the risen Christ on their own. Jesus appeared to them and made himself evident to them so that they could see and understand. The eyes of everyone were opened and they began to receive the fullest part of the message of Jesus' ministry. It was this Rising from the dead was the promise extended to everyone, not just to Jesus himself. The bonds of death were broken, not just for this one man at this one time, but as the beginning of what God promised to everyone as Jesus rose, we also would rise. This is what's given to us as the fullest promise of the faith. It's also the animating energy of Christian culture.
Speaker 1:Rather than gathering around the tomb of the tragic hero, we're promised the certainty that death need not hold us. The power of death is not the final word, even if that is what makes for the grave of the hero and cements his place in the imagination of everyone. No, the final word is that our lives cannot be taken away from us. As we live, as we come to the decisions for our lives and as we encounter the counterattack from the powers of this world, we ourselves are promised the gift of resurrection. Our lives are not just valuable and important. Their value and their importance are immortal. This is a gift given to each of us.
Speaker 1:When the disciples began to see the risen Jesus, they saw something more than the revived body of their hero. They saw the promise of a whole new way of life, of which he was simply the first member what he was, they would become and, as puzzling and confusing as their encounter with him might have been, they understood that he standing in the midst was the doorway to the future. This is the promise of Easter Sunday. We're not left alone in our lives to make our way in the world as best we can, even if we're committed to goodness and justice. Way in the world as best we can, even if we're committed to goodness and justice, even if our lives are to embody service and tolerance, even if we're the examples of forgiveness and help to all the world in need. Our efforts are limited to the span of our lives, no matter how much power we command. The power of our lives is cordoned off by how long we will live. The constraints of our living, our place and time, and education and circumstances. They limit us as well. But if we're promised that our living is not limited simply to how long we'll be breathing, then the promise of life opens out into eternity. What we are and what we will become becomes something different when buttressed by the forever of a resurrected body. Our decisions and all the content of our lives that really make us us, they all take on eternal significance in the face of resurrection.
Speaker 1:As CS Lewis never tired of reminding his readers, we are immortal creatures, given the gift of life by God himself. Everything we do is not simply a matter of circumstance. It is a matter of immortal weight. He called it the weight of glory, and so it is. Perhaps it is the first gift of Easter Sunday. As dawn was breaking on that Sunday morning, the women began to see their lives change. The story written into their consciousness was adding a new chapter, one in which everything would be different. This is the story we read, the one written for us. This is our Easter too. The risen Christ has risen for us to offer us the gift of life, resurrected. After all, when the bonds of death are broken, they're broken. We only have to walk away from the chains to begin to live Back in just a moment. Welcome back to our final segment Faith in Verse.
Speaker 1:We have a poem today called my Printer. My printer doesn't work at all and I can't get to my messages now. It's as if they're in free fall. I guess I could. I just don't know how. Things are complicated and highly techie more than they actually need to be. Really. Plenty of people think it's all sexy, but in truth I'm not that touchy-feely which leaves me completely isolated.
Speaker 1:Now, amid the gathering dust of my devices, the miracles of communication bow before each of my intermittent crisis, all of which is part of a fallen creation that we all suffer and do our best to endure. Our technology is but the complication our great love for a full life can ensure. Thank God, we have hope here and now, greater than the sum of what we can do, all greater than our machines can allow, since the focus is not how but who. These small irritations are the investment in the conveniences we so long for. Just know they're certainly not heaven sent, so we need not to them bow or adore. That's my printer. We begin the Easter season now. We begin our rejoicing in Christ's resurrection. I hope that in the weeks to come you can join us again. Living Catholic is a production of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City for Oklahoma Catholic Radio. To learn more visit okcrorg.