the paschal mystery

images of Christ’s sacrifice

  1. suffering servant

   

  1. Jewish connection to Isaiah when messiah is foreshadowed as: “He was pierced for our transgressions, crushed for our sins, Upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole, by his stripes we were healed”
    1. Paschal lamb

   

  1. connection to the Passover when the Jews escaped the death of their first born by putting a lamb’s blood over their door. the blood of these lambs freed the Jews in Egypt and Jesus’ blood frees us all.
    1. ransom for many

   

  1. ransom was the price paid to release a slave and with Jesus we are all ransomed and freed

significance of resurrection

  • resurrection demonstrates that Jesus is the Son of God
    • confirms Jesus’ divinity AND Jesus’ teachings
  • resurrection opens the possibility of new Life for us—the center of the Paschal Mystery that provides us with the hope of redemptive suffering
    • in Jesus’ death we are liberated from sin and in the Resurrection a new life is opened to us
  • Jesus’ resurrection confirms that we will also experience a resurrection 
    • our body will transform and unlike belief of Gnostics we will be perfected in the union of both body and soul—they are one not opposed
    • our resurrected bodies will not be corruptible and we will enter a new kind of existence with God

Ascension

  • before ascension the descent into Hell occurs
    • Christ experiences the real moment of death and loss of physical life
    • Jesus goes to righteous who died before & brings them to heaven
  • brings us full circle (symmetry): Incarnation = Jesus comes to earth & Ascension = Jesus returns to His Father 
  • Christ now has full authority over heaven and earth
  • humanity now has possibility of spending eternity in heaven—Christ does not give up his human nature after Ascension and so we are honored at the heavenly banquet

the Paschal mystery

saves us from

  • Christ’s Paschal mystery saves us from sin and its consequences
    • guilt, shame and death
    • loneliness, despair, and feeling unloved
    • addictions and attachment to things
  • we are saved from those things that Adam introduced with Original Sin and become human

saves us for

  • Paschal Mystery Saves us for Eternal Life
    • Forgiveness and healing from mortal and venial sins
    • Freedom
    • Joy
    • Loving communion—experience the beatific vision
    • Eternal Life
  • salvation comes from Jesus Christ, the Head, through the Church, which is His Body
    • baptism→ sanctifying grace which leads us to practice hope, faith, and love.`
  • in experiencing sanctifying grace and practicing the theological virtues we are humanized and therefore divinized—sacraments of the Church help us on this journey towards God