LTACL: I Am Not the Easter Bunny (Fr. Robert McTeigue, S.J.)

0:00Listen to this. I bet this is never happened to you. I was visiting a family on Easter Sunday And I rang the doorbell on here the little boy on the other side of the door say he's here He's here and he's stampeding towards the door and I thought to myself oh gosh I I figured eventually at least you know one person in the world might might like me I didn't think it would be that kind of enthusiasm, but okay I'll play the hand I'm dealt and he throws up in the door with wide-eyed wonder and he looks at me and he says oh It's you And he slams the door See he thought that I was the Easter bunny I'm gonna try to do something different because it is the ock of a Vista I have something uplifting to say I really meant it stay with me. I've got a story to tell How I'm desert father Robert McTague your host here every day the Catholic current coming to you from the station of the cross Catholic Media network. Let's take a closer look glad you're here now. I don't have an objection to the Easter bunny I like hunting for eggs when I was a kid. I like getting chocolate from the Easter bunny. I like the baskets

1:04I had knew a family where the little kids were old enough to figure out that the physics behind Santa Claus Just wasn't working and one little girl told me but the Easter bunny he's legit because mom and dad Just don't seem like the kind of people the hide eggs all over the front lawn. Am I right? I made a mental reservation. Good gesture with that I am But what about Easter? We can acknowledge Easter and a lot of different ways we can sell chocolate and make Easter baskets and die eggs We can say rather anodine things about Easter on Social media we can sing a couple of extra ala lia's in church and then just get on with What would you call it? Some people would call it real life Some people more romantically inclined might refer to the high poetry of ordinary time But I want to suggest that

2:06Celebrating Easter Isn't a matter of season or time or calendar But it's responding to an amazing fact Christ died for us He absorbed all of the consequences of our sin. He drained the bitter chalice to the very end and He rose again Death could not hold him death could not defeat him the world could not contain him and he invites us to share in his victory His joy and his glory Which I'll be talking about in the weeks ahead Well, what do we do with that Emphasis on do It'll be a disaster if we say oh, yeah, Easter. That's nice. That was So a couple days ago. I was that was last week, right That would be the equivalent of Mary Magdalene Seeing the risen Lord and saying oh, it's you

3:08Now St. Paul understood Easter He knew that Easter meant that after what our Lord had achieved for us We ourselves would still had work to do he wrote this in his first epistle to the Corinthians Clean out the old yeast so that you may be a new batch as you really are unleavened For our Paschal land Christ has been sacrificed Therefore let us celebrate the festival not with the old yeast the yeast of malice and evil But with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth So says St. Paul practically speaking what does that mean for us It means that we don't just get a campaign ribbon congratulating us on having put up with another lend It means that all the powers of death and rebellion and selfishness in sin Can with the grace of God be driven out and be replaced with

4:09What leads to life ever lasting So let's celebrate the octave of Easter let's celebrate the Easter season But let's celebrate not just with nostalgia not with just a little bit of cultural nods here and there But rather with a commitment and a plan for conversion Think on these things today taken to prayer and talk about it with those you love Go in peace and please do pray for me for I am a sinner