We interrupt this season of crass politics and ISIS terrorist attacks with an important Easter message: Real men wash the feet of refugees, Muslims and women, and strive to live in peace.
On this first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox – Easter Sunday – the world may feel like an empty cave where the sound of suffering echoes loudly. Too many people are lonely, poor, exhausted and trapped “by a digital, virtual worldliness that is opened and closed by a simple click,” in the words of Pope Francis, one real man among too many fools who has morphed the Catholic Church from ancient ruin to modern sanctuary.
“All of us together, Muslims, Hindus, Catholics, Copts, Evangelical (Protestants) brothers and sisters – children of the same God – we want to live in peace, integrated,” Francis said during his recent homily.
But more than the words of the pontiff were transformative and poignant this Holy Week. What he said was outshined by what he did.
In the aftermath of the deadly Brussels massacre, amid the boorish feud between certain presidential candidates, Pope Francis got on his knees and washed the feet of Muslims from Syria, Pakistan and Mali, a Hindu from India, Coptic Christian women from Eritrea and Catholics from Nigeria.
“Gestures speak louder than pictures and words,” Francis said Thursday before tenderly consoling and dignifying these 12 immigrants at the Reception Center for Asylum Seekers in Castelnuovo di Porto, outside Rome.
Pow!
The power of humility is striking. The optics of an alternative is potent spiritual medicine. Like a crocus appearing out of the cold ground, a great moral leader gives us hope. A man who takes no comfort in comfortable surroundings and instead cares for and loves the Other is an angelic elixir with potential to heal broken hearts and cure calcified cynicism.
Set side by side to the 24-hour “news” cycle of petty political rubbish, violence, materialism, greed and power mongering sat this humble but strong man, saying it like it truly is: Good and bad know no single color, race, gender or religion. Those who commit terrorism and acts of violence are “people who do not want to live in peace,” and equally depraved are those who profit from war and hate.
But Francis reminds us there are good, loving people, too, who can be seen more often if one kneels and looks up.
“Each of us has a story within us,” the pontiff says to those inclined to stereotype groups that look or act differently.
“So many crosses, so many sorrows, but we also have a heart open to brotherhood. May each one of us, in our own religious language, beg the Lord that this brotherhood be contagious in the world, so that there are not 30 coins to kill our brother, so that there will always be brotherhood and goodness.”
Thirty silver coins was the paltry sum it took to bribe Judas Iscariot to betray Jesus prior to the Last Supper on Holy Thursday, before he was crucified on Good Friday, according to the Christian faith. Two days later, on Easter Sunday when she found Christ’s tomb empty, an angel told Mary Magdalene that Jesus had risen from the dead. The resurrection of Jesus and ongoing life as the son of God is the foundation of Christianity, symbolic of the salvation available to anyone seeking forgiveness.
The betrayal and crucifixion of Christ was long ago, but Christians live and dream it now, and metaphors depicting the struggle between good and evil persist in every faith. We are confused and afraid – are the images haunting our minds the bloodied bodies of those maimed and killed by terrorists, or a version of Christ crucified on the cross?
Regardless of your faith, sometimes it feels we are alive at a very bad time, but the story of struggle is not new. What changes is our reaction to it, and here, too, Pope Francis gives us hope by his words and his deeds. No longer is the ritual of washing the feet of the poor on Holy Thursday restricted to men. Pope Francis changed the rules and welcomes women, Muslims, black and brown people to the brotherhood.
They say Easter is a “moveable feast” because the calculation of when this celebration of rebirth and redemption occurs – the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox – changes from year to year. The universe, stars, sun and moon dictate.
And if the festival of Easter can change by force of nature, and the pope can change thousands of years worth of tradition, then today I have faith we can change, too. We can live in peace if we act accordingly.
Happy Easter. He is risen! She is risen! We all are risen.
Cynthia Dill is a civil rights lawyer and former state senator. She can be contacted at:
Twitter: dillesquire
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