Hearing Her Name (Easter Sunday, April 9)

Readings: Jeremiah 31: 1-5 and John 20:1-18
 
Here in this garden Mary experiences a sublime moment of clarity. She pokes her head into the empty tomb and encounters two angels (though we can’t tell if she realises what they are), she spins around to see a gardener (though that is not who he is). Both ask her why she is weeping, to both she asks after her Lord… everything to this point is a cascading experience of confusion and distress – where is the body, where is her Lord, who are these people standing in and around his tomb so early on a Sabbath morning?
 
And then a singular voice cuts through the chaos, cuts through the noise and distraction, the loss and desperation. A singular voice – which has no likeness in this age or the next – dispels all fear and falsehood with a word: “Mary.” In this moment truth radiates, beauty shines, and redemption blossoms. It is a restorative word of recognition, her teacher, her shepherd, her saviour calls her by name. In the moment he recognises her (Mary) she recognises him (Rabbouni) – his naming of her makes possible her naming of him. Having been seen, we are able to see. Jesus’ voice dissolves all confusion and grief, and Mary knows – with perfect clarity – who she is, and before whom she stands: she is a disciple of the Living Lord.
 
Jesus’ naming and claiming of Mary, fulfils that which he promised earlier in the gospel:
I won’t leave you orphaned; I’m coming to you. A little longer, and the world won’t see me anymore, but you’ll see me, because I live, and you will live.
 
Her encounter with Jesus, the sound of her name on his lips, his resurrected body before her, vindicates all he had said and done. It vindicates the million little reasons he had given her to believe, to hope, to follow. He is indeed the good shepherd who will call the sheep by name, he is indeed the Son of the Most High able to lead us into life, he is indeed the light and life of the world, he is indeed the one who came that we might have life in abundance. Here, in this moment of recognition, Jesus’ words are vindicated: because I live, you will live.
 
Mary finds herself in the presence of the Living Lord, and in joy and relief embraces her friend, her hope, her Rabbouni. And yet, that is not who she has been named to be, that is not why she has had this encounter with the resurrection and the life. It is not so that she might build him a tent on earth, nor ascend with him to the heavens. No, in being named she is claimed – in being claimed she is commissioned: she is a disciple of the Living Lord. Mary is named so that she might proclaim the resurrection. She is named a herald of good news. Mary is named and claimed as one set apart to proclaim the spirit of adoption we receive through the resurrection and ascension of Jesus (for he goes not only to his God but our God, not only his Father, but our Father).
 
In speaking her name, Jesus signals to Mary that he lives, and that she will also live. She is called into life – a life of faith and witness, a life of a disciple in service to the world, a life glorifying God in the manner of Jesus’ own life. This is why she is asked not to cling; not because Jesus wants to create any distance between her and him (for in the ascension there can no longer be any distance between Christ and creation – for Jesus is with us always to the ends of the earth and the end of the age). She is asked to go so that she might teach others that because he lives, we will live!
 
On Easter Sunday, we take our place in the line that reaches back some two-thousand years to Mary – the first of the witnesses, the first herald of the resurrection. On Easter we remember that Jesus has also called us by name. That Jesus triumphed over sin and death for us as well. That Jesus promised us that because he lives, we will live. And that we will not live just any kind of life, but a life of love, a life of hope, a life of joy, a life of service. We are called (raised!) into a life grounded on the great proclamation: The one the world thought dead has ascended to his God and our God, to his Father and our Father. The one Rome tried to kill, did not leave us orphaned. Weep not! Hear your name in his promise: because he lives, we will live. Jesus is with us always, to the end of the age.

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Image: Graham Sutherland, Noli me tangere, 1961.