Easter Vigil 2018
 
Dear brothers and sisters, we have made a long journey already this Easter Night, having begun our pilgrimage gathered together outside around the Fire that acknowledges God’s greatness and actions, all of which show His wisdom and love.  Around this fire of Divine Love we remembered how, in the Beginning and with ardent joy, our Triune Lord formed us in His own likeness and set us over the whole world to serve Him as our Creator, and to rule over all creatures.
 
Even when we disobeyed Him and lost His friendship He did not abandon us but, through the Prophets, taught us to hope for Salvation, and so our pilgrimage set off into this Cathedral, the dark of sin all about us, yes, but led, for all that, by a light taken from the Fire that formed itself into the towering Flame of our Redeemer. 
 
Our journey has been in the footsteps of the Scriptures, which reminded us of the dignity of our original state in the Garden, the disaster of our Fall from grace and, thereafter, the enduring mercy of Our Heavenly Father in preparing us, as His Holy People, for redemption. 
 
How glorious is the brightness that dawned on this Night when we, together with Mary of Magdala and the Holy Women, reach the Tomb and, on entering, are struck with amazement to hear that our Jesus of Nazareth, Who was crucified: has risen.   We know Christ, raised from the dead will never die again and how, having died with Christ we, too, shall return to life with him.
 
Saint Paul tells us that everyone destined for Salvation is summoned to go, in his or her turn, into the tomb with Christ and join Him in death so that, as Christ was raised from the dead by the Father’s glory, they too might live a new life.  He goes on to point out that, from the Dawn of the Resurrection onwards it is by baptism into the death of Christ that we enter that same Tomb so as to rise with Him and witness something so new that it has never been heard of.
 
So I hope you will not mind if I address my words now to Claire and David, our catechumens about to be baptised, as they, in their turn, enter the Tomb to rise with Him.  Just as the words of the Angel to Mary and the Women were the most amazing Good News ever told in all Creation, so too we rejoice to see the Lord making all things new for David and Claire, and for us, this Easter time with the best gift of all, that it the gift of Divine life.
 
Up and down our diocese and, indeed, across the Catholic world this Night, hundreds of thousands of adults will become new members of our Church through the waters of baptism.  They d id not choose the Lord but Jesus chose them and , just as the Angel charged the Women to go with their story to Peter, so too the Lord commissions these new-born of the Resurrection to go out and bear fruit that will last. 
 
Yes, brothers and sisters, this night of nights these, our new-born brothers and sisters testify to our Church, just as Mary, new-born from the Tomb, testified to Peter, how Jesus is the Lord and how, in Him, God is making all things new. 
 
The Women will proclaim to Peter and the Church that: it is the Lord!  It is the same Lord whose Word, out of darkness and void, made the lights of the Heavens and the waters and living things of the Earth; the same Lord who made mankind in His image and likeness and saw it very good.  It is the same Lord Who, even when we disobeyed Him and lost His friendship did not abandon us: the same Lord who made a son for Abraham and Sarah, even though he was too old—and Sarah herself was barren—so that, from one person descendants were born, as many as the stars of heaven.   It is the same Lord Who brought His People out of slavery, freeing them from the might of Pharaoh, his army and chariots and bringing them into a land with large, flourishing cities they did not build, and vineyards they did not plant.  It is the same Lord who provides His people with water without cost, they who have no money, for: His Word that goes forth from His mouth, does not return to Him void, but achieves the end for which He sent it.  It is the same Lord Who has taken us from among the nations and brought us back to our own land: the same Lord Who sprinkled clean water upon us to cleanse us from all our impurities, and idols.  It is the same Lord Who has given us a new heart and placed a new spirit within us. It is the same Lord Who makes us to live by His statutes, careful to observe His decrees. It is through His gracious acts that we live in the land He gave our fathers; that we are His People and He our God. 
 
Even to this night the glorious deeds of the Lord go on!  Our brother David and sister Claire, like their fellow catechumens around the world this night, are made brand new creations in the Water and the Word that flow from the Paschal Mystery of Our Risen Lord. It is He, the same Lord this Night, who makes all things new.
 
The Message of the first Easter Sunday dawn is that we can do nothing by ourselves.  When they came to the tomb, Mary Magdalene and the Women were saying to one another:  Who will roll back the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?  They knew it was impossible for them to remove the obstacle in the way of the event that was the newest of all Creation.  But when they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back, even though it was very large.  
 
Dear brothers and sisters, it is the Lord Who rolls away the stones in the path of our Church that make it impossible for us to meet Him.  It is the Lord Who, having once begun in Galilee, begins with us anew in that same Galilee.  It is the Lord Who promises to meet us in old places transformed by His new life in this Year of the Lord 2018.  This Night let us resolve to move on from those places where He is no longer and go out to meet Him, Who is Risen, where He means with us to, make all things new.