Sermon for the Feast of St. Mark
“Be not affrighted.”
Mark’s Gospel account of the Resurrection is one of two Gospel readings for Easter Day. Like John’s Gospel, it emphasizes the empty tomb, the first moment in the process of thinking about the Resurrection. In Mark’s case, it is about Mary Magdalene and another Mary coming to the tomb with the intent to honour and respect the dead. They come bearing burying spices only to discover that the one whom they seek, “Jesus of Nazareth, which was crucified, is risen. He is not here. See the place where they laid him.” Only then are they directed to go their way and to tell the other disciples and Peter that “he goeth before you into Galilee: there will ye see him.” There is something wonderfully concise in this short Gospel pericope.
Yet the short ending of Mark’s Gospel actually ends with the words which are not included in the Easter Day reading. He ends his Gospel, at least in its short form, with the words, “For they were afraid.”
This is different from “be not affrighted” or “be not amazed” (RSV). Amazement conveys a sense of wonder. That signals the idea of the unexpected that marks the beginning of the dawning awareness of the idea of the Resurrection and its radical meaning that changes everything, quite literally. But the short ending is quite suggestive about Mark and his gospel. It was Austin Farrer who best grasps its significance by linking the ending to Mark’s account of the Passion with the curious scene in the Garden when Christ is taken captive; it is the scene of the young man who ran away naked. Farrer suggests it was Mark himself.
As we have been suggesting, the Resurrection makes visible what is already present in the Passion, albeit in different modes of realization. To know one’s fears and to face them and acknowledge them goes a long way towards overcoming them. The greater amazement or wonder here is that the Resurrection speaks to our fears and uncertainties and provides a way to think things in a new and radical manner. It opens us out to a new way of thinking about death and suffering by recalling us to the greater wonder of essential life. That is Christ who wills to suffer for us and whose death and resurrection are the triumph of life over death. Life is absolutely prior and as such death is changed.
